How to see

Strangely, I am reading two books that seem to correspond to/with each other. One is Ways of seeing by John Berger. The other is The living mountain by Nan Shepherd. Whilst they are not on the same subject at face value, the authors say comparable or parallel things.

But initially, the story of looking for lost things. My family came to my house for Christmas lunch. My sister moved some things that were on the table to a bench. Among those things were my house and car keys. After everyone had left I looked for my keys but couldn't find them. I had cleaned up the kitchen and moved things back to the table, including a bowl of fruit. My sister had put my keys in the bowl. I did not notice them when I moved the bowl back to the table. I was doing what we do when we read - scanning - so all I saw was fruit. Later, when looking for my keys, I relooked at the bowl of fruit, in relation with my thinking about the events of the day, and only then did I see my keys. I was truly looking at the bowl, probably for the first time. Artists who paint still lifes must also do this - really 'see' things.

John Berger (p 9) says:

We never look at just one thing; we are always looking at the relation between things and ourselves.  

Nan Shepherd (pp 10-11) tells us how to see in nature:

This changing of focus in the eye, moving the eye itself when looking at things that do not move, deepen one's sense of outer reality. Then static things may be caught in the very act of becoming. By so simple a matter, too, as altering the position of one's head, a different kind of world may be made to appear.... Details are no longer part of a grouping in a picture of which I am the focal point, the focal point is everywhere. Nothing has reference to me, the looker. This is how the earth must see itself.

Her text in The living mountain considers being - her own being and the mountain's/nature's, the relationship between watcher and watched, and the senses being put to full use.

For unnumbered years it [water] has welled from the rock, and flowed away. It does nothing, absolutely nothing, but be itself. (p 23)

...the colour seemed to live its own life, to have body and resilience, as though we were not looking at it, but were inside its substance. (p 30)

It astonished me that my memory was so much in the eye and so little in the feet... (p 46)

Though I did not know it then, I was leaning my way in, through my own fingers, to the secret of growth. (p 58)

Whether you give it conscious thought or not, you are touching life, and something within you knows it. A sense of profound contentment floods me as I stoop to dip the pail. But I am aware all the same that by so living I am slowing down the tempo of life; if I had to do these things every day and all the time I should be shutting the door on other activities and interests... (p 82) 

...I awake with an empty mind. Consciousness of where I am comes back quite soon, but for one startled moment I have looked at a familiar place as though I had never seen it before. (p 91)

 ...I am continually coming to the surface of awareness and sinking back again, just seeing, not bedevilled with thought, but living in the clear simplicity of the senses. (p 93)

 To bend the ear to silence is to discover how seldom it is there... But now and then comes an hour when the silence is all but absolute, and listening to it one slips out of time. (p 96)

Such illusions, depending on how the eye is placed and used, drive home the truth that our habitual vision of things is not necessarily right: it is only one of an infinite number, and to glimpse an unfamiliar one, even for a moment, unmakes us, but steadies us again. (p 101) 

 And in the last chapter, titled 'Being', here it is:

How then may be lived a life of the senses so pure, so untouched by any mode of apprehension but their own, that the body may be said to think. Each sense heightened to its most exquisite awareness is in its total experience. This is the innocence we have lost, living in one sense at a time to live all the way through. (p 105)

...the long rhythm of motion sustained until motion is felt, not merely known by the brain, as the 'still centre' of being. (p 106) 

The thing to be known grows with the knowing. (p 108) 

For an hour I am beyond desire. It is not ecstasy, that leap out of the self that makes man like a god. I am not out of myself, but in myself. I am. (p 108) 

There is nothing more to be said, but a lot to be experienced. Nan Shepherd's text relates to Buddhism as well as deep ecology - the practices of meditation and mindful walking, mindfulness in general, are all expressed in her book. What do we really see?

See the world as your self

See the world as your self.
Have faith in the way things are.
Love the world as your self
then you can care for all things.

Lao-Tzu in the Tao Te Ching (translated by Stephen Mitchell)

I love this poem, although the second line is difficult. Thinking about what is wrong with the world, it is not the world that is wrong, but the people in it. Nature is not wrong. And what is the key thing wrong with humans? We are human-centred. OK, you may say that a lion is lion-centred etc. In terms of survival, all species are self-centred. This is the selfish gene thing. But humans are a particular species, a particular being, that value our own importance over all else, to the point of shitting in our own nest (our universal home, the Earth), not feeling the pain of other living beings or even of our own species.

