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The focus of attention, of consciousness, which is without diversion or deviation.

There is no other energy — available to a human — that is as powerful. 

Wednesday, January 5, 2022 (XII/三)

"There must be first the quiet or harmony in one's own self if one would find harmony with others."   ECRL 1540-7

《道德經》

道德經第五十三章

使我介然有知，行於大道，唯施是畏。

大道甚夷，而民好徑。

朝甚除，田甚蕪，倉甚虛；服文綵，帶利劍，厭飲食，財貨有餘；是謂盜夸。

非道也哉！

Dao De Jing Chapter Fifty-three — C. Ganson

53 — 道之主道

The Main Path of Tao

Let me walk along the main path of 道

and avoid by-paths of worthless knowledge.

I would not leave this main path, so easily followed,

but many people prefer the by-paths.

The palaces are well kept

while fields go untilled

and the granaries are empty.

To wear elegant clothes, to carry a fine sword,

to gorge with food and drink, to have wealth and riches,

all this invites plunder.

Is this not departing from 道?

Dao De Jing Chapter Fifty-three — James Legge

53 (Increase of evidence)

If I were suddenly to become known, and (put into a position to) conduct (a government) according to the Great Dao, what I should be most afraid of would be a boastful display.

The great Dao (or way) is very level and easy, but people love the by-ways.

Their court(-yards and buildings) shall be well kept, but their fields shall be ill-cultivated, and their granaries very empty. They shall wear elegant and ornamented robes, carry a sharp sword at their girdle, pamper themselves in eating and drinking, and have a superabundance of property and wealth; - such (princes) may be called robbers and boasters.

This is contrary to the Dao surely!

Dao De Jing Chapter Fifty-three — Arthur Waley

53

He who has the least scrap of sense,

Once he has got started on the great highway has nothing to fear

So long as he avoids turnings.

For great highways are safe and easy.

But men love by-paths.

So long as Court is in order

They are content to let their fields run to weed

And their granaries stand empty.

They wear patterns and embroideries,

Carry sharp swords, glut themselves with drink and food,

Have more possessions than they can use.

These are the riotous ways of brigandage; they are not the Highway.

Far Journeys

ROBERT A. MONROE

ISBN 0-385-23182-2 

Copyright © 1985 by Robert A. Monroe 

An Eleanor Friede Book

Prologue

 

There seems to be an easy way to do—and a hard way. Given the choice, all of us take the easy route simply because it's more efficient, saves time and energy. If it's too easy, some of us feel guilty. We get the uncomfortable sense that we're missing something if we don't go laborious, tried-and-true pattern. If it's that easy, it must not be good, might even be sinful.

But after a while, the easy way becomes the ordinary way and we forget the old road. When you've lived in an area long enough to have travelled between two cities before the interstates and freeways were built, try the old familiar highway just once. You'll find once is enough. The start-and-stop congestion, the total disorder, the growing frustrations far overshadow any remaining nostalgia you may have harboured. You have enough of such local traffic at the beginning and end of each run on the Interstate.

Now the problem. Suppose you met someone who had never driven on an interstate. All his life, he has driven only in local traffic. He's heard about such superhighways. He might even have seen one from a distance or heard the rumble of vehicles or smelled their exhaust fumes. He rationalizes any number of reasons why he hasn't and won't go interstate; he doesn't need to, he's satisfied the way he is; they travel too fast so it's not safe; you have to go out of your way to get on it; it's full of strangers from all over the place so you don't know whom you'll meet so you can't trust them; your car isn't in very good condition and it might break down and leave you stranded without anybody to help, in some lonely spot you never heard of. Maybe sometime you'll try it, but not right now.

Suppose you happened to see a construction order from the state highway department to begin demolition of the old highway so that all local traffic will have to go interstate eventually, like it or not. What do you do? What would you do? Nothing? Suppose the recalcitrant is an old and dear friend. Then what? Your friend knows of the order but refuses to believe it. He can see the work crews beginning to form at the end of the old highway and he ignores their existence. Thus you know the intense trauma he will undergo when the old road is shut off, and he will be carried kicking and screaming onto the Interstate.

You decide to do something, anything you can. After your decision, weeks, months—years—pass due to your own inertia. You have your own rationale. You don't know how to proceed. You don't know how to describe the interstate in local traffic terms, and your friend understands only local traffic. Someone else will come along and do it for you, for your friend.

Finally, finally—you discover the stupidly simple answer. You and your friend suffer from the same affliction but from different causes. It is inertia. Back in the old railroad days, a locomotive could pull only four or five cars at a time because if more cars than that were added, it would simply spin its drive wheels trying to get started. Inertia. Then a smart young thinker came along and invented the sliding coupler, which let the locomotive pick up the slack—and inertia—one car at a time. Ask any freight conductor what it was like to be in a caboose on the tail end of a 100-car train when he highballs the engineer. Instantaneous zero to thirty miles per hour. It's the same with automobiles. The transmission is there to provide big torque in low gear to overcome inertia. Once underway at cruising speed, power is required only to overcome wind resistance and road friction—and very little of it relatively. The hard case is the catapult launch on an aircraft carrier, which does the job in a hurry and not too gently. Guns are inertia-overcoming devices for bullets.

It's doubtful that explosive or catapult methods to the full-speed interstate in a different form will be less than confusing and bewildering, even with modification to local trade standards. Take this as an illustration: . . . I can't get the stuff under a null point, there ought to be a better way to do this!

(Your uncontrolled emotion of anger is using much of your energy. A very human response.)

A better way to do it . . . stuff can't help being what it is, you kick a stone in your path and it hurts your toe, why get angry at the stone, you can't be angry at it for being on the path or being harder than a toe . . . yes, now let's see if it works. 

(It is the focus of attention, of consciousness, which is without diversion or deviation. No other energy available to you as a human is as powerful. As a lens will direct the energy you call light, so you can use consciousness.) 

Each time I hear something like that, I realize how far I have to go.

(You are doing very well, Mister Monroe. Your own recognition of such percept is an indication.)

Hey, I got it! It's under the baseline . . . uh, except for this one sawtooth, can't seem to hold onto it, and there's a smaller waveform on the sawtooth, can't get it put away.

(It is another form of rote, as you call it. Take it if you so desire. It may be interesting to you.)

Sure, why not!

(Click!)

Going from local traffic to interstate does indeed require an entry or acceleration lane to merge into the flow. If you can make the tools supplied by local traffic apply in the design and building of the ramp, so much the better. You need to remember especially the inertia factor—pick up the slack on one loaded car at a time, start in low gear so you don't stall the engine, then shift smoothly; automatic transmissions don't know when you need to shift. If the design is correct, your friend is cruising along the interstate long before the old highway is closed down.

You do the best you can.

Robert A. Monroe

Faber, Virginia

1985