BREAKUP: "Be Gentle With Me" (comedy)

Wisdom Quarterly

"Be gentle with me, oh oh, be gentle with me...please be gentle with me, handle with care, be gentle with me...or I shall kick your teeth in."

Breaking up is hard to do, they say. But it depends. It certainly is if one repeatedly reflects on the appealing qualities of the lost person.



However, if one were to from to time consider and reflect on the unappealing aspects, that clinging and pining would vanish.



One would become disenchanted, disillusioned, dispassionate. And then it would be possible to be freed. There is, of course, a trap. If one pushes away from the pain, that is just as dangerous as clinging to the pleasant in the first place. Aversion is as hard to deal with as undue attraction.

"Garden of Love" (Benny Hill)

Hate quickly replaces love -- without displacing it. One is then attached and angry, hurt and seeking some way of ridding oneself of the pain, the memory, the intrusive thoughts.







Wise reflection (yoniso manasikara) sees things as they truly are -- neither ignoring the bad nor exaggerating the good.



With freedom comes laughter again. Everything is funny. Everything is light. Everything is fine just as it is, because fine/not-fine is all in the mind that judges it so. With a different decision, the world seems to change. There is no out there without an in here.



Laugh, and the whole world laughs with you. Cry, and you can cry alone. (Misery loves company, but the company soon wearies of les contagious miserable).

Be sure to have the number to cancel.

A natural solution without harmful chemical pharmaceuticals? (welltabs.com)

Lady Gaga's going bald, Kim Kardashian's skin

Wisdom Quarterly (GOSSIP+ADVICE)
Akasa, Netherlands (willem-mantra.blogspot.com)

Balding?

She "plummets like a shooting star that shines so bright yet falls so far" (How Have the Mighty Fallen?/Sabbat)

Rumor has it, superstar singer Lady Gaga is using Rogaine (to regrow hair). No one in her camp is speaking publicly. But drug and alcohol abuse, mania, sex addiction, stress, a temper, and other acidifying habits would take their toll on anyone's body. Too much testosterone, which causes men to go bald, would also make Gaga (aka S.J.A. Germanotta) stressed out and sexually aggressive. (According to John Gray, therapist and acclaimed author of Men Are From Mars Women Are From Venus, females need oxytocin not testosterone to feel soothed. The imbalance would ruin her life, not only cause her hair loss. Hair damage and thinning are aggravated a lack of self-worth. So is anxiety and self-starvation (yo-yo dieting or an undiagnosed eating disorder). As it would for any of us in her position, these things cause the multi-millionairess to overprocess, bleach, dye, and weave her hair -- and even to pull it out. Gaga's yoga habit would help, but she practices exactly the wrong kind (Bikram) for a "fiery constitution" (called pita dosha in Ayurveda). She needs soothing, not stimulation. Is she on a sure track to the 27 Candle Club?

Scabby?


Gorgeous Kim Kardashian has a hideous secret -- one that, like Lady Gaga's, would be helped by an alkalizing diet and a good detoxing -- scaly psoriasis. Her human scabies was revealed on a recent episode of "Keeping Up with the Kardashians." She may avoid stressful situations to prevent flare-ups of this itchy blotchy skin disease, but the root cause is environmental toxins being cleared from the body through its largest organ, the skin. That means the lungs and colon are not doing their job. Yum, celebrities are so beautiful...and just as human as Hollywood agents, some of the least savory humans on the planet.

Some Buddhist advice on lust

Key passages from Buddhist texts translated by Wisdom Quarterly
(Wonderlane/Flickr.com)

What household-Buddhists do is one thing. What Sangha-members (Buddhist monastics) do is another. The Buddha advised renunciates (monks, nuns, novices, and those training intensively) to be extremely careful to avoid the snare of lust.

Of great advantage is restraint in body, of great advantage is restraint in speech. Of great advantage is restraint in mind, of great advantage is restraint everywhere. The renunciate restrained in everything is freed from all sorrow.

It would be far better to bore out your eyes with red-hot irons than encourage yourselves in sensual thoughts or look upon a man or woman's form with lustful desire.

The renunciate who has retired to a quiet of place [seclusion of heart/mind but not necessarily of body, unless that is needed], who has calmed mind/heart, who clearly perceives the Dharma experiences a joy transcending that of humans.

O renunciates, if you must speak with a [member of the other sex], let it be with pure heart, and think to yourself, “As a renunciate I will live in this corrupting world as the spotless leaf of the lotus, unsoiled by the mud it grows out of.”

If the [person] be old, regard that person as your [parent]; if young, as your [sibling]; if very young as your child.

O renunciates, cover your heads with the helmet of right intention, and abandon with fixed resolve the five [strands of sense] desire.

Lust clouds one's heart when it is confused with [form's] beauty and the mind is dazed.

One who is controlled in hand, foot, speech, and in the highest [head], one who delights in meditation and is composed, one who is solitary and contented -- that person is called a renunciate.

One who holds neither “I” nor “me” at all towards mind and body [a stream enterer or other noble disciple], who grieves not for that which one does not have -- that person, indeed, is called a renunciate.

As the jasmine creeper sheds withered flowers, even so, O renunciates, totally shed lust and hatred. More

(discovermagazine.com)

Gratification, Danger, and Escape – 1
Based on Bhikkhu Bodhi's translation in Anthology of Discourses
Before my enlightenment, O disciples, when I was still a bodhisatta (being striving for supreme enlightenment), this thought occurred to me:

“What is the gratification in the world, what is the danger in the world, and what is the escape from the world?”87

Then I thought:

• “Whatever joy and happiness there is in the world [and there is plenty], that is the gratification in the world;
• That the world is impermanent, pervaded by disappointment, and subject to change, that is the danger in the world;
• The removal and abandoning of [sensual] desire and lust for the world, that is the escape from the world.”

