The Parable of the Sacred Grove

Xia on the true meaning of sangha (TempleoftheGoddess.org)
(shinra-sanne.deviantart.com)

A solitary man journeyed about the world. When he met others on the road, he looked down, grunted a passing greeting, hunched his shoulders, and continued on his way.

In each village he passed, he saw the people gathering beneath the trees, the "Sacred Groves" they called them. They entered the wood by twos, threes, sometimes alone. They danced, sang, laughed, ate, and watched the cycles of the Moon together.

The man wondered what it would be like to walk beneath those trees. Each time he passed their wood, he wondered if the people would welcome him or turn him away.

He wondered why they met in their Sacred Groves, beneath the trees, instead of the village square. He wondered what drew them to those places. But the man never went into the woods. Having decided long ago that he needed no one, he walked alone. It was better that way. Still, he wondered. More

Healing with "The Book of 528" (video)

Wisdom Quarterly, Dr. Len Horowitz

HealingCelebrations.com, HealthyWorldAffiliates.com, Tetrahedron.org, HealthyWorldStore.com, LiquidDentist.net, Love528.com, FluScam.com

• All messages get a reply: (888) 508-4787

Dr. Leonard G. Horowitz, internationally known public health authority, has founded various non-profit educational organizations to educate people around the world on matters of extreme public importance -- vaccinations, musical scale manipulation, government conspiracies, population reduction plans...

For more than a quarter century, his offerings have endorsed taking personal responsibility for health choices. The goal is achieving optimal wellness and assuring disease prevention through positive lifestyles. This also involves risk avoidance and keeping abreast of controversial social, economic, environmental, and political issues and threats during this fascinating and challenging age.

(Mr. News)

"If the mainstream media won't do their job, don't fight them, just replace them because they are no longer relevant." - Editor 
(guerillamedia.co.nz)
. HealthyWorldAffiliates.com from Len Horowitz. TheVinnyEastwoodShow.com (americanfreedomradio.com) "In a world so full of madness, if you lose your sense of humor you'll go friggin' nuts, it's the lighter side of genocide." Film Maker:
 Putting in what the media leave out, bringing the world news from the front lines, Mr. News is New Zealand's alternative Media.

Time Travelers (Chrononauts) I've Met

Dr. Bruce Goldberg (drbrucegoldberg.com)

Chrononauts travel to and from the brahma world naturally (Tiada/Flickr).

Time travel will be discovered in approximately the year 3050 by a man named Taatos. He is the Hermes of ancient Egypt and the very first "chrononaut" (time traveler). Prior to his actually traveling back in time, holographic images were sent into the past.

This is why the ancient Egyptians, Greeks, Romans, and others described "visions" by their oracles, soothsayers, and psychics.

[Today we have physics as well as visitors from the future. So while 2012 will continue to be a time of upheaval, just as is being experienced right now, it will only be the end of an age, not at all the end of the world. Except, one may suppose, it will be the end of the world as we know it. But that has happened many times before in cyclical samsara characterized by restless anicca.]

We can summarize the characteristics of time travelers as follows:

• They have mastered hyperspace travel between dimension, and can move through walls and solid objects.
• By existing in the fifth dimension, they can observe us and remain invisible.
• Genetic manipulation of our chromosomes is a routine procedure for them. They have greatly sped up our rate of evolution.
• The origin of these chrononauts is Earth from 1,000 to 3,000 years in the future.
• Their main purpose is to accelerate our spiritual growth.

Maitreya, the Buddha of the future, now residing in a space world called Tusita (Tiada/Flickr).

THEY ARE US IN THE FUTURE

We do not have to be abducted to talk (telepathically) with time travelers. It is simply a matter of using the Fifth Dimensional Travel exercise that I present here.

The first time traveler I met in hyperspace (the fifth dimension) was a pure human calling himself Traksa. He lives in the 36th century on Earth when time travel is manifested by way of teleportation. [See Nature Physics article below showing how this is already taking place experimentally]. This means that Traksa can beam his physical body back to our century without requiring a spacecraft.

[This is time and again mentioned by Shakyamuni Buddha who, while not traveling through time to the best of our knowledge, traveled through hyperspace to reach the Brahma Worlds at will in the body. Arhats such as Ven. Maha Kassapa were able to do so just as easily. Since it is all in the NOW, the only time we ever have, it is not much of a stretch to imagine that time is no more real than the illusion of samsara, the wheel of rebirth. But it certainly is our reality until we break free.]

