Thursday, October 27, 2005

Book Review - The Call by Oriah Mountain Dreamer

I just finished The Call: Discovering Why You Are here by Oriah Mountain Dreamer
and it is a wonderful book.

There are some wonderful scenes in it and beautiful little things about life and about Oriah herself. She is truly an unusual woman and a seeker of truth.

But as far as the title of the book goes the book itself doesn't answer any questions at all. It doesn't help you at all to discover why you are here.
It is just a tome on one woman's angst in this crazy world we live in and her battle with what she sees as contrasted with what she feels.

Overall the book adds some nice threads to the tapestry of my search for the meaning of life but it doesn't bring me any closer to my goal.

The search for the meaning of Life

Wednesday, October 26, 2005

New interface to the meaning of life stories

I have designed a new look for the meaning of life stories. The stories used to be in a simple text list format and it had no pizazz.
I have created a visual interface where you can get a sense impression of the stories by looking at a picture.
It has a really nice feel to it. The stories are interesting and short.
Here is a thumbnail of the interface:


You can check it out at The search for the meaning of life website

Will

Saturday, October 15, 2005

Mandala



I had a dream last night that I was looking at a big beautiful mandala and I noticed that it was broken in spots.
A person from the corporation asked me if I wanted them to fix it.

Wednesday, October 12, 2005

steg ti rehtruf eht yrt I redraH ehT

The Harder I try the further it gets.
I have been reading a lot and researching the meaning of life and it's discouraging. There is so much material to sift through. I keep hoping that I will find a gem that will set me on the right course.
I keep getting these recurring thoughts that interrupt my search:
  • Maybe it isn't meant to be found. Maybe it has to come to me
  • Sometimes I think that there is a way to titrate it down -cut it in half; then cut it in half again and again until eventually it all comes down to one syllable and that would be the answer to the search.
  • It sometimes feels like there is no answer, or it simply wasn't meant to be found. I just find it so hard to believe that this is all a meaningless accident. There should be a great nothingness -there should be even less than a nothingness. Defining nothing implies something. But there is something We see and feel it all around. How did this happen? and has it really been going on forever? And on into forever?
  • I remember this great quote from Carl Sagan "If you want to make an apple pie from scratch you have to first create the universe." Staggeringly deep. I wonder what he is doing right now?

The search for the meaning of life continues in darkness

If you have the answer I would love to hear it.

Tuesday, October 11, 2005

Sometimes it's hard to stay on the real purpose


I used to think that I had the power to control them, I could turn off the TV or listen only to public radio. I could get a pop up blocker and ignore them in magazines. But no matter how hard we try they still manage to get inside. It's what they do. They spend all their time figuring out how to do it.

I was working at the computer when a big truck pulled up in front of my house and parked. The whole room went dark and for a second I thought there was a total eclipse or something.
I had to snap a picture of this. It just seems to be an apt metaphor for the world we live in. They are everywhere and they are vying for your attention. It leaves you so little time to think for yourself... It is so hard to stay on the goal and to see the path when everything around you screams for your attention. After a thousand times of them telling you how to think it starts to take hold..

The Search for the Meaning of Life

Sailing and questing

I have a friend with a beautiful sea-worthy sailboat. He is going to be making an attempt to do a solo trip across the Atlantic real soon. He has stocked the boat with food and is doing all the maintenance things he has to do. I wonder what it is that drives a man to take on a challenge like this. I
have been tempted to ask him to take me along but a part of me holds back. What about the bills, the house, the cat. Funny how these little concerns seem to be more important to me than the concern that a cross-atlantic sail can be a very dangerous thing. Are there other things in life that we are the same way about. Worry about the things that you really shouldn't worry about and meanwhile the big things go almost unnoticed.

One Man's Search to Find the Meaning of Life

Friday, October 07, 2005

Addendum to last post

Go to this website and you will understand what I meant in my previous post.
http://www.anzwers.org/free/universe/index.html

When The Ants go marching in


I heard somewhere that the galaxy takes about 20 million years to make one rotation. I wonder how many rotations it has already made. And I wonder how many more it will make?



I have a lot of Angst about the world we live in. I am always troubled by the way things are. I always have this nagging feeling that we are on the wrong path. Life wasn't meant to be about cubicles, quarterly reports, 401ks, quick vacations to Aruba and finding a good auto mechanic.
This morning I sat down at my desk and spent some time paying my bills then I went for a walk to the mailbox.

I have to admit that even though I border on being a Luddite I do love the mailbox. We have to give credit to Benjamin Franklin for this among other things. The mail system is a remarkable machine that allowed us to communicate across time and place. I don't think this is true any longer the days of people actually putting together long letters of thoughts and ideas is long gone. We live in a world of immediate gratification, sound bytes and blurbs.

Back to my story
I took my bills in hand and went for a walk to the mailbox. Along the way I spotted this candy bar being systematically disected by Ants. My mind quickly traced through a familiar path.
The first Thought Stop was this: "Look, another example of the rampant consumerism and manufacturing industry polluting the world. The little things add up. Why don't people care enough to at least throw the trash out in a way that it will be handled correctly? Are we lost because we don't care about the world anymore?"..


From here I looked closer and I moved on to the second Thought Stop.
There were ants all over this thing. They were joyfully feasting on the sugar and the chocolate. There were hundreds of them and they were doing what they were meant to do -clean up the world.
Thought Stop 3: It's a shame, I thought to myself , that there wasn't a type of Ant that could seal up the ozone hole, or a type of Ant that could reduce Global Warming, Or even a type of Ant that feasted on Automobile emissions.
Thought Stop 4: We are doomed. This is going to all come crashing down. We will pollute the Earth, use up the oil, drop nuclear bombs or whatever. But eventually it will all come crashing down.
Out of this pessimism a new thought stop wiggled its way into my mind.
Thought Stop 5: Won't Mother Nature take care of all of this? Just like she always has. Won't there always be Ants and the such to clean up the mess?
Let's spend a little more time on this Stop.
First of all let's ask the question "What is Mother Nature?"
Is she in the woods? In the Rain Forest? In the trees? In the Earth? In the Solar system? or even the galaxy? Yes she is in all of these things -and more. She is in everything and part of everything.
Just the smallest part of her takes 20 million years to revolve once; Has done it many times and will do it many more.
Maybe it is silly of us to try to change things. Or even to get Angst over it.

Will is on a quest to find the meaning of life

Sunday, October 02, 2005

One possible answer

I have been rolling the question around in my head a lot lately and a lot of iterations have been popping out but here is one that came to me while I was on the border between sleep and wake.

Did you ever give a gift to someone?
I mean really give a gift?
It had nothing to do with you looking good or you spending the right amount of money.
What did you want out of this gift? You probably wanted the recipient to simply enjoy it.
That would give you great joy. There is a simple beauty to this.

What if this is the meaning of life? What if there is a "Higher Power". And this higher power bestowed upon us this gift of life? What would this higher power want from us - in other words what would be the meaning of life?

Maybe it would simply be for us to enjoy it.