Proto-IMAGE

Most of the optical vision in human eyes had been well researched

and we believe ” Seeing is believing”

despite of nobody knows what the others are actually seeing it,  in absolute term.

( You may already know or you can find hundreds of false-vision, illusion trick samples in the Net.

What we believe, we are seeing is the mare reconstructed image in the brain, which may be a false. )

—

I used to have a friend who was a color-blind.  When he told me at an art class, while painting a land-scape,

he is painting a tree as green by the color name written on the paint tube.

He couldn’t see green or red,  neither he can describe whether those green and red looks like gray or

another color what so ever.  Since nobody taught him what it is, so, he couldn’t have a word to describe it.

—– and we, lucky to have Pan-chromatic vision couldn’t guess or imagine how the world looks to him.

Our eyes itself are rather simple optical device, there is no color filter hence the image projected to the

retina is in full color though, the sensors, nerves and the visual cortex in the brain are too complexed,

far beyond the today’s science and the technology.  So that we can’t tap-into the brain and extract

an image what color blind is actually seeing the world.

With the same reason, a topics what I’m going to write here may not able to give an objective proof

or to give a demonstration to others though, if anybody else can find the same phenomenon,  soon

or later it would be recognized as a common phenomenon.

—–

Once before, when I went back Japan, I found the mountains of duster-cloth (which we call  Zoukin)

piled up in my family house.  Each of them, the old cloth has been cut to the size and hand stitched.

They were made by my mother.  When she faced the condition of her hand became stiff and feel a pain

with her age,  she decided to fight back.  Instead to have a medication or pain-killer kind, she started to

make Zoukin by hand stitching them, using old cloths she had been accumulated over the years.

—– Among such Zoukin, I found the one I know very well.  I knew it, but not in my ordinary memory.

—– Time to time, I give a massage to my eyes,  by lightly pressing the eye-balls with my finger.

(While eyes closed, of cause  😀  )

Under light pressure, in the dark field of my vision, the same image of distinct pattern always appears.

The pattern is like a line print of four petals flower.  It appear only first moment, a second or two and

dissolved into the dark.

Astonished to see the very pattern on the cloth,  I asked my mother, what was it ?

She told me, that cloth was a Yukata ( thin, light Kimono) she used to wear when I was a new-born baby.

The pattern appearing in my eyes was the printed pattern on the Yukata which I saw when I was a baby.

The first image I saw, has been burnt into my eyes.

This is the Proto-Image of my life.

—

For a new-born baby animal,  to recognize and register  who is the mother, into their brain

is the most crucial matter in their survival. (If it was the case of Zebra / the black stripe pattern,

and the Penguin / the voice, and so on)

Likewise,  we human has the same instinct —– we capture the image of the first sight, assuming

the person whom the baby saw, is the mother, and the key image was literally burnt into the vision.

—–

As I wrote in an early post [ Subconscious Data Bank ], we are accumulating a loads of information

without even aware of it.  And the Data Bank in our Subconscious may contain even the Genetically

implanted information. ( Experiment of the psychologist found that even the few months old baby showed

the reaction of alert when he (she) saw the image of tiger (not a toy but real one)—–only the explanation

is, it must be a genetically implanted memory )

—— and those information is affecting our way of thinking, decision-making or preference etc.

But, how about this Proto-Image ?   Would this one image, direct the one’s life ?

May be the image of four petals flower made me to pay more attention to the flower —— yet it need to

have more research.  And the Internet must be a good forum to exchange the information.

—– So, if you were intrigued, just try to see whether you have the same kind of burnt into image

in the bottom of your eyes. ( It takes only few second to test.  🙂  )

And if you found one, please post a comment here.

—

Calligraphy — Cacography

A friend, who studied Japanese but struggling to write in Japanese asked me about the sample

New Year’s card design I’ve posted here few days ago —– ” Writing  of those card looks terrible.

Is Japanese these days couldn’t write properly because they no longer hand-write but use key-board ?”

