tao1776

Poor back up policies - note to self ; The next time you spend countless hours writing and researching a book idea, back it up on a good CD double check that it's right. Do it twice and put one copy in a safe place. Writing is very cathartic for me and for millions of other aspiring writers as well. Some stories churn in your gut like a bad piece of meat. You can hear it gurgling and twisting its way through your bowels and you just have to get it out. My last book attempt had me writing in my sleep. I don't know if I coined the phrase or not, but I was sure living it as I came to a point of, "going Hemingway". Late nights, drinking hard, the story taking over my every waking moment. It was a pleasurable hell. And then I had to put it down for a spell. And when I took it back up, I found that I had lost most of the book and the task of starting over seemed daunting and perhaps a waste of time. However I still feel the need to write above and beyond my "more ...

The hens, or as we affectionately like to call them, "the ladies" are months away from any egg laying. Nor has the brood developed their grown up voices. They exhibit a collection of squawks, squeaks and clucks. And although they do all share the same living space they do not all share the same personality. Each hen is different from the other and I am beginning to form my favorites. Gaia Girl has names for them all. I only know them as this one or that one. The runt, little Andy, the bigger one, the lighter one. Gee, I can barely tell Gaia Girl's two cats apart. Reminds me of the twin boys that used to live down the street. Together Rob and Curt was Rob and Curt. Apart, I never got it right. I felt like I was shouting, "tails" while it always come up "heads". Whoops! But she loves me anyway. And I am heads over heels for her too. The garden is growing as well. That's what they do! It's whats growing in there that has me puzzled. I always ...

I sat down at my local sportsman's club the other night and found myself sharing a conversation with the mother of a friend. She is in the position of being a full time caregiver to her failing mother while her son at age 40, continues to behave much like a teenager while living under her roof. Meanwhile her siblings offer little support. She was feeling worn out as many caregiver's do and needed to unload. By my line of questioning and my unstated offer of a listening ear she had a lot on her plate that she readily shared. At one point she stopped to ask me who I was and what I did for a living. I offered her a different perspective on the role of her mother, her son, her siblings and how it all related to her and she to them. With a clear view you understand your strengths and your weaknesses and wherein lies the balance and responsibility of all parties concerned. Ultimately you know when to hold them and when to fold them - you become less identified with your role and mor...

I'm reading a very interesting and informative book that my acupuncturist thought I should borrow. Byron Katie is best know for "The Work" a series of steps and questioning used to confront the stories that we tell and define ourselves by. This particular book uses the backdrop of the Tao Te Ching. While offering insight on "The Work", we learn to question the stories we tell ourselves that lead us away from a state of mindfulness and to that of following that untamed elephant that we call our mind. An example of how "The Work" would have me tackle my story head on might unfold as something like this: The Judge your Neighbor Worksheet 1) Who angers, confuses, saddens, or disappoints you, and why? What is it about them that you don't like?  I am so pissed off at my ex and how she has managed to play the victim through our ongoing divorce process. She's stubborn, manipulative and hard. She is unwilling and unable to take any responsibility for...

I have always enjoyed riding a bicycle. My friend and I were discussing recently that we never saw our parents ride a bicycle. It was a vehicle designed for children or men in parades or professional racers and entertainers. We were glad of heart on a recent run where we saw many people who were well past retirement age. I swear that I saw a few guys who were over the age of seventy five! It would seem that injury and fear of pain kept me off my two wheeled enjoyment for more years than I should count. Last year I threw caution to the wind and began to push my limit to the limit. It was painful and lung breaking. There were times that I thought that I could not endure. But a pending divorce has it's gifts. A devil may care attitude spattered with specks of wisdom had me push on: never too much - never too lenient. By summer's end I was at the top end of what I like to call my "fighting weight". Not the result of some unhealthy body image, the result of knowing what ...

The Hexagram K'un / Oppression (Exhaustion) above TUI THE JOYOUS, LAKE below K'AN THE ABYSMAL, WATER The lake is above, water below; the lake is empty, dried up. Exhaustion is expressed in yet another way: at the top, a dark line is holding down two light lines; below, a light line is hemmed in between two dark ones. The upper trigram belongs to the principle of darkness, the lower to the principle of light. Thus everywhere superior men are oppressed and held in restraint by inferior men. The Judgment OPPRESSION. Success. Perseverance. The great man brings about good fortune. No blame. When one has something to say, It is not believed. Times of adversity are the reverse of times of success, but they can lead to success if they befall the right man. When a strong man meets with adversity, he remains cheerful despite all danger, and this cheerfulness is the source of later successes; it is that stability which is stronger than fate. He who lets his s...

 THE SCOTSMAN & THE TAOIST  I laughed at this one! I am the Scotsman. I am the Taoist. How beautiful the mutual arising!

Statistics proved right when one out of our fifteen chicks turned out to have a rooster lurking in their midst. He is now learning to crow. He's beginning to pester the hens. And you can tell by the glint in his eye and the proud strut when he walks, that he is really beginning to believe that he is the, "Cock of the block. Wrong! Can you say, "The circle of life?" Ahem. Pot - Bound!!! My old friend, "Chick" gave me a handful of sticks a year ago last fall and told me to stick a spade into the ground; opening a gap just wide enough to shove the stick into the smiling slit of earth. Last year I saw sprouts spring begin to spring up as the sticks themselves just dried up and fell away. This being the second year, I am getting a few helpings of raspberries. These are the thorn-less variety and are planted in such a way that you can pick the nut crunch and sweet red berries from both sides of the bush. Chick died last August. He would get such glee and be ...

No work or love will flourish out of guilt, fear, or hollowness of heart, just as no valid plans for the future can be made by those who have no capacity for living now. - Alan Watts I am on a weeks vacation. This is the first vacation in over thirty four years that has not been time spent with my soon to be ex-wife. I'm still grieving over what could have been/should have been. And when I review the tale of our marriage dissolving, I often feel the observer and not a participant. It did not seem that it could go any other way. And for me to concede (once again) to that of her role of the perpetual victim and of her inability to survive without my having to conform to her "high conflict-no resolution" mind and personality, I would have surely soon turned to stone. My hollowness of heart is being replaced with love and life and hope and I'm finding that it is a painful transformation. Divorce does suck! I am reminded however that that was then: and now is now. L...

I have so much to say on the subject, but not the will... But...cut & paste I will "Flags are bits of colored cloth that governments use first to shrink-wrap people's brains and then as ceremonial shrouds to bury the dead." Arundhati Roy, author