For these reasons, I do not love my species. Or at least, I do not love them above other species. Equanimity is a beautiful thing.

Deep ecology à la Thich Nhat Hanh/Buddhism

The second notion the Diamond Sutra advises us to throw away is the notion of person or human being. When we look into the human being, we see animal, plant and mineral ancestors. A human is made of non-human elements. If we take away the non-human elements, the human being would no longer be there. 

This is the oldest teaching on deep ecology. To protect the human being, you have to protect what is not human. Discriminating between human and nature is wrong view. 

Thich Nhat Hanh, Beyond the self, p xii

I love this teaching! It totally resonates with my view of the world, and relates to another post on David Suzuki speaking at WOMADelaide.

Black house spider

I have a 'pet' - a black house spider - 'a common species of cribellate Australian spider, found throughout much of Australia and New Zealand' (Wikipedia). She (I presume) is 2 years old (I presume) and has been living in the corner of the bathroom window for that span of time. They are not supposed to live for much longer than that but she has had a relatively stress-free life - no kids, no partner - so maybe that explains it. I allow her to live there because I always know where she is - she never leaves the window. A huntsman that wandered all over the place I would struggle with. She can be relied on to stay where she is. She has remained unfound by a male black house spider. Why I don't know. Now if she had chosen the shed....

However, she must sometimes be very hungry. Not much edible food wanders into that part of the bathroom, or into the bathroom at all. What was she thinking when she chose that spot? It isn't location, location, location. Although they like habitating around light sources (eg a window) that may attract insects.

Over summer there were blowflies in the house for a while and that must have been feast time for her. Every time I caught one I would fling it into her expansive web. She would wait a polite (cautious) amount of time before heading out of the corner to get her catch. The fly, once in the web, would stop struggling - a survival strategy probably. But there was no hope. She is big, about the size of my thumb and about the same shape (body and legs included) and she knows what she is about once the food is in the larder. Lately though there hasn't been much happening. I caught a moth the other day and flung it into her web. She didn't wait a seemly amount of time but raced out to get it. She seems to be able to survive on not much food.

Sometimes when I am in the bathroom cleaning my teeth at the basin, she will come out. I think she has realised that I am not going to hurt her, and might in fact be her main source of food! In the middle of the night if I go to the bathroom, I sometimes see her well out of the web, looking as though she is smacking herself on the bum. In fact she is producing the stuff her web is made of (so I'm told). It's a very cute-looking activity for a creature who would not normally be described as 'cute'. Studying her through living with her has made her a 'person'. She is a spider like no other, because I 'know' her. She is not really my pet of course - I don't own her - but we have a relationship.

There will come a day when she dies. Not sure what the signs will be but it might be a 'curl up' affair. I will be sad; she has become part of my life in this old house.

Meanwhile, my black house spider is not only in the web, she's on the web!

A Buddhist take on the environment

These two Buddhist-flavoured poems say it all for a deep ecology view of the world:

His Holiness the Dalai Lama writes in his poem on the environment:

In the remoteness of the Himalayas
In the days of yore, the land of Tibet
Observed a ban on hunting, on fishing
And, during designated periods, even construction.
These traditions are noble
For they preserve and cherish
The lives of humble, helpless and defenceless creatures.

Thanks to the Tibetan Environmental Watch

And from the Buddha himself, on social action:

He who has understanding and great wisdom does not think of harming himself or another, nor of harming both alike. He rather thinks of his own welfare, of that of others, of that of both, and of the welfare of the whole world. In that way one shows understanding and great wisdom.

— Anguttara Nikaya (Gradual Sayings) Fours, No. 186

Thanks to Buddhism and social action: an exploration by Ken Jones

Corellas are in town

For 3 days in a row corellas (native Australian white cockatoos) have visited our area, specifically my pine trees (and trees in the backyard) as well as the street pines (Norfolk Islanders).

They first came on Sunday morning at 6am (thanks very much), waking me up with their cries which could only be described as squawks and that is probably too kind a term. They stayed for about half an hour, then flew off wheeling and circling in a group of about 30.

