Posted inPersonal/Stories Spiritual practice/meditation

Calm clear consciousness — my new favorite “mantra”

OK, calm clear consciousness isn't really a mantra for me, notwithstanding the title of this blog post. Those are just three words that I've been saying to myself a few times a day, because they do a good job of summing up my current approach to meditation and spirituality. Here's some additional words that explain part of the meaning that I attribute to calm clear consciousness.  Consciousness. Everything we have experienced, are experiencing, and will experience is dependent on consciousness. No consciousness, no experience.  But there are degrees of consciousness. There's a big difference between someone comatose, in a dreamless…
6
Posted inBuddhism Personal/Stories

Another mini-enlightenment visits me on a yoga mat

I'm assuming, and hoping, that my many mini-enlightenments are adding up to an eventual maxi-enlightenment -- in the same way saving spare change found in pockets eventually totals to some real money. Today I added to my mini-enlightenment score card while standing on a mat in an exercise room at my athletic club where I do some Tai Chi and yoga after doing my elliptical trainer and weight lifting thing. I decided to take a photo of the just-after-mini-enlighentment moment in case I ever attain maximal Buddha nature, and those who revere me want documentation of something analogous to the…
26
Posted inMeaning of life Personal/Stories

Best wishes for an ordinary New Year

Here's my New Year's wish for visitors to this Church of the Churchless blog, myself, and indeed, everybody. Be ordinary. Do ordinary things. Feel happy in your ordinariness. I say this because now that I've reached the wise old age of 71, I've realized that overlooking the ordinary that's right at hand for some supposedly extraordinary thing that's around a corner has some serious drawbacks. One reason is what I talked about in a post last month, Why you should be happy today, right now, no matter what. Be happy today, right now, at this very moment and every following…
6
Posted inHumor Personal/Stories

I urge that Santa Claus be impeached

If you think I'm tough on religious leaders, check out what I wrote about Santa Claus in my HinesSight blog post, "Santa Claus must be impeached."  I credit my wife, Laurel, with coming up with the concept for our 2019 Christmas letter. Then I researched the grounds for impeachment and came up with four excellent reasons. There are more, of course. For example, I deeply doubt that Santa Claus is abiding by minimum wage and workplace safety laws in his present-making workshop staffed by elves.
8
Posted inPersonal/Stories Radha Soami Satsang Beas Spiritual practice/meditation

Yes, I’ve changed my mind about spirituality. That’s a good thing.

Today a commenter on one of my blog posts said something astoundingly obvious -- that what I write about now is different from what I wrote about five or ten years ago. Well, duh... I'm constantly changing, as are we all. I learn, grow, evolve, change my mind, look upon things differently.  Since I've published a book that consists of Church of the Churchless posts from the early years of this blog, 2004 to 2006, I'm well aware of how my approach to spirituality has changed since then. If you read Break Free of Dogma, and naturally everybody should, you'll…
104
Posted inMeaning of life Personal/Stories

Lessons about thankfulness from our dog

Our oldest dog, ZuZu, died last month. I'm still grieving. So when I looked through my previous Thanksgiving Day blog posts (a holiday here in the United States), it seemed fitting to share a 2013 post, "Our 14 year old dog teaches me about thankfulness." That dog was Serena, shown above in her younger days on a bank of the Metolius River in central Oregon. Here's most of what I said in the blog post I wrote about her when Serena's health was fading. She doesn't look like she did in her younger days. But heck, who does? Surely not me. Being…
2
Posted inDeath/Rebirth Personal/Stories

Love hurts. But the pain of love also is pleasure.

Last Tuesday our older dog, ZuZu, had to be put to sleep. Which is another way of saying, euthanized. Tearfully, I was able to write about her last days on my HinesSight blog in It was a good day for our dog to die. Of course, it wasn't a good day. Not really. I wanted ZuZu to live much longer. What I meant was explained in the first part of the blog post. Don't get me wrong. I didn't want our beloved older dog, ZuZu, to die. But she did last night, put out of her misery by a dose…
15
Posted inDeath/Rebirth Personal/Stories

Recognizing the reality of your death is key to living life

One of the best things about being human is also one of the worst things: understanding that your death is inevitable. We have this capacity because of our evolved brain. Other animals, almost certainly, lack the ability to envision a far-off future that bears no resemblance to what's being experienced in the present.  This enables us to construct civilizations that have transformed our planet. Cell phones, symphonies, electric cars, and so much else wouldn't exist without our ability to imagine possibilities that could exist, but don't at the moment. But there's a dark side to what evolution has wrought. We…
20
Posted inPersonal/Stories Reality

Deep thoughts about a typo in my new book

I'm eager to write about a newfound typo in my recently published book, "Break Free of Dogma," for a couple of reasons. One is that this gives me another chance to plug my book, which is prominently displayed at the top of the right sidebar.  Also, I've got some deep thoughts about the typo that I just discovered in the book. It came to light today after I gave some copies of the book to my fellow Tai Chi students. Handing a book to Jeremy, I told him that several of the mini-chapters refer to Tai Chi, such as the…
4
Posted inPersonal/Stories

