Same Old Same Old

It seems the pundits and pollsters pegged this election about right. The GOP swept into power in the House and reduced the Democratic majority in the Senate to near a bare minimum. Republicans also took control of a majority of governorships. So, as some progressives predicted, has the world as we know it come to an end?

I don't know about you, but today doesn't seem that much different from yesterday. The sun came up about the same time and people are going about their routine lives. It's the same old same old.

Aah, I hear some of you say. It may not seem so different now, but just you wait two months or so, then you'll see.

See what?

When the Democrats swept into office in 2008, the buzz was that things would be different now. They would jettison all the excesses of the Bush administration. Science would trump politics. We would bring our troops home. Health care would be dramatically reformed. A new day was dawning. Hope would be turned into reality.

How's that working out? All these dramatic changes we were promised never panned out. Obama continued much of Bush's wiretapping follies and did not shutdown Guantanamo. Politics continues to trump science. Instead of bringing most of our troops home, we simply moved a good number of them to a different theater. The health care bill that passed was an embarrassment and Democrats have been no friends to labor, the environment or the millions of people being fraudulently thrown out of their homes.

Alas, the new day never dawned.

So, excuse me if I don't buy into the opposite scenario -- imminent doom. While I have no doubt the Republican-controlled House will pass some horrid legislation, that only represents one-third of the equation. If some of these draconian measures become the law of the land, then the fault still will lie with the Democrats, not the Republicans, since the former still controls 2/3 of the federal power structure.

The Tao of Dark Sages - Chapter 11, Part 4

The Tao of Dark Sages
by Scott Bradley

There is a teacher who differentiates between complete enlightenment and what he calls human adulthood. Could this be a different way of saying what you mean?

Yes, I think so. Remember when we last met in Nepal? We were discussing transcendence of self through awareness as the next step beyond becoming more fully our innate selves? This, I think, is that distinction. Becoming our innate nature is the growing process — becoming an adult human, if you like. Transcending even this self in non-dual awareness is enlightenment. The first, we can grow into, though not by way of achievement. The second, is realized in satori and we can only be open to it arising.

And realizing ‘adulthood’ is the best way to be open to the second.

Makes sense.

But isn’t it a bit silly to be discussing various ‘schools’ of thought, Sue-tzu? As if our beliefs one way or the other made any difference? The next thing you know, we’ll have established our own school and will start bashing the others.

Yes, I think you’re right. But I don’t regret having gone there — we just have to be careful not to dwell there. So, we’ve diverged quite a bit. Does anyone have anything to add to...what was our topic?

Why we are here. But can I go back to what you said about affirming the self in its totality? It’s just that I find so much in myself that I don’t like; it’s hard to envision affirming those things and saying it’s alright.

You know, Buz, I like your question and think maybe we should make it the object of our next assignment. Why don’t we all consider this problem of discontent with ourselves and how it might relate to self-affirmation and talk about it tomorrow morning. ‘Til then, enjoy.

If you're interested in reading more from this series by Scott Bradley, go here.

The Final Frontier

I still remember the day I sat with my mom in front of our old black-and-white TV to watch Neil Armstrong and Buzz Aldrin take those first historic steps on the moon. In fact, throughout my youth I rarely missed the lift-off and coverage of the Gemini and Apollo space programs.

For years, I supported the mission of NASA and thought it would be a travesty to end our exploration of space. Lately, I have changed my view completely. With all the problems we have domestically and internationally, it seems like such a waste of money and technology. Shouldn't we commit these large expenditures of funds and brainpower toward improving the lot of the vast majority on the planet we live on?

Since the beginning of human history, our species has looked to the sky for answers. Part of the reason we send spacecraft up into the heavens is that we mistakenly believe that we can find the indomitable truth out THERE somewhere. Maybe, just maybe, we can come face-to-face with our creator.

For all our efforts, we are no closer to discovering truth...because we keep looking in the wrong places.

It resides in each of us. It's there in the mysterious void in our most inner depths.

More importantly, as long as we strive to find truth, it will evade us. As long as we search, we won't find it. As long as we utilize our brains and our know-how, we won't be able to comprehend it.

