Security and certainty are - mostly - illusory. Some epochs in life make this quite apparent. This is such an epoch in my life. I feel deep periwinkle peace and wild apricot freedom in my heart! I have no doubt that this life story will unfold in a fashion unfathomable to me right now and more wonderful than I expect. There will be challenges - a giant learning curve like a scythe - that I'm ready for. Why be afraid of the unknown future? Not knowing simply means that I don't know what to be anxious about. Perfect. Earlier this month I went on a four-day solitary meditation retreat, in a tiny cabin in the woods, next to the oxbow of a small river. Ah, sweet solitude. Crunching through the snowy woods in the longest twilight in my memory, swooning over its blue colors, utterly in love with the cracking, popping sounds of trees, beguiled by wind. I asked no one in particular for grace: "May I have a gift for everyone I meet." Daytime, standing meditation facing bright sunshine, right next to the river, in love with sounds of popping and cracking ice as the temperature rose, infatuated with sunshine. Gold and orange. Renewal.

En route to Arenal last October, we saw this dog atop a car going about 56-64 km/hr (35-40 mi/hr). Our tour guide said that's not so unusual unless you're in the city. I love this image. The look on the dog's face as we passed was beyond the beyond. Being literary-minded, I see the world in symbols. This dog represents, to me, two things: > having mastered a skill, now enjoying the easy play of using it > the freedom and joy of the open road, of the sensation of wind in your face What do you get out of this photo?

My weekly discussion group at the Buddhist centre is now talking about the individual, the group, and the spiritual community. The ideas jive with my own. A group and a spiritual community are different, with different - often contrasting - goals. The purpose of a group, even a positive one, is social cohesion. The purpose of a spiritual community is to encourage each person in it to become more of an individual. What is an individual in this context? In a nutshell, it's someone who: accepts change, who lets go of notions of self (who they think they are), can commit themselves fully to something, is well along in breaking fetters (such as doubt and anger), is aware that ends are different from means (i.e., the ritual of meditation is not the end we seek; meditation is a means to cultivate specific mental states), is aware of the influence of sensory stimuli on our minds and who seeks to reduce that influence, and who actively nurtures positive emotions to supplant negative ones. [The late journalist Syney Harris wrote that "Any philosophy that can be crammed into a nutshell belongs there." I hope I'm quoting him accurately.] So.... What have you done lately to be a true individual?

what I thought about when I was supposed to be meditating today: We who believe in an essential part (soul/spirit) that continues independent of the body usually think of it as individual and entire. To have this view is to be confident that we are each responsible for our own karma. By "karma" I mean the results of the trajectories of our choices and circumstances, some of them random. I'm not sure the soul does remain entire. I suspect that it breaks down into smaller bits like a drop of water joins a pool or like a flame from a torch joins the flame from a bonfire. Maybe its constituent bits then recombine with other soul-bits like DNA recombine. The newly configured soul then goes into a new being. I've had this view for a long time. To have this view is to feel more truly that "we are all one." The new thought today was about the soul that is freshly liberated from the body. Many religions treat this time as gravid with potential to help the soul in its journey, to heal or to harm, even to continue to communicate. To have this view is to believe that it takes time for the soul to shuffle off its mortal coil. So perhaps the soul has a sort of dissolvable sheath. It is a fact that a human body, regardless of its weight at death, is a few grams lighter immediately after the moment of death. [When I appear to refer to religions as validating viewpoints, I'm not. Religions are valuable only as springboards for ideas. They can also provide the simple comfort of feeling sure about something when we are frightened or confused. It's our moral responsibility to constantly re-consider what is true.]