*Sufi Salad* a la Jung-Fire!

[Guest guest]

My friends around the fire,

Sorry for a second posting. But the first one didn't show all the quotes. So

I'll try again....

Here I sit, trying to catch up with the wonderful discussions around the fire

the last couple of days. I wanted to let each person know how much their

thoughts and words resonate with me. But I am dumbstruck! You tell me! If

this is not the creative teamwork of kindred spirits for beginning an

absolutely Divine Sufi Salad, please tell me what is?

Bowing to your collective light,

and shadow....

Ghazaleh

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:

Those who deem themselves blessed with enlightenment and are not impelled to

service of those less well endowed, perhaps have not travelled the full path

intended by Divine purpose. So it stikes me that at some point we may be

called upon to be " bearers of salad " from the hub to the rim. At the very

least this might take the form of a collection of memorable salads hence the

" salad cookbook " . And it may be necessary to offer with the cookbook a few

basic lessons in salad cookery, beginning with applications of the basic

principle that the TRUE SALAD is greater than the sum of its parts.

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Mike:

The real search is not to establish external blame but to gently but firmly

tame the 'beast within'. An image I have worked with for years comes from

Iranian Sufism,

and that is the image of 'a man of light' struggling to rid himself of cloak

of darkness in the midst of a sandstorm.

This is the sandstorm...

Paths very often criss-cross, and one is definitely going both ways at once

and nowhere at all as well as everywhere in an instant most of the time.

Keeps one on one's toes, no?

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Toni:

Do we have a life apart from the events of 9/11 , and would it be wrong to

place emphasis on the rest of our lives where we actually " are'?

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Alice:

Ramakrishna pointed out - digging ever so many little shallow

holes will not lead to water!

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Colette:

It seems paradoxical, that to learn to accept who we are as Is, is somehow

about relaxing the armoured defense of persona. Relaxation of contraction,

while at the same time remaining vigilant because the habit of resistance

through seeking an

idealised self image is a pattern of behaviour the mind is so used to. It

isn't easy to rest in simple bare awareness.

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:

Why take off the table mess and darkness and intensity of emotion and the

chaos of experience *in both its details and meaningfulness*. What possibly

would reconcile 'Jungian feeling' with the cleaver's stroke splitting

detail and meaning?

***

I'm well aware one man's coherency is another man's " shut that horrid rock

and roll off " unpleasantness.

***

I do experience our clashes as being 'archetypally reasonable', thus

worthy of self-critical process. But, often we seem (to me) caught on the

horns of a dilemma, and caught in the borderland between LOGOS/meaning &

EROS/growth. The problem is we've agreed growth cannot be therapy and that,

to me, is a startling and obvious contradiction in terms.

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Deborah:

I keep seeing that it's the way we live our lives that got us where we are.

Unlimited resources, unlimited need. Both of those lies are the foundation

principles of our economic system.

People who live in tribes and tents in the desert as their forefathers lived

since who knows when: we engage ourselves in their distant lives every time

we step into our car.

Americans love their cars. We're proud of loving cars. We love them so much

we've woven a culture around them that rises or falls as they do. Passing

each other on the highway, wearing sunglasses, sometimes giving the finger, a

person's car is a statement of who they are. It's that mythic self pushing

down the accelerator of 'Excalibur', 'The Green Gonad', whatever persona the

vehicle has extracted from the owner's imagination. The young girl in the red

car who just gave the minivan the finger--she is half there and half in a tv

commercial in her mind. And yes--all the rest of it--e.g., she dresses like

Ally McBeel, she's dating X because he looks like -- I dunno -- Brad Pitt.

Not up on my celebrities.

Is anything wrong with this? Not in itself. It's very human. In another age,

would she not sit beneath a tree and dream herself Ophelia?

But everything tells me myths are wrong when they become destructive. Maybe

it's the simple matter of who they serve. Which magic cauldron they come out

of. If not out of one's center -- how can one be centered?

I'm just throwing ideas out, trying to put my finger on it. Because the

question was raised about possible peaceful alternatives. I'm speaking long

range, because I think that's where we are. Now or never. (There goes

Elvis!..)