Tao Bible - Joshua 23:12-13

Else if ye do in any wise go back, and cleave unto the remnant of these nations, even these that remain among you, and shall make marriages with them, and go in unto them, and they to you: Know for a certainty that the LORD your God will no more drive out any of these nations from before you; but they shall be snares and traps unto you, and scourges in your sides, and thorns in your eyes, until ye perish from off this good land which the LORD your God hath given you.
~ King James version ~

Tao requires no means test.
~ possible Taoist alternative ~

On his deathbed, Joshua tells the children of Israel that God will be on their side as long as they are devoutly on his. If they turn away from God, he will make their lives one of misery until every last one of them is dead.

Tao takes no sides. Tao is ever available for everyone, whether you acknowledge Tao or not.

If you're interested in reading more from this experimental series, go to the Tao Bible Index page.

The Enlightened Eunuch

Earlier today, while listening to my favorite rock station on the radio, I heard the DJ quote or paraphrase (not sure which one) a statement by legendary rocker Ted Nugent. It went like this:

Trying to define rock 'n roll is like trying to explain an orgasm to a eunuch!

For me, the same goes for enlightenment. It's not something one person can explain to another. It is something that each person must experience for themselves before they have as much as an inkling as to what it's all about.

What Will Really Change?

Unless the pollsters have it all wrong, the Republicans should take control of the US House of Representatives once all the votes are counted. There is an outside chance that the GOP will take control of the US Senate as well. For the sake of speculation, let's say both of this possibilities come to pass. Here's the question I would like to pose to many of you: What will really change?

Yes, I realize that many of you believe that the Republicans will pass all sorts of horrible legislation and the nation will be thrown into a nasty tailspin. In fact, some of you may think they will send us so deep into a hole that we may never recover.

But there is one variable you seem to be ignoring: The current president is a Democrat WITH veto power. Since it is highly unlike the GOP will gain enough seats to be "veto-proof", you simply need to have confidence that Mr. Obama will veto all the bad legislation that crosses his desk.

What I think has so many of you scared out of your wits is that you have very little confidence in the president in this regard. Over the first two years of his presidency, he has exhibited very little backbone. He seems to cave in at the drop of a hat. He throws in with the naysayers far too easily.

Admit it. What scares you the most is that a GOP Congress will pass draconian types of legislation and, in the interests of "bipartisanship", your guy won't fight it, but will sign it into law!

None of the Above

As it happens EVERY two years, people are coming out of the woodwork to bash people like me who refuse to vote on political candidates. We're told we should not shirk our "civic duty". We're told that voting for the "lesser evil" is nothing to be ashamed of. We're told that people who don't vote will have no room to complain later. We're told we must vote to save mom, apple pie and the whole of humanity. This same tired litany goes on and on and on.

But what if instead of referring to political candidates we were speaking of consumer products or big corporations? Many of the same people who argue that we must vote today are the very same people who support the concept of the boycott. So, what's wrong with boycotting candidates?

We've all seen this scenario before. It is discovered that a company is peddling a toxic product or the company supports some sort of draconian policy. What is the remedy that many people suggest as a way to punish the offender or to send a message to the world at large? A boycott is called. Don't buy the product, we're told. Don't support the company. Hit 'em in the pocketbook.

If two or more companies are found to be colluding in their misdeeds, many will suggest we boycott them both. If you continue to buy what they're selling, we're told, we let them off the hook. We provide no incentive for them to mend their evil ways. They ONLY way we can hope to motivate them to change course or policy is to turn away from them completely.

So, why can't this rationale be employed with our political process? Both companies -- the Democrat and Republican Parties -- are guilty of marketing an inferior product. Both are guilty of catering to wealthy special interests. Both pursue policies that are detrimental to the vast majority. Both support endless war. Both have blocked any meaning campaign finance reform. Both have helped to dismantle the social safety net.

If not buying a product or service is viewed as an incentive to motivate a company to change it's miscreant behavior, then the same principle can be applied to our political process as well. What if they held an election and no one showed up to vote? Wouldn't that send a damning message in and of itself?

