Via NPR // 500,000

 

by Jill Hudson

Win McNamee/Getty Images

The U.S. death toll from COVID-19 is on track to pass a number next week that once seemed unthinkable: Half a million people in this country dead from the coronavirus. Losing half a million lives to this disease was unimaginable when the first few people died of COVID-19 in the U.S last February. 

After nearly a year, it's easy to forget how suddenly the pandemic upended our lives. NPR would love to see your photos. Click here to send your images and tell us your story.

What will it take to finally halt the spread of the coronavirus in the U.S.? Here's a look at how herd immunity works. 

Via Daily Dharma: You Are Already Accepted

In accepting yourself, you’re simply agreeing to the fact that you are already accepted by the entire universe, just as you are.

—Ruben L. F. Habito, “Be Still & Know”

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Via Ram Dass - Love Serve Remember Foundation // Words of Wisdom - February 21, 2021 💌

 

 

The first being one must have compassion for is oneself. You can't be a witness to your thoughts with a chip on your shoulder or an axe to grind.

Ramana Maharshi said, "If people would stop wailing 'alas I am a sinner' and use all that energy to get on with it they would all be enlightened."

He also said, "When you're cleaning up the outer temple before going to the inner temple, don't stop to read everything you're going to throw away..."

- Ram Dass -

Via Tumblr

 

Via Daily Dharma: Connect to the Buddha Inside You

 You lack nothing of the wisdom and perfection of the Buddha, right at this moment.

—Elihu Genmyo Smith, “No Need to Do Zazen, Therefore Must Do Zazen”

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Via White Crane Institute

 

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Donald Trump and Roy Cohn

1927 -

ROY COHN, American lawyer born (d. 1986);  An evil, dramatic, controversial and dangerous man in life, Cohn inspired many dramatic fictional portrayals after his death. Probably the most famous is his role in Tony Kushner’s Angels in America: A Gay Fantasia on A Theme, in which Cohn is portrayed as a self-hating, power-hungry hypocrite who refuses to accept himself as a homosexual, and is haunted by the ghost of Ethel Rosenberg as he lies dying of AIDS. In the 2003 HBO version of Kushner's play, Cohn was played by Al Pacino, and Rosenberg was played by Meryl Streep. Cohn is also a character in Kushner's one-act play, G. David Schine in Hell. He was a despicable, vile person.

His sleazy soul-less mind still haunts us today in the person of his protégé, Donald Trump. Cohn’s influence on Mr. Trump is unmistakable. Mr. Trump’s wrecking ball of a Presidency — the gleeful smearing of his opponents, the embracing of bluster as brand — has been a Roy Cohn number on a grand scale. "If you get a punch, you punch back....harder." Mr. Trump’s response to the Orlando massacre, with his ominous warnings of a terrorist attack that could wipe out the country and his conspiratorial suggestions of a Muslim fifth column in the United States, seemed to have been ripped straight out of the Cohn playbook.  Even more recently, his response to the impeachment has been to bray about his being "the chief law enforcement officer of the country"....which he is decidedly NOT. Clearly, whatever "lesson" Republican Senators think he's learned has nothing to do with restraint. We now find ourselves in a country where the rule of law has been seriously undermined, if not destroyed. Thanks Roy.

For 13 years, the lawyer who had infamously whispered in McCarthy’s ear whispered in Mr. Trump’s. In the process, Mr. Cohn helped deliver some of Mr. Trump’s signature construction deals, sued the National Football League for conspiring against his client and counter-sued the federal government — for $100 million — for damaging the Trump name. One of Mr. Trump’s executives recalled that he kept an 8-by-10-inch photograph of Mr. Cohn in his office desk, pulling it out to intimidate recalcitrant contractors.

The two men spoke as often as five times a day, toasted each other at birthday parties and spent evenings together at Studio 54. Roy Cohn....Cryptmaster. One final story that my friend Robert reminded me of...  Cohn gave his services to Trump free of charge. Finally, as a gift Trump gave the pathetic homo a set of gold and diamond Bulgari cufflinks. Upon the settlement of Cohn’s estate, the links were found to be fakes.

Inversion

Via Daily Dharma: Communicate by Listening

Few of us communicate really well. We think explaining ourselves is key, but listening is the most important part.

—Sallie Tisdale, “Travel Guide to the End of Life”

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Via Daily Dharma: Experiencing Things as They Are

 When we train ourselves by constant practice to stop verbalizing, the brain can experience things as they are. By silencing the mind, we can experience real peace.

—Bhante Henepola Gunaratana, “Do Thoughts Ever Stop?”

