Seventy-five

Martin Luther King Jr.
“Freedom is never voluntarily given by the oppressor; it must be demanded by the oppressed.”

Seventy-four

Burn it down...

“Nobody can give you freedom. Nobody can give you equality or justice or anything. If you're a man, you take it.“
~Malcolm X~

Seventy-three

“which will lead to even more of them despairing at the future and what with the planet about to go to shit with the United Kingdom soon to be disunited from Europe which itself is hurtling down the reactionary road and making fascism fashionable again and it’s so crazy that the disgusting perma-tanned billionaire has set a new intellectual and moral low by being president of America and basically it all means that the older generation has RUINED EVERYTHING and her generation is doooooomed”

From Girl, Woman, Other by Bernardine Evaristo

Seventy-two

“It is impossible to express the experiences you have below the surface with words, when water gently caresses your face and body, the pulse decreases and your brain relaxes. You are immediately cut off from the stress and hustle of everyday life when you are below the surface – there are no noisy telephones or SMS messages, no inboxes full of mail, no electrical bills, or other trivialities of everyday life taking up time and energy. There is nothing connecting you to the surface but the same withheld breath that connects you to life. There is only you and a growing pressure on your chest that feels like a loving hug and the vibrations from the deep quiet tone of the sea. It is quite possible that this deep quiet tone is none other than the mantra Om, the sound of the universe, trickling life into every cell of your body.”
~ Stig Åvall Severinsen ~

Seventy-one

Today in America, after only four months from our first case, we exceeded 100,000 deaths.

~Aeschylus~
“And even in our sleep,
pain which cannot forget 
falls drop by drop upon the heart,
until in our own despair, 
against our will,
 comes wisdom through the awful grace of God.”

Seventy

“The greatest thing in the world is to know how to belong to oneself.”
Michel de Montaigne

Sixty-nine

Again...

“There is a pleasure in the pathless woods, There is a rapture on the lonely shore, There is society, where none intrudes, By the deep sea, and music in its roar: I love not man the less, but Nature more.”
Lord Byron

Sixty-eight

“Until one has loved an animal, a part of one’s soul remains unawakened. ”
~ Anatole France ~

Sixty-seven

“In Buddhism, we express our willingness to be realistic through the practice of meditation. Meditation is not a matter of trying to achieve ecstasy, spiritual bliss or tranquility, nor is it attempting to become a better person. It is simply the creation of a space in which we are able to expose and undo our neurotic games, our self-deceptions, our hidden fears and hopes. We provide space through the simple discipline of doing nothing. Actually, doing nothing is very difficult. At first, we must begin by approximating doing nothing, and gradually our practice will develop. So meditation is a way of churning out the neuroses of mind and using them as part of our practice. Like manure, we do not throw our neuroses away, but we spread them on our garden; they become part of our richness.”

From The Myth of Freedom and the Way of Meditation
By Chogyam Trungpa

Sixty-six

when you add grief to misery...

“So it’s true, when all is said and done, grief is the price we pay for love.” 

~ E.A. Bucchianeri ~

“You will lose someone you can’t live without,and your heart will be badly broken, and the bad news is that you never completely get over the loss of your beloved. But this is also the good news. They live forever in your broken heart that doesn’t seal back up. And you come through. It’s like having a broken leg that never heals perfectly—that still hurts when the weather gets cold, but you learn to dance with the limp.” 

~ Anne Lamott ~

“we are imperfect mortal beings, aware of that mortality even as we push it away, failed by our very complication, so wired that when we mourn our losses we also mourn, for better or for worse, ourselves. as we were. as we are no longer. as we will one day not be at all.” 

~ Joan Didion ~

“It is useless for me to describe to you how terrible I felt in the time that followed. If you have ever lost someone very important to you, then you already know how it feels, and if you haven't, you cannot possibly imagine it.”

~ Daniel Handler ~

Sixty-five

For the love of fermentation...