” I don’t think so.  Some of them sending me beautifully hand-written letters.  And the writing on the sample

cards may be done by a good professional calligrapher” —— ” What, are they done by professional ?”

” Yes, I’m sure this person can write in  pretty square formal style as well though, —— think,

receiving  New Year’s Greeting from close friends, do they  want to see a card looks like a formal notice

from officials ? —– How relaxed or polite and formal, the commonsense is the same to western culture.

The choice of a birthday card to your friend or to company boss would be different here isn’t it ? ”

———- Give a close look to the sample cards, top one and the bottom card,  you  may realized that

the first three lines on top card and the four lines on the bottom card, the writing is identical.

( By the way, the writing starts from the right to left.  Hence I meant, three vertical lines on the right )

Its indicates, the graphic designer used the same resource of the writing and composed those two

cards —— its mean,  it was not his own casual writing, but it was there as the special resources.

And the calligrapher who did the assignment treated this as an art, hence he did rather funny writing.

It’s not for a solemn occasion but joyful one.  It’s a Happy New Year.  😀

—

Doing artistic calligraphy is a very special skill of the art.  While writing the same letter, the movement

of the blush and the force to push on the paper makes different boldness, etc etc,  million of resulting

differences on the line, hence the written letter gives different impression, on top of the letter’s own

meaning.  When the impression enhancing the meaning of the letter itself,  it makes the art.

A letter of the Grace written in smooth flowing line, or the Power written with bold, and blunt movement

of the blush, will give distinctive impression and it would strike the viewer’s subconsciousness.

———- Around my life, strangely there were many calligrapher. (Though, I was called Kana-kugi  😀  )

My grand father was a calligrapher and having its line of blood, my father and sister had pretty good

hand.  And an  AD / POP planing company where I worked for short time had started by the group of the

calligrapher as a lettering, font design studio , hence I had plenty opportunities to see them at work.

” The requirement of the assignment, the concept in mind, then just face a blank sheet of paper and put

blush on it.  The blush start to run as if he got his own mind.  My hand is just giving a support for his

movement.  And the letter prevailed as if it was there before hand ” —— m m m ?  What an explanation.

I was young (!) and hate irrational magic or mambo-jumbo like my father’s Buddhism then.  It was out of

my comprehension, though after learned what is the structure of the mind and the Zen —— now I know.

The meaning of the letter will be read by the brain, but the style of writing can hit the guts straight.

———- If you have seen a Chinese film ” Hero” you might remember, a master calligrapher wrote

one huge red-letter SWORD which was then hanged behind of the king (who became the Emperor)

the letter  was in the ancient form,  so that the Chinese calligrapher has even more choice to express

the meaning.  It was a very impressive powerful calligraphy. (—- I want to have a poster.   🙂 )

—-

You may feel strange though,  I found the psyche or deep psychology in the Calligraphy and the

Haiku, even the Art of Pablo Picasso are all having the common factor —– Zen.

—– Once Picasso said, art is easy but to stay in the mind of child is not easy.

An episode of Picasso —– One day he asked a carpenter to make a small structure and he drawn a

sketch with each dimensions on it.  When the carpenter measured the sketch, he found the drawing has

the exact dimension down to the mm accuracy.  —— and the Picasso’s blue period paintings are

well-known with its accurate realism.

How the same painter, who got such exact eyes and the skill, could produce notoriously deformed

paintings and especially such as like his last series Las Meninous —– almost like a child’s doodling.

—– Haiku master Basho taught the way to create Haiku, is to capture ” Wabi and Sabi” though,

in his later life, he reached and created the Haiku in ” Karomi ” ( light-heartedness ).

It is exactly the same in calligraphy.  All down to the same matter, liberation of the mind —- freedom

without the impediment of the thinking, mind = Mushin ( mind of no-mind ) in  Zen term.

( In Zen, this freedom of creation was called in the state of Jizai )

Of cause, not all of them even know the Zen, and the creativity is not the monopoly of the Zen.

Zen is only using  the inherent state of the mind or subconscious, common to all the human being.

