*image by Ben Harubin

 

One morning one man woke up to find himself almost not there...
at least a particular part of himself...
the part that was always searching for himself.

A man complained: "I am addled and confused."
And someone asked: "For how long?"
"Every time I think about it," he replied.
And someone said: "Then it would seem to me, based on the words you used
to describe the situation, that you have three ways to approach it –
abandon being either addled, confused, or thinking about it."
And the man slapped himself on the forehead and cried out:
"Dunce! -- how could I for so long have missed it?"

In the world of the mind, to believe that illusionary activity can produce
real results is a quite high and impressive peak in the Stupid Mountain Range.

"Climbing, climbing,
always climbing;
never moving but
always climbing...and whining about it, of course."

There was once some nonstop activity, which developed the ability to speak.
And what do you think was the very first thing it did?
Yep, that's right, it gave itself a name, thus turning itself into a
verbal-sounding object, rather than activity.
And why, you may ask, do I bring this up? Is it because the activity did
itself harm by this naming? Did it interfere with its operations?
Or simply create a confusing situation?
Yes why, you may ask, did I bother to bring the subject forward?
(Well Jeeze! -- it's just a subject, why all the "why"s?)

A man asked a stranger, "If man's mental world is an enclosed, go-nowhere, self-fueling,
self-consuming, meaningless illusion, then what could be more foolish, and increased
doses of the same, than struggling to realize this."
"In what way is the discovery of a septic field of more value than the field itself?"
And the stranger said, "Do you really want a response to that?" And when the man hesitated, he added, "Or do you really need one?"
And the man suddenly recognized that it had been his hesitation to see this that had caused him to ask the question, thus -- case closed!

(As if within a finite system there can practically be an endless, ongoing "open investigation.")

Knowing where to stop and shift directions can be as important
as knowing where to begin.

One man chewed his food really well --
for fifty years in fact
before spitting it out.