DIARY 83 - Everything begins with S

If I was to describe this week it would be dominated by words of a sibilant nature.

STILLNESS
Not a lot of that around at the moment. Internal restlessness by day and a sleepless tumbling by night. Turning rancorous by Friday.

SHOULDER PAIN
After my retreat, my shoulder discomfort abated enough for me to stop taking painkillers at night. But in recent weeks I've had to start taking them again. When I don't, I sleep my useful 5hrs, but its like I've been sleeping on a hard boiled egg all evening. I don't feel physically very relaxed.

STUDENTS
Yes they've managed to not only keep us up past our bedtime once this week, waiting for the music to stop when they go out clubbing, but also to return at 3am with an inconsiderate fanfare of chatter and music.

SATISFACTION
Exactly how I achieve a semblance of satisfaction with my current work/life balance, is becoming an almost perpetual question. Work gives me little by way of satisfaction, mostly the opposite, so my own time has to be where I find some treasure. But this can be so fleeting, or I find it so filled with competing demands on my time, that I end up doing very little creative work that I find satisfaction in, or can be sustained. I'm finding this a deepening source of sadness and frustration.

SIMPLICITY
Hmm, its at times like these I desire this so much. Everything can seem to have become so emotionally complex. I then have a strong urge to prune the expectations and demands I place on myself.

SILENCE
The students are only one thorn in the side of peace and quiet in our flat. We live right by the Newmarket Road, one of the main traffic artery into the centre of Cambridge. So congestion and traffic noise is pretty constant. Lacking internal silence I crave it externally - wishing for some reciprocity. I've also been wishing we'd been more pro active during the Summer and found a new and quieter place to live. Ah regrets! I have a few.

SOLITARY SECLUSION
One of Sangharakshita's points for new and old members is that they should spend at a week or more on solitary every year. I've not been on one for over three years, and it is beginning to show. Much as I love living with David, in this flat we cannot help but be in each others pockets a lot. Finding personal secluded space is not easy to achieve. Going off for a day on my own, is occasionally possible. But that's not really like being on my own 24hrs a day, with only me and the clutter of my thoughts for company.

SANCTUARY
I've started reading a book by Abbot Christopher Jamison called 'Finding Sanctuary'. Taking the rule of St Benedict as his guide the Abbot perceptively draws out the salient points on how this could be applied to everyday life. So far its very good, accessible, not remotely preachy, in fact he's kind and possesses a great deal of human understanding. I'm finding the idea of lectio divina, thought provoking and intriguing, I may write more on this later. I've also bought another book by him called 'Finding Happiness' and 'A Book on Silence' by Sara Maitland. So I appear to be returning to my 'monastic' theme again, there's some life in it yet. I'm looking for a sense of direction from them I suspect. I've also revived my intention to go to stay in the Zen Mountain Monastery during Davids time away on the ordination course. I had yet another go at getting a response from them. This time I got one, and an encouraging one at that, so it may yet happen. Depends largely on whether I can get a month off from work in one go, which maybe the deciding factor.

SINKS THAT ARE BLOCKED
SHOWERHEADS THAT ARE BROKEN
SLOW OVENS
& SLOW SLOW PUNCTURES
Our oven has been infuriatingly out of action for three weeks or so. The electrician came once and declared there wasn't a problem. He must have just wanted to charge two call out fees or something. Last Sunday our sink got blocked, so we couldn't wash up or do any clothes washing. David's bike developed a slow puncture, which my repair didn't solve. All these were sorted out by the Monday evening, but it did seem at the time that reality was embarking on a cruel test of our patience and equanimity with things that go wrong. This leaves us with the outstanding issue of the shower head, which is usable, but the fixing that holds it upright has broken and we reported so long ago I've almost lost the will to carry on breathing. But I guess in this time of Polish plumber shortages, its not going to be considered a high priority......

SIMMERING
I feel as though I'm a pan of water that's been left on simmer for too long.


SIONARA !

DIARY 82 - Returning to feast at the table

How am I ?- well at one level weary - at another fed up - at another hanging on in there -are you getting the picture? Keeping engaged with my work has been difficult, I've kept drifting off into bored day dreams. There has been an awful lot of deep sighing, internally and externally, going on. On Friday I awoke feeling drained of even the motivation to get up, I was in an extremely negative state of mind. It was no use talking about it, giving it the oxygen of publicity would only ratify it and thus makes it worse, not better. Meditating helped in restoring some balance, but it wasn't at all suitable for me to be on the phones, and talking much to customers that day. This all feels uncomfortably similar to how I was before I went to Padmaloka. It seems I was being a little presumptive in thinking I'd done with feasting at the table of dissatisfaction. There is a teaching in here somewhere, about the transitory nature of my moods, that I don't always remember. Though I have to acknowledge that when I do feel most at ease, comfortable with myself, feeling positive and capable of so much more, I am always some where else other than at work. As any week progresses, it's effects can be slow acting surreptitious poison.


