I've been watching Sadhguru videos regularly since I discovered them in February, almost daily along with cat videos. He still hasn't said anything that has put me off and has said much more that I quite like. I avoid videos with titles that seem to have no meaning or relevance like what to name a child or about wearing black clothes. It's very possible the content contains just as much wisdom as other videos, but I'm a little scared, I suppose, that I'll come across him saying something truly brow-furrowing that I couldn't accept. 

I've already come across him telling jokes that weren't that funny which puts doubt on his spiritual advancedness. Granted he's a mystic, not a rabbi or a comedian (although I think maybe an inordinate amount of spiritual teachers are closet aspiring stand-ups). He's told funny jokes I've heard before. And one funny one I hadn't heard before about an actor doing Shakespeare. The punchline was: What do you expect from material this terrible?! That's a good punchline, the joke almost writes itself!

Not to toot my own horn, and although thinking or filtering things this way may be detrimental, I hear him mentioning things that resonate with things I've come up before on my own and I can't help but feel the teeniest, tiniest bit of affirmation. In no way do I think I'm advanced nor that I don't need a guru.

For instance a video that reminds me of my joy-generating meditations/exercises. Ironically the video is about "being joyful", but what resonated was when he takes a strange left turn and he's talking about "love". What he talks about doing with love is basically my joy-generating meditation, words substituted. Joy/Love that is the result of external circumstances is fleeting and will pass, but if joy can be generated within oneself just through concentration and realization that it's there and that it's always there, and not relying on external factors, that's not something anything or anyone can take away. I guess it works with love if that's the focus. I've interpreted Tibetan monks doing the same thing with compassion.

He also touches upon a musing I've blogged about regarding how much energy it takes to be social and an active participant in this world. It's exhausting compared to the relatively small amount of energy I expend just living a flawed, urban-hermit like existence. People don't notice how much energy it takes because it's just normal and even desirable for most people. You wouldn't notice it until you start withdrawing from society but then get thrust back into it by merely meeting up with an old acquaintance. But most wouldn't even like the withdrawing part that calms energies because of psychological hang-ups of being lonely or getting restless.

I've also mentioned long-term mindfulness practice as being effective in dealing  with mental health issues to varying degrees depending upon the individual. I have to be modest about it and can't speak for anyone else. For me, I found that when old mental health issues would arise, mindfulness practice would intervene like a gatekeeper. The mental health issue would announce itself like it had all the right in the world to be here, but then mindfulness practice would begin its withering interrogation of how's and why's and for what purpose? and what do you hope to accomplish? Eventually the mental health issue would reveal itself as a crutch that I wanted and had summoned, but was a failing in its unproductive, self-destructive nature and was unnecessary from a logical point of view (Suicide conveniently withstands the inquiry. Mindfulness practice arrives with its articles of inquisition and suicide begins presenting its case with "exhibit A:" and gestures palms extended at my entire life, and ends with "he's gonna die anyway". Mindfulness practice forgets about the droids and lets the boy go about his business). 

One concept he mentions that was completely new to me is that human beings are born with a certain amount of energy that must be exhausted before being able to "die well". That's why it's better not to die prematurely like in an accident or by suicide; one's natural energy hasn't dissipated. This is not a concept I've recognized in the so-called Tibetan Book of the Dead or in any of my Vajrayana readings (I may not have the spiritual aptitude to recognize it). Dying well with energies properly exhausted helps lead quickly to a good, natural rebirth. Dying with energy remaining requires that energy to still be dissipated before being reborn, which could take years or decades (or longer) in human time. 

I don't know what basis there is to believe in that, but . . . same goes with the Tibetan teachings. If you're not on board with Tibetan Buddhism there's no reason to believe in any of it, but I've already tentatively gotten on board with Sadhguru, so I can afford him some benefits of doubt. His mention of "better not die by suicide" is OK with me because it's in the same context as "better not die in a tragic accident". Like you can prevent that?! These aren't judgments, just assessments of dying without natural life energies being depleted. 

I suspect whatever he has to say about suicide would be in general discouraging, presumably regarding typical suicides and fair assumptions about them, and would not necessarily apply to me. What teachers say about suicide and how is often a litmus test for me and nothing he's said about suicide has been offensive or insulting. I still get a sense he knows what he's talking about even with blanket statements or assumptions. 

It very well may be that all my years of chronic suicidal ideation by nature have been dissipating my reserve of life energy. If you keep death that mindfully close to you, perhaps the energies are drained that much quicker than if you expend them doing worldly things, not at all aware of them. It may have been by instinct that I've failed in the past because they hadn't been drained sufficiently enough (I know I'm giving my instincts a lot of uncalled for credit here, emphasis on the 'may have been'). It may be that if Sadhguru were my teacher, he'd give me a sadhana to work on that suicide is forbidden and not an option. That I would have to take seriously. And maybe why he's not my teacher in this lifetime.

My Sadhguru playlist (videos that had particular resonance for me).

looming

I exchanged the last of my U.S. cash for NT dollars late last month, so I'm officially looking at the end of funds, i.e., the supposed end of my life. I suppose I should put a disclaimer here (or trigger warning? spoiler alert?) that this all is only a reflection of current thoughts and not necessarily a projection of future action. My primary truism regarding suicide still applies that if I'm not doing something right now, it's fair considered I'm not doing anything at all. And I'm not doing anything right now, I'm blogging.

I have about three month's worth of funds left with no more "buffer" (that was the last of the U.S. cash) and no intention or desire to do anything about it. I know I've blogged this many times before, projecting how long I have left in terms of funds running out, and all of those times funds have come through, all those times I still had that buffer of U.S. cash. I don't know what I was thinking when I wrote about it before, was I being dramatic? Crying wolf? Maybe I was testing myself, practicing what it might feel like to face the end of funds? 

That last one sounds like something my subconscious would do, and if that's the case I think the practice paid off. All those times before I don't think I did so well. I'd feel anxious and desperate despite how disparate that was to my philosophy; basically getting caught up in the emotions of particular circumstances – exactly what mindfulness practice trains not to do. Now, this time, it's supposedly fer reals, it's serial; no buffer, no reserve, no reprieve, no miracles, no savior, no windfall, no stuffed mattress, no cartoon safe filled with NT cash falling through my ceiling. The cash will be gone in a few months, and when the cash is gone, the cash is gone. That means no mo' money. Great! Faboo, that was the plan. No point to those previous reactions, better to just prepare.

This is a big deal. It's nothing to be dramatic about, but I also don't want to downplay that it's a major marker signaling the end of my current life path. John's blog was mostly about his experience with terminal cancer and dealing and doing his best to live with it, but then he reached that point, that marker in the last month that signaled it was over (even though it might not have been so clear to him at the time) and there was no more treating or dealing with the cancer, no more fighting it. It just became about the non-stop, excruciating pain and managing it with military-grade the best big pharma painkillers until the end. For me, no matter what mind games I played with myself, no matter what neurotic dysfunction or flaky waffling I wallowed in, the end of funds, running out of money was always, always, always endgame. 

That was the plan. No matter what paltry, lame excuses I made to live on, no matter how many times I tried and chickened out, the plan was to constantly make life decisions that would funnel me to the point where I would reach the end of my funds and there would be no surviving the decision of suicide at that point. Ironically, it was my parents who foiled the plan for so long by providing base funds (which they thought were supplemental to my income because in their minds they simply couldn't conceive of me being unemployed as I have been for the past decade) that kept me not only alive, but reasonably, relatively comfortable. 

Chronic suicidal ideation is survivable in a similar way that bipolar, schizophrenia, PTSD, etc. are survivable. Those, of course, aren't death sentences per se, whereas if suicidal ideation becomes acute, survivability goes down because that's its nature. But if it remains chronic that means there are still mental mechanisms leaning towards living embedded in the consideration and contemplation of suicide and living with it becomes possible. 

I did and was all that but then I added a "fail-safe" (or its opposite, "success-danger"?), a few extra lines of code in the software of mental mechanisms that guaranteed that someday I would succeed in committing suicide instead of just living and getting by with the suicidal ideation. I basically sabotaged chronic suicidal ideation so that it wasn't survivable. The plan was that I set up the conditions so that I would have to commit suicide (by agreement with myself) when I had no more support (money) for living. And I'd never be desperate or motivated enough to make the money myself to survive. I learned about myself that no matter what job I landed or stability or satisfaction I found, it wouldn't last. I'd get bored, I'd sabotage it, I'd come around back to suicidal ideation and nothing anyone has done or said or been to me has changed that.

Little of this is actually new aside from hitting that marker of exhausting my buffer of U.S. cash. The "chronic suicidal ideation" concept is still a relatively new revelation that I'm not through mulling, but all of the suicide stuff otherwise is not. So I think it fair to quickly fill in the rest of the suicide philosophy that I prefer to approach it positively without despondency and recognizing that all things are impermanent anyway. I choose to view it positively as part of my path and that there is something to learn from it. Better that than be all negative about it, right? 

