posted May 30, 2008 02:18 AM              

-- Adeline Cullen Ray

All that is good belongs to you. Release anything unlike love.

A thousand half-loves must be forsaken to take one whole heart home.
Rumi

An insult is a boon to the sage.
Lao Tse

Anger is fear under pressure
Mary (Carla Gordan)

posted May 30, 2008 10:53 PM              

I don't give a damn for a man that can only spell a word one way.

It ain't what you don't know that gets you into trouble. It's what you know for sure that just ain't so.

It is not best that we should all think alike; it is a difference of opinion that makes horse races.

Don't let schooling interfere with your education.

Don't part with your illusions. When they are gone, you may still exist, but you have ceased to live.

Get your facts first, then you can distort them as you please.

Forgiveness is the fragrance that the violet sheds on the heel that has crushed it.

Ideally a book would have no order to it, and the reader would have to discover his own.

The rule is perfect: in all matters of opinion our adversaries are insane.

Man is the only animal that blushes - or needs to.

The Public is merely a multiplied "me."

posted June 01, 2008 12:08 AM              

Good motives, sincerity, and infinite love can conquer the world. One single soul possessed of these virtues can destroy the dark designs of millions of hypocrites and brutes.

The highest ideal is eternal and entire self-abnegation, where there is no 'I', but is Thou'.

posted June 01, 2008 12:34 AM              

Therapy of the soul takes seriously the medieval philosophical notion that the soul is what makes us human, and it doesn't easily dismiss human problems and foibles as diseases to be cured, but sees them as necessary, if painful, ingredients in a fully human life.

Ancient literature makes a distinction between the soul and the spirit, and this important consideration, foreign in many ways to common thinking, has been developed in creative ways by C.C. Jung and especially James Hillman. Although the issue is subtle and complicated, in general terms we can see spirit as focused on transcending the limits of our personal, time-bound, concrete life. The spirit is fascinated by the future, wants to know the meaning of everything, and would like to stretch, if not break altogether, the laws of nature through technology or prayer. It is full of ideals and ambition, and is a necessary, rewarding, and inspiring aspect of human life.

The soul is, as Jung says, the "archetype of life," embedded in the details of ordinary, everyday experience. In the spirit, we try to transcend our humanity; in the soul, we try to enter our humanity fully and realize it completely. Egged on by spiritual ambition, a person might imitate the old saints and go into the desert or the forest to be cleansed and discover a higher level of consciousness. Full of soul, a person might endure the highs and lows of family life, marriage, and work, motivated by a compassionate and hungry heart.

Wondering about the soul, seeking adequate language for it, wanting definition and insight, all mark the beginning of the process of bringing soul to life. Care of the soul begins in the felt acknowledgment of its reality and importance. The soul becomes more present as we consider it in our conversation, writing, meditating, and the thoughtful living of our everyday lives.

In a culture largely driven in spiritual directions - evolving, growing, changing - the concerns of the soul may well appear slight and soft. Giving genuine attention to the soul, we may find ourselves somewhat at odds with the world around us. The soul finds value in dependency, the past, intimacy, a slow pace, and sometimes even regression. Introducing soul to modern life may appear at first glance to be a quiet, unobtrusive work, but because the soul has such deep roots in personal and social life and its values run so contrary to modern concerns, caring for the soul may well turn out to be a radical act, a challenge to accepted norms.

The soul is deep and attention to it is often simple, and yet is the source of our passions, our identity, and our vitality. Acknowledging its primacy for the first time, we may find that we have opened Pandora's box and let loose all the debris of a fully engaged, vibrant human life....

~ Thomas Moore, The Education of the Heart

The soul sees by means of affliction. Those who are most dependent upon imagination for their work -- poets, painters, fantasts -- have not wanted their pathologizing degraded into "the unconscious" and subjected to clinical literalism... The crazy artist, the daft poet, and the mad professor are neither romantic clichés nor antibourgeois poseurs. They are metaphors for the intimate relation between pathologizing and imagination. Pathologizing processes are a source of imaginative work, and the work provides a container for the pathologizing process... The wound and the eye are one and the same. From the psyche's viewpoint, pathology and insight are not opposites -- as if we hurt because we have no insight and when we gain insight we shall no longer hurt. No. Pathologizing is itself a way of seeing; the eye of the complex gives the peculiar twist called "psychological insight".