Line by Line - Verse 12, Line 4

The chariot course, and the wild hunting waste Make mad the mind;

~ James Legge translation, from The Sacred Books of the East, 1891 ~

Racing and hunting madden the mind.
~ Gia-fu Feng and Jane English translation, published by Vintage Books, 1989 ~

Racing and hunting make one wild in the heart
~ Derek Lin translation, from Tao Te Ching: Annotated & Explained, published by SkyLight Paths, 2006 ~

Desire messes with your heart.
~ Ron Hogan rendition, from Beatrice.com, 2004 ~

One of the chief complaints of so many people in our modern world is that they seem to spend their days racing from one responsibility to the next. If it's not the job, it's their kids. If it's not the kids, it's their spouse/partner. If it's not the spouse/partner, it's their extended family. If it's not the extended family, it's their friends. If it's not the friends, then it's their church or civic group. Round and round they go in a constant blur of frenetic motion.

When we don't take the time to make room for ourselves, we can't catch our breath. When we don't take the time to allow for some silence and emptiness, we find that our cup runneth over.

Slow down. Take a powder. The machine that runs constantly is more apt to break down.

To view the Index page for this series to see what you may have missed or would like to read again, go here.

Easy As Pi-e

Since I have been unable to find a lot of quality word games -- my passion -- to add to my Linux system, I have added some puzzle games instead. My favorite of these is a form of computerized Mahjongg. While there are some software versions that award points, the version I have is played simply on a timed basis.

Here's the somewhat interesting part. My game comes with 9 levels of difficulty. My ability to solve puzzles the quickest are for the supposedly two most difficult ones. I am not sharing this "achievement" as a means of boasting or patting myself on the back. And the reason I certainly am not boasting is because, for the life of me, I can't solve the supposed easiest puzzle in a quick time frame! In fact, my slowest times come from the board that is supposed to be the easiest to solve.

I've encountered this same problem numerous times in life, particularly in school. What most people consider easy is next too impossible for me to comprehend. What most people seem to wrestle with, I tend to breeze right through.

I suspect this has something to do with my autistic brain, the one that views the world far differently than most people...or maybe not. I don't truly know. What I do know is that it can often be quite exasperating, at times.

Soon the Ringing Will Stop

I have been an eligible voter for 35 years. In all that time, I can't remember an election that included so many doggone recorded phone messages supporting or opposing candidates or ballot measures. In fact, both my wife and I think that we've received more political robocalls this year than in all the previous campaign seasons combined!

Just last week we received several dozen, including ten on Friday. It got to the point in which we quit answering the phone and allowed every call to go to voice mail.

Neither of us understands WHY almost every candidate and group opposing/supporting a ballot initiative thinks that these robocalls would sway a thinking person. I have never changed my opinion about a candidate or ballot measure due to anything said in an automated message, though I suppose a lot of others do (?).

Of course, after today, we will also be able to reclaim our mailbox at the post office and be able to watch TV or listen to the radio without being constantly bombarded with negative attack ads.

No wonder average folks like us have grown sick of politics. All these campaigns are enough to drive a person batty!

The Tao of Dark Sages - Chapter 11, Part 3

The Tao of Dark Sages
by Scott Bradley

Sue-tzu, what you’ve just said...it seems like it’s all that ever need be said. And yet, I want more. It’s the same like when I read Lao-tzu — I’ll read something and say, "that’s it, be that and it’s done!" — and then I turn the page and read more. You know what I’m trying to say? It’s like I see the truth of something, but just move on to the next piece of wisdom because the being of the truth seems to evade me. Is this seeking?

Sounds like seeking to me, Nellie. But I guess, too, that it’s part of the process. Understanding grows. Having thoroughly bashed seeking, let’s now affirm it: "Seek and ye shall find".

Exposure to truth, presented in various forms and media, nourishes understanding. To stop at page one because we are unable at present to absorb and be the truths it contains, would be to deny ourselves the opportunity to further nourish our understanding. And let’s not forget, all of us being unique individuals, we each one have a different path to Tao.

