Category: Artifact

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Unbound

“Ash nazg durbatulûk, ash nazg gimbatul,
ash nazg thrakatulûk, agh burzum-ishi krimpatul”

“One Ring to rule them all, One Ring to find them,
One Ring to bring them all, and in the darkness bind them”

An eternal ring binds
the conceptual mind. 
While
In fellowship's might 	
Burns freedom's light.
By
Middle way found
Go those unbound, 
With abundance, midst dearth
Those bound to Middle Earth.
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May I:

Revere all beings;
Shelter the ill-natured, 
    overwhelmed by illusion
    of Samara’s ring;  
Regard myself as inferior, 
    and deem others as superior;
In all my actions, watch my mind;
See all as spiritual friends in kind; 
Comfort the conquered 
    and offer conquest of caliber;
Offer support and jubilation to others,  
   and smother the suffering of many Mothers; 
See all things as hallucination, 
    and without attachment gain freedom from illusion.  

(A contract reflection of "Eight Verses For Training the Mind")
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Twelve Meditations

Taking refuge in Buddha
Taking refuge in Dhamma
Taking refuge in Sangha 

Developing Morality
Developing Concentration 
Developing Wisdom

Determination to be free,
Influenced by mind of enlightenment, 
Wisdom, realizing the ultimate nature of existence 

Discover true state
Without doubt
Of self-liberation. 

Base, Path, Fruit 
of Base, Path, Fruit
of Base, Path, Fruit
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Empty Space Of Space Empty

Virtual particles in the Quantum Vacuum of “empty” space. (DEREK LEINWEBER)
Naught within
  if naught without 
Naught that will  end
  that did not begin
Naught begins
  that will not end
Nothing open
  not enclosed
Nothing closed
  not once open 
Space empty
   of empty space
Empty space 
  of space empty
All different 
  in difference same 
In variance 
   on universal plane
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“All we ever see of stars are their old photographs.”

Hubble Deep Field (HDF)
Alan Moore:
"[W]e are actually in what Einstein referred to as a block universe. This means that the universe of space-time is a colossal solid that is eternal and is unchanging. I think this is the view of conventional physics. There’s of course people who would contest that view, but that’s normal in physics, and Einstein’s theory has so far stood up to the most rigorous testing. In the decades since his death, nobody has disproved it.

So, if we are in a block universe that is eternal and unchanging, that means that everything within that universe is also eternal and unchanging. It means that we are not really moving through our lives. Time isn’t there. Instead, our consciousness is moving through a solid medium of space-time. The best way to imagine this is as a reel of film. Each of those little images on the reel of film are fixed and unchanging. There is no movement in them. However, when we apply the beam of a projector to them, or the beam of consciousness in the analogy that I’m making, then Charlie Chaplin does his funny walk and saves the girl and defeats the baddie. You’ve got action. You’ve got morality. You’ve got narrative. You’ve got events. From static images.

And if that is the case, if we are in an unchanging and eternal solid, then that means we’re in it forever, and that all of the past is still there and is still happening, back in the past. And the future is already happening. That we are already dead. We are not yet born. That this is the nature of time, and that if everything in the past is still there, that includes our lives and the lives of everybody else, and every moment of consciousness within those lives. So it seems to me that, basically, we are living in an eternal recurrence, that when your consciousness reaches its concluding point at your death, it has nowhere to go but back to the beginning of that reel of film. And it will always seem like the first time, even though it doesn’t really make sense to talk about a first time. That seems to me to offer a rational way around the concept of death. I think I’ve made a pretty good stab at it."