I can see that I'm an OK Manager, obviously I could always do better, of course. Things have definitely improved in the team since last year or so, in some part due to me, I know that. But I'm finding I don't care for, or take much pride in it as an achievement. It feels a bit like accepting an award on behalf of someone else, who is unfortunately out of the country,so cannot be here to receive it in person. I guess this just shows that some part of me (probable my heart) isn't in it. But, is it really only a sense of duty and financial necessity that is keeping me here? Surely there are also aspects of it which are a spiritual practice - often feels as if its only ksanti ( forbearance) . This doesn't appear enough to prevent it becoming hollow and empty of meaning at times. I feel a bit like a house plant that, from time to time, doesn't get enough essential nutrients from the soil its in, nor enough sunshine for it to fully grow or blossom.

This weekend David and I started the prolonged ritual of Christmas shopping, and preparing for the festive season. I got most of my families presents sorted out today, so hurrah!!! I'm going to see my folks early in December, so I've had to get my act together much earlier than usual. The sooner we get everything else sorted the better. I don't enjoy shopping at the best of times, but particularly so when I'm surrounded by this hurried throng of anxious consumerism. But I suppose they are as concerned as I am to get all the preparations over with pronto. There feels something quite sad and poignant about it this year. What with all the bad economic news, some people who shouldn't do, are being plunged into more expense. So much expectation of us,to buy stuff, any old stuff. Christmas is a time when conspicuous consumption becomes compulsory. I should complain, Windhorse, and my job, are dependant on this time of year. Little wonder people outside of Windhorse, in the FWBO ,and even the wider world, must look askance at us and wonder how on earth a group of Buddhists ended up creating this ethical gift company. What a strange position, to find oneself in as a Buddhist. But then buying and selling gifts is just a means, and that is not the whole story of what Windhorse does by a long long chalk.

DIARY 81 - The Oxygen of Publicity

I'm beginning to wish. so called economic experts in the media would just shut up talking about how they see the economy going in the next year. These doom sayer's, the seers of the modern world will be as inaccurate as the seers of old. The stock market is ruled by a level of superstition and accuracy of prediction similar to that of Astrology i.e not at all scientific and very imprecise. Economic advisers are the new astrologers, the agents, as well as the oracles, of doom. If we never heard them again I doubt we would be any worse off. Economic prophesy creates the thing it predicts, summons the very beast it fears into existence - makes it more likely to manifest. So if we shut them up, any recession could be much shorter as a result. The more they talk about it the worse it will get. Don't give them the oxygen of publicity to their pernicious chatter. Gag them right now!


















Watched a DVD Thursday night - The Fountain - quite possibly one of the most over inflated, preposterous movies I've seen in many a year - so confident was it of its profundity and meaning - but in reality it was clumsily conceived and stunningly predictable. David assures me that 'Requiem for a Dream' by the same director - Darren Aronofsky - is excellent. So someone has got carried away with there own success and self-importance since then, haven't they! - to produce an out and out turkey. It proves its really dangerous to inhale the oxygen of your own publicity. I've not been so eager for a movie to reach its end, since David and I endured the interminable time and vacuity of 'Russian Ark'. If you've seen that film, you'll know exactly what I mean.


Talking of over inflated egos, its become apparent that a number of English comic double acts have also soaked up too much of there own publicity. They keep doing the same stuff with ever diminishing humour or relevance. The two acts I have in mind are Little Britain and The Mighty Boosh. - each has had their moments of brilliance. For both it is the dreaded third series syndrome. First series, good, a little rough and unpolished, but still shows great promise. The second series, very good, ideas and characters well rounded and fully developed - a riot of fun. Third series, same characters, not developed much further, a feeling of lifeless routines permeats each episode - so they reach for the gross out, or coast along on old jokes, repeated and over extended until they become really tiresome. You can always have too much of a good thing. A forth series, is therefore highly inadvisable - Little Britain USA - what a load of old shite!!!

CD Review - Scott Walker - The Drift

Scott Walker, what galaxy is he destined for? What is he trying to communicate back to us from his rogue planet? What exactly does he do with himself between making these albums? 'The Drift' was released onto an unsuspecting world in 2006, a mere eleven years after 'Tilt', and its predecessor 'Climate of Hunter' was another eleven years before that. For the majority there is only the Scott Walker of his sixties hits. For others its the Scott Walker who turned his back on pop fame, and went all continental, and sang Jaque Brel songs, that was considered somewhat radical in its day. These days less so, though Marc Almond does appear to have entirely based his subsequent solo career on the Scott Walker model. Here Walker pits himself against a splintering fragmented musical backdrop. It has a similar effect to that created by David Sylvian on 'Blemish', of unbearable truthfulness and disconcerting honesty. As Walker grows older, he continues to go where no pretty voiced pop singer has gone before. Rather than sitting back on his reputation and completely retiring into the lifestyle of a reclusive icon - he seems to be becoming even more ambitious with increasing age - he is now at 65, officially a pensioner.

I first got caught up in the world of Scott Walker, with the mid-eighties album 'Climate of Hunter', a work issued at the height of pure electro pop. It was defiantly out of step, suffused as it was with great drifts of melancholy and a keening bartered soul. His distinctive vocal quality remained to act as emotional ballast,but its like listening to soft fudge being gradually melted. This is not sentimental or syrupy music. It was contrasted and set off against a languid background of strings and occasional dissonant tonalities from the saxophone of Evan Parker. Lyrically the songs are dominated by an intensity of feeling and expression, as opposed to an ease of comprehension. You can never be sure what the hell they are about, but they have deep deep emotional resonances. Most of them were just called Track, 3, 4, 5,6, or 7, as if he didn't want to give clues, you had to find your own connection or interpretation. They all had an unsettling atmosphere seeping out from under them, as if a bucket had a leak.