So long, disciples, as I did not fully understand as they really are the world’s gratification as gratification, its danger as danger, and the escape from the world as escape, for so long I did not claim that I had awakened to the unsurpassed perfect enlightenment in this world with its devas, māras, and brahmās [light beings, adversaries, and divinities], in this generation [a biological not chronological reference] with its ascetics and brahmins, its [earthbound-] devas and humans.

But when I had fully understood all this, then I claimed that I had awakened to the unsurpassed perfect enlightenment in this world with…its devas and humans. The knowledge and vision arose in me:

“Unshakable is the liberation of my mind; this is my last birth; there is now no further re-becoming [rebirth].”

• 86. Ajjhupekkhati. This refers to the third itemupekkhā (equanimity, impartiality, unbiased observation], which literally means “onlooking,” that is, detached observation or examination.
• 87. These three terms, which often appear together in the texts, are in Pāli: assāda, ādīnava, nissaraṇa. The commentaries relate them to the Four Noble Truths in this way: “Danger” indicates the truth of suffering [dukkha or disappointment]; “gratification,” the truth of the origin (for pleasure is the stimulus for craving, the true origin of suffering); and “escape,” the truth of the cessation of suffering, or Nibbāna (Sanskrit, nirvana). Although the fourth truth, the truth of the path, is not explicitly mentioned in this triad, it is implied as the means or way of escape.

Finding happiness from Buddhist point of view

Jerome Ryan (mountainsoftravelphotos.com) and Wisdom Quarterly
Dieter Glogowski is a contemporary Tibet and Nepal photographer. His photos are excellent, and the quotes he chooses to accompany them are short and thought-provoking (mountainsoftravelphotos.com).

The root teachings of Buddhism are the Four Noble Truths, which state that there is disappointment and we can rise above it by a path of practice that reduces our attachment and clinging to things, people, and states. There are Buddhist resources to assist in increasing joy.

At war with China? Ever notice how much the most famous Buddhist, the 14th Dalai Lama, laughs? He laughs in spite of all difficulties. If we can learn to do that, it will serve the world well. Smile, and the whole world smiles.

Wisdom (the 14th Dalai Lama): It is important to know that there are three kinds of wisdom: / Wisdom resulting from listening, / wisdom resulting from reflection, and / wisdom resulting from meditation.

Consciousness (Dhammapada): We are what we think / All we are arises from our thoughts / With our thoughts we create the world.

Compassion (Mother Teresa): Always try to act in a way that people are happy to have met you.

Equanimity (Sutta Nipata): We exchange the breath of air with the rain forests. We drink the very water that flows into the ocean. Water and air are integral parts of our lives. And we are part of the whole world. We realize that we depend on each other, that we are related to each other. Then we will deal with all of nature carefully, we are part of it.

Love (Phil Bosmans): A flower needs sun to become a flower. / A human being needs love to become a human being.

Impermanence (14th Dalai Lama): It is my firm conviction that the power of the gun barrel is of limited time. / But the power of truth will increase more and more with time.

Mindfulness (Thich Nhat Hanh): Real life is experienced here and now. The past has already gone; the future has not yet come. Only in the present moment can we truly live life.

Meditation (Sogyal Rinpoche): The gift of learning to meditate is the greatest gift you can give yourself in this life. For it is only through meditation that you can undertake the journey to discover your true nature, and so find the stability and confidence you will need to live, and die, well; meditation is the road to enlightenment.

(Geshe Yongdong) Path to Happiness Teaching, October 13, 2009, Part 1A

• The Discourse Collection (Sutta Nipata)
• Illustrated Treasury of Truth (Dhammapada)
• Buddha-path and other photos (AJE44/Flickr)
• PHOTOS: Thru the Lens (Adrian-Evans.com)
• Euphoria Yoga of Woodstock, NY
  

"The Politics of Ecstasy" (video)

The oxymoronic "Politics of Ecstasy" (one not having anything to do with the other) might be about meditative bliss (piti and sukha). It might be about the dance club drug "E" (which is a groovy love potion and a terrible health menace because it contains the brain-depleting toxic chemical amphetamine "Meth"). Or it might be about having fun in an oppressive Judeo-Christian society with Puritanical (Sharia Law) leanings.

America is great, but it can be just a little hypocritical. We all try as best we can to enjoy ourselves, while being made to feel guilty about it. This shaming does us more harm than good. And in the long run, we are co-opted: We are lied to as kids and go on to lie to our kids in the naive beliefs that this keeps them "innocent."

It leads to disillusionment. We have fun and enjoy having fun, and there's no reason for fun other than fun. There's plenty of time to suffer and discover that most things are unsatisfying. All of these issues are called "politics" only when our hippie parents sit around and talk about it academically:

Buddhism at minute 22:22

• AUDIO: Deep Buddhist meditation explained in English
  
• North Korea's Global Happiness Index: China is the world's happiest place!
• Most global polls rate Scandinavian and west European nations as being among the world's happiest and most liveable. Not so says a North Korean survey, which ranked China as "the happiest place on earth." As Shanghaiist is reporting, a new global happiness index awarded China 100 out of 100 possible points.
• Be happy anywhere: the Beautiful Buddhist Nuns of Burma
  
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Shell Oil US President Marvin Odum talks about both history and the future.... witness cutting-edge college and high school student vehicles, many getting over 1,000 miles-per-gallon. Eco reporter Cary Harrison is covering the 2010 Shell Oil Eco-marathon, bonding with the brilliant minds who have gathered in the oil capitol to demonstrate what the future could look like.

• Radio and online webstream: Go Harrison!