A Prayer Shared

One Little Candle

It is better to light just one little candle
Than to stumble in the dark.
Better far that you light just one little candle,
All you need is a tiny spark.
If we'd all say a prayer that the world would be free,
A wonderful dawn of a new day we'd see...
And if everyone lit just one little candle,
What a bright world this would be.

When the day is dark and dreary
And we know not where to go;
Don't let your heart go weary,
Just keep this thought in mind...

It is better to light just one little candle
Than to stumble in the dark.
Better far that you light just one little candle,
All you need is a tiny spark.
If we'd all say a prayer that the world would be free,
A wonderful dawn of a new day we'd see...
And if everyone lit just one little candle,
What a bright world this would be.

guess who the candles are?>;p

The World needs more adults(on Hope and Duty)

still percolating.. ^_^

thereare several stories i would like to share regarding this. the first has been shared already in the book recommendation post last jJuly>;p

what do imean by "adults"? well, for all purposes i agree withR. Heinlein. "...indeed a juvenile becomes an adult when, and only when,
he acquires a knowledge of duty and embraces it as dearer than the self-love
he was born with...."" Adults are those who recognize duty. When i was a child, adults where these persons who literally made the world go round. they were where the "buck" stopped, because they didn't(or couldn't) pass it to anybody else.. theirswas theresponsibility . if no one else would do it, they would, they did the "necessary" things.. and this set them apart from my world as a child and i always chafed evrytime i was told "huwag kang basta-basta sasali sa usapang matatanda." this became a goal in my life to finally be recognized as an adult. to be part of that world where thingsthat matter are done, and respect andtrust given, that you can accomplish what is given to you/or what you said you can, of course i didn't know then the weight of the responsibility that accompanied that respect.but since i learned about duty, ibecame aware of the meaning it gives not only for/to me but for those that are dependent on the duty that i need to do. but unfortunately, imho, the desire to be initiated to, or to be part of the adult world is not that great in recent years, perhaps because of the seeming failures of adults to do their duty in recent years, and also the glorification of youth in the media and society today (look at commercials, who are they targetting?,X-games, MTV and what-not - mostly selling instant gratification, fun and be young forever -- selling a lifestyle without showing the consequences, without responsibility >.< - and this of course is being perpetuated by.. you guessed it, "adults" who are out for profit of course, coz the young rarely reflect before buying into something -- if it looks like fun, we got to try it!). the rites of passage to adulthood is almost entirely gone now in our society.. youth is glorified now as the peak rather than being a responsible contributing member of society, or being responsible not only for one's self/actions but for all.but i give credit to the young too who try who give their time, talent, treasure to help ease the ills of this world those who work hard and should be recognized as responsible , contributing members of society, and they are many.. and yet they shouldn't be the ones responsible, yet.where are the adults? thus i come to the last story i will share regarding this.. a few weeks ago i got the chance to talk with Isabel, a fil-Dutch friend from college, who's now living in the netherlands if i'm not wrong. she asked me how the country was and i said that the philippines is still the same and will continue to be so long as the same kind of people are elected as our "leaders"unfortunately, it looks like the majority of the people will continue to elect these people. but, fortunately, the number og people who want change is increasing.. awareness is increasing and more and more people see the need to contribute to nation-building in their own small way, in their circle of influence. A very modest number to be sure( i like to include myself as one of them) but more than what was in past years.She asked if there is still hope.... i answered. hope is a non-issue in nation-building, besides it took us more than 50 years to get where we are now at, it isn't realistic to expect that we can change it all in the same amt of time, change the tide, maybe...but isn't hope the very thing that makes us go on? she said.. i said to her children can hope. we adults, don' have that luxury.. because it is a necessary thing to do? she said.... exactly! i said... hope is a non-issue when duty is involved. children can only hope that we adults do our duty, and we should recognize that our duty is to make sure they do not hope in vain.. (i'm still getting her permission to post our actual conversation here ^_^) hope you got something out of the first "real" blog i made hehe^_^

Think about It

We have no more "right" to consume happiness without producing it than to consume wealth without producing it."
-- G.B. Shaw ---


and this video too.