It also helps having a system of belief that includes reincarnation and doesn't put that much ultimate importance on any single bodily lifetime. Each lifetime is important, but for me the importance is measured in what's learned and spiritual progress made. Dying is not an ultimate end. I agree with the belief it's just the end of a body and not the end of a "person" or the energy or the path/journey it's on. How we die and the mindset we're in when we die is key to future manifestations and not human morality or judgment (except to the effect that they affect our mindset). 

If a "trigger warning" was warranted, I hope it's more to trigger living mindfully. If you're suicidal and don't believe in reincarnation, don't be an ass and just don't do it, throwing away your shot. Whoops, there goes the trigger warning.

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follow-ups

. . . I had braced myself for a long, cold, bitter winter with actually little evidence or suggestion by meteorologists to justify that expectation. I was just pessimistically bracing for the worst, hoping for better and fortunately after those two cold blasts early in January, at least one of which was Siberian, it hasn't been that bad, spasiba. Daytime highs, which are my standard gauge of the days in general, have been up and down but never as cold and with plenty on the mild side. I looked back at what I'd written about previous winters and this year is no where near as bad as Taipei could get. My nerves and psyche would be shredded catatonic if it was like one of those winters, especially with no hot water. 

. . . I've adapted alright to no hot water, helped by no sustained cold winter temperatures. It's still not pleasant and I still bifurcate my showers, even when I can't siphon hot water from my neighbor, to minimize being under cold water at any one time. When I do tap his hot water, I try minimizing any effect on his showers by waiting until I hear his water turn off. I can still get sufficient hot water for my needs for a short while afterwards. Hopefully there is zero effect on his showers and therefore no reason for him to do anything about it. Interdependence in action perhaps as I'm being considerate towards him but for selfish reasons.

. . . That fine line between "showing restraint" and resisting alcohol consumption became a slippery slope of itself towards resistance and I don't think I've gotten too nutty about it. It's no great achievement, just preferring to lean towards not drinking when it comes to mind. But I'm not that strict about resistance and alcohol levels in bottles still steadily decrease, just not as fast. Under my new regimen of "can I say no to this?" I'm drinking maybe half what I was. It's probably more complicated than that. The effect on my gut was incredibly quick, though, improvement within days and I don't think it just happened out of coincidence. This is attributable to the alcohol drop-off. Do I feel any different otherwise? Not really. Can I fall back into it? Easily, I'm not fooling myself about that. 

. . . I'm willing to backtrack a bit on my disparaging suggestion regarding the mental health industry and their inability to treat something like "chronic suicidal ideation". My inability to even imagine how they would go about treating it is probably more indicative of my lack of imagination (and professional education and training) than their ability to target strategies for treatment for whatever comes their way. 

. . . Still nary a thought of going to the bank. I don't know if I've gone past the point of no return, whereby if I went to the bank today funds would not come through before current remaining funds ran out. I don't care, I'm not thinking about it. I'm assuming I'm past the point. I've been bracing myself mentally and conditioning myself to conjure and maintain cognitive dissonance whenever I feel comfortable on the day-to-day conveyor belt of habit and routine: This is not going to last, everything must and will change. Many elements in my surrounding life have already shaken up senses of perpetual comfort, now it's just me that I have to work on and just keep myself off-balance instead of being complacent about anything. With the external world I keep adapting and coping with disturbances and changes, but internally I have to shake things up myself and there is no adapting or coping, just acceptance. 

I've been re-reading "John's 'WTF? I've got cancer?' Blog" for a second time through. My methodology this time (instead of reading by month) was to start at the first entry and then click and read individual posts in sequence, and when I stop reading I'd bookmark the next entry for where to start the next time. His Blogger template is one where links change color after they're clicked, making it easy to know where I'd left off in the archives/entries list on the right. 

The first time I read the blog, it was a first impression thing and I think I made observations that probably don't hold up. Maybe I was nit-picking critical and making unfounded assessments that I'm not feeling this time (except the lack of editing, especially when he writes something had been edited). But if I was unfairly judgy it was probably because of an observation I did make before, which is that a lot of what I read in his personality resonated as being a lot like me. He was hitting too close to home. John, in some aspects, was me. And that bugged me (guess I'm not unique).

I think I made the unfair observation before that maybe he wasn't all that popular or likeable? He got a cat that avoided him far longer than the time it usually takes an adopted pet to adapt (kitty don't like you, holmes*). If I did make any such assessment, that is truly cringe-worthy since I'm very much at the bottom of any barrel of likeability. I'm in no one's consideration to even contact which I think is a fair measure of whether people like you or not.  

* My theory is that animals and babies don't lie. If they don't like you, i.e., you're unlikeable, they'll let you know. They can sense your dark clouds. That's why I stay away from people's pets and babies lest they call out and confirm my unlikeability. The closest I have is a robot vacuum cleaner that hates my guts and never goes where I want it to go or it comes right at me when I'm not looking, the fucker.

It's nice to read it for what it is without being judgy and I'm getting more nuances this time, recognizing when he's covering up freaking out or melting down, and he doesn't always try to cover it up. I probably got how funny he could be as his sense of humor is similar to mine (I'd be surprised if I didn't mention that before), and I still appreciate it. 

More prominent in my reading is the sense that I'm reading the thoughts of someone who is doomed. His uncertainty as to when and moments of hope are profound in light of the terminal diagnosis with a fairly absolute cap on how long he can be expected to live in the best of scenarios. But when hope peeked through, he jumped on the hope. He seemed to be a pessimistic skeptic, but willing to latch onto unlikely hope when it happened to manifest. He wanted to live. 

And he continued to live as much as possible despite being doomed and despite the misery of treatment. He continued to travel and worked on a bucket list. He still engaged with people and worked on projects like fixing up his condo when he could've just said screw this, what's the point? 

Actually it seems that he was cherry-picking his treatment to minimize the misery, even if that meant the treatment was less effectual (advantage: cancer). And even though he declined treatment that would be debilitating or would be so miserable that he couldn't enjoy what little life was left for him to enjoy . . . what he describes still seems pretty miserable to me. It was a very fine line he was delineating. I wouldn't be willing to go through even what he went through. 

I wonder if there are people who wouldn't be willing to go through even what I'm going through. People for whom my life and issues might be purely mental health issues and wouldn't suffer the idiotic, flimsy mind games I play with myself to keep living. They might have taken life more seriously than I do and ended this kind of miserable life long ago as I should have, except . . . I want to live. Don't get me wrong, I also do want to die, I view it as a great adventure that awaits, as moving on. I would even say I'm looking forward to it. But I'm still here, so logically, if not obviously, I want to live; my ego-self is still attached to my life despite how illusory and fleeting I know it is. My life isn't miserable, it's profound! (my god, did he really just say that?😧😒😲)

I also view my life as doomed since I still haven't gone to the bank to try adding funds and still don't plan to. I haven't panicked yet despite seeing the finite and dwindling amount of money I physically have left (actually less than I thought since the remainder is US$ that I have to convert and it just so happens that the NT$ is currently at record strength against the US$, so compared to any other time in history I'm getting the least amount of NT for every dollar I convert. Coincidence?! . . . I think not). However, realizing viscerally what it means I do sometimes feel my gut tighten and a dark cloud in my head and at least briefly question my constitution. Actually I think the amount of time I have left is comparable to the time John had left after totally giving up on treatment. 

I'm not projecting anything as definite. I obviously don't know what I might end up doing. As I've said, I just don't know myself that well. The evidence of my life is that I'll try to continue on, but I've always had the money to continue on. This is the first time the money is really coming to an end. This is looming. It's dire, but it's also great. It's by design, mind you; this is exactly how it was supposed to happen if I didn't end my life in the ideal way, without external pressure. 

Doomed, John slogged on until he couldn't. What else is he supposed to do? Same here, just no travel on my agenda. Forget riding a bike around the island. Not even revisiting old haunts and places I've been to in the Taipei area that surely may have changed. I hear they've started construction on a bridge across the mouth of the Danshui River, an incredible project that I would have thought unthinkable. That's a bridge I'll never cross. I have no bucket list. Suicide is my bucket list. No adopting a cat, I'm allergic anyway. Daily cat YouTube videos, though. 

Guitar god Eddie Van Halen died on October 6. And I just found out that the Van Halen brothers are essentially Asian American! What the fuck?!

How I didn't know Eddie and Alex are Asian American is pretty frickin' mind-blowing. Their father was Dutch and mother Indonesian. I don't know a single American with one white parent and one Asian parent who doesn't consider him or herself Asian American, although I'm sure they're out there. Maybe the Van Halen brothers?! Maybe the Van Halen brothers themselves kept quiet about their Indonesian heritage for whatever reason which is why I never knew about it. I knew they were Dutch and that Van Halen is a Dutch name, either from reading it in a magazine or hearing it from a classmate who read it in a magazine. Not a word about Indonesia and I remember a classmate wondering why Alex had "Chinese eyes" in a rare photo where he wasn't wearing sunglasses. Brother Eddie looked "normal" so that was the end of our junior high inquisition.

