Stratovolcano, 14,411 Feet (4,392M)
Cascades Mountain Range, Western Washington
Due East of Seattle, Tacoma, Olympia, and Puget Sound
Karen and I have traveled all around this immense and dramatic mountain many times since 2010.
Stratovolcano, 14,411 Feet (4,392M)
Cascades Mountain Range, Western Washington
Due East of Seattle, Tacoma, Olympia, and Puget Sound
Karen and I have traveled all around this immense and dramatic mountain many times since 2010.
Stratovolcano, 12,281 Feet (3,743 M)
Cascade Mountain Range, Southwestern WA
Near Yakima, Packwood, Klickitat, and Goldendale WA
Karen and I have traveled all around this immense and dramatic mountain many times since 2016.
Stratovolcano, 11,240 Feet (3,425 M)
East of Portland, Vancouver, Gresham, Troutdale, Sandy OR
Cascades Mountain Range, Northwestern Oregon
We can view Mt. Hood from many locations in Vancouver and Portland, Washington.
Karen and I have traveled all around this dramatic mountain many times since 2001.
"Looking and seeing are two different things. In tai chi we see without looking. When we look, we focus our gaze on some point. As we do that, there are subtle changes in our facial muscles which affect all our muscles. We see what we're looking at but miss the rest. Imagine having to deal with multiple opponents. The ideal is to see as if you're looking from behind your head so that your vision broadens. An easy way to understand it is by holding your arms at your side as if making a cross with your body. Can you see your hands with your peripheral vision? If you can, that's what your seeing should feel like. As you do that, you will notice that things get quieter and softer, more relaxed, and seem to slow down."
- Joe Eber, Facebook Post
Vision, Seeking, Sensations, Perceptions, Looking By Michael P. Garofalo
han de zhi hou.
bi yu chi zi.
du chong hui she bu shi.
meng shou bu ju.
jue niao bu bo.
gu ruo jin rou er wo gu.
wei zhi pin mu zhi he er zui zuo.
jing zhi zhi ye.
zhong ri hao er bu sha.S
he zhi zhi ye.
zhi he yue chang.
zhi chang yue ming.
yi sheng yue xiang,
xin shi qi yue qiang.
wu zhuang ze lao.
wei zhi bu dao.
bu dao zao yi.
- Pinyin Romanization, Daodejing, Chapter 55
The "Four Horsemen"
Of Contemporary Free Thought
Christopher Hitchens, Daniel Dennett, Richard Dawkins, Sam Harris
The "Four Horsemen" of Free Thought in 2009
I have enjoyed and benefitted from reading three books by the fine writer, humanist, and scholar: Sarah Bakewell.
How to Live, or A Life of Montaigne in One Question and Twenty Attempts at an Answer.
At the Existentialist Cafe: Freedom, Being and Apricot Cocktails.
This week, I have enjoyed reading her newest book:
Humanly Possible: Seven Hundred Years of Humanist Freethinking, Inquiry and Hope. Penguin Press, 2023, 454 pages. VSCL.
Ten Golden Rules for Living the Good Life
“1. Examine life, engage life with vengeance; always search for new pleasures and new destines to reach with your mind.
2. Worry only about the things that are in your control, the things that can be influenced and changed by your actions, not about the things that are beyond your capacity to direct or alter.
3. Treasure Friendship, the reciprocal attachment that fills the need for affiliation. Friendship cannot be acquired in the market place, but must be nurtured and treasured in relations imbued with trust and amity.
4. Experience True Pleasure. Avoid shallow and transient pleasures. Keep your life simple. Seek calming pleasures that contribute to peace of mind. True pleasure is disciplined and restrained.
5. Master Yourself. Resist any external force that might delimit thought and action; stop deceiving yourself, believing only what is personally useful and convenient; complete liberty necessitates a struggle within, a battle to subdue negative psychological and spiritual forces that preclude a healthy existence; self mastery requires ruthless cador.
6. Avoid Excess. Live life in harmony and balance. Avoid excesses. Even good things, pursued or attained without moderation, can become a source of misery and suffering.
7. Be a Responsible Human Being. Approach yourself with honesty and thoroughness; maintain a kind of spiritual hygiene; stop the blame-shifting for your errors and shortcomings.
8. Don’t Be a Prosperous Fool. Prosperity by itself, is not a cure-all against an ill-led life, and may be a source of dangerous foolishness. Money is a necessary but not a sufficient condition for the good life, for happiness and wisdom.
9. Don’t Do Evil to Others. Evildoing is a dangerous habit, a kind of reflex too quickly resorted to and too easily justified that has a lasting and damaging effect upon the quest for the good life. Harming others claims two victims—the receiver of the harm, and the victimizer, the one who does harm.