This is a point i have been trying to make

"It is costly wisdom that is bought by experience.... Learning teacheth more in one year than experience in twenty"
Roger Ascham(takenfrom the Theophysical Digest,1st quarter 2005)

this(plus the latest qoutes i posted) is specially dedicated to those who hate reading or who don't read or who dismiss history as a primary/valuable learning tool, and to those who don't understand my frustration when i do meet such people.... i used to quote Goethe to them(from the book Sophie's World's intro"Those who cannot draw upon 3000 years of human existence are living from hand to mouth" or words to that effect, can't quite remember verbatim now -- but i couldn't quite get my point across and i believe the Roger Ascham's quote would be better at it^_^. i just used to call them "arrogant bastards" when i get frustrated, but i know that never accomplished anything constructive)

Why arrogant?because i have met lots of people, decent very intelligent persons, who regard their experience and reasonings as the end when it comes to the validity of lessons to be learned some even think that their epiphanies are "it"(congratulating themselves on their brilliance) failing to consider that their experience/s,thought/s may not be unique and that it may have been experienced/thought by other persons before in the long course of human existence in this planet and that that experience/thought has been reflected upon and the lessons extracted,learned/rejected in the test of millenia. and here you are convinced that your conclusions, from your life experience, are IT!! slow down. read, read with the spirit of learning, you may find more valuable gems in your life experiences that you uncover from taking part in the author's story. though these lessons are distilled from the author's own life experiences, you can partake of the lifetime it took to gather these lessons i njust a day or two of reading(or an hour or four)enriching your own immensely for a fraction of the time and cost to gather the same lessons where you to experience the same exact experiences that has enabled the author to learn those hard bought lessons. Only if you have partaken a lot can you even safely argue that your epiphanies are IT!!in short, do your research first ^_^ and let your reason//assent//doubt have free reign so that you can really suck out all the marrow you can get from you life experiences, as well as the collective human experience and hopefully the lessons that need to be learned will BE learnt by you and can be contributed to the collective human experience.pushing us one step closer to realizing our potential, one step closer to be truly human.

points to Ponder

"What ails the world?... Looking superficially. most people would be inclined to say that it is poverty and hunger, greed, war, indifference to values, selfishness, and so forth. Probing deeper into the question, perhaps we can say that the world, suffers from the stupor of a lack of true intelligence.Humanity is not short of brain capacity or intellectual brilliance... It does seem to lack the intelligence necessary not to commit the same grievously harmful mistakes again and again."

Radhia Burnier"The Light Bearer"(as condensed in the Theosophical Digest, 1st Quarter 2005)

"Reason is a choice. Wishes and whims are not facts, nor are they a means to discovering them. Reason is our only way to grasping reality -- it's our basic tool of survival. We are free to evade the effort of thinking, to reject reason, but we are not free to avoid the penalty of the abyss we refuse to see."
- Terry Goodkind, "Faith of the Fallen"

Anton's beautiful take on the human Condition(the human spirit)

Anton, a very good friend of mine quite outdid himself ( avery hard thing to do if you know the guy ^_^) with a post he did in his freindster blog located here

anyway, i will shamelessly reproduce what he posted there in case that link won't work:

THE HUMAN SPIRIT

Whenever we tackle damnation, salvation, and the human spirit it is difficult to separate it from the religious colorations that are part of these experiences. But in order to have a clear understanding of these topics we have to strip them of any divine notion and concentrate on their human applications. What is the human spirit? The human spirit is the aspect of a person that goes beyond his animality and his rationality. It is fuelled by his sense of dignity and self worth, motivated by his need to search for happiness, and guided by his own sense of morality. The infinite drive of the human spirit is man's need to transcend the boundaries of his existence. It is the desire to achieve something more than what you have. To better understand this let us assume that the totality of ones being is enclosed by a sphere. The person cannot see the boundaries which enclose him but his spirit drives him to explore this world which seems limitless at first. Eventually his consciousness makes him aware of the limits which this sphere of existence surrounds him. Once you know a certain truth, you cannot go back and unlearn it, and to do so would be foolish. Thus the person's being steps into another sphere of existence, and like the previous one, it seems limitless at first. The human spirit is again driven to explore and understand this new realm. And once its boundaries are determined and understood, the spirit once again transcends into the next sphere of existence. And the process goes on. We all know that there will always be boundaries that the human spirit will encounter and that we are all destined to transcend them. A rational being cannot be satisfied with his level of existence when he discovers an opportunity for a better way of life because his spirit is driven by the need to find something better.