Furthermore, in the past few days it has come to my attention that the brothers had immigrated from the Netherlands at an old enough age to be passably fluent in Dutch (young enough to not have a Dutch accent), enough to give interviews in American-accented Dutch. They were at least bilingual!! (I haven't come across anything definitive indicating they didn't know any Indonesian from their mother, maybe they did but mum's the word on the Asianyay ingthay). 

I grew up in upper-middle class, white suburbia where racism definitely existed but wasn't horribly overt or physically violent as it was for the Van Halen brothers. We idiotically didn't listen to black music and that closed-mindedness extended to sexism as we stupidly didn't think girls could rock and ignored the obvious evidence that they could. It also made us Grade A assholes making fun of foreigners and thinking a death-metal band called Stormtroopers of Death with an album titled Speak English or Die was a hoot. What a bunch of fucking idiots we were and represented. I'm not proud of it. I did my best to fit in and in return they did their best to ignore that I looked like the people we were making fun of (no one turned and looked to me at that Alex Van Halen "Chinese eyes" remark). 

If we had seen videos of our rock heroes speaking a foreign language, I bet our narrow little minds would've been blown! They're foreigners! But not nearly as much as if we had learned they were Asian American. I don't know what I would've done with that information. I probably would've distanced myself from it and dismissed it. At that age and in that place, there was no Asian pride, no "Asian American", and Indonesia wasn't even really part of Asia anyway, at least not the important part. There wasn't even awareness of racism; I didn't learn about it until college and only then did I realize it was there all along like rigpa. 

I'm very proud that Van Halen was the first ever rock concert I went to, still in junior high. Diver Down Tour, Brendan Byrne Arena in the Meadowlands, NJ. I remember being in the stands and not believing I was in the same space as Eddie Van Halen! He was right there before my eyes with his trademark 500-watt smile doing his bouncy multiple scissor kick jumps on the raised platform stage left and David Lee Roth with his acrobatic, martial arts kicks and infamous ass-less chaps. 

My first rock concert and there were Asian Americans in the band! In later pictures, his Indonesian heritage is facially more apparent and he could pass for an elder Southeast Asian gentleman. Alex can stop wearing sunglasses all the time.

If I knew they were Asian American, I probably would've made more of an effort to remain a fan after the first white guy David Lee Roth was fired. My mind would've been blown 30 years earlier as my Asian American awareness dawned and remembered Eddie and Alex were "half Indonesian". I had trouble getting into their post-DLR sound and didn't feel like chasing it. Even now in my iTunes collection I have all six David Lee Roth-fronted studio albums, but only two songs with Sammy Hagar. And then after the second white guy Sammy Hagar was fired/quit, the name Van Halen became more associated with ridiculous, ego-driven drama and I didn't need that kind of instability in my life. 

I couldn't say I was a fan anymore when the third (fourth?) white guy Michael Anthony was fired (white people being fired by Asians is a comic thrill you only understand if you laughed when Apu gleefully hired Homer to work at the Quik-E-Mart), but I couldn't imagine any legitimate reason for the bassist to be fired. They could spin the revolving door with singers, but Michael Anthony's solid playing and stratospheric backing vocal was the third key to the Van Halen sound. The only reason that makes sense is nepotism, Eddie wanted his son Wolfgang in the band and that's not a legitimate reason. May as well change the band's name to "Eddie & the Family Van Halen" (that would've taken balls). I dunno, maybe Wolfgang was too young at that point for this theory to hold, but when he was finally recruited, it didn't look good. At least Eddie may have been clearing the way for Wolfgang.

I actually have Van Halen's entire catalog of studio albums on my computer (even the reviled Van Halen III), unscrupulously downloaded many moons ago from some unscrupulous Brazilian or Russian site that had them all just in case I might someday be interested. They aren't loaded onto my iTunes and so I have to specifically choose to listen to them like in the old days of LPs and CDs, which is rare for me to do and most of it has gone unlistened to until recently. I have to admit the music is consistently good, Eddie and Alex kick ass no matter who is singing. But aside from them I'm still not thrilled by the writing or what's on top (nothing against Sammy, I wish I liked it more).

One of the greatest, game-changing electric guitarists of all time was black. The other was . . . Asian American?! I'm still trying to get my head around that one. I was born too late to appreciate Jimi Hendrix, but then got it when I realized what he did to electric guitar in the 60s is analogous to what Eddie Van Halen did in the 70s. I just couldn't hear it because I didn't experience it and everyone was standing on Jimi's shoulders by the time I came of age. They were like a two-stage rocket with Jimi taking off into space and then Eddie blasting into hyperdrive 10 years later.

14 min. clip from the Mean Street Tour supporting Fair Warning, a year and a half before I saw them. No ass-less chaps, but that's quite a bulge Diamond Dave is sporting.

For the past several months I've been focusing morning sitting on the Tibetan Buddhist concepts of sem and rigpa. Both of those terms are translated as "mind", but distinguish between different types of mind. Sem is mind as manifested in our perceived reality and it is also divided in two. One aspect of sem mind is how we subjectively perceive things, what is received through our senses and how our brains integrate them and interpret reality. The other aspect of sem is what's out there, what's being perceived and is also a product of mind. It's not to say that without us being here that it would disappear, that would be a misinterpretation of it being "product of the mind", but rather establishing the non-duality between reality and mind – what's "out there" IS our mind. That takes a bit to get one's sem around. 

The focus on sem is also good for returning the wandering discursive mind back to the breath – Zen focus on breathing – that I perennially wrangle with. I start by identifying breath as being representative of sem, so as soon as I think "sem" my mind immediately goes to my breath and the sensation of breathing and then that expands to focusing on all senses and what they're doing, as well as the discursive mind and the thoughts which are also sem. It sometimes takes a while for the thought of sem to trigger the focus, sometimes it's there from the start or even before starting (although once it came to me literally right before the 46-minute timer went off (sem! *beep beep beep*), which wasn't ideal). Doesn't matter. And once the focus on the perceiving is there, it spreads to the objects of perception, the other side of sem.

Rigpa is a more elusive concept of mind; it is mind as the ground of all being. Sem mind is merely the projection or manifestation of rigpa. Sem is how mind appears as our perceived reality and with what and how we interact in our lives, but rigpa is the true mind, the true ground of existence. Imagine seeing the trees (sem) but being unable to see the forest (rigpa), or the waves but unable to see the ocean. You look as hard as you can and you can see the trees and the waves, but for the life of you you fail at the challenge of seeing the forest or the ocean. The problem with the analogy is that we can see the forest and the ocean, but that's also the conceptual difficulty of rigpa where everything is rigpa, rigpa is imbued through everything around us, but we can't see it or point to it. 

Rigpa can't be learned or taught, but must be experienced, it is said, and experiencing rigpa is akin to enlightenment. And as I understand it, it is the "clear light" or "pristine cognition" (or many other terms) described in the death-point between in the so-called Tibetan Book of the Dead. There's a point in the death process where all beings experience enlightenment but it is so subtle that beings generally blow through it without any recognition or notice of it. It is possible to train oneself to try to recognize it, and enlightenment can be achieved during the death-point bardo if successful. 

Of course, not having a teacher I haven't received any instructions on it, but maybe while alive keeping a meditative focus on the understanding that rigpa is life and reality itself all around us and we are experiencing it, just not noticing it, will help recognize it when encountered in death. During the death process, not succumbing to the fear and tumult of the death process and concentrating on recognizing the clear light/pristine cognition so that when it occurs it's the most obvious thing because we just lived our entire life marinating in it. It's something that becomes obvious at that point along with the recognition, finally, that it's been there all along. 

Both of these focuses on sem and rigpa are ideally maintained or returned to throughout the day and not just for the cushion.

Recognition of experiencing rigpa is described as something very familiar, like the meeting of mother and child. I hope I can be forgiven if that analogy is somewhat lost on me. I mean, yeah, familiar – I've never failed to recognize my parents whenever they or I came out of customs at the airport no matter how many years have passed, but any implication of a pleasant familiar reunion would be pushing it. I suppose the analogy may have been a sentimental expression of what Tibetans believed was universal. Even Paul Simon wrote a song about it, so OK, fine. 

Me? I'd go for a familiarity that's less sentimental and perhaps even more universal than the mother and child reunion that's only a motion away. I'm thinking the familiarity more like whenever we wake up and we know who we are and that this is reality. We aren't repeatedly freaked whenever we wake up wondering who or where we are. It's just here immediately, not frightening, not necessarily comforting, just fact and possibly profoundly familiar if you think about it. I also like that familiarity being of oneself as similar to The Conference of the Birds when the thirty birds reach their stated goal of meeting the Simorgh, which we find can be translated to "thirty birds" in I think Persian or Farsi. You reach the clear light/pristine cognition state and its basically a mirror, yourself. 

