bodhisattva epitome of incomprehensibility A word I tried to put in a poem when I was a teenager and misspelled stupidly, putting the "v" in the wrong place. Bodhisvatta, maybe, I thought it was? Another reason why I think Chomsky's right about the internalized language stuff. The pattern "ttva" just never comes up in English. As a kid, I had a knack for picking up spelling patterns early, confusing as English's are - but double consonants near single ones were always my weakness. "Occasional." Or if from a different language. "Broccoli." I feel like I should put "Occasional Hanukkah Broccoli Bodhisattva" on the inside cover of my notebooks to keep all this in mind. Esp. if it's haram to the Calvinists. 210926 ... unhinged bodhi (enlightened) sattva (being) they vow to give up their own nirvana until all other beings are also enlightened. the idea felt like a great blanket to me, like justification when my father told me for years that i was too compassionate. my compassion barely seemed to register on this scale. i have a tshirt i made at a place that would iron on glittery letters for you and i stuck 'urban bodhisattva' in silver glitter letters on a purple shirt. the woman at the store asked me 'are you sure you spelled that right?' 210926 ... tender square from an interview between joseph campbell and bill moyers from the docuseries “the power of the myth.” joseph campbell: eternity isn’t some later time. eternity isn’t a long time; it has nothing to do with time. eternity is that dimension of here and now, which thinking in time cuts out. *this is it.* if you don’t get it here, you won’t get it anywhere. and the experience of eternity right here and now is the function of life. there’s a wonderful formula that the buddhists have for this: bodhisattva. the bodhisattva, the one whose being, stattva, is illumination, bodhi, who realizes his identity with eternity and, at the same time, his participation in time. and the attitude is not to withdraw from the world when you realize how horrible it is, but to realize that this horror is simply the foreground of a wonder, and come back and participate in it. “all life is sorrowful” is the first buddhist saying and it is; it wouldn’t be life if there were not temporality involved, which is sorrow—loss, loss, loss. bill moyers: that’s a pessimistic note. campbell: well, i mean you’ve got to say yes to it; it’s great this way, it’s the way that god intended it. moyers: you don’t really believe that. campbell: that’s the way it is! and i don’t believe anybody intended it but this is the way it is. and joyce’s wonderful line, you know, “history is a nightmare from which i’m trying to awake.” and the way to awake from it is not to be afraid, and to recognize that, as i did with my conversation with that hindu guru or teacher that i told you of, that all of this as it is, is as it has to be and it is a manifestation of the eternal presence in the world. the end of things always is painful. pain is part of there being a world at all. moyers: but if one accepted that isn’t the ultimate conclusion, to say “well, i won’t try to reform any laws, or fight any battles, or—” campbell: i didn’t say that! moyers: isn’t the logical—couldn’t one draw that though, the philosophy of nihilism? campbell: well that’s not the necessary thing to draw. you can say “i will participate in this right now and i will join the army and i will go to war.” moyers: i’ll do the best i can? campbell: i’ll participate in the game. it’s a wonderful, wonderful opera, except that it hurts. and that wonderful irish saying, you know, “is this a private fight or can anybody get into it?” this is the way life is. and the hero is the one who can participate in it *decently,* in the way of nature, not in the way of personal rancor, revenge, or anything of the kind… mythology i think of as the homeland of the muses, the inspirers of art, the inspirers of poetry. and to see life as a poem, and yourself participating in a poem, is what the myth does for you. moyers: what do you mean a “poem”? campbell: i mean a vocabulary in the form, not of words but of acts and adventures, which connotes something transcendent of the action here, and which yet informs the whole thing. so you always feel in accord with the universal being. (full doc link: https://www.amazon.com/the-heros-adventure/dp/b07bc2vhhj/ref=sr_1_1?dchild=1&keywords=joseph+campbell+and+the+power+of+myth+with+bill+moyers&qid=1633010627&s=instant-video&sr=1-1) 210930 ... unhinged i was late to the joseph campbell party but i think he was a genius westerners always confuse the first Noble truth (life is suffering) as some kind of nihilism. but the christian parallel is 'we all have our cross to bear' buddhism_vs_nihilism on blue my shambhala_training has a segment of curriculum called 'fearlessness in everyday life' and also likened a bodhisattva to a spiritual warrior. the point is we rouse ourselves to make the whole world a better place for all of us. 210930 what's it to you? who go blather from