God, Make Up Your Mind

God make up your mind
God make up your mind
Do you wanna play fair
Or should I take what's mine?
Like everyone else

Why am a teacher on the street sign
has done so much more than politicians
than musicans
You wanna help someone you gotta be a no one
that's what I figured out the cat in the street meant

You gotta make up your mind
make up your mind
make up your mind

- Cold War Kids

"You Cretin!"

From Timothy McSweeny's Internet Tendency – "Lacanian Jokes of the Day":

Lacan once had a patient who believed he was a chicken.

At last, the man was cured. When he was released from the asylum, he crossed the road. Lacan called out, "Why are you crossing the road?"

"To get to the other of the Other," the patient replied.

"You cretin!" Lacan said. "The other of the Other does not exist."

"I know," the patient replied, "but tell that to the fox!"

"I guess he's cured," Lacan thought to himself, "at least by Parisian standards."

_ _ _

And for those of you who know me well, this has superb interwoven meaning:

_ _ _

"The Chosen Ones" - Diane Hamilton in Tel Aviv, Israel

"we did a powerful "bigmind" with the "voice of the chosen people"- a cultural pathology for Jewish people at times - and we moved this voice from ego, to tribe, to ethno, to world, to planetary and then kosmic-centered - that was AMAZING! I really experienced how it is to feel like the chosen planet".

My friend Gilad, an integral thinker in Israel, sent me this lovely message today after spending a few days on retreat with Diane Musho Hamilton in Tel Aviv (put on by Integral Aikido). I thought the application of voice dialogue to a such a specific cultural perspective was an interesting turn in the evolving intersection between the Big Mind Process and Ken's developmental schema.

This isn't the first time I've seen the Big Mind process used in this way. When I was in Boulder last year, Suzanne Cook-Greuter led a few sessions where voice dialogue was used to speak from a 1st person perspective of each of her developmental levels.

I wonder whether Diane could tackle some of the tough Australian cultural pathologies when we bring her out September: mortgage interest rates, petrol prices and late trains? "Can I speak to the Kosmoscentric voice of the 8:20 all stations to Lidcombe via Bankstown running late by 15 minutes" ;-P

World Press Photo 2008

I'm hoping to get to the World Press Photo Exhibition at the State Library before it finishes on 5 June.

The bus shelter advertising for this exhibition has been lighting up my neurons every morning for a fortnight. There's a number of stellar shots on view, but by far my favourite is this one of locals in the Congo evacuating enormous dead mountain gorillas with makeshift stretchers.

Evacuation of dead Mountain Gorillas, Virunga National Park, Eastern Congo

Brent Stirton, South Africa, Reportage by Getty Images for Newsweek

Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse - Paul Pfeiffer

Paul Pfeiffer

Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse, 2004.

(exhibiting at the Sydney Biennale 2008)

Promise Me - Thich Nhat Hanh

Hatred will never let you face the beast in man.

- Thich Nhat Hanh

Circle Heads

Stuart Ringholt
Circle Heads, 2005

Finding the Father - Robert Bly

My friend, this body offers to carry us for nothing - as the ocean carries logs. So on some days the body wails with its great energy; is smashes up the boulders, lifting small crabs, that flow around the sides.

Someone knocks on the door. We do not have time to dress. He wants us to go with him through the blowing and rainy streets, to the dark house.

We will go there, the body says, and there find the father whom we have never met, who wandered out in a snowstorm the night we were born, and who then lost his memory, and has lived since longing for his child, who he saw only once

... while he worked as a shoemaker, as a cattle herder in Australia, as a restaurant cook who painted at night.

When you light the lamp you will see him. He sits there behind the door... the eyebrows so heavy, the forehead so light... lonely in his whole body, waiting for you.

- Robert Bly

All You Who Sleep Tonight - Vikram Seth

All you who sleep tonight,
Far from the ones you love
No hand to left or right
And emptiness above -

Know that you aren't alone,
The whole world shares your tears
Some for two nights or one
And some for all their years.

- Vikram Seth

Untitled - Kabir

I talk to my inner lover, and I say, why such
rush?

We sense that there is some sort of spirit that loves
birds and animals and the ants--

perhaps the same one who gave a radiance to you in
your mother's womb.

