32. Heng / Duration (con't)

                                                                   32.   Heng  /  Duration

                                                                                The Image

                        "Thunder rolls, and the wind blows ; both are examples of extreme mobility and so are seemingly very opposite of Duration, but the laws governing their appearance and subsidence, their coming and going,,  endure .   In the same way the independence of the superior man is not based on  rigidity and immobility of character .   He always keeps abreast of the time and changes with it .  What endures is the unwavering directive, the inner law of his being, which determines all his actions ."

                             What exactly IS "the inner law of one's being" ???   

                              2 words :   Consider ... .

                                                       "Tare Forward" and "Keep the Faith"

32. Heng / Duration

                                                                    32.  Heng  /   Duration

                                                                           The Judgement

                                   "Duration is a state whose movement is not worn down by hindrances .   It is not a state of rest, for mere standstill is regression .  Duration is rather the self-contained and therefore self-renewing movement of an organized, firmly integrated whole, taking place with the immutable laws and beginning anew at every ending .   The end is reached by an inward movement, by inhalation, systole, contraction, and this movement turns into a new beginning, in which the movement is directed outward, in exhalation, diastole, expansion .

                                     "Heavenly  bodies exemplify Duration .   They move in their fixed orbits, and because of this their light-giving power endures .   The seasons of the year follow a fixed law of change and transformation, hence can produce effects that endure .  

                                      "So likewise the dedicated man embodies an enduring meaning in his way of life, and thereby the world is formed .  In that which gives things their Duration, we can come to understand the nature of all beings in heaven and on earth ."

"Play It As It Lays" ---Joan Didion

                                                            How are we to find Beauty in the most heinous and hideous ?   E-Z  ya' -gotta believe it there to being with, and now here's one made Famous by Robert Pirsig [Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance]  --->   "Believing is Seeing" --  counter-intuitive for sure, but there it is, ready or not, like it or don't .

                              One of THE most Difficult Concepts to teach is 'Life IS what it IS' .   It's the same with WAR, Beauty, and Ugliness .   To just BE means to accept things and events as they are without judgement nor bias .   What complicates 'BE-Ness' as well as 'Is-Ness' is ---> Discrimination, where Discrimination 'hides behind" Discernment .  The Mind >Discerns< and that Discernment begets all kinds of both Intellectual and Emotional TROUBLE .  

                               The Late Zen Master, Seung Sahn Soen Sa taught ,   "Moment to moment everything is already correct,  moment to moment everything is already ---> PERFECT .   If we view Perfection as Beauty, we have means to accept things AS THEY ARE , as already BEING  Beautiful .

                              Consider ... .

                                                              "Tare Forward" and "Keep the Faith" .

"Rub-a-dub-dub"

                                                           Shakespeare has given us, "To be or not to be"...  perhaps the GREATEST of all soliloquy(s) .   I have struggled with "IT" to the point of self-inflicted madness that manifested as the NECESSITY to MEMORIZE the whole fucking thing, so I could transport it to my Sub and UN-Conscious where it could be assimilated to eventually surface with UNDERSTANDING .   I mean-shit- it ain't like I'm-gonna walk up to a Someone and ask, "Should I BE or should I NOT BE ?"   What does "IT" even MEAN ?????   To BE >what< ...to BE >who< ???  

                          It's madness alright, Should I BE myself ?  Should I NOT BE myself ???   WTF ???!!!

                          At various points I've been asked by my male Students, "How can I score with chicks ? "  I have tortured them with, Whatever you do DON'T "Be Yourself" .   I mean  IT'S FUNNY rite ?  

                          After the snide laughter subsided I always added ---->  JUST BE !!!    THAT my friends is the Essence of Zen ===  to just BE  .   To just BE  "Aye, there's the rub."

"I was beside myself."

                                                           That Word ---> Majesty, is-gonna give us a fucking WORLD-of-HURT ... know what we're-gonna do ?   We're-gonna (get this) "Leave it  >be<" .   Instead, we're-gonna focus on ---> "Being" which is far more Promising .