Time travelers use names that represent their current mission. One of Traksa's assignments consisted of introducing me to Art Bell [of Coast to Coast fame]. If you spell the time traveler's name backwards, it reads "ASK ART"! I have had the pleasure of being interviewed by Art nine times. Good work, Traksa.

On the left: Janine Cooper is an artist and a friend of mine. I hired her to paint portraits of the chrononauts I described in Time Travelers From Our Future. Janine got her inspiration from her own subconscious, not from photos or movies. Traksa told me that he telepathically directed her in each of the portraits, especially this one -- Traksa himself. [So Star Wars and every other sci-fi series are right: whites survive into the future. Or perhaps Traksa's characteristically Caucasian features demonstrates that space beings seeded DNA and racial features near the Caucasus Mountains in the first place by descending Mt. Sumeru in ancient Sumeria and at other times in the past.]

The actual photographs of Traksa and the three other time travelers groups presented in my book Time Travelers From Our Future.

Traksa has told me that there are many time travelers around today. They do not hold public office or place themselves in positions of attention. Their function is to be in the background, spending most of their time in the fifth dimension so we cannot see them. In order for us to be able to see a time traveler, they must slow down their frequency vibrational rate (FVR) and enter our three-dimensional world. It is only then our physical eyes will be able to see them.

Here are some of the other chrononauts I have met in the fifth dimension:

1. MUAT - Traksa's supervisor. He was active in Mu (Lemuria) and Atlantis and is from the 40th Century.
2. NIREV - 31st century - Focused on the Industrial Revolution
3. ALSINOMA - 34th century -Tutored Da Vinci (creator of the Mona Lisa)
4. CHAT NOY - 50th century -Assisted in the development of time travel. His name stands for "tachyon."

Chrononauts are spiritual people. They follow us from lifetime to lifetime, tracing our souls [continuity of process, identity, consciousness stream] back to previous lives and monitoring our spiritual unfolding. Their ultimate purpose is to facilitate the perfection of the human soul to allow for ascension and the end of the karmic cycle.

There are also future problems -- wars, pollution, infertility -- in this and parallel universes that they are trying to avert by assisting us now in our spiritual progress.

As we grow spiritually, so do they. They are us in the future.

• Fifth Dimension Travel exercise
• Contact Dr. Goldberg to share experiences meeting time travelers.

It must be 3050 (again), because it's already starting:

Experimental quantum teleportation of a two-qubit composite system

Qiang Zhang^1,2,Alexander Goebel¹,Claudia Wagenknecht¹,Yu-Ao Chen¹, Bo Zhao¹, Tao Yang², Alois Mair¹, Jörg Schmiedmayer^1,3 & Jian-Wei Pan^1,2 (Nature Physics 2, 9/17/06)
Abstract: Quantum teleportation¹, a way to transfer the state of a quantum system from one location to another, is central to quantum communication² and plays an important role in a number of quantum computation protocols^{3, 4, 5}. Previous experimental demonstrations have been implemented with single photonic^{6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11} or ionic qubits^{12, 13}. However, teleportation of single qubits is insufficient for a large-scale realization of quantum communication and computation^{2, 3, 4, 5}. Here, we present the experimental realization of quantum teleportation of a two-qubit composite system. In the experiment, we develop and exploit a six-photon interferometer to teleport an arbitrary polarization state of two photons. The observed teleportation fidelities for different initial states are all well beyond the state estimation limit of 0.40 for a two-qubit system¹⁴. Not only does our six-photon interferometer provide an important step towards teleportation of a complex system, it will also enable future experimental investigations on a number of fundamental quantum communication and computation protocols^{3, 15, 16, 17, 18}.

• Quantum physics
• IT and computation
• Optical physics
  
• Qiang Zhang
• Alexander Goebel
• Claudia Wagenknecht
• Yu-Ao Chen
• Bo Zhao
• Tao Yang
• More authors of this article
• Supplementary info

Mushrooms Can Save the World (video)

(SupremeMasterTV08)

SupremeMasterTV (AW942) Botanist Paul Stamets is a world-renowned American mycologist specializing in fungi. He has written six books on fungi and for decades has studied the medical applications of fungi and its roles in rehabilitating the environment. It is able to magically renew contaminated soil. Download episode: video.godsdirectcontact.net

• STUDENT'S HANDBOOK OF MUSHROOMS OF AMERICA
  
• Mycologista, The Mushroom Blog
  
• Post Punk Kitchen Forum
  

Breaking the Spell of Religion (audio)

Exploration with Dr. Michio Kaku (Saturday, July 16, KPFK.org)
Breaking the Spell (skeptic.com)

Can science explain religion as a natural phenomenon -- or set of phenomena useful to human beings in spite of the absence of a "God" as conceived of in human cultures?