'To be healed' is that goal which takes one into therapy, and we are healed of that goal when we recognize it as a fiction. Now the goal as fiction has become a psychic reality, become a psychic reality itself, so that indeed the way did become the goal. This deliteralized method of healing, so ironic, slippery, paradoxical, that seems to fulfill and defeat our striving at the same time (as if the two senses of 'want' suddenly conjoin), bespeaks the mercurial consciousness of Hermes, Guide of Souls, Guide of Ways.... Goals, especially the highest and finest, work like overvalued ides, the roots of delusions that nourish great canopies of sheltering paranoia, those spreading ideals of size and import which characterize the positive goals of so many schools of therapy today. We see enough of the disastrous effect of goals in daily life, where the belief in an overriding idea about one's purpose in life, what one has to do, the raison d'être for one's existence turns out to be the very goal which blocks the way.

~ James Hillman, Re-Visioning

I remember when I was at Oxford saying to one of my friends as we were strolling round Magdalen's narrow bird-haunted walks one morning in the year before I took my degree, that I wanted to eat of the fruits of all the trees in the garden of the world, and that I was going out into the world with that passion in my soul. And so, indeed, I went out, and so I lived. My only mistake was that I confined myself so exclusively to the trees of what seemed to me the sunlit side of the garden, and shunned the other side for its shadow and its gloom. Failure, disgrace, poverty, sorrow, despair, suffering, tears even, the broken words that come from lips in pain, remorse that makes one walk on thorns, conscience that condemns, self-abasement that punishes, the misery that puts ashes on its head, the anguish that chooses sackcloth for its raiment and into its own drink puts gall: - all these were things of which I was afraid. And as I had determined to know nothing of them, I was forced to taste each of them in turn, to feed on them, to have for a season, indeed, no other food at all.

I don't regret for a single moment having lived for pleasure. I did it to the full, as one should do everything that one does. There was no pleasure that I did not experience. I threw the pearl of my soul into a cup of wine. I went down the primrose path to the sound of flutes. I lived on honeycomb. But to have continued the same life would have been wrong because it would have been limiting. I had to pass on. The other half of the garden had its secrets for me also.

~ Oscar Wilde, De Profundis

Who is going up the mountain?... Is the one ascending the puer aeternus, the winged godlike imago in us each, the beautiful boy of spirit -- Icarus on the way to the sun, then plummeting with waxen wings; Phaethon driving the sun's chariot out of control, burning up the world; Bellerophon, ascending on his white winged horse, then falling onto the plains of wandering, limping ever after? These are the puer high climbers, the heaven stormers, whose eros reflects the torch and ladder of Eros and his searching arrow, a longing for higher and further and more and puer and better. Without this archetypeal component affecting our lives, there would be no spiritual drive, no new sparks, no going beyond the given, no grandeur and sense of personal destiny.

So, psychologically, and perhaps spiritually as well, the issue is one of finding connections between the puer's drive upward and the soul's clouded, encumbering embrace...

The anima, "the archetype of life", as Jung has called her, is that function of the psyche which is its actual life, the present mess it is in, its discontent, dishonesties, and thrilling illusions, together with the whitewashing hopes for a better outcome. The issues she presents are as endless as the soul is deep, and perhaps these very endless labrynthine "problems" are its depth...

The spirit asks that the psyche helps it, not break it or yoke it or put it away as a peculiarity or insanity. And it asks the analysts who act in psyche's name not to turn the soul against the puer adventure but rather to prepare the desire of both for each other.

~ Hillman, Peaks and Vales

The power I possess is sex, passion, love,
which you mortals, in honoring me,
celebrate in your diverse ways.
I'm no less the darling of Heaven.
I am the goddess Aphrodite...
Now this young man, alone
among his contemporaries,
says freely I am a despicable goddess.
Marriage is anathema to him,
he goes to bed with no girl.
The goddess he adores is Artemis, a virgin,
Apollo's sister, the daughter of Zeus.
Our young friend thinks her
kind of divinity the most exhilarating.
In the pale green forests they are inseparable,
they drive their killer hounds until the wild life,
squirrels as well as stags, is extinct.
Such a friendship between human and god
is a remarkable event --
I would not deny him this happiness.
I have no reason to.
It's purely his offenses against me
which I resent and will punish -- today.

~ Euripides, Hippolytos

You can see the beauty of Christ in each individual person, in that which is most his, most human, most personal to him, in things which an ascetic might advise him sternly to get rid of.

~ Thomas Merton, Conjectures of a Guilty Bystander

posted June 01, 2008 03:20 AM              

peaceful, loving wonder of feeling
for All that was
and how All was connected
to this Now.

