Compassion With An Edge
This is one of the most nuts and bolts description of compassion I have encountered. It puts my idealism to the test. It is humbling. That’s a good thing for this hermit like character. So for all of us with a pulse, read on.
” There is nothing that anyone does or has done that gives you a right to dissociate from that person or to deny yourself the quality of sympathy and compassion relative to that person.
Through the play of your life, you must demonstrate the taking on of the suffering of everybody, the conditions of everybody. You must maintain your sympathy.
You must be free of this tendency to separate from others.
You are all part of the same picture. There is no individual karma, ultimately. You must transcend not only your own apparently individual destiny and tendencies, you must overcome it in the form of all others.
This is the meaning of compassion and love. This is what Enlightenment expresses.
There is no private karma, there is no personal righteousness. All are involved in the same Reality.”
-Adi Da Samraj.
Adi Da Samraj
Pass the Practicals, Please
LIke our old friend Sisyphus, it has been a time of pushing practical stones up the hill only to find more at the bottom waiting for another round of the exercise called life maintenance. This is good as it seemed like the accomplishment pipeline was clogged for awhile, so although it is not glamourous it is what we do.
Life goes on while life goes on. If I can breathe consciously, remember I am not the one who is living me now and practice aloha while driving, I consider those small victories in the over- arching practice of vulnerability and balance.
I could get more profound, wax eloquently about conditional existence, the binding nature of point of view, and the sorrows of Mother Guppy eating her own in this realm of natural disasters and wars, but the fact of the matter is, there are countless trailer loads of green waste to remove from a lot of tree trimming, the mobile mechanic is coming to repair a ruptured brake line on the Sanctuary truck, gotta go to town to pick up parts for my personal vehicle and on and on.
So I will let the eloquence rest in the department of good ideas ( next to the good intentions of working on the Sugar Cane Mill painting), call the mechanic to find out his ETA and get back to the tree limbs looking for a new home. All while remembering to stay hydrated of course. Sigh….. so practical.
Thanks for taking some LIP from me.
Bruce
Mikioi! The Website has landed!
And the Oscar for best upgraded website goes to......
Mikioi is Hawiian for “excellent work”. And as many of us know, “mahalo” means thank you.
Those words are in the right place at the right time as I want to thank my friends, Dorothy Hall and Aaron Nakagawa for their great energy, humour, and creativity in producing and polishing my website. It is complete, although not without its imperfections. Only the Art Gods are perfect and we mere mortals cannot afford to offend the Art Gods, so we throw in some imperfection for humility’s sake. That is a five dollar sentence for we’re too damn tired to fix anything else, so we all gotta live with it.
The link for the site is just under the heading of the LIP. You can go back and forth from Site to LIP. LIP to Site, Site to LIP……This is very good to know for those of you who are on vacation and are seriously bored with everything around you or have just gotten home, brain dead from the work day from hell. Regardless of how you have stumbled upon these electronic nuggets, I hope you will find some aesthetic pleasure and enjoyment as you take in the paintings or words or videos.
Thanks for taking some LIP from me,
Bruce
Klik, Klak, and the Na Pali Coast
Klik and Klak
Klik and Klak are Sun Conures. One might mistake them for avid Green Bay Packer fans, given their orange-yellow and green plumage, but they play no favorites in the NFL.
Klik and Klak know two speeds. Quiet and loud. Really loud. So loud in fact, it would put any Cheesehead to shame.
They were quite cute the other morning as I snuck into their Conure Condo on the Sanctuary to feed them just as the sun was coming up.
It was cold, they were cuddled together in their fleece camper shell and simply voiced some chortling to let me know they were as affectionate as ever but I was nuts if I expected them to get out of bed so early.
Normally their breakfast is served an hour or so after the sun comes up but I wanted to get an early start on the day as it was time to play hooky. A rare occasion in the life of an overly responsible fellow such as myself. Taurus rising after all.
It has been a dry winter, outside of the deluge we experienced a couple of months ago, and it was a perfect day to take a hike on the Na Pali coast with a visiting friend.
So off we went and got to the trail head on the legendary North Shore of Kauai, arriving at a decent hour.