( Zen is the one who elucidated and established the methodology.  Like a phenomenon of fire —– the

science elucidated the oxidizing mechanism, hence we are able to know how to use and control it now)

—-

Starting with exacting discipline, then free the mind and free the hand to write the letters inspired

by the occasion or the meaning of the letter —– freedom like a child’s imagination.  So, it looks almost

like a scribble of a child —— on the thin line between Calligraphy and the Cacography. 😀

This is the Art.

( Yet, distinguish them, you may need to have seen million letters of good and bad one beforehand )

___/\___

—

Wao ! — Jaw Dropping ?

When we encounter something  utterly new or strange, there are two distinctive reaction.

Wao, and  Jaw Dropping.—- You may think they are the same.  No they are not.

Wao is a part of the thinking process,  intellectual activity.  When it was somewhat new but still within

the anticipation,  such as a technological advancement,  we express Wao ! with some admiration.

In contrast,  when we encounter utterly unexpected and beyond the comprehension —– since, we

can’t find any related notion or idea,  we lose a word.

So,  only a reaction was to drop the jaw. —– ! ? ? ? —– as the jaw dropped, only a sound

came out of the mouth is, — Haaaaa.  🙂

This is the moment our mind / thinking  become completely blanc.

—-

Why I started to talk about this is, I met a person stubbornly

refuse to accept the mental state of Mushin ever existed.

His stance was,  as we have a self-conscious and the awareness of our state, which is independent

to our thinking therefore it is persistently there,  so that it exists even a moment when the one is

in the mental state of so-called Mushin.

So,  I asked him,  when he was damn struck,  completely taken aback in a Jaw dropping situation,  how long

it took him to came back his own sense ?  And at the very moment he was Dropping the Jaw, had he got

awareness  ” I’m dropping my jaw ” ?  —– m m m —– —– after long silence,  he seemed to have

convinced that  ” the complete blanc moment of self-conscious is exists “.—- You see ?  The Mushin is

not a fancy invention of the Zen Buddhists,  it is the one of a definite state of the human mind.

And it is inherently exists in the mind or brain function.  As the higher brain function is a later addition

in the evolution process,  there is a state without self-conscious —– it is the default state of the mind.

Most important key is even one’s MIND is in its blank state, all the physiological body function,

and the activities which is under the control of subconscious are fully functioning ——– in

other words, anything sublimated into the subconsciousness can act in its maximum potential

since it having no interference of the thoughts / hindrance. ——- This is the ZEN.

—-

Buddhism is a teaching which utilizing this state of the mind,  and the practice to gain the

control of the mind to get this mental state by will.

( Without waiting a Jaw Dropping moment to come  🙂  )

—-

Walking ZEN

Under financial strain and adding to it, the heavy freezing weather —— it could be the shortage, price up

—– so, I found some items in the shop are already sold out —– etc.  And only few days left to the Xmas,

the mind of the people walking on the street are a bit tense. —– isn’t this a symptom in your mind too ?

Are you bumping to others or nearly so while walking on the busy street ?

Then think and reflect a bit —– ? ? ?

I know, you have or feel some pressure in your mind or in your subconsciousness, —– a tension

of ” Have to do, and I’m in hurry ” list of tasks to your job or to your family, kids etc.

Though, when you have a task in your hand, but for walking, do you think, to have such tension,

would it help you to walk any quicker ? —— I don’t think so.

Far from it, as your mind is stack and lost the flow, flow of mind, flow of smooth movement, you tend

to bump or come too close to other people,  while feeling “Who the devil,can’t you see the others”.

———- The remedies is in your mind.

Just rise your eyes and see  5m away. —–See all the people walking toward you just as

the moving objects, not take notice of each individual.

In this view,  you can see the direction where moving objects flow,  which one is coming

toward you and which one is swaying ——- then you can see where the gap would be.

So, you can freely sway and able to navigate and able to walk much quicker.

( Though, if you are believing, it is the other’s fault not to open the way for you —–>  forget this blog

and buy  Body-armour  😉  )

——

Our  Peripheral Vision can sense the object’s movement very well.  And when one’s vision was spread

wide,  having no center weighted attention,  it can see the flow of movement all over the visual field.