Is it logical you would be walking around entirely
orphaned now?

The truth is you turned away yourself,
and decided to go into the dark alone.

Now you are tangled up in others, and have forgotten
what you once knew,

and that's why everything you do has some weird
failure in it.

A Moment - Ruth Stone

Across the highway a heron stands
in the flooded field. It stands
as if lost in thought, on one leg, careless,
as if the field belongs to herons.
The air is clear and quiet.
Snow melts on this second fair day.
Mother and daughter,
we sit in the parking lot
with doughnuts and coffee.
We are silent.
For a moment the wall between us
opens to the universe;
then closes.
And you go on saying
you do not want to repeat my life.

- Ruth Stone

Nunc Dimittis - James Laughlin

Little time now
and so much hasn't
been put down as I
should have done it.
But does it matter?
It's all been written
so well by my betters,
and what they wrote
has been my joy.

- James Laughlin

Nothing But Death - Pablo Neruda

Death is inside the bones
like a barking where there are no dogs.

- Pablo Neruda

.

It's Grand

It's grand to be unemployed
And lie in the Domain,
And wake up every second day -
And go to sleep again.

. "It's Grand" - Banjo Patterson (1902)

"Lord, grant me one honesty" - Michael Dransfield

More and more, of late, it becomes
difficult to be whole. The uniy of self
is riddled through by doubt, which
devours concentration as small insects
might tunnel through a book seemingly
intact, but torn from certainty.
And there are interruptions. The sun
is torn from me by the wind of seasons changing
merging, breaking, a branch rasps
against the window, voices of children.

Lord, grant me one honesty. What I ask
is not the valour of being sure; perhaps
to hear again the mind, itself, a rivulet
flowing or falling. Yes, even that, and know
it is divinity. But there is nothing
as positive. Only from time to time
when there is no-one near
comes a small sound, as a child's voice,
which I take and pass on to reed and string,
hoping for the one note to appear, and be
wind on high stone, or a river; hoping
somehow to please You with my song.

… that seems to exist in a fourth dimension beyond jeans

Sass and I went to see a couple of readings at the Sydney Writer's Festival tonight. Anne Enright did a superb reading from her recent book of short stories, charting a stoic Irish wife's response to her husband's intermittent "relapses" of cheating. Junot Diaz spoke after her, also waxing about cheaters. True to form, he delivered a cracking yarn spoken from his signature Domincan voice (and done in an interesting second person voice).

You have a girlfriend named Alma, who has a long tender horse neck and a big Dominican ass that seems to exist in a fourth dimension beyond jeans. An ass that could drag the moon out of orbit. An ass she never liked until she met you. Ain't a day that passes that you don't want to press your face against that ass or bite the delicate sliding tendons of her neck. You love how she shivers when you bite, how she fights you with those arms that are so skinny they belong on an after-school special.

Alma is a Mason Gross student, one of those Sonic Youth, comic-book-reading alternatinas without whom you might never have lost your virginity. Grew up in Hoboken, part of the Latino community that got its heart burned out in the eighties, tenements turning to flame. Spent nearly every teen-age day on the Lower East Side, thought it would always be home, but then N.Y.U. and Columbia both said nyet, and she ended up even farther from the city than before. She is in a painting phase, and the people she paints are all the color of mold, look like they've just been dredged from the bottom of a lake. Her last painting was of you, slouching against the front door: only your frowning I-had-a-lousy-Third-World-childhood-and-all-I-got-was-this-attitude eyes recognizable. She did give you one huge forearm. I told you I'd get the muscles in. The past couple of weeks, now that the warm is here, Alma has abandoned black, started wearing these nothing dresses made out of what feels like tissue paper; it wouldn't take more than a strong wind to undress her. She says she does it for you: I'm reclaiming my Dominican heritage (which ain't a complete lie—she's even taking Spanish to better minister to your mom), and when you see her on the street, flaunting, flaunting, you know exactly what every nigger that walks by is thinking. You met at the weekly Latin parties at the DownUnder in New Brunswick. She never went to those parties, was dragged there by her high-school best friend, Patricia, who still listened to TKA, and this was how you got the chance to strike while, as your boys put it, the pussy was hot.

