Happy birthday
Tayata Om Gate Gate Paragate Parasamgate Bodhi Svaha
Peter Dixon Woolley










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There are innumerable ways to waste your own time. The most frequent one, in my case, is with organizational thoughts. It starts as a little, apparently insignificant thing; like the need to clean the bathroom if a maid is not available.
It has to be deeply cleaned at least twice a month. How wonderful it would be if the thought stopped at that. It is information enough, isn't it? But there comes the tools needed: rubber boots, rubber gloves, perhaps a mask, hot water - and what if the house I am living at doesn't have a boiler system? Water from an electric shower should be hot enough? Should I boil some water before starting anything else? Better to start from scratch.
First: heat up a big pan filled with water till boiling. Oh, wait! Do you have a big pan?
From scratch again.
Go and run some errands with this list: big pan, rubber boots, rubber gloves, face mask, sponge, plastic broom, powder soap, scrubber, squeegee, bucket, bleach - have to remember to wear clothes I absolutely don't care about (going trough my wardrobe mentally now). Remember to wash away really good any traces of bleach: I don't want to spoil dear clothes latter on. Not to forget to take a shower afterward, NEVER before. Then comes the scrubbing; where, for how long, using this or that tool, this or that chemical - but was it clean enough? Better to go trough it all again: sink, floor, toilet, shower, taps, corners, bathtub; soap it, scrub it, bleach it, wash it, flush it, slosh it, squirt it, squeegee it... Remember to ask your brother to sit when peeing or, even better(!), teach him the deep cleaning process! Lets see... what would he need? Rubber boots, rubber gloves, face mask...

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Sistema anti-furto escandinavo.







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La Ruche

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You sit




You walk




You're standing naked on the play-ground




You kiss her lips, she melts away




Is that her skull?




You're still a clown




Perhaps one day she did feel sad




No one was there




The weeds, my friend, are prrrrrecious




Look way up there, it's not all within
The road is not straight and never will be




Would you not tell me about your plans?







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I was called again, very early this morning. The call seemed, at the same time that would wisper my name, to ask: "Why wont you answer me?". But I am ALWAYS sleeping when they call me. Will I ever hear anything besides my own name? Do I WANT to hear anything beyond?

Write and forget, "It's only a dream".















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Photo by a CapellaGarden's student (was this Mayuko's shot?)

"I turn to another class(...) in whose eyes whatever is unusual is wrong; whose ears detect in each protest against bigotry—that parent of crime—an insult to piety, that regent of God on earth. I would suggest to such doubters certain obvious distinctions; I would remind them of certain simple truths.
Conventionality is not morality. Self-righteousness is not religion. To attack the first is not to assail the last. To pluck the mask from the face of the Pharisee, is not to lift an impious hand to the Crown of Thorns.
These things and deeds are diametrically opposed: they are as distinct as is vice from virtue. Men too often confound them: they should not be confounded: appearance should not be mistaken for truth; narrow human doctrines, that only tend to elate and magnify a few, should not be substituted for the world-redeeming creed of Christ. There is—I repeat it—a difference; and it is a good, and not a bad action to mark broadly and clearly the line of separation between them.
The world may not like to see these ideas dissevered, for it has been accustomed to blend them; finding it convenient to make external show pass for sterling worth—to let whitewashed walls vouch for clean shrines. It may hate him who dares to scrutinise and expose—to rase the gilding, and show base metal under it—to penetrate the sepulchre, and reveal charnel relics: but hate as it will, it is indebted to him.
Ahab did not like Micaiah, because he never prophesied good concerning him, but evil; probably he liked the sycophant son of Chenaannah better; yet might Ahab have escaped a bloody death, had he but stopped his ears to flattery, and opened them to faithful counsel."

Charlotte Bronte on Jane Eyre's Preface








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How I won the couch...

Well, at least for one night...


... maybe two? : p






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"I hate you, Gavrila Ardalionovitch, solely (this may seem curious to you, but I repeat)—solely because you are the type, and incarnation, and head, and crown of the most impudent, the most self-satisfied, the most vulgar and detestable form of commonplaceness. You are ordinary of the ordinary; you have no chance of ever fathering the pettiest idea of your own. And yet you are as jealous and conceited as you can possibly be; you consider yourself a great genius; of this you are persuaded, although there are dark moments of doubt and rage, when even this fact seems uncertain. There are spots of darkness on your horizon, though they will disappear when you become completely stupid. But a long and chequered path lies before you, and of this I am glad. In the first place you will never gain a certain person."

Fyodor Dostoyevsky - The Idiot



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“Habitual associates are known to exercise a great influence over each other's minds and manners. Those whose actions are for ever before our eyes, whose words are ever in our ears, will naturally lead us, albeit against our will, slowly, gradually, imperceptibly, perhaps, to act and speak as they do. I will not presume to say how far this irresistible power of assimilation extends; but if one civilized man were doomed to pass a dozen years amid a race of intractable savages, unless he had power to improve them, I greatly question whether, at the close of that period, he would not have become, at least, a barbarian himself. And I, as I could not make my young companions better, feared exceedingly that they would make me worse—would gradually bring my feelings, habits, capacities, to the level of their own; without, however, imparting to me their lightheartedness and cheerful vivacity.

Already, I seemed to feel my intellect deteriorating, my heart petrifying, my soul contracting; and I trembled lest my very moral perceptions should become deadened, my distinctions of right and wrong confounded, and all my better faculties be sunk, at last, beneath the baneful influence of such a mode of life. The gross vapours of earth were gathering around me, and closing in upon my inward heaven; and thus it was that Mr. Weston rose at length upon me, appearing like the morning star in my horizon, to save me from the fear of utter darkness; and I rejoiced that I had now a subject for contemplation that was above me, not beneath."

