Happy Birthday, Professor.

 You are still missed and loved by so many...

To My Daughter

There is so much in this world to learn and your daddy is growing too. You will bring out the best in me as I will help you do. I will teach you the best I can in awe of how little that I knew. When you have gotten older and no longer need my hand, when you are no longer crawling but using your own two feet to stand, I will give you room to grow as you play with buckets in the sand.

On your first day of preschool sweetheart, while I am happy, I might still cry.

So if you see tears in daddies eyes while glancing back to blow a kiss, know that you have not made me cry it's just that baby I will miss.

I love you,

- Dad

When You Fall in Love

When you fall in love
You recall over and over again the face and name of your beloved;
God smiles within the face and name of the beloved

As you love
Your life begins to join the one you love
Eventually you unite with your beloved
In a mystic union of effortless intense devotion

If you love money, you become like money
If you love time, you become like time
If you love life, you become life

Ultimate

Going past images and sounds – a “you”, non-you, opens another way of “seeing”. Mystics and scientists extend themselves into such extraordinary extra-dimensional views. 

We buy food, entertainment, and things – not happiness. Daily contemplation of basic truths, prayer and meditation – in the morning, afternoon and evening; ease and happiness spontaneously arise.  

By good example and state of being, those around you will be encouraged. Your happiness belongs to everyone. No need to convince anyone. Blossom like a flower; the rest takes care of itself. 

Coming of Age

Coming toward old age is easy - it happens. Coming to terms with advancing old age is difficult. There are many unexpected changes in health, habits, and powers. Fortunately mother nature gives us time to anticipate and adjust. Difficult goodbyes coming upon one upon another with accelerating velocity. Become aware of the minuses and pluses of aging. 

• Cooling of passions brings new freedom from complexity.
• Wisdom dawns.
• Spiritual senses open to eternity.
• Long friendships truly valued.

Blank Page

Blank page. Openness. 

All possibilities still here. 

Add a line, mark, letter or word

and infinite possibilities fade

into finite actualities.

Eucalyptus Grove

There's a eucalyptus grove on the UC Berkeley campus. I take students there on a march across the campus. Best to visit that Eucalyptus grove in the late afternoon. While we dialogue on truth and justice and the environment, the sun slowly sets down. The day's natural cycle now apparent - light streaming through the trees.  

How can students "know" the earth if they are always encased in technology's air conditioned classrooms with florescent lights.
   
Studying our environment only in a classroom is an abstraction. Existential honesty requires walking out of the classroom! Again, let us walk outside like the ancients and the aborigines. Feeling earth below, the sky above, and body breathing-moving. Feeling life all around and within.
  
A place is not “just a place” - it is a constant, a ground, a marker in spacetime – around which time dances as events and stories.
   
I knew this grove when it was twice as large. I saw half of it taken to develop a new life sciences building. It was quiet place back in the 1970's – while now in 2010's the sound of air conditioning units competes with song birds. Returning again and again to this eucalyptus grove defines memories and change.   

The Future is Unknown

The future is unknown. We estimate what is possible. Our times demand social and technological change. Let love take over. Minimize the use of machines to do our walking. Let "Social status" drop away and replace by love. We can't change the world overnight, but can start from where we are. Kindness matters. A gentle word would allows for a great flowering of philosophy, art, care for self, compassion for others. Beyond that, care for all living things and the earth.

Getting It All Done

GETTING IT ALL DONE is impossible. Sometimes I feel as if my world will fall apart if it all does not get done right away. This "getting it all done now" idea is mostly self generated - and passed around to children, parents, friends, mangers and subordinates. Does "it" really have to be done? Now? Later? Never? Be realistic.

Wonder and Mystery

We are so fortunate to be alive and conscious. 

Awareness is the cream of the universe. 

Feel the wonder and mystery. 

Rise above the tasks of the day.

 

Maze of Life

We are all lost in the maze of life. There is no way out except death. In the meantime, the issue is to live as well as possible. It takes courage to stay awake for the greatest show on earth: our own lives. Staying awake is the key to life more abundant. Everyday, grab hold of moments of stillness and quiet. Let the stillness seep in slowly until arriving at deep stillness. Suddenly, one may hear white noise in the the ears. Awareness of the body becomes more obvious. It’s different each time. That is part of the wonder of being-here-now. Relax deeply into It, there’s no other place we need be. Just here and now complete with forces of distraction all around! You become stillness!        

                                               ~  americ@well.com

Today's Destiny

Today! You have an appointment with destiny. The idea of destiny suggests some future great event that will happen to us. For a young person, perhaps, the day of meeting the love of their life; a mature person, the day a grandchild is born. Or, for a whole culture, the day the world ends. Destiny, however, is nothing greater than the meeting of the present with the future. When does that happen? That’s right now as the present meets the future – today. We don’t know when we’ll die. We can’t assume waiting for destiny as some “big event”; but, feeling totally present, today itself is a big event.

Being a Philosopher-at-Large

From time to time, I feel that I'm really a "philosopher-at-large". It's one of my jobs in this life. I reflect on things. I am not a writer, but more a speaker. That's why I use audio so much. That which appears real to me is often unspeakable and un-writable. The best I can do is sing or write a spontaneous poem. So here I am - reflecting on myself, in public, about this occupation of philosopher-at-large. Thankful for so many people who keep visiting this philosopher-at-large blog over all these years. You keep me going.

Time Monster

In the end, we get swallowed up by the time monster. Easy to think that time is not real. Time is personified by clocks, chimes, bell towers, time stamps, a side bar on computer screens, and much more. The price of life is time. But beyond time is eternity. People in jail are said to be "serving time". The events and stages between conception and death are the "story of our lives". Stories happen in time, like movies and novels. Life implies death; death implies life.