The ancient Hawaiians used this trail as the only way into the interior valleys they inhabited. And after hiking a portion of the trail they earned my complete respect. What a royal pain in the ass of a trail. Beautiful— way beautiful, as the botanical garden covered mountains sheer into an aquatic world of relentless waves. Land, sky and water all joined together to take away your mind. But really you don’t have much mind because it takes so much energy to go up the trail, down the trail, big steps, slippery steps, tree roots, a drop off here and there, and oh did I tell you it was a dry day so it was perfect hiking? Man, the Ancients most definitely did not run down to Blockbusters to rent a movie at the drop of a hat. I can just see it…… “Kimo, Honey….would you go down to cousin Anuhea’s and borrow a cup of taro flour?….. It’s only ten miles and it’s just a light drizzle. If you really loved me you would do it.” Kimo the bachelor made the right decision I want to tell you.
Lotsa people taking the Ancient’s path. All sorts and types and it is wonderful that it is still possible to do so. From serious hikers, to casual strollers, hiking boots to bare feet, barely moving to one gal running at a dog trot wearing a skimpy bikini and looking like a South American distance runner. I was happy for her there were no mosquitoes out.
If you visit Kauai, definitely check it out. Pace yourself or don’t, but whatever you do, bring your ibuprofen. I believe the Hawaiian word for that is hoʻokāpuhi, which translates to “wise”.
Thanks for taking some lip from me,
Bruce
Czopek was here......
It All Started Here
There are a few spiders in the “studio” corner of my oh so spacious bedroom/living room/library that are a bit miffed tonight as I dusted the place down and did an initial sketch of the next painting, “It All Started Here”. It will be of the first sugar cane mill on Kauai by Poipu. Sweet.
It is good for the spiders to keep up some form of nomadic culture and it is even better for me to get started on another chapter in the book of color, composition and balance.
The mythical reworked Bruce Czopek Fine Art web site is stumbling across the finish line and will be here soon. I do not lie….. trust me….. soon…… really. I’ll let you know. In the meantime, chew on some sugar cane.
Thanks for taking some LIP from me,
Bruce
Where Is It? What Is It?
Coming soon to a synapse near you….. free associative writing.
Please know I enjoy writing, I would do it even if there weren’t a dozen or so faithful LIP fans out there clamoring for the latest installment on the seeming chaos of this life in progress…..
……Ah, now I know what I want to write about. Forgive me, there was no idea present when the fingers started tickling the keyboard. But there is some rumbling inside this cranial chamber. I know it will come forward soon…….okay.
…….You don’t know what a single thing is. That is right, sorry for the inconvenience, but it is true. You can know all about something, all the characteristics, composition of, describe it to the nth degree with all sorts of factoids, but at the end of it all, you don’t know what it IS. What is IS.
Who says since something has discrete edges, that it is a separate entity, that those edges mark a boundary? “What?”, you say…. “It’s obvious, everyone knows that”. Hah! the “know” word. Man, do we get into trouble with that one.
Some things are instinctual. One does not step out in front of a bus because empirically it is proven that isn’t a sound idea. But you still don’t know what a bus IS. It and all density past the form of light is arising in the midst of infinity to your perception -a fractalized pattern of light bouncing off the inside back wall of a gelatinous orb that sits inside your skull. Gimme a break. It’s all just denser versions of chaos. Just because this process repeats itself doesn’t mean there is an order to it all! While we’re at it….if you’ve got infinity on one side and infinity on the other side….can you please tell me where the middle is? And don’t point to yourself and say “Here!”.
What is a “you” anyway? Just a sense of separateness generated by an overstimulated nervous system. Face it- You just don’t know what anything IS!
I heard a great story once about two highly esteemed Tibetan Buddhist monks, Chogyam Trungpa Rinpoche and Dilgo Khyentse Rinpoche. It was in France, they were sitting together apart from their students, having a grand old-time, talking and laughing their respected Tibetan asses off. One of their students who just had to eavesdrop on the conversation, snuck up to within earshot. She reported that she heard one of the Rinpoches, say to the other as he pointed at a tree…..”And they call that a tree!!!!” , followed by another burst of hilarious laughter. They got it…… and the fact there wasn’t any ground underneath them to stand on in a knowledgeable way was not disconcerting, just the opposite.