We each one have that unique combination of understanding and experience that ignites in us an awakening. Who knows what words or experience might bring about that sudden turning about in awareness that is awakening? For one Zen master it was watching his green phlegm slide down a wall! For another it was getting his nose twisted. For another it was overhearing someone reading a sutra. For me it was... Ha! Just kidding!

Your examples are of people who had satori experiences — sudden awakening. I’m a bit unsure where we stand in relation to this idea of sudden awakening versus gradual awakening. I have for a long time leaned toward sudden awakening since awakening cannot in any way be achieved. And I think you, too, lean in this direction. And yet, a lot of the time you seem to suggest that we can ‘grow spiritually’ — which I take to mean be gradually awakened.

Whichever way you lean, you are likely to tire and fall over, Scott-tzu! Sorry, that’s a bit glib, but I couldn’t resist. But if there is leaning then I’d have to say that I lean in both directions, which puts me in the middle standing straight with good posture, I think.

Satori is a very real possibility for us all and it comes spontaneously and without our having managed it. For that very reason, we must leave it to arise as it will. In the meantime, we grow and experience much of what satori might bring.

If you're interested in reading more from this series by Scott Bradley, go here.

Storms Are Brewing in Your Eyes

It's well known that almost anyone to the left of center isn't a big fan of one Sarah Palin. However, we're certainly not alone in our dislike of this woman. Reports are coming out that many in her own party don't like her either!! In fact, in a Sunday post on Politico.com, "Next for GOP leaders: Stopping Sarah Palin," we're told that

There is rising expectation among GOP elites that Palin will probably run for president in 2012 and could win the Republican nomination, a prospect many of them regard as a disaster in waiting.

Many of these establishment figures argue in not-for-attribution comments that Palin’s nomination would ensure President Barack Obama’s reelection, as the deficiencies that marked her 2008 debut as a vice presidential nominee — an intensely polarizing political style and often halting and superficial answers when pressed on policy — have shown little sign of abating in the past two years.

"There is a determined, focused establishment effort … to find a candidate we can coalesce around who can beat Sarah Palin," said one prominent and longtime Washington Republican. "We believe she could get the nomination, but Barack Obama would crush her."

This sentiment was a nearly constant refrain in POLITICO interviews with top advisers to the candidates most frequently mentioned as running in 2012 and a diverse assortment of other top GOP officials...

This got me to thinking of a song by Jefferson Starship. Entitled "Sara" (without the "h"), some of the lyrics seem very apropos. Aside from the line featured as the title of this post, the one that I thought really summed up the feelings of many of us is "No time is a good time for Sara[h]."

Seems to be a sentiment many people on both sides of the political aisle can agree upon!

Tao Bible - Joshua 8:2

And thou shalt do to Ai and her king as thou didst unto Jericho and her king: only the spoil thereof, and the cattle thereof, shall ye take for a prey unto yourselves: lay thee an ambush for the city behind it.
~ King James version ~

Tao does not strategize.
~ possible Taoist alternative ~

God tells Joshua of a plan to ambush the town of Ai, so that the Israelites may defeat them in battle.

Tao is. Tao has no use for strategies, drawn up plans, theories or machinations. Tao is how things work of themselves beyond all desire and meaning.

If you're interested in reading more from this experimental series, go to the Tao Bible Index page.

Question: What's Up With Ai?

In the Book of Joshua, Chapter 8 (referenced later tonight in the daily Tao Bible post), is the story of how the Israelites slaughtered the people of Ai and then burned the city to the ground. (It is interesting to note that there are no allegations in Joshua that the people of Ai had done ANYTHING against the chosen people.) Why was this city ransacked and its inhabitants murdered?

One might guess that the answer is that the Israelites wanted to possess what the people of Ai had. In this vein, one might figure the nomadic tribe wanted the land of Ai for their own. However, according to the bible, this does not turn out to be the case at all!

And Joshua burnt Ai, and made it a heap forever, even a desolation unto this day. (Verse 28)

So, it looks like they destroyed the city just for the sake of destroying the city. They simply burned it to the ground, then moved on.

What's up with that?

To see what other questions I've asked about the Christian Bible, go here.