This diffused vision without having any concentrated mind / attention is nothing but the

Eyes of Mushin / Mind of No-Mind  in the Zen Buddhism.

Without any projected attention / absolute passiveness / open-minded,  we can see which person is

going to right or left, hence we can see where the gap of flow would be, and the best direction to walk,

ahead of moment = able to fore-see = predict what would be, so that we can minimise the trouble and

maximise the smoothness and the speed of walking.

———- I know, most of you know this already.  Yet still in a daily life we are entwined with silly mind

and eyes would be caught by big boobs etc, and too many congested thoughts obstructing and blinding

our eyes or making us short-eye-sighted —— then bump to others.

That’s why, ” Get rid of the thoughts and open your eyes wide ” —–

You see, this is the Zen teachings and it is just there on the street.  Zen is, in fact easy and simple practice.

The matter is only you, just open your eyes.

—– So,  I hope you able to walk smooth and able to do all the shopping quick in optimum efficiency

for the coming festive season. 🙂  ( Though, I’m already a bit tired for too many parties —– parties for

a person who doesn’t drink is not very much a fun, unless the music is German-Base or Jungle   😀 )

___/\___

—–

A Dirt for Health ? ? ?

A woman who is an ex-direct action activist and having quite open-minded thinking said to me,

” A scientist said, the reason why the kids these days are so allergic to everything,  is because the sterile

city environment,  and on top of it,  the attitude of the mothers became dirt-phobia,  hence the kids life

became hygienically too clean and depriving the opportunity of them to build up the resistance and

immunity against the germs and toxic substances.”  ” So that our family is drinking a tea with a pinch

of dirt in the pot” —— m m m.

” I think, in certain extent, it is true, but I don’t think you are right ”  ” Along side, did you teach them

to wash their hand and washing them in the bath ? “

” Yes of cause ”

” The teaching and the message of washing the hand having two meanings, one is in hygienic implication

and the other is the spiritual teaching to observe the one’s cleanness in the life.  If the kids sees you to put

dirt in the drink,  the consistency of the message is completely break down. For a teaching become

sublimated and became a part of one’s spirituality,  its need to have absolute consistency. ——do you

know, a dog-poo on the street, where does it goes and disappearing ?

It dried up and ground by the shoes, blown away by the wind.  So, the air we are breeding  having the

powdered dust of the dog-poo as well.  Without noticing, we are taking enough dirt into the body.

So that, there is no point intentionally put a dirt into a tea,  it wouldn’t do any good but spiritually it is

the dreadful act.  In worst case, your kids may get wrong message and think ” I am safe to do dirty act,

as I got immunity or strong enough to defy even STD ” —– It’s an awful situation ”

” Oh, you are very opinionated person ”

” Bloody hell, it is not an opinion.  This is the common sense ”

——- oh, dear  🙂

—–

Sound of BACH

One of the reader left a comment, ” the post should have more media ” —– Yes, I’m well aware of it.

And the post shouldn’t be longer than 140 words otherwise no one would read  😀

In fact I got many plan to put a photo or video image into the post, such as ” I should put my Ancient Yoga

dancing video image into  Most Bizarre Story in Zen :-D”  or a photo of frosted leaves

into  Cold Blow — ( I’ve seen the frost in the night ) but  when I went to the same place next day,

frost wasn’t there. 😀 — It’s a bad tendency of ex-photographer, don’t want to settle with casual photo or

somebody else’s photo found in the Net.  😉

Anyhow,  while searching a music sample to talk about with my friend,  I stumbled a Youtube

image which I should have put into my BACH post —— ;

This is a part of J.S.Bach’s  Art of Fugue which I’ve talked about, but not from the beginning yet still

it may give some idea.  This musician / programmer, SMALIN having 200 or more music videos there.

And I found his graphical representation of the music is very effective as we can see the structure

of it in one glance.  Especially, the graphical patterns are much easier to distinguish than hear in sound.