I did a little thought experiment with that cancer blog I read and went back to the beginning of his experience to see how far I would've made it if I found myself in a parallel situation. I swear I'm not obsessed with his blog or anything, but there is a lot to think about and mull over theoretically about living and dying from what he presents.

He first noticed something wrong with his guts during a road trip in the latter part of May 2014, initially thinking it was a bad omelette while driving out to Chicago. He endured symptoms over the course of the road trip with his brother taking Route 66 (and copious amounts of over-the-counter stomach medicine) from Chicago to Santa Monica, and by the end of May he was back in Seattle. I imagine I would've done exactly the same. If it was physically possible for me to keep pushing on, I think I would have in silent complaint. 

The next milestone was stabbing abdominal pains on June 9 that kept him up all night wondering whether he should go to the ER. By morning he quickly realized going to work was not going to happen and he went to the ER that was three blocks away from his condo in Capitol Hill. He calls it Group Health, but from Google maps (no I'm not obsessing), I think he's referring to the Kaiser Permanente, a west coast health care behemoth with which I'm unfortunately familiar. 

Could I even get to the ER? I was once in a similar situation a bunch of years ago (whoa, dude! That was coincidentally also in September! I didn't look for the post to get the link, but just came across it in the course of things. I call it 911 in that post for familiarity, but here, and most of Asia, it's 119). Five or six hours of excruciating, stabbing abdominal pains that had me laid out gripping my mattress, sweating with the air conditioning on, making frequent trips to the bathroom whenever that seemed to be an option for some relief from the pain. I had my backpack prepared as a go-bag with things I thought I'd need if it got so bad that I felt it was absolutely necessary to make a dash out into the rain and hail a cab for the nearest hospital. But it abated after five or six hours and never came to that. I never told anyone about it, but my best guess is that it was kidney stones which I hear are very painful but no permanent damage after they pass.

I don't know what my breaking point is to go to the ER when enduring that kind of pain, but it's safe to say more than five or six hours. But what if the pain continued and didn't look like it was going to let up? I'm going to assume for this experiment that I make it to the ER, but because I'm me I have to consider the possibility that I wouldn't get to the ER. Faced with needing to do something, no longer being able to endure enduring the pain at home, I might just make my way to the river about a half mile away (possibly less than three Seattle blocks), and I have no idea how that scenario continues. Collapse and die? Collapse and fall into the river and drown? Collapse and someone notices and calls 119? 

But I get to the ER because he did. He had health insurance and I don't, but Taiwan has national health. I don't know how that works nor where I fit into it, but let's say, like him, I don't have to worry about that (my national health card would've been thrown into the go-bag). A CT scan is required. He had a problem lying down for any period of time because of back problems, but I don't. The scan results pointed to needing a colonoscopy and he had to be sent to another hospital for that as an in-patient, but he couldn't just head over there himself. He needed to call someone to go with him. He had to go through his metaphorical rolodex and his younger sister was finally able to accommodate. 

Me?: "Is there anyone you can call?" No. No family? No. Friends? No. No friends? I don't even have a phone. I don't have anyone's phone number, much less anyone with a car. I can't even call my landlord. Imagine if that was where it all ends, lol! But as far as this thought experiment goes, it just may as well be. If in that parallel situation, I suppose they would arrange an ambulance or (more likely) a taxi to transport me (or they might have the facilities to do the colonoscopy), but once the reality of the colonoscopy* became manifest along with the discovery of the mass and the surgery required to cut it out, I would go along only as far they rolled me along that path telling me what needed to happen, and only as long as they actually instigated it. As soon as I could make an escape, out of their sight and their control, it would be endgame for me. If at any point I could say, "I need to go home and think about it" and they let me, that would be it and I'd be gone. If they said, "No, we can't let you go under these conditions", then I'd play along until I could get away. I'm a very patient patient.

* They literally, not metaphorically, shove a camera up your asshole after 24 hours of cleaning out all the shit, literally, with the medical metaphor of Drano and look for anything that doesn't belong there.

Needless to say, there would be no chemo for me. Once a terminal diagnosis is made, I wouldn't do anything to further treatment. I don't know if I would even tell anyone, but stranger things have happened and I just don't know myself well enough to guess what I would do (that's a totally separate (and futile) thought experiment). My hope would be just to have enough time to metaphorically clear my browser history (as well as literally clear my browser history since that seems to be what people do, not sure why), finish up any loose ends and proceed with plan A, involving dying without dignity. 

I finished reading that blog by the person who had terminal cancer, and unfortunately his final post, entitled "My Final Post", was not to report a miracle cure and that the cancer was gone and there was no more need to maintain the blog. I'm sure the hope he was hoping against was more than mine.

All that was done and dusted 3 years ago, and it was still sad when the end came and how. Actually no, it didn't matter how, just that the end came. There was a lot that was left out in his last days, I shouldn't wonder, but he would be forgiven if the pain he was in precluded blogging about it. It's not clear if the cancer killed him or if he "died with dignity", taking the killer drugs that under state law allowed him to end his life himself when the suffering became too great.

Ironically, he created what I think is a valuable document. One of his gripes early on when obsessively researching cancer after he was diagnosed (a quite common reaction), was that all of the testimony regarding treatment and drug therapies were by survivors. People testifying this or that was great or worked, but what about the people for whom those treatments didn't work? His blog now exists as a voice of someone who didn't survive, and even as his was stage 4 terminal cancer with little chance of long-term survival, he voices an experience of the various treatments he underwent, while clearly stating the kind of patient he was: a cancer specialist's nightmare, i.e., one who wasn't willing to sacrifice quality of life. He was willing to forego treatment, i.e., die sooner, if it meant day-to-day present moment pain was more manageable, rather than subject himself to the mercy (or lack thereof) of the medical/big pharma/insurance industry and their mess of a system with whatever treatment they conjure to live longer but in considerably more misery. What's worth what to whom is totally subjective and up to the individual.

And it should not be missed that the big turning point in his decision about continuing treatment, which was to not continue treatment, i.e., give up, i.e., fuckitall, was because of the mental frustrations dealing with the quixotic clown show (or goat rodeo, as he might call it but actually doesn't) of the health care industry and its administrative system (not the hands-on medical professionals trying to treat him).

My personal take from his experience is that I'm pretty confident I'm not fooling myself about my attitude towards death or dying. He would write things distinctly from the perspective of someone facing death, and I would recognize it as the reality-perspective I steep in. To him it was something new he was facing and realizing. It's my normal. Like from his normal, he would forewarn readers when he would be writing about death and dying, assuming it was unpleasant and depressing, but for me that was the stuff I wanted to know. It was my version of what a cancer patient starts researching obsessively once diagnosed. It's the distinction between someone living an ordinary life and suddenly coming to terms that this life must end, and having that as an acknowledged assumption from the start. Am I dying of anything? Not that I know of. Am I dying? We all are, honey.

Another take away from his blog is that personal blogs can endure! It's been almost three years since his last post and still I found his blog and read it and found it meaningful and worthy (even with its shortcomings). I don't remember how I found it. Sometimes after I do a web search I'll do the same search with "blog" added at the end. I think that's how I found his, but I forget the search term and haven't been able to re-create it. And anyway that technique of looking for blogs has become less effective as search engines, especially "evil is OK!" Google, gear and funnel results towards corporate, profitable or trending hits. Web searches are no longer democratic emphasizing the actual search terms (otherwise when you search "patagonia", for example, you'd get the place first, not the company. If someone created a successful company called "Suicide, Inc.", their website would probably end up superseding the topic), and it's almost impossible to find personal blogs worth reading; little voices who are just stating their experience and reality. It was hard enough even when Blogger had a "Next Blog" function that led to a random Blogger blog, but Google removed that citing "lack of use", ensuring absolute "non-use".

A possible good thing about that is that it's more safe to maintain a personal blog because the chances are low that someone they know will randomly find it. A lot of people I knew ended their blogs over concerns about what they were putting out and who might find it and possible unexpected and unpredictable consequences. I was never concerned about that because I never felt anyone would care about anything I put out.

I've been reading through John's "WTF? I've got cancer?" Blog I found by someone with terminal cancer. *spoiler alert* . . . It doesn't end well. At least that's what I'm assuming considering the title of his final post. I haven't read the later posts so I don't yet know how exactly it all ends, because once I read the premise of the blog and then seeing it was quite finite, I decided to go straight to the beginning and read through it chronologically as it chronicles his discovery of the cancer in spring 2014 and goes until his final post in September 2016. 