"God made yeast, as well as dough, and loves fermentation just as dearly as he loves vegetation."
~ Ralph Waldo Emerson ~

“To ferment your own food is to lodge a small but eloquent protest - on behalf of the senses and the microbes - against the homogenization of flavors and food experiences now rolling like a great, undifferentiated lawn across the globe. It is also a declaration of independence from an economy that would much prefer we remain passive consumers of its standardized commodities, rather than creators of idiosyncratic products expressive of ourselves and of the places where we live, because your pale ale or sourdough bread or kimchi is going to taste nothing like mine or anyone else's.”

~ Michael Pollan ~

“Resistence takes place on many planes. Occasionally it can be dramatic and public, but most of the decisions we are faced with are mundane and private. What to eat is a choice that we make several times a day, if we are lucky. The cumulative choices we make about food have profound implications. Food offers us many opportunities to resist the culture of mass marketing and commodification. Though consumer action can take many creative and powerful forms, we do not have to be reduced to the role of consumers selecting from seductive convenience items. We can merge appetite with activism and choose to involve ourselves in food as cocreators.”

From Wild Fermentation: The Flavor, Nutrition, and Craft of Live-Culture Foods by Sandor Ellix Katz

Sixty-four

“Blessed is the man who, having nothing to say, abstains from giving us wordy evidence of the fact.”

~George Eliot~

Sixty-three

Happy

Three Little Birds by Bob Marley
Living in the Moment by Jason Mraz
The Sound of Sunshine by Michael Franti
Higher Love by Whitney Houston & Kygo
Somewhere Over the Rainbow by Israel Kamakawio'ole
Happy by Pharrell Williams
Here Comes the Sun by The Beatles
What a Wonderful World by Louie Armstrong
Don't Worry Be Happy by Bobby McFarin
Across the Universe by The Beatles
Give Love by MC Yogi

Sixty-two

Eight Limbs of Yoga

1. Yama = Social Restraints

• Ahisma = Do No Harm
• Satya = Tell The Truth
• Asteya = Do Not Steal
• Brahmacharya = Use Sexual Energy Wisely 
• Aparigraha = Have No Possessions

2. Niyama = Self-Restraints

• Saucha = Purity of Mind, Body, and Speech
• Santosha = Be Content
• Tapas = Be Self-Disciplined
• Svadhyana = Study Self
• Ishvarapranidhana = Study God

3. Asana = Practice of Body Postures

4. Pranayama = Practice of Breath Control

5. Pratyahara = Withdrawal from sensory experiences - release addictions and distractions

6. Dharana = Concentrate on Inner States: Mantra, Breath, Bandha, Mudra

7. Dhyana = Meditation

8. Samadhi = Enlightenment

Sixty-one

“Yoga is the journey of the self, through the self, to the self.”
The Bhagavad Gita

Sixty

“Most people think that meditation just involves allowing the mind to rest in a non-conceptual state. But if we simply strive to let the mind relax without having applied methods to transform our habitual patterns, we won’t see much change. If we push the ‘pause’ button on a tape recorder, the sound will stop; when we release the button, the tape will continue to play the same tune. Just because we pause and take a break from our mental habits during resting meditation, this doesn’t mean that we have a erased the tape of habitual mind. To actually do so and record a new one,We don’t force a non-conceptual state but instead engage in effortful meditation - repeatedly bringing the mind back to a spiritual topic or point of concentration, no matter how often we become distracted.

The method of effortful meditation that we use in the Bodhisattva Peace Trainings is contemplation. We repeatedly contemplate the teachings, imprinting them on the tape of the mind. Then when we press the pause button, relax, and release it, what we hear will be different than before. Contemplation has the power to change the mind’s patterns, replacing our negative habits with virtuous thoughts.”

From The Bodhisattva Peace Training of Chagdud Tulku

Fifty-nine

The Greater Good

Paraphrased from an article by Marcie Bianco

What is the difference between liberty and freedom in the eyes of many Americans?

Absolutely nothing.

And therein lies not only the problem driving the culture war around coronavirus shelter-in-place orders but also arguably the crux of all fronts of America's culture wars; from guns to religion to speech to now, it seems, haircuts.

"Give me liberty or give me death!" so goes the universal whine, lifted from Patrick Henry's Virginia Convention speech in 1775. Leaving aside the obvious reply, there is an irony in the protesters' call for liberty that inspires me to reach for another popular quote from American culture: "You keep using that word. I do not think it means what you think it means."

