Circling Lhasa...by Judith Hertog from Tricycle Magazine

I wonder if today’s Lhasa is the city that Tsering dreamed of so many years ago. I once

told Tsering that when Lhasa was transformed into a modern city with the most up-todate

conveniences, he too would be nostalgic for the past.

“Possibly,” he said, and shrugged.

I saw Lhasa as a place outside time, a place where I could hold on to the past. But

whenever I return, I find a changed city. I remember once more that the true city I am

looking for is actually the one of the fantasy novels and video games. And even that

Lhasa is the ideal of an ideal. There is nothing to hold on to. The scent of my

grandmother’s skin, the shine of chestnuts on an autumn day, a first kiss in a cemetery—

they are but disappearing memories.

The only permanence is the permanence that I cling to in my mind: my ideals of how to

live; how to be happy; how to raise my children; how to furnish my home; how to better

the world; how to fill my time. And these ideals are just as insubstantial as my memory

of Tibet.

I know that the Tibet of my imagination has never existed. I know the past is not a place I

can return to. But in my memory I keep circling Jokhang Temple on a cold winter

morning before sunrise, listening to the hum of monks starting the day with prayer.

A thousand years ago, the Tibetan mystic and poet Milarepa hit upon the paradox that

even the Buddhist ideals he preached were no more than the grasping of his mind. In

one of his songs, “The Understanding of Reality,” Milarepa preaches the Buddhist path

to a group of dakinis, or sky spirits:

. . 

A thousand years ago, the Tibetan mystic and poet Milarepa hit upon the paradox that

even the Buddhist ideals he preached were no more than the grasping of his mind. In

one of his songs, “The Understanding of Reality,” Milarepa preaches the Buddhist path

to a group of dakinis, or sky spirits:

. . .in [the realm] of absolute truth

Buddha himself does not exist;

There are no practices nor practitioners,

No Path, no Realization, and no Stages,

No Buddha Bodies and no Wisdom.

There is no Nirvana,

For these are merely names and thoughts.

Matter and beings in the Universe

Are non-existent from the start;

They have never come to be.

There is no Truth, no Innate-Born Wisdom,

No Karma, and no effect therefrom;

Samsara even has no name,

Such is Absolute Truth.

A most inspiring beautiful article.

LOVE this article, Love this man. Read here.

The Three Graces by Sally Mann

My cup of tea

WATCH this beautiful video 'girls still wanna have fun' on Wifey.com.

A Painting by Francesco Clemente

Eyes Open

And the trick is to stay propped up for 50 or 60 or 70 or 80 or 90 years. Yes eyes open while the flies get stuck in the paper and the great paintings are stolen and the faithful wives run off with the unfaithful lovers, all to die in the morning, unclasped and cold and kissless. Charles Bukowski

Brave & Beautiful

To our neighbors:

What a beautiful fall! Everything shimmering and golden and all that incredible soft light. Water surrounding us.

Lou and I have spent a lot of time here in the past few years, and even though we’re city people this is our spiritual home.

Last week I promised Lou to get him out of the hospital and come home to Springs. And we made it!

Lou was a tai chi master and spent his last days here being happy and dazzled by the beauty and power and softness of nature. He died on Sunday morning looking at the trees and doing the famous 21 form of tai chi with just his musician hands moving through the air.

Lou was a prince and a fighter and I know his songs of the pain and beauty in the world will fill many people with the incredible joy he felt for life. Long live the beauty that comes down and through and onto all of us.

— Laurie Anderson
his loving wife and eternal friend

Daggers

Daggers- In honor of Manjushri, the Boddhisattva of Wisdom. Cuts through ignorance and duality, severs duality and unifies.  Acknowledging the interconnection of every-body and every-thing in motion. 'The We of Me'....made for Love, Adorned

The Four Reminders

Joyful to have Such a human birth, Difficult to find, Free and well-favored.	But death is real, Comes without warning. This body Will be a corpse.
Unalterable Are the laws of karma; Cause and effect Cannot be escaped.	Samsara Is an ocean of suffering, Unendurable, Unbearably intense.

I Love the Moon

Small Dark Jewel

LEO (July 23-Aug. 22): "I was six years old when my parents told me that 
there was a small, dark jewel inside my skull, learning to be me." So said 
the Leo science fiction writer Greg Egan in his story "Learning to Be Me." 
Let's pretend that you, too, have a small dark jewel inside your skull 
that's learning to be you. It's a good metaphor for what I believe has been 
happening all these years: You have been gradually mastering the art of 
being the best Leo you can be. It hasn't been easy. You weren't born 
knowing how to be your beautiful, radiant, courageous self, but have had 
to work hard to activate your potentials. Now you're moving into an 
especially critical phase of the process: a time when you have the chance 
to learn how to love yourself with greater ingenuity.

Impermanence

'Whether we die enmeshed within our hopes and fears or free ourselves by recognizing the selfless luminosity of our innermost being, impermanence lies at the heart of all existence. In illness or health, life or death, the body is the greatest teacher of impermanence.'

'I think of a great work of art as like a moon shining in the night sky; it illuminates the world, yet its light is not its own but borrowed from the hidden sun of the absolute.'

the sun the moon and the stars....

A little bit of Tuscon...

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

'...human history, really — is full of evidence that we’re not here long, that we should get our houses in order and do something of value with our time.'

From this NYTimes article on Adam Yauch

Thank you Ravi Shankar

This song inspired and was the soundtrack all my Sanskrit work in jewelry. Thank you Ravi Shankar.
Click HERE to hear it.

Oh Master,show some compassion on me,
Please come and dwell in my heart.
Because without you, it is painfully lonely,
Fill this empty pot with the nectar of love.

I do not know any Tantra, Mantra or ritualistic
worship i know and believe only in you.
I have been searching for you all over all the world,
please come and hold my hand now.

The Solar System

For most people, life on earth is hard. For the lucky ones it is merely hectic. No wonder we get caught up in our daily lives. We look down rather than up. We ignore the face that we live on a tiny speck of rock suspended in an unutterable

vastness of empty space. But above the thin skin of the atmosphere are other worlds. Worlds where 100 year old hurricanes are raging, ice volcanoes are erupting, gargantuan lightning bolts are leaping between cloud tops and moons. These things have been happening for billions of years, but it is only now that we can see them in glorious close-up. We are extraordinarily privileged to be alive...Welcome to the sun and planets, the moons and comets and chunks of assorted rubble...