The reason for reading the whole thing is to see how this one person experiences death impending. In that regard, I'm just a poseur so this gives me a chance to compare and reflect on whether I'm really on that path and realization. I think it's fair to say I keep death and related concepts (dying, dead, mortality, finality, tie-dyeing, existence) front and center of my being, but I don't know if I've really been tested viscerally. Actually, to think about it, that's among the stupidest things I've ever said about myself, but forcing myself to doubt myself is a way of keeping grounded. I'm decidedly not dying of cancer, nor anything like a train arriving at its terminal.

Reading the blog, I remind myself to have sympathy and not lose sight of what he was dealing with, which is not hard to do. But I also have to make an effort to read it just as it is for what it is, and not treat it as an ordinary piece of writing, i.e., not reading it critically or analytically and what it's not or what I want it to be. There are things I couldn't help. I try to suppress my editor habit triggered by the typos, the travelogue portions leave much to be desired, the handyman mundanities are among the curious things he focuses on while undergoing treatment. Nothing egregious.

But I wonder why I attach to this person's blog. There might be plenty of cancer blogs that are well-written and philosophical and that generate genuine sympathy. This person . . . oh. Is a lot like me? Or from what he writes, I interpret him being a lot like me, even if he wasn't. There are aspects about him that I recognize might be similar to aspects of how I am. How's that? 

At one point he said that no one would describe him as "kind". Who describes themselves like that? In my most self-deprecating moments, I think I would be insulting people in my past if I stated none of them would describe me as kind. But that's how he feels or sees himself. And no one in my present tense could describe me as kind, because there isn't anyone here to describe me. Solitary as I am, I don't feel like a kind or generous person. He describes himself as socially avoidant and a loner. He's a divorcé. He adopts a cat that takes almost 4 months to get used to him (animals and babies don't lie in judging character). I don't know what to make of the paucity of comments (maybe meaningful responses happen directly). There's indication he's probably Republican.

Basically the feeling I'm reading – and may easily be completely wrong – is that he's not the most popular or likable person in his social circles? And looking around me, neither am I, and I'm not even Republican. I'm not judging him, I'm just wondering why his blog, with all the problems I have with it, is the one I find worth reading. Maybe if his blog was life-affirming in the face of impending death and deep and profound and touching and sensitive and had trended and had hundreds of thousands of followers and Oprah's attention and comments sections packed with strangers offering support and advice and services and ice cream, I just wouldn't have been interested. That's just me. I'm reading this person's blog. I think maybe we're similarly porcupine-ish with odd quirks and perspectives that other people don't quite get and would prevent trending or Oprah. How's that? And it's not even whether or not he's likable or popular, since how he is socially may basically be his choice.

I'm still reading through the blog, but I am within his last year. I don't know whether it will get impassioned or dramatic towards the end nor whether there will be insights or breakthroughs or crying. I will say that his writing does improve (as do his travelogues) over the course of the blog from being fairly straight-forward utilitarian to becoming even funny and witty (in a grim, dark, morbid way); perhaps a by-product of recognizing his peeps are reading and don't want to be bored to death (misery doesn't necessarily love company when you're dying of cancer?). 

One of the benefits of not having a phone is that my mother can no longer call. After my father died, it became even more clear that we don't understand nor like each other and we can't communicate without insulting each other, both intentionally and unintentionally, and phone calls would at best be barely civil and would always be frustrating and negative. They would revert back to the days when they were overtly strained and awkward and didn't last long because I had nothing to say to them and no interest in what they said. It was a fortunate coincidence that just a few months after my father died, Taiwan ended 2G phone service and I simply refused to upgrade because I didn't need nor cared to.

On my part, I would be perfectly content to never hear from her again. I can't speak for her part, but for whatever reason (habit? investment?), she feels compelled to try to remain in touch, and that, unfortunately, has led her to start sending emails. Early on, I overreacted to an overture to go on a cruise, but I learned quickly if I just ignore them, that's taken as a response and there's no follow-up. Now when I get an email, I typically glance at it just to get the gist and immediately delete it. Sometimes she sends photos of my brothers' families, but if they don't send photos themselves, obviously they don't care if I have photos of them or not and they get deleted after I see how the kids are growing.

There was one photo she sent not long ago of the monument that she had made for my father, and since it is quite large, I think she has it in mind that this is a family . . . thing. As family members die off, they and their dates get added to the monument. The concept was mentioned when I was last there when my father died in November 2016, and I was horrified by the thought of some attachment to them for all eternity.

If I had my druthers, I would just disappear without a trace and I wouldn't care whatever they put on the monument. It has nothing to do with me. I don't care what name they use, and the end date would only be the year since an exact date couldn't be pinpointed. What I would want, though, is the URL of this blog under my name and dates. I wonder how many tombstones have internet URLs on them. I'm sure it's been done.

The question for me, though, is how do I get this URL on the fucking monument. If I leave a note mentioning that's what I want, that would direct people to this blog, which I don't want to do. I'm not hiding it, I do assume it will be found, but I want it to be found without my having to direct people to it. I'm being totally neurotic. And once they find it, they'll find this last willful testament that I want this URL on any marker they insist on making for me, and they'll have to do it or else it will be a clear diss at me in my afterlife and all of eternity! You want that on you?

Actually, if they find this blog, they'll have an exact end date. Or, like Kurt Cobain, close enough.

I was wrong about the two previous posts not needing to have been writ. They were actually helpful. Sometimes you need to go some place to realize it's not a place you want to go. Oh. That's kinda the story of my life.

The conveyor belt/treadmill metaphor was useless, albeit accurate, but realizing that still requires formation of some other paradigm. New paradigm. Different paradigm. What was wasn't working.

Nothing should be comfortable about my existence, considering how it has to end. Well, how it has to end for all of us, but trying or pretending to choose to in my case. Itsa big difference. For people in general, we all have to die but that's no reason to not get comfortable about existence as much as we can. Let it come when it does. Don't go where you're not invited until you're invited.

For people like me with the realization of death as a focus, there is no getting comfortable with existence. Death is a reality that can't be put aside because putting it aside is ignoring the obvious, and existence is by nature uncomfortable because it's fleeting and needs to be explored and understood as such. Maybe that's what the great adepts were getting at. Maybe they were as bad at it as me. Probably not.

I'm thinking I have to tap into sadness and despair, not as emotions but as concepts, which is a bit ironic since Buddhism teaches to do away with concepts. In this case, the concept is a tool in furtherance of doing away with concepts. Which in many ways is exactly what many Buddhistic methods necessarily are.

Sadness and despair are useful in that those are the normative emotions, tools, concepts that ordinary people avoid or are given as reasons or explanations for suicide. But I'm not ordinary, I'm not necessarily suicidal, it's just what I want to do and will eventually have to do since that's the way I set my life up. Not being suicidal makes it hard to commit suicide. Tapping into sadness and despair just as concepts, and not as the things humans generally attach to as real and things to avoid, can help. 

There's a lot of blurring that goes on. All the beauty in the things I love and appreciate become sadness and despair because they are fleeting. They won't last no matter how much I want them to be loved. Dig deep and deeper into those emotions of love and appreciation and they become sadness and despair because they all come to pass. It's still love, and joy is still joy, laughter is still laughter, but they take on more dimensions, they become multi-faceted. Anger is no longer a feeling but an energy that's pretty useless and can be stopped when recognized as an energy. Lust is no longer some base animal impulse for desire and self-gratification, but a very powerful energy that is very useful if controlled. Despair and sadness don't mean depression. Everything starts getting transformed in practice.

I don't know when it will be time, I don't know how others knew it was time, but I've come to imagine it's a full-body realization. I've never had that before. I used to talk about being at 100% or getting to 100%. As a full-body realization, I doubt I've ever been near 100%. I won't project on what I think I was, I may have never even been 1%, I may have gotten to 80%, I just don't know myself that well. 

tbd, afterglow I

According to the Tibetan Book of the Dead, after the outer dissolutions come the inner dissolutions. I don't think it's entirely inappropriate for me or anyone to try envisioning the outer dissolutions without a guide. The way they are described still deal with senses that are in our experience. The inner dissolutions, on the other hand, are so subtle that I think they likely defy gross-level imagination or visualization. Maybe it's like remembering a dream and being tasked to describe all the gossamer details of the dream you weren't paying attention to because . . . it was a dream.

Something I find fascinating and profound on a philosophical level are the descriptions of the first two of the inner dissolutions, referred to as "redness" and "whiteness". In biology, life begins with the sperm and egg successfully mashing together after a man and woman have successfully mashed together sharing bodily fluids and all sorts of erotic noises, like ooh-ahh (하게) and uh-uhn. And that wet, slapping sound you can make by rapidly pulling both cheeks in and out with your mouth slightly open. Philosophically speaking.

In the Tibetan conception of conception, basically the male contributes his "white essence" and the female her "red essence" which separate in the newly-formed being to create the experience of duality to exist in the world. The white essence moves up the central energy channel to rest in the brain center for the duration of life, while the female red essence descends and resides in the bodily center, commonly referred to in Eastern spiritual physiology as the 'chi' center, a few clicks south of the navel and a few clicks back. I don't know what a 'click' is, but I find it funny when people use it as a term of distance. It doesn't seem to mean anything but everyone just pretends it does.