Then over a decade later came 'Tilt', the harshness and dissonance had grown stronger, song structures were slimmer, paired back and all but abandoned to expression. A bleaker, sparser cinematic sound pervades the entire album. It was as if in the intervening years Walker had gone deep into some personal 'heart of darkness' and was exhibiting what he'd discovered. So, now, eleven years after all that, we get 'The Drift'. It opens with impatient aggression. The track 'Cossacks Are' - has an insistent drum sound , a pounding irregular heartbeat, that dominates over Walker's voice, it teeters on the edge of despair, not always lush and comfortingly familiar. The words he utters are infused by some profound loss or tragic meltdown etched into sound- 'a moving aria for a vanishing style of mind' or 'A nocturne filled with glorious ideas' or It's hard to pick the worst moment'. Obviously Walker is not at ease with the state of contemporary life, and we are not left at ease when listening to it either. I have yet to sit through the album from start to finish. At some point the unsettling intensity of it overwhelms me, and I need to take a break. It is so doom laden it scratches at, and wrenches upon the emotions, similar to a destructive tornado sucking you up, spinning you round and spitting you out.

'Climate of Hunter' was as if a man were broken hearted by the end of a love affair, and a painful divorce. 'Tilt' was as if a man were wandering loveless through a desolate landscape, suffused with an air of lingering regret. 'The Drift' is as if that man is now lost in an urban nightmare, deranged, and on the edge of becoming completely unhinged, frightened by the horror surrounding him - of a diseased and corrupted humanity. This is not escapist, nor straightforwardly accessible music, its extremely challenging, with an almost operatic level of heightened emotion. Walker comes across as the eternal pessimist, grimly reaping. This is similar to the aesthetic impact of Ingmar Bergman in musical sound. It possess the same raw nerves portrayed and emotions exposed, the richness of tonality and textures, contrasted with an open vein of cathartic release. Though I do recommend this album, it is with some reservation, be warned its not remotely optimistic or positive about the future of humanity. It is partly a medieval morbid masterpiece, partly a grand thesis about mortality infecting everything we do like a disease, and partly a grotesque, apocalyptic zombie movie. 'The Drift' is not for those who are squeamish at the sight of fake blood being spilt.

DIARY 80 - Restless Unreason

I've had a number of weeks, where I've pretty much slept through the night with no breaks. This week unsatisfactory sleep, has made something of an unpleasant, and unwelcome return. Sunday night it was broken into by external circumstance, the students in the next flat, yet again, playing loud dance music, after 12.30 at night. I got up annoyed, banged on their door, and said 'come on guys', the volume subsequently dropped. Since then my nights have had an increasingly restless character, with much physical tumbling and sheet tugging with David ,accompanied by matching mental states. I don't know about you, but I don't find the middle of the night a time for constructive thinking, otherwise I'd be making more use of this unexpected bonus wouldn't I. Things do not get clearer, so I see my way ahead gloriously illuminated. Instead my mind searches for things it can obsessively churn over, be narked or get into a state of self-righteousness about. Trying to mentally shift to contemplating something with a more positive purpose or emphasis is difficult, as the slipperiness of negativity will gradually sour milk, and turn cider into vinegar.




















Still, outside the hopelessness of these nocturnal musings, I don't understand why I am so restless and unsettled, as in myself I feel OK. What is going on in the terrain of my subconsciousness? I've thought, perhaps its the beneficial effects of my retreat wearing off, or some accumulation of tension after a fortnight back at work, or past associations with being awoken suddenly in the night - who knows. Not that work has been much of a strain, in fact it's been uncharacteristically quiet for the time of year. The current economic climate obviously is a concern. I may be being foolishly optimistic, but the thought of a recession seems not to be alarming me. There has been so much unhelpful, hyped up economic speculation and hysterical predictions going on - you'd think we were all doomed. If we are in recession, we'll know soon enough, how long, or how deep will become clear soon enough, if its the end of the dominance of western global capitalism, we'll know soon enough. If we must be concerned about anything then let it be climate change. Though we ordinary folk have about as much effective control over this as we do over the credit crunch - a moderate amount of - Zilch!
















Windhorse, like any other company, is planning for the worst, trying to be leaner and keener as a business, and doing everything it can to keep its turnover up. I don't for some reason feel worried about its survival. If it were to fold, that would be a shame, but its not the end of life as we know it. A business like everything else is an impermanent phenomena. I've experienced at least four recessions, including the deep one in the mid seventies, and been made redundant twice. So I know they're not pleasant. These will be difficult times for everyone, but the economy has grown out of proportion, you only have to look at the average house price to see that. Things need bringing back down to terra-firma. The Queen, for once, said something perspicacious this week, when on a visit to the London School of Economics, she said: 'If these things were so large, how come everyone missed them?' Indeed your Majesty- how come? I would say banks and governments became so focused on stimulating exponential growth at any cost, they abandoned sensible precautions and fiscal rectitude. Instead we were encouraged to believe it was possible to have everything we wanted, to live beyond our means without consequence. You want a house, a car, a swimming pool, a face lift - here, have the dosh now, though you and your offspring will be paying for it, for the rest of your lives. Unfortunately those same folk are now going to be bearing the brunt of the financial and social suffering that may result - no one will be bailing them out in quite the same way as failed banks or governments.