To make the image,  may be the Midi cord is directly triggering the position and the length of each note,

therefore it is rather simple but very clear.  Same tonal information is in the music score, graphically

though, I found this is the simplest and more effective demonstration.

t—–

Then what I found the next to above clip was —— jaw dropping funny music video.

As a matter of fact this (yet another ) Japanese phenomena [ Miku Hatsune ] was totally new to me

until only few weeks ago.  This music animation program was created by YAMAHA as an open-source.

Anybody input the phonetic note, it will be played in synthesized voice, and the character Miku Hatsune

will sing as the user programmed, so that, anybody can produce a music anime of female singer, free.

There said to be half million Miku Hatsune video clip in the Net. ( search them, if you are interested in )

——- In 60~70th, there were two memorable musicians played BACH in new sounds.

One was the Swingle Singers. They played Bach’s polyphonic music purely by a jazz scat like voices.

And another was a French pianist Jacque Lucie and he played or improvised  Bach in Jazz.

Both sound are still in the bottom of my music memories, alongside the more traditional classic musician,

Jazz musician and they formed the music culture of my life.

Between Jazz and Baroque music, there is a common character of the improvisation —– spontaneous

on the spot creation.

Very interesting fact is, when musician is improvising the phrase, frontal lobe of the brain

became inactive. Frontal robe is the place, where rational thinking or process of causation is taking place.

This is the exact parallel to the Buddhism teaching  Mushin.— To be creative, don’t think.

Open mind mean, don’t impose a preconceived idea or judgement —– or Thinking.

You may wonder, ” Without knowing the passage, how musician can improvise ?  With the intelligence

shut down, how musician can control music making ?” —— may be you are not a musician.  That’s why

you ask this question.  If you still need to think about This Music, you can not improvise it on the spot.

When you became This Music or This Music became You, and you can play it without reading score,

without thinking —– then you can improvise it in total freedom.  Zen Buddhism call it Ichijo / Oneness.

So, with open mind, see and listen this  BACH sang by  Miku Hatsune —– It’s not too bad 😀  Ha ha ha.

Did you enjoyed ?  Or is it gone too far you think ?

Some irritating noise and instability of the sound there, still, considering it was created by an ordinary

person, using freely available open source, —— it is pretty impressive.  I like it. Thanks to the creator.

___/\___

—-

Unconscious ~ Subconscious ?

“There must be an unlimited possibility beyond the boundary of human consciousness”.

But there is a strange myth ” We human is only using 20% (?) of our brain,  hence to develop its hidden

potential is limitless,  blah blah ” —— according to the Guru. —- What a beautiful dream.

( With the observation by the PET Scanner, no such hidden or inactive region of brain exists)

Since it is a myth, nobody know who said it or where its original research has come from.

And such myth has been used by ignorant youth to justify the experiment to the drugs and even many

grown ups is using it as an excuse to smoke cannabis,  saying ” This is to touch my Spirituality ”

I know a lots of 19 century poets, novelists and artists were the addict of opium when it was not a banned

substance and quite a lot of their works were said to be contributed by its influence etc etc. — THOUGH,

—– Really ?  The question is even though their poems, stories were written when they were under

the influence of the drugs, their works and the imaginations couldn’t be existed without it ?

And the drugs DID OPEN any unknown horizon ?

Did, LSD actually created anything new, unknown to human culture, other than colorful

so-called psychedelic paintings or rather dull monotonous, endless music ?

——

The surrealism poet / artists, Andre Burton, Poul Eluard tried the mescaline, alkaloid  from cactus

to have a hallucinated state of the mind and produced  poetries or so-called  Automatism scripts.

I spent quite a money to buy this expensive book and looked their creation or the description of

unknown ! (?)  when I was a poor student of the Uni’.   Though, there was nothing in it.

Just the meaningless, endless continuation of the words and words —– yet more words.

( Still, it was better than  Dadaism poetry  ( Ha ha ha  😀  ) as they are at least the words ).

—-

We, some times, speak or utter a word without conscious.

Fortunately or unfortunately, the word came out of the mouth disappear at once.