Alma is slender as a reed, you a steroid-addicted block; Alma loves driving, you books; Alma owns a Saturn (bought for her by her carpenter father, who speaks only English in the house), you have no points on your license; Alma's nails are too dirty for cooking, your spaghetti con pollo is the best in the land. You are so very different—she rolls her eyes every time you turn on the news and says she can't "stand" politics. She won't even call herself Hispanic. She brags to her girls that you're a "radical" and a real Dominican (even though on the Plátano Index you wouldn't rank, Alma being only the third Latina you've ever really dated). You brag to your boys that she has more albums than any of them do, that she says terrible white-girl things while you fuck. She's more adventurous in bed than any girl you've had; on your first date she asked you if you wanted to come on her tits or her face, and maybe during boy training you didn't get one of the memos but you were, like, umm, neither. And at least once a week she will kneel on the mattress before you and, with one hand pulling at her dark nipples, will play with herself, not letting you touch at all, fingers whisking the soft of her and her face looking desperately, furiously happy. She loves to talk while she's being dirty, too, will whisper, You like watching me don't you, you like listening to me come, and when she finishes lets out this long demolished groan and only then will she allow you to pull her into an embrace as she wipes her gummy fingers on your chest. This is me, she says.

Yes—it's an opposites-attract sort of thing, it's a great-sex sort of thing, it's a no-thinking sort of thing. It's wonderful! Wonderful! Until one June day Alma discovers that you are also fucking this beautiful freshman girl named Laxmi, discovers the fucking of Laxmi because she, Alma, the girlfriend, opens your journal and reads. (Oh, she had her suspicions.) She waits for you on the stoop, and when you pull up in her Saturn and notice the journal in her hand your heart plunges through you like a fat bandit through a hangman's trap. You take your time turning off the car. You are overwhelmed by a pelagic sadness. Sadness at being caught, at the incontrovertible knowledge that she will never forgive you. You stare at her incredible legs and between them, to that even more incredible pópola you've loved so inconstantly these past eight months. Only when she starts walking over in anger do you finally step out. You dance across the lawn, powered by the last fumes of your outrageous sinvergüenzería. Hey, muñeca, you say, prevaricating to the end. When she starts shrieking, you ask her, Darling, what ever is the matter? She calls you:

a cocksucker

a punk motherfucker

a fake-ass Dominican.

She claims:

you have a little penis

no penis

and worst of all that you like curried pussy.

(Which really is unfair, you try to say, since Laxmi is technically from Guyana, but Alma isn't listening.)

Instead of lowering your head and copping to it like a man, you pick up the journal as one might hold a baby's beshatted diaper, as one might pinch a recently be-nutted condom. You glance at the offending passages. Then you look at her and smile a smile your dissembling face will remember until the day you die. Baby, you say, baby, this is part of my novel.

This is how you lose her.

Earl Grey

Within the
hidden world
we disclose
through
the simple joy
of being noticed
I wouldn’t
dare admit
how the
bergamot on
your tongue
conjures
childhood
reminders of
Grandad’s
aftershave.

All Day Practice

The Integral Spiritual Centre recently posted a video of Father Thomas Keating and Diane Musho Hamiltion talking about spontaneous practice outside the consecrated space of prayer or meditation. I loved the way their chat coursed around an underlying theme of unconscious competence being the hallmark of stabilised transformation.

The video caught my attention mainly because I've been noticing a marked improvement in my ability to carry the embodied wisdom cultivated in mediation and prayer into my daily interactions since recommitting to daily practice a few months back.

The big one's been finding innovative ways of practicing 'not this, not that' with the thought process that seeks to define categories and concepts outside of my proximate self as I (e.g. judgements or expectations at work or old concepts of who I am in relation to family). I've been finding that I can hold that mind in a not this, not that state to reveal a deeper level of presence, and then from that state of presence, allow the conceptual mind to do its work. It's been great practice. I'm finding myself aware of my self system as an undefinable process, and then in not suppressing any part of it, I'm able to experience a more unconditioned presence as self and a healthy self concept in perpetual motion.