Oil has become the center of our culture. Once it was gold -- the

Conquistadors and their heartlessness. Now it's black gold. Makes me pause,

sit up, even gasp--the symbolism.

We have our Reasons, our That's The Way It Is, our There's Nothing I Can Do.

We have decided we need our cars at all costs, and our reasons become holy.

Unquestioned. There are reasons for that: we're a big country, we have to get

to work. We have to have money. (More money. ) Our kids have to get to the

mall to work so they can make money to pay for their car. We hate commuting

but--That's The Way It Is.

<snip>

Americans don't even think about oil until the price goes up. The power goes

off.

What am I doing that keeps letting that unimaginative alphamale

winner-take-all take-all? I want to see my part in it. It's what I'm

responsible for, what I can control. All I have to is admit that I can.

It dawns on me. I go to make a halloween costume for one of the kids. I

stand in line, adding up the costs of the material etc. Then I go and see

something similar on the costume rack ready-made. It costs less for the

finished piece than it does for what I just spent for only the materials.

What can I conclude except the person who made it wasn't paid a living wage

to make it. Not any living wage we would consider.

Anyway, I am feeling a need to be aware of these interrelationships and what

part I have in them. We were less dependent on oil in the 70's when we first

tightened our belt and planned ahead to wean ourselves from the stuff. But

that all got sidetracked -- if you look back with a critical eye, you have to

see alpha male's shadow on it, the puppetmasters shaping the way here. And

then came the tv commercials that became almost as long as the tv show and

likely more interesting. But it didn't matter because I didn't want to watch

it anyway. But someone watches. Someone buys the myth they sell. Someone

makes those decisions that shape young consciousness and what is valued and

acted on in our culture.

I know I can't control that. But I can control what I think and am willing

to act on.

We were taught that values are things we are willing to act on. What am I

willing to act on? That's the question.

Just now, it is so big and heartbreaking. My daughter Ariel made me think of

something that might help: she has a close Muslim friend (oddly enough -- in

this homogenized Midwest town, so does my youngest son-- one is a daughter of

a prof at the college, the other the son of a military guy ) and she came

home from school the other day and said she wanted to share the fast of

Ramadan with her. Her friends have decided to do this together.

They're 14 years old.

Lord my god. This is their world we are shaping!

I am going to join them. To feel the pain of hunger, because I dread the

potential of 7 Million innocent people starving this winter. How can I do

otherwise? Pain is a teacher. It teaches the heart. It must ask the body,

mind, soul to seek a way into the future for all our children.

How does peace being with me, we ask the heart? We ask for wisdom. We ask

across time and space and deserts.

Maybe you will join in? Ask your friends to do this?

This is not a matter of any religion, any part of this darkness. Anymore than

it is in Belfast or anyplace touched by the poison of terrorism. As alice's

wheel shows us-- the same heart beats all our hearts. Appeal to it for

wisdom.

It is a prayer, isn't it? It seems more fitting that standing in the town

square strutting piety.

" Do this in memory with me. "

Forgive my ignorance and emotion. It's the best I can do.

Love,

Deborah

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:

May the hearts of you and yours beat warmly

and louder than the drums of war.

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Suzanne:

I am reading Pema Chodrin's newest book, The Places That Scare

You, and was especially moved by the opening of Chapter seven:

" Our personal attempts to live humanely in this world are never wasted.

Choosing to cultivate love rather than anger just might be what it takes to

save the planet from extinction. What is it that allows our goodwill to

expand and our prejudice and anger to decrease? This is a significant

question. Traditionally it is said that the root of aggression and suffering

is ignorance. But what is it that we are ignoring? Entrenched in the tunnel

vision of our personal concerns, what we ignore is our kinship with others.

