Friday, November 15, 2024

Via Dhamma Wheel | Right Living: Abstaining from Misbehaving Among Sensual Pleasures

 


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RIGHT LIVING
Undertaking the Commitment to Abstain from Misbehaving Among Sensual Pleasures 
Sensual misconduct is unhealthy. Refraining from sensual misconduct is healthy. (MN 9) Abandoning sensual misconduct, one abstains from misbehaving among sensual pleasures. (MN 41) One practices thus: “Others may engage in sensual misconduct, but I will abstain from sensual misconduct.” (MN 8)
Reflection
There are so many ways it is possible to misbehave among sensual pleasures. Anything that feels good has the power to seduce us, and it does not take much for us to want more and more of almost anything. It is not that such pleasures are bad or evil, just that the pursuit of them can expand out of proportion and distort our behavior. It is empowering to understand this and temper our relationship to pleasure accordingly.

Daily Practice
Notice when something feels pleasurable and examine the texture of that sensation closely. Then let it go, as all transitory episodes of experience will inevitably cease. It is okay to welcome pleasure into your house as a guest, so to speak, as long as you also escort it to the door and wave goodbye when the time comes. It is when we chase after pleasure or try to hold on to it that we are in danger of misbehaving. 

Tomorrow: Developing Unarisen Healthy States
One week from today: Abstaining from Intoxication

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#DhammaWheel

Questions?
Visit the Dhamma Wheel orientation page.



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Via Daily Dharma: Focus on Sensation

 

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Focus on Sensation

Sensations arise and then disband. If we focus right here—at the consciousness of sights, sounds, smells, tastes, and tactile sensations—we’ll be able to gain insight quickly.…

Upasika Kee Nanayon, “The Pure Present”


CLICK HERE TO READ THE ARTICLE


Listening to Our Ancestors
By Thich Nhat Hanh
Three practices for listening mindfully—to ourselves and others.
Read more »

Via White Crane Institute // ONE, the official publication of the MATTACHINE SOCIETY



ONE Magazine
1952 -

ONE, the official publication of the MATTACHINE SOCIETY, Articles of Incorporation signed in the Los Angeles law office of Eric Julber. In January 1953 ONE, Inc. began publishing ONE Magazine, the first U.S. pro-gay publication, and sold it openly on the streets of Los Angeles. In October 1954 the U.S. Post Office Department declared the magazine 'obscene'. ONE sued, and finally won in 1958, as part of the landmark First Amendment case, Roth v United States. The magazine continued until 1967.

ONE also published ONE Institute Quarterly (now the Journal of Homosexuality). It began to run symposia, and contributed greatly to scholarship on the subject of same-sex love (then called homophile studies').

ONE readily admitted women, and Joan Corbin (as Eve Elloree), Irma Wolf (as Ann Carrl Reid), Stella Rush (as Sten Russell), Helen Sandoz (as Helen Sanders), and Betty Perdue (as Geraldine Jackson) were vital to its early success. ONE and Mattachine in turn provided vital help to the Daughters of Bilitis in the launching of their newsletter The Ladder in 1956. The Daughters of Bilitis was the counterpart lesbian organization to the Mattachine Society, and the organizations worked together on some campaigns and ran lecture-series. Bilitis came under attack in the early 1970s for 'siding' with Mattachine and ONE, rather than with the new separatist feminists.]

In 1965, ONE separated over irreconcilable differences between ONE’s business manager Dorr Legg and ONE Magazine editor Don Slater. After a two-year court battle, Dorr Legg’s faction retained the name “ONE, Inc.” and Don Slater’s faction retained most of the corporate library and archives. In 1968, Slater’s faction became the Homosexual Information Center or HIC, a non-profit corporation that survives today.


