初心

原意

Remembering when experiencing the Chasm

29

䷜

坎

Flowers do not dream of bees and butterflies

Flowers blossom.

The bees then arrive, flying

And the dragonfly already enjoys the summer.

Living things tend to change unrecognizably as they grow.  Who would deduce the dragonfly from the larva, the iris from the bud, the lawyer from the infant? Flora or fauna, we are all still shape-shifters and magical reinvents. Life is really a plural noun, a caravan of selves.

一 Diane Ackerman

Life is a wave of creative consciousness rippling through space and time that we have the honour of aesthetically surfing.

一 Alex Grey

As you go the way of life,

You will see a great chasm. Jump.

It is not as wide as you think.

一 Joseph Campbell 

我獨異於人，而貴食母。

                                     ➥母為 ➠  有、名萬物之母。

from

道德經: 第二十章

絕學無憂，唯之與阿，相去幾何？善之與惡，相去若何？人之所畏，不可不畏。荒兮其未央哉！衆人熙熙，如享太牢，如春登臺。我獨怕兮其未兆；如嬰兒之未孩；儽儽兮若無所歸。衆人皆有餘，而我獨若遺。我愚人之心也哉！沌沌兮，俗人昭昭，我獨若昏。俗人察察，我獨悶悶。澹兮其若海，飂兮若無止，衆人皆有以，而我獨頑似鄙。我獨異於人，而貴食母。

GGG

The plurality of Fernando Pessoa

Le Puits Gaillot & le Ciel

Não sou nada.

Nunca serei nada.

Não posso querer ser nada.

À parte isso, tenho em mim todos os sonhos do mundo.

I'm nothing,

I'll always be nothing.

I can't even wish to be something.

Aside from that, I've got all the world's dreams inside me.

一 Álvaro de Campos (Fernando Pessoa's heteronym), Tabacaria ["The Tobacconist's" or "The Tobacco Shop"] (15 January 1928)

Variant translations:

I am nothing.

Never shall be anything.

Cannot will to be anything.

This apart, I have in me all the dreams of the world.

一 trans. Jonathan Griffin, in Selected Poems (Penguin Books, 1974), p. 111

I am not nothing.

I will never be nothing.

I cannot ever want to be nothing.

Apart from that, I have in me all the dreams of the world.

一 In Webster's New World Dictionary of Quotations (2005), p. 649

I am nothing.

I shall never be anything.

I cannot even wish to be anything.

Apart from this, I have within me all the dreams of the world.

一 Fernando Pessoa

Começo a conhecer-me. Não existo.

Sou o intervalo entre o que desejo ser e os outros me fizeram.

I'm beginning to know myself. I don't exist.

I'm the gap between what I'd like to be and what others have made me.

一 Álvaro de Campos (Fernando Pessoa's heteronym), "Começo a conhecer-me. Não existo.", in Fernando Pessoa & Co: Selected Poems, trans. Richard Zenith (Grove Press, 1998)

Somos dois abismos — um poço fitando o céu.

We are two abysses — a well staring at the sky.

一 Fernando Pessoa, Livro do Desassossego: Composto por Bernardo Soares, ajudante de guarda-livros na cidade de Lisboa, A Factless Autobiography, Richard Zenith Edition, Lisbon, 2006, p. 48

Considero a vida uma estalagem onde tenho que me demorar até que chegue a diligência do abismo. Não sei onde ela me levará, porque não sei nada.

I think of life as an inn where I have to stay until the abyss coach arrives. I don't know where it will take me, for I know nothing.

一 Fernando Pessoa, Livro do Desassossego: Composto por Bernardo Soares, ajudante de guarda-livros na cidade de Lisboa, A Factless Autobiography, Richard Zenith Edition, Lisbon, 2006, p. 40

O meu coração é um pouco maior que o universo inteiro.

My heart is a little larger than the entire universe.

一 Fernando Pessoa "Saí do comboio" (4 July 1934), trans. Richard Zenith

O amor é que é essencial.

O sexo é só um acidente.

Love is essential. Sex, a mere accident.

一 Fernando Pessoa, Poem (5 April 1935), reported in Poesias inéditas (1930-1935), p. 192

Sê plural como o universo!

Be plural, like the universe!