Towards the end of the week, after many fractured nights of sleep, I was beginning to feel mentally a bit pooped. Communication by me, with my team, on Friday, proved a tad fraught with sensitivity and reactivity. Though I did have a brief moment of insight - when I have enough emotionally on my plate, I find it hard to listen, or cope well hearing other peoples emotiveness. I start to feel weighed down and oppressed whilst I'm listening - internally there can be a restlessness, and sometimes a dismissive response can arise. Fortunately, I don't voice this response, but it can make my communication clumsier, as I try skilfully to work my way around this internal obstacle of frustration. I can become downhearted at the crude nature of some of my imperfections, and the ineptness of my communication skills. Oh well, more to practice, more work in progress.

BOOK REVIEW - Big Mind-Big Heart by Dennis Genpo Merzel

Genpo Merzel's appeal as a teacher, is based on his ability to make connections between the sometimes obscure Zen source material and ordinary peoples lives. Sometimes this is a tricky line to walk, the main danger being to the health of Buddhism. You make something accessible, but it may be done at some cost to the Dharma (the Buddha's teachings) - to dumb down, misrepresent, or introduce elements that are not in sympathy with it. The challenge for all Buddhist traditions working in the West is to maintain the clarity of the teachings they've inherited, whilst discovering ways to fit them into the culture they now find themselves in.

This is not a new dilemma, it occurs when Buddhism arrives in any new culture it encounters. It happened in China, Japan and now in the US and UK. Chan/Zen, has found itself at both a physical and philosophical distance from the original Buddhist source material, ever since Bodhidharma arrived from India. This explains why Chan/Zen repeatedly states its ancestral lineage back to the Buddha, just in case we might be inclined to doubt it. On one hand it appears defensive about this Dharma inheritance, on the other, it confidently asserts that its teachings are 'a special transmission outside the scriptures'. The core Zen texts are mostly later Mahayana concoctions, the only existent texts often being Chinese translations, or sutras that are specifically Chinese Chan in origin. Aspects of Zen teaching can, as a result, seem to tread an unconventional line, when placed against earlier Buddhist teachings. This generation of texts need referring back to the primary scriptures, in order to provide continuity and context. Otherwise you will not be able to discern whether a sutra's teaching has cultural or doctrinal authority. There is an element of 'Chinese whispers' here, where the message gets seriously distorted the further away from the source - the original Buddha's teachings - it gets. So, in the West there is both a requirement to experiment, but also to accurately present the Buddha's teachings as clearly as possible. Merzel's book doesn't quite succeed in doing both.

Having admired some of his previous books I approached this book, with expectant interest. I'd heard about the Big Mind -Big Heart process he's been championing, without quite ascertaining the details of it. Finally I could obtain a better sense of what this consisted of. The endorsement on the cover from Ken Wilber, should have been advance warning - he says that the Big Mind process can be used - 'in any spiritual path you wish, or even by itself, as a practice for realising your True Self''. This tells you all you need to know about where this book is coming from. Merzel wants this approach to be accessible to all, but in order to achieve this he has effectively to neuter the Buddhism that should underpin and explicitly give it vigor. He often blurs distinctions between religions, making relativistic generalisations and sweeping universalising of belief systems. The idea of what the True Self is, is a substantially different affair looked at it through Buddhist eyes, than it would be through a psychologists eyes, for instance. Quite what sense, if any, does the ideal of a True Self make within the theology of Christianity or Islam. What exactly would Enlightenment mean to Catholic theology? Also, The Ten Perfections of the Bodhisattva - are translated by Merzel into - The Ten Perfections of Excellence. This makes no real sense without also understanding The Bodhisattva Ideal, and that these perfections can only be fully practiced by an enlightened being - not an unenlightened one! Its important to know that these are difficult Ideals to put into practice, not an easy to follow, step by step, Self-Help Guide.

The publisher designates the book as Self-Help/Body Mind Spirit, and I would say that's the best place for it. Essentially the process Merzel has designed is a development of a psychological technique called Voice Dialogue. In this you speak as aspects of your psyche and come into a more intimate relationship with them. What Merzel has done is extend this voice dialogue to include spiritual aspects too. So practitioners speak as The Self, The No Self and The True Self, etc. This makes sense if you believe these things are present, buried within your current, but still conditioned unconscious - Enlightenment is already within you, you just need to unlock it from your experience. That a conditioned person could intimately experience the unconditioned, whilst remaining a conditioned person, I can't quite believe is possible. There might be vague glimmers, but no substantial insight. The view behind this seems to misrepresent the Buddha Nature doctrine of imminence, though this is not directly mentioned here at all.