On Monday morning they revisited with a larger crowd, again at 6am. They hung around in the trees for a bit longer, till about 7am. You could hear them chewing away, occasionally squawking, before they again rose into the air simultaneously and flew off.

About 100 (!) came again on Tuesday morning at 6am but this time they stayed until 8am, to make sure they really finished the job. This time they left a HUGE mess - in the street, in my garden, on cars, everywhere within range, before flying off to leave someone else to deal with it. That night, even though it was really hot, I swept up the street mess, as I wanted people to like them rather than hate them, and let's face it, we don't like our lives being inconvenienced by nature any more.

They haven't as yet returned. It was an invasion, yes, but one I enjoyed. I got a really good close up shot of this bird in the backyard, and if they had come back for long enough and I had talked to him for long enough, I reckon he might have got tamer. They do listen to you when you speak to them. At least, they look like they do.

I couldn't think of a better way to herald Australia Day! (Which I never celebrate.)

Hear within yourself the sound of the Earth crying

The most important thing you can do is hear within yourself
the sound of the Earth crying.

These words may be attributed to Thich Nhat Hanh, but the whole sense of this is conveyed in John Seed's Introduction to the Mourning.

'Life is a web, we are like a leaf on a tree...We have disconnected ourselves from this intelligence of the Earth, we only need to look at the kind of world we are creating to see that maybe we need to go back to an older way.'

We suffer from the illusion of separation from other living things – anthropocentrism (the tendency for human beings to regard themselves as the central and most significant entities in the universe, or the assessment of reality through an exclusively human perspective).

To wander off the track (but not really), here are 3 simple lines of poetry from Gary Snyder:

stay together
learn the flowers
go light

To stick with 3s, here are 3 key processes from the Council of Beings

1. The great turning (gratitude)
2. Seeing with new eyes
3. Going forth

Once we stop repressing the pain we feel for the world, our empowerment remains and strengthens. Doing inner work removes our fear of being fully open to the feelings of what is happening to the earth.

'May all sorrows ripen in me' (Shantideva)

World leaders need to think like a planet
Without emotions, truly realizing the interconnectedness of all life stays stuck at the intellectual level. Mental concepts alone do not affect our attitudes and behaviors. According to Macy, humans' connections to other life forms are based on more than the emotional attachments to places and beings we have loved.

"They are also organic, woven by shared ancestries, embedded in our bodies. Each atom in each molecule of our being goes back to the beginning of life and has belonged to far more ancient and varied forms of life than our own. The human form we wear now is just the latest and briefest chapter of a long evolutionary journey."

In The Dream of the Earth, Fr. Thomas Berry refers to the "shamanic personality," which can understand and speak for other life forms, Macy said.

"It is essential to our survival," she said. "It helps us to … dispel the trance of industrial civilization."

INTERESTING: TO BE EXPERIENCED!

When does something become a fact?

A friend recently said that her daughter had to write an essay on climate change - there was no option for her to dispute it.

This raises the question 'When does something become an accepted fact?' The debate around climate change has been raging for years (since the 1980s at the very least). Has it slowed down? Have the skeptics been silenced, overwhelmed by science? Does this mean that children or people should no longer bother looking at the arguments for and against? The answer to the last question is yes. As with philosophy which is famous for arguments (or should I say, intellectual debate), some things become accepted and are no longer disputed. This saves time and allows people to argue about something more disputable and important to progress.

I for one believe in climate change (accept it as a fact) and have done for a long time. Perhaps I have never debated it but always had 'blind faith'. If we can stop arguing about its existence, then maybe we can get on with doing what we can to keep our world liveable for all living beings. However, being who we are, this seems unlikely. I pray that I will never have to say 'I told you so'. Bring on whatever change in consciousness 2012 is purported to create (providing it is sustainable)!

In the body, out of the mind

For an in the body and out of the mind experience, do a walk in Deep Creek, South Australia, like we did the other day. 14 kms of up hill (to a cliff overlooking the sea) and down dale (to a waterfall in a gully) in 33 degrees heat (that's the crazy bit). Actually it wasn't totally an in the body out of mind experience but was definitely physical.

