Fwd: Alain de Botton on the qualities of a healthy mind, Lucille Clifton on how to be a living poem, the magic and mystery of murmurations

Date: Sun, Oct 29, 2023 at 6:01 AM
Subject: Alain de Botton on the qualities of a healthy mind, Lucille Clifton on how to be a living poem, the magic and mystery of murmurations.

Alain de Botton on the Qualities of a Healthy Mind "The mind is its own place, and in it self can make a Heav'n of Hell, a Hell of Heav'n," Milton wrote centuries before modern science came to illuminate how the mind renders reality — the mind, this sole lens we have on what the world is and what we are. The quality of our mind, then — the clarity of it, the composure of it — shapes the quality of our lives. Viktor Frankl knew this when he observed amid the most unimaginable of circumstances — the barbed-wire inside of a concentration camp — that "everything can be taken from a man but one thing: the last of the human freedoms — to choose one's attitude in any given set of circumstances." That choice, that attitude, is what we call mindset, and it is as trainable as a muscle, as teachable as piano. How to cultivate a mind that faces the gauntlet of living without making of it a hell is what Alain de Botton, philosopher of poetic pragmatism, explores in A Therapeutic Journey: Lessons from The School of Life (public library). Illustration by Margaret C. Cook for a rare 1913 edition of Walt Whitman's Leaves of Grass. (Available as a print.) Recognizing that the mind is at bottom an attention machine — and, as cognitive scientist Alexandra Horowitz observed in her exquisite experiment in widening the lens, "attention is an intentional, unapologetic discriminator [that] asks what is relevant right now, and gears us up to notice only that" — De Botton writes: A mind in a healthy state is, in the background, continually performing a near-miraculous set of maneuvers that underpin our moods of clear-sightedness and purpose… A healthy mind is an editing mind, an organ that manages to sieve, from thousands of stray, dramatic, disconcerting, or horrifying thoughts, those particular ideas and sensations that actively need to be entertained in order for us to direct our lives effectively. A mind at its best, De Botton argues, is equally capable of self-compassion and of what Iris Murdoch so wonderfully termed unselfing. He writes: A well-functioning mind recognizes the futility and cruelty of constantly finding fault with its own nature… [It] can quieten its own buzzing preoccupations in order, at times, to focus on the world beyond itself. Undergirding his formulation of a healthy mind is the intimation that cynicism is the unhealthiest of mindsets and the surest pathway to despair: A healthy mind knows how to hope; it identifies and then hangs on tenaciously to a few reasons to keep going. Grounds for despair, anger, and sadness are, of course, all around. But the healthy mind knows how to bracket negativity in the name of endurance. It clings to evidence of what is still good and kind. It remembers to appreciate; it can — despite everything — still look forward to a hot bath, some dried fruit or dark chocolate, a chat with a friend, or a satisfying day of work. It refuses to let itself be silenced by all the many sensible arguments in favor of rage and despondency. Complement with neuroscientist Antonio Damasio on the relationship between the body and the mind and psychologist Carol Dweck's pioneering framework of the two basic mindsets that shape our lives (and how to cultivate the far more fruitful one), then revisit Alain de Botton on what emotional maturity really means and the importance of breakdowns. Starlings and the Magic of Murmurations: A Stunning Watercolor Celebration of One of Earth's Living Wonders Biking back to my rented cottage from CERN one autumn evening, having descended into the underworld of matter for a visit to the world's largest high-energy particle collider, a sight stopped me up short on the shore of Lake Geneva: In the orange sky over the orange water, myriad particles were swarming in unison without colliding. Except they were not particles — they were birds. Thousands of them. A murmuration of starlings — swarm intelligence at its most majestic, emergence incarnate, a living reminder that the universe is "nothing but a vast, self-organizing, complex system, the emergent properties of which are… everything." The majesty and mystery of murmurations come alive with uncommon beauty in We Are Starlings: Inside the Mesmerizing Magic of a Murmuration (public library) by writers Donna Jo Napoli and Robert Furrow, illustrated by artist Marc Martin, who also brought us the wondrous A Stone Is a Story. As a murmuration of starlings takes flight against a breathtaking watercolor sky, the story is told from the perspective of the birds — an antidote to our anthropocentric view of the natural world, which Rachel Carson pioneered nearly a century ago with her revolutionary writings about the sea. Soft yet striking, the illustrations play masterfully with our sense of scale — we zoom out and out from closeups of the flock to the full sweep of the murmuration, then back to the scale of the feathered particle that is the individual bird. A four-page gatefold wings the book with a sense of the astonishing grandeur of these small, fragile creatures constellating something immense and powerful, greater than the sum of its parts — one of the living wonders of this Earth. Couple We Are Starlings with the lovely animated poem "Murmuration," then revisit other kindred illustrated celebrations of the natural world: The Forest, Dawn, What Is a River, and The Blue Hour. How to Be a Living Poem: Lucille Clifton on the Balance of Intellect and Intuition in Creative Work and the Healing Power of Connection Every single thing we make, even the smallest, we make with the whole of who we are and what we have lived — with every impression and every memory, every love and every loss, consciously and unconsciously constellated into the creative act. A song encodes its maker's entire history of feeling. An equation cannot describe why an apple falls without its maker's entire understanding of how the universe works. The poetry of personhood — which we might call soul — is the raw material for all creative work. To hear its voice requires a delicate harmonizing of what we consciously know and what we unconsciously are — a syncopation of intellect and intuition. Thinking about this in the context of Virginia Woolf's meditation on how to hear your soul and Nick Cave's insistence on the creative power of trusting yourself, I was reminded of some wonderful passages I had saved from various interviews Lucille Clifton (June 27, 1936–February 13, 2010) gave over the course of her long and luminous life. Lucille Clifton, 1995. (Photograph: Afro American Newspapers/Gado/Getty Images) A century after the polymathic Nobel laureate Henri Bergson considered the interplay of intuition and the intellect in the creative work of science, Clifton takes up the question as related to art in a Rattle magazine interview from the winter of 2002, reflecting on where a poem comes from: You can murder poems, I mean, I've done it, when you start thinking too hard in your own way and you start intellectualizing, because I think a poem has to come from intellect and intuition. If you get too much intuition you have sentimentality, which is not good, and with too much intellect, it has a whole lot of stuff that nobody knows nor cares. But a poem, it's about a whole human and speaks to the whole human and it has to come from a whole human, so you involve all of yourself. In the final years of her life, in another interview, Clifton revisits the subject of this integrated totality of being and how to hear its voice: A human is not sections, is not parts. Stanley Kunitz says that poetry is the story of what it means to be human in this place, at this time… If something wants to be said — the poem — the poem knows that I will accept it… You allow it in yourself. You allow it to do its work in you. Poetry can be so healing precisely because it springs from that deepest place of reckoning with what it means to be human — the place we seek with the intellect but touch with the intuition. And down there in the depths, we don't much differ from one another, sharing the same basic longings, the same basic fears. Clifton reflects: Poetry can heal. Because it comes from a heart, it can speak to another heart. […] Somebody asked me why is it that I want to heal the world. I want to heal Lucille Clifton! And fortunately, I am very human just like all the other ones, all the other humans. With an eye to what it means to be a poet, she adds a sentiment equally true of any creative endeavor: I didn't graduate from college, which isn't necessary to be a poet. It is only necessary to be interested in humans and to be in touch with yourself as a human. Complement with Clifton's classic "won't you celebrate with me" — a living testament to this poetry of personhood turned art — and her spare, stunning ode to the common ground of being, then revisit Wendell Berry on how to be a poet and a complete human being and Anne Gilchrist — Whitman's most beloved friend — on inner wholeness and the key to a flourishing soul. Forward to a friend/Read Online/ A SMALL, DELIGHTFUL SIDE PROJECT: Uncommon Presents from the Past: Gifts for the Science-Lover and Nature-Ecstatic in Your Life, Benefitting the Nature Conservancy