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Dr. Dennett, an atheist and liberal, takes a serious look at the possibility that religions may serve an important and beneficial evolutionary purpose. He is interviewed by theoretical physicist, cofounder of string field theory, and peace activist Dr. Kaku, City College of New York (CUNY). This is followed by a discussion with Steven Pinker, author of The Blank Slate: the Modern Denial of Human Nature.

In The Blank Slate, one of the world's leading experts on language and the mind explores the idea of human nature and its moral, emotional, and political colorings.

With characteristic wit, lucidity, and insight, Steven Pinker argues that the dogma that the mind has no innate traits -- a doctrine held by many intellectuals during the past century -- denies our common humanity.

It also denies our individual preferences, replaces objective analyses of social problems with feel-good slogans, and distorts our understanding of politics, violence, parenting, and the arts.

Injecting calm and rationality into debates that are notorious for ax-grinding and mud-slinging, Pinker shows the importance of an honest acknowledgment of human nature based on science and common sense.

Skeptic Society's Michael Shermer speaks on "strange beliefs" at TED

China's "Father Nature" and California's Yeti

Shen Nung, Viharnra Sien (วิหารเซียน), Chinese-Thai community, Thailand (Clay Irving)

The sign next to the statute reads: "Shen Nung - The First Farmer and Founder of Natural Mad" (Med/Ag, medicine and agriculture?)

Shen Nung (also Shennong) is also known as the Emperor of the Five Grains and the Father of Chinese (Herbal) Medicine. He was a ruler of China and cultural hero who is reputed to have lived 5,000 years ago. He taught the ancient Chinese people the practices of agriculture. Appropriately, his name means "the Divine Farmer." The demigod (human-deva hybrid) Shen Nung taught his people how to cultivate grain as food so they could avoid killing animals and living like ogres, who lust for blood. By choosing plants -- as if to say "I give you every seed-bearing plant on the face of the whole Earth and every tree that has fruit with seed in it; they will be yours for food" (Gen. 1:29) -- they were able to increase their population, sophistication, and domesticated civilization. China was once one of the great realms on par with ancient Egypt, Sumer, and the Indus Valley civilizations. All of them were rooted in the teaching and help of devas according to their history and lore.

This proves there is no "Bigfoot," but it does not explain the ancient lore from India (yaksha) to China (yeren) to Indonesia (orang pendek) to Siberia (Mountain Man) to Bhutan (yeti)

Our Yosemite-Yeti Expedition
Pat Macpherson (Wisdom Quarterly)
Team WQ spent an extended Father's Day weekend on safari in the northern highlands of Yosemite National Park and the desolate desert lowlands (where they are also sometimes spotted) of Mono Lake.

They aren't far apart as the crow flies, but there is a steep altitude drop off from one to the other. The Tenaya Lake region is an alpine granite wonderland.

We were headed for Cloud's Rest. And while it seemed clear that Earthbound-devas (bhumi-devas or woodland fairies) were all about, we could locate no trace of Sasquatch, the abominable California yeti (yakshi) of indigenous Californian and Buddhist lore.

The most famous yeti or yakkha in Buddhism is Alavaka (as recorded in the "Inspired Utterances," Ud. VI, 1). His description makes it clear that while he might have been a cross bred cannibal, he was powerful, intelligent, and possessed supernormal abilities.

Our "sightings" of flora and fauna were just black bears, massive redwood trees, and a certain father's prank.

We did see how the Native Americans lived, particularly the local Paiute, who now have their own museum exhibit at Mono Lake and a strange relationship with brine-shrimp-flies.

• Bigfoot appeared after experiments to cross ape, human
• The most famous Buddhist Bigfoot: Yakkha Alavaka
• VIDEO: Police capture Bigfoot on dash cam (Discovery)
• Indonesian yeti (orang pendek) spotted in the jungle
• Bigfoot saved from drowning in icy Siberian river
• Cryptozoologists embark on hunt for Indonesian yeti
• Sasquatch Music Festival 2011
  

Tree Fairies ("devas") in Buddhism

Simone Gaulier, Groningen Univ., Buddhism in Afghanistan and Central Asia (Vol. 2)

DRYADS (Tree Devas)

The theme of the tree spirit (dryad) inherited from nature genii found in the Vedas and Vedic Brahmanism in ancient India was inherited by early Buddhism. Such a theme had already been adopted to represent Maya, Siddhartha's mother, during the birth of the Bodhisat (buddha-to-be).