Last bit of the recipe is to do it with other people, a lot of water, and carryable food (but not food that will go off). If you want to extend the experience you can camp, but we didn't. Instead we went swimming up the road (and some of us swam at the waterfall in rather swampy looking water) in the sea at Normanville. You can also have hot chips at the Victory Hotel, top of Sellicks Hill, and wash it down with a beer (my first for many years). Then home to see the effects of this huge effort (slightly sore legs the next day from the climbing up and down hills, including using your hands to pull yourself up on a very rocky path).

No photos to prove it, and no enlightenment (lots of heavy breathing), but it's a great end to the old year (2011) and a great new year's resolution for 2012 (more of the same). Let's all get outdoors and into it, doing natural things in a natural environment! Reads like an ad for living in South Australia, and it is!

View Deep Creek Cove the easy way (on Flickr)

Saving everything

It seems that everything needs saving now - whales, blue fin tuna, sharks, orang utangs, sun bears, the list is endless and that is before you start on rainforests, rivers, wetlands and other natural habitats. It is overwhelming and much as I dip in my pocket, it never seems to be enough. I am almost at the point of saying I don't care, simply because the statistics are so daunting and the task so great.

I went to a Transition Town workshop recently where we did an exercise initiated by Joanna Macy. One person (the future) listened whilst the other (the present) talked about what it was like to participate in saving the world (well not quite, but being part of a movement to bring change to a long-suffering world). Another exercise was to look at someone intently (not easy) and imagine their ancestors standing behind them. Afterwards I wondered whether the American Indians might have done this exercise when looking at the white invaders but in reverse - wondering what the future generations of this people would be like, and what world they would get from their ancestors.

I feel sorrowful that the creatures that least deserve it are suffering first, and the creatures that have brought on this world of turmoil and change are suffering least and will definitely suffer last. Why should it be this way? My neighbour apologised the other day for the inconvenience building next door had caused me. Nice as it was, I keep thinking of the people in Africa who have to walk miles each day... and for what? Brackish water. To survive.

My sole consolation in this world of shifting events is the Buddhist saying: Maybe good. Maybe bad. This great turning (Joanna Macy) may go either way, for better or for worse, and that is what we take on when we are born into this world. But now the world is Eaarth rather than Earth, less friendly than friendly, and we know not what we do or where we are headed.

John Seed interview

Heard John Seed on Radio National tonight talking about deep ecology and our place on the earth. His words were inspiring because he is so clear about unclear things, and makes the point that we can't answer the big questions - it is all hanging in the balance. It is certainly going to be the end of the world as we know it, and possibly the end of we humans. But he makes the point that miracles occur all the time (and gave examples), so anything is possible. The idea is not to be inactive once we find our 'eco spirituality' but to develop our own way of responding to the needs of the planet, which has the disease called humans (as per a cartoon by Lewis pictured). These are my words and probably an incorrect interpretation of what he was saying. I would have to go to a deep ecology workshop to find out more about this style of thinking or rather feeling. He talked about Joanna Macy who is another interesting figure in the deep ecology movement.

No thanks, non merci, nej tak, no gracias, etc

All of these 'nos' are to nuclear energy wherever it is being produced. I remember 'nej tak' being a slogan from the 80s (?). What has happened to our position on nuclear energy? It seems to have eroded, and sadly some influential Australians have participated in this process by proponing nuclear energy as the answer to the energy issues of our future (what future?).

Well with limited knowledge on my side to argue soundly, I still say 'no thanks'. The mistake we are all making in my eyes is to think our lives can be lived as they are now (why would you want to anyway but won't go there). We are putting our heads in the sand if we assume that. There are too many of us on the planet and a certain percentage of us are using far too much energy, and our 'needs' and lifestyles are destroying the planet, which, we should remind ourselves, is a living thing with innocent life that we are dragging down with us - no, pushing in front of us. As usual we are prioritising ourselves over everything else. Most humans would have to agree on at least this point. And most humans who are contributing to this waste of life are not admitting that they have a problem with species being threatened - they are able to avoid relating to the pain of an arctic bear that has to swim for miles simply to find somewhere to lob his beautiful white body, not to sunbake but to survive. It is harder to feel sorry for sharks perhaps as Australians have a fear of them and see them as the enemy, but the reality is that sharks play a crucial role in our ecosystem. It is big picture stuff and requires a very big step away from ego-driven needs and wants. And who wants to feel that world pain? I would rather not but it is always with me.