The danger in the Big Mind process is that it appears to make Insight a simple matter of psychological role play, for this truth to arise into consciousness. As a Buddhist, admittedly from a different Western Tradition, with its own jargon, I found it difficult to understand exactly what level of spiritual experience was being evoked by this role-playing. There is such a jumble of specialised jargon's, disguised Buddhist references, psychological models, psycho/spiritual guff, Self-Help and Universal philosophies at play here. In short, some of the underlying premises of this book are extremely dodgy. Mostly its misleading about how an Insight experience could be achieved. If it was this easy, then surely the Buddha, or some enlightened person over the last few millenia, would have espoused it. I don't believe Merzel is such a person either.This book comes across as half baked Buddhism, garnished with a sprinkling of psychology for added cultural zest. It maybe that people will try this technique, experience something bigger than themselves, and this could be of some help to them. At the very least it could assist with the whole process of psycho/spiritual integration. There isn't much danger in actually using the technique, but there would be if you bought into the wooliness of the philosophy behind it.

FEATURE 15 - Studs Terkel on a Soapbox - Parts 1&2

Two You Tube videos from a programme made about Studs Terkel seven years ago.





Studs Terkel on Interviewing.

"I've changed the word 'interview' to 'conversation'. That's deliberate, because of the connotations. I'm talking about the connotations in my mind. You go for a job, you get interviewed: that means you get asked questions, and you give answers... Well, I don't want it to be like that. I want it to be like a conversation, and I want it to be entertaining and I want it to be enjoyable. To me, to the guy I'm talking with, and to all that audience of eavesdroppers out there who're hearing it. That's exactly the atmosphere I want to create, that they're eavesdropping. They're excluded from the conversation, but I don't want them to feel that, I want them to feel they could join in if they wanted to."

Studs Terkel from a book of interviews he had with that other great oral historian, Tony Parker.

DIARY 79 - A few things to say about......

BARAK OBAMA

Yes, he is a breath of fresh air, a beacon of hope, an opportunity for the US to reform itself and repair its sullied image in the world. I seriously hope he does get the mandate, and survives long enough to do some good. I am deeply aware,however, that I know little or nothing about the policies he is campaigning on. Much is the same for Mc Cain, the media reports have focused exclusively on personality and charisma, to the neglect of giving us a clear idea what they stand for, apart from crudely sketched partisan positions. The mood in the UK, at least, seems to be that any change whatsoever will be better than things staying as they are. If the Republicans get re-elected, whether by hook or by crooked means, social unrest could follow, the US's democratic reputation already in tatters will completely collapse, quickly to be followed by their economy, it would seem. If the Democrats get elected there could still be social unrest in some southern states, or a Presidential assassination. Not a comforting scenario to envisage, and I hope I'm not being unduly pessimistic. But this does highlight how much America stands at a very uncertain moment in its history, poised as it seems for radical change, and for once positive with hope in its heart, however briefly it may or may not turn out to be. Memories of President Kennedy are unnervingly coming to my mind here, and in the UK the wave of renewed optimism and desire for change that swept Blair into power in 97 - and look where all that ended up!



BRAND & ROSS

What a kerfuffle this week about two overpaid entertainers behaving like juveniles. The details about the answering machine messages left on Andrew Sachs phone, prove it was entirely an unedifying event, obscene, and not even redeemed by an ounce of wit. The fuss that has ensued seems out of proportion, but perhaps its not just about this particularly incident, but the whole comic culture. What comedians get away with these days on prime time television has changed so radically in the last ten years. If I might indulge in a Mary Whitehouse moment - there really have to be some boundaries as to what is considered appropriate for public broadcast. Its not really good enough to justify it by saying this is how folk speak in ordinary life. You shouldn't as a matter of course pander to the crueler aspects of human communication. TV & Radio is not ordinary life, its life writ large and visually enhanced, so it will have an impact on the society it reputedly serves. It acts not as a mirror, but as a magnifying glass, and as such it gives a distorted picture. To treat it as a reflection of reality is dangerously naive. It isn't just down to Ross and Brand to clean up their act, but a whole raft of TV entertainers who will merrily slander and publicly defame people simply on the basis of their passing celebrity. Humour does have a need to satirise and prick pomposity - but much of what passes for amusing comment is really giving someone whose fallen from grace or has revealed a humiliating flaw in their character, a good public kicking.


In the 80's comedians did develop a moral compass, jokes about someones disability, race, sexual orientation or gender were forsaken. These now seem to be deemed appropriate when it comes to any celebrity who falls on hard times - I've heard some truly awful remarks being made about Kerry Katona, Amy Winehouse and Heather McCartney - all women I'll have you note! The details of their personal responsibility for what has happened to them aside, no one should be lampooned for their inability to overcome their drug or alcohol addiction, or the fact that they have a false leg. This humour might be called 'edgy', and irreverence does have its place, but it needs to be skillful and have a moral purpose too, otherwise it will not hit its intended target. It just becomes vindictive, the humour of the school playground. Leaving lewd messages on a 78 year old's answering machine, is just disrespectful towards someone who was going to be a guest on your show. If they'd stopped for one minute to think ' would I like this if it were done to my grandparent' or to bring it closer to home' if this were done to me would I find it funny'? But I guess they got carried away, so intoxicated with their god like gift, they lost the plot completely.