I saw
3 Sleeping faces
in the deep-night clouds.
(fore-front, twinkling Stars)

The One on the left,

Noble, Pensive, open.

the One in the middle,

Stern, Forbidding

the One on the right,

soft Neanderthal...misty;

mystery, fading.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=i4gBI94aWGY

posted June 01, 2008 04:08 AM              

(Although I still think you can do better than Osho.)

You probably already see most of the things I think to show you.

I wish I had "Sun trine Moon".

Is it luck?

Or a lot of hard work?

Or a lot of no-work?

Or maybe all of the above?

posted June 01, 2008 03:40 PM              

That which does not die cannot live. For life and death are the obverse and reverse of the same coin. Life is another name for death, and death for life. One particular mode of manifestation is what we call life; another particular mode of manifestation of the same thing is what we call death. When the wave rises on the top it is life; and when it falls into the hollow it is death. If anything is beyond death, we naturally see it must also be beyond life. I must remind you of the first conclusion that the soul of man is part of the cosmic energy that exists, which is God. We now find that it is beyond life and death. You were never born, and you will never die. What is this birth and death that we see around us? This belongs to the body only, because the soul is omnipresent. "How can that be?" you may ask. "So many people are sitting here, and you say the soul is omnipresent?" What is there, I ask, to limit anything that is beyond law, beyond causation? This glass is limited; it is not omnipresent, because the surrounding matter forces it to take that form, does not allow it to expand. It is conditioned by everything around it, and is, therefore, limited. But that which is beyond law, where there is nothing to act upon it, how can that be limited? It must be omnipresent. You are everywhere in the universe. How is it then that I am born and I am going to die, and all that? That is the talk of ignorance, hallucination of the brain. You were neither born, nor will you die. You have had neither birth, nor will have rebirth, nor life, nor incarnation, nor anything. What do you mean by coming and going! All shallow nonsense. You are everywhere. Then what is this coming and going? It is the hallucination produced by the change of this fine body which you call the mind. That is going on. Just a little speck of cloud passing before the sky. As it moves on and on, it may create the delusion that the sky moves. Sometimes you see a cloud moving before the moon, and you think that the moon is moving. When you are in a train you think the land is flying, or when you are in a boat, you think the water moves. In reality you are neither going nor coming, you are not being born, nor going to be reborn; you are infinite, ever-present, beyond all causation, and ever-free. Such a question is out of place, it is arrant nonsense. How could there be mortality when there was no birth?

One step more we will have to take to come to a logical conclusion. There is no half-way house. You are metaphysicians, and there is no crying quarter. If then we are beyond all law, we must be omniscient, ever-blessed; all knowledge must be in us and all power and blessedness. Certainly. You are the omniscient, omnipresent being of the universe. But of such beings can there be many? Can there be a hundred thousand millions of omnipresent beings? Certainly not. Then what becomes of us all? You are only one; there is only one such Self, and that One Self is you. Standing behind this little nature is what we call the Soul. There is only One Being, One Existence, the ever-blessed, the omnipresent, the omniscient, the birthiess, the deathless. "Through His control the sky expands, through His control the air breathes, through His control the sun shines, and through His control all live. He is the Reality in nature, He is the Soul of your soul, nay, more, you are He, you are one with Him." Wherever there are two, there is fear, there is danger, there is conflict, there is strife. When it is all One, who is there to hate, who is there to struggle with? When it is all He, with whom can you fight? This explains the true nature of life; this explains the true nature of being. This is perfection, and this is God. As long as you see the many, you are under delusion. "In this world of many he who sees the One, in this ever-changing world he who sees Him who never changes, as the Soul of his own soul, as his own Self, he is free, he is blessed, he has reached the goal." Therefore know that thou art He; thou art the God of this universe, "Tat Tvam Asi" (That thou art). All these various ideas that I am a man or a woman, or sick or healthy, or strong or weak, or that I hate or I love or have a little power, are but hallucinations. Away with them! What makes you weak? What makes you fear? You are the One Being in the universe. What frightens you? Stand up then and be free. Know that every thought and word that weakens you in this world is the only evil that exists. Whatever makes men weak and fear is the only evil that should be shunned. What can frighten you? If the suns come down, and the moons crumble into dust, and systems after systems are hurled into annihilation, what is that to you? Stand as a rock; you are indestructible. You are the Self, the God of the universe. Say--"I am Existence Absolute, Bliss Absolute, Knowledge Absolute, I am He," and like a lion breaking its cage, break your chain and be free for ever. What frightens you, what holds you down? Only ignorance and delusion; nothing else can bind you. You are the Pure One, the Ever-blessed.

posted June 01, 2008 10:27 PM              

If the "looking" smilie is for me and you are wondering why I am ignoring you, it's because you asked me to awhile back.