So what am I saying now that I have rambled down the path of love and emotion? That we must consider a different life path, one that is inclusive of all living things. At the moment we don't even include our own species let alone others. And saying yes to nuclear energy is not doing this, it is thinking we can solve a problem that is getting bigger and bigger. It is thinking we are smarter than we are. In fact a species that would 'progress' towards its demise is not smart at all. As the American Indians have said, No tree has branches foolish enough to fight amongst each other. (This is a quote from A Dare a Day)

Humans vs non humans

This is an interesting quote I found in Earth Circles:

The deepest cause of the present devastation is found in a mode of consciousness that has established a radical discontinuity between the human and other modes of being and the bestowal of all rights on the humans. The other-than-human modes of being are seen as having no rights. They have reality and value only through their use by the human. In this context the other than human becomes totally vulnerable to exploitation by the human, an attitude that is shared by all four of the fundamental establishments that control the human realm: governments, corporations, universities, and religions - the political, economic, intellectual and religious establishments. All four are committed consciously or unconsciously to a radical discontinuity between the human and the nonhuman.

Thomas Berry, The Great Work (New York: Random House, 1999), 4.

More about the tree

I have decided not to cut down my frontyard pine tree. The offer was to pay for cutting it down and replace it with a suitable tree in an advanced state of growth (you can buy them at about 3 metres tall). The pine is not an Australian native and everyone knows that pine needles can be a pain. So whilst it was a difficult request to deal with it was put in the most attractive way by the new owner. It was still a hard decision as I have lived with that tree for more than 20 years and it is much older than that. When you buy a house it takes years to get to know not just the house and its foibles but also the garden if you are lucky enough to inherit one. And the seasons, and the birds and other wildlife (which unfortunately includes rats).
In recent years I have seen the suburb change, as you do. Houses have been bulldozed to make way for flats/units, some of which are 2 storey. In the process trees and shrubs have also been cleared. There is a vacant block up the road that has a beautiful old gum at the front. It cannot be removed because it is 'significant' - that is, the trunk 1 metre above ground is 2 metres in girth or more. I am wondering if it will survive the building process and how much it will be respected. Some of the work is pretty rough on the surrounds whether intentional or just the outcome of big machines.
We all live in changing times and suburbs, and many want both worlds - a nice environment but one that doesn't impinge on their lifestyles (in the form of having to pick up leaves, trim branches and the other inconveniences of nature). We are all so busy that the old ways, when home owners used to enjoy doing things around their property on the weekends and saw it as part of their role, are dying. Now we want patios and home entertainment that is more clinical, and doesn't rely on nature for comfort. (My pine tree provides valuable shade in summer as I don't have air conditioning. This is 'significant' - last year we had 10 days of over 40 degrees centigrade heat.) However, one day this conflict between lifestyle and the environment will have to change. It may be too late by the time it happens, that is my concern.

'I own a tree'

There is an ad on prime time TV that shows a guy standing in his backyard with his partner, looking up at a tree and saying 'I own a tree. I've never owned a tree before.' I hate ads but that particular ad I had a soft spot for, as although the guy was obviously a new home owner, it was the tree he related to (OK it was an ad and it worked).
Well now that is significant for me. Because I own a tree. A big pine tree in the front yard on the western side. Perhaps 30 feet tall, maybe more. Big. The canopy is half over my roof and half over the next property. At the moment there is no house on that property. But there will be. And I had a call from the new owner, a nice bloke, proposing that I cut down my tree so that their cars will not have pine cones and resin dropped on them while they are in the drive.
So what do I do? I would never cut down that tree left to my own choice. All right, it does put a lot of stuff in the gutters which is an ongoing problem, and no doubt affects the rainwater that goes into my two tanks on that side of the house. I don't drink that rainwater - not yet, but if it gets dry enough over the next few years I may. But sulphur crested cockatoos and Major Mitchells flock into that tree (and the one on the other side). There are 50 to 100 of them. They swoop in, usually early in the morning, and then they quietly chew. If you go outside you can see glimpses of their whiteness and hear some crunching noises but that is all. After a while you can hear a pelting noise - that is them dropping the chewed pine cones onto the roof and ground. This routine can go on for an hour. Then all at once they fly from their different positions in the tree as if a gun has gone off. They squawk and scream and fly off. It is a racket. When you look around you can see bits of pine cone everywhere - strewn on the footpaths, in the garden, on the verandah roof (and in the gutters, sigh). It is a treat not just for them but for me. And a laugh.
I guess some of us love trees and the shade and natural unpredicatable events they bring, and some of us love cars.

