Wise Words of Wittycism. (WWW)
1) Ritual celebration and enjoyment after
success or completion of tasks can become
habitual and self perpetuating of such tasks and success.
Thus the virtue of 'partying hard', being creative
and adventurous in ones reward/pleasure seeking!
2) The assesment around here is biased! And heavily in
favour of those who are able to do the work
required for the assesment.
So stop complaining, and do the work required
for the assesment!
3) If you're not "smart" enough, "rich" enough, or whatever, then
hang around those that ARE!
The odds are that;
a) some of it will rub off on to you,
b) you'll learn that you don't want to be "smart," "rich,"
or whatever,
c) you'll learn that you were already "smart," "rich," or
whatever ;)
4) Never let desire, or principles, or values, or truth, or a
prevailing sciences facts for that matter, get in your way of doing
what you know is the right thing to do.
5) They say success is getting what you want, whilst happiness is
wanting what you get. In that case I believe there's a case for
happiness being over-rated.
6) However if you've been overly miserable lately, it's probably
because you need to open up your mind to some further education.
7) Always waiting for the perfect idea, choice, decision,
opportunity, could lead to habitual procrastination.
So procrastinate later. If a perfect idea, or opportunity,
or a rational decision/choice/action is not available, start the
ball rolling even with an "irrational" choice/decision/action.
And improvise as you go along.
In short, you must realise the paradox that it is not rational to
make ALL decisions rationally.
8) "Emptiness is like water, existence like its waves."
-- Hsing Yun, Lectures on Three Budhist Sutras.
Thus the substantial substance of 'nothingness', as all things of
material are defined, and in degrees, ultimately rest in
emptiness.
9) Consciousness or the human Power On Self Test:
As absurd as it may sound, to be effective at it, just like we
would think before we acted, and could think before we spoke, we
have to think before we think.
10) To become a Man of Knowledge, a person must consequtively overcome
four personal enemies; - Fear, - Clarity, - Power, - and finally
Old age. -- Distilled from Carlos Castaneda's "The teachings of
don Juan, a Yaqui way of knowledge."
11) "Those who have lots, will recieve more, and those who have little
will lose even that." Or words to that effect. I think there are
similar sayings in just about every book of wisdom, and they invariably
refer to "faith." It could just as well have meant "happiness",
or "money", or just about anything we all aspire to.
But is it really those who have 'lots' more than some arbritrary
level? Or does it mean those who believe they have =more= will
recieve more!?? Is the glass half empty for you or half full?
Does it bother you so much when you have 'less' that you cannot even
function? Or are you so happy about it that you cannot help but attract
more!??
If you accept that perhaps its not the quantity, perhaps not even
the quality that really matters, but how you feel about yourself with
respect to what you've "got" that which determines how you disable
OR enable yourself in your daily endeavours, then perhaps you dont even
need any to begin with? You may not even need any to begin with to be
happy with yourself!
However, if more is what you want, then it is clear that
you have to be happy with what you have got or get! For being unhappy
in itself may not contribute towards you acquiring more.
From my Cynosure:
*) "[If] You are feeling sorry for yourself, you may notice that it
happens now and again, but it's not permanent and it's not
something you'd really want to invite anyone to join you
in doing. Take a deep breath, and get to work on this."
--- Sheila Green
*) "There's only one way to augment one's capacity to give, or to
teach, or to express. That's to do so." --- Sheila Green.
*) "Those who indulge in anger do precisely that: they decide on it."
--- Sheila Green.
*) "What it boils down to is the blame game. Those who would rather
protect their egos than their own best interests will allow
themselves to believe that it is always the fault of someone or
something when they are put in a risky position. It's a learned,
if inneficient, behaviour for them, but it allows them to hide
from their responsibilities, which is why it's deeply cherished by
it's practitioners, to the degree that they'll insist it's
inevitable." --- Sheila Green.
*) "Reason is so insecure that it seeps into every one of our
activities, welcome or not, in search of it's assurance that it
could somehow define them. Anger doesn't really happen instantly,
which makes it different from pure emotion or instinct, which do
occur immediately upon stimulation. Anger is decided upon in
advance, sometimes as a more generalized 'policy' for response of
threat, as well as subsequent to events for which a more valid act
of response is also feared." --- Sheila Green.