Remember?

You called me a b****, and one of the most arrogant, narrow-minded, ungiving and unforgiving people you know. You asked me to stay out of your threads, to stop throwing wrenches and stones in your path (which I wasnt), that I was standing in the way of your happiness. You said you are tired of trying to like me. That your plan was to stop pretending to like me. So I dont understand why you are here in this thread addressing me.

I'm respecting your wishes, happily.

Peace to you brother.

posted June 02, 2008 12:53 AM            

Reaction is always kept at a bare minimum, because Scorpio's art is to probe your nature and motives relent­lessly, while remaining inscrutable himself, and he's an ex­pert at it.

It's important to remember that there is a particular type of Scorpio who moves and speaks rather quickly, and appears to have an open, friendly manner. Look deeply into his eyes and really think about some of his past actions, his true behavior. He's really just playing a game with all his happy talk. Inside, he's as tough and determined as the more typical, poised Pluto people. Perhaps he's even a shade more dangerous because his disguise is better, and he fools you more easily. Start treating him as Chariie-nice-guy, who's completely harmless, and you may be courting some trouble. Be on guard with all Scorpios. I don't mean they're wicked. They're just not soft or naive.

Scorpio naturally at­tracts either fiercely loyal and dedicated admirers, or en­vious and spiteful enemies. But even the latter give him grudging respect, and you'll notice they're careful not to challenge him openly. The examples of the few who did are vivid and painful reminders that caution is required in an attack against Scorpio and his planet, Pluto. Remem­ber that Pluto rules nuclear power.

The bull seldom rushes forward to stomp on your toes. He simply wants to be left alone. Don't disturb him and he'll remain contented. Press him and he becomes obstinate. Shove too hard, tease too much, and be prepared for violent rage. He can go for months and years on end. exhibiting perfect poise and control, inhaling the fragrance of the posies and ignoring the nervous clacking and cluck­ing all around him. Then some unexpected day, a pushy person will pile one straw too many on his broad back. He'll snort, begin to paw the earth, narrow his eyes-and charge. Get out of the way as fast as you can and run for your life. The Taurean temper is seldom displayed impulsively, but when the bull gets mad, he can destroy everything in his path, up to and including Scorpios. Destroy is not the right word. Demolish is better. It may be some time before the dust settles and peace reigns again. Some Taureans have such control that they only charge once or twice in a whole lifetime. Even the quick-tempered ones won't erupt more than once or twice a year, if that often. Still, it's best to remember that Taurus usually doesn't get just a little mad or annoyed. If the incident is large enough to rock his normally placid emotions, you can count on blind fury, no ordinary anger.

And so she went on taking first one side

and then another and making quite a conversation of

it altogether...

She generally gave herself very good advice (though she seldom followed it) ...

~ by Linda Goodman

posted June 02, 2008 01:17 AM              

quote:

---

Hi Steve,
If the "looking" smilie is for me and you are wondering why I am ignoring you, it's because you asked me to awhile back.

Remember?

---

I do remember, but I'm trying my best to forget, if you know what I mean. I'm sure you have said things in anger before, that you wish you could take back. Still, I dont see where I asked you to ignore me; only to stop writing emails to me, "throwing wrenches in my spokes", and "placing stones in my path". What I remember more clearly was making an apology to you. That fell on dead air, or deaf ears, but even then I still felt like reconciling. Most recently, I "remember" humbling myself and giving you a compliment in this thread. I was under the mistaken impression that you wanted to move on, too, and start over. I thought maybe it was some Taurean thing; of not wanting to spell it out (words being cheap), and just giving it time to heal and see what happens. I respected that. But I guess I misread your signals. Sorry. In any case, you have not exactly been ignoring me. You responded to me in this very thread - until I gave you a compliment; only then did you become mysteriously silent and decide to start respecting what, I guess, you took to be my wishes. So, maybe you can see how I would misread your signals? We can blame it on MercuryRx, I suppose.

quote:

---

You called me a b****, and one of the most arrogant, narrow-minded, ungiving and unforgiving people you know. You asked me to stay out of your threads, to stop throwing wrenches and stones in your path (which I wasnt), that I was standing in the way of your happiness. You said you are tired of trying to like me. That your plan was to stop pretending to like me. So I dont understand why you are here in this thread addressing me.

