Tuesday, April 8, 2014
Via Daily Dharma
All Politics are Local
| April 8, 2014
Why do I consider it so crucial to
balance the outer aspects of nonviolence and compassion with the inner
support of contemplative practice? Because in the end, all politics are
local, and we cannot love life and humanity if we do not love each
other, one on one.
—Lama Surya Das, "Why Sit?"
Monday, April 7, 2014
VIa UTNE: Free Your Mind: Practice Vipassana Meditation
After
years of heavy addiction, Chris Grosso found himself literally on his
knees, utterly lost and broken. Grasping for life, he needed to find a
new path, one that went beyond conventional religious or spiritual
doctrine—one free of bullshit. Indie Spiritualist
(Beyond Words Publishing, 2014) empowers readers to accept themselves
as they are, in all their humanity and imperfect perfection. In this
excerpt learn the basics of vipassana meditation, a simple relaxation
practice that can be done by anyone and in any setting.
While I personally practice many different types of meditation—never feeling like I have to stay within the confines of only one tradition—I typically respond with vipassana, as I’ve found it to be the most universally applicable form of meditation around. Any form of meditation that resonates with you—whether guided, mantra, movement, and so forth—will definitely be of benefit.
I adore meditation because there are countless ways to meditate, with no particular style being any better than another. It’s all about what resonates with you. You can find many free guided meditations online by searching Google or YouTube, as well as by visiting your local library. Most meditation practices are to spirituality what Bob Ross was to painting—very laid back and go with the flow. And while your practice may not provide you with happy little trees, it will over time create a greater sense of peace, clarity, and serenity in your life, and that’s sorta like happy little trees, right?
Through years of drug addiction, I did considerable damage to myself, resulting in heavy bouts of depression and anxiety. For years, I relied on antidepressant and anti-anxiety medications to keep me in a somewhat balanced state, but after cultivating a dedicated meditation practice I eventually found myself at a place where, under doctor supervision, I was able to taper off the medication and no longer needed it.
Let me make it perfectly clear, however, that there is absolutely nothing wrong with taking prescribed medication for conditions like anxiety, depression, and so forth. I recognize that they were very necessary in my life at that time, as I was very chemically off-balance. There is nothing unspiritual about taking prescribed medication when needed, because our own mental and emotional well-being must come first before we can truly help others.
Whether we are on medication or not, meditation practices will certainly help us to not only cultivate more calm in our lives, but also to handle things like stress, anxiety, and depression in gentler ways. For the benefit of those who are new to meditation, I’m providing these simple guided instructions for the practice of vipassana.
Vipassana Meditation
Besides being asked, “What’s an Indie Spiritualist?” the second most common question I’m typically asked is “What type of meditation do you practice?”While I personally practice many different types of meditation—never feeling like I have to stay within the confines of only one tradition—I typically respond with vipassana, as I’ve found it to be the most universally applicable form of meditation around. Any form of meditation that resonates with you—whether guided, mantra, movement, and so forth—will definitely be of benefit.
I adore meditation because there are countless ways to meditate, with no particular style being any better than another. It’s all about what resonates with you. You can find many free guided meditations online by searching Google or YouTube, as well as by visiting your local library. Most meditation practices are to spirituality what Bob Ross was to painting—very laid back and go with the flow. And while your practice may not provide you with happy little trees, it will over time create a greater sense of peace, clarity, and serenity in your life, and that’s sorta like happy little trees, right?
Through years of drug addiction, I did considerable damage to myself, resulting in heavy bouts of depression and anxiety. For years, I relied on antidepressant and anti-anxiety medications to keep me in a somewhat balanced state, but after cultivating a dedicated meditation practice I eventually found myself at a place where, under doctor supervision, I was able to taper off the medication and no longer needed it.
Let me make it perfectly clear, however, that there is absolutely nothing wrong with taking prescribed medication for conditions like anxiety, depression, and so forth. I recognize that they were very necessary in my life at that time, as I was very chemically off-balance. There is nothing unspiritual about taking prescribed medication when needed, because our own mental and emotional well-being must come first before we can truly help others.
Whether we are on medication or not, meditation practices will certainly help us to not only cultivate more calm in our lives, but also to handle things like stress, anxiety, and depression in gentler ways. For the benefit of those who are new to meditation, I’m providing these simple guided instructions for the practice of vipassana.
Make the jump here to read the full blog
10 Crazy Christian Quotes You May Not Have Heard
We all hear of the uber-crazy stuff that high-profile fundamentalists
Christians say. Stupid Christian quotes are gleefully reported by the
liberal media, and rightly so. For those of us who are SANE Christians,
it’s a reminder of the reasons that non-believers think all Christians
are crazy. As a member of the Christian Left, I say “let’s expose these
kooks”! Here are some quotes by fundamentalist Christians that you may
not have heard. Y’all enjoy.