*) "Anger is a behaviour that children are taught. Not all children
are so oppressed, however." --- Sheila Green.
*) "Some people don't want to be in charge of their own destiny.
Some people don't want to take responsibility for their own lives.
Such folks find it much easier to throw a hissy fit instead.
One can, however, fight ferociously without being the least bit
angry. Such are the most dangerous of opponents..."
--- Sheila Green.
*) "Don't sweat the small stuff; besides it's =all= small stuff."
--- Sheila Green.
*) "Some people feel they own the rights to self-importance, or they
put some arbitrary personal stake on outcomes well beyond their
sphere of influence." --- Sheila Green.
*) "I think it's quite realistic to understand that we can't control
other people or events. While this may be construed as
powerlessness, I find that it makes more sense to understand that
our power is in our influence over our responses to such, and
that's never out of reach." --- Sheila Green.
*) "What's innate is the ability to respond forcefully to threat; the
addition of being peeved via assumption of guilt in another is
acquired, by some, after observation and practice."
--- Sheila Green.
*) "The fact remains that any reasonably healthy human can avoid the
bad habit of anger, and in doing so better preserve general
health. The same applies to other such vices, and true
intelligence insists on no less." --- Sheila Green.
*) "Ol' Punk made a point of getting her quite long and ample
forelock, mane and tail completely enclumped with burrs.
She did it at a most busy time, and thus it was that I
found myself postponing pressing matters to undo her
new coiffure, since I've somehow mellowed beyond the
point of leaving such things to the students, else,
more likely, I wanted to spare her undue stress in
the process.
She's a fine old mare, out of Quarterhorse royalty, and
rather than take the time to bring her to the barn for
her grooming session, I undertook the task out in the
southwest corner of a sixty-acre meadow, in the shade
of some trees, where I found her grazing. She didn't
need the other kind of deburring, in which her rough
edges of instinctive suspicion of predatory behavior
in some humans would have to be assuaged, because it
had been an issue the two of us managed previously.
The birds sang as the fresh breeze caressed us. The
views of the woodlands around our lush field were as
stunning as only rich sunlight on October's foliage
can be, here. The horse seemed quite glad to have
her scratchy headdress and tail ornaments removed.
The detached burrs fell to the ground in an area
mowed frequently, although the burdock isn't a
plant to which I can object, knowing its good
traits as well as being immersed in its bad.
Taking burrs out isn't particularly difficult, as
long as one remembers to remove the hairs from the
burrs instead of the burrs from the hairs. It is,
however, a time-consuming, even tedious, task. As
I calmly persisted with the job, I pondered things
including how odd it is that some people would be
grumbling about such things, and that I couldn't
recall anyone in my family ever having done so.
I realized that my grandparents, parents, aunts,
uncles, and cousins were none of them prone to
complain, much less become temperamental, and
especially not about such minor inconveniences.
As I kept taking the hairs off the burrs, I started
to see a parallel between human behavior and burrs.
A healthy human life is like an unencumbered hair:
it falls straight and smooth from a state of full
potential to one in which all energy is expended.
It isn't entangled in artifice distorting fears
into malice at all. An unhealthy life, however,
can result when a seed is sown such as that when
examples of anger rather than honesty are seen.
That seed grows when fertilized with the false
belief that wrath would somehow make safe, not
destroy, those indulging in it. It flowers in
the form of the sticky entanglements trapping
others as well, although the object of hate
isn't the worst victim of it. Thus it sows
the next harvest for those caught to reap.
I understand why horses perceive some humans
as being predators. I don't understand why
humans don't perceive that they thus prey
upon themselves first and foremost."
--- Sheila Green.
*) And from other Wiser men & women:
*) "Mediocrity is a vice of the doomed." -- Alan Schwartz.
*) "Luck = Preparation x Opportunity." -- Steven Scheussler.
*********************
"Could you teach me to know a prayer-flower when I see it?"
"And if I could, what better would you be? Why know the name of a thing,
when the thing itself you do not know? Whose work is it but your own to
open your eyes? Indeed the business of the universe is to make such a
fool of you that you will know yourself for one, and so begin to be
wise."
-- George MacDonald, Lilith.
"From causes which appear similar, we expect similar effects. This is the
sum total of all our experimental conclusions."