She became a Sal tree spirit (Salabhanjika), as Wisdom Quarterly has demonstrated. These themes from around the area the Shakyans [the Buddha's family clan] ruled, in modern Pakistan and Afghanistan in the ancient Northwest Indian frontier, grew in Gandharan art.

The devas became incorporated in various depictions of Buddhist legends. In Afghanistan (e.g., Shotorak), these supple figures surround bas relief images of Maitreya (the future Buddha or "Messiah") and Siddhartha (the historical Buddha) enthroned.

They were discreetly presented in one of the final nirvana scenes on the same site, appearing down to the waist in the Sal (Sala) trees. The same dryad (female tree spirit or bhummi devi) can be found by the end of the 6th century in Kyzyl as the Buddha is passing into nirvana. Her bust emerges from a flowering Sal tree, casting a shower of petals on the body of the Buddha.

Gandharvas and Apsaras

The Gandharvas are music-playing genii (devas) ruled by Dhrtarastra, the Great King of the Eastern Sky. The flying Apsaras are celestial figures forming one of the eight categories of supernatural beings in Buddhist cosmology developed in its iconography. The most famous is perhaps Pancaskikha, the harp playing companion and charioteer for Sakra (Indra).

Variations of these graceful figures filled the transcendent scenes of the Buddhist legends with increasing frequency. But they already seem to have served in the early Buddhist sects to express the superhuman destiny of the Buddha. In Bamiyan [former Afghan site of the largest Buddha statues in the world], for example, they contributed to an atmosphere of celestial glory.

Richly adorned and wearing sophisticated princely garments, the Gandharvas have generally been given masculine features, while the Apsaras assumed a feminine appearance despite the indeterminate sex of such supernatural creatures.

"Angelic" figures (in Miran), garland bearers (Yotkan), crown bearers (Fondukistan and Kyzyl), the bearers of baskets filled with flowers (Kumtura), revolving in the air (Kyzyl), or appearing on the balcony of celestial palaces (Shotorak and Kyzyl), this subtle and elegant throng was to provide later Mahayana Buddhism with the heavenly orchestras of its Pure Lands. [And these elements were later incorporated into the religions of the Near East, most notably Christianity.]

Lokapalas ("Four Great Kings")

The "guardians of the four directions" (Lokapalas) appear in the art of Gandhara (ancient northwest India, now Pakistan and Afghanistan) in the course of one of the episodes in the life of the Buddha -- "the offering of the four bowls." The Buddha has his first meal after enlightenment.

Four neutral devas (literally, "shining ones," fairies, elemental, nature spirits) later took on a militant character in Central Asia, around Khotan. Aurel Stein discovered statues of them at the gate of a burial mound reliquary (stupa) in Rawak. They are the "four great kings" of the sky -- Vaisarvana of the North tramples a demon. A prince in armor with pointed ears heralds the celestial kings as depicted in Asian caves (Tun-huang, Turfan, and Bezeklik, etc.)

They seem to be advanced space aliens in helmets, military dress, protected by breast-plates -- Dhrtarastra (East), Virudhaka (south), and Viupaksa (West) bearing swords and spears.

On Earth there are not only fairies but ogres (yakshas) -- "Pan" like nature men, wolf men, abominable snowmen, men of the mountain, intelligent bipedal hominids who at best were only half human. Like the reptilians (nagas, dragons, serpents, vipers, tyrant rulers) they were derived from Vedic mythology. The tree spirits were sometimes celestial, sometimes earthbound nature beings -- bhummi devas -- in early Buddhism.

Trees are life-sustaining along the Himalayan foothills from Afghanistan to India (fullstopindia.com).

The World's "Second Oldest Profession"
The Getty and many other top American museums are part of a long history of illicit art trade. Looted art has been trafficked for as long as art has been in existence, and Frammolino says this is due to the overpowering effects of antiquity. Aprodite is the stone goddess (pictured above), from Felch and Frammolino's new book: Chasing Aphrodite: The Hunt for Looted Antiquities at the World's Richest Museum [the Getty].