STUDS TERKEL

When I heard on the radio that Studs Terkel had died at the age of 96, I let out an instinctive and impassioned cry of 'Oh No'. In that moment I recognised quite how personally I felt this loss, how much I'd come to love a respect the work of this pioneer civil rights, broadcaster and oral historian. Very much a man of the people, and of his time, Studs was left wing in America, when it was a very unpopular if not dangerous thing to be. He was briefly blacklisted during the Mc Carthy era. His interest in ordinary peoples experience steps out of every page of his books, and was no doubt present in his radio broadcasting too. If you haven't read any books by Studs Terkel, I highly recommend them. My personal favorites are' Hope Dies Last' about individuals who've never lost their idealism, or 'Will the Circle be unbroken' where he interviews people about their different views on death, or 'Working' where he talks to workers from all types of work and careers.


Studs Terkel, undoubtedly had his own political views, yet his approach to documenting his subject matter was impartial, showing every possible angle on a subject. He interviews people from all social, economic and political spectrum's, and allows them to speak. What is communicated is their basic humanity outside of stereotypes. Irrespective of your own views about the opinions they express, in the end you understand a little better their experience, and why they have come to that conclusion, however unpalatable it might be to you. In 'Working' he interviews people at all levels of the Ford Company, and what he reveals is how each level of the business always blames the level above them as the source of all their problems. In his books you really are forced to 'bare witness' to the breadth of human experience and step out of your limited, self preserving perspective.

His approach to making his books was laborious, often visiting an interviewee several times. He always took a tape recorder with him, though he barely understood the technicalities of how it worked, and was lost if it didn't. Until her death a few years ago, his wife listened to and transcribed these tape recorded interviews. Terkel would then further edit and polish them. What he produced was invariable a seamless personal monologue, with little sense of Terkel's actual presence or questions. Without resorting to racial or cultural caricature he allowed something of their manner of speaking to come off the page. This is a skill he sensitively developed to a high degree. It is his self-effacement that gives the books their impact,because of this the books are never about him as the author, or the book being an expression of his ego. His books are about lives the people in them. His approach to interviewing was to encourage the person he was interviewing to open up and more deeply reveal themselves. Jonathan Ross should take note!

DIARY 78 - Taking your eye off the gravy

When you're making gravy, you finely cut onions, slowly fry them, and gradually add flour, flavourings and water. Once the ingredients are all mixed its very easy to think nothing is happening for quite some time. But don't ever go away and do something else. If you take your eye off the gravy for even a few seconds it will thicken too much, form a skin, or worse still burn on the bottom of the pan. To make a good gravy you need to keep stirring, keep adding water, you need to give it your full attention. As with gravy, so it is with practicing the spiritual life. If you don't give it the right degree of attention, keep stirring it, keep adding water, it will solidify forming a wrinkled old looking skin, or at worst the light of inspiration will burn itself out.



I've been away on retreat, for a fortnight at Padmaloka. The retreat, called The Heart of Ordination, was based around the four ordination vows that I took when I became a member of the Western Buddhist Order. You accept the ordination on the basis that you will - be loyal to your teachers - remain in harmony with friends and brethren - do so in order to attain enlightenment - and for the benefit of all beings. I took these vows eight years ago. The day before the Public Ordinations we were told to note them, as they were very important commitments we were to recite. However, that was the first I'd heard of them. These days the four vows have developed a much higher profile in the WBO, to the extent of having an entire retreat constructed around them.



I was supporting Padmavajra in his study group, so I'd prepared well, and dutifully read all the background material and made notes. I knew this retreat would challenge my rather distant stance towards the institutions of the Order, and sure enough it did so. One by one, within the first few days they all popped up- being in good contact with my Private Preceptor, attending Order weekends, being in a Chapter, writing in to Shabda, doing my sadhana. What quickly became clear was that my original decisions to withdraw from close association with these things was entirely emotionally reactive. These undoubtedly had there purpose at the time, and were encouraged, if not inflamed, by the climate of liberalisation and permissiveness then current in the Order,which I was strongly resistant to. As I have changed my lifestyle considerable since then, these views were in serious need of an update. They'd settled into sentimental habits very entrenched against change. Once again my strong tendency to respond to disillusion / dissatisfaction, by dropping whatever causes it like a hot potato, was being highlighted. This had been particularly the case with my feelings about Order Chapter - based entirely upon my uncomfortable dispiriting experiences in my first Chapter. After some reflection and reconsideration I am now up for joining a Chapter again.


The retreat had four ordinations taking place during it which were very wonderful and pleasing events to be a part of. I couldn't help but remember my own. I realised on the retreat how important it is to keep the connections with my ordination alive. So it was a good atmosphere, good study, some excellent walks, talks and pujas - we did two Confession pujas which I'm particularly like, as it is based on a chapter from The Sutra of Golden Light - one of the few Mahayana Sutras I genuinely have time and fondness for. So I've returned back to Cambridge with renewed sense of spiritual purpose, as if some great impediment has been removed, and I'm sort of back on track. I've a list of six things I need to address over the next six to twelve months, I'm confident I will be able to significantly move these on. I have great resolve within me than I've had for a number of years. I'm feeling easier within myself, and more content.

FEATURE 14 - Complicite

This gives you perhaps a bit of a better flavour of what A Disappearing Number was like. Sorry most of it is not in English.