一 Fernando Pessoa, Páginas Íntimas e de Auto Interpretação (published posthumously, 1966)

Life is what we make of it.

Travel is the traveller.

What we see isn't what we see but what we are.

一 Fernando Pessoa

Who will write the story of what could have been?

That, if someone writes it,

Will be the true history of humanity.

What exists is the real world—not us, just the world.

We are, in reality, what doesn’t exist.

I am who I failed to be.

一 Fernando Pessoa

My soul is a hidden orchestra; I know not what instruments, what fiddlestrings and harps, drums and tamboura I sound and clash inside myself. All I hear is the symphony.

一 Fernando Pessoa

Quotes

Charles Frizzell

莊子

荃者所以在魚，得魚而忘荃

蹄者所以在兔，得兔而忘蹄

言者所以在意，得意而忘言

吾安得忘言之人而與之言哉？*

“The fish trap exists because of the fish. Once you’ve gotten the fish you can forget the trap. The rabbit snare exists because of the rabbit. Once you’ve gotten the rabbit, you can forget the snare. Words exist because of meaning. Once you’ve gotten the meaning, you can forget the words. Where can I find a man who has forgotten words so I can talk with him?”

“Flow with whatever may happen, and let your mind be free: Stay centred by accepting whatever you are doing. This is the ultimate.”

“Once upon a time, I dreamt I was a butterfly, fluttering hither and thither, to all intents and purposes a butterfly. I was conscious only of my happiness as a butterfly, unaware that I was myself. Soon I awoke, and there I was, veritably myself again. Now I do not know whether I was then a man dreaming I was a butterfly, or whether I am now a butterfly, dreaming I am a man.”

“A path is made by walking on it.”

“Let your heart be at peace.

Watch the turmoil of beings

but contemplate their return.

If you don’t realize the source,

you stumble in confusion and sorrow.

When you realize where you come from,

you naturally become tolerant,

disinterested, amused,

kindhearted as a grandmother,

dignified as a king.

Immersed in the wonder of the Tao,

you can deal with whatever life brings you,

And when death comes, you are ready.”

“I cannot tell if what the world considers ‘happiness’ is happiness or not. All I know is that when I consider the way they go about attaining it, I see them carried away headlong, grim and obsessed, in the general onrush of the human herd, unable to stop themselves or to change their direction. All the while they claim to be just on the point of attaining happiness.”

“To a mind that is still, the entire universe surrenders.”

“If a man crosses a river

and an empty boat collides with his own skiff,

Even though he is a bad-tempered man

He will not become very angry.

But if he sees a man in the boat,

He will shout at him to steer clear.

If the shout is not heard, he will shout again, and yet again, and begin cursing.

And all because someone is in the boat.

Yet if the boat were empty,

He would not be shouting, and not angry.

If you can empty your own boat

Crossing the river of the world,

No one will oppose you,

No one will seek to harm you”

一 莊子 Zhuangzi

Water does not resist. Water flows. When you plunge your hand into it, all you feel is a caress. Water is not a solid wall, it will not stop you. But water always goes where it wants to go, and nothing, in the end, can stand against it. Water is patient. Dripping water wears away a stone. Remember that, my child. Remember you are half water. If you can’t go through an obstacle, go around it. Water does.

一 Margaret Atwood

I am losing precious days. I am degenerating into a machine for making money. I am learning nothing in this trivial world of men. I must break away and get out into the mountains to learn the news.

一 John Muir

But we lack the intellectual vision, and the ability to change our minds. We must decondition ourselves from 10,000 (12,500) years of bad behaviour. And, it's not easy.

一 Terence McKenna

The Cosmic Spirit seeks not to restrain us

But lifts us stage by stage to wider spaces.

If we accept a home of our own making,

Familiar habit makes for indolence.

We must prepare for parting and leave-taking

Or else remain the slave of permanence...

一 Hermann Hesse

Always we are chasing words, and always words recede. But the greatest experiences are those for which we have no expression. To live only on that which we can say is to wallow in he dust, instead of digging up the soil. How shall we ignore the mystery, in which we are involved, to which we are attached by our very existence? How shall we remain deaf to the throb of the cosmic that is subtly echoed in our own souls?

一 Abraham Joshua Heschel