Because, my fellow Americans, liberty does not mean what you think it means.

Liberty is a type of freedom defined and limited by civil society. It is not an unrestrained, unchecked license to do whatever one desires. Rather, liberty is a right constituted by the nation one lives in.

This is perhaps why the Declaration of Independence does not once mention the word "freedom" but instead champions the "inalienable rights" of "life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness".  And the preamble of the Constitution mentions "liberty" only in the context of forming a more perfect union.

And yet, as the quarantine protests make clear a popular, yet factually and legally inaccurate sentiment, has infected the minds of many Americans. To paraphrase, it goes something like this: "This is America and I am free to do whatever I want!"

But, actually, no. You can't. Americans must abide by laws, regulations, and codes that range from their towns' garbage collection rules to the federal law declaring that 18 is the legal voting age.

The general and patriotic spirit is that collectively, as Americans, we will follow these laws to promote and ensure the general welfare of all of the people of the United States.

Without a doubt the tension between liberty and freedom resides at the very foundation of this nation. It is a tension that has widened into an incredible and increasingly partisan chasm between "the good of the people" and "the good of the person."

But, instead of indiscriminately crying freedom or liberty to defend one's assumed rights what might happen if we were to understand liberty as a freedom that holds us accountable for the welfare of the nation and all of its people?

Might we then be able to form a more perfect union?

Fifty-eight

“The old world is dying, and the new world struggles to be born: now is the time of monsters.”
~Antonio Gramsci~

Fifty-seven

“The way that Bhakti Yoga works... you just love until you and the beloved become one.”
~Ram Dass~

Fifty-six

“Perhaps in the back of our minds we already understand, without all the science I've discussed, that something terribly wrong is happening. Our sustenance now comes from misery. We know that if someone offers to show us a film on how our meat is produced, it will be a horror film. We perhaps know more than we care to admit, keeping it down in the dark places of our memory-- disavowed. When we eat factory-farmed meat we live, literally, on tortured flesh. Increasingly, that tortured flesh is becoming our own.”
~Jonathan Safran Foer~

“As far as food is concerned, the great extravagance is not caviar or truffles, but beef, pork and poultry. Some 38 percent of the world's grain crop is now fed to animals, as well as large quantities of soybeans. There are three times as many domestic animals on this planet as there are human beings. The combined weight of the world's 1.28 billion cattle alone exceeds that of the human population. While we look darkly at the number of babies being born in poorer parts of the world, we ignore the over-population of farm animals, to which we ourselves contribute... that, however, is only part of the damage done by the animals we deliberately breed. The energy intensive factory farming methods of the industrialised nations are responsible for the consumption of huge amounts of fossil fuels. Chemical fertilizers, used to grow the feed crops for cattle in feedlots and pigs and chickens kept indoors in sheds, produce nitrous oxide, another greenhouse gas. Then there is the loss of forests. Everywhere, forest-dwellers, both human and non-human, can be pushed out. Since 1960, 25 percent of the forests of Central America have been cleared for cattle. Once cleared, the poor soils will support grazing for a few years; then the graziers must move on. Shrub takes over the abandoned pasture, but the forest does not return. When the forests are cleared so the cattle can graze, billions of tons of carbon dioxide are released into the atmosphere. Finally, the world's cattle are thought to produce about 20 percent of the methane released into the atmosphere, and methane traps twenty-five times as much heat from the sun as carbon dioxide. Factory farm manure also produces methane because, unlike manured dropped naturally in the fields, it does not decompose in the presence of oxygen. All of this amounts to a compelling reason for a plant based diet.”
~Peter Singer~

Fifty-five

“I lied and said I was busy.
I was busy;
but not in a way most people understand.

I was busy taking deeper breaths.
I was busy silencing irrational thoughts.
I was busy calming a racing heart.
I was busy telling myself I am okay.

Sometimes, this is my busy -
and I will not apologize for it.”

~Brittin Oakman~

Fifty-four

“Knowing how to be solitary is central to the art of loving. When we can be alone, we can be with others without using them as a means of escape.”