THEATRE REVIEW - A Disappearing Number

It's been quite a few years since I've seen a theatre work created by Theatre de Complicite, the company name now thankfully shortened to Complicite. The last time was The Street of Crocodiles revival at the Queens Theate in 1999, a production based on the life and stories of Bruno Shultz. Over the decades I believe I've seen five productions by them. I've taken many a friend to see them, confident they'll never let me down, producing each time entertaining, fascinating, experimental theatre of great beauty. This production centres on the work and creative relationship between a Cambridge Mathematics Don - G.H. Hardy, and an Indian Clark - Shrinivasa Ramanujan in the early decades of the Twentieth Century. Hardy was the first Westerner to recognise Ramanujan as the unconventional genius of pure mathematics that he was. Interwoven into this is the contemporary love affair between a university lecturer in Mathematics, and Hardy/Ramanujan enthusiast and an Indian American futures salesman. A play about pioneering theoretical mathematics doesn't sound exactly like compulsive theatre, but Complicite bring their usual visual relish to it, finding visual ways to demonstrate Ramanujan's ideas, and make them imaginatively comprehensible.
















Complicite productions frequently break new theatrical ground, with A Disappearing Number they explore what digital technology can bring to the theatrical experience. There are so many creative layers to this production, so many ways it engages us, not just intellectually, but also with the eye and the ear. They never become so self conscious of its art that their productions become cold, alienated and emotionally barren places. They seem to embrace the impossibility of their mission with an almost evangelical passion. Attempting to capture by clever cross cutting of time and sequence, via the simultaneous overlaying of different periods of experience, the brilliant essence of Ramanujan's ideas. Sometimes, as you see a scene acted out down stage, up stage you're also seeing the same scene played out in the background in a time delay, like a fuzzy memory. Through this inventive interplay, it becomes so much more than the telling of the tale of Hardy & Ramanujan's lives, It spins outward on the axis of its own universe to become a meditation on the possibilities of mathematics as art. The intrinsic beauty of its patterning and philosophy. Gives us a felt sense of what a numerical relationship can tell us about infinity, reality, human existence and our search for meaning through our virtual conceptual worlds and real relationships, all before death overcomes us.















Seeing the one performance only scratches the surface of what this hugely ambitious production has to offer. It so vividly captures how the world of pure mathematics, like that of pure physics, inevitable trespasses onto existential territory, to bridge the gap between the temporal sciences and those ineffable aspects of reality that we carelessly group under 'spiritual.' The closing lines of the play spoken by the character Aninda Rao to the recently bereaved Al Cooper, explain that Ramanujan's ideas about infinity mean that if time is continuous, and space is continuous then your never truly separated from anyone, or anything. All the main characters of the play are scattered across the stage, as though across human history,and are seen to be slowly tipping ash from the books they hold in their hands. This was such a melancholic image for a shared sense of impermanence, its beauty profoundly moved me. Brilliantly realised theatre, that rare mix of the heart and mind entranced, comes no better than this production.

DIARY 77 - The Search for a Wish Fulfilling Jewel

David Foster Wallace expressed it well in the extract I published a few weeks ago ( Feature No 11) when he said there was no way of avoiding the act of worship. It's an inbuilt part of a natural human response to reality that we end up worshipping and putting our faith in something, whether it be secular,sensual, scientific or spiritual experiences. In Buddhism the nearest equivalent term for faith is the word sraddha, which at best could be described as - that which we place our heart upon. It's in this sense that the term worship could be helpfully viewed - as an expression of what we emotionally or spiritually most depend on. Worship then is an act of devotion and supplication, emerging out of a feeling of sraddha towards something. At this point we are symbolically making conscious what appears to have already happened unconsciously. We cannot help but offer ourselves completely up - even to our darkest moods of nihilism, or atheist indifference we surrender ourselves. The feeling for sraddha has to be there in some form, as a tangible, latent or unconscious feeling, otherwise the act of worshipping becomes emptied of significance. You cannot retrospectively create a feeling of sraddha via the act of worship, it has to be there in the first place.



Yet sraddha can be is such an amorphous and elusive thing to keep a permanent grasp of. We often look to those visible acts of worship to give shape and form to what our sraddha is placed upon. But you cannot always deduce the cause from looking at the result. We can be so easily mislead by our own imaginative misconceptions of what expressions of faith and devotion are - it can all get too elevated and other worldly in tone. The remarkable thing in David Foster Wallace's speech was how he brought elevated things down to the very ordinary circumstances of modern existence. In this sense sraddha can be seen as an ever present quality as constant as our breath. Like our breath, it isn't always present in our conscious awareness, until it stops, or we bring our attention to it. Sraddha is an incorporeal thread connecting us to the True Nature of Reality, which Buddhism would call Buddha Nature. Any act of worship stimulated by sraddha, connects us to the True Nature of Reality, or as Dogen would say - is an actual manifestation of it. Even actions based on a imaginative misconception, if stimulated by a feeling of sraddha are not wasted. Dogen indicates that every action we take, however mundane or spiritual they are, are, from the perspective of Realising the True Nature of Reality, seen as manifestations of sraddha, of Buddha Nature. All is conjoined as if the rhythm of a heart beat was playing upon a drum..



