A Quiet Watercourse

I saw the film “Angels and Demons” last night, it’s a good film and I recommend it.  I’ll not spoil the plot, I hate it when people do that, but something in there got me thinking this morning.  I’ve come to believe that we have a tendency to defend fixed ideas rather then living truths.

In Buddhism we know that the cause of our suffering is that we tend to form crystallised ideas of the world and pretend they’re the reality, then get all hurt and confused when the ever changing world has moved on.

For example, we have people defending the idea that climate change is a fraud based, one look at the seasons and the state of the arctic ice is enough to make you say “hang on a minute…”.  But we tend to take our concepts, our ideas and try to make the world fit them.

In IT circles, we have various Operating System technologies which are considered by some proponents to be superior in all aspects to the others.  They’ll insist blindly that they are right, come what may.  The truth is that the choice of technologies adopted should be driven by the needs in reality, not the ideology in your head.

In religion, we have conflicts between doctrines and never mind the friction between science and religion.  Many people on all sides of the divide are busily defending their doctrine, not looking into what is real.

I was going to query the reasons we defend the ideas, are they the right ones?  Are we defending out of belief in their rightness or terror of the consequences if they’re wrong?

I question whether we should be defending them at all.

I’ve been getting out on the bike a bit more recently, one of the things I’m enjoying is the greater level of awareness it brings to the process of travelling.

I have a better understanding now of what Robert M Pirsig was talking about in Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance when he wrote:

“In a car you’re always in a compartment, and because you’re used to it you don’t realize that through the car window everything you see is just more TV.  You’re just a passive observer and it is all moving by you boringly in a frame.

On a cycle the frame is gone.  You’re completely in contact with it all.  You’re in the scene, not just watching it anymore, and the sense of presence is overwhelming.”

I agree, I also know that I am also more present in the moment when I’m on the bike, there are fewer distractions.  Now leaving aside the practise of cyclists who wear mp3 players, which to my mind is just plain dangerous, there are just fewer things to distract you on a bike as opposed to driving a car.  I speak as a driver with more than 15 years experience, no stereo, no conversations or arguments, no mobile phone while driving.  Know what?  It’s great….

The sheer extra sense of presence is well worth it, and I’m rediscovering a whole side to my home town I’d forgotten about and areas that I’d never seen but can now explore more easily.  It occurs to me that you really do miss an awful lot in a car.

I’ve been keeping up with the commentary on the unfolding storm.  One of the things I’ve noticed is that there is a definite tendency to go a little apocalyptic, in feel if not in explicit content.  It’s all too easy to get frozen in the headlights of the oncoming storm, with the feeling that we will be torn apart, a wrecked destitute society.

I’m of the opinion that this will be a huge challenge for us, and that our lifestyles will change.  The general phrase used is that our standard of living must come down.  I was talking on the phone to a very old and dear friend last night and something we agreed on has bubbled to the surface of my mind.  Most of the things we take for granted, could be described as “frivolous”.  CDs, DVDs, Playstations, large wardrobes, flashy cars and I’m sure that each reader can add to this list with your own examples.

So… Let’s re-examine it.  Given the above, how far does our quality of life really fall now?  Granted, access to medical treatment is an issue, but with the reduction of car use and a corresponding increase in our activity level shouldn’t we be generally healthier?

If a lot of what we are going to lose is our illusions and largely unimportant frivolities, how far will our “standard of living” really fall?  I honestly believe that we can rise to this.  Perhaps if we accept that we might just gain a sustainable, ethical way of life, coupled with my own belief that this change will bring opportunities for those prepared to forge ahead.  Could it be that our perception of our “standard of living” needs a reassessment?  I don’t have the answers right now, but as a correspondant once said of me, I tend to ask the questions and try to provoke my readers to think.

Guess what I’m doing now…..

We know we have a global problem, and if we’re serious about tackling it, the effort must start with us individually.  We cannot afford to wash our hands of this and rely exclusively on the authorities.  I’m going to sketch out the territory where I see the solutions being, and I’ll do it over a few posts.  I’d like to start by pointing out that I’m speaking from a UK perspective here, so your mileage may vary.

We use a huge amount of our energy in transport, I’m finding the march to electric cars and other ‘alternatives’ interesting to watch.  We already have the problem that without cheap, plentiful and energy dense fuel, we can no longer use the methods of air travel that we do, how much more true is this for cars?  The fuels we use in cars and planes provide us with a lot of energy in a small space, more than you might think, in fact they are far superior to any solid fuel, to quote a site that covers alternate energy sources:

“to replace your petrol tank with plant biomass, for instance, it would require two and a half times the mass (rather simplified, of course).” -  The Wolf at the Door. (the graph in figure E2 is illuminating)

The problem we have is getting that much energy around the place, and generating it in the first place.  We can keep pace with our current energy demands, but what happens when everybody starts plugging their electric cars into the electricity grid and demanding that sort of energy from it several times a week?  Remember, we don’t have to generate all that energy in oil, it’s conveniently there already.