Reality is here and now, not there and then

If we aren't in touch with the reality of what is actually present before us, right here and now, there's little point in conjecturing about what might be, there and then. This is my main problem with religiosity. Like a magician, religions do their best to distract our attention from what is really going on, so they can astound us with supposed miracles: A rabbit popped out of a hat! A woman was cut in two! is similar in kind to God so loved the world he sacrificed his only begotten son! and Heaven awaits those who have faith! Atheists like…
12
Posted inBooks Personal/Stories

My “Break Free of Dogma” book is live on Amazon

Today's visit to our mailbox was both exciting and a bit scary. I knew that Amazon would have delivered a print copy of my new book, Break Free of Dogma, which consists of 93 posts that I selected from the early years of this blog, 2004-06.  But even though the cover and interior design files uploaded without a hitch, I couldn't be sure the book would look as good as I expected until I ripped open the Amazon package. Delight! Here I am, doing the obligatory author-selfie thing. I chose to have a painting of my mother when she was sixteen…
10
Posted inPersonal/Stories

Photos I took (except for one) at the Salem Art Fair

Sometimes, well, often, I wish that everyone who comments on this blog used their real name and shared personal details of their life -- much like Facebook does, or at least was supposed to do. But once in a while I like to share some descriptions of my own life, if only to remind people that even though discussions and debates on this Church of the Churchless blog can get hot and heavy, each of us has much more important things going on in their lives. So here's an Adobe Spark web page I made tonight of photos that I…
5
Posted inPersonal/Stories

Support LBGTQ rights by signing a petition I just started

Please sign this petition I just started to support the Salem Human Rights Commission in its stand against the City of Salem leasing a building from the Salem Alliance Church to temporarily house the public library. Click on this link to the Care2 Stand up for LGBTQ rights in Salem! petition. The church rejects same-sex marriage and considers same-sex sex to be a sin. The Commission is calling on City officials to find another location for the library while renovations are made, even if that location costs more and is less convenient. For those unfamiliar with this abbreviation, LGBTQ stands…
3
Posted inPersonal/Stories

Turban tying and Bollywood dancing at World Beat Festival

As a change of pace from our usual Church of the Churchless programming, I wanted to share what I did yesterday: attend the opening day of the Salem World Beat Festival, as I do every year. It's difficult to draw profound philosophical messages from a highly enjoyable celebration of multiculturalism. But that won't stop me from trying. After I got back from the festival, I shared photos and videos that I'd taken in an Adobe Spark web page. You can peruse them by clicking below.   Obviously -- but sometimes the obvious needs mentioning -- there was zero evidence of…
2
Posted inPersonal/Stories Spiritual practice/meditation

Stuff happens

Here's what I'd call a guest post, if I wasn't the guest, since I wrote it for my HinesSight blog a few days ago. There I called it, Stuff happens. Things fall apart. Such is life. But "Stuff Happens" is a fine title all by itself. Enjoy. Unless you don't. Which is fine, since stuff happens. Sometimes the most obvious things about life need to be talked about. It's easy to overlook them not in spite of their obviousness, but because the familiar tends to fade into the background, while new stuff grabs our attention. So here's a few obvious…
11
Posted inDeath/Rebirth Personal/Stories

Our dog likely is dying, but we had a good time today

Life is difficult. Sometimes really difficult. Like when someone you love likely is going to die soon. Our dog, ZuZu, is in the late stage of chronic liver disease. Her vet has told my wife and I that ZuZu probably has weeks or months left to live, not years. So the WillaMutt Strut event ZuZu and I went to today was poignant for me. (It's put on every year by the Willamette Humane Society, where my wife is a volunteer dog walker.) Here's photos of what likely was ZuZu's last time at the event. She enjoyed herself, as did I.…
7
Posted inBooks Personal/Stories

Praise Me! I’m writing a Church of the Churchless book

Well, the title of this post is accurate, but it needs some explaining. Actually, I've already written almost all of the Church of the Churchless book, since after I started this blog in November 2004 I've written 2,601 posts. Assuming each has around 500 words (likely more, so this is a conservative estimate), that's 1,300,500 words. Wow.  For quite a while I've been thinking I should fashion those posts into a book. Recently that thought became action. I've already gotten 58,000 words worth of blog posts selected and mildly edited. Mostly I've just been removing links and a bit of…
27
Posted inBuddhism Personal/Stories

My Zen snow globe

BEHOLD... my mystical magical enlightening Zen snow globe! You turn it over to stir things up, then it settles down. Until things get stirred up again, after which they settle down. Just like life.
6
Posted inPersonal/Stories Radha Soami Satsang Beas

My definitive answer to why I left Radha Soami Satsang Beas

Geez, I thought, when I read the comment. Another one!  I have no idea why so many people are so interested in why, after 35 years, I deconverted from being a follower of Radha Soami Satsang Beas (RSSB), which is headed by a guru devotees consider to be God in human form. But here's the comment by the somewhat weirdly named "Guru." Naturally my second thought was, No way am I going to pick only one option or reply in one sentence. Instead, I'll use this blog post to convey what I hope is the definitive answer to why I…
55