Sunday, November 06, 2016

The Mind's Order


"The order that our mind
imagines is like a net,
or like a ladder,
built to attain something.
But afterward you must
throw the ladder away,
because you discover that,
even if it was useful,
it was meaningless"

- Umberto Eco (1932 - 2016)

Saturday, November 05, 2016

Chain of Connection


"In considering the study of physical phenomena, not merely in its bearings on the material wants of life, but in its general influence on the intellectual advancement of mankind, we find its noblest and most important result to be a knowledge of the chain of connection, by which all natural forces are linked together, and made mutually dependent upon each other; and it is the perception of these relations that exalts our views and ennobles our enjoyments."

- Alexander von Humboldt (1769 - 1859)

Thursday, November 03, 2016

Cannot be Put Into Words


"Words have value;
what is of value in
words is meaning.
Meaning has something
it is pursuing,
but the thing that
it is pursuing cannot
be put into words
and handed down."

- Chuang Tzu (c.4th Century B.C.)

Wednesday, November 02, 2016

Layered Consciousness


"The color-patches of vision part, shift, and reform as I move through space in time. The present is the object of vision, and what I see before me at any given second is a full field of color patches scattered just so. The configuration will never be repeated. Living is moving; time is a live creek bearing changing lights. As I move, or as the world moves around me, the fullness of what I see shatters. “Last forever!” Who hasn’t prayed that prayer? You were lucky to get it in the first place. The present is a freely given canvas. That it is constantly being ripped apart and washed downstream goes without saying; it is a canvas, nevertheless. 

But there is more to the present than a series of snapshots. We are not merely sensitized film; we have feelings, a memory for information and an eidetic memory for the imagery of our pasts. 

Our layered consciousness is a tiered track for an unmatched assortment of concentrically wound reels. Each one plays out for all of life its dazzle and blur of translucent shadow-pictures; each one hums at every moment its own secret melody in its own unique key. We tune in and out. But moments are not lost. Time out of mind is time nevertheless, cumulative, informing the present. From even the deepest slumber you wake with a jolt- older, closer to death, and wiser, grateful for breath. 

But time is the one thing we have been given, and we have been given to time. Time gives us a whirl. We keep waking from a dream we can’t recall, looking around in surprise, and lapsing back, for years on end. All I want to do is stay awake, keep my head up, prop my eyes open,... "

- Annie Dillard (1945 - )

Monday, October 31, 2016

Boundaries


"Indeed, the only truly serious questions are ones that even a child can formulate. Only the most naive of questions are truly serious. They are the questions with no answers. A question with no answer is a barrier that cannot be breached. In other words, it is questions with no answers that set the limit of human possibilities, describe the boundaries of human existence."

- Milan Kundera (1929 - )

Sunday, October 30, 2016

Life's Timelessness


"The timeless in you
is aware of life's timelessness.
And knows that yesterday
is but today's memory
and tomorrow is today's dream."

- Kahlil Gibran (1883 - 1931)

Saturday, October 29, 2016

Mutual Interdependece


"The realm of yin and yang is the life where we oppose one thing against the other: good against bad, up against down, heaven against earth, this against that, self against other, form against emptiness, speech against silence. This is not a matter that exists in the realm of yin and yang points to the place where there’s a merging of opposites. In the Identity of Relative and Absolute we chant: 'Within light there is darkness but do not try to understand that darkness. Within darkness there is light, but do not look for that light.' Light and darkness are opposites, yet each one of them contains the other. They’re mutually arising and interdependent. There’s no separation between them. We tend to see them as separate, but they’re not... form is emptiness, emptiness is form, form is exactly emptiness, emptiness exactly form. Can it be any more specific and clear than that?"

- John Daido Loori (1931 - 2009)