When doing it today, I noticed an interesting way of returning to consciousness which is able to be found when I try to not define myself. I open myself to the realisation that everything is in flow, then notice it through my thinking processes (which is where my attention is when I feel the need to return to consciousness other than thinking!) that this is true, and then commence the not this, not that from there. What happens is that my thinking mind is satisfied that it has worked out that the entire universe is flow, then turns to defining me, and from that spot quickly realises that the rules outside also apply inside, and then rests. It's a nice neutraliser for my neuroticism!

Resting as open presence at work has been really pleasing for me. It's given me the ability to get through this rather incongruent temporary compromise with more equanimity and also allowed me the space to challenge my assumptions of what "this is". The mix of the two has been a critical insight. In the past I've thought that being in deep presence would just end up pointing out the pains of this compromise, and so I engaged in avoidance. I've also existed in the concepts of what I think this thing "is" so deeply that I've not been able to locate my presence beyond the clockwork universe I'd sealed myself in. With the two together, I get to notice that I'm not stuck beyond the inevitable slips into unconsciousness, and that I'm also able to inhabit perspectives relating to this work which are pleasing and productive for my health and wellbeing.

Beyond that, I'm also noticing that through holding this practice throughout the day, I'm also able to see the distinction between presence and the self-structure more. It's given me a cool insight into application of a Wilber-Combs matrix type analysis of my own path forward. From the distinctions I'm inhabiting, I'm able to be my present less-conditioned self anywhere, and yet, I also need to have a healthy ego which is happy and engaging in activities which are developmentally appropriate. This has been a big shift for me. I've been trying to overcome a horrible greeny/spiritually pluralistic defence inside me which has been either seeing wide presence and thinking that all is manifest so there's no good grounded reason for allowing myself to do things which are at my edge (a terrible neurosis around seeking permission for being myself to avoid the revocation of love in previously contingent relationships), or seeing my edge of development and then losing presence in the sole identification with that ego. This healthier space between the two is very bright indeed.

It's a place where I can intersect my own state capacities with my own stage capacities (across various lines). It's a bit like the triangular conception done by Terri O'Fallon at Pacific Integral on charting through the matrix what you can and can't see. To me, by knowing where my presence is, I don't have to be at the mercy of the self-concept all the time. By not being at the mercy of the self-concept, I can get enough subject-object distance on it to engage in transformative work, anywhere, in real time. With that, I'm able to be in process while I engage with the ways my stage-structure conceptions (rather than my defences and disillusionment) want to interact with the world(s) that stage-concept discloses to my perceptions and analysis... and all that's happening across my self-system continuum (proximate, distal etc). It's a very liberating practice for a dude who has been stuck in emotional and physical turmoil (and the scripts inside that turmoil) for a while.

Blessing of history, as first woman bishop consecrated

(From smh.com.au) - IN THE presence of her husband, her twin sons, the head of the Australian Anglican church, archbishops and bishops and veterans of a 30-year campaign for women in ministry, Kay Goldsworthy made history last night when she was consecrated the nation's first woman bishop.

Bishop Goldsworthy broke down the barriers at the male-only ecclesiastical office at Perth's St George's Cathedral, where she was ordained as a priest in 1992.

She wore to her consecration symbols and gifts of her church life. She carried a mitre, designed by a close friend and mentor, Father Nigel Wright. Around her neck was the pectoral cross, a gift from her family and from the Parish of Applecross that she received when she was made deaconess in 1984. Her episcopal ring was a gift from women deacons and priests in the diocese of Perth, and other supporters of women in ministry.

The Archbishop of Perth, Dr Roger Herft, said after the ceremony that when he offered Bishop Goldsworthy the nomination she asked: "Why me?"

"After several weeks she met with me and her response is etched in my memory: 'I can only say 'yes' because God has already said 'yes' to the world and to me in Jesus. The 'yes' to this call to be bishop scares me as will all the other 'yes-es' that God will place upon me. I rest in God's 'yes' and pray that I can be a channel of blessing for others."'

He added: "I pray that Kay's 'yes' tonight will give women in particular the confidence to say 'yes' knowing that the 'yes' that God offers in Christ as portrayed in this church and in its expression of ordained ministry is beyond gender, class, colour, culture and nationality."

The long-time campaigner for women bishops Dr Muriel Porter said she never thought the moment would happen in her lifetime and the symbolism of the event was "beyond telling".