From Afghanistan with Love (rawa.org)
Afghanistan has world's oldest oil paintings

Majority in U.S. say leave Afghanistan
German troops intensify attacks on Afghan civilians

Blasts kill 20 in Afghan flashpoints
Afghanistan to be handed over to gangsters
“Iran caught 10 times trying to send arms to terrorists”
Deadly attack on Afghan wedding party
In Kabul, air pollution a bigger killer than war
Afghanistan tackles sex abuse of kids within police
15-year-old Afghan girl gang-raped in Takhar
MPs’ brother, friends held with drugs
Two girls killed, one survives strangulation
US spends two billion a week in Afghanistan
Afghan taxes squeezing poorest
AFGHANISTAN: Clashes displace 12,000 in Faryab

Most Australians sick of the Afghanistan cost, saying we are fighting a losing battle

Wedded to the warlords: NATO’s unholy Afghan alliance
Report: Billions in U.S. aid wasted in Iraq, Afghanistan
With friends like these, who needs the Taliban?
Afghanistan: A Heritage in Ruins
Afghan judge whips man for drinking alcohol
IDP situation concerning, UNHCR
Afghanistan remains dangerous for children: UN
Teenage girl raped in Sar-i-Pul
Nato airstrike kills 14 women and children in Afghanistan
Kabul gold rush: western billions bear fruit
Girls’ schools closed in Logar after Taliban threats
112 killed in Nuristan airstrike: governor
Afghanistan emerges as worst violence-hit state
Foreign troops kill civilians in Maidan Wardak
Militants hack off Afghan’s nose, ears
Taliban kill head of Afghan girls’ school
Aid workers fight secret war against HIV on Kabul’s backstreets
Police collecting opium tax in Uruzgan
Iran executes Afghans in violation of agreement
Why US can’t combat Afghan corruption

Why We Love Trees (Tree Hugger's Ball)

We love trees. And what better way to show it than to save them, meditate under them, and hug them? The Buddha was born under a Sal tree in Lumbini Garden.

During his quest, he sought shelter under a great Sal tree. There he realized that a course of austerities was no way to enlightenment; then, mistaken for a tree spirit (dryad or bhummi-deva), he was fed good food that fortified him for the more difficult effort of balancing striving-and-receiving.

He then sat under a Bodhi tree and reached enlightenment. He taught under trees, taught others to sit under trees, and frequently retreated to the forest alone to enjoy the silence and bliss of meditation under trees.

Such was his experience under the canopy that when it came time to pass into final nirvana, he laid out between twin Sal trees. He joyfully said goodbye, gave his last words of advice -- "All conditioned-phenomena are hurtling towards destruction; work out your liberation with diligence" (Parinirvana Sutra) -- then entered the purifying absorptions (jhanas) before going beyond:

"Gone, gone, gone beyond, gone altogether beyond, O what an awakening, so it is!" (the Heart of Perfect Wisdom Sutra mantra)

(OC Weekly: Tree Hugger's Ball)

It’s that time of year again -- the annual Tree Hugger’s Ball takes over Silverado, and OC’s eco-maniacs get their day in the Sun. The afternoon begins with the Go Green Expo, an environmental fair dedicated to teaching everyone how to do just that via food, art, auctions, shopping, costumed dancers, and information about alternative energy and fuel-efficient vehicles. Eco-hero Daryl Hannah is the night’s guest speaker; she’ll be followed by bands playing folk, Appalachian music and “environmental blues” (gas prices, oil wars?) and dancing until midnight. Guests are encouraged to wear their own earthy costumes. It is a ball after all.

"The Tree of Life" (2011 film)

Brad Pitt stars in a new film from Terrence Malick -- the acclaimed director of Badlands, Days of Heaven, and The Thin Red Line. The Tree of Life is the impressionistic story of a Midwestern American family in the 1950's.

It follows the life journey of the eldest son, Jack (played as an adult by Sean Penn), through the innocence of childhood to his disillusioned adult years. He tries to reconcile a complicated relationship with his father (Brad Pitt).

Jack finds himself a lost soul in the modern world: He is seeking answers to the origins and meaning of life while questioning the existence of faith.

Through Malick's signature imagery, we see how both brute nature and spiritual grace shape not only our lives as individuals and families, but all life.