- “When the temptation to masturbate is strong, yell “Stop!” to those thoughts as loudly as you can in your mind. Then recite a portion of the Bible or sing a hymn.” –Mormon Guide to Self-Control
- “We don’t have to protect the environment, the Second Coming is at hand.” –James Watt, Secretary of the Interior during the Reagan years.
- “I called to buy some meth, but I threw it away.” —Rev. Ted Haggard, when details began to emerge about his visits to a male prostitute, in 2006.
- Our culture is superior. Our culture is superior because our religion is Christianity and that is the truth that makes men free. –Pat Buchanan
- “This Christmas I want you to do the most loving thing and I want you to buy each of your children an SKS rifle and 500 rounds of ammunition.” —A speaker at the 1995 convention of the U.S. Taxpayers Party. A few months later, Dobson endorsed their candidate for president, Howard Phillips.
- “Kids today are looking for something to die for… If you give them something to die for, they’ll go to the edge of the earth for you.” —James Dobson’s son Ryan, in 2005. His book, 2Die4 : The Dangerous Truth About Following Christ advocates “murderous war because our enemies are deadly.”
- “The right of holding slaves is clearly established in the Holy Scriptures, both by precept and example.” –R. Furman, Baptist, of South Carolina
- “Sex education classes in our public schools are promoting incest.” –Jimmy Swaggart
- “Nobody has the right to worship on this planet any other God than Jehovah. And therefore the state does not have the responsibility to defend anybody’s pseudo-right to worship an idol.” –Rev. Joseph Morecraft, Chalcedon Presbyterian Church, “Biblical Role of Civil Government” speech given 8/31/93 at Biblical Worldview and Christian Education Conference
- “When you know the LORD you have no need for masturbation.” –Brice Wellington
Via JMG: Sullivan Doubles-Down On Mozilla Flap
A civil rights movement without toleration is not a civil rights movement; it is a cultural campaign to expunge and destroy its opponents. A moral movement without mercy is not moral; it is, when push comes to shove, cruel. For a decade and half, we have fought the battle for equal dignity for gay people with sincerity, openness, toleration and reason. It appears increasingly as if we will have to fight and fight again to prevent this precious and highly successful legacy from being hijacked by a righteous, absolutely certain, and often hateful mob. We are better than this. And we must not give in to it.Sullivan says he's gotten hundreds of emails from readers who "overwhelmingly disagree" with him about the controversy.
Labels: activism, Andrew Sullivan, Brendan Eich, Firefox, LGBT rights, marriage equality, Mozilla, Proposition 8, technology
Via Tricycle
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April 7, 2014 | New at Tricycle: A Buddhist visits Burning Man; Karma Trinlay Rinpoche's online retreat on the six paramitas;
a look at the different kinds of debt (social, economic, spiritual); an
escape from the least livable city on Earth; an institute updates the
age-old tradition of the scholar-practitioner; and interviews with the
leading voices in contemporary Buddhism in our newest e-book, Conversations: Volume 1. |
|
 MAGAZINE: DHARMA ON THE PLAYA |
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| Psychedelic experimentation, intimate connections, and all-night partying: all activities we normally associate with the annual art and music festival Burning Man. But when contributing editor Allan Badiner visited the playa—Burning Man's desert city—he found a community based on generosity, nonjudgment, and principles that reminded him of the eightfold path. | |
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Via Daily Dharma
Pure Gold
| April 7, 2014
Free passion is radiation without a
radiator, a fluid, pervasive warmth that flows effortlessly. It is not
destructive because it is a balanced state of being and highly
intelligent. Self-consciousness inhibits this intelligent, balanced
state of being. By opening, by dropping our self-conscious grasping, we
see not only the surface of an object, but we see the whole way through.
We appreciate not in terms of sensational qualities alone, but we see
in terms of whole qualities, which are pure gold.
—Chogyam Trungpa Rinpoche, “Love Story”
Sunday, April 6, 2014
Via Daily Dharma:
The Only Place
| April 6, 2014
Just as we cannot live without water,
so are joy and peace essential for our inner fulfillment. We may not
even be aware that we are searching for something. It manifests only in
our restlessness as we move from here to there, trying out different
friends, different ideas, different jobs, different countries. Whatever
we attempt is a reflection of our inner thirst, which we hope to quench
in all these external ways. What we are looking for lies within us, and
if we gave out time and energy to an interior search, we would come
across it much faster, since that is the only place where it is to be
found.
