Don't go back to sleep

Sudden awakening,

Gradual cultivation.

-- Chinul

I heard this on a podcast I was listening to on the way home from class today. It's a description of a particular school of Buddhist thought I believe. I didn't really research it anymore than it took to attribute it to the correct teacher. But as soon as I heard the words, I just kept repeating them over and over in my mind. I was driving on the freeway with no way to make a note. I wanted to remember them.

This is how it has always been for me. There are moments where you feel like you really "get" something. It's so easy to feel like that's all it takes...a sudden jolt of the intellect...and that's enough. But it never is, is it? We find ourselves slogging through the poppy fields like Dorothy in the Wizard of Oz, getting drowsy. It would be so easy to just go back to sleep.

Freedom

"Emancipate yourselves from mental slavery, none but ourselves can free our minds." - Bob Marley

A meditation on hope

When I was listening to this in my car yesterday, I didn't realize that it was a TED Talk from 2003. It seemed to be speaking to our current state of affairs. I find myself listening to the news of members of the House and Senate still bickering away as usual and wish that they could each give a little talk about what it is that they are doing to bring hope to a struggling nation.