The Guidelines - (a repost)

(with great thanks to Diane Duane for her interpretation of Surak) Ideally, do no harm.

Harm speeds up the heat death of the Universe and indirectly, your own.  More practically, do as little harm as possible. We are creatures of a Universe in which entropy exists,and therefore see no way of escape,but we do not need to help it.

Harm no one’s internal, invisible, integrities.  Leave others the privacy of their own minds and lives.Intimacy remains precious only insofar as it is inviolate:Invading it turns it to torment.

Reach out to others courteously; accept their reaching in the same way, with careful hands.

Do no murder: The spear in the Other's Heart is the spear in your own; You are he. All action has reaction: What force you inflict inevitably returns. The murder of the other is the murder of your own joy, Forever.

As far as possible do not kill; Can you give life again to what you kill? Then be slow to take life. Take only life that will not notice you taking it. To notice one’s own death increases entropy. To die and not notice it increases it less,but still does so. 

Cast out fear.

Cast out hate and rage.

Cast out greed and envy.

Cast out all emotion that speeds entropy,whether it be love or hatred. Cast out these emotions by using reason to accept them,and then move past them.

Use in moderation emotions that do not speed entropy,taking all care that they do not cause others pain,for that speeds entropy as well. Master your passions,so that they become a force for the slowing of the heat death.

Do no harm to those that harm you. Offer them peace, and offer them peace again,and do it until you die. In this way, you will have peace,one way or the other,even if they kill you. And you cannot give others what you have not experienced yourself.

Learn reason above all.  Learn clear thought;learn to know what IS from what it seems to be,and what you Wish to be. This is the key to everything:the truth of reality, the reality of truth. 

What IS will set you free.

paraphrased from and all original copyright to:

Diane Duane;

Spok's World©

-Diane Duane-

with utmost thanks for her interpretation of some of the Universe’s Fundamental truths.

A Quote

"When religion and politics travel in the same cart, the riders believe nothing can stand in their way. Their movement becomes headlong, faster and faster, and they forget that the precipice does not show itself to a man in a blind rush, until it is too late."

- Frank Herbert

- Dune

This Pisses Me Off

Reference posts: THURSDAY, JULY 28, 2011 AND THURSDAY, JUNE 30, 2011

This:

Facebook treats you like a lab rat || By David Goldman

bothers me. I have no issue with A/B tests in general. I know what they are and what they are used for. I'm...o-k with that, basically.

This is playing with peoples inner selves, and it violates one of the most basic tenets of cthia:

"Harm no one’s internal, invisible, integrities.

Leave others the privacy of their own minds and lives.

Intimacy remains precious only insofar as it is inviolate:

Invading it turns it to torment."

In a nutshell? It's wrong!! As in, morally offensive to anyone with a conscience. Not as in, incorrect, although arguments could be made for that as an interpretation as well.

I'm gonna go stew for a while...

Zachary Quinto Official Website - Blog - 10.16.11. nyc...

Zachary Quinto Official Website - Blog - 10.16.11. nyc...

Cast out fear.

Cast out fear.

Now, don’t misunderstand. When I say “Cast out fear”, I do not mean pretending we are not afraid.

Pretending there is not a python in your living room will not make it go away if there is one. First you have to accept that it is there. Once you have done that, then you can grab a phone and call the animal control people and have them come and remove it. But until you first set aside that fear, and say to yourself, “There is a python in my living room.”, there will be a python in the house every night.

And your bed will be increasingly crowded.

Thus, we must first cast out fear.

We have to be able to look that which we fear right in the eye and say to it, I am afraid.  

Is there really anything you would rather do less?

Would you really want to look your enemy in the eye and say  I am afraid.

Of course not. Because, at that moment, you are at your most vulnerable.

But that is the point we must reach, because just beyond that point of fundamental vulnerability, lies the leap to true power. It is at this moment that we are connected with it all, and for a brief few seconds, it all makes perfect sense. And we realize that that moment is the most powerful in our lives.

From here we can accomplish  anything.

paraphrased from and all original copyright to:

Diane Duane;

Spok's World©

-Diane Duane-

with utmost thanks for her interpretation of some of the Universe’s Fundamental truths.

What is Canada becoming? Canada 's tolerance misplaced?

Calgary Herald Article

An excellent read!

Mahfooz Kanwar, PHD, is a Sociologist and an Instructor Emeritus at Mount

Royal College.   This very wise, educated gentleman is a first generation Canadian whose parents immigrated from Pakistan .  He is also Muslim, but truly understands what it is to be Canadian first, even though he and his parents are from another country.

