Goodness what a find! Colour photographs from the Farm Security Administration collection taken during the depression in America in the late 1930's and early 1940's. Those photographic icons in black and white are joined by...well, go take a look and be disturbed. The whole set can be seen here. There are images here that are every bit as powerful as those B and W's we know so well.

These images, by photographers of the Farm Security Administration/Office of War Information, are some of the only color photographs taken of the effects of the Depression on America’s rural and small town populations. The photographs are the property of the Library of Congress and were included in a 2006 exhibit Bound for Glory: America in Color.

From One Cool Thing A Day.

It was most gratifying to receive an email from somebody today. She said,
There was a moment today to read your blog and I found it uplifting and
amazing to be so in touch with where you are - even though I tend to think
'real life is too short for reading blogs'.

There you have it. Just one such message, letting me know that visiting Jademountains makes a difference, has me uplifted and inspired to writing. Being in touch is a two way street and I always like to hear from readers either via email and or via comments. So please don't hang back, leave a comment. (I moderate comments so you will not see what you said until I've had a chance to read the comments.) Just saying something simple like, I'm here still means I get a feel for the people who are reading and that in turn has an impact on what I write about.

I've just updated my schedule by the way.

Ever since I started practising Zazen in Japan almost 10 years ago, I've been attracted to the idea of becoming a Zen monk. In 2009 I went for a week long retreat at Throssel Hole Buddhist Abbey in Northumberland and upon my return realised that a) I could never become a monk and b) monks have got it right.

To encourage myself to focus more on my Zen practice, I saved up for 6 months in 2009, bought myself a camper van, and moved to Devon...
Undeceivable - Moonraker Zen.

Everything in me goes out to Pascal who I met briefly when he visited Throssel. There he is in his VW Moonraker, parked on the side of some wild and windy Devon road and sitting Zazen. He is doing what most of my generation, including me, dreamed of doing.

You asked about what a monk does when she goes on retreat as I am at the moment. Much the same as you Pascal in spirit at least 'though not in form. Living each day, facing the conditions that come before me, responding to them best I can. Remaining fully committed to staying with changing circumstances. Knowing that each day is a life changing day and going with those moments even when they don't make sense - for example go out and buy a bag of chips...or whatever. Toffee Crisp wasn't it?

There is planning ahead. There is organizing in the micro and macro sense. And then there is what happens. There is, as happens for me, a playfulness in living which can so easily get lost in the corridors of convention and expectations.

This post has been slightly edited, particularly the last paragraph - 15th Feb. 2010.

Dear Reverend Master Mugo,

You have asked me to consider writing a regular contribution to your Jade Mountains. With some nervousness, and as usually seems to be the way with these situations, something is saying yes, ok; and then I’m trying to work out what it is I’ve said yes to, and if it is good to do then why is it, and how can it work for us? I know you better than to ask exactly what it is you were thinking of, so here is my go at what might work for me.

The first thing to say is that this clearly can’t just be an opportunity for me to tell people who read your site what I think about things. If I was going to do that then I’d be setting up my own site and doing it directly; and I’m not. So if not that, then what?

Well, I started to wonder what you think might be missing from Jade Mountains as it currently stands. And I came up with a couple of possibilities.

The first is that you’re a monk - and a very well established one at that: however understated about it you may be, you are a Zen Master. It follows that your life and experience may not express many aspects of what Buddhist training might be like for people who aren’t monks - although your honesty and humanity in what you write go a long way to showing that this difference isn’t as great as we sometimes might like to think.

Secondly, and perhaps more deeply, for me a great deal that is important in our training is about the dynamic between ‘teachers’ and those of us hoping to learn something and receive support in our practice. Zen in particular seems to be so much about someone asking a question and an answer coming back - often not the answer we were looking or hoping for but an answer that cuts to the core of what is being asked. Quite a few of your postings reflect this with you sharing some of the letters people have sent you and your responses. And wouldn’t it be interesting to see if some of the dynamic of how this continues over time could be illustrated by me sharing my thoughts, worries and questions with you, and through you with your readers?

So these thoughts led me to wonder - how about me writing to you on a regular basis through your site? Often it could be that no actual response is needed from you - there is something about the act of opening up and asking and sharing that frequently just by itself resolves the question.

When I look at your original request for me to contribute in this light then I can see a possibility of me writing about training and how that impacts everyday life without it being me expressing my opinions, or trying to inform or teach. It would really just be a continuation and development of what we have been doing for years.

You have been around and deeply involved in all of the nearly 20 years I’ve been training in this practice - from being the scary visiting monk who used to come to our home when we were running the London Meditation Group; through the years when you lived in the mobile home in our yard here on the farm; and with our ever evolving relationship with the OBC and the Lay Ministry. This seems like another opportunity opening up - perhaps unorthodox, but I suppose you often seem to find some particular energy in new approaches to things.

As ever I am left wondering maybe it will work? maybe it won’t? and cutting through all this nervousness echoes one of the hallmarks of your particular teaching - let’s get up and try it and maybe we’ll find out.

Does any of this make sense? Is it the sort of thing you were thinking of?

in gassho,

Andrew

Consciousness, believe it or believe it not?
Thanks to Renegade Buddha - glad you are back at it again.

This will not be last time we take a look at consciousness. In the mean time...just sit!

I've added another photograph to this posting. If you love dogs take a look, if you don't I wouldn't!