MN 19: Two Kinds of Thought (English) - Majjhima Nikāya - SuttaCentral

MN 19: Two Kinds of Thought (English) - Majjhima Nikāya - SuttaCentral

....

“Suppose, bhikkhus, that in a wooded range there was a great low-lying marsh near which a large herd of deer lived. Then a man appeared desiring their ruin, harm, and bondage, and he closed off the safe and good path to be traveled joyfully, and he opened up a false path, and he put out a decoy and set up a dummy so that the large herd of deer might later come upon calamity, disaster, and loss. But another man came desiring their good, welfare, and protection, and he reopened the safe and good path that led to their happiness, and he closed off the false path, and he removed the decoy and destroyed the dummy, so that the large herd of deer might later come to growth, increase, and fulfilment.

“Bhikkhus, I have given this simile in order to convey a meaning. This is the meaning: ‘The great low-lying marsh’ is a term for sensual pleasures. ‘The large herd of deer’ is a term for beings. ‘The man desiring their ruin, harm, and bondage’ is a term for Māra the Evil One. ‘The false path’ is a term for the wrong eightfold path, that is: wrong view, wrong intention, wrong speech, wrong action, wrong livelihood, wrong effort, wrong mindfulness, and wrong concentration. ‘The decoy’ is a term for delight and lust. ‘The dummy’ is a term for ignorance. ‘The man desiring their good, welfare, and protection’ is a term for the Tathāgata, accomplished and fully enlightened. ‘The safe and good path to be traveled joyfully’ is a term for the Noble Eightfold Path, that is: right view, right intention, right speech, right action, right livelihood, right effort, right mindfulness, and right concentration.

“So, bhikkhus, the safe and good path to be traveled joyfully has been reopened by me, the wrong path has been closed off, the decoy removed, the dummy destroyed.