-- David Hume, An Inquiry Concerning Human Understanding.
"What we observe is not nature itself, but nature exposed to our method of
questioning." -- Werner Heisenberg, Physics and Philosophy.
"The most savage controversies are those about matters as to which there
is no good evidence either way." -- Bertrand Russel.
"The lies we tell about our duty and our purposes, the meaningless words
of science, and philosophy, are walls that topple before a bewildered
little 'why'." -- John Steinbeck, The Log from the Sea of Cortez.
"We say to ourselves: it would indeed be very nice if there were a God,
who was both creator of the world and a benevolent providence, if there
were a moral order and a future life, but at the same time it is very odd
that this is all just as we should wish it ourselves."
-- Sigmund Freud, The Future of an Illusion.
*********************
From Friedrich Wilhelm Nietzsche.
FROM THE HEIGHTS;
*) "He who despises himself, nevertheless esteems himself thereby, as
a despiser."
*) "The maturity of man -- that means, to have reacquired the
seriousness that one had as a child at play."
*) "A sign of strong character, when once the resolution has been
taken, to shut the ear even to the best counter arguements.
Occasionally, therefore, a will to stupidity."
*) "The criminal is often enough not equal to his deed. He extenuates
and maligns it."
*) "The great epochs of our life are at the points when we gain
courage to rebaptize our badness as the best in us."
*) "The will to overcome an emotion is ultimately the will of
another, or of several other, emotions."
*) "What a person is begins to betray itself when his talent
decreases, -- when he ceases to show what he can do. Talent is
also an adornment; an adornmnet is also a concealment."
*) "Where there is the tree of knowledge, there is always Paradise:'
so say the most ancient and the most modern serpents."
*) "What is done out of love always takes place beyond good and
evil."
*) "Insanity in individuals is often rare -- but in groups, parties,
nations, and epochs it is often the rule."
*) "Love brings to light the noble and hidden qualities of a lover --
his rare and exceptional traits: it is thus liable to be
deceptive as to his normal character."
*) "One does not hate as long as one disesteems, but only when one
esteems equal or superior."
*) "One loves ultimately ones desires, not the thing desired."
*) "One does not believe in the follies of clever men: what a
forfeiture of the rights of man."
*) "The consequences of our actions seize us by the forelock, very
indifferent to the fact that meanwhile we have "reformed.""
*) "I am affected, not because you have decieved me, but because I
can no longer believe in you."
***********************
From Carlos Castaneda's Allegoric Tales of Power:
***********************
******* The Teachings of don Juan; A Yaqui way of Knowledge. ********
"Ordinarily, he said, the noise of a brook or a river can trap a
bewildered man who has lost his soul and carry him away to his death."
--
"The man then must walk in any direction. It will be a short or a long
journey, depending on his willpower. A strong-willed man journeys
shortly. An undecided, weak man journeys long and precariously."
--
"Having unbending intent meant having the will to execute a necessary
procedure by maintaining oneself at all times rigidly within the
boundaries of knowledge being taught. A man of knowledge needed a rigid
will in order to endure the obligatory quality that every act possessed
when it was performed in context of his knowledge.....
Unbending intent was composed of (1) frugality, (2) soundness of
judgement, and (3) lack of freedom to innovate(!)....
It was believed that one had freedom to seek a path. Having the freedom
to choose was not incongrous with the lack of freedom to innovate; These
two ideas were not in opposition nor did they interfere with each other."
***** A Separate Reality; Further Conversations with don Juan. ******
"What makes us unhappy is to want. Yet if we would learn to cut our wants
to nothing, the smallest thing we'd get would be a true gift...
To be poor or wanting is only a thought; and so is to hate, or to be
hungry, or to be in pain....
Only a warrior can survive. A warrior knows that he is waiting and what
he is waiting for; and while he waits he wants nothing and thus whatever
little he gets is more than he can take. If he needs to eat he finds a
way, because he is not hungry; if something hurts his body he finds a way
to stop it, because he is not in pain. To be hungry or to be in pain
means that the man has abandoned himself and is no longer a warrior; and
the force of his pain and hunger will destroy him....
A warrior has to use his will and his patience to forget. In fact a
warrior has only his will and his patience and with them he builds
anything he wants."