Gary Synder poem - pure and simple

I love this poem by Gary Snyder, especially the last 3 lines. It encapsulates everything we should be trying to do with our lives and lifestyles:

For the Children

The rising hills, the slopes,
of statistics
lie before us.
the steep climb
of everything, going up,
up, as we all
go down.

In the next century
or the one beyond that,
they say,
are valleys, pastures,
we can meet there in peace
if we make it.

To climb these coming crests
one word to you, to
you and your children:

stay together
learn the flowers
go light

— Gary Snyder, from Turtle Island

Giving back to the earth

I went to a talk recently about breathing. I am interested in breathing (apart from the obvious reason of staying alive). Anyway, the speaker talked about a technique where you breathe in energy from the earth through your feet, take it up through your body and then breathe it out through the top of your head. A common enough breathing exercise that I have come across at other talks and workshops.
But now I think - haven't we taken enough energy from the earth already? How about giving some energy back to the earth? At a yoga weekend once, we were introduced to an exercise where we imagined breathing in all the 'black' of the world (ie negativity, impurities etc) and converting it to 'white' (positivity, goodness, purity etc), then breathing it out into the world again. Many people at the workshop objected to this exercise. It was not a good PR tool. But I think the so-called 'new age' too often has a 'what's in it for me' approach that is about more of the same - not giving but taking.
So let's focus on what we can give back to this ailing world of ours, be it energy, love, or just plain old respect.

Sounds of silence - listen up...down and all around!

Having never been a TV watcher, and not really a music listener, I have spent time sitting listening...to what? To my thoughts, to sounds of the neighbourhood, to 'white noise'. straining my ears to hear. Sometimes in the middle of the night in bed my listening has been driven by paranoia, when there was noone else in the house. But it is fun to 'listen out' - up, down and all around, as far as the ear can hear, to see if you increase the aptitude of your ears to pick up sounds further and further away. Like that, I have heard dogs talking to each other, probably suburbs away, birds singing at odd times like between 10pm and midnight, when you would think they would be asleep. I don't think I have 20/20 hearing as the sounds of young people talking are often a mumble to me. But I am sure the ear can be trained to hear better, just as the eyes can become accustomed to walking at night. So far I have only really mastered this one by negotiating the hallway without hurting myself, but out in the bush it is a whole different experience.
When meditating this means I can hear my heart beating, or sometimes something more (atoms bouncing around?). At any rate, I like it. Now that I have got hold of a deep ecology book, Bill Devall's Simple in means, rich in ends: practicing deep ecology (the practicing bit drew me to it), I am delighted to see a section on 'Silence' which states 'Silence is intuitively valued. Well-being of humans and other animals is partly determined by quiet.' And of course, 'quieting our chattering minds' (something I attempt to do often).
It is ironic that Rachel Carson's book is called Silent Spring. When I walk on the beach or in a park and see people with headsets on, I often think her prediction has already arrived in another form. (But would like to add that music can be a wonderful thing.)

Deep ecology, what is it?

Again to Wikipedia, deep ecology is 'a body of thought that places greater value on non-human species, ecosystems and processes in nature than established environmental and green movements' (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Deep_ecology). Deep ecology supports 'the claim that, like humanity, the living environment as a whole has the same right to live and flourish.' It 'is concerned with the fundamental philosophical questions about the impacts of human life as one part of the ecosphere.' Sorry for all the quotes but that is as much as I know. However for the amount of times I have felt that we as a society do not value other life and put ourselves above other living things, this 'smacks true' to me and feels like a system I can support and believe in. It takes Animal farm (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Animal_Farm) a step further in terms of egalitarianism and it is ironic that this story has animals as characters representing human society.
I hope to find a book about deep ecology that is readable. Years ago I tried to read one (forget the title and author) and could not get past the preface.