“What should be done for his disciples out of compassion by a teacher who seeks their welfare and has compassion for them, that I have done for you, bhikkhus. There are these roots of trees, these empty huts. Meditate, bhikkhus, do not delay or else you will regret it later. This is our instruction to you.”

La pensée de la semaine - Matthieu Ricard - Semaine #32

La pensée de la semaine - Matthieu Ricard

Si l'on souhaite se libérer définitivement de la souffrance, il est important de bien distinguer ce qu'il faut faire de ce qu'il ne faut pas faire. Car on ne peut espérer goûter le fruit d'un acte bénéfique que l'on n'a pas accompli, ni échapper aux conséquences de ses propres méfaits. Une fois mort, nous suivrons le sillage de nos actes, les bons et les mauvais. À présent que nous avons le choix entre deux chemins qui nous conduisent l'un vers le haut et l'autre vers le bas, n'agissons pas en contradiction avec nos désirs les plus profonds. Pratiquons tous les actes bénéfiques possibles, mêmes les plus infimes. Les gouttes, en s'ajoutant, ne finissent-elles pas par remplir une grande jarre ? [...]

JETSUN MINGYUR PALDRÖN (1699-1769)
Jetsun Mingyur Paldrön (mi 'gyur dpal sgron, 1699-1769), extraits de bka' gsang rdzogs pa chen po dkon mchog spyi ‘dus khrid yig man ngag gsal sgron snying po, publié par D. G. Khochhen Tulku, Mindroling Monastery, Clement Town, Inde, p. 17-18

Being miserable is a habit. Being happy is a habit. The choice is yours. ~ Tom Hopkins

m.twitter.com/Zen_Moments

Angelou

“You may not control all the events that happen to you, but you can decide not to be reduced by them.”  -- Maya Angelou

Choice

What it lies in our power to do, it lies in our power not to do. ~ Aristotle

Full Maturity

Full maturity is achieved by realizing that you have choices to make. ~ Angela Barron McBride

Shantideva's Words on training the mind

If this elephant of mind is bound on all sides by the cord of 
    mindfulness,
All fears disappear and complete happiness comes.
All enemies:  all the tigers, lions, elephants, bears, serpents (of 
    our emotions),
And all the keepers of hell: the demons and the horrors,
All of these are bound by the mastery of your mind,
And by the taming of that one mind, all are subdued,
Because from the mind are derived all fears and immeasurable 
    sorrows.

-- August 28th,  from Glimpse After Glimpse

Choosing my story

On Catching Thoughts Before They Become Emotional Reactions

by Rachel Whalley

“I am not what happens to me. I choose who I become.” ~Carl Jung

Recently I experienced a big shock—the kind that most of us don’t encounter very often.
I was with a friend when I discovered evidence of a physical disaster near my home. I did not, at that time, know any of the details, nor did I know what kind of impact it might have on my own life.

Now, normally, I am a person who likes, even needs, to process my emotional impact verbally. In other words, I really like to talk things out. (What else would you expect from a professional therapist, right?) But in this circumstance, I found myself unwilling to talk about my inner workings at all. My friend who was with me was even a little frustrated. She couldn’t understand why I shut down. I didn’t even know, myself.
So What Happened?

Later though, as I recovered from the feeling of shock, and that first big emotional wallop, I had some insight into my own process.

Usually, I am pretty grounded. I know how I feel pretty quickly, and I’m agile and adaptable, able to examine my shifting thoughts and feelings within a few minutes.

When something like that shock hits me, though, I don’t know how I feel. I hear lots of my inner parts giving all different kinds of feelings and ideas. I can feel my Core Self listening to them, kind of like a trained cop handling tens of panicky witnesses.

And I discovered that the reason I didn’t want to talk about these thoughts and feelings as they came up was because I didn’t want to commit to any of them. I could have explored any one of those thoughts and followed it down the rabbit hole, getting worked up about a particular story.

In that vulnerable state where I still wasn’t grounded enough to know what I believed, I sent up my boundaries so that I could calm the riotous crowd inside me until I knew what thoughts and emotion I decided to allow to fully exist.

How Did I Do That?

This may sound like some kind of zen mentalist magic, but the truth is that anyone can learn to do this.
In her book Emotional Alchemy, author Tara Bennett-Goleman talks about “the very latest research in neuroscience–including the neurological ‘magic quarter second,’ during which it is possible for a thought to be ‘caught’ before it turns into an emotional reaction.”

It’s so much easier to nip a feeling in the bud, before it really takes root and spreads throughout my system and I have to go digging up the entire weedy garden.

Dr. Carl Jung knew, more than fifty years ago, that such mindfulness was possible. I’m so grateful to live in an age where the tools to achieve it are so readily available, so that each of us who wishes to can achieve true peace.

Rachel Whalley is a psychotherapist and energy healer in Seattle, WA. She helps people who are struggling with body image and self-esteem issues connect with their whole and healed Selves. She also teaches folks about the personality system called the enneagram.


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