I have decided that I can no longer discuss politics with others. I love to talk about politics, but I find that I lose any sense of humor I may have had at any point in my life and others do no love to talk about politics with me. It is not good for the world. I tend to alienate others and myself when talking about politics and I tend to want to bite my ear by the end. (I am sure that those I speak to would like to do more physical harm to me than that, and I am all about self-preservation. Therefore I think my self-preservation instincts should now kick in.)
I have decided to adopt some of the tenants of buddhism. I have been a long believer in Karma, but perhaps I need to adopt more buddhist ideas and ideals in my life. I know nothing about buddhism other than something about Nirvana, but for some reason I enjoy collecting buddas. I picked up a cheap one in San Francisco's chinatown and Karen and Wendy brought me a cool one from their trip to China. So based on this extremely limited knowledge of buddhism I am now going to enter into budda mode about politics. (I honestly don't know if that even makes sense, but it sounds good and calm and enlightened!!)
As Jon Stewart always says....Here is your moment of zen:
(Btw, is zen part of buddhism???)
4 comments:
Cousin Trisha here: Aaawww...I didn't get to talk politics with you... Actually, my political two cents right now is Check Your Polling Location! Yes, the county is switching locations-doesn't matter that I've voted at the library for years (can you say high school?) but this year my location is the rec center by the library-I'm going to have to vote early to be able to vote. I don't know much about Buddha-sorry.
I like the zen moment.
Brooksey, I actually quite enjoy hearing you talk politics, just when I'm not involved in the conversation. Anyhow though, karma is totally doctrinal, Alma 41:15 "For that which ye do send out shall return unto you again, and be restored.." You see?
Oh, I have a solution to the whole politics thing, maybe you can just write political statements concerning current events instead of actually discussing them with other people. I think that's what I should do. Politics interest me but I hate talking about specific issues with actual people, especially people with different opinions. It's not like I don't like hearing different perspectives, but when they have different opinions, it just makes conflict just so much more likely.
Brooke,
A good introduction to Buddhism, for westerners, is "The Tao of Pooh." It's a very beautiful book.
Some other books I've read that I liked are, "Insight Meditation" by Joseph Goldstein, and "Diamond Mind" by Rob Narin.
Read the Tao of Pooh first, then Diamond Mind. Of course, you have to sift through some things that conflict against what LDS believe, but there are some good things in there.
Salena
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