Escape From Anguish and Ignorance

Soichi Sunami, ”Man-Eater with Pennants” by Alexander Calder, ca. 1950

(via journalofanobody)

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"I demanded a realm in which I should be both master and slave at the same time: the world of art is the only such realm. I entered it without any apparent talent, a thorough novice, incapable, awkward, tongue-tied, almost paralyzed by fear and apprehensiveness. I had to lay one brick on another, set millions of words to paper before writing one real, authentic word dragged up from my own guts. The facility of speech which I possessed was a handicap; I had all the vices of the educated man. I had to learn to think, feel and see in a totally new fashion, in an uneducated way, in my own way, which is the hardest thing in the world. I had to throw myself into the current, knowing that I would probably sink. The great majority of artists are throwing themselves in with life-preservers around their necks, and more often than not it is the life-preserver which sinks them."
- Henry Miller
Reflections on Writing
The Wisdom of the Heart

via whiskey river

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“The word within a word, unable to speak a word,
Swaddled with darkness.”

—	T. S. Eliot, from “Gerontion”

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"I had a discussion with a great master in Japan, and we were talking about the various people who are working to translate the Zen books into English, and he said,"That's a waste of time. If you really understand Zen, you can use any book. You could use the bible. You could use Alice in Wonderland. you could use the dictionary, because the sound of the rain needs no translation."

-Alan Watts, "In My Own Way." (via Parabola Magazine)

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Enlightenment - that magnificent escape from anguish and ignorance - never happens by accident. It results from the brave and sometimes lonely battle of one person against his own weaknesses.

Bhikkhu Nyanasobhano.

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Link to Leonard Cohen's new song "Show Me The Place"

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link [via Whiskey River]

"Hear this or not, as you will. Learn it now, or later - the world has time. Routine, repetition, tedium, monotony, ephemeracy, inconsequence, abstraction, disorder, boredom, angst, ennui - these are the true hero's enemies, and make no mistake, they are fearsome indeed. For they are real."
- David Foster Wallace