According to the Madhyamikas, we can speak of two aspects of perception. From one point of view, it is valid; from another point of view, it is deceptive or deluded. From this understanding we can attribute two aspects to a single event of cognition. Just because we have valid, direct experiences of objects does not mean that these things and events experienced by us possess objective, intrinsic existence.
Practicing Wisdom
“Every statement of view, however certain one may strive to make it, can never, on the relative level, be more than a point of view.”
Translator’s Introduction to “The Wisdom Chapter” Jamgön Mipham
By studying others’ points of view, it is possible for us to discover new and refreshing perspectives on the world.
“Life flickers in the flurries of a thousand ills, more fragile than the bubbles on a stream. In sleep, each breath departs and is again drawn in; How wondrous that we wake up living still!”
“… the dualistic appearances of delusion are the play on the surface of the mind, like waves on a deep and vast ocean… the uncontrived, nondual appearances of the nature of mind are the display of its innate creative dynamics, similar to the totality of water’s movement throughout the entire ocean.”
>print lyrics 'Where do you go' by Peter Sarstedt
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You talk like Marlene Dietrich
And you dance like Zizi Jeanmaire
Your clothes are all made by Balmain
And there's diamonds and pearls in your hair, yes, there are
You live in a fancy apartment
Off the Boulevard St. Michel
Where you keep your Rolling Stones records
And a friend of Sacha Distel, yes, you do
But where do you go to, my lovely
When you're alone in your bed?
Tell me the thoughts that surround you
I want to look inside your head, yes, I do
I've seen all your qualifications
You got from the Sorbonne
And the painting you stole from Picasso
Your loveliness goes on and on, yes, it does
When you go on your summer vacation
You go to Juan-les-Pins
With your carefully designed topless swimsuit
You get an even suntan on your back, and on your legs
And when the snow falls you're found in St. Moritz
With the others of the jet set
And you sip your Napoleon brandy
But you never get your lips wet, no, you don't
But where do you go to, my lovely
When you're alone in your bed?
Won't you tell me the thoughts that surround you?
I want to look inside your head, yes, I do
Your name it is heard in high places
You know the Aga Khan
He sent you a race horse for Christmas
And you keep it just for fun, for a laugh, ha-ha-ha
They say that when you get married
It'll be to a millionaire
But they don't realize where you came from
And I wonder if they really care, or give a damn
Where do you go to, my lovely
When you're alone in your bed?
Tell me the thoughts that surround you
I want to look inside your head, yes, I do
I remember the back streets of Naples
Two children begging in rags
Both touched with a burning ambition
To shake off their lowly-born tags, they tried
So look into my face, Marie-Claire
And remember just who you are
Then go and forget me forever
But I know you still bear the scar, deep inside, yes, you do
I know where you go to, my lovely
When you're alone in your bed
I know the thoughts that surround you
'Cause I can look inside your head
Na-na-na-na, na-na-na-na-na-na-na
Na-na-na-na, na-na-na-na-na-na-na
GUY: Buddy, what would you do if you found out that you weren’t real?
…
BUDDY: I say, okay, so what if I’m not real?
GUY: I’m sorry. “So what?”
BUDDY: Yeah. So what?
Guy: (SCOFFING) But if you’re not real, doesn’t that mean that nothing you do matters?
BUDDY: What does that mean? Look, brother, I am sitting here with my best friend, trying to help him get through a tough time. Right? And even if I’m not real, this moment is. Right here, right now. This moment is real. I mean, what’s more real than a person tryin’ to help someone they love? Now, if that’s not real, I don’t know what is.
From "Monty Python's The Meaning of Life" (1983 Film)
CHAIRMAN: ...Which brings us once again to the urgent realization of just how much there is still left to own. Item six on the agenda: the meaning of life. Now, uh, Harry, you've had some thoughts on this.
HARRY: That's right. Yeah, I've had a team working on this over the past few weeks, and, uh, what we've come up with can be reduced to two fundamental concepts. One: people are not wearing enough hats. Two: matter is energy. In the universe, there are many energy fields which we cannot normally perceive. Some energies have a spiritual source which act upon a person's soul. However, this soul does not exist ab initio, as orthodox Christianity teaches. It has to be brought into existence by a process of guided self-observation. However, this is rarely achieved, owing to man's unique ability to be distracted from spiritual matters by everyday trivia.
[pause]
BERT: What was that about hats, again?
“Galaxy Song”song by Eric Idle From “Monty Python’s The Meaning of Life“
“Galaxy Song” by Eric Idle (lyrics) and John Du Prez (music)
Whenever life gets you down, Mrs. Brown,
And things seem hard or tough,
And people are stupid, obnoxious, or daft,
And you feel that you've had quite enough,
Just remember that you're standing on a planet that's evolving
And revolving at nine hundred miles an hour,
That's orbiting at nineteen miles a second, so it's reckoned,
A sun that is the source of all our power.
The sun and you and me and all the stars that we can see
Are moving at a million miles a day
In an outer spiral arm, at forty thousand miles an hour,
Of the galaxy we call the 'Milky Way'.
Our galaxy itself contains a hundred billion stars.
It's a hundred thousand light years side to side.
It bulges in the middle, sixteen thousand light years thick,
But out by us, it's just three thousand light years wide.
We're thirty thousand light years from galactic central point.
We go 'round every two hundred million years,
And our galaxy is only one of millions of billions
In this amazing and expanding universe.
The universe itself keeps on expanding and expanding
In all of the directions it can whizz
As fast as it can go, at the speed of light, you know,
Twelve million miles a minute, and that's the fastest speed there is.
So remember, when you're feeling very small and insecure,
How amazingly unlikely is your birth,
And pray that there's intelligent life somewhere up in space,
'Cause there's bugger all down here on Earth.
“I seem to have been only like a boy playing on the sea-shore, and diverting myself in now and then finding a smoother pebble or a prettier shell than ordinary, whilst the great ocean of truth lay all undiscovered before me.”
Where Does The Ocean Go (Ghost in the Shell: Stand Alone Complex)
Human from
Old French humain, from
Latin hūmānus,
the adjectival form of homō
('man' — in the sense of humankind) from
Latin hemō, from
Proto-Italic *hemō from
Proto-Indo-European *ǵʰm̥mṓ (“earthling”) from
Proto-Indo-European *dʰéǵʰōm (“earth”),
1 Corinthians 13 11.: When I was a child, I talked like a child, I thought like a child, I reasoned like a child. When I became a man, I put the ways of childhood behind me.
12: For now we see only a reflection as in a mirror; then we shall see face to face. Now I know in part; then I shall know fully, even as I am fully known.
“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.