"Tonight is like another Easter eve. A new fire has been lit and the candles lit from it are the Light of Christ dispelling the shadows that have lingered over women for far too long."

The Australian Anglican Primate, Phillip Aspinall, said Bishop Goldsworthy's service pointed to the church's inclusive nature. "The fact that today you are the first woman admitted to this office in this church points to the ongoing overcoming of barriers in the ever-widening embrace of God."

The archbishops of Adelaide and Brisbane attended but missing was the Sydney Archbishop, Peter Jensen, an outspoken opponent of women priests and bishops.



http://www.smh.com.au/news/national/blessing-of-history-as-first-woman-bishop-consecrated/2008/05/22/1211183001218.html

Present Centred

My friend Trish has a fantastic blog which charts her journey as an erudite psychology student, integral theorist, poet, Christian Nun, and, at times, woman traversing the uncertain drifts of sickness and pain. Given my recent past, our blogs have got a lot in common!...

... and she writes a great turn of phrase.

This is a recent post which really got me:

"There are fingernail marks in the tight grip I have on the words of a beautiful angel called Ana, who a month ago told me to stop doubting the validity of my perceptions. It's healthy to doubt the knowledge that I have about those perceptions, but don't doubt the seeing".

http://calmclarity.blogspot.com/2008/05/present-centred.html

A work in progress

The waves refract
lightforms against
the foam ceiling and
airconditioner vents
defiantly entertaining
an otherwise vacant hour
yet feebily binding me
to the memories of a
distant life lived before
my hours became
my only commodity.

If his humanity
was apparent
I’d love to know
if he was ogling
the expanse from
his harbour view
or the shallower
waters in his reflection.

A Cartoonist Talks to God

 

God bless our contradictions, those parts of us which seem out of character. Let us be boldly and gladly out of character. Let us be creatures of paradox and variety: creatures of contrast; of light and shade: creatures of faith. God be our constant. Let us step out of character into the unknown, To struggle and love and do what we will.

• Leunig

Neti Neti

I am

(not)

definitive.

Integral Cente, Integral Foundation - Sydney, Australia.

I'm a trustee of the Integral Foundation here in Sydney, and one of the main activities of the Foundation is to offer microfinancing to Integrally-informed projects in Sydney. The Integral Centre here in Sydney is a brand which sits to move in and with these projects as they arise. This September, we'll be launching the new structure through a retreat and speaking tour by Diane Musho Hamilton Sensei. It's an exciting turn of events for the integral crowd here in Sydney, and hopefully a launching pad for much more intelligent work to come. Come along!

Integral Meditation
A 5-Day Retreat

with Diane Musho Hamilton Sensei
Friday 5 – Wednesday 10 Sept 2008

This five day retreat gives you space and time to explore the depths
of Big Mind and Big Heart through an Integrally-framed range of
meditative, psychodynamic and body practices.

Diane Musho Hamilton Sensei is the dharma successor of American Zen
Master Genpo Roshi, and is his first successor in the Big Mind
lineage. Diane's program will lead you through Zen meditative
practices, psychodynamic shadow work, and the Big Mind process. The
retreat will also include bodywork and energetic practices to
provide you with a rounded transformative experience that engages
the full depths of your self through mind, body, spirit and shadow.

Big Mind is the name given, by Genpo Roshi, to a straightforward and
effective method of self investigation designed to give you an
experience of your unconditioned nature. This process is a new
synthesis of methods from western psychology and the non-dual wisdom
traditions which successfully navigate core aspects of your psyche
to reveal the compassionate nature of your heart and to cultivate a
better understanding of the limitless wisdom and presence of your mind.

Diane is a truly impressive teacher who uniquely holds status as a
Zen sensei, Big Mind process facilitator, and as a key teacher with
Ken Wilber's Integral Institute. She is also a professional
mediator, group facilitator, and trainer in conflict resolution.

With a demanding international teaching schedule, this retreat
presents a rare opportunity to study and practice with Diane on her
first teaching visit to Australasia.