In the experience of the redness and whiteness stages of the inner dissolutions, it seems to me to be suggested that death involves the dissolution of the father and mother's contribution to a life. That is to say they themselves were necessary elements of the child's psyche, its psychic life. It's not like the father contributed sperm, the mother egg, and out came baby running helter skelter throughout life as a completely separate, individual being. Rather, in the child were always the father and mother essences, presences, for the whole of its life. There was no awareness when their essences were established, and it is only when awareness recedes to the subtlety of the inner dissolutions that they dissipate as part of the death process of the child, but they were there the whole time in between.

The color associations of the dissolutions are said to be the result of the end of the energy currents that existed while alive, including emotions, psychology, the sort of internal things yogic exercises deal with, i.e. chakras, nadis, bindus, etc. I'm obviously not writing from experience nor inspiration, just processing what I've read and don't really understand. The psychic elements kept the red and white essences in place, and after death the experience of whiteness is said to occur as the white essence descends in the central channel as the psychic winds weaken and redness occurs when the red essence ascends for the two of them to meet and dissolve at the heart center. So long mom, dad, thanks for all the fish. I never really liked seafood.

to be determined III

Just my imagination, running away with me.

I would have left music at home. For the past however many many years I rarely, if ever, wasn't listening to music when I went out. I only turned it off when people were taking my money (but giving me something I wanted in return). It was such that there were times I would turn off the music and be fascinated by what the ambient world sounded like. It became such that I designated certain conditions whereby I would turn off the music and experience the world as it sounded (sometimes becoming bored with it and turning the music back on). But no music this time; leaving behind the habit, not taking the emotions and attachment that music embodies.

I wouldn't have left alcohol at home, but I wouldn't have been drinking, either. I'd have a cute half bottle of Jack Daniels along with other things, but I'd be keeping clear to keep calm, peaceful, positive, tapping into happiness. The ha'fifth because it, or something like it, has always been there. Not even just in case, it's just always been there. I've read it isn't ideal to be disoriented by substances like painkillers or things that dull the senses, but I'm going to create a loophole for that. I will disable, hamper, stymie my consciousness, but realize only my physiology is affected. The substances will be more of a facilitating device.

In this regard, years of mindful alcoholism(!) may prove to have been helpful. Mindful alcoholism, wtf? I don't think I've ever used the term "mindful alcoholism" before; I don't think I've ever even thought of it. Using it now surprises me because it suggests how dangerous the practice I've developed is. Alcoholism is not a legitimate mindfulness practice. There are aspects of my practice that are even more risky, I shouldn't wonder, in possibly deluding myself thinking I'm doing a practice with one targeted aim, when I may be doing something entirely different and destructive in my mindstream and karma. I would never suggest to anyone to practice "mindful alcoholism". At least not as a starting point. If yer a drunk already, might as well give it a shot, so to speak.

But my loophole is being aware that whatever happens that doesn't rely on bodily structures will not be substantially affected by the effects of the substances. It may be detrimental to be pumped full of morphine or other drugs by some clinician who's just doing a job based on their own assessment of what's preferred treatment. Consciously using substances oneself for the purposes of dying and being aware of the need to keep mind and body separate, especially when mind and body separate, may prevent detriment caused by disorientation.

Despite near-death accounts suggesting it's not necessarily painful, I expect pain, at least discomfort and unpleasantness. Like a prostate exam. I don't know why, just to be on the safe side maybe. It seems logical, might as well expect and brace for it. It won't be for long, but it will be pretty intense. I won't like it, but I'm hoping mindfulness practice will keep me from panicking and help me keep calm in an experience that I visualize as difficult and intense as being exposed in the midst of a violent hurricane in the middle of the night.

And I do practice it as much as I can. Whenever I find myself challenged in uncomfortable situations, I imagine it as a bardo experience and react accordingly with equanimity and calm. Not that in my daily life do I find myself in terribly challenging, uncomfortable situations. Crowded rush hour MRT, sweaty and sticky in torrential rain, noisy children in the library. Maybe I should schedule a prostate exam. Even amusement park rides and extremes of physical challenges I would practice as bardo preparation. Not that I can even remember the last time I've been to an amusement park, but I see it on Korean TV. I imagine I wouldn't be much fun to be with at an amusement park. I'd be on rides calmly contemplating how interesting the experience is.

There will be a loss of consciousness. That's obvious. It's hard to die if you don't lose consciousness at some point. It's even described in the Tibetan Book of the Dead that after death there is no continuum of consciousness and whatever continues on is subject to "losing consciousness"; and logically the residual habit of past existence would include the experience of losing consciousness. Losing consciousness is no big deal, we do it at least once a day when we fall asleep. That may be to say that one of the most profound and frightening aspects of dying, going from awareness of being here to not being here, is something we regularly experience. The difference being the assumption of waking again when we sleep and the lack of said assumption when we die.

From asphyxiation to brief but intense pain to loss of consciousness, I expect death to occur fairly quickly. How quickly death occurs after loss of consciousness, I gather, depends on circumstances. Death can be immediate in cases of sudden or violent deaths, or it can be prolonged like my father who was kept alive by a machine, with zero prognosis of regaining consciousness, for a week. When the dissolutions occur, as described in the Tibetan Book of the Dead, is probably variable and individual. A straight-forward, starting point visualization of the dissolutions might have them occur sequentially after the loss of consciousness, but I have read other descriptions that describe the outer dissolutions as the dying process leading to the loss of consciousness, so occurring before death, rather than after. There's almost certainly not a uniform model of how or when they occur.

I take the descriptions of the dissolutions in the Tibetan Book of the Dead and Sogyal Rinpoche's book as starting point templates, maybe ideal dying-at-home-surrounded-by-loved-ones-along-with-a-chanting-monk situation, and not literal nor universal. My impression of the descriptions of the dissolutions is that they are universally experienced in varying forms according to the individual and the circumstances, but that awareness of them differs between practitioners and non-practitioners, as well as degree or level of practice. Non-practitioners who haven't prepared experience them but in a more or less non-active manner, almost analogous to animal instinct, like a fish trapped in a net, with little to no understanding what's going on. If they were visible, they might look like me on an amusement park ride; something's happening, but no reaction.

If my mindfulness practice can kick in and weather the experience with some degree of awareness, I imagine the four outer dissolutions being very intense, almost as if they were happening all at once. Earth or ground (sensation of solidity) dissolution feeling like great crushing pressure all around, acutely felt at every point on the body where there is physical sense. Water (sensation of fluid elements) dissolution as feeling like being tossed uncontrollably around in a great torrent of my own bodily fluids, but not reacting in fear. The heat dissolution (remnant sensation of metabolism from being a living being) arising as a heat sensation while being tossed around by water, but then also dissipating. The wind/air dissolution is the end of breath and the movement of gas elements. The outer dissolutions signal the end of our subjective awareness of our physical existence of this life, separate from the continuation of the physical corpse left behind which will begin to decompose on a cellular level immediately.

Also the end of this exercise. The description of the dissolutions in the Tibetan Book of the Dead are found on pages 174-176 (chapter 8, sub-heading "Signs of Extremely Near Death") of the 2005 full translation (paperback), and pages 255-258 (chapter 15, sub-heading "The Outer Dissolution: The Senses and the Elements") in Sogyal Rinpoche's Tibetan Book of Living and Dying. They go into greater detail than I can imagine or understand, which is part of the purpose of this exercise. What am I getting out of their descriptions? If it's a personal experience, how do I personally envision it? It's no doubt inferior to the profundity of the actual experience, the nuances of which are suggested in the books, but it's worth it to try to be prepared. In any case, it's my death, not the bookses'.

TBD (to be determined) II

Visualizing approaching death positively is super important as far as I'm concerned. I recall an old "happiness generating" practice I used to do and that comes in handy in this regard. It was cold generating happiness without relying on outside factors, the way we usually conceive happiness. Happiness is an energy that can be tapped by not being afflicted or attached and just letting it emerge, accepting it despite counter outside factors, including death.

I visualize or mentally rehearse the death process with the Tibetan Book of the Dead and Sogyal Rinpoche's Tibetan Book of Living and Dying as guides or templates. I don't take them literally, but I use the descriptions to help envision what I think it might be like for me to die. I agree with the notion that the death experience is not the same for everybody, rather it is informed by the subjective person, including psychological make-up, beliefs, overall life experience, circumstances of death, what was eaten for lunch, etc. Someone dying peacefully in a hospital bed will have a different death experience from someone being murdered in a violent crime or in a war. Two people sitting next to each other in a crashing jetliner, one of whom is a long-time mindfulness practitioner, will have similarities in the death experience because of the manner, but how they go through it would be different. Just for the record, I don't think I know what I'm talking about.

