Date: Tue, 16 Nov 2004 11:54:48 -0500
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Random Thoughts By Reverend R Clark <clark@acceleration.net>
In the Summer of '89, the first job I did while living on Quarry Hill (2nd oldest American intentional community near Rochester, VT) involved air nailing cedar shakes. I worked as a helper applying these as siding to an old hodge-podge structure built and renovated in many spurts of inspiration over twenty years or more and built mostly from recycled materials by non-professionals. This renovation I helped with was far more extensive and better funded than any previous and succeeded in bringing the structure up to code, I think, although it was a struggle. The shakes were a savvy approach to pulling a lot of diverse elements, mis-matched windows, add-on & on seams and stylistic variations, together into one visual package.
To achieve this end the straw boss wanted the walls to be "totally random." He also wanted no more than the maximum exposure on a given shake and no less than the minimum exposure in no pattern. This is what both of us did. Or so we thought, because upon backing away 6 - 8 feet from the wall we'd just done large sine waves were apparent in the "Big Picture." Upon reflection we decided the boss had set too many parameters for "random" to be approachable.
“What you see, depends on where you stand.”
- Ra Bonewitz in "The Cosmic Crystal Spiral"
"Total Random" requires an environment devoid of rules, apparently. A condition I have great difficulty envisioning. Random doesn't compute with me or computers for that matter. Since a computer does what it is told and only that then there is no random it is all "pre-ordained." Actually, "Random" is very high on my "There ain't no such a Animal" List. Even though they've taken Pi out to so many decimal places that it is printed as a book inches thick, I am convinced that it will repeat eventually. I see implicate order in every direction I look and sense a loving structure at the center of my soul.
I find that at some level or point of view or stance or just plain distance all this makes sense. By way of visual demonstration please check the next clear table you come to after getting up from the computer. If you will, as you approach the table if clear or after you get there and begin to clear at least a good sized portion near the edge until you are certain you have a near perfectly flat surface to look at. Flat? You sure? Reposition your point of view so that you may sight across the longest part of the clear portion. Still Flat? Unless your table is far more precise than mine you will see that it is far from perfectly flat. This "snail's eye view" is where we find ourselves in life because it is so interesting, it is up front... in your face, as attention getting as a roller coaster.. hills and valleys.. ups and downs. Whereas at a more distant view these average out and are not apparent.
“Just as the eyes are for seeing and the ears for hearing, Peace is for perceiving blessings...”
- Nilton Bonder, "The Kabbalah of Envy"
An example of hearing this averaging might be found Music where in the scales or more accurately their temperament I think they call it, some of the notes are deliberately "out of tune" when they are in what is accepted as In tune. A big part of the concept of tuning came about due to the practical concerns of producing a particular range of notes limited to a mere fraction of the near infinite available frequencies in the audible range of which I seem to remember only 1000 are typically used by humans in music. Tuning is similar to other consensuses like our marking the passage of time, date &tc. these also being arbitrary conventions that folks agree on. So it seems we can focus on and perceive the elements that are "out of tune" or we have the choice to rise above them until the symphony is heard to be singing and swinging sweetly.
“There are different ways of listening to music. There is a technical state when a person who is developing technique and has learnt to appreciate better music, feels disturbed by a lower grade of music.
But there is a spiritual way, which has nothing to do with technique. It is simply to tune oneself to the music.”
- Hazrat Inayat Khan (Sufi master)
“ "Love it the way it is." The way you see the world depends entirely on your own vibration level. When your vibration changes, the whole world will look different. It's like those days when everyone seems to be smiling at you because you feel happy. The way to raise your vibration level is to feel more love. Start by loving your negative feelings, your own boredom, dullness and despair. It's hard to believe, but changing the ’content’ of your mind does nothing to change your vibration level. For the purpose of raising your awareness, it is useless to change your ideas, your faith, your behavior, your place of residence, or your companions. It is not arbitrary or an accident that you are where you are, so you might as well get your attitude straight before you make a change. Otherwise you might find yourself chasing all over creation looking for the right place, and not even the Sea of Infinite Bliss will feel right to you. You take yourself with you wherever you go. As they say in Zen: "If you can't find it where you are standing, where do you expect to wander in search of it?" ”
- Thaddeus Golas, "The Lazy Man's Guide to Enlightenment"
“If everything is connected to everything else, then everyone is ultimately responsible for everything. We can blame nothing on anyone else. The more we comprehend our mutual interdependence, the more we fathom the implications of our most trivial acts. We find ourselves within a luminous organism of sacred responsibility.”
- Laurence Kushner, "Invisible Lines of Connection"
“Serving peace is not easy. Often it is harder to seek dialogue with someone close at hand a spouse, relative, co-worker, employer, or neighbor than with a distant enemy seen only on television screens.”
- Jim Forest (The Ladder of the Beatitudes)
“All things pertaining to spiritual progress in life depend upon peace.”
- Hazrat Inayat Khan (quoted in The Heart of Sufism edited by H. J. Witteveen)
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Copyright (c) 1998-2011 R. Clark - clark@acceleration.net .
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