*Venue: *Brahma Kumaris Centre, Wilton
*Dates:* Fri 5 – Wed 10 Sep

*Cost:* $750 -includes accomodation and food;
Scholarship places are available.
http://www.integralcentre.org/bigmind

Places limited – to reserve a place or recieve further information,
email: integralcentre@gmail.com

/Visit and retreat sponsored by The Integral Centre, Sydney/

Loesch mir die Augen aus

Extinguish both my eyes: I see you still;
Slam shut my ears: I can still hear you talking;
Without my mouth I can implore your will
And without feet: Towards you I keep on walking.
Break off my arms: I shall still hold you tight;
My heart will yet embrace you all the same.
Suppress my heart: My brain knows no deterrent;
And if at last you set my brain aflame
I carry you still on my bloodstream's current.

- Rainer Maria Rilke

Theopoetics

In researching for a poetry project I've been working on, I happened this morning on the interesting work of the theopoetic movement. I'll let them tell you more about it:

Madeleine L'Engle: … I sometimes think God is a shit-and he wouldn't be worth it otherwise. He's much more interesting when he's a shit.

Melinda Henneberger: So… to you, faith is not a comfort?

ML: Good heavens, no. It's a challenge: I dare you to believe in God. I dare you to think [our existence] wasn't an accident.

MH: Many people see faith as anti-intellectual.

ML: Then they're not very bright. It takes a lot of intellect to have faith, which is why so many people only have religiosity.

--Newsweek, May 7, 2006

Theopoetics offers us another path, another tool to help us deepen our faith and challenge passivity and oppression toward a deeper becoming. And unlike the proof and comfort of assurance that the tools of religiosity can seem to provide, theopoetics replaces certainty with Beauty and sureness with Art. It lets us open old drawers and crates, unpack grandmother's theology, great-grandfather's books, and read them in the light, their dust swept aside by the movement of the breath: Spirit.

For all that it offers, theopoetics is not a readily found idea, and as such, has not garnered as much attention as perhaps it might be due. In fact, without access to a specialized library, much of the information pertaining to it, and certainly direct access to its literature, is not available. Should one begin their search online, the smatterings of reference to it are few and far between.

A handful of articles and texts are repeatedly found, and yet they are just a few facets of the jewel.Consequently, after I had begun to look around for theopoetics materials, and found them to be relatively rare and far flung, I came to believe that there should be a means of corralling the available information so that it was more accessible to those seeking. After some months I decided to move on the idea and make a site (even if an asynchronous, non-spatial one) from which people could begin to explore. From that point forward, working, reading, and exploring for the site has only made me more certain that there needs to be more work, reading, and exploration.

I believe that the site can become the digital nexus for what I imagine will become an increasingly covered and interesting topic. While I am unabashedly Quaker, it is not. Though my selections are undoubtedly influenced by my Membership in the Religious Society of Friends, I intend for this little corner of the web to be useful to a broad range of spiritual and poetic thinkers; my desire is that it serve as a crossroads for all those interested in the field, process, and potential of this Art as theology. I would like it to become a ready reference for all things theopoetic. For students and teachers and for all of us that read, aware of the Breath.

While what I present here is not complete, I believe it covers most of the major work and workers to date. I will continue to update content substantially in the following months: in the future I plan for, there will be more names, texts, details and conferences to add. To that end, if there are desires for additional information to be included here, or clarifications/corrections, I hope to learn of them and will do my best to accommodate. The only thing I ask is that you send me an email if you find this site useful and/or interesting. Contact from others helps to lubricate the gears.

http://theopoetics.net

There's also a really interesting article co-authored by process philosopher Catherine Keller here.

China by Bob Perelman

This photo is reported to be Chinese soldiers in Tibet being handed faux Tibetan Buddhist monk's outfits in preparation for a staged riot for broadcast. The sheer hyperreality of such a report, this image and my alienation from any verifiable truth prompted me to post the postmodern poem below called China. It's reported that Bob Perelman wrote this poem after picking up a photojournalism book in San Fransisco's Chinatown and schizophrenically writing his own disjointed captions to the pictures in front of him, all within a subtext that points to China's evolving position as the third superpower.

We live on the third world from the sun. Number three. Nobody tells us what to do.

The people who taught us to count were being very kind.

It's always time to leave.

If it rains, you either have your umbrella or you don't.

The wind blows your hat off.

The sun rises also.

I'd rather the stars didn't describe us to each other; I'd rather we do it for ourselves.