• Justin Bieber's Mexican girlfriend, Jewish tattoo
• War-weary lawmakers push Obama to end Afghan war
  
• Student finds universe's "missing mass"
• US crime is down, but media wants fear in these cities
• High school graduation rates are up in US
• Obama admin. still trying to illegally kill Gaddafi
• War Powers Act: Obama can now be Dictator
• "1984" in 2011: U.S. House votes for "Patriot Act"
  

The U.S. House of Representatives voted Thursday to extend three key provisions of the Patriot Act until June 1, 2015. The Senate voted earlier in the day to approve the extension bill. The House vote was 250 in favor, with 153 opposed. Oppositions to the bill said it was an invasion of privacy and had hoped to add language providing for further oversight and audits of the activities the law permits. The three provisions are as follows: One would enable law enforcement officials to conduct surveillance on suspects without a warrant who switch communication devices, such as using disposable cellular phones. A second would let officials conduct warrant-less surveillance on suspects not currently linked to any known terrorist organization abroad. The third would enable officials access to suspects' business transactions without a warrant. Pres. Obama signed the bill using an auto pen machine from France. Source

Chemtrails in our skies are toxic (video)

"Aluminum, barium, and strontium pollution is being caused by chemtrails" says Michael J. Murphy.

The rains flooding the Mississippi are no accident. They are part of the government's (military-industrial complex) desire to have total control of the weather. Spraying in one location drifts with unintended consequences. It is not accident that 100+ tornadoes blow through an area. HAARP allows precision guidance of hurricanes coming on shore by heating the sky and altering their trajectories. Aerosols are alkalizing normally acidic and healthy soil, making it harder to grow crops and organic foods. Forests are collapsing in the northwest and in Hawaii.


"What in the World Are They Spraying?" Maui is being destroyed by chemtrail spraying campaign.

As the ecosystem suffers, so goes human health. With water contamination and bodily toxicity, the only hope is good nutrition. But even that is compromised with purposeful spraying campaigns. Rep. Dennis Kucinich lost family members trying to ban chemtrails and geoengineering. The bill he sponsored was modified to prevent interference with globalist plans. Fallout, rain tests, direct observation of iridescent light scatter patterns in heavily sprayed skies... the evidence is abundant. He who controls the water controls the world. Rain is the source of water.

• TruthMediaProductions.us
• Globalskywatch.com/chemtrails
  
• Barium, strontium titanate, and non-ferroelectric oxide ceramic composites for use in phased array antenna
• ExposeChemtrails.com

Blood tests reveal chemtrail contamination
Bridget Lewison for KTOX

Blood test in Mojave reveals results of aerial chemical spraying by secret military-industrial programs allegedly sponsored by black budge operations in the Pentagon and DARPA.

GOLDEN VALLEY (Feb. 10, 2011) - Al DiCicco hasn't been well for a while. The disabled Golden Valley man recently had some blood work done at his doctor's office, and the results have him alarmed.

Al's blood plasma levels for the chemical element barium were 150 mcg; the maximum reporting level for barium is 11 mcg. With levels more than 13 times acceptable levels, Al's doctor has referred him to the Poison Control Center for treatment.

Exposure to small amounts of barium, dissolved in water, may cause a person to experience these problems:

1. breathing difficulties
2. increased blood pressure
3. heart rhythm changes
4. stomach irritation
5. muscle weakness
6. alterations in nerve reflexes
7. damage to brain, liver, kidney, and heart

The Buddha's Forest Tradition

Wisdom Quarterly

The Buddha lovingly bundled beholding the Himalayas from behind, Ladakh, India

The wonderful thing about Buddhism originally (the Dharma as taught by the historical Buddha, Siddhartha Gautama) is that it was a forest tradition.

Siddhartha left Kapilavastu, the territory of his family, cut off his hair, discarded his fine clothes, crossed the river in a simple garment and went in search of yogis in the wilderness.

He found Alara Kalama and then Uddaka Ramaputra, wandering ascetics who taught him to meditate in the tradition of mental serenity. This led to a great accomplishment -- self control and a clear heart/mind.

But he left it behind as well because he realized that serenity in itself -- even to the tranquil depths of full absorption -- did not lead to final and complete liberation (moksha).

India had found many routes to the heavens. And many seers could see no further than this. Uddaka Ramaputra's teacher, Rama, had reached the zenith of worlds beyond form. But even that was not outside of samsara, the interminable Round of Rebirths.

Leaving behind these great teachers, Siddhartha plunged himself into the forest to practice austerities. Everyone understood that this had to be the way to break free of sensuality, the body, and all its temptations and bonds.

