A Fistful of Sand

Reality is a marvelous idea. Yet, most of us don’t know how it works. Everything we think we know is wrong. Why do we tend to believe in fantasies? It is because we were conditioned to do so. This is partly a function of education at times when the information available to educators was erroneous or incomplete. It is also a function of a kind of “spiritual fanaticism” that runs amuck in the Western world. In this case there seems to be an active avoidance of reality, science, and even common sense. The United States provides ample examples of this, I’m sure other nations do as well, and just as proudly. For example, in the US there is a movement afoot to ban evolution from school books and replace it with something called “intelligent design” based on upon a minority religious view. The measure has gained traction in several states, most notably, Texas. I’m sure there is a joke in there somewhere: what would the Texas legislature know about “intelligent” anything? (That’s one that...

I have heard that on one occasion the Blessed One was staying near Savatthi   in the Eastern Monastery, the palace     of Migara's mother. Now on that occasion the Blessed One, on emerging from seclusion in the late afternoon, sat warming his back in the western sun. Then Ven. Ananda     went to the Blessed One and, on arrival, having bowed down to the Blessed One, massaged the Blessed One's limbs with his hand and said, "It's Amazing, lord. It's astounding, how the Blessed One's complexion is no longer so clear & bright; his limbs are flabby & wrinkled; his back, bent forward; there's a discernible change in his faculties — the faculty of the eye, the faculty of the ear, the faculty of the nose, the faculty of the tongue, the faculty of the body."   "That's the way it is, Ananda. When young, one is subject to aging; when healthy, subject to illness; when alive, subject to death. The complexion is no longer so clear ...