Education XXV: to be aware of conditioning is the only way out of conditioning

Look at this boy on the right of the picture. He and his family have just survived the bombing of their house in Siria.

He is still suffering the extreme fear produce by extreme violence. This suffering will condition him, possibly to be angry and-or violent.

Is it possible an education that favors an awareness of this conditioning, his homo sapiens conditioning, his genetic conditioning, the conditioning produced by the way his ancestors have lived (epigenetic), his cultural, familiar conditioning.....and the conditioning of suffering produced by the infinite conditioning of his fellow humans.

Is it possible to be completely aware of the WHOLE field of conditioning?

And maybe conditioning need not be something negative. Maybe is a necessary barrier that if we jump over would bring another state of mind, more pure, more fit.

I pray that you have it, little boy.......

Not that far....and always there.....

I get together with two other people to read and comment a text of J. Krishnamurti, The Flight of the Eagle.
We chose chapter 3 almost at random. There was a part that struck us, in parenthesis, and here it goes:

"But a mind that has limitless space and that quietness, that stillness, has no centre as the `me', the `observer,' is quite different. In that silence there is no `observer' at all; that quality of silence has vast space, it is without border and intensely active; the activity of that silence is entirely different from the activity which is self-centred. If the mind has gone that far (and really it is not that far, it is always there if you know how to look), then........"

Not that far....and always there.....

(the whole chapter can be read in:  http://www.jiddu-krishnamurti.net/en/flight-of-the-eagle/1969-03-23-jiddu-krishnamurti-flight-of-the-eagle-3-meditation)

Solidarity - Insolidarity

Have a look at this link.

And now this other link

There is this mixture in all of us, as individuals and as species......

What is meditation?

Today a group of friends invited me for a morning of Vipassana meditation.

While I was sitting, the question arose: what is meditation?. This is a question that cannot be answered when you are NOT meditating, as then it would be just an intellectual answer.

So, something came to my mind: to meditate is to be OPEN and CONSCIOUS. Open to everything and conscious of that everything. Not only to what is "happening" (breathing, thoughts, etc). Happenings have a beginning and an end, they are related to "actions taking place".  But it seems there is something besides "happenings".....

recognition-security-good feeling.......the unconcious axis

Yesterday, a friend of mine had to read some of her poems in front of some people. She was preparing it quite thoroughly, and even a bit nervous.

The recognition from those unknown people would produce a sense of security and that was linked to a sense of good feeling.......all unconscious, and working perfectly...

[ The recognition from those unknown people would mean a signal to our brain of acceptance in the group, a neuronal mechanism from the time when we were "group animals", and perfectly kept till today. The acceptance would mean one would be accepted and secure in that group and to promote such behavior the brain was wired to secrete some kind of "pleasure substance", that would reinforce and validate the whole behavioral-neuronal axis]

There is nothing good or bad about it. It is like that in all of us, these long existing reflexes working unconsciously. But perhaps we should be aware of it, specially of the last part, the part that makes us feel good physically.....

.....and of the possible addiction to this good feeling.....

.....and to the rationalization that we do the action (in this case, reading the poem)...for the good of mankind.......

......and one question: is the "awareness" of such mechanism, at the same level as the mechanism itself?

everything is how we look at it

Yesterday one of my twins was crying. I looked at him and he looked really in pain. I asked him what happened. He said his brother had a pencil and he had not one.....!!!!

I told him that that was not so important. Then, as an experiment, I told him that things have the importance that we give to them.....that everything is how we look at them......

And then I realized I am not doing it myself........I do not realize this simple fact in my daily life....(!!!!)

Enough

Enough.

We are all responsible, and contribute to this in a lesser o greater degree, by having opinions, wanting security, being tribal.....

But, enough

Emptiness. Education XXIV

Weekend of cinema. Today I went to see "Flight". It is a movie about an alcoholic pilot.