---

Let's just say, I feel ambivalent towards you, and you tend to awaken strong reactions in me, one way or another. I dont really think of you in those terms - to be honest, I really dont know what to make of you much of the time. Certainly, a few sentences blurted out at the height of anger, after several days of conflict (and at least two days of sincerely struggling to be diplomatic), and after being told "F-CK YOU!" (while we're laying it all on the table here) and that I have "mars dribbling down my chin" (as opposed to spewing out of my mouth, like old saint jwhop, i guess?), dont exactly do justice to my full opinion of you. I think you have your flaws, as we all do. Yet, even inspite of some powerfully uncomfortable reactions to you, I still consider the things I like about you as more compelling, in the final analysis.

I was hoping we could move on, and try to be reconciliatory, since we both like to post here so much, and I doubt either of us wants to tip-toe around the other. Our philosophies do seem to clash at times, but that is part of what makes it interesting, at least, for me. Perhaps it was careless of me to post on this thread. Or maybe I should have posted things that were more in line with the topic. I can see how you might interpret my responses as antagonistic (and, indeed, they were intended to be provocative), but, at the time, I was under the impression we had moved on, and there was a different atmosphere between us. Even so, it seems careless of me now, to post in this thread as I did. I'm sorry for that.

quote:

---

I'm respecting your wishes, happily.

Peace to you brother.

---

Whatever you think is best.

If you think we ought to avoid direct (and/or indirect) communication,
I will respect that; for all I know, it is the wise course.
But I did think that we could give it another shot.
I realize we dont exactly "know" each other, but,
still, you have been more than a fixture in my life for a few years now.
Maybe its all the fixed energy in my chart, but,
its hard for me to forget all the warmth I see in you,
and feel towards you, just because of one immature episode.
I never had to try to like you; that was just a mean thing to say.
The kernal of truth there is just that I've been impatient at times with you,
or felt that you were too impatient with me, or something.

Sorry to go into all this, and make such a big deal of it.
I realize I'm a very minor player in your life,
and you probably arent losing any sleep over this stuff.
Its just my way to want to deal with all these things.
Maybe its a Scorpio thing, or just something stupid.
I dont really know.

But, for the record, I think you are a beautiful person,
and I really am sorry for dumping those words on you.
If I could take them back, I would.
That is not who I am or who I want to be.
Anyway, I really did mean it when I apologized,
and when I said that about your "Sun trine Moon".
I do envy that aspect, and what it reflects of your character.
Maybe it seems presumptuous of me to think I have anything
to show you, or anybody, but that is really just how my mind works.
I think it is the Aqua Moon. I often come across things in my reading
that remind me of someone I know, and seem like they might be useful to them,
and then I just go ahead and show it to them.
I guess I ought to focus more on my own lessons,
and not try to get in everyone else's head so much,
but this focus on others is often overwhelming in me.
Which is not to say that I'm not totally oblivious to others
in ways that are extremely important, etc....

Sorry to go on and on about it.
I just think there is a lot of room
for misunderstanding between you and I,
and, for whatever reason, good or bad,
its hard for me to be detached from that.

If you would like to discuss this in private,
I would like to invite you to write to me; clean slate.
If not, then, I will do my best to respect that too;
to try to steer clear of you somewhat from now on,
and allow you to move on in your own way.
I really dont mean that in any backhanded way.
I think this is just a matter of personal choice.
I just want to smooth things over and make things cool.

posted June 02, 2008 01:29 AM              

quote:

---

It's important to remember that there is a particular type of Scorpio who moves and speaks rather quickly, and appears to have an open, friendly manner. Look deeply into his eyes and really think about some of his past actions, his true behavior. He's really just playing a game with all his happy talk. Inside, he's as tough and determined as the more typical, poised Pluto people.

---

This seems misleading to me.

I'm more than a Scorpio.

I'm lots of things.

I'm complex.

Often, I'm as innocent (naive?) and lacking in guile as anybody.

I dont think its fair to isolate a few of my past actions,
and conclude that this is "my true behavior".

Perhaps thats just Linda's Aries Sun,
trying to reduce everything to a soundbite?

It seems that anyone who knows me knows that I am many things.

By all means, keep my shadow in mind,
but dont imagine that it discredits my light.

I am careful to show many sides of myself.

To some, it may seem like two-facedness,
but really it is an effort to conceal nothing.

I show my shadow, and I show my light.

And I trust you to take me as I am; as the whole that I am.

love to you,
s