--
"I told don Juan how much I enjoyed the exquisite sensation of talking in
the dark."
***************** Journey to Ixtlan ************************
"You take yourself too seriously." He said slowly. "You are too damn
important in your own mind. That must be changed! You are so goddamn
important that you feel justified to be annoyed with everything. You're so
damn important that you can afford to leave if things dont go your way. I
suppose you think that shows you have character. Thats nonsense, you're
weak and concieted!"
I tried to stage a protest but he did not budge. He pointed out that in
the course of my life I had not ever finished anything because of that
sense of disproportionate importance that I attached to myself.
I was flabbergasted at the certainty with which he made his statements.
They were true, ofcourse, and that made me feel not only angry but also
threatened.
"Self importance is another thing that must be dropped, just like personal
history," he said in a dramatic tone.
--
"To be a hunter sounded very nice and romantic but it was an absurdity to
me, since I did not particularly care to hunt. "You dont have to care to
hunt or to like it," he replied to my complaint. "You have a natural
inclination. I think the best hunters never like hunting; they do it well
thats all."
--
"Why should the world be as you think it is? Who gave you the authority to
say so?"
--
"To be inaccessible means you touch the world around you sparingly. You
dont eat five quail; you eat one. You dont damage the plants to make a
barbeque pit. You dont expose yourself to the power of the wind unless it
is mandatory. You dont use and squeeze people until they have shriveled to
nothing, especially the people you love."
--
"To worry is to become accessible, unwittingly accessible. And once you
worry you cling to anything out of desperation; and once you cling you are
bound to get exhausted or to exhaust whatever you are clinging to."
--
"I am trying my best," I said. "No. I disagree. You're not trying your
best. You just said that because it sounds good to you; in fact, you've
been saying the same thing about everything you do. You've been trying
your best for years to no avail. Something must be done to remedy that."
...
"You're wrong again. You can do better. There is one simple thing wrong
with you - you think you have plenty of time."
--
"Personal power is a feeling," he said. "Something like being lucky. Or
one may call it a mood. Personal power is something that one acquires
regardless of ones origin. I already have told you that a warrior is a
hunter of power, and that I am teaching you how to hunt it and store it.
The difficulty with you, which is the difficulty with all of us, is to be
convinced. You need to believe that personal power can be used and that it
is possible to store it, but you havent been convinced so far."
...
"To be convinced means you can act by yourself."
...
Whenever you do realise that you are wrong, and that it certainly makes a
world of difference, you can say that you are convinced. And then you
proceed by yourself. And by yourself you may even become a man of
knowledge.
...
"A man of knowledge is one who has truly followed the hardships of
learning."
--
"There is something in you that is very chintzy and I know what it is. You
are just humoring me. You have been humoring everybody all along, and
ofcourse, that places you automatically above everyone and everything. But
you know yourself that that cannot be so. You are only a man, and your
life is too brief {?} all the wonders and all the horrors of this
marvelous world. Therefore, your humoring is chintzy; it cuts you down to
a crappy size."
--
He said he was tired of my acting as an ultimately important being that
has to be given proof over and over that the world is unknown and
marvelous.
--
"But thats unfair, don Juan. I want to understand everything, otherwise
coming here would be a waste of my time." "A waste of your time!" he
exclaimed parodying my tone of voice. "You certainly are concieted."
--
"You're rational, all right," he said fiercely. "And that means you
believe that you know a lot about the world, but do you? Do you really?
You have only seen the acts of people. You're experiences are limited only
to what people have done to you or to others. You know nothing about this
mysterious and wonderful world."
--
A passionate man has earthly belongings; and things dear to him - if
nothing else, just the path he walks.
************************ TALES OF POWER ************************
"The self confidence of a warrior is not the self confidence of the
average man. The average man seeks certainty in the eyes of the onlooker
and calls that self confidence. The warrior seeks impeccability in his own
eyes and calls that humbleness. The average man is hooked to his fellow
man, while the warrior is hooked only to himself. Perhaps you are chasing
rainbows. You're after the self confidence of the average man, when you
should be after the humbleness of the warrior. The difference between the
two is remarkable. Self confidence entails knowing something for sure;
humbleness entails being impeccable in ones actions and feelings."