I have taken some high Dharmic teachings and reduced them to street talk and I ask forgiveness for wielding such a clumsy stick in short order. Indeed, there are far more eloquent discourses about this. Some will break your heart in a good way, as you are brought to a point of realizing your are defending a ghost but you don’t know how not to do just that- yet still you profoundly intuit there is much more going on than said ghost. That is when it get’s really raw and humble and juicy.
It is a jumping off place of release that doesn’t end in a crash landing. It is, in fact a point or place where you constantly jump off. Lo and behold, there is an Intelligence, not based on knowing but on Being that comes forward, waving a flame of compassionate light that illumines your way along a path of not knowing. It is demanding, nurturing, forceful and gentle. It asks everything and gives everything – an exchange resulting in a radical change of perception. You don’t know what THAT is either. But believe me, it just doesn’t matter.
Thanks for taking some LIP from me,
Bruce
The New Years Free Association Game
Ten sessions of Rolfing are completed just in time for the New Year to start. I “graduated” a few days ago, noticeably straighter in posture, more aware of certain linkages in the muscular information highway, and able to hold my own in any La Maz class after serious resort to deep breathing and only occasional screaming. Well, no screaming actually, but all I can say is- beware session seven. Your life will never be the same.
Now the body remembers mo betta what it is like to let gravity do much of the work of keeping itself straight. Maybe next up is my guest appearance on the dance reality show my friends religiously gather for. Dance TV I call it. Think dance and American Idol combined and you’ve got it. Some impressive stuff goes on there I am told. However, I will let my impressive moves be reserved for the neighborhood as I go for daily walks, the Ida Rolf way- Fred “Kapaa” Astaire in flip flops.
And now we are walking into the New Year. Last year is last year and not a moment too soon, thank you very much. There are only so many lessons one can have impressed on the body mind during the course of 365 days and nights.
There are a few moments I would like back in order to redo, but regrets are constipating, ergo not worth visiting. Better to fall forward into the New Year, too young and innocent to harbor regrets.
What do you want from your new year? I don’t think that is too much to ponder. I however draw the line at resolutions which are only a few consonants and vowels away from regrets when they don’t manifest.
However, in the spirit of the New Year, and like a dog, riveted on his owners dinner plate, I am ever hopeful the universe will grant morsels of satisfying growth and self understanding and happiness. Not just for myself but for our global village.
So I ask again, what do you want from your new year? No need to write me unless you simply have to. There is something to say for intention though and one can’t make use of intention unless there is some direction for it to be applied to. So feel it out and don’t let your doubt mind get in the way of heart-feeling. If that is operative there is a chance to go past illusory confusion and tap into a reservoir of hereto unknown pathways you may just have to go down.
I’ve got an idea…… sit down across with someone and play “New Years Free Association”. The key here is not to think. Just look at someone and say the first thing that comes into your mind that might be in the arena of want you want from the New Year. It might be better just to start off with free association shorthand, keeping it down to just two words: More this, less that, be this, give this, learn that, world peace, more food, less hunger,play marbles,make babies, space voyage, kayak trip, lose weight, gain weight, don’t know, find direction, better eyesight, eye exercises,get laid, not me, run for congress, establish a food bank, make bundles of money to give away, get to know your inner stock broker, finish the gawl dang website!!!!…… See? We are already growing into more than two worded intention. Free association at it’s finest. It is important to answer your partner back right away and not get lost in the brain closet. So let er rip. It could get scary, and you might end up somewhere in a neighborhood you never knew existed. But you have the whole rest of the year to find your way out. And hey- you might just not want to leave there anyway.
thanks for taking some LIP from me,
Bruce
May All Be Blessed
MAY EVERYONE AND ALL BE BLESSED. MAY EVERYONE AND ALL KNOW THEY ARE BLESSED.
Happy New Year One and All.
with love,
Bruce