What ?  What did you say ? —– What ? Did I say anything ?   I don’t know,  I don’t remember.

( It could have been a Truth ! )

Though, it is almost impossible to write unconsciously.  Yet, in the written words, our subconscious

may show up without our intention, so the skillful writer could write hidden meaning using utterly different

description —– lots of poetry, especially  Symbolism Poetry is using this technique. ( Since, it is stronger )

Our vague inspiration would take a form of concept and then converted into the word or words, using

the notion or meaning of the word to carry and to express what was the original feelings or inspiration.

Therefore, it is often the process of the compromise.  Just borrow the meaning of the word which is likely

fit to the original inspiration, but not necessary exact.  (—– Some time, a  rigid meaning of the particular

word itself may give the inspiration as a trigger )

Unlike the spoken words, the writing leaves visible evidence, which can be objectively read

again and again.  As the written letters has to be visually read and its pattern has to be configured

as the word, then converted to the notion or meaning,  it is impossible to avoid the thinking process.

So, no unconscious writing could exist, hence  Automatism couldn’t produce anything significant to

the human creativity at all. —– ( finger itself may move unconsciously though, it would be hard to create

legible letter without having visual feedback of the graphic positioning ).

_____

So,  there is a funny misconception,  lots of people thinking as if there is a secret garden in our brain where

the treasure was hidden. And suddenly its door would be opened by the drug or meditation,  and make

us a genius or superman. 😀 —– Though as I wrote in many of my early posts, there is no such magic, but

we are living with unconscious / subconsciousness as a part of our life in every moment.

We are thinking unconsciously, —— and  when we converted  its result to visible or noticeable form as in

the last process in the brain, we start to feel ” Thinking “.

Our eyes are seeing the scenery mostly  without noticing anything —– until something trigger the attention.

Then, conscious process of  WATCHING starts.  Still, during this unconscious seeing, some of the images go

to unconscious memory and  its data process is taking place. ( Some of them may come back in a dream )

So, all about the matters of unconscious / subconsciousness are how to deal with those invisible animals. 😀

How to know or see its tendency,  and to know how to control them.

—— and this is what all about the Buddhism.

—–

When I was in my junior school,  we were taught to keep the school tidy and clean.

So too, pick up the trash on the floor.  Teachers told us ” Picking it up, while you are thinking ” This is a trash,

I have to pick up” is not good enough yet.  Pick it up without thinking is what you have to do “.

In fact, effectively  we were taught Zen practice in the junior school. ( Whether a teacher was

aware, this is the Zen Practice or not —– such Ethos has been  so deeply embedded in the Japanese culture,

people are no longer bother to distinguish its origin )

Picking up a trash without thinking ( ie; in Mushin )and put it into a bin,  how many second does it need ?

And living in a clean environment all day without bothered by dirt ( ie; in Peace of Mind ). Who needs more ?

So,  we were taught and learned the way to live in the clean environment.

And this Ethos and the Practice has been  embedded into our deep subconsciousness as a habit.

—— therefore one’s room would be clean,  not mention his (her) own life.  ( Well, ideally  😀  )

You may say ” What ?  Is this All about the Buddhism ?”—–Yes it is. It’s a Dog shit isn’t it.  😀

Yet this Dog Shit would clean up your life and give you a Peace of Mind and the Nirvana.  That’s

why ” Every body was born with Dharma and anybody can get Nirvana “

( Of cause, Buddhism and the Zen practice will not end with picking up a trash.

It is a start and it is a metaphor  😀 )

And how to utilize those mechanism of subconsciousness to more proactive situations, such as

in the creative front is what I wrote before —– ( Please refer to Category / Art )

___/\___

—-

Cold blow / Wistle blow ?

Its getting pretty cold.  I saw beautifully frosted  decorated leaves.

It said to be the coldest in 17 years, and some says the ill effect of the climate shift caused by  El Nino

or La Nana kind —–. (To know the detail, go to Wikipedia please  🙂  )

On my previous post I wrote  “To know the Truth wouldn’t change our life” ——- then, the conflicting

question arose.