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Jefferson Airplane - Crown Of Creation

Crown Of Creation

Jefferson Airplane

 

The lyrics from the song are mostly taken from John Wyndham’s science fiction novel, “The Chrysalids”, published in 1955. The book is set in a post apocalyptic society, where…

 

You are the crown of creation

You are the crown of creation

And you've got no place to go

Soon you'll attain the stability you strive for

In the only way that it's granted:

In a place among the fossils of our time

In loyalty to their kind

They cannot tolerate our minds

In loyalty to our kind

We cannot tolerate their obstruction!

Life is change

How it differs from the rocks

I've seen their ways too often for my liking

New worlds to gain

My life is to survive

And be alive for you

Aah ah ah ah..

Via Daily Dharma: Finding Your Personal Path

 When we place our hearts upon the practice, the teachings come alive. That turning point, which transforms an abstract concept of a spiritual path into our own personal path, is faith.

—Sharon Salzberg, “How Important Is Faith?”

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Via Ram Dass - Love Serve Remember Foundation // Words of Wisdom - February 17, 2021 💌

 "Reflection will give you a chance to stand back in your soul, your witness consciousness, to look at your life, and see how much of the systems of which you’re a part are still attractive or aversive to you. Because ultimately, the art, as Christ said, is to be in the world, but not of the world."

- Ram Dass -

Keep Calm When Your Mind is Wild

Via Daily Dharma: Notice Your Fluid Sense of Self

 When we look carefully, we discover that the sense of self is not a particle that never changes, but rather a flow, a wave of thought and feeling that can increase and decrease and is therefore not permanent.

—Shinzen Young, “Brief Teachings”

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Via Tricycle // On Meditation

 

On Meditation Directed by Rebecca Dreyfus

In a beautiful compilation of short films, longtime meditators discuss how their lives and work in the world have been transformed by their practice.

Watch now »

Via Daily Dharma: Note the Love Already Around You

 There is far more love available to us in any given moment than we might be aware.

—Kate Johnson, “Making the First Move”

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Via Ram Dass - Love Serve Remember Foundation // Words of Wisdom - February 10, 2021 💌

 

“Love” – Written by K.K. Sah

Enter into an Indian family and then you can understand love. Love does not wait for logic and is the easiest path of all.

The first test of love is that it knows no bargaining—true love cannot exist in an arrangement by two parties. Love is always the giver not the taker.

Love can conquer everything. It is the best medicine. It can take you to God because love is God.

It is all powerful. It knows no fear. It is the highest ideal

Love is higher than work, than yoga, than knowledge, although the highest forms of love and wisdom are in reality one.

Duty is seldom sweet. It becomes sweet only through love which shines only in freedom.

Every motion is a circle. Therefore do not hate anyone because that hatred which comes out of you must in the long run come back to you. When you send love it will naturally come back to you, completing the circle.

Love attracts human beings to each other, animals to animals and all of creation in an endless embrace.

Love manifests from the lowest atom to the highest being- it is omnipotent and all-pervading.

Love is the one motive power that pervades the entire universe – unattached – yet shining in everything and without which the whole universe would fall to pieces in a moment.

Via Tumblr

 

Via Whiate Crane Institute // HENRY ROLLINS

 

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Ally Henry Rollins

1961 -

HENRY ROLLINS, American musician, born; After joining the short-lived Washington D.C. band State of Alert in 1980, Rollins fronted the California hardcore punk band, Black Flag from 1981 until 1986. Following the band's breakup, Rollins soon established the record label and publishing company 2.13.61 to release his spoken word albums, as well as forming the Rollins Band, which toured with a number of lineups until 2003 and during 2006.

Since Black Flag, Rollins has embarked on projects covering a variety of media. He has hosted numerous radio shows, such as The Henry Rollins Show and Harmony in My Head, and television shows, such as MTV’s 120 Minutes and Jackass, along with roles in several films. Rollins has also campaigned for human rights in the United States, promoting Gay rights in particular, and tours overseas with the United Service Organizations (USO) to entertain American troops, despite his opposition to the Bush administration  and the Iraq war.

Rollins has become an outspoken human rights activist, most vocally for Gay rights, while deriding any suggestion that he himself was Gay. In 1998, he declared: "If I was Gay, there would be no closet. You would never see the closet I came out of. Why? Because I'd have burned it for kindling by the time I was twelve ... If I was Gay, at this stage of the game — age 37, aging alternative icon — I'd be taking out ads." Rollins frequently speaks out on social justice on his spoken word tours and promotes equality, regardless of sexuality. He was the host of the WedRock benefit concert, which raised money for a pro-marriage equality organization.