Anne Bronte - Agnes Grey







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Clara Haskil plays Mozart - Piano Concerto No. 19 (3 of 4)

Tayatha Om Gate Gate Paragate Parasamgate Bodhi Svaha











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I have a stain there in the ocean that is mine and mine only, solely for my eyes. 
It moves this way, that way. Like this, like that. 
Up and down the waves, dancing and distorting. 

God only knows what it is made of and why it hangs within my sight. 
When the fishermen come it gets shy, therefore it floats away. 
Although it never sinks this stain of mine, it likes to play this silly game.

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"How are you going to save the world? How find a straight road of progress, you men of science, of industry, of cooperation, of trades unions, and all the rest? How are you going to save it, I say? By what? By credit? What is credit? To what will credit lead you?’
‘You are too inquisitive,’ remarked Evgenie Pavlovitch.
‘Well, anyone who does not interest himself in questions such as this is, in my opinion, a mere fashionable dummy.’
‘But it will lead at least to solidarity, and balance of interests,’ said Ptitsin.
‘You will reach that with nothing to help you but credit? Without recourse to any moral principle, having for your foundation only individual selfishness, and the satisfaction of material desires? Universal peace, and the happiness of mankind as a whole, being the result! Is it really so that I may understand you, sir?’
‘But the universal necessity of living, of drinking, of eating— in short, the whole scientific conviction that this necessity can only be satisfied by universal cooperation and the solidarity of interests—is, it seems to me, a strong enough idea to serve as a basis, so to speak, and a ‘spring of life,’ for humanity in future centuries,’ said Gavrila Ardalionovitch, now thoroughly roused.
‘The necessity of eating and drinking, that is to say, solely the instinct of self-preservation...
‘Is not that enough? The instinct of self-preservation is the normal law of humanity...’
‘Who told you that?’ broke in Evgenie Pavlovitch.
‘It is a law, doubtless, but a law neither more nor less normal than that of destruction, even self-destruction. Is it possible that the whole normal law of humanity is contained in this sentiment of self-preservation?’"

Fyodor Dostoyevsky - The Idiot

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It will grow again, your hair and nails, your strength. Your heart will stop shrinking and will grow again, along with your kindness.







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Dream

Huge green snake eats a gecko, then a frog. A small fish jumps out of the aquarium and flies way too high in the sky. It doesn't die in the air, but it breaks in two by hitting back the water. A funeral is requested, invitations are sent.
Welcome sweet friend, grab a shovel.







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O ensino dos valores humanos é em geral considerado uma incumbência da religião ou da família. A espiritualidade e a vida comtemplativa são reduzidas, assim, a meros complementos vitamínicos da alma. Os conhecimentos filosóficos que adquirimos são quase sempre distantes da nossa prática, e cabe ao indivíduo escolher suas próprias regras de vida. Mas em nossa época, a pseudoliberdade de fazer tudo o que passa pela cabeça e a falta de referências deixam o indivíduo infeliz desamparado. As considerações abstratas em geral incompreensíveis da filosofia contemporânea somadas ao ritmo febril da vida cotidiana e à supremacia da diversão e do entretenimento deixam pouco lugar para a busca de uma fonte de inspiração autêntica quanto à direção que podemos dar à nossa vida.

É necessário reconhecer que oferecemos uma resistência fenomenal à mudança. Não falamos apenas da alegria e do vigor com que a nossa sociedade adota como tendência as novidades superficiais, mas de uma inércia profunda no que tange a qualquer transformação genuína do nosso modo de ser. A maior parte do tempo não queremos nem ouvir da possibilidade de mudar e preferimos tratar com escárnio aqueles que buscam soluções alternativas. Ninguém quer ser raivoso, ciumento ou orgulhoso, mas a cada vez que cedemos a essas emoções, usamos a desculpa que isso é normal, faz parte dos altos e baixos da vida.

Então, por que mudar? Seja você mesmo! Divirta-se bastante, compre um carro novo, mude de ares, consiga uma nova amante, tenha tudo, farte-se de tudo que é supérfluo, mas, acima de tudo, jamais toque no essencial, porque isso exige um trabalho duro, um esforço verdadeiro. Uma atitude como essa seria justificada se estivéssemos satisfeitos com o nosso destino. Mas estamos mesmos? Citando Alain mais uma vez: "Os insanos são mestres no proselitismo e, principalmente, relutam em curar-se."

Matthieu Ricard em "Felicidade: a prática do bem-estar".














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I hope it fell from the sky :)









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foto daqui

nuvem negra, passalogo.











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Em termos gerais, o altruísmo é a fonte genuína de benefício e felicidade. Portanto, se tivéssemos nascido em uma esfera da existência onde o seu desenvolvimento não fosse possível, estaríamos em uma situação sem esperança, o que felizmente não é o caso. Como seres humanos, temos as faculdades apropriadas para o desenvolvimento espiritual, dentre as quais a mais preciosa é o cérebro humano. É muito importante não desperdiçarmos a grande oportunidade que nos é oferecida por nossa condição de seres humanos, pois o tempo é um fenômeno momentâneo e inesperado. É da natureza das coisas que elas sigam um processo de mudança e desintegração. Por isso, é de extrema importância darmos significado a nossas vidas.

S.S. Dalai Lama em "O livro da felicidade".




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Fredo Viola - The Sad Song

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"Não sei quanto às outras pessoas, mas quando me abaixo para colocar os sapatos de manhã, penso: Deus Todo-Poderoso, o que mais agora?"
Charles Bukowski










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Sexta Feira Santa

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Sometimes I have this strange sensation; as if I could feel my hair growing, going slow motion in time.








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