One reason we train as warrior-bodhisattvas is to recognize our

interconnectedness-to grow in understanding that when we harm another, we are

harming ourselves. For an aspiring bodhisattva, the essential practice is to

cultivate maitre. This is called " placing our fearful mind in the cradle of

loving-kindness "

That pretty much says it for me. Once we are able to make a heart connection,

a personal identification with the people in Afghanistan and everywhere in

the world; once we see they are just like us, with the same needs and fears

and desires to be loved and free from pain and suffering, we will no longer

be able to kill one another with such impunity. In war it is always

necessary to make the enemy appear subhuman, to project evil and darkness

unto the " other " , to separate them out from the human family. But that is a

stance which seems to be increasingly hard to maintain. The efforts to join

with the " so called " enemy is just that, an effort to bridge that separation,

to maintain the " wholeness and integrity of the human family. It is NOT

choosing to side with the enemy against our own country as so many tend to

see it, but any effort to offer lovingkindness and compassion on all sides,

So, as I see it is important to acknowledge the violence, the suffering and

the pain that is increasingly present in our world but to be mindful that in

our response we are helpful and not adding to the violence and suffering. It

is also important to bear witness to the abuses of power that are being

perpetrated in the world, wherever that may be and to acknowledge it. There

is no easier way for evil to spread in he world than for good people to say

and do nothing. If enough people speak up long enough change can and will

eventually occur.

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Toni:

<<Hurray for your awareness and political activism. But...there is more to

life, even now that tirades against or for anything. It is our personal

business

with whom and with what we fight our fight. Politics is a function (I'm not

sure

it is higher) but it is a function that does not comprise all there is in our

lives. >>

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Greg:

Politics is such a messy business! God bless those who are willing to schlog

through the muck on our behalf.

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Colette:

Do not be afraid,

You are not tainted

You just hold them both

You can't have white

Without the black,

No story without a screen,

No rainbow dancing

Without Beauty's dream.

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:

I strongly feel growth demands of me intimacy and vulnerability and

misplacement of my smarty pants. Here it is one-to-many and one-to-one. In

a mundane way its also miraculous. I would term this process for me could

be called individuation but I'm more tuned to the idea of increasing my

experiential awareness.

Should I need therapy I might be inclined to claim some devastating

incapacities and seek guidance so that a better self might be resurrected

through some 'program', or, better: deprogramming and reprogramming.

However I'm not a participant/observer here at the Jung-Fire to subject my

many faults to anybody's therapeutic scrutiny.

Now, I do not feel the emergence of passionate disagreements, dissonances,

levels dialoguing at cross-purposes (or past each other,) tensions or

schisms is the sign of anything but diverse, passionate and creative people

in what is a creative and dynamic engagement; i.e. a sometimes fit-full

dance of well-meaning human natures.

***

As I have expressed on several previous occasions, my own personal

preference favors the sharing of where people happen to be today in all its

richness and imperfection. I am grateful and inspired most to learn how the

wonderful people of Jung-Fire are living 'the symbolic life' today.

It may not be readily apparent, but I have a great affinity for people who

are so bold to express how their lives are going, what they are doing, and

what their visions concern.

***

The tremendous erudition, wisdom and fruits of hard won past experiences

offered here are invaluable gravy to me. All gravy (in my view,) and no

meat and potatoes makes it easy to rinse off the plate. But, I have been

known to do the truly messy dishes.

***

I also like to pretentiously consider and then jostle and scramble almost

any kind of received wisdom, or, especially simplification or

generalization. Since I tend to do this with my smarty pants on and cinched

tight, yeah those ill fitting red boxers with the 'complex' designs, I

probably obscure what is most compelling to me: spontaneous learning, messy

loving, and playful creating.

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Alice:

Recipe for Sufi Salad

prepare yrself w/snifter of Russian vodka or Turkish raki

then istening to a CD of national anthems n a few dervish twirls

start w/Chile peppers

add Brussel sprouts

Chinese cabbage

Swiss cheese

Jerusalem artichokes

Spanish olives

Canadian bacon bits

Portuguese sardines

Toss w/Italian n Greek dressing 1/2 cup each

serve on morrocan couscous

w/Swedish rye bread on the side!

A glass of chilled French Chablis or German Liebfraumilch to taste

YUM!

love

ao:]

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Greg:

Dear Alice,

This is a weee bit of a high-cholesterol salad you propose, but it sounds

devilishly delicious.

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Colette:

I am happy!

Bubble bath makes soul child

Sing

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