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Gay Wisdom for Daily Living from White Crane Institute

"With the increasing commodification of gay news, views, and culture by powerful corporate interests, having a strong independent voice in our community is all the more important. White Crane is one of the last brave standouts in this bland new world... a triumph over the looming mediocrity of the mainstream Gay world." - Mark Thompson

Exploring Gay Wisdom & Culture since 1989!
www.whitecraneinstitute.org

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Via White Crane Institute // DR. S. JOSEPHINE BAKER

 


Dr. S. Josephine Baker
1873 -

DR. S. JOSEPHINE BAKER, pioneering public health physician, born (d: 1945); Jo, as she preferred, was born in Poughkeepsie, New York in 1873 to a middle class Unitarian or Quaker family. When she was sixteen, her father and brother died from typhoid, which left her family with no means of support.

Early in her career, she had helped to twice catch Mary Mallon, also known as Typhoid Mary. Mary Mallon was the first known healthy carrier of typhoid who infected countless people through her job as a cook. Mallon was not the only repeat offender in being a typhus-contagious cook, but she was the only one put in isolation for the rest of her life. It may have been relevant that the other offenders were male, or that they were not of Irish heritage.

Josephine Baker was becoming famous, so much so that New York University Medical School asked her to lecture there on children’s health, or 'child hygiene', as it was known at the time. Baker said she would if she could also enroll in the School. The School had to give in because there was no one else who could give the lectures. So in 1917 Baker graduated with a doctorate in public health. After the United States entered WWI, Baker became even better known. Most of this publicity was generated from her comment to a NY Times reporter. She told him that it was safer to be on the front lines than to be born in the United States because the soldiers died at a rate of 4%, whereas babies died at a rate of 12%. She was able to start a lunch program for school children due to the publicity this comment brought. Over the years of her career, she made intelligent use of the press to advance the goals she had for public health. She made use of the publicity around the high rate of young men being declared 4F (not eligible for draft due to poor health) as a motivating factor for support in her work on improving the health of children.

Josephine Baker was now known across the world. She was offered a job in London as health director of public schools, a job in France taking care of war refugees, and a job in the United States as Assistant Surgeon General. Baker became the first woman to hold a federal government position when she accepted the position as Assistant Surgeon General of the United States. In 1923 she retired, but she didn't stop working.

Josephine Baker became the first woman to be a professional representative to the League of Nations when she represented the United States in the Health Committee. Many government positions, departments, and committees were created because of her work including the Federal Children's Bureau and Public Health Services (now the Department of Health and Human Services) and child hygiene departments in every state. She was also active in many groups and societies including over twenty-five medical societies and the New York State Department of Health. She also became the President of the American Medical Women’s Association and wrote 250 articles (both professional and for the popular press), 4 books, and her autobiography before her death in 1945.

Josephine Baker wrote very little about her personal life, however her partner for much of the later part of her life was Ida Alexa Wylie, a novelist and essayist from England, and self-identified as a 'woman-oriented woman'. I.A.R. Wylie is best know for the novel "The Daughter of Brahma", and "Life with George", an autobiography. When Baker retired in 1923, she started to run their household while writing her autobiography. In 1935, Baker and Wylie decided to move to Princeton, NJ, together with their friend Louise Pearce, M.D.. Pearce was a biological researcher at the Rockefeller Institute, working on animal models for trypanosoma (African Sleeping sickness) and syphylis, and the testing of treatments. Pearce later became the President of the Women’s Medical College of Philadelphia. While Baker and Pearce left little documentation of their personal lives, Wylie was open about her orientation. But she did not identify either Baker or Pearce in her writings. Wylie's papers, including some personal letters, were donated to the Women's Medical College of Philadelphia (now the Medical College of Philadelphia), where they are now available in the college's archives.