But alcoholism is the result of complete empty lives....and wanting to fill this vacuum of a nihilistic society with women, alcohol, jobs

I do not want my twins to have this "vacuum" in their lives. Is there an education that could prevent that?

And it comes to my mind that yes, there is a role in education, in not giving unimportant values as supreme values, in having a reference in the sense of appreciating beauty, silence, in appreciating a nice person, in being sensitive........

The obsolete consciousness XIII

Yesterday I went to the movies to see the film "Zero dark Thirty".

This violence from both sides, extreme, refined, cruel.....both sides wanting "the good" (!!!)....

And these little men, at the top of both organizations, thinking they are important, taking decisions way beyond their true dimension, playing with their electronic toys......

I came out feeling we are very basic in our evolutionary path.......

utterly open

It had rained heavily during the night and the day, and down the gullies the muddy stream poured into the sea, making it chocolate-brown. As you walked on the beach the waves were enormous and they were breaking with magnificent curve and force. You walked against the wind, and suddenly you felt there was nothing between you and the sky, and this openness was heaven. To be so completely open, vulnerable to the hills, to the sea and to man is the very essence of meditation. To have no resistance, to have no barriers inwardly towards anything, to be really free, completely, from all the minor urges, compulsions and demands, with all their little conflicts and hypocrisies, is to walk in life with open arms. And that evening, walking there on that wet sand, with the seagulls around you, you felt the extraordinary sense of open freedom and the great beauty of love which was not in you or outside you but everywhere. We don't realize how important it is to be free of the nagging pleasures and their pains, so that the mind remains alone. It is only the mind that is wholly alone that is open. You felt all this suddenly, like a great wind that swept over the land and through you. There you were denuded of everything, empty and therefore utterly open. The beauty of it was not in the word or in the feeling, but seemed to be everywhere about you, inside you, over the waters and in the hills. Meditation is this.

(J. Krishnamurti)

The Intangible

Astronomers using the Atacama Large Millimeter/submillimeter Array (ALMA) telescope have seen a key stage in the birth of giant planets for the first time. Vast streams of gas are flowing across a gap in the disc of material around a young star. These are the first direct observations of these streams, which are expected to be created by giant planets guzzling gas as they grow. The result is published on 2 January 2013 in the journal Nature.
The international team studied the young star HD 142527, over 450 light-years from Earth, which is surrounded by a disc of gas and cosmic dust — the remains of the cloud from which the star formed. The dusty disc is divided into an inner and an outer part by a gap, which is thought to have been carved by newly forming gas giant planets clearing out their orbits as they circle the star. The inner disc reaches from the star out to the equivalent of the orbit of Saturn in the Solar System, while the outer disc begins about 14 times further out. The outer disc does not reach all the way round the star; instead, it has a horseshoe shape, probably caused by the gravitational effect of the orbiting giant planets.
According to theory, the giant planets grow by capturing gas from the outer disc, in streams that form bridges across the gap in the disc.

So many amazing things, we cannot even imagine it all.
However, this is what can be seen, has substance, body......but maybe the most important is the "intangible", what has no substance, what is not and at the same time is......
(dictionary: intangible: Unable to be touched or grasped; not having physical presence.)


( This artist’s impression shows the disc of gas and cosmic dust around the young star HD 142527.  From http://www.almaobservatory.org)

What is silence?

strong and weak

Some people occupied with deceptions a house in which I had put a lot of work. And they did not want to leave. And they have not left. At the beginning I had a lot of thoughts about it. Sometimes I would wake up and that was the first thing I would think about. Often thoughts would come to me in the middle of the day. I would even be unpolite with my own family, due to the bad feeling it created in me.

And one day, two months ago, I realize it was hurting me, not only mentally, but also physically. I realized it was going to make me sick. I felt it with certainty. I tried to put it aside, but very often I could not. I thought I was not strong enough to remove it, to let it go.