What is Canada becoming?   Canada 's tolerance misplaced?
By Mahfooz Kanwar, For The Calgary Herald, March   30, 2009
C Copyright (c) The Calgary Herald

Canada 's Immigration Minister Jason Kenney is getting flak from the usual suspects, but he deserves praise instead.

Recently, Kenney pointed that out while at a meeting in Toronto .  Members of Canada 's Pakistani community called on him to make Punjabi one of Canada 's official languages.  It makes me angry that such an idea would enter the minds of my fellow and former countrymen, let alone express them to a Minister of the Crown.

A few months ago, I was dismayed to learn that Erik Millett, the principal of Belleisle School in Springfield , N.B., limited playing our national anthem because the families of a couple of his students objected to it.

As a social scientist, I oppose this kind of political correctness, lack of assimilation of new immigrants to mainstream Canada , hyphenated-Canadian identity, and the lack of patriotism in our great nation.

Increasingly, Canadians feel restricted in doing things the Canadian way lest we offend minorities.  We cannot even say Merry Christmas without fear of causing offence.  It is amazing that 77 per cent of the Canadian majority
are scared of offending 23 per cent of minorities..  We have become so timid that the majority cannot assert its own freedom of expression.  We cannot publicly question certain foreign social customs, traditions and values that do not fit into the Canadian ethos of equality.  Rather than encouraging new immigrants to adjust to Canada , we tolerate peculiar ways of doing things. We do not remind them that they are in Canada , not in their original homelands.

In a multicultural society, it is the responsibility of minorities to adjust to the majority.  It does not mean that minorities have to totally amalgamate with the majority.   They can practice some of their cultural traditions within their homes -- their backstage behavior.  However, when outside of their homes, their front stage behavior should resemble mainstream Canadian behavior.  Whoever comes to Canada must learn the limits of our system. We do not kill our daughters or other female members of our families who refuse to wear hijab, niqab or burka which are not mandated by the Qur'an anyway.  We do not kill our daughters if they date the "wrong" men.  A 17-year-old Sikh girl should not have been killed in British Columbia by her father because she was caught dating a Caucasian man.

We do not practice the dowry system in Canada , and do not kill our brides because they did not bring enough dowry. Millions of female fetuses are aborted every year in India , and millions of female infants have been killed by their parents in India and China .  Thousands of brides in India are burned to death in their kitchens because they did not bring enough dowry into a marriage.  Some 30,000 Sikhs living abroad took the dowries but abandoned their brides in India in 2005. This is not accepted in Canada .

In some countries, thousands of women are murdered every year for family or religious honour.  We should not hide behind political correctness and we should expose the cultural and religious background of these heinous crimes, especially if it happens in Canada . We should also expose those who bring their cultural baggage containing the social custom of female circumcision. I was shocked when I learned about two cases of this barbaric custom practiced in St. Catharines , Ont.  a few years ago.

I have said it on radio and television, have written in my columns in The Calgary Herald, and I have written in my latest  book, Journey to Success, that I do not agree with the hyphenated  identity in Canada because it divides our loyalties. My argument is that people are not forced to come to Canada and they are not forced to stay here. Those who come here of their own volition and stay here must be truly patriotic Canadians or go back.

I am a first-generation Canadian from Pakistan .  I left Pakistan 45 years ago.  I cannot ignore Pakistan , because it is the homeland of my folks, but my first loyalty should be and is to Canada .  I am, therefore, a proud Canadian, no longer a Pakistani-Canadian.  I am a Canadian Muslim, not a Muslim Canadian.

I do not agree with those Canadians who engage in their fight against the system in their original countries on Canadian soil.  They should go back and fight from within.  For example, some of the Sikhs, Tamil Tigers, Armenians and others have disturbed the peace in Canada because of their problems back home.  Recently, a low-level leader of MQM, the Mafia of Pakistan , came to Canada as a refugee and started to organize public rallies to collect funds for their cause in Pakistan .  On July 18, 2007, the Federal Court of Canada ruled that MQM is a terrorist group led by London-based Altaf Hussain, their godfather.  As a member in the coalition government of Pakistan , this terrorist group is currently collaborating with the Taliban in Pakistan . That refugee was deported back to Pakistan .

Similarly, I disagree with newcomers who bring their religious baggage here. For example, Muslims are less than two per cent of the Canadian population, yet in 2004 and 2005, a fraction of them, the fundamentalists, wanted to
bring Sharia law to Canada . If they really want to live under Sharia, they should go to the prison-like countries where Sharia is practiced.

I once supported multiculturalism in Canada because I believed it gave us a sense of pluralism and diversity. However, I have observed and experienced that official multiculturalism has encouraged convolution of the values that make Canada the kind of place people want to immigrate to in the first place.

