http://www.thecouchforum.com Come speak your mind about whatever. en-us Folks, My wife has an allotment, which provides us with some fruit and vegetables. Over the years we have increased our cultivation of this plot, until it is cultivated to the edges, with small paths in between the beds. We have reached a balance, where further effort will not produce noticeable gains in the crop. So now, year by year, we get about the same crop from about the same effort, carefully rotating crops to avoid exhausting the soil. We expect to carry on like this into the foreseeable future. Is there any reason to believe that the world economy is not like this? e. http://www.thecouchforum.com/comments.php?id=1086 Wed, 02 Jul 2008 08:42:58 MDT http://www.thecouchforum.com/link.php?action=detail&id=1086 Here is the original uk commercial. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iJ1lxLdzP0w Here is what I was drawn to make of it.. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rE9iUB5kuPI :bow: http://www.thecouchforum.com/comments.php?id=1085 Mon, 30 Jun 2008 02:16:14 MDT http://www.thecouchforum.com/link.php?action=detail&id=1085 hi all, the forum software has been upgraded to implement new security measures in response to a recent malware attack on the forum. cheers, :heart:lib http://www.thecouchforum.com/comments.php?id=1084 Sat, 28 Jun 2008 08:44:59 MDT http://www.thecouchforum.com/link.php?action=detail&id=1084 Folks, I know that this is a very personal question, so please feel free to skip it. Buddhists tell us about ‘arising thoughts'. These are thoughts that flow through our minds all the time, and which we notice more strongly when we are quiet and not busily engaged with something. Do you have patterns of arising thoughts that you recognise, do you welcome them or try to avoid them? I guess the question is – What does your mind think about when it's in neutral? My arising thoughts are mostly a bit grim. Maybe 80% of them are regrets, unhappy scenarios, triggers, nearly always from the past. I know that this is a depressive mode, and have become pretty good at filtering the thoughts out, regarding them as so much back chatter and not paying attention to any one of them. Of course, some get through, and sting a bit. Then I have to be aware that this is happening and bring myself back to mindfulness. My mind does not naturally generate many happy thoughts, although there is a great feeling of contentment when I can quiet it through meditation or gentle activity. Learning about Buddhism has been a comfort to me, as I realised that I'm not alone in finding arising thoughts a problem. The Buddhists talk about ‘Dukha' or craving as a ground for these unhappy thoughts. That makes sense to me, as many of my arising thoughts are about scenes in life that I wish had been different. Anyway, I would like to hear from others on this subject. Are you able to identify your most common arising thoughts, how often they come, and how they make you feel? e. http://www.thecouchforum.com/comments.php?id=1081 Tue, 24 Jun 2008 03:40:01 MDT http://www.thecouchforum.com/link.php?action=detail&id=1081 I wrote a lot of poetry between twenty-five and thirty and the notebooks have started to piss me off. I started rereading and found a lot of crap but some stuff I decided reflects a voice. The twenties is a fertile time and my 'method' was to catch my preoccupations in verse without all that 'waiting' and agonizing they say you should do. To me it sometimes worked, and here are a few results. [b]Conventional Mentality.[/b] A conventional mentality In my family, I'd get no news, There were no real views. It was really bad In the end, I've decided, I'd decided. To the outside world, That which meant so little in this world, All was well of course, All was well. The conventional mentality, Which makes out the world in a queer way, Views lovers without feeling, Leaves its lost sons reeling. [b]Going Against The Grain.[/b] Hardest thing, To go against the grain, Of your bringing-up, Your having been brought-up. Mostly forgotten in The sad and lonely world, That immensely important holy of holies, The child in us, the touched and Put-together thing. That many choose to ignore mostly, All past history, (Yes, yes it is..) To dare and hope, To go against the grain, Fuck'em, fuck'em, fuck'em, Got my life to live. Yet still you carry the heavy goods of it all, Put-together again, severed but still joined, Despite years and illusions shed, It's still you and your life now getting out of bed. Going against the grain. [b]Self's Heart.[/b] Self's heart made of So many things, in Memories that don't always offer Polished fragments. A kind memory or a giving In the self's heart, possible, but As well an unforgiving Mark that must be In the desperate heart of living, Hard because often it hasn't A choice; hid in the heart Of things. Soft ways, loving ways, Hard to make, The play away at old stuff, Particles of past, Not always pretty but A head that must make out A way for the heart to swarm and live, Fathom from broken things some ability to give. [b]True Workings. [/b] True workings, Heart searchings, Secret yearnings, Could there be Truer workings? Life has a way of secretly, silently, Ruthlessly and systematically, Pulling apart your dreams. However, If we care for true workings, Heart searchings, Secret yearnings, If we are not afraid of Time, And her hoard of monsters, (to come and already gone) Her penetrating wind always blowing, We work on the true path laid by our heart. http://www.thecouchforum.com/comments.php?id=1080 Tue, 24 Jun 2008 01:55:05 MDT http://www.thecouchforum.com/link.php?action=detail&id=1080