--
"Do you know that at this very moment you are surrounded by eternity? And
do you know that you can use that eternity if you so desire?"
***********************
From Goethe's Faust:
Mephistopheles:
Why, in the end, thou'rt what thou art!
Though thou be crowned with wigs of myriad tresses.
Although thy foot on ell-high buskins presses,
Though bidest ever what thou art.
Mephistopheles:
Go to Slight reason, now, and science slight,
Wherein doth lie man's greatest might!
Let but the spirit of lies enamour
Thy soul of sorcery and glamour,
And pact or none -- I hold thee tight!
To him have Destiny a spirit given
To all unbridled ever forward sweeps,
And by o'erhasty effort driven,
The Earths delights still overleaps.
Through wildest life I'll hale him by the thrapple,
Through vapid insignificancy;
I'll have him wiggle, boggle, grapple,
And his insatiability
With meat and drink I'll mock before parched lips that hover,
Vainly he'll crave refreshment for his flame.
Himself unto the Devil had he not made over,
He'd go to the Devil all the same!
Mephistopheles:
Husband your time, time fleets so swiftly on;
Yet order teaches how time may be won.
My dear friend, I bid you therefore
A course of Logic first prepare for.
Then will your mind be drilled and braced,
In Spanish boots be tightly laced,
And henceforth greater caution taught,
Shuffle along the path of thought,
Nor zig-zag, as the wind may blow,
Will-o-the-wisp it to and fro.
Then will they teach you many a day,
That what at a stroke you did alway,
Like eating and like drinking free,
Must needs be done with one, two, three.
True, the tissue of thought have warp and weft,
Like a masterpiece of the weavers craft.
One tread, and a thousand threads do flit,
Hitherward, thitherward, shoots the shuttle;
The threads flow out, unseen and subtle;
One stroke, and a thousand knots are knit.
Then the philosopher learnedly
Shows you that so the thing must be.
The First was so, the Second so,
Therefore the Third and Fourth are so;
And were not the First and Second, then
The third and fourth had never been.
All scholars praise it, but lord love 'em,
It hasn't yet made weavers of 'em!
He who some living thing would study
Drives first the spirit out of the body,
And then the parts he holds in his hand,
And there fails him but the spiritual band.
Encheiresis Naturae, Chemistry calls it,
Makes itself, knowing not what befalls it.
Faust:
I fear I don't quite grasp the matter.
Mephistopheles:
After a while you'll manage better.
You'll learn to reduce things by and by,
And to classify all appropriately.
Mephistopeheles:
And then the next thing I must mention,
Is Metaphysics, Give it your close attention.
With thought profound take care to span
What wont fit into the brain of a man.
But fit or not -- 'tis small concern,
A pompous word will serve your turn.
But for this session -- first of all
See that you be methodical.
Each day your here for five hours' space;
With the first stroke be in your place.
Be well prepared before you start.
Get all your paragraphs by heart,
That you may spy, with the watchful look,
Lest aught he say that's not i' the book.
And write for dear lifes sake, as though
The Holy Ghost dictated to you.
Faust:
Yet with this flowing beard bedight
I lack the ease of life polite.
I court but failure in the endeavour.
To mingle with the world, that could I never.
I feel so small where others are;
I should be awkward everywhere.
Mephistopheles:
'Tis use my freind, all use; allay thy fever.
If but thou trust thyself, than hast thou savour vivre.
The He-Ape [Sidles up and fawns upon Mephistopheles]
Oh! rattle the dice,
Make me rich in a trice,
And let me be gainer!
I'm short of the trash,
And were I in cash
I were so much the saner.
Mephistopheles:
How dearly would the ape now join the scramble,
And in the lottery for fortune gamble!
The Witch, declaiming from the book in a bombastic manner.
This must thou know!
From one make ten,
And two let go,
And three make even,
Then art thou rich;
Thus saith the witch.
Now four prefix;
Make seven and eight.
'Tis ended straight!
And nine is one
And ten is none.
This is the witch's once-times-one.
.....
The lofty Might
of science quite
From all the world lies hidden.
Yet take no thought,
It comes unsought;
Ask not, it comes unhidden.
Faust:
My fair young lady -- bold the offer,
Yet may I my arm and escort proffer?