But I have. The problem is still there. In the hands of lawyers. But it does not hurt me anymore.

And I have learnt something: everything can either make us weak (hurt us) or make us stronger.......

(picture from:  http://www.thehighlanderspoems.com)

Life is one minute, one minute that goes quickly

Today Oscar Niemeyer died. He was 104 years old.
One has to listen to somebody that old.
I listen to an interview done when he was 100.
He said:

"Life is one minute, one minute that goes quickly.
The important thing is to be fraternal, simple
to relate well to other people
to not find fault in others
to think that everybody has qualities"

No, not this

No, not this.
No matter where you live, no matter what you beleive,
Not this

(picture: a man carries a killed child in Gaza, November 2012)

time by the seaside

I am spending time on the sea side. I do not have now a regular job. There is no job security, or income security, but I can come to the sea if I want, hoping this insecurity would not spoil the being here....

And I am walking on the beach, and something comes to my mind:

I am not the thoughts I have,
I am the observer of those thoughts.
I am not the one to whom things are happening,
I am the observer of things happening.....
The less concrete I am,
the more integrated.....

It is likely that I have read something of this sort before, I do not know, but it does not matter.....

Look, look at these faces, these eyes....there is hope...

Today I read this news in the BBC:

"Surgeons have removed a bullet from the head of a 14-year-old girl, a day after she was shot by Taliban gunmen in north-western Pakistan's Swat Valley, for defending the rights of girls that want to attend school.

The operation on Malala Yousafzai, a campaigner for girls' rights, went well, her father told the BBC.
The attack sparked outrage among many Pakistanis, who gathered in several cities for protests and held prayers for the girl's recovery.
The militants said they targeted her because she "promoted secularism"."

Yes, as humans we are prejudiced, very conditioned, fearful, violent, separated by our conditioning concepts and traditions.....but look at these faces, these eyes, these little hands, this purity......There is hope for all of us, humans....

is compassion exclusive to (some) human beings?

A recent article in the journal PlosOne (an amazing journal everybody in the world can access for free) describes the recent finding of a new type of monkey. It lives in the lowland rain forests of central Democratic Republic of Congo, between the middle Lomami and the upper Tshuapa Rivers:

Right at the heart of Africa........ where we all come from....

This new species has been called Cercopithecus lomamiensis, or "lesula", its common local name.

Looking at his picture, one cannot avoid seeing some kind of "compassion" in his face....or at least some kind of natural "goodness".

(Citation: Hart JA, Detwiler KM, Gilbert CC, Burrell AS, Fuller JL, et al. (2012) Lesula: A New Species of Cercopithecus Monkey Endemic to the Democratic Republic of Congo and Implications for Conservation of Congo’s Central Basin. PLoS ONE 7(9): e44271. doi:10.1371/journal.pone.0044271)

worm's waking

THE WORM'S WAKING

This is how a human can change:

there's a worm addicted to eating grape leaves.
Suddenly, he wakes up,
call it grace, whatever, something wakes him,
and he's no longer a worm.

He's the entire vineyard,
and the orchard too, the fruit, the trunks,
a growing wisdom and joy
that doesn't need to devour.

Rumi

It says it all......

The obsolete consciousness XII. Beleifs

"Man has always sought something more than the daily living, with its pain, pleasure and sorrow; he has always wanted to find something more permanent. And in his search for this unnameable thing, he has built temples, churches, mosques. Extraordinary things have been done in the name of religion. There have been wars for which religions are responsible; people have been tortured, burned, destroyed; for belief was more important than truth, dogma more vital than the direct perception. When belief becomes all-important, then you are willing to sacrifice everything for that; whether that belief is real or has no validity does not matter as long as it gives comfort, security, a sense of permanency."
(J. Krishnamurti, 1970 in a public talk)

This explains a lot of present conflicts and wars.....I wonder if a deep understanding (not just intellectual) is possible about this issue, this way of working of our brains......