Run in front of your shadow.

A sister who points to the sky at least once a decade is a good sister.

The landscape is motorized.

The train takes you where it goes.

Bridges among water.

Folks straggling along vast stretches of concrete, heading into the plane.

Don't forget what your hat and shoes will look like when you are nowhere to be found.

Even the words floating in air make blue shadows.

If it tastes good we eat it.

The leaves are falling. Point things out.

Pick up the right things.

Hey guess what? What? I've learned how to talk. Great.

The person whose head was incomplete burst into tears.

As it fell, what could the doll do? Nothing.

Go to sleep.

You look great in shorts. And the flag looks great too.

Everyone enjoyed the explosions.

Time to wake up.

But better get used to dreams.

- Bob Perelman

Scheduled phone interruptions = solid gold public living

I bumped into these brilliant sites today:

Popularity Dialler (http://popularitydialer.com/); and
PhoneMyPhone (http://www.phonemyphone.com/).

Each of them call your phone for you at a scheduled time to provide a phone interruption when you anticipate being bored-to-death in meetings or any of the other horrendous forms of hominoid interaction.

From Popularity Dialler:

"Have you ever been in a situation where you wished your cell phone would ring? Maybe you wanted to look extra important or popular on that hot date. Or maybe you just needed an excuse to escape from an unpleasant meeting.

With "The Popularity Dialler", you can plan ahead. Via a web interface, you can choose to have your phone called at a particular time (or several times). At the elected time, your phone will be dialled and you will hear a pre-recorded message that's one half of a conversation. Thus, you will be prompted to have a fake conversation and will easily fool those around you".

Popularity Dialler is especially hilarious. They sport pre-programmed phone calls from a random male, random female, an affirmation call, a standard boss call, or, my favourite, the random "cousin in need"! The recordings are genius, one-sided conversations metered so that you have space to plausibly respond in kind.

Unfortunately there's a hitch with using PD at the moment (beyond it only being available in the US for now): turns out that the FCC in the States has asked them to close down their service after a spurious situation arose where a senior attorney for the FCC received an unrequested PD call on her cell phone and then filed a complaint. Oddly, possible entrapment issues have been uncovered by the PD folks, who did some research and revealed that the phone call upon which the citation was based was requested from an FAA (Federal Aviation Administration) IP address. As the PD folks say: "Thus, the call was both elected and received by employees of government agencies. It seems a little strange".

Apparently, the main issue at hand is that people in the US pay for their incoming cell minutes so if they receive calls they don't request, they still have to pay for them. That's a tremendously shitty system huh?!

You can hear some cracking yarns using the dialler here.

King, Warrior, Magician, Lover

"The crisis in mature masculinity is very much upon us. Lacking adequate models of mature men, and lacking the societal cohesion and institutional structures for actualising ritual process, its "every man for himself". And most of us fall by the wayside, with no idea what it was that was the goal of our gender-drive or what went wrong in our strivings. We just know we are anxious, on the verge of feeling impotent, helpless, frustrated, put down, unloved and unappreciated, often ashamed of being masculine. We just know that our creativity was attacked, that our initiative was met with hostility, that we were ignored, belittled, and left holing the empty bag of our lost self-esteem. We cave in to a dog-eat-dog world, trying to keep our work and out relationships afloat, losing energy, or missing the mark. Many of us seek the generative, affirming, and empowering father (though most of us don't know it), the father who, for most of us, never existed in our actual lives and won't appear, no matter how hard we try to make him appear".

Robert L Moore & Douglas Gillette

King, Warrior, Magician, Lover:
Rediscovering the Archetypes of the Mature Masculine

Transcription of Organ Music

The flower in the glass peanut bottle formerly in the
. kitchen crooked to take a place in the light,
the closet door opened, because I used it before, it
. kindly stayed open waiting or me, its owner.

I began to feel my misery in pallet on floor, listening
. to music, my misery, that’s why I want to sing.
The room closed down on me, I expected the presence
. of the Creator, I saw my gray painted walls and
. ceiling, they contained my room, they contained
. me
as the sky contained my garden,
I opened my door

. The rambler vine climbed up the cottage post,
the leaves in the night still where the day had placed
them, the animal heads of the flowers where they had
arisen
. to think at the sun.