Undue Influence

Back in my old stomping grounds of Oregon, Rep. Peter DeFazio is experiencing an unexpected challenge in his race to return to the US House of Representatives from the state's 4th district. In the past, DeFazio always has won in a walk, far outdistancing any Republican foolish enough to run against the incumbent in this bastion of liberal Oregon. This year, however, as with far too many of his fellow Democrats, DeFazio finds himself in a dogfight.

I really don't care who wins as I have no horse in this race. The reason I have mentioned the DeFazio race is because of his opponent, Art Robinson. According to Willamette Week,

The race would hardly register on anyone’s political Richter scale except for the significant amount of money being spent on Robinson’s behalf by a shadowy Washington D.C. group called Concerned Taxpayers for America. CTA has spent money opposing just two congressional candidates: Maryland Democrat Frank Kratovil and DeFazio.

CTA has spent $300,000 on ads against DeFazio, and the spending appears to be having some effect. A GOP poll last week indicated that Robinson is within six percentage points of DeFazio.

...Recently, reports were filed with the Federal Elections Commission by CTA, and its source of money is now out of the shadows. CTA has just two donors. One is a concrete firm in Maryland that apparently doesn’t like Kratovil. The other is Bob Mercer, who with his partner runs Renaissance Technologies, one of the nation’s largest hedge funds.

...Mercer most likely is spending his money in this district race, however, because DeFazio’s sponsorship of a couple of Wall Street reform bills. One in particular, H.R. 4191, specifically targets funds like Mercer’s and would charge a fee on his fund’s transactions.

This is the landscape that the Citizens United decision has bought us. Singular individuals or companies can exert undue influence on one or more political races.

The ramifications of this landmark Supreme Court decision are only beginning to be felt. I'm more than confident that the landscape will get more gruesome as time marches forward.

Let's say you are a person of "means" and you have a good amount of spare change in your pocket. Some elected official is running for re-election in a far corner of the country and this official has supported/opposed legislation you hate/hold dear OR the official has said something at some point in his/her life that you loathe or love to death. You immediately can create one of those nonprofits that needn't publicize its donors (that's basically you) and spend your money willy nilly either to support or oppose the candidate.

Single-handedly you can exert the greatest impact on the political race in question and no one -- including the candidates themselves -- may have a clue who you are or what axe you have to grind. What a glorious system!

Of course, the above scenario is predicated on the idea that you are halfway sane. What if you've lost a few of your marbles along the way?

In such a case, you could decide to support/oppose a candidate based solely on their apparent dental work, their shoe size or the color of their hair. Heck, you could place the names of all the candidates of the political party you hate the most in a drum and randomly pick out two or three names. Then you could anonymously spend untold amounts of money attacking them for real or perceived sins. All this in a race you genuinely have no interest in at all.

A far fetched scenario? Sure. But it's both possible AND legal now. The rich and well-to-do have been granted a green light for undue influence in any race OR ballot initiative that they see fit. Not only do they not have to explain to anyone WHY they have injected themselves into specific campaigns, but they don't even have to reveal their involvement at all.

If it wasn't already, our political system is now doomed.

I So Understand

One of the big stories making the rounds -- I've written about it before -- is the foreclosure scandal. Banks have sold mortgages in the form of "financial instruments" to a dizzying number of mortgage services, hedge funds and who knows what else. The paperwork has lagged behind or, in some cases, it's been literally shredded. So, while homeowners are being threatened with or actually thrown from their homes for missed or nonpayment, no one can be sure that the enterprise foreclosing on a home is the genuine legal holder of the note.

Fortunately, I haven't been involved in this sort of scenario (yet?), I so understand the overall parameters. I suffered through a somewhat similar situation a few years ago in connection with a college loan.

When I attended graduate school, I took out two college loans. Neither was huge as I was able to garner one of the Graduate Teaching Assistant positions and this lessened my costs considerably. Within a year after graduation, I was able to pay off the smaller of the two loans. However, the larger one of several thousand dollars remained.

Not being a rich bloke, I paid on it when I could. I dutifully paid some months and had to let it slide other months. When my mother died in August 1992, my brother and I split the proceeds from her life insurance policy. One of the first expenditures I made was to pay off the larger school loan. It felt really, really good to be done with it.