The alternative fuels revolution is looking, at least to me, like us sticking our head in the sand and pretending we can keep doing “Business As Usual”.  I don’t agree with this, we can’t keep on this way, I’m increasingly of the opinion that “BAU” is not a viable option.

So, where do I see our options?  Greater use of Public transport is a good place to start, allowing us to quickly increase the efficiency of our travel with services that are already in place and working.  Of course, public transport networks do need improvement in many areas, and in others are, for the moment, almost unavailable.  For freight, rail travel is much more efficent than road, with the advantage of removing the huge HGVs from most of our roads.  I think that a network of mostly light rail and walkable / rideable cities, with the option of electric vehicles for commercial use will go a long way towards making a much more pleasant environment for us and our children and keep the wheels turning in a more sustainable way.

There is another option, one that’s good for our waistlines as well as our bank balances. Many of us can act quickly to improve our health, cut our emissions and our fuel bills by cycling around the place.  Even if it’s just one day a week to work, or to the shops and back, we should try to replace car trips with bike trips.  A bike uses, far fewer resources to make, maintain and run than many other modes of transport.  A good cycling advocacy website is Why Cycle?.

So, am I preaching from my armchair here?  No, I bought a mountain bike and some accessories on the weekend of the 4th April and started practising with it, and I’m having a really enjoyable time.  I have a greater degree of choice on my routes than I do with a car and also few of the associated costs, unlike a car, I can expect the bike to pay for itself with fuel savings.  Maintenance is something that needs doing, but is enormously cheap compared to a car.

I’m also discovering that if you’re a little outgoing with it, you speak to people more and it makes things much more rewarding.  I’m finding something Robert M Pirsig said to be very true, in Zen and The Art of Motorcyle Maintenance, he says that on a motorbike you’re part of the scene, not seperated from it by a car.  As I’m travelling more slowly and quietly, I’m finding that very true, even more true for a bicycle than a motorbike.  This changes the whole nature of travelling.

I’m also getting into situations that are completely new to me, let me give a very cool example from the morning of Sunday 12th.

I’d gone out for a ride along the local canals and got to a local nature reserve, I decided to try my lights and went through the Netherton Tunnel, nearly 2.8 km (1.7 miles) of darkness with light and air shafts in the ceiling.  I got through there fine and had a ride round the canals at the other end then turned and came back.  As I got to the tunnel a narrowboat was going in and the driver and his wife joked about me riding a bike through the tunnel.  So I slowed down and kept pace with the boat through the tunnel, using their boat headlights to provide much better light than my smaller lights.  We wound up having a good conversation while travelling for nearly an hour way underground and bumped into some other cyclists on the way.

I’ll no doubt return to my bike in future posts.

In my previous post, I compared what’s happening to the ‘End of Rome’, if we’re not very careful then this is going to be very much the case.  Of course, this whole thing does provide us with an opportunity, all it requires is a change in the way we look at things.

I think this is an important change to make, as I think we seem to be largely in denial of the scale of what’s happening, but also unable to see a way through it.   Now, my personal conviction is that this isn’t a deficiency in intelligence, or in our ability to rise to the challenges ahead of us.  I think it’s a problem of perspective, we cannot accept the change because we seem to lose everything, and I admit the sheer enormity of the idea is frightening.

So can we turn that perspective around?  I think the answer is yes, we have an opportunity here to learn much more about living lightly on the Earth in a sustainable way, but also a chance to learn to take pleasure in something other than reckless consumption.  We could gain a better environment to live in, with less noise and traffic fumes.   A chance to slow down the pace of things maybe, gain some much needed time for reflection?  I feel that we lose a great deal because of our frantic pace, we miss a lot and I know I’m not the only one who feels like that, but more of that another time.

It’s easy to point the finger and call this wishful rusticism, but the alternative is unsustainable and will come crashing down around our ears sooner rather than later.  So we may as well find the silver lining, I don’t think it’s such a bad one.

So, this could be our chance at a new age, not a ‘Golden Age’ by today’s standards, but given where those standards have led us to, how much faith can we put in them anymore?

I’ve been watching the unfolding story of our global economic problems with a growing sense of foreboding.