In the Hinayana Buddhist’s view,  an attitude “When its cold, just feel the chill and shiver with

other people who is suffering” —— this is correct.

Or, stand up and shout, telling the people  “What is causing the climate change, and the cause

of appearance of El Nino, in order to save the suffering of the people”——- this is correct too, save

the possibility he might be barking wrong tree.

So, one sect might go out and walking in a chilling wind. ( Don’t catch cold or even worse, pneumonia )

And another sect may go to a demonstration banging their symbolic flat drams on the front line.  (Though,

I haven’t seen them these days —— are they still alive ?    Do you know ? )

It’s better know the fact, better still the Truth. —– the one might be placed there to know and shout as

he (she) might be born for its purpose. —– though it may not be a license to become arrogant or snobbish.

——– And my answer ?

I would stick with Buddha’s teachings “Don’t torture yourself. Don’t go extreme” therefore

sitting next to a heater. (How convenient  🙂 )

——- Environment or external occurrence may give you a jolt to your unprepared mind

as it has been in the blank state.   Its jolt may give you a sudden enlightenment, though,

if it was expected or a prolonged same condition, mind couldn’t be fresh and naked

—— nothing would happen  /  it’s a same cold day)

Better make a hot tea with honey and lemon  😀  ( The truth is in the cup.  Honest, I can taste it.)

___/\___–

——

PS :  It seems the world was so disturbed by the exposure of the confidential US diplomatic correspondences

by Wikileak. —— how silly.

Every body knows, politics, diplomacy, economics, even so-called big charities are dirty business and

having dirty linen and utter hypocrisy,  tons of it,  exactly same to everybody’s private life.  Yet still

we pretend to be clean face and  talking with others with sweet words.

Sneaking behind, and suddenly pull-down somebody else’s trouser and to expose dirty pants,  then

shouting  “Have look this is the truth” —–So, what ?   It wouldn’t help anybody.  History will tell.

It just filling the arrogant dirty satisfaction of  Wikileak’s  founder.  Much worse than a scavenger.

Because, if it was a whistle blow,  what the blower want to resolve or change and to which direction.

There is non. Could he expect the politics can change ? ( In any system or ideology —– because the

environment and the contents / human is the same —– no utopia nor ideal man exists)

It would only push the politics even more murkier business, deleting all the traces at once.  That all.

Since, clean man (and woman) wouldn’t become politician.

Since, ambition to the power and to become famous is the synonym of self-centered arrogance and the

manipulation of the others by deception as an effective means. ——- Hence it can not be clean by nature.

Still, we could have wiser life, accommodating and concealing smelly guts inside.  😀

(You are well aware this hidden truth  😀  )

The Truth of the life was clearly elucidated by Buddha as the Four Noble Truth —— and

its Fourth is the direction How to live DESPITE of Those TRUTH / Reality.

Exposing smelly guts wouldn’t help anything.  The MATTER is how to live with it.

This is the Buddhism.

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Life in GREEN

I’m a Green mountain person rather than Blue mariner.

So that, ever I know great deep Blue sea looks awesome and beautiful to see, though —— imagine,

if I were left in the middle of infinite sea, —– m m m, — may be I can’t survive.  It’s awful isn’t it  😀

But if it was in the mountain or even in the great expanse of field, I may able to survive with some bush crafts.

—–

Any how, its nice to be in the Green, and this is almost genetically programmed basic emotion / instinct.

( This is why, we feel and praised the courage of the great navigator set sailed to the unknown horizon ).

So, we have an  idiosyncratic idea, the Green is the symbol of the life, therefore we feel

the most comfort and peace.

So that, it is strange to know, this color Green, the color of the trees and grasses is the most useless

element to the plant life. —– They themselves don’t appreciate Green light at all.

Their most fundamental  life activity / Photosynthesis  is in fact relying on other than this, very Green.

As the Photosynthesis is only using Violet to Blue light (and Red ) the Green light was thrown out or

reflected away —– hence we are seeing its reflected colored light, which  made us to believe, grass is green.