What the Buddha realized is what "everybody" knows now: The body is not to blame, but rather attachment and clinging, which are defilements of the mind/heart. Insight brought Siddhartha to this realization. And that realization made him the Buddha.

Siddhartha did his striving almost exclusively in the quiet and nurturing atmosphere of the forest, attaining buddhahood in a grove of Bo trees (Bodh Gaya).

Legend has it, that on becoming a supremely enligthened teacher (samma-sam-buddha) he remained in the forest, in the vicinity of the Bodhi tree (the sacred and sheltering fig tree), staring at unblinkingly in admiration.

Woodland sprites (fairies, earthbound-devas) had offered to save his life when his fasting had becoming so extreme that he looked dead. "He's dead," one said. The other explained, "No, this is how ascetics behave." "We should feed him deva food through his pores," they concluded.

"No," Siddhartha aware of their conversation said to them, "that won't be necessary. People think that I am fasting, and were I to be living on subtle deva nourishment, it would be deceiving them." But this encouraged Siddhartha to nourish his body with human food.

He came to understand that it was not by rejecting the world and such facts as the constraints of materiality (e.g., the need for nutrition) that one finds freedom. Instead, it is by practicing serenity-and-insight, Zen and Vipassana one can say. The first prepares the mind/heart through concentration (calm, collectedness, intensification, and focus). The other aims the laser singularity of consciousness on mindful contemplation of four things that lead to freedom here and now.

They lead the heart to realize nirvana and the complete end of suffering.

Realizing it and deciding to teach others the path of purification, the path to freedom, he walked to another forest in Sarnath, in a deer park outside of the famous ancient Indian city of Varanasi. There he instructed the first Five Disciples, who had formerly practiced austerities with him trying to reach liberation.

Siddhartha returns to the Five Ascetics as the Buddha and sets rolling in motion the Wheel of the Dharma by teaching them the path to enlightenment (History of Buddhism).

When the Five Ascetics reached enlightenment by hearing the Dhammacakkappavattana Sutra ("Turning the Wheel of Dharma"), the Buddha began a forest tradition of recluses. Whether lay people came to him or wanderers on a quest for enlightenment, the Buddha's essential advice was the same:

"Here in this Dharma (this Teaching), a meditator who has gone to the forest, or to the foot of a tree, or to an empty place, sits down cross legged, holding the back sustainably erect [not too stiff, not too lax], arousing mindfulness in front."

Of course, before there can be real insight into those four things mentioned before, there must be serenity. Mindfulness is not thinking. There is contemplation and reflection and reviewing (anussati), but that occurs as one emerges from the purifying absorptions (jhanas, zens, ch'ans as it were).

To gain concentration (samadhi) to the level of full-absorption one needs mindfulness, which simply means constant-bare-awareness, nonjudgmental attention, non-evaluative holding in consciousness. One avoids two extremes, rigidity and laxity, and balances in the blissful middle, awake but serene.

The Buddha often taught lay people and rulers outside of cities, villages, and hamlets while residing in groves and orchards.

Then the Buddha moved from grove to grove -- bamboo, mango... -- from glade to glade, staying outdoors, enjoying the freedom of the left-home life. He developed a great following. He said the home life was constricted and dusty, but renunciation (which need not mean getting rid of anything but simply letting go of the attachment to everything) was open and free:

• "Household life is crowded, constricting, and dusty! A life gone forth is wide open. While living at home, it is not easy to carry out this noble life utterly perfect and pure as [the milky luminous lustre of a] polished conch shell... But suppose I cut off my hair and beard, don a saffron robe, and go forth from home into homelessness? What if I leave behind my fortune, small or large, leave behind my circle of family and friends, small or large? Then doing so out of verifiable-confidence (saddha) in this Teacher or this Teaching or these well-taught disciples, after past lives of accumulating the right conditions for attaining the expeditious state of a recluse in the Buddha's lineage, surely one has found the surest means of winning the stream that runs towards and merges with the deathless nirvana!"

Before monasteries were built, the Buddha sent his disciples into the forest to live, in no way harming nature, taking their ceramic bowls with them to gather alms food which delighted the people of India to give in a longstanding tradition of dana. After monasteries were built, the Buddha sent his disciples into the forest to practice. Even at the end of his days before his final passing into nirvana without remainder outdoors in a grove between twin Sal trees, he advised his deva and human disciples who had gathered in the tens of thousands (mostly devas):

The Buddha in a bamboo grove, Malaysia(Esani/Flickr.com)

If you would maintain in purity the [monastic] precepts, you should not give yourselves over to buying... You should not covet fields or buildings, nor accumulate servants, attendants, or animals. You should flee from all sorts of property and wealth as you would avoid a fire or a pit. You should not cut down grass or trees, neither break new soil, nor plough the earth. ...All of these are things which are improper (for a recluse).

