Sunday, July 17, 2016

A Minute Meditation

 It seems as though humans, world-wide, have always regarded mountains as special places.  So many cultures placed the residences of their gods and goddesses on mountain tops.  And, how many prophets, sages, and poets have retreated to the mountains, either for a short time or for a lifetime?

Here's a brief reaction to a day in the Sierras from a writer whom I have just belatedly discovered.  

Another glorious Sierra day in which one seems to be dissolved and absorbed and sent pulsing onward we know not where.  Life seems neither long nor short, and we take no more heed to save time or make haste than do the trees and stars.  This is true freedom, a good practical sort of immortality.

-- John Muir --
from  My First Summer in the Sierra

I like that last line:  This is true freedom, a good practical sort of immortality. There is no past, no future, just the ever-present now, just being there.  

13 comments:

  1. when younger i did a fair amount of mountain hiking and climbing; Muir captures that so well: the feelings of freedom and presence and identity with the larger world; very zennish, one might say...

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Mudpuddle,

      "Spring water is pure in an emerald stream
      moonlight is white on Cold Mountain
      silence thoughts and the spirit becomes clear
      focus on emptiness and the world grows still"

      -- Han Shan (aka Cold Mountain) --
      from The Collected Songs of Cold Mountain
      trans. Red Pine

      Delete
    2. excellent/tx; cold mountain is one of the best...

      Delete
    3. Mudpuddle,

      He's been a longtime favorite of mine. I finally found a complete collection of his poetry. I just read one a day, and it's in the morning. I'm thinking about moving it to the end of the day, just before lights out. Or, maybe read one in the morning and one in the evening.

      Or, maybe read one in the morning to help start the day off right, and then reread it in the evening to complete the day.

      Delete
  2. There is a point, however, beyond which no human can penetrate or survive. Perhaps that says something even more significant about the highest mountains.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. R.T.,

      Places we are not meant to go?

      Delete
    2. Fred, I think that may be true. We are limited. The cosmos is unlimited. By definition, we cannot go beyond ourselves. This perhaps explains why mountains in myth, legend, and history were such sacred places.

      Delete
    3. actually, the gist being, imho, that the mountain, the temperature, and the views are all one with you; that the speaker, and his surround are inseparable...

      Delete
    4. Mudpuddle,


      "The birds have vanished down the sky.
      Now the last cloud drains away.

      We sit together, the mountain and me,
      until only the mountain remains."
      -- By Li Po --
      Translated by Sam Hamill

      Delete
  3. R.T.,

    True, perhaps, but as Arthur C. Clarke's Second Law reminds us:

    The only way of discovering the limits of the possible is to venture a little way past them into the impossible.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Fred, I remember escaping from the many urban annoyances (Fresno CA in the early 70s) to the Sierras often as a way of . . . well, escaping! I need the peace and quiet of being alone. But anything like immortality never ended my mind. I guess I was not much of a philosopher or thinker. I was simply hell-bent on escape from what I thought was one of the worst cities on the face of the earth.

      Delete
    2. i used to drive through Fresno occasionally; it was kind of depressing...

      Delete
    3. R.T.,

      An escape to Sanity would be the way I see it. Actually escape isn't the best world, unless one could say escape to something better. It's a journey from a negative state to a positive state--maybe getting healthy again.

      Delete