Literally superficially, as we are seeing the plant looks green,  we were planted the idea,  Life = Green

—– even though, we are seeing their rejected waste / no use to their life.

It’s very very funny in deed.

I don’t think Buddha ever thought of this —— because its wouldn’t make

any difference to our life at all (other than the biologist who is studying this biochemistry).

This is definitely the Truth and a part of the Dharma, though we are living on the false impression.

Whether the stars are the holes on the ceiling above the earth or the another sun in a universe

far away in the space, it wouldn’t change our dairy life at all.  (Astrologer may say otherwise.  🙂  )

We may never know all the Truth.  But this is what we are.  The matter is not what we know,

but the awareness, what we don’t know.  Leave the space to hear, see the otherwise.  Open mind.

–So, on the end, —

—— One of my friend made a lamp to illuminate his room plant with 50 Green LEDs —– its made

the plant leaves shining green and looks vibrant —— though, I advised him to change them with

40 Blue and 10 Red LEDs —— the result ?   You may guessed it, it looks very harsh and dreadful  😀

So, on the end, living on the false comfort such as, so-called ” Healing —, Soothing comfort —, sweet words,

enlightenment, — be green ,  etc etc ”   may not necessary be a bad thing.

After all, important thing in life is Be happy. ( and Be pragmatic, in other word Be flexible. 😀  )

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Standard VIEW

You may know there is the camera lens called standard lens (and the wide-angle lens, tele-photo lens etc).

Is it a kind of lens, camera manufacturer arbitrarily named it, just for a convenience ?

Or, is there any standard of vision exists ?

Whether you aware or not, you are looking an image, photo or painting  with standard view.

You may not believe it —— so, just try, and find it.

Look at a cover photo on the magazine and a poster on the wall ——- have you done ?

Do you noticed,  when you see a cover photo of a magazine,  with  what distance did you look at it.

The distance from your eyes to the magazine was about 12″~14″ (30cm ~ 35cm) as this distance gives

the most clear vision. (unless you got short or far eye-sighted)

Closer than this, you can’t see whole picture. Further than this, it’s too far to see the details.

And if the image you looked at was about A4, the diagonal size was 14″, and the eyes to cover this size

of image, the angle of view  was about 45 degrees.

When you see a big poster, you don’t look at in this distance, unless you need to see the detail. —– you

step back and see it from a distance.  Then you may realized, in fact you are looking the image always

in the same scale —— if it was small, you give a close look, and see a big image from the distance.

The reason is, our vision in our eyes can see this size of image most clear and reasonably in detail.

If the image spread much wider, like a land-scape,  to see the whole detail we have to look around.

And if we need to see more detail such as to read the letters, we need to capture the image, in the

center of eyes,  within the angle of about 18 degrees.

So that, to see the image of 14″ size, in distance of 14″  which is about 45 degree of vision, gives best image.

Best image is in the vision of not too wide or narrowly concentrated just in the middle.  Middle way in vision.

Therefore the photographic lens which can produce this angle of view  has been  named ” Standard Lens “.

Before the digital revolution, the camera meant 35mm camera.  And the lens which gives this angle of

view was happened to be about 50mm, hence 50mm lens was accustomed to call, Standard Lens.

A photo image taken by a standard lens and printed to about 9″x 12″, viewed from 14″ away,  it looks

most natural and having the same perspective. (If the same photo was enlarged to twice big, then look it

from the twice distance, it will give the same perspective —– angle of view is still 45 degree)

—— With this reason, the great photographer Henri Cartier-Bresson was using only standard lens

(wide angle lens was for land scape only ) saying ” My lens is my eyes ” and only shot

from the normal eye level.  Because, to do his photography, he didn’t want to rely on the optical

effect but the natural way to see the life, just as an ordinary man.

So, the standard view is not only with a camera lens but our eyes having the same standard.

And this standard view, not too wide, not too narrow, just in the middle was what

the Dharma gave us.—— Therefore, this is the visual equivalent of the Middle Way.

—— Though, I hate standard lens. 😀

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