Flash forward two years. One day, when going through the day's mail, I opened a letter which informed me that such and such a company was prepared to take me to court for nonpayment of my student loan. WTF?

I immediately got on the telephone to call their information center. I explained that I had paid the balance IN FULL 2 years previous and thus owed them nothing. Their rep got on his computer. He told me they had no record of a payment received. WTF?

I had to do some searching through my records, but I found the canceled check. I called the company back. I provided all the info on the canceled check and I even faxed them a copy of it. That's when I learned a bit of information about the banking industry that I had not been aware of.

You see, I had paid off my loan to the bank I had taken the loan from. Unbeknownst to me, said bank had sold my loan to a different bank several months BEFORE I paid it off. Neither the seller nor the buyer had informed me of this transaction. The upshot was that I had sent my payment to the former owner of the note who had not passed it on to the new owner which, I believe, is a form of theft!

That's all well and good the new owner of the note stated, but we want OUR money now!! It's your responsibility to pay us or we're taking you to court. I told them that, if they wanted their money, THEY needed to get it from the original holder of the note.

Because my dad is an attorney (criminal defense, not civil) and I have a fairly strong background in constitutional law, we were able to prevail without the need for going to court. It took over one and one-half years, but after much wrangling, the new holder of the note finally received the payment from the previous holder of the note. While I didn't part with any additional money in the form of a loan payment, I spent a pretty penny mailing and faxing a variety of correspondence and I pulled out what little hair I had left numerous times.

All this effort for a loan of less than $10,000. I can imagine the strong-arm tactics utilized when the note is 10 or 100 times greater! I can also understand the massive confusion there must be for a homeowner whose note has been sliced and diced enough times to make one's head spin.

I also imagine that the most commonly used phrase throughout the whole sordid process is: WTF?

Line by Line - Verse 12, Line 3

The flavours five deprive the mouth of taste;
~ James Legge translation, from The Sacred Books of the East, 1891 ~

The five flavors dull the taste.
~ Gia-fu Feng and Jane English translation, published by Vintage Books, 1989 ~

The five flavors make one tasteless in the mouth
~ Derek Lin translation, from Tao Te Ching: Annotated & Explained, published by SkyLight Paths, 2006 ~

(No corresponding line)
~ Ron Hogan rendition, from Beatrice.com, 2004 ~

My wife is a huge fan of The Food Network. It has scads of programs that cover almost every conceivable aspect of cooking (including several off-the-wall cooking competitions). One of the themes the various hosts and cooks harp on is making sure the flavors in any dish meld together. Too many disjointed flavors that don't flow together well can really turn an appetizing creation into a complete culinary disaster.

This same metaphor applies to all aspects of our lives as well. Too much of a good thing can be just as detrimental as not enough.

To view the Index page for this series to see what you may have missed or would like to read again, go here.

What Will They Do?

Many of the folks who voted for President Obama had such high hopes. Unfortunately, once he was ensconced in office, he seems far more interested in doing the bidding for the corporate elite, not the throngs of people who made it possible for him to be elected.

It is in this same vein that Dave Johnson asks a similar question for this year's campaign: What will tea party members do when their politicians betray them?

Tea Party members hate Wall Street bailouts, trade deals like NAFTA, job outsourcing, giant corporations buying laws, government spending, and elites telling the rest of us what to do. But there is no question that their candidates — many of them wealthy corporatists themselves — are funded by big corporations (even foreign oil companies) and Wall Street. So the question is, once in Congress will they vote with their base or their owners? And when they vote with the people who bought them, what will Tea Party members do about it?

Good question! The answer will be interesting.

You Say Tomato, I Say...

While the pundits thrash about for explanations as to why so many Americans are fed up with BOTH mainstream political parties, here's an article that underscores a common problem: Whenever one of the two lambastes the other for unethical or less than transparent behavior, it's not too long until we learn that the accuser is just as guilty as the accused!

While President Obama and other Democrats have excoriated Republican "front groups" for using secret money to pay for attack ads, Democratic political committees have begun doing something similar: collecting cash from outside nonprofit groups that don't disclose their contributors and using the money to pay for negative campaign commercials, campaign records show.