10. Kindness towards others tends to be rewarded. Kindness to others is a good habit that supports and reinforces the quest for the good life. Helping others bestows a sense of satisfaction that has two beneficiaries—the beneficiary, the receiver of the help, and the benefactor, the one who provides the help.”
- By M. A. Soupious and Panos Mourdoukoutas, The Ten Golden Rules: Ancient Wisdom from the Greek Philosophers on Living the Good Life, 2009.
My wife, Karen, is scheduled today, 11/19/23, for urological/gynecological surgery today at Legacy Hospital in Vancouver. We check in at 5:30 am this morning. Surgery around 9 am. She and all of us are very concerned and hope for the best outcome. She will stay at the hospital overnight.
I had a cardio-conversion procedure done at Peace Health Hospital in Vancouver on 11/22/23. Thus far, my serious and scary symptoms of atrial fibrillation and atrial flutter have abated; and, I feel fine and can walk and exercise again.
We are both over 75 years of age. We try to face and adjust to our medical problems in a positive, constructive, and practical manner. We don't complain at lot, and try to laugh off some of our nagging problems of old age. On the whole, we are happy and grateful people.
The Three Treasures
My Body
Feelings, Emotions, Body-Self, Past-Present, Id-Ego,
Physical Health, Unconscious Dimensions, Breathing,
Eating, Moving, Sleeping, Digesting, DNA, Sexuality,
Drinking, Vitality, Brain, Immediate Environment.
My Mind
Thoughts, Emotions, Experiences-Reflections, Ego, Goals
Past-Present-Future, Language Culture, Heart-Mind, Attitudes,
Beliefs, Opinions, Histories, Will, Hope, Memories, Spirit,
Brain-Body interactions with mundane environment.
My Actions
What I Do Today. My Behaviors and Character.
Family Life. Social and Community Interactions.
Purposeful activity towards the Future. Moral-Ethical Acts.
Practices, Exercises, Play. My employment or work.
The Three Treasures are intertwined, integrated, interconnected, involved, and interwoven in some way all the time; all to the benefit of well-being and good health. They can become disconnected and conflicting which produces poor bodily health, mental confusion, and useless, evil, or self-destructive acts. Balance, clear purpose, and reflection are some essentials.
We can separate these aspects of Being-In-The-World intellectually when reflecting; when Acting and Doing they are integrated.
The Living Body is the foundation of Mind and the means of flourishing Actions. Consciousness requires a Living Body.
I don't find it scientifically plausible to accept notions of our having consciousness after death, having an invisible immortal soul, being ghostly beings, having immortal supernatural lives in fanciful heavens or hells, or other imaginary religious memes about our "after-lives."
Qigong routines are intended to nourish, refresh, rejuvenate, and reenergize our Living Bodies. Seeking immortality, spiritual rebirth, or special magical super-powers via Qigong, ascetism, or prayers do not seem reasonable to me. Seeking and cultivating good health and longevity - Yes!
- By Michael P. Garofalo, 9/2022
Cultivating Longevity (Yang Sheng Gong)
The Longevity Plan. By John D. Jay and Jane Ann Day, wth Matthew LaPlante. 2018, 304 pages. 1. Eat good food. 2. Master your mind-set. 3. Build your place in a positive community. 4. Be in motion. 5. Find your rhythm. 6. Make the most of your environment. 7. Proceed with purpose. John D. Jay, M.D., Cardiologist, Electro-physiologist.
Books by Tom Bisio Books by Eva Wong Books by Livia Kohn
Books by Ken Cohen Books by Yang Jwing-Ming
"In long-established Chinese traditions, the "Three Treasures" are the essential energies sustaining human life:
This jing-qi-shen ordering is more commonly used than the variants qi-jing-shen and shen-qi-jing.
The Three Treasures or Three Jewels (Chinese: 三寶; pinyin: sānbǎo; Wade–Giles: san-pao) are theoretical cornerstones in traditional Chinese medicine and practices such as neidan, qigong, and tai chi. They are also known as jing, qi, and shen (Chinese: 精氣神; pinyin: jīng-qì-shén; Wade–Giles: ching ch'i shen; "essence, breath, and spirit")."
"The Three Treasures or Three Jewels (Chinese: 三寶; pinyin: sānbǎo; Wade–Giles: san-pao) are basic virtues in Taoism. Although the Tao Te Ching originally used sanbao to mean "compassion", "frugality", and "humility", the term was later used to translate the Three Jewels (Buddha, Dharma, and Sangha) in Chinese Buddhism, and to mean the Three Treasures (jing, qi, and shen) in Traditional Chinese Medicine."
- Three Treasures in Taoism
Guarding the Three Treasures. By Daniel P. Reid. Simon, 1993, 484 pages.
The Three Treasures. By Jong Kook Baik. 2019, 397 pages.