Having returned to the cottage in Stanhope ready to share it as a mini retreat centre, impending visitors delay renovations, though maybe lack of enthusiasm is playing a part too ... and since a car is required for the first visit, a few days are spent researching the possibilities along with attendant role playing from used car salesmen ... the car chosen comes from the local firm with an ethical reputation, even if the car itself was not the first choice ... anyway, it is blue, which is the main thing ... psyche is examined for any attachment to this new acquisition and there is none, as with the house ...it seems that the integration of no-self prevents the operation of "me" and therefore "mine", which is a liberation ... letting go of stuff has been done before and may be done again ... meanwhile house and car enable enhanced interaction with other humans, which seems a helpful stage, since solitude is seductive and maybe itself an attachment.
Meanwhile the growing library has new additions from David Bohm ... the optimistic "Quantum Theory", hopefully of use to visitors with some knowledge of mathematics and physics, and the philosophical work, "Thought as a System", which examines the ways thought leads to actions and eventually to a world which no sane individual or society would design ... pointing to "The Limits of Thought", co-authored with K ... and the problems inherent in processing incoming data through a conditioned brain ... or, as Bohm puts it:
" ... thought takes sense perception, among other things, as the source of its information; and it says that sense perception is unaffected by thought - that it is just telling you something. And thought will then proceed from there. But it may turn out that the perception has already been affected by thought, and that thought is thus taking something it has done as being a fact independent of thought."
This phenomenon was seen after a retreat at Findhorn some years ago, when, in an elevated state, visions appeared in the form of Christian symbols ... being more interested in Buddha at the time, mind protested ... two possible interpretations seem to be: the Christian fundamentalists are right after all and Jesus is indeed the one true path; a lifetime of steady conditioning has clogged the deeper layers of the brain to produce sub-conscious images ... take your pick! Or add your own interpretation ...
Reflecting on the pervasive nature of the Christian story, a brief foray into the history of calendars shows many alternative ways to measure world or human time, mostly religious and some still used in religious contexts ... however, in the current secular world time is measured from 2018 years ago, which, however you tell it to soothe non-Christian sensitivities, was the supposed incarnation of Christ ...
Since the day is warm and sunny and free until four, when some envelopes need stuffing with next month's schedule for Wheels to Meals ... a task shared with Gillian who holds the project together, defending wherever possible against any attempts to measure it or ration it ... an angel in the community, a Christian of the Methodist non-conformist tendency, whose Minister likes to evangelize, though that's not Gillian's style ... Churches and Chapels, as elsewhere in the DUK, closing for want of customers ... some finding other uses ...
So, up the hill it is, in shorts and t-shirt, cooling breeze blowing, ground nesting birds twittering to distract predators, gorse filling the nostrils with long remembered aromas, uplifting views all round ... legs glad of the outing, keeping in trim for future adventures ... in harmony with Nature ... divine!
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