Margaret:
I am not a lady, am not fair;
I can find my way home without escort, Sir.
Faust:
By Heaven, but this maid is fair!
I never have seen the like of her.
Modest and virtuos, through and through,
Yet with a touch of shrewdness, too.
Her flaming cheeks, her crimson lips,
I'll not forget till the worlds eclipse!
How she casts down her shamefast eyes
Deep in my heart engraven lies.
What a curt answer did she fling!
Upon my soul, 'twas ravishing!
Faust:
Dear maid, believe me, so-called cleverness
Is oft but vanity and dull pretence.
Generals:
What man can set his trust in nations!
No matter what his services forsooth!
'Twas ever thus! The mob's ovations,
Like a woman's favours, are bestowed on youth.
Mephistopheles:
What is accursed, yet welcome ever?
What sought, yet ever chased away?
What is aye taken into favour?
What chidden and condemned for aye?
What must thou to thine aid not summon?
What name rings sweet to every man?
What nears thy throne with happy omen?
What from thy throne itself doth ban?
Mephistopheles:
Thereby the learned Sir I recognise!
What ye not handle, miles from ye lies;
What ye not grasp, that fails you through and through;
What ye not reckon, think ye, is not true;
What you not weigh, it hath no weigth, say ye;
What ye not coin, it hath no currency.
Mephistopheles:
How fortune is linked with Merit
To their fools' wits doth ne'er occur.
Had they the Philosophers Stone, I swear it,
The Stone had no Philosopher.
CARE:
Though of ear unheard, the groaning
Heart is conscious of my moaning;
In ever changing guise
Cruel power I exercise.
On the highway, on the billow,
Cleave I close, a carking fellow;
Ever found, an unsought guest,
Ever cursed and aye caressed.
Hast though not Care already known?
Mephistopheles:
Him can no pleasure sate, no bliss suffice,
Thus ever after changing forms he springeth.
Even to this last sorry empty trice,
Poor wretched, with all his soul he clingeth.
Me did he sturdily withstand ---
Time triumphs, lies the greybeard in the sand.
The clock stands still ----
Helen, to Faust:
Woe's me, an ancient adage proves on me its truth,
That Fortune weds with Beauty never abidingly.
In sunder rent the bond of life is, as of love,
And both bewailing anguished I say farewell,
Upon thy bosom casting me yet once again.
Recieve, Persephoneia, thou the child and me!
Chorus of Angels, strewing roses;
Roses, ye twinkling,
Balsam - besprinkling,
Fluttering, thickening,
Secretly -- quickening,
Leaflet bewinged that are,
Rosebud -- unringed that are,
Hasten to bloom!
Purple and green burst
Spring from the gloom!
Paradise sheen burst
Into his tomb!
Chorus Mysticus;
All things corruptible
Are but reflection.
Earths insufficiency
Here finds perfection
Here the ineffable
Wrought is with love.
The Eternal -- Womanly
Draws us above.
***************************
I ain't a poet, And don't everybody bloody well knowit! ... Roses are red, Violets are blue, Some poems rhyme.
The following can be a warning to those contemplating or engaging in cyber
romance to be careful, and is dedicated to a daffy, sweet, witty, caring,
warm and gentle chicago woman, who bravely with noble intent encouraged
me to open up and accept love, but, I assume, was herself struck by nerves
and doubt before the day of reckoning:
:-) Ofcourse, I dont believe the warning will be heeded by anyone but the
wise.
Fools fool that I am
In the dark of cyberspace
A good natured soul, incidently
The Idea, a platonic embrace
Feeling safe I slipped, accidently
And fell in love again.
...
Distance, an indifferent tyrant
Time, of opportunities always a pirate
Money, as usual so un-compliant
Mind, of hearts desires -- all silent.
...
Clear sunny day, why the poor visiblity?
Discarded my part, so say my ears
Surely nowt, are greater fears
Pain of heart, rain of tears
Does the knowledge, induce feelings of invincibility?
...
Pining for your sweet attention with hunger
Laden heavy of sorrow sickening
Weak and vulnerable to inward and outward anger
I struggle to prevent this hearts poisoning
...
I wish I wish, there was an isolated place
Where I can scream and scream
Or an unchallenged, mad open road race
where I can swerve and swerve...
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