• The Buddha's Last Bequest (compiled from the Chinese Tripitaka)
• Meditation on Breathing - the First Foundation of Mindfulness (the Body)
• The Absorptions in Buddhist Meditation (Leigh Brasington)
• Intellectualizing the Meditative Absorptions (Bhante G)

Bolivia grants Nature rights (video)

Bolivia's new Mother Nature Law

ZMEscience.com
Environmentalism is finally being taken seriously. Steps are moving in the right direction to protect nature and reverse climate chaos. One intriguing idea, spearheaded by Bolivia, is to give legal rights to natural systems: Bolivia’s "Law of Mother Nature" is set to pass, which will redefine the mineral riches as “blessings.” It is expected to lead to radical new conservation of these resources.

“It has to happen. We have to be able to give legal protection and consideration to the rest of the natural world,” said Patricia Siemen, executive director of the Center for Earth Jurisprudence. “It’s in the human best interest, as well as the larger natural world’s.”

The first article of the Mother Nature Law (translated from Spanish) states that every human activity has to “achieve dynamic balance with the cycles and processes inherent in Mother Earth,” with Mother Earth defined as “a unique, indivisible, self-regulating community of interrelated beings that sustains, contains, and reproduces all beings.” A Nature ministry will be formed and issues will be addressed thoroughly. More

The Tree of Contemplative Practices

Tree of Contemplative (meditative and physical) Practices (Martin Beck Matustik, contemplativemind.org)

Under the Bodhi Tree
Wisdom Quarterly

It is one of the most embellished and famous stories in the world -- the Buddha under the Bodhi tree. Before attaining buddhahood, Siddhartha struggled for six years. Most of that time may not have been spent sitting. Sitting was the culmination of the practice.

We tend to focus, or are directed to concentrate, on exactly the things the Buddha overcame: struggling, severe austerities, fighting, battling with inner demons (maras), rejecting the angelic care of devas, dieting (eating only certain foods then fasting altogether), and discursive thinking.

None of these led to illumination, although from time to time Siddhartha had epiphanies about what might work and what certainly would not. He had already learned the absorptions (jhanas) but seems to have only skipped through them without developing or indulging in them for fear of attachment to the bliss they produce.

Now, under the tree, he reasoned that he should not fear pleasure far removed from sensuality. There is an elevated, more reliable source of pleasure and happiness. The meditative absorptions purify the mind/heart. They become a platform for successfully practicing mindfulness.

And it is mindfulness of the body, sensations, mind, and mind objects (all detailed in the The Discourse on the Fourfold Setting Up of Mindfulness) that yields liberating insight. One begins with the breath (under the category of "body"), and the practice culminates in meditating on the causal links of Dependent Origination.

It seems like a lot to remember, except that we forget that the purified mind is easily able to remember what needs attending to under the care of a teacher who has practiced Buddhist meditation. Unfortunately, there are very few such teachers. But hidden deep in Asia and only rarely visiting the US, there are some. (We have met them, we have named them on Wisdom Quarterly, and increasingly there are Westerners trained by these lights. The future of American Buddhism is not likely to be monastic but oriented towards lay-meditative practices).

So we find a tree. And if is old enough and big enough, it is likely to be inhabited by dryads (woodland sprites) and rooted deep into Mother Earth (Gaia). Nagas may help or harm, maras and yakkhas tempt and distract and attempt to terrify one from one's Quest. But ultimately it is a matter of perseverance over effort, balance over striving, letting go over insisting.

Siddhartha entered the successive meditative absorptions, emerged from them with a purified mind (because these states suppress the defilements that are obstacles to serenity and insight), then practiced mindfulness of Dependent Origination until he broke through to liberation.

The Mindful Lawyer

Judges, lawyers, mediators, law professors, law students, and other legal professionals gathered at the UC Berkeley School of Law for the first ever national conference exploring the integration of meditation and contemplative practices with legal education and practice. The Mindful Lawyer: Practices & Prospects for Law School, Bench, and Bar offered a blend of academic presentations, discussion, and contemplative practice. Video and audio recordings are available on the conference website, along with guided meditations, syllabi from related law courses, and relevant books and articles.