One group, Patriot Majority PAC — a Democratic political committee that has run a hard-hitting $1.7 million attack ad campaign against Sharron Angle, the Republican candidate for Harry Reid's Senate seat in Nevada — has gotten one of its largest donations, $250,000, from a liberal nonprofit that doesn’t release the names of any of its contributors, the records show.

Another newly formed political committee, America's Families First Action Fund, which is running negative commercials against Republicans in House races across the country, recently got $1 million from a closely related nonprofit affiliate, the records show. Both organizations were set up over the summer by Democratic strategists, who emphasized in a memo to donors that contributions to the nonprofit could be kept anonymous...

Now, I think there is no question that the groups that favor the GOP have been the worst transgressors this election season, but if the Democrats are employing the same strategy too, it's really hard to cast aspersions on the other side.

Ya know, those in glass houses shouldn't throw stones!

The Tao of Dark Sages - Chapter 11, Part 2

The Tao of Dark Sages
by Scott Bradley

(Mark-tzu) "To know the Tao is easy." What does this mean? That it is easy to know about the Tao, but difficult to harmonize with it. To talk about it is easy, to live it is hard. Talk is easy, silence is hard. But it is in silence that the proof of the Tao is found. The proof of a sage is his or her silence. "The true sage does seek to communicate," wrote Chuang-tzu.

Are you offended, Scott-tzu? Good! You work on what it is in you that can be offended and we will work on what it is in us that is "off". And in the mean time, you are all welcome here, my dear ants.

(Sue-tzu) What fun! Thank you, Scott-tzu, for stirring the pot! Let’s grow together! And now, where were we? Oh yeah, poor Buz. Sorry, Buz. Tell us why you are here.

I’m here because I am seeking to make spiritual progress and think you can help me. Realizing this, I see that there is a problem with "seeking". I know I can’t find what I want by seeking it. What I want is to not want to seek. I’m seeking to not seek. And I don’t know any way to get out of this conundrum.

Does anyone have a answer to this problem?

Stop seeking? Let go of seeking?

When I let go of something, I find that other experiences arise out of the void. If you have let go of seeking, what has arisen for you, Nellie?

Well, I can’t truly say that I’ve completely let go of seeking, but when I "try it on" I feel a sense of contentment and affirmation. The struggle stops. And I feel a welling up of thankfulness and acceptance. It’s like you have said, a great big Yes! fills me.

To what, then, are you saying Yes!?

To everything. To everything in my experience. It’s like a big, wonderful sigh of relief and contentment.

Then are you saying Yes! to whatever it is in you that causes you to seek or just to the state of being one who doesn’t seek?

I’m not sure. I’ll have to give that some thought. But, I think when I say "everything" I mean everything, including that part of me that seeks. And...the seeking itself?

Can we affirm what we see as harmful in ourselves? I don’t see how we can do anything else. Our affirmation of all of our experience means...well, all of our experience. Isn’t Affirmation, with a capital "A", all about not making distinctions between harmful and helpful, right and wrong, and all that lot? Isn’t the harmony of the Tao just this, the cessation of division? A profound unity of the heart?

Now, I want to say something that feels a little content-ful, but nonetheless is worth being said: Affirmation of your self as it is, is perhaps the most important thing you can do to grow spiritually. Say Yes! to this messed-up self that you are. Experience thankfulness for this crazy knot of conflicting desires and hungers that is you. I cannot emphasize enough how liberating this can be. Say Yes! to you.

And Buz, if you are finding it difficult to let go of seeking, might I suggest that you try affirming it? Because there is no difference between letting go and affirming. To affirm is to let go. To let go is to affirm. Accepting your self in totality, what is there left to seek? What else can it mean that you are everything you seek?

If you are what you seek, affirm what you are and seeking dissolves. If you affirm what is part of you it will stop seeming like all of you. Affirmation is the negation of division. Division is the cause of struggle. Seeking is struggle.

If harmony is the goal, let harmony be the means. Don’t stand divided against yourself. Ever.

If you're interested in reading more from this series by Scott Bradley, go here.