. Can I bring back the words? Will thought of
transcription haze my mental open eye?

. The kindly search for growth, the gracious desire
to exist of the flowers, my near ecstasy at existing
among them
. The privilege to witness my existence – you too
must seek the sun…

. My books piled up before me for my use
. waiting in space where I placed them, they
haven’t disappeared, time’s left its remnants and qualities
for me to use – my words piled up, my texts, my
manuscripts, my loves.

. I had a moment of clarity, saw the feeling in
the heart of things, walked out the garden crying.
. Saw the red blossoms in the night light, sun’s
gone, they had all grown, in a moment, and were
waiting stopped in time for the day sun to come and give
them....
. Flowers which as in a dream at sunset I watered
faithfully not knowing how much I loved them.
. I am so lonely in my glory – except they too out
there – I looked up – those red bush blossoms beckoning
and peering in the window waiting in blind love,
their leaves too have hope and are upturned top flat
to the sky to receive – all creation open to receive – the
flat earth itself.

. The music descends, as does the tall bending
stalk of the heavy blossom, because it has to, to stay
alive, to continue to the last drop of joy.
. The world knows the love that’s in its breast as
in the flower, the suffering lonely world.
. The Father is merciful.

. The light socket is crudely attached to the ceiling,
after the house was built, to receive a plug which
sticks in it alright, and serves my phonograph now…

. The closet door is open for me, where I left it,
since I left it open, it has graciously stayed open.
. The kitchen has no door, the hole there will
admit me should I wish to enter the kitchen.
. I remember when I first got laid, H.P. graciously
took my cherry, I sat on the docks of Provincetown,
age 23, joyful, elevated in hope with the
Father, the door to the womb was open to admit me
if I wished to enter.

. There are unused electricity plugs all over my
house if I ever need them.
. The kitchen window is open, to admit air…
. The telephone – sad to relate – sits on the
floor – I haven’t the money to get it connected –

. I want people to bow as they see me and say
he is gifted with poetry, he has seen the presence of
the Creator.

. And the Creator gave me a shot of his presence
to gratify my wish, so as not to cheat me of my yearning
for him.

. Allen Ginsberg
. Berkley, September 8, 1955

Salon.com Interview with Ken Wilber

Ken Wilber was interviewed by salon.com last week. I found it to be a stellar summary of his recent thought.

Watch out for Steve Paulson's vocal shift toward the end of the interview where he starts twigging that Wilber may be on to something liberating and gets all acquisitive. It's a terribly amusing turn, and I dare say, a very familiar one for me.

You Are The River: An Interview with Ken Wilber
By Steve Paulson April 28, 2008

Ken Wilber may be the most important living philosopher you've never heard of. He's written dozens of books but you'd be hard-pressed to find his name in a mainstream magazine. Still, Wilber has a passionate - almost cultlike - following in certain circles, as well as some famous fans. Bill Clinton and Al Gore have praised Wilber's books. Deepak Chopra calls him "one of the most important pioneers in the field of consciousness." And the Wachowski Brothers asked Wilber, along with Cornel West, to record the commentary for the DVDs of their "Matrix" movies.

A remarkable autodidact, Wilber's books range across entire fields of knowledge, from quantum physics to developmental psychology to the history of religion. He's steeped in the world's esoteric traditions, such as Mahayana Buddhism, Vedantic Hinduism, Sufism and Christian mysticism. Wilber also practices what he preaches, sometimes meditating for hours at a stretch. His "integral philosophy," along with the Integral Institute he's founded, hold out the promise that we can understand mystical experience without lapsing into New Age mush.

Read full article: Here

Another gold moment:

Q: But somewhere down the road—50 years from now, 500 years from now—once neuroscience becomes much more advanced, will scientists be able to pinpoint where [our] values and thoughts come from?

KW: I'm saying we'll never understand it. The materialists keep issuing promissory notes. They always promise they're going to do it tomorrow. But interior and exterior arise together. You can't reduce one to the other. They're both real. Deal with it.

Amusing Errors in Predictive Text Messaging #1

#5#3#9= Key & Jew

Hi honey, I'm heading out and should be back at 4. Do you want me to leave you the jew?