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Gay Wisdom for Daily Living from White Crane Institute

"With the increasing commodification of gay news, views, and culture by powerful corporate interests, having a strong independent voice in our community is all the more important. White Crane is one of the last brave standouts in this bland new world... a triumph over the looming mediocrity of the mainstream Gay world." - Mark Thompson

Exploring Gay Wisdom & Culture since 1989!
www.whitecraneinstitute.org

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Thursday, November 14, 2024

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Via Dhamma Wheel | Right Action: Reflecting upon Mental Action

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RIGHT ACTION
Reflecting Upon Mental Action
However the seed is planted, in that way the fruit is gathered. Good things come from doing good deeds; bad things come from doing bad deeds. (SN 11.10) What is the purpose of a mirror? For the purpose of reflection. So too mental action is to be done with repeated reflection. (MN 61)
Reflection
To be alive is to take action every moment. Even when we are not moving our bodies or speaking out loud, our minds are always doing something. (You may have noticed this in the meditation hall.) Moreover, what the mind does in one moment sets the stage for what it will do the next moment. This is why it is so important to be consciously aware of what is happening in your mind—that allows you to direct the process somewhat.
Daily Practice
Develop the habit of noticing what your mind is doing as it does it. And when appropriate, do not be shy about consciously directing what actions your mind undertakes. If you are in the grips of an unhealthy state, do what you can to abandon it. If a healthy mental or emotional state is arising, work on maintaining it. Plant your seeds carefully, and you will harvest healthy fruit. Good things come from right action.
Tomorrow: Abstaining from Misbehaving Among Sensual Pleasures
One week from today: Reflecting upon Social Action

Share your thoughts and join the conversation on social media
#DhammaWheel

Questions?
 Visit the Dhamma Wheel orientation page.
Tricycle is a nonprofit and relies on your support to keep its wheels turning.
© 2024 Tricycle Foundation
89 5th Ave, New York, NY 10003

 

Via Daily Dharma: Sit with the Mess

 

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Sit with the Mess

We have to sit with our resistance to feeling whole, to feeling all those painful and messy parts of ourselves.

Barry Magid, “Five Practices to Change Your Mind”


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A Mind Like Space
By Bhikkhu Anālayo
A German-born Bhikkhu on using the notion of space as a powerful tool for actualizing the potential of emptiness.
Read more »

Via Three Teachings: Dealing with Despair

 

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November 14, 2024

Possibility Is Always There
 
When despair creeps up on us, or hits like a truck, it can feel overwhelming. That’s because despair means a lack of hope. Even in our darkest grief, if we can find hope, we can find comfort; without hope, breaking free and moving forward may feel impossible.

Attuning to the body and practicing mindfulness or another form of meditation can help stir hope we might not believe is there. So too can poetry, art, spending time with loved ones, or doing anything that creates space, shifts perspectives, and cultivates calm. Orientation is crucial, journalist and former Tricycle executive editor Emma Varvaloucas reminded us in a recent podcast episode. Possibility is always there—even in the midst of pain and confusion. We must remain open to all of it.

As poet Jane Hirshfield told Tricycle’s editor-in-chief James Shaheen in a podcast episode last year, paraphrasing a thousand-year-old poem in the collection The Ink Dark Moon, “If you live in a house which is impermeable to the cold winds and storms and difficulties of this world, you will also wall yourself off from the moonlight.”

This week’s Three Teachings features three podcast interviews on dealing with despair. 
Forward today's teachings to a friend »
An Antidote to Despair With Emma Varvaloucas

Journalist Emma Varvaloucas discusses how we can break out of cycles of pessimism and despair by paying attention to what’s going right.
Listen now »
From Despair to Possibility With Rebecca Solnit 

Writer and activist Rebecca Solnit discusses the power of hope in times of catastrophe, the dangers of hyperindividualism, and why she believes beauty is an essential piece of activist work.
Listen now »
“Don’t Despair This Falling World” With Jane Hirshfield 

Poet Jane Hirshfield discusses how poetry can communicate deep truths we might have trouble understanding in a more conventional presentation. She also discusses the balance of abiding in uncertainty and trust, and how to sit with uncomfortable emotions and truths.
Listen now »

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