                              The E-Z-way-out is to translate Being to  make it Life ; and for sure, Majesty of Life, does satisfy our intent to gain Understanding, plus it reads well AND "It makes Sense" .   But is "IT" Enough ?????   

                               ALL of Most-of-Us, at one time or another, have heard this complaint from our Close and sometimes Intimate Others, "I just want to be ME".   It is as if the ME is a SOMEONE ELSE, a Someone Else who can't manage unpleasant Conditions, who has, somehow, gained Control over one's Mind and Body and NOT for Good Purposes ;  and there is the correlation to the DESIRE to actually BE who you REALLY are, because the Real Me is surely capable of correctly managing ANY Situation or Condition with a guaranteed superlative result .   It is somewhat commonplace to hear, "I was beside myself" .   It's like WHAT THE FUCK JUST HAPPENED ???   You were ONE person now there's TWO ????   What manner of fucking SORCERY was "at play" Here ???   Could it possibly BE that one of Me was MAJESTIC and the other ME was NOT ?????     THAT'S the Problem with Majesty of Life == Majesty of ME,  it just don't fucking "work" .   

Miss Poke

                                                          I can hear my Gentle Readers screaming ,  WHERE IS THE MAJESTY OF BEING WHEN INNOCENT SCHOOL-AGE CHILDREN are MERCILESSLY SLAUGHTERED BY AMERICANS AND THEIR BOMBS ?????    And again, WHAT ABOUT SANDY--HOOK ???    It's Brutal ----- I know and it is EXCRUCIATING .

                           "IT" doesn't get any better when we look for 'Majesty of Being' in trump .   Majestic ?????   NO FUCKING WAY .    

                            In Hermann Hesse's Brilliant Masterpiece, NARCISSUS AND GOLDMUND there is a punishing scene where Goldmund finds the Love-of-His-Life dead, a victim of the Black Plague .   He stares incredulously -- his SORROW Untold .   But then his Mind "breaks" .  He begins to see the colors on the corpse, the patterns of decomposing skin and its texture, he sees rainbows ...  He has the thought, "How BEAUTIFUL..."    A rotting decaying Corpse, seen as >Splendor< .   I mean, I had to put the Book down to gather myself, to collect my thoughts ~~~~~~  I've seen corpses, "made-up" of course, they don't look so good, let alone Beautiful .   But can you see it ???   Dr. Campbell's Majesty of Being" manifested in a sickeningly hideous corpse .   To actually BELIEVE that there is Beauty in Death, on the surface it ain't Human, but COSMICALLY it is INFINITE --- and we can conclude that it requires something of SUPER-HUMAN Effort to see such Beauty .   

                            From the backseat of the family sedan restless children cry-out   "ARE WE THERE YET?"    Close ... 

Solve-ation

                                                           Yesterday when I pulled away from my machine I didn't feel good .   Completing my Effort with a quote from Shakespeare I THOUGHT would be sufficient closing .   I was rwong* .    While eating b-fast I remembered a better quote and it was from Dr. Joseph Campbell .  Here it is : 

                                                     "The Problem of the Hero going to meet the Father is to open his Soul beyond terror to such a degree that he will be ripe to understand how the sickening and insane tragedies of this vast and ruthless cosmos are completely validated in 'Majesty of Being' .  The Hero transcends life with its peculiar blind-spot and for a moment rises to glimpse the Source . "

                                  The Ability to "open one's Soul" --- what does that even MEAN ?    And Further, what, exactly, is "The Majesty of Being" ??    MANY years have elapsed since I began studying Dr. Campbell's Work, shit I would NEVER even DARE to question has arrived .   I can preach that, as Planetarians, we MUST be able to "Open OUR Souls" but exactly HOW the fuck DO WE DO that ?   And, as far as "Majesty of Being" goes is there some Definition to aid Us in our Efforts to bring each one of US >>TOGETHER<< that we may Experience "Shared Commonalities" and Tread on "Common Ground" ?   How are we to Solve the Problem of the Hero ???????