—Ayya Khema, “Thirsting for Enlightenment”
Saturday, April 5, 2014
Via Daily Kos: Harvey Milk becomes the first openly #lgbt elected official on a U.S. stamp!
"Harvey Milk becomes the first openly #lgbt elected official on a U.S. stamp! A fitting honor for such an inspiring leader."
Via JMG: Quote Of The Day - Markos Moulitsas
Labels: Brendan Eich, Daily Kos, internet, LGBT rights, Markos Moulitsas, marriage equality, Mozilla, Proposition 8, technology
Via JMG: NOM Launches Mozilla Boycott to Support a Holocaust Denier
"When Brendon Eich made his modest contribution to support Proposition 8, Barack Obama was on the ballot as a candidate who said he believed marriage was the union of one man and one woman. Now Eich has been the target of a vicious character attack by gay activists who have forced him out of the company he has helped lead for years. This is a McCarthyesque witch hunt that makes the term 'thought police' seem modest. We urge all consumers to remove Mozilla's Firefox web browser from their computers as a sign of protest. This attack to deny Mr. Eich his livelihood for supporting true marriage is a continuation of the shameful pattern we have consistently seen from gay activists. It basically says to all those in America and around the world who believe in a view of marriage that is consistent with the teachings of their faith that they are all bigots and haters and there is no place for them in civil society. This is the totalitarian worldview we will all be under if marriage ultimately is redefined in the law."VERY FUCKING RELATED: Two years ago NOM launched their continuing boycott of Starbucks after the company issued a statement endorsing marriage equality in Washington state. Several months after the boycott started, hate group leader Tony Perkins declared to his national radio audience that NOM's boycott had cost Starbucks over $10B in stock value.
It didn’t take long for Starbucks to lose bucks over marriage. Hello, I’m Tony Perkins of the Family Research Council in Washington. In January, Starbucks CEO Howard Schultz said endorsing same-sex marriage would be good for business. Boy was he wrong! Siding with radical homosexuals has its price in this country. And in Starbucks case, the cost is about ten billion dollars. That’s how much the coffee giant’s lost in stock value since the campaign to Dump Starbucks got underway. In the last eight months, the company's missed sales projections and watched stocks dive from $61 to $48, for a loss of more than $10.2 billion. How many companies will fall for the lie that endorsing same-sex marriage will help business? J.C. Penney’s tried it. Target’s tried it. Now Starbucks. And every time, there’s a reason to believe that alienating millions of customers will directly affect a company’s bottom line. On the flip side, look at Chick-fil-A. They found out that supporting traditional values pays just as many cultural dividends as financial ones.From Joe:
Brian Brown and his clown car of evil are trying to sell the claim that they are super concerned about evil homofascsists destroying the livelihood of Brendan Eich, but they bragged about having caused a $10B stock loss that may have devastated the investment portfolios of uncountable retirees, families, and pension funds. So what if thousands of people who also oppose same-sex marriage suddenly saw their nest eggs dwindle? And if a dive in stock price prompted Starbucks to enact massive layoffs among straight minimum wage workers? Serves them homos right.
The truth, of course, is that NOM's boycott had nothing to do with the price of Starbucks stock and everything to do with the volatility experienced by much of the restaurant sector at that time. In early 2012 at the start of NOM's boycott, Starbucks traded at $43. It closed today at $71.55. That's a 66% increase. Other companies are probably lighting candles in the hope of a boycott from NOM.
But all that is only part of the story.
Shortly after NOM's boycott of Starbucks began in America, Brian Brown posted a gloating update in which he announced that NOM had purchased Arabic-language banner ads to promote the boycott on websites based in several Middle Eastern countries that carry the death penalty for homosexuality. His intent, obviously, was to whip up anti-gay sentiment in places where our brothers and sisters already lead lives of quiet terror at best. Perhaps he even hoped for a madman to take out the entire staff at one of those overseas Starbucks. THAT would send a message back home, huh?
REMINDER: When major national Christian groups with millions of followers call for boycotts, that is a righteous use of the free market in order to preserve morality, marriage, family, and the American way. But if a gay keyboard activist tweets a call for a boycott, THAT is homofascist intimidation, intolerance, bullying, a stifling of religious liberty, and an attempt to deny the freedom of speech. And don't you forget it.
