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[OM] Alt Dot Life [was ... Sacrilege? Sedition??]

Subject: [OM] Alt Dot Life [was ... Sacrilege? Sedition??]
From: Moose <olymoose@xxxxxxxxx>
Date: Thu, 19 Apr 2012 14:20:49 -0700
On 4/12/2012 12:27 PM, Bob Whitmire wrote:
> Indeed, and so we come to the headwaters of Bob's personal struggle with 
> photography. ... But regardless of the cause, the fact remains that I am 
> seriously reluctant to sally forth down the road already traveled while not 
> having determined whether there is another path, or whether this photography 
> thing has run its course.
>
> I don't _think_ it has run its course. I think I'm still looking for a little 
> something else, another direction. I hesitate to say that I'm looking for a 
> more artistic approach because I think that would be hackhood once removed. 
> Last night as I gnawed this particular bone while trying to go to sleep, I 
> thought about that image I posted on Facebook a week or so ago, the rather 
> dark image of Pemaquid River. I happen to like that image a lot, although it 
> is in no way representational of the scene as presented through the 
> viewfinder of my E-1. Rather, it is an interpretation of that scene--and a 
> dramatic departure from reality (in some ways, every image is an 
> interpretation, right?). But it did come up from some deeper spot that guided 
> me as I worked without my being able to see exactly which hands were on the 
> controls, or even where the controls were.

"ZEN SAYS: Think of all the great words and great teachings as your deadly 
enemy. Avoid them, because you have to find 
your own source.
You have not to be a follower, an imitator. You have to be an original 
individual; you have to find your innermost core 
on your own, with no guide, no guiding scriptures. It is a dark night, but with 
the intense fire of inquiry you are 
bound to come to the sunrise. Every body who has burned with intense inquiry 
has found the sunrise."
Ohso, Zen: Turning In, Chapter 10

> So did I, as sleep began to take me, stumble onto something? Is there a place 
> for interpretation here that is not aimed specifically at separating tourists 
> from their money, but rather making work accessible through the gallery so 
> that they can run screaming or purchase as their hearts and heads dictate? I 
> really don't know.

Yes, I believe so. Don't limit your possibilities by imagining the gallery, 
what has been and is, but may not be the 
future, as a necessary part of the process. The key is already there, " ... it 
did come up from some deeper spot that 
guided me as I worked without my being able to see exactly which hands were on 
the controls, or even where the controls 
were."

"Trust the Navigator."
- Carol Anne Fusco

> All I know is that I'm not interested in taking more pictures of lobster 
> boats motoring our of New Harbor, or of Pemaquid Point Light, at least not in 
> the customary ways.

Each thing we do is a step along a way. Much as we may try, it's not actually 
possible to know where that step leads 
next, let alone what lies farther along the path. An important thing to realize 
is that the next step I am about to take 
would not be possible without the step I have just taken, nor would that step 
have been possible without the one before 
it, and so on.

> This is getting muddier and muddier, so I think I'll stop myself short of 
> embarrassment. Suffice it to say that the train has run off the track and is 
> crashing through the bushes looking for that other track.

It may be useful to recognize that the painful drama of Ben's health crises, 
the rather pleasant drama of rediscovering 
photography and riding its wave for a few years, every thing you have done or 
that has happened to you - are all steps 
along the mysterious path.

"It is said, I think in the Lankavatara Sutra, that unskilled farmers throw 
away their rubbish and buy manure from other 
farmers, but those who are skilled go on collecting their own rubbish, in spite 
of the bad smell and the unclean work, 
and when it is ready to be used they spread it on their land, and out of this 
they grow their crops. That is the skilled 
way.

In exactly the same way, the Buddha says, those who are unskilled will divide 
clean from unclean and will try to throw 
away samsara and search for nirvana, but those who are skilled bodhisattvas 
will not throw away desire and the passions 
and so on, but will first gather them together. That is to say, one should 
first recognize and acknowledge them, and 
study them and bring them to realization. So the skilled one will acknowledge 
and accept all these negative things. And 
this time he really knows that he has all these terrible things in him, and 
although it is very difficult and 
unhygienic, as it were, to work on, that is the only way to start. And then he 
will scatter them on the field of life. 
Having studied all these concepts and negative things, when the time is right 
he does not keep them anymore, but 
scatters them and uses them as manure. So out of these unclean things comes the 
birth of the seed which is realization. 
This is how one has to give birth.

Therefore the thing is not to battle any more, not to try and sort out the bad 
things and only achieve good, but respect 
them and acknowledge them. …, like wonderful manure. … we have been collecting 
so much rubbish that now we have a 
wonderful wealth of this manure. It has everything in it, so it would be just 
the right thing to use, and it would be 
such a shame to throw it away. Because if you do throw it away, then all your 
previous life until today, maybe twenty, 
thirty or forty years, will have been wasted. …, so one would have a feeling of 
failure. All that struggle and all that 
collecting would have been wasted, and you would have to start all over again 
from the beginning. ... At this stage 
there are good things and bad things, but this collection contains good things 
disguised as bad and bad things disguised 
as good.

One must respect the flowing pattern of … the early part of one's present life 
right up to today. And there is a 
wonderful pattern in it. There is already a very strong current where many 
streams meet in a valley. And this river is 
very good and contains this powerful current running through it, so instead of 
trying to block it one should join this 
current and use it."

- Chogyam Trungpa, Meditation in Action, pp 34-39*

> The secret being, of course, that one does not find that other track while 
> actively involved in looking for it. One finds the track after one _stops_ 
> looking for it and just accepts what the muses--or fates--offer up from the 
> universal pool.
>
> I have a headache.

Take two sutras and call yourself in the morning.

B. D. A. Moose

-- 
What if the Hokey Pokey *IS* what it's all about?

* A book to which I was called by a dream many years ago.
-- 
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