~ bell hooks ~

Fifty-three

For The Love of Music

“Music was my refuge. I could crawl into the space between the notes and curl my back to loneliness.”
~Maya Angelou~

“After silence, that which comes nearest to expressing the inexpressible is music.”
~Aldous Huxley~

Fifty-two

Why Run?

“I run because if I didn’t, I’d be sluggish and glum and spend too much time on the couch. I run to breathe the fresh air. I run to explore. I run to escape the ordinary. I run to savor the trip along the way. Life becomes a little more vibrant, a little more intense. I like that.”
Dean Karnazes

“The pain of running relieves the pain of living.”
Jacqueline Simon Gunn

Fifty-one

“One of the strange things about living in the world is that it is only now and then one is quite sure one is going to live forever and ever and ever. One knows it sometimes when one gets up at the tender solemn dawn-time and goes out and stands out and throws one's head far back and looks up and up and watches the pale sky slowly changing and flushing and marvelous unknown things happening until the East almost makes one cry out and one's heart stands still at the strange unchanging majesty of the rising of the sun--which has been happening every morning for thousands and thousands and thousands of years. One knows it then for a moment or so. And one knows it sometimes when one stands by oneself in a wood at sunset and the mysterious deep gold stillness slanting through and under the branches seems to be saying slowly again and again something one cannot quite hear, however much one tries. Then sometimes the immense quiet of the dark blue at night with the millions of stars waiting and watching makes one sure; and sometimes a sound of far-off music makes it true; and sometimes a look in someone's eyes.”

From The Secret Garden by Frances Hodgson Burnett

Fifty

"Only the wounded understand the agonies of the wounded."

~Mirabai~

Forty-nine

“Don’t leave your room, don’t commit that fateful mistake. Why risk the sun? Just settle back at home and smoke. Outside’s absurd, especially that whoop of joy, you’ve made it to the lavatory--now head back straight away!

Don’t leave your room, don’t go and hail a taxi, spend, the only space that matters is the corridor, its end a ticking meter. She comes by, all ready for caressing, mouth open? Kick her straight out, don’t even start undressing.

Don’t leave your room, just say you have the influenza. A wall and table are the most fascinating agenda. Why leave this place? Tonight you will come home from town exactly as you were, only more beaten down.

Don’t leave your room. Go dance the bossa nova, shoes without socks, your body bare and coat tossed over. The hallway holds its smells of ski wax and boiled cabbage, writing even one letter more is excess baggage.

Don’t leave your room. Do you still look handsome? Just ask the room… Incognito ergo sum, as petulant Substance once remarked to Form. It’s not exactly France outside.

Don’t leave your room! Don’t be an idiot! You’re not the others, you’re an exclusion! Choreograph the furniture, essay wall-paper fusion. Make that wardrobe a barricade. The fates require us to keep out Cosmos, Chronos, Eros, Race and Virus!”

Written 1970 By Joseph Brodsky

Forty-eight

ernestly, you attempted to unfeel the pains that ran too deep to ignore medicating your emotions that were too intense to release crying out in the night gripping desperately to the day shaking pushing consciousness away looking for a new reality while re-living the past striving for a future that brought forth hope happiness and stumbling down to the bottom again life ending before knowing the bliss before finding the release always wanting to be more than you were something better than you were than the you that your mind created laughing through the tears dancing through the anger trying to recreate a life already lived and yet unknown and unfound hidden never to be seen by your bright beautiful eyes because You Closed Your Own Eyes And Forgot To Say Good-Bye.
happy birthday

Forty-seven

“If you feel ‘burnout’ setting in, if you feel demoralized and exhausted, it is best, for the sake of everyone, to withdraw and restore yourself.”
~Dalai Lama~

Forty-six

“I must not fear. Fear is the mind-killer. Fear is the little-death that brings total obliteration. I will face my fear. I will permit it to pass over me and through me. And when it has gone past I will turn the inner eye to see its path. Where the fear has gone there will be nothing. Only I will remain.”
~Frank Herbert~

Forty-five

“All the world is full of suffering. It is also full of overcoming.”
~Helen Keller~