Labels: bigotry, Brendan Eich, Brian Brown, Christianists, evil, Firefox, hate groups, hypocrisy, liars, Mozilla, NOM, Tony Perkins
Via JMG: Nate Silver Compiles Prop 8 Donations By Staffers At Major Silicon Valley Companies
The list includes Hewlett-Packard, Intel, Cisco Systems, Apple, Google, Sun Microsystems, eBay, Oracle, Yahoo, Advanced Micro Devices (AMD) and Symantec. I limited the search to donors who listed California as their location. In total between these 11 companies, 83 percent of employee donations were in opposition to Proposition 8. So Eich was in a 17 percent minority relative to the top companies in Silicon Valley. However, there was quite a bit of variation from business to business. At Intel, 60 percent of employee donations were in support of Proposition 8. By contrast, at Apple, 94 percent of employee donations were made in opposition to Proposition 8. The opposition was even higher at Google, where 96 percent of employee donations were against it, including $100,000 from co-founder Sergey Brin. There isn’t much data on Mozilla. Only four Proposition 8 donors listed it as their employer: Eich, who donated in support of the measure, and three others who opposed it.Silver notes that his result does not include those who chose to donate to either side of the campaign without disclosing the name of their employers. About 12% of those in the database did not.
Labels: 2008 elections, Apple, boycotts, Brendan Eich, California, eBay, Google, Intel, LGBT rights, Mozilla, Nate Silver, Proposition 8, Silicon Valley, Yahoo
Via JMG: Carole King Surprises Beautiful Cast At Curtain Call Plea For AIDS Donations
Beautiful, the Broadway musical that tells Carole King's life story through her songs, has been running for months to record crowds and rave reviews. King had famously declined to see the show, telling Playbill in December after walking out of a reading, "I can't watch my life played out before me." She changed her mind on Thursday, choosing to attend the show during the week that Broadway casts issue curtain call pleas for donations to Equity Fights AIDS.
She finally showed up. After months of wondering whether Carole King would ever come to see the Broadway musical based on her life and comprising her music, the singer/songwriter surprised the cast and crew by attending Thursday evening’s performance of “Beautiful: The Carole King Musical.” After the curtain call, as the cast was doing the annual appeal for Broadway Cares/Equity Fights AIDS, Ms. King ventured out on stage. “They had no idea,” she told the applauding audience. Jessie Mueller, who earned strong reviews for her portrayal of Ms. King when the show opened in January, wept, along with several other members of the cast. The charity effort became a song auction: Ms. King led the cast in “You’ve Got a Friend.” The appeal raised $30,000.
RELATED: Carole King's 1971 album Tapestry has sold over 25 million copies and is among the greatest selling albums of all time. It swept the major awards at the 1972 Grammys, taking Album Of The Year, Song Of The Year, Record Of The Year, and Best Pop Female Vocal. Tapestry spent 15 consecutive weeks atop the albums chart and 43 years later that remains the record for a female vocalist. The album appeared on the Billboard Top 200 for 302 weeks, another record for a female vocalist, and sixth on the all-time list for weeks on that chart. (#1 is Pink Floyd's Dark Side Of The Moon at 741 weeks.)
Via JMG: Todd Starnes On Brendan Eich
Labels: Brendan Eich, crackpots, Fox News, LGBT rights, marriage equality, Mozilla, Proposition 8, Tea Party, technology, Townhall
Via Daily Dharma
The Pinch of Generosity
| April 5, 2014
When you are practicing generosity, you
should feel a little pinch when you give something away. That pinch is
your stinginess protesting. If you give away your old, worn-out coat
that you wouldn’t be caught dead wearing, that is not generosity. There
is no pinch. You are doing nothing to overcome your stinginess; you’re
just cleaning out your closet and calling it something else. Giving away
your coat might keep someone warm, but it does not address the problem
we face as spiritual practitioners: to free ourselves from
self-cherishing and self-grasping.
—Gelek Rinpoche, “Generosity (and Greed) Introduction”
Friday, April 4, 2014
Via JMG: Ben Shapiro Launches Mozilla Boycott
Tea Party shrieker Ben Shapiro has launched an OKCupid-style boycott of Mozilla on his Truth Revolt site. Because gaystapo.
REMINDER: When powerful national Christian groups with millions of members call for boycotts, that is a righteous use of the free market in order to preserve morality, marriage, family, and the American way. But when gay individuals call for a boycott, THAT is homofascist intimidation, intolerance, bullying, a stifling of religious liberty, and an attempt to deny the freedom of speech. And don't you forget it.
Reposted from Joe Jervis
REMINDER: When powerful national Christian groups with millions of members call for boycotts, that is a righteous use of the free market in order to preserve morality, marriage, family, and the American way. But when gay individuals call for a boycott, THAT is homofascist intimidation, intolerance, bullying, a stifling of religious liberty, and an attempt to deny the freedom of speech. And don't you forget it.
Labels: Ben Shapiro, boycotts, Breitbart, Christianists, crackpots, douchebaggery, Mozilla, religion, Tea Party, teabaggers
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