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Chapter of the Week: #04
[cite] Lynn Cornish:[/cite]... I disagree.
... it's more that you are creating pathways of neurons that ignite when you see a "D", rather than wearing a groove, but it feels more like a groove.
... That's pretty much how you learn how to play an instrument, isn't it?
... So I take it all back...I agree.
... Now that's what I like to hear. A little grist for my mind's mill.
... Pleasure and pain create the pathways - the groove. Or we could say, pleasure and pain are the pathways that lead to the 'emergent pathways' of that which we learn.
... Just the opposite. 'Trying to learn' prevented me from playing. My sons are excellent examples of how pleasure and pain are the guiding force in learning. This goes for music and everything else I 'taught' them during home schooling. Simply put, they 'taught' themselves (perhaps I was their coach). The rest is just afterthought and illusion. Of course, the whole 'teaching - learning' myth is a cornerstone of our cultural paradigm, making what I say rather "disagreeable".
... Now, that sounds good too!
Comments
Chapter 4
The way is empty, yet use will not drain it.
Deep, it is like the ancestor of the myriad creatures.
Blunt the sharpness;
Untangle the knots;
Soften the glare;
Let your wheels move only along old ruts.
Darkly visible, it only seems as if it were there.
I know not whose son it is.
It images the forefather of God.
Read commentary previously posted for this chapter.
Read notes on translations
I feel the flow of the moment as it empties into the next moment... moment... to... moment. The moment fills yet is never full; it flushes into the next moment. This feeling, deep and profound, only surfaces in my awareness when I'm still – when I [chref=16]hold firmly to stillness[/chref]. Here, the sharp glare of differences empty into feelings of [chref=56]mysterious sameness[/chref].
Sharpness divides me from the ancestor of all this and leaves me terribly alone. The knots and the glare of difference blind my mind of [chref=21]this[/chref]. Thus, my motto: simplify, consolidate, slow down, be still, [chref=28]return[/chref]. This is easy as long as I remember [chref=32]that it is time to stop[/chref] now! Ah, there's the catch. Yet, the wearier I become, the easier [chref=40]weakness[/chref] becomes my relief, allowing me to [chref=15]fall apart like thawing ice[/chref] and [chref=61]take the lower position[/chref]. Oh, how egalitarianly simple and straightforward!
Of course, when I'm busy,... busy,... busy(1), this is [chref=63]difficult[/chref]. Busy is too vigorous, too bright. Living busy is one of the unintended consequences of civilization. Viscerally knowing that helps slow me down some. I notice Nature; Nature is not busy. Nature [chref=21]follows the way and the way only[/chref].
In the original literal Chinese (below), there is no 'let your wheels move only along old ruts', but I love the sentiment anyway. Perhaps the idea is that by letting wheels move only along old ruts one did not kick up a lot of dust. Same its dust reminds me of 'dust to dust, ashes to ashes' – 'all is vanity', as the book of Ecclesiastes in the Old Testament put it so well.
way flushes yet use of perhaps not full.
deep! like 10,000 things of ancestor.
lower (subdue) its sharp (keen, vigour), gentle its brightness (naked, alone),
same (together) its dust,
profound (deep; crystal clear) like perhaps exist.
I (we) no know who of son (seed, egg),
image (shape, resembles) emperor (Supreme Being) of earlier (before; first; ancestor)
The way flows through, yet never fills.
Deep, it is like the beginning of all things that exist.
Relax the focus, merge the differences, as though they are dust.
Profoundly deep and clear as though it exists.
We know not what caused it,
It resembles a supreme before being.
(1) The Chinese word for busy is mang. That character is composed of two sub-characters, heart-mind and to perish. The combined meaning for me is: busy equate to the perishing of the heart-mind. What is stress, but simply being busy to the max, filling it to [chref=9]the brim[/chref].