I heard a quote while watching The National Parks: Americas Best Idea
“Gentlemen, why in heaven’s name this haste? You have time enough. [...] Ages and ages lie before you. Why sacrifice the present to the future, fancying that you will be happier when your fields teem with wealth and your cities with people? In Europe we have cities wealthier and more populous than yours, and we are not happy. You dream of your posterity; but your posterity will look back to yours as the golden age, and envy those who first burst into this silent, splendid nature, who first lifted up their axes upon these tall trees, and lined these waters with busy wharves. Why, then, seek to complete in a few decades what the other nations of the world took thousands of years over in the older continents? [...] Why, in your hurry to subdue and utilize nature, squander her splendid gifts? [...] Why hasten the advent of that threatening day when the vacant spaces of the continent shall all have been filled, and the poverty or discontent of the older States shall find no outlet? You have opportunities such as mankind has never had before, and may never have again. Your work is great and noble; it is done for a future longer and vaster than our conceptions can embrace. Why not make its outlines and beginnings worthy of these destinies, the thought of which gilds your hopes and elevates your purposes?”
The full text is below in context of the whole chapter.
chapter 121: The Temper of the West – Viscount James Bryce, The American Commonwealth, vol. 2 [1888]
March 24th, 2010 | filed in Inspiration, Musings, Uncategorized
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My dog Toots had an encounter with a rattle snake this past weekend. In all my years of hiking and climbing in California I have seen dozens of rattlers, yet I’ve never known anyone to get bitten (in CA). So when Toots ran up to me cowering and hid by my feet on Sunday, I assumed he’d been stung by a bee. That’s exactly how he responded to a bee sting months ago. However a half an hour later it looked as though he had a golf ball in his mouth. That’s a big reaction, I thought.
Well another twenty minutes later and his lip on the left side of his face drooped inches lower than usual. Still thinking it was a bee sting I thought maybe he was experiencing anaphylactic shock. I investigated and saw a drop of blood next to his nose. A puncture wound. Not good.
I was about to get a fast education on dealing with poisonous snake bites.
I called to find the closest pet ER. As we headed to the pet hospital I began reading up on snake bites. I wanted to know what I needed to do NOW in order to help. This was the most difficult piece of info to discern- suggestions ran the full gamut from lancing the bite area, to sucking out the poison, to doing nothing. Nothing didn’t feel very proactive, yet without expert input nothing was exactly what I was going to do.
I also found out that sometimes only one puncture wound is evident, that swelling that continues to spread is common, and that sometimes a snake will only inject a small amount of venom. I really clung to this last point.
It turns out doing nothing prior to arriving at the pet hospital was the best thing to do. At the pet hospital the veterinarian took a blood sample to get a platelet count. The bite had occurred two hours prior and Toots’s was already in the low range. The Dr. recommended I use antivenin which I found out is costly, over $500 for a pet and around $1,500 for a human. The closest antivenin was in the next county so I drove to get it. By this time Toots’s swelling had spread to the whole side of his left face and his neck, and he was beginning to whine in discomfort.
The Dr. began administering the antivenin in an IV when I returned, about seven hours after the bite occurred. The antivenin is effective as long as it is administered in the first 48 hours. Seven hours, by the vets account, was a very fast response. Toots then stayed overnight. By the next morning Toots’s swelling had subsided considerably and I picked him up and took him to his regular vet for her input. By Monday afternoon we went for a walk and almost all of his swelling was gone.
Phew.
He’s curled up next to me now- he’s been sleeping a bit more than usual the past two days. He looks like a seahorse with his head tucked down in his curled body.
He’s a champ.
March 23rd, 2010 | filed in Musings, Uncategorized
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I love kirtan. And I especially love Krishna Das’s kirtans. So this last December I sought out and experienced the joining of many blisses- Maui, kirtan, and Krishna Das. Maui is on its own so healing, so when I combined Maui’s atmosphere of total embrace with Krishna Das’s kirtan in Haiku, Maui I experienced one of the most joyful times in my life.
When we do kirtan, the practice of what in India is called “chanting the Divine Name” over the course of a few hours, we are letting go of our “stories” and offering ourselves into the moment over and over again. Chanting is a way of deepening the moment, of deepening our connection with ourselves, the world around us, and other beings. The Sanskrit chants that we sing come from a place deep within each of us, so they have the power to draw us back within. If we go deep enough, we will all arrive at the same place, our deepest Being.
Krishna Das, Chants of a Lifetime
February 9th, 2010 | filed in Inspiration, Musings, Uncategorized
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Is your ability to do things in the world enhanced or hindered when you are happy?
Sadhguru, Founder of the Isha Foundation
The world doesn’t need what you do, it needs your energy of aliveness, of joy. The world needs people who are alive. So look within, come alive and live your joy. Be who you are and be amazed at how this harmoniously serves the whole.
February 7th, 2010 | filed in Inspiration, Musings, Uncategorized
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January 13th, 2010 | filed in Inspiration, Musings, Uncategorized
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I spent a few, as always, magical days in the Eastern Sierra this last week. As I arrived a front was passing through and a strong wind and light dusting of snow welcomed my arrival. The next morning I awoke to crisp and calm brilliant blue skies. I then headed out with my man and my pup, Toots…. After hiking all day in the John Muir Wilderness in the Cottonwood Lakes area I stopped to read John Muir’s words at the trailhead.
“I only went out for a walk and finally concluded to stay out
till sundown, for going out, I found, was really going in.”
Needless to say, nature therapy is priceless. Later in Bishop I met up with some wonderful locals and learned the meaning of Inyo (the magnificent Inyo County of the Eastern Sierra)- dwelling place of the great spirit.
October 10th, 2009 | filed in Inspiration, Musings, Uncategorized
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So I was listening to a John Lennon song the other night on Pandora when I heard a very familiar phrase. In his song “Beautiful Boy” John Lennon quotes Emile Coue, one of the early pioneers of hypnosis. In the song he sings the wonderful suggestion and famous Coueism,
Every day,… in every way,… it’s getting better and better.
Yep, flourishing souls nourish themselves with great thoughts and vibrations.
September 7th, 2009 | filed in Inspiration, Musings, Uncategorized
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Sometimes it is the process of doing that makes things clear. If we don’t start, we never know what could’ve been. Sometimes the answers we find while searching are better or more creative than anything we could have imagined before.
Lynn Cox in Grayson
Lynn’s other book Swimming to Antarctica is one of the most inspirational books I have ever read. She is a woman who has united people in cultures around the world simply by following her passion of swimming. Really. A formula so absurd no fiction writer would propose it, yet a formula so true to the idea that when we awaken and follow our passions greater things than we could ever imagine do happen.
August 8th, 2009 | filed in Inspiration, Musings
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Her life was just beginning and the infinite didn’t have to hide in a symbol
- it was showing it’s beauty everywhere. This was all so new.
She might as well have been asleep to this point because she was being flooded with life.
And the urgency she once had to rush ahead, to know, and to expect… had waned. She was comfortable not knowing.
Time which had for her been careening ahead like a boulder fractured from a steep granite canyon had come to rest peacefully, like a still meadow morning.
She figured she was ready for all that lay ahead.
August 8th, 2009 | filed in Musings
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