Although I think subjectivity may inform various aspects all through the bardo experience from death to re-birth, I also think that maybe the overall structure of the bardos as described in the Tibetan Book of the Death is universal, and whenever something is described as happening, something is happening but how that something appears depends on the previous and future lives. As much as I dislike the idea of imposing my beliefs on the rest of humanity, if I believe in reincarnation because it just makes sense as a natural cycle, one of the many that we see in nature, then I'm positing that it happens to everyone. We're all part of nature, regardless of belief that we are not, that we are somehow special and above it. Even a bardo experience of going to heaven and meeting God can occur as a result of strong belief and expectation during life, but then it will melt away like a reincar-ception into the bardo of re-birth and the process of reincarnation, with the last remnant wisps of the previous life wiped away by or at the conception of the next life, only taking karmic imprints into the new life. I did mention that I don't really think I know what I'm talking about, right?

The many near-death and death-revival accounts that exist may suggest the subjectivity and diversity in experience in just approaching death. Those accounts, often described as varying degrees of peaceful, may just be skimming the surface, either going deep into death with critical functions stopped but not for long, or being clinically dead for a longer period but not so deep that they couldn't be revived. By nature they did not go so far where the brain structures that support life processes were destroyed. Still, I think our mode of existence and being is so habituated (ego) that there's a lot of momentum of subjectivity that goes deep into the bardo experience.

Beyond near-death and revival experiences, when brain and physical sensory processes definitively stop functioning, I think we go into what the Tibetan Book of the Dead describes as the outer and inner dissolutions which may be less affected by subjective experience. I think even the habit consciousness of the vast majority of people fades to black, maybe because it can't handle what's happening to it. I might even say the dissolutions characterize the end of awareness. The only way to maintain awareness is through training and practice while alive to prepare and recognize it when it occurs. And even then the death experience as described may be so overwhelming and disorienting that recognition isn't necessarily possible (spontaneous recognition, however, is still possible because anything's possible).

The Tibetan Book of the Dead makes sense to me when it describes parts of the bardo experience as being extremely disorienting and confusing. I imagine it would be. Our habituated existence has always relied on sensory input processed through our brains to form all of subjective reality. Very stable. At death, the senses stop reception, the brain dies, reality fades away, and all that's left as described in the book is a non-corporeal habit of subjectivity feeling like it's blown about in hurricane force winds.

All of this is just my own little thought experiment; envisioning a scenario maybe a way of trying to be prepared. Everyone who does this might come up with something completely different. Very little is narrowly defined, I think, in the bardo. The subjectivity of the death experience might also include the sequence of events. They don't occur in one uniform way and may not be clear-cut. I heard one lama talking about the dissolutions starting even before death, and listening to that I couldn't say I disagreed or thought it was wrong. I thought it was interesting, a very broad interpretation. And the bright light many people attest to and the calm that comes with it may also be related to the dissolutions, which I've contemplated as beyond the point of revival.

All of this is contemplating just the death point bardo, the first of three death bardos. I couldn't do this sort of thought experiment with the remaining two bardos because I don't have any real insight into them to add to what the Tibetan Book of the Dead already presents. Doing a personalized version would be like doing a bardo version of the Divine Comedy, and as much of a big joke my life has been, I'm no Dante. The death point is something we're all eminently qualified to contemplate, because it's something we will imminently expect. No one has to believe in anything in particular to contemplate it.

tbd I

At any time this month I could have disappeared off the face of the earth and no one would have noticed anything amiss. Nary a shimmy nor a wiggle in the Force. So why am I still here? Am I deep down really afraid of death? I don't think so. I seriously entertained the possibility and concluded on one hand, yes, I think humans have a natural fear of death and I have it, too. I looked for it and, lo, there it was, that unsettling complete erasure of the sum total of all I am, all I know and all I have been. All this subjective experience and reality, the only existence I know of, irrevocably gone.

On the other hand, I'm also kinda looking forward to dying. What's been so great about being me anyway? Recognizing it as something inevitable, I'm fascinated by it and interested in venturing into the experience. That sort of tempers the fear, albeit an intellectual exercise tempering an innate, visceral reaction. In the end, I don't think it's a deep down fear.

Am I afraid of doing it myself? That would just be pathetic considering all I've written. I just don't think that's the case. I sure hope not. Am I lazy? That's actually closer to plausible. Pathetic, too, but not as pathetic as being afraid to do it myself.

Thinking all of this out, the reason I'm still here is that I'm still in the thrall of the conveyor belt of daily mundanity delivering me from day to day, distracting and fooling me into thinking there's still stuff I want to do, that I'm not done or I'm not sick of it yet. Exactly the same as a year ago and probably beyond. I just marked exactly one year of absolutely no progress between realization and action.

Great, that's just faboo that I can pinpoint that out. Now what? It goes to the old questions how did Anthony Bourdain, Shinee's Jonghyun, Robin Williams know/decide it was time? But their answers would not be mine. And my motivation isn't like theirs, maybe isn't enough. Right, that whole "looming" thing. I'd be walking the plank and I'd turn around and go "What's my motivation?!", and the pirates would *poke* *poke* me with something sharp, and only then I'd finally realize I just have to do it.

I continue to mentally prepare through mindfulness practice and meditations and visualizations. I think approaching death should be joyful and positive. Like James Earl Jones's character, Terence Mann, giggling while walking into the cornfields at the end of "Field of Dreams" (there's a very loose theory out there suggesting that Terence Mann, like Archibald "Moonlight" Graham, is already dead and was a recycled soul for purposes of the "quest" and then is being reintroduced to the death realms).

. . . a person's wisdom should be judged by the effect it has on his or her life. If that wisdom doesn't have the effect of settling the problems and difficulties in one's life – of creating a sense of ease, well-being, space, happiness, peace, and freedom – then it cannot be the real thing. - Ajahn Brahm (The Art of Disappearing)

My immediate reaction was to ask myself whether whatever wisdom I have is the real thing, followed by a quick, emphatic nöpe! Mind you, I absolutely do not disagree with him. Reading things like that, it rings right. And I have no problem with anyone, myself included, telling me my wisdom is flawed.

But that was just my quick answer and pondering it with more nuance, it turns out to be more perplexing than that.

Does my purported wisdom or practice have an effect that settles the problems and difficulties in my life? What problems do I really have? Obviously it seems and feels like I have many, but when I have a goal of bringing my life to a close, my "problem" is just being here. Not to put too fine a point on it, the reasons why bringing my life to a close is the goal are not a problem.

Within being here, all the normative things that might be perceived as problems don't amount to much. The role mindfulness plays is that it keeps me from being overly neurotic or angsty about it like I have been in the past. It keeps negativity and negative reactions in focus and at bay and promotes the opposite, or at least neutrality. There has been a settling effect on the problems, but it may not look like it.

What difficulties do I have? I can't say I don't have difficulties. There are things that I find difficult, but they're mostly neurotic things that are difficult only because I create them or let them be difficult. Again, mindfulness just observes the perceived difficulties and tries to understand they're my own creation and not to get bent out of shape over them. Rainy days are difficult. My neurotic reaction about my neighbors is difficult. They're not really difficulties. If pressed, they fly out the window.

How about separately considering sense of ease, well-being, space, happiness, peace and freedom? That's where it gets perplexing because contemplating dying brings exactly those feelings: sense of ease, well-being, space, openness, happiness, peace and freedom.

They aren't what psychiatrists might point out in some suicidal cases where there's a feeling of euphoria once they've made the decision to kill themselves. That's a false sense of those feelings because it's conditional on knowing they're going to be released from their pain, rather than having a settling effect on their problems and difficulties.

Contemplating death, those feelings are very real for me. The feelings aren't contingent on having made a final decision and looking forward to it as a relief. They are there with the very contemplation and vary in intensity depending on the depth of it. But are they connected to wisdom?

Some would say true wisdom would make me want to live. I would call that dogmatic, judgmental attachment to living just for the sake of preserving life that's ephemeral by nature. That's not wisdom, either. Wisdom is an understanding, it doesn't make people do or not do anything. It's morality's job to police behavior, not wisdom's, and I've never cared much for human or social constructs of morality.

I think it is very possible for practitioners to contemplate death and connect deeply with the reality that one day we will die and feel that sense of freedom and peace; that letting go. It's not an abandonment or a 'why bother?' letting go, but it's based on wisdom understanding, accompanied with mindfulness training to not be attached or overly sentimental about our lives.

I live on the third floor of a residential low-rise in a flat sub-divided into four discrete apartments. I don't know any of my neighbors. I don't know what they look like. Very rarely we might pass one another coming or going. I wouldn't recognize them passing on the street. I don't know anything about them except their audible departure routines in the morning or when they deviate from it.

