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My brother's death
Mine died too from Wal-mart. Maybe it's a Wal-mart thing. Yet, I never saw it catch a fly. 
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My brother's death had a profound effect on me, but not to drive me to cling to my kids as apparently portrayed. Fox wove footage of me recounting my expatriate experiences (with globe in hand) together with assorted footage concerning my brother's death, and the light house / surfing museum my parents built in Santa Cruz as a memorial to him.
He died surfing in Santa Cruz in 1964, while I was living and working in Bangkok Thailand. We'd been apart for years, so it wasn't as painful an experience as I'd have had if a loved one in my midst suddenly died. Never-the-less, his death pulled me into the deepest quandary I'd ever known... what is life vs. death?
Moment to moment, day and night, week by week I pondered this. Finally, months later while riding on the bus home, I realized... life and death are the same! Following that my life went on as usual, though for the first time I noticed that I was actually thinking for myself. Upon reflection I realized that up until then I'd only been reiterating thoughts I'd learned or that were instilled in me from birth.
Three years later, while working in Vietnam, I came across the Tao Te Ching - a kind of Taoist 'bible'. A few passages really spoke to my time in Thailand, e.g., [chref=2]Thus, Something and Nothing produce each other[/chref] and [chref=56]This is known as mysterious sameness[/chref]. My journey in Taoism, in particular, began then and there. (Note: my Yoga began in 1960 for reasons I don't recall.)
The quandary and resulting epiphany, caused by my brother's death, convinced me I must have been enlightened. The years passed until, in the early '80s, I was again pulled into a deep quandary, though not by anything in particular this time. Over a period of six month I wrestled, moment to moment, day and night, with the 'bones of my thoughts' - words. The result was 'correlations'. This 'tool', when incorporated into my outlook, made it impossible for me to get intellectually stuck on 'one side of the coin'. It was a bias buster, plain and simple. It was a while before I realized that this kind of 'tool' is the last thing anybody would want. Our species' social instinct drives us to want to have our biases supported not neutralized; it is other people's biases we want busted.
The correlations made me realize that my notions of 'enlightenment' were simply symptoms of my illusion of 'self' and of the preconceptions still lingering in my mind after that initial wake up call, i.e., my brother's death. Now, as the years pass and I become more deeply aware of how life and death are the same, I can only live moment to moment as 'reality' unfolds before me. I sense that this happens to us all, especially as our lives approach death. However, our life long conditioning (belief) keeps the sense of this 'mysterious sameness' silent in our sub-conscious. Nontheless, we feel its shadowy ripples and we give these shape according to the beliefs we [chref=42]'carry on[/chref] our backs' until death do us part.
Death lies at the heart of our fear, which in turn drives all we do. It is poignant irony how profoundly death is the master of our lives, and yet we're so un-aware of its primal control over our lives. We are so into life that we loose it. As Christ said, "Whosoever shall seek to save his life shall lose it; and whosoever shall lose his life shall preserve it." or as Buddha put it He who surrenders self will be free....
My brother's death had a profound effect on me, but not to drive me to cling to my kids as apparently portrayed...."
Yes, this is exactly what I initially thought when I saw the episode (I didn't see the first). Now that I have gone through your site and have read this posting, I know the truth. It is a shame that the truth has to be distorted to gain ratings.
peace to you Carl,
regards,
bob
Thanks for sharing. Peace on your journey as always.
I'm not a Taoist per se but, here's the way I see it. The universe is made up of the physical (matter/energy) and the non-physical (consciousness). Two sides of the same coin. One side could not exist without the other. Each side validates the existence of the other.
I asked my mother that old question, "If a tree falls in the woods and there is no one there to hear it , does it make a sound?" She answered, "Of course it does." But I disagree. Sound is the movement of air. Without an ear to sense the movement, send a signal to the brain so that a consciousness could perceive it, there is no sound. So it is with the physical universe. It must be realized to be real.
Conversely, a consciousness alone in a void could not validate itself. It would have no way of knowing if it was real or have any basis in which to form thought.
I consider my physical body to be a conduit for consciousness. A sensory organism so that the big bang could be heard.
When you burn a log in your stove, it would appear that the log is gone, never to be seen again. But this is not true. It has merely been transformed. The matter/energy that was the log is still a part of the physical universe. It will never truely dissappear.
When we die, our bodies will be transformed but, the "stuff" our bodies are made of will exist eternally.
Likewise our consciousness will never dissappear. It may be transformed but it will exist eternally in some form.
Whether our consciousness retains some form of individuality, well who knows but, I have a memory of dying of polio as a young boy in 1934 England.
Disclaimer: This is just my opinion and not to be taken as gospel.
Another possibility is that Carl really is crazy and the lady on TS was right!
People who claim to be afraid of death are really afraid of life, but it's easier to fear something we see as distant and strange, rather than something which surrounds us everyday...
Lot more food for thought in this thread, but that'll do for now...
I was more of a father to him from birth than a brother-then we had a long seperation (our reunion after 2 years is still the most amazing experience of my life) and then when he moved in with me I had such hopes...but his lack of ambition and my alcoholism combined for a failure-i really hadnt seen him much last couple years, just in and out 'hey how ya doin' type stuff...and havent seen him for the month since i moved out...I miss him, and always will...worst thing, hes moved back in with our folks, and you dont even want to hear the story of that relationship, and how much this troubles me.
...'he's my brother, he's nice, i like him'-saw that on a poster or something once...anyway, the title of this thread always makes me think of him and finally thought i'd write something down-maybe it doesnt belong here but it's where I am atm...and what is death but a seperation, a loss of contact and a chance to think about what could've been...