People are running round trying to prop up the system without realising that it might just be time to question a few of the basic assumptions that underlie that system.

The one I think needs to be addressed with priority is the fixation with growth and how to restart it.  We have only so much planet, and we have been burning through the available resources with abandon.  You can only grow for so long, sooner or later you run out of room to grow and resources to grow with.  That’s the problem, we’re trying to do something that just isn’t possible and if you get into a fight like that, you won’t be the one left standing at the end.  Reality is always right and denying that basic fact just stores up trouble.

It’s time to start moving towards a path based on what we can sustain, it will be slow and challenging, but there really is little alternative and the clock is ticking ever louder.

We also need to realise that we need to start questioning the assumptions that underlie our methods and beliefs in all areas of our lives, putting our heads in the sand and allowing others to think for us is no longer an option.

Dare we begin to compare this to the fall of Rome and, in our denial, are we and our leaders guilty of fiddling while Rome burns?

Well, I had an interesting experience in Secondlife last night, at a sim called “The Buddha Center” they showed a BBC video on the life of the Buddha.  As aide from the odd technical hiccup it was an enjoyable experience and when I found the video on YouTube, I thought I’d share it with everybody!

It’s 50 minutes in length, so be sure you have a cup of Tea when you click play, and the DVD purchase notice will vanish after the first 30 seconds or so. 

Here’s a fun experiment, my friend Peter over at The Buddha Diaries has started a meme on the above subject and is asking his blogger friends to carry it on.  I’m going to very interested to see how far this spreads.

The rules are really quite simple:

1. Answer the questions
2. Link back to the original meme
3. Tag others to participate

So without further ado, let’s get stuck in!

1) How do you sleep at night? Is your sleep affected by the national angst? Do you drop off easily, as you always did? Or does it take a while to get to sleep?

Generally, I sleep soundly, when I eventually get to sleep.  I’m a bit of a martyr to lying awake tossing and turning, depending on what I’ve been doing before I turn in.  I tend to wake quite early as well, then lie there listening for the alarm.

2) What strategies, if needed, do you use to get to sleep? Pills? Sheep? Late night television shows? And/or…?

I’ve used a few over the years, one was a relaxation technique in which you begin at the feet and imagine each part of your body (feet, shins, knees, thighs, etc) to be warm and heavy.  Another is to mentally release my grip on whatever is keeping me awake, then imagine it floating away.  Sometimes, it’s just a quick bathroom trip.

3) Do you wake up in the middle of the night, plagued by obsessive thoughts?

No, once I’m asleep, I rarely wake.  But, lying awake plagued by obsessive thoughts, guilty as charged I’m afraid!

4) What strategies do you have to get back to sleep?

In all honesty, I’d just use the ones from question 2.

5) Are your dreams affected? Are they more anxious than before? Do they wake you up in a sweat? Or are they peaceful, innocent, undisturbed by the general malaise?

Here’s an interesting one.  I rarely remember my dreams, those that I do recall are either terrfiying or just plain surreal.  I’ve often wondered why I only rarely recall them, and at one point in my life, I genuinely believed I didn’t dream at all.

So, in the spirit of the original post, I’d like to impose on the following people:

• abarefootman
• Drops of Water
• Riding The Wind
• Surfing the Tao

I’ve been reflecting on the phrase “The Meaning of Life” recently. The feeling arose within me that a meaning would remove all uncertainty from our lives, and it would also absolve us of responsibility for finding our own direction in life.

But as surely as we would lose the responibility, we also would lose the power to change the story, to take control. Let’s consider an opposite idea then, what if there isn’t a meaning in the way we like to think? I think that the meaning is to live mindfully in the moment, no matter what you happen to be doing.

OK, consider, if life is lived in the moment. So by looking for a meaning of life outside of the moment, from some external source, does our search mean we then miss the meaning?

A couple of people I know were talking the other day, one of them has just turned 24 and felt he was “getting old”. They were then saying that from mid-20’s to mid-30’s were the “best years, the prime, of your life”.

I’m thinking about blind acceptance of “common wisdom”, even when a little reflection will show it for the sham that it is. Surely, being in “your prime” is entirely attitude, there’s so much more to it than simple physical condition or age. In any event, our technology and extending lifespans are rewriting the rules as we go.

But even purely in physical condition terms, I’ve seen people at least 10 years older than me walk into the gym and match the younger gym rats in terms of performance.

Perhaps the notion of “prime of life” is inaccurate? I think it’s not the possession of a physical or mental condition, but its expression. It’s not what you’ve got but how you use it?