When I contemplate my demise scenarios, it's safe to say there would be little impact on them except in the unfortunate circumstance if I bite it in my apartment. If I don't leave a body in my apartment, there would be little to no disruption or disturbance in their lives beyond the bustle of the disposal of my belongings.

They know just as little about me, and flipping the scenario I would experience little disruption or disturbance if any of them were to no longer be among the living. If they died in their apartment, I don't think any of them are so disconnected and isolated like me that people wouldn't come looking for them before olfactory factors became necessary to alert the world of their passing. Whatever the scenario, the bottom line is I wouldn't be very much affected.

There are two people in Taipei that I know and have met with socially in the past . . . let's say five years, albeit rarely. If either of them died, I don't know how the news would even get to me, and it's not a stretch that it just wouldn't. I just wouldn't find out. Exactly the same if I were to die.

I have a nominal facebook presence. Again, no one there would know if I died unless someone plied my computer post-mortem and stumbled across my page and were to tactlessly and tastelessly announce it to a reply chorus of "aw gee, that's too bad" at best. Any announcement to inform my contacts would have to be made on my page, so that's pretty freaky. Speaking from the grave. That's actually a great idea. Write the announcement in my voice. Get creative.

And on the flipside, if any of most of the couple dozen contacts I have were to die, . . . well, I'd probably at least know about it. Some are as active as me on facebook or even less and maybe there would be no one to mention them dying. But my response couldn't be much more than "aw gee, that's too bad". I'm not involved in their lives. I don't make contact with them or try to be more than an abstract, internet presence. Even people I've known from long ago who were much more than "facebook friends", we're not present to each other now. Effectively "aw gee, that's too bad" friends.

Finally, all that's left to contemplate is a few family members. What if Audrey or any of my cousins or either of my brothers committed suicide? There's no reason for me to think any of them would, but none of them thinks I would, either. It's impossible to really know what it would feel like, even going deep into the scenario in meditation, but I'm having trouble imagining myself reacting much differently than how I would expect them to react if I died.

Whatever impact there is, it would be something to experience and then pass. It would pass. Again, there's no involvement in each other's lives. If I died, what difference would there be in their lives except the knowledge that I'm now dead? If any of them died, what difference would there be in my life? Only the expectation that they're out there and available for a possible hypothetical future meeting up? Not good enough. If they care, they should be present. If I care, I should be present. We're not present, so we don't care. Voilá, we have a meeting of the minds.

A Certain Kind of Death

(tip: watching documentaries at higher speeds saves time)

Charnel grounds, in some societies, used to be where unclaimed corpses were taken and left to the elements or to be consumed by vultures and wild animals. Certain types of yogins and adepts would go there to meditate and confront human death and decomposition. We don't have charnel grounds.

We have documentary filmmakers. This sort of documentary is certainly no equivalent to charnel grounds, but still has meditational value in contemplating the raw reality of one kind of death, especially since there's no censorship. So yea, *warning* graphic images of corpses. It's not intentionally gruesome and it's neither unduly respectful nor disrespectful. Just the facts, ma'am.

I'm glad they didn't censor anything. It's important to see death as it really is, not prettied up to be presentable and "alive looking" at funerals. That's just a way of being in denial about death, I think. When you see a dead body, there should be a visceral reaction. This is everyone, how we all essentially end up naturally. After a mortician gets done with a body, we can look at it and think, "It's not so bad". I call that a certain kind of denial.

Still, don't even consider watching this if you have any inkling it's something you don't want to see. And if you don't know and just want to "take a look", be prepared to stop as soon as you realize you don't want to go there. It's like at the first realization I'm hearing a Celine Dion or Justin Beaver song, I shut it down immediately by any means necessary short of murder (bodily harm is acceptable). Although I wouldn't know right away if it was a Justin Beaver song since I've never heard enough to recognize it. I've heard just enough to know I'd rather look at human corpses than listen to that. Unfortunately, I do know what Celine Dion's unspeakable devil-howling sounds like.

Mind you, the documentary is not about the dead bodies. The dead bodies are just part of the narrative of people who die without friends or family to check in on them. People who die and have to be discovered, rather than surrounded by loved ones or relatives at least. They become cases for the government to deal with. The fact that they died is just part of the cases and that aspect is shown.

I contemplate the possibility of ending up like this. It's my worst case scenario to die in my apartment of some medical or health failure and needing to be discovered after neighbors, strangers, are alerted by the foul smell. I won't go unclaimed, at least. Personally I don't care at all about that. I just don't like the inconvenience and disturbance to other people.

If I die outside of my apartment by some accident or health failure, then I'll likely go unclaimed and end up in Taiwan's version of this kind of fate. No one would be able to ID me and no one would notice me missing for a while. The first person to notice, I've mentioned before, would be my landlord after several months of missed rent and not posting the gas meter reading, which I have to do every other month.

In my ideal situation, I would disappear without leaving a body for anyone to deal with. After it's clear that I've disappeared and not coming back (this blog found?), there would just be my meager possessions for which I'll leave a holographic will instructing that my things be taken by anyone interested and otherwise donated if there's no interest. The rest will be disposed of and I'm sorry for the inconvenience that will cause. Hopefully someone can be hired, like in the documentary ("drayage" I think they called it), using my remaining funds to take care of that.

I have to remember to specifically state that if I leave bodily remains, control of them is absolutely, under no circumstances to be given to my mother. That's the only aspect of leaving a body that I care about. My final wish is that my complete cremated ashes be scattered in the ocean.

I doubt holographic wills exist legally in Taiwan, but for that reason they might be respected. There's probably little reason for holographic wills in Taiwan. A holographic will is one that's written by the decedent but not notarized nor legally overseen or represented. They're enforceable in California and other states where they are statutorily supported in cases where property disputes arise.

I Dream of Jinn

So I was reading an article in National Geographic magazine. Something about the Silk Road. Something about China developing a modern "Silk Road". Something about the reporter/writer traveling it on foot. It was a casual read, killing time, being lazy not reading things of real interest. The Silk Road is of casual interest to me for what it represents and has to say about human development; anthropology and archaeology. Basically I'm saying I have no concrete context for writing this.

But I came across this passage:

In "The Exhaustive Treatise on Shadows", central Asian polymath Al-Biruni observed that jinn were "the impure parts of the erring souls, after they have been separated from their bodies, who [the souls] are prevented from reaching their primal origin, because they did not find the knowledge of the truth, but were living in confusion and stupefaction."

and a little later this:

What to do if approached by jinn on the Silk Road: "No matter what it does, no matter how frightening it is, don't panic or show emotion. Just sit down on a rock and wait. It will lose interest. It will go away".

Jinn is the origin of the word "genie", so can be broadly understood to be supernatural in nature. Even superstitious, fine. Possible phenomena beyond normal human perception, I would put it.

The author projected some of his ideas of jinn in his writing, noting certain circumstances and wondering if they were jinn at work. In another encounter mentioning that he was likely the jinn in that situation. He was interpreting jinn in his own way that he could understand, and he was open-minded about them.

"Impure parts of erring souls" I don't read as judgments but descriptions. The parts that are impure aren't necessarily good or bad, the souls that have erred aren't necessarily good or bad. They are just descriptively impure or erring, as well as possibly actually being either.

"Primal origin" is from whence we came and . . . whernce we go (the word I believe you're looking for is "whither", you idiot. -ed.). I think the more sophisticated understanding is that they are the same place or state. The more ridiculous understanding is that we come from our parents bumping uglies and go to places called heaven or hell based on external judgment of our behavior.

The Buddhist-based description that I'm familiar with suggests the primal origin is a primordial energy state that's part of the cycle of reincarnation. A well-defined and self-identified drop of water falls into the sea and disappears until natural process create another drop of water out of the same molecules. A different drop of water made of the same stuff. Reincarnation is literally the recycling of souls. It's very green.

"Knowledge of the truth" a Buddhist might interpret is the truth of impermanence, an extension perhaps of one of its four noble truths of suffering. It's an easy lesson because we all ultimately experience it in death. When we die there is no greater expression that nothing stays the same, everything changes. But there are people whose attachments are so strong that they try to defy death and cling to some aspect of their life so much that they miss the lesson, even as they die.

"Living in confusion and stupefaction" is the way they lived their lives or their karma that preconditioned them to not be able to come to terms with death and the impermanence it reveals. That aspect of them gets stuck here as jinn. Basically ghosts.

"No matter how frightening it is, don't panic or show emotion" can be cut and pasted into parts of the Tibetan Book of the Dead and no one would even notice. In fact that's exactly what it says about the death bardos. I extend that to the living bardos. Except where large spiders are involved.

"Just sit down on a rock", well that's just meditation. "It will lose interest. It will go away".

That's great advice, I'm gonna start doing that. When negativity starts to overwhelm and I let myself get annoyed and aggravated by other people, I'm just gonna stop, get out of anyone's way and wait until my bad attitude loses interest and goes away. Jinn, ghosts, in us, out of us, as us. Discuss.