Here, we stand on guard for Canada , not for countries we came from.  Like it or not, take it or leave it, standing on guard only for Canada is our national maxim. Remember, O Canada is our national anthem which must not be disregarded by anybody, including the teacher in Springfield , N. B.

Mahfooz Kanwar, PHD, Is A Sociologist and an Instructor   Emeritus at Mount Royal College.
C Copyright (c) The Calgary Herald

 

The Guidelines

(with great thanks to Diane Duane for her interpretation of Surak )

Ideally, do no harm.

Harm speeds up the heat death of the Universe

and indirectly, your own.

More practically, do as little harm as possible.

We are creatures of a Universe in which entropy exists,

and therefore see no way of escape,

but we do not need to help it.

Harm no one’s internal, invisible, integrities.

Leave others the privacy of their own minds and lives.

Intimacy remains precious only insofar as it is inviolate:

Invading it turns it to torment.

Reach out to others courteously:

Accept their reaching in the same way,

With careful hands.

Do no murder:

The spear in the Others heart is the spear in your own;

You are he.

All action has reaction:

What force you inflict inevitably returns.

The murder of the other is the murder of your own joy,

Forever.

As far as possible do not kill;

Can you give life again to what you kill?

Then be slow to take life.

Take only life that will not notice you taking it.

To notice one’s own death increases entropy.

To die and not notice it increases it less,

but still does so.

Cast out fear.

Cast out hate and rage.

Cast out greed and envy.

Cast out all emotion that speeds entropy,

whether it be love or hatred.

Cast out these emotions by using reason to accept them,

and then move past them.

Use in moderation emotions that do not speed entropy,

taking all care that they do not cause others pain,

for that speeds entropy as well.

Master your passions,

so that they become a force for the slowing of the heat death.

Do no harm to those that harm you.

Offer them peace, and offer them peace again,

and do it until you die.

In this way, you will have peace,

one way or the other,

even if they kill you.

And you cannot give others what you have not experienced yourself.

Learn reason above all.

Learn clear thought;

learn to know what IS from what it seems to be,

and what you Wish to be.

This is the key to everything:

the truth of reality, the reality of truth.

What IS will set you free.

Ladies and Gentlemen,

May I humbly present to you, The Duchess of Sydney Street, The Lady, Miss Amber Flames!

Desiderata

I have always loved this piece; I remember my mom having a large black-framed copy hanging in the living room when I was a kid. I've learned since then that it's much more recent than tradition holds, but, meh! That doesn't alter it's simple wisdom. Thanks for reminding me of it DaveyWavey!

Desiderata

Go placidly amid the noise and the haste,
and remember what peace there may be in silence.

As far as possible, without surrender,
be on good terms with all persons.
Speak your truth quietly and clearly;
and listen to others,
even to the dull and the ignorant;
they too have their story.
Avoid loud and aggressive persons;
they are vexatious to the spirit.

If you compare yourself with others,
you may become vain or bitter,
for always there will be greater and lesser persons than yourself.
Enjoy your achievements as well as your plans.
Keep interested in your own career, however humble;
it is a real possession in the changing fortunes of time.

Exercise caution in your business affairs,
for the world is full of trickery.
But let this not blind you to what virtue there is;
many persons strive for high ideals,
and everywhere life is full of heroism.
Be yourself. Especially do not feign affection.
Neither be cynical about love,
for in the face of all aridity and disenchantment,
it is as perennial as the grass.

Take kindly the counsel of the years,
gracefully surrendering the things of youth.
Nurture strength of spirit to shield you in sudden misfortune.
But do not distress yourself with dark imaginings.
Many fears are born of fatigue and loneliness.

Beyond a wholesome discipline,
be gentle with yourself.
You are a child of the universe
no less than the trees and the stars;
you have a right to be here.
And whether or not it is clear to you,
no doubt the universe is unfolding as it should.

Therefore be at peace with God,
whatever you conceive Him to be.
And whatever your labors and aspirations,
in the noisy confusion of life,
keep peace in your soul.

With all its sham, drudgery, and broken dreams,
it is still a beautiful world.
Be cheerful. Strive to be happy.

I LOVE POI!!!

If the title wasn't enough to make the point, then perhaps these videos  will! I got into poi partially due to an occasional fascination with it in general, and partly due to a few friends from work who practice it (Thanks Justin and Molly!). Later, after I had been a practicing beginner for about 6 months I found a whole online community of spinners...people like Nick Woolsey from NS, (www.playpoi.com), Thomas Johansson from Nevisoul (www.nevisoul.com), Yuta,, from Japan and many, many others.


The videos below are only a small part of what continues to inspire me to practice, to get better, and also  to get into better shape (as I will have to in order to keep up with these guys, lol).


Enjoy: