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Chapter of the Week: #71 [Archive]
Hey Buddy,
I've read quite a bit of science fiction, though not so much the past few years. (Spendin' time with my 9 yr. old daughter is so much better!)
Anyway, the Ender series is one of my all-time favorite series. And Speaker for the Dead is my favorite. I usually cry at several places in the book - Card does a good job of eliciting emotion in the reader.
The author I've read the most, and the most consistently, is David Eddings. He does the sword and sorcery style, but I've enjoyed his series immensely. (Between 2 different story lines, he's got about 18-20 books, which I've read several times each.)
Enjoy the Ender world. I haven't read any of his other Ender ones, like Ender's Shadow, or Shadow of the Hegemon. But they sound good.
I've read quite a bit of science fiction, though not so much the past few years. (Spendin' time with my 9 yr. old daughter is so much better!)
Anyway, the Ender series is one of my all-time favorite series. And Speaker for the Dead is my favorite. I usually cry at several places in the book - Card does a good job of eliciting emotion in the reader.
The author I've read the most, and the most consistently, is David Eddings. He does the sword and sorcery style, but I've enjoyed his series immensely. (Between 2 different story lines, he's got about 18-20 books, which I've read several times each.)
Enjoy the Ender world. I haven't read any of his other Ender ones, like Ender's Shadow, or Shadow of the Hegemon. But they sound good.
Comments
Note: The Tao Te Ching can be obscure, especially if you think you're supposed to understand what it's saying! We find it easier and more instructive to simply contemplate how the chapter resonates with your personal experience. Becoming more aware at this fundamental level simplifies life. This approach conforms to the view that true knowing lies within ourselves. Thus, when a passage in the scripture resonates, you've found your inner truth. The same applies for when it evokes a question; questions are the grist for self realization.
Chapter 71
To know yet to think that one does not know is best;
Not to know yet to think that one knows will lead to difficulty.
It is by being alive to difficulty that one can avoid it.
The sage meets with no difficulty. It is because he is
alive to it that he meets with no difficulty.
Language, the 'process' we use for thinking is an art. Take painting, for example. A painter's art is a reflection - an interpretation - of reality as seen through the artist's (observer's) eyes. Likewise, thoughts are a reflection of reality as seen through the thinker's (observer's) mind. Thoughts then reflect the thinker's mind (and more deeply his core emotion) with reality as the stimulus. Reality is a light which casts shadows - our thoughts - as it passes through our emotion. Thus, to think that one does not know is best, given the tenuous thread connecting thinking to reality.
Next, how does one know one knows? That's easy. If my knowing can be put it into words and [chref=1]spoken[/chref], it is not knowing, but only a shadow of knowing tainted by emotion and experience. Although, I do feel I am getting close to knowing if I end up with a broad, balanced and emotionally neutral point of point.
Chapter 12 speaks about how our senses [chref=12]blind[/chref] us. For example: [chref=12]The five notes make his ears deaf.[/chref] I can see adding a cautionary word about thought here... Something like: The two thoughts, yea and nay, blind man's mind.
What is obvious to me is how much we, as a species, long to know and to control. To know and control ties in with our belief in free will. The reason we don't hold children and animals accountable for their actions is that they don't know better, thus they are not in control ? their 'will' is not free and some other agency (instinct and such) is in control. Adult humans on the other hand...
Thus this chapter is equally telling by putting it this way,
To have free will (control) yet to think that one does not is best;
Not to have free will (control) yet to think that one has, will lead to difficulty.
This chapter correlates with being stuck on any desire, thinking that I know what will fulfill that desire and bring me happiness when fulfilled. The more blindly I cling to that illusion, the more difficulties I have. Then I?m unable to be open to flowing with reality, to what can lead to true contentment (which is the letting go of desire).
This fits so well with chapter 15, about being hesitant, tentative. These are great ways to avoid difficulty. Questioning things helps me be more flexible, less attached to things needing to be a certain way. I?m more able to respond appropriately to reality, which helps avoid difficulty. 9 times out of 10, I?m getting in my own way, creating difficulty by struggling to make reality fit my wishes, which just ain?t gonna happen!
That?s why I have to constantly remind myself, that I don?t really know anything. Every time I think I?ve got it, especially when it leads me to think I can then help change another person for the ?better?, I?m surely missing the point. I always like the way Carl often puts it also: ?Not this, not that.?
If I remember right, Buddhism has something about the mind being a sixth sense (no, not the movie!).