It might be hard to conceive this in our day-to-day experience. If this assertion from Dogen is true, then our every action becomes an act of sraddha, the work of Buddha Nature. When I get up in the morning, as I wash. make myself breakfast, when I shit, shave or sharpen a pencil, when I cycle to work, get irritated by motorists, am bored at the prospect of work, feel lackluster energy wise, be inspired, joyful or content with my life. What stops us seeing all these things as an expression of the True Nature of Reality? Perhaps its that we imagine something altogether more elevated and other worldly as our ticket to liberation. We experience craving or aversion to experience, and its this resistance that causes our suffering, and the pain of it blinds us to ever seeing daily life as an expression of the True Reality of Buddha Nature. We're wishing our liberation can be found somewhere else, anywhere other than in what we already have. What we have is a problem, not a solution.



We can all appear sometimes to be searching for what Buddhism calls a Wish Fulfilling Jewel. In old fairy stories if wish fulfilling jewels are used purely for worldly pleasure and gain, they seriously backfire upon the owner whose misused them. Everyone who discovers them wants to use the jewels to change reality, to change their external reality to some thing they'd much prefer - healthier, richer, sexier, happier. The true purpose of the jewel is rarely consciously revealed, because in the end its owner realises that what they really want has been right before their eyes all along. True wealth and happiness then naturally flows out from this realisation. In Buddhist parables the Wish Fulfilling Jewel is always hard to find. When it is found, it is hidden in some entirely unexpected place - in a dung heap - or most tellingly, secretly sown into the hem of a robe someone is wearing. They already had it within their possession, but didn't realise it. Once they accepted that it was themselves and not external reality that needed to change, at that point they discover the whereabouts of the Wish Fulfilling Jewel. All of which indicates that our richest experience, the source of true wealth and real liberation, is always to be found much closer to home, often overlooked, and right before our eyes. Sraddha and Buddha Nature seem also to be like this.



I always seem to be wrestling with the fabric of my life. I want either myself, or reality, to change to something I can truly be happy and contented with. The tussles can go on for weeks, months or even years. This week I got the first sense, after seemingly months and months of this sort of internal wrangling, that at least for the time being I'm done with it. I've had enough of giving too much unwise attention to my difficulties, and the finding of a miraculous cure for my ills. Sometimes we worship fruitlessly at the altar of our own suffering for far too long. Living in such a crucible of intense feelings and yet not finding them diminished or transformed, only makes them become more tender and sensitive. I've been wishing for a jewel to transform either me, or my circumstances. I'm coming to appreciate that the life I already have, the one right before my eyes, is going to be a lot more satisfying if I can just let it be.

FEATURE No 13 - Elbow

In my teens and twenties I kept my finger keenly on the popular music pulse. Avidly pursuing and following up lines of enquiry, listening out all the time for new bands and directions that seemed worth chasing up. Sometimes I was in pursuit of what turned out to be a passing novelty, or a band that issued one great album then disappeared into obscurity i.e. Deaf School or Young Marble Giants. Some bands were so eccentric they'd never be hugely popular i.e. James Chance & the Contortions, or The Native Hipsters. The amount of money I've thrown away on duff albums over the years, in the pursuit of that rare, but beautiful gem, doesn't bare thinking about. But I've been immensely more enriched by this than having the money languishing in my bank account. I can't afford to be so profligate with my money these days, and anyway I am a good deal choosier. The majority of contemporary rock is either plastic, pastiche or a parody of talent - but then, whenever has it not been so? Even the truly vacuous has its own appeal, and consequently its own market. I can slum it, and boogie down with the rest of them. For me music has never been solely a form of escapism, its also been something that energised, enhanced and engaged me with life in a joyful way.


Most 'noughties' guitar bands have a knowing plagiarism, they add nothing new to the lexicon, and merely revamp other peoples past glories - usually U2's. With the advent of You Tube, you can save yourself so much money by hearing and seeing the band first. You can decide for yourself whether you like what they do, and whether they are worth buying or not. I researched the Ting Tings, Hot Chip and Vampire Weekend this way..... and now Elbow. I have to acknowledge that I knew very little about Elbow, until I saw them recently on Jonathan Ross. Then of course they went on to win the Mercury Prize 2008. Already on their fourth album 'The Seldom Seen Kid' I obviously had a bit of catching up to do. Their appeal lies in their melding of beautifully crafted melodies, delivered by the supremely gifted vocals of Guy Garvey, with a willingness to boldly experiment with musical textures. The rest of the band provide a really solid level of musicianship, which is at times quite awesome in the breadth of its accomplishments. The real clincher for me has been the videos, for which I believe they've usually engage a group called The Soup Collective. The example posted here, to the song 'Switching Off' is simply knock out, and so cool. Constructed around the largely unadorned idea of a lighthouse flashing, yet it adds to and embellishes the Elbow song immensely. Its visual strength is in the image being allowed to develop its own depth of connection, with some subtle adjustments and evolving changes, but mostly by just letting it be.




I'm going down to Fopp this weekend to see if I can pick up their back catalogue cheap. If I have any reservations about Elbow its that their predominantly mournful tone might not bear excessive repetition. Even I - Melancholy Man - can have too much of wallowing in despondency - especially if belongs to someone else.

FEATURE No 12 - Rick & Steve - The Vital Statistics