The human spirit is driven from one finite level of existence to the next because he discovers that he is not content. His quest to seek happiness becomes a search for the infinite. We can therefore conclude that the human spirit is driven to seek the infinite, a level of existence in which we find the happiness which we seek.

But human beings are flawed creatures. We lack the ability to discern true happiness because our natural tendencies get in the way. The human will is finite and we constantly succumb to our base instincts and thus we are strayed from our quest to seek out the boundaries of our existence. We cannot transcend because we are made disillusioned by our sensations into thinking that we have found the infinite. Blinded by the overload of our senses we are deceived into a complacent form of existence. In this manner we are killing the human spirit. How does this happen? Man’s will is always in constant battle with his instincts and there are countless experiences which heighten the sensations we experience. This overload of our senses breaks down man's will and thus he succumbs to his animality. With continuous exposure to such experiences that person begins to need them. He is caught up in a deadly loop which eventually kills his spirit because it cannot move on with his quest for the infinite.

Aside from our animality another trap for the human spirit is man's rationality. Human beings are the only creatures on the planet with the ability to rationalize. For every other organism, thought and emotion mean the same thing: when scared you run, when hungry, you kill, when trapped fight. Given enough time man can find a way to rationalize anything. This is how we delude ourselves. Although rationality aids us in conquering our animal instincts, it can also lead us into great harm. There are times when we are too caught up in our duties that we loose sight of what really matters. And although we are not happy we tend to justify our actions by saying this makes me happy. Oghtness, obligation, and duty are important in the development of one's character and understanding. But more often than not we seek actions that make us noble rather than our nobility seek that which improves us. “I do not loose, I win” are famous last words. What price are you willing to pay for victory? Is it worth your freedom, your life, and your soul? And are you even sure that that is what you want? You can rationalize this in anyway you want but we all know are rationality is flawed because we are mortal. You can make all the wrong choices and take all the fallacies for the truth and still you can justify that you have lived a fulfilled live. Like our instincts, rationality can blind us into a complacent existence. The human spirit stagnates in the cesspool which our rationality has created for it. We become robots who have conquered the traps of our animality but have replaced it for the cage of our rationality.

Damnation is to kill the human spirit and its drive for the infinite and the ultimate evil is to consciously or unconsciously promote the damnation of one's self and of others. we can therefore take salvation as the freeing of the human spirit form the shackles of our paralyzing instincts and the prison of our blinding rationality in order that the human spirit can soar and transcend the boundaries of our humanity to fulfil its destiny which is the search for the infinite. One cannot gain salvation if one is not damned, and if we are not damned we do not need salvation. Then it becomes a matter of setting the human spirit free. But what do we do when the spirit is trapped by because we succumb to our instincts or when we rationalize our way into blindness?

Damnation is a human act because it is a wilful submission to the power of our instincts and rationality. We are overwhelmed and our fear dictates us into surrender. We then rationalize that we are happy because we do not want to admit that we are weak. If damnation is a human act, then so is salvation. Once we realize this, we can act on it. Remember that a human act is governed by our free will, which is autonomous from any form of governance. Thus the human will is the tool that we use to act with once we realize that we have damned ourselves and that we have to save the human spirit.

By virtue of its autonomy it does not need instincts nor is rationalization to function and thus it the perfect weapon of salvation.

Human life is the reality in which we live in. Our beings are constantly exploring this realm of existence and breaking through the limits which they discover in order to achieve the infinite. But sometimes the human spirit is unable to peruse its destiny because it becomes trapped man's tendency to succumb to his natural instincts and the inability of man to see past his own rationality. In this way the human spirit slowly dies, because the mortal frame in which it resides in is flawed and cannot move beyond the illusions that his instincts and rationality believe to be real.

But man is also equipped with free will. Man can at any given time voluntarily act upon his dilemma once he becomes enlightened to the situation and has a desire to set his spirit free from the illusions that hold it captive. The sad thing is many human beings are unable to fully use their free will to attain salvation because they are not aware of its true power and are more often that not ignorant of their predicament. They spend the rest of their lives unfulfilled, unhappy, and with a nagging sensation that they have missed out on something. Their spirits have not soared and their souls are dead. They die as empty husks devoid of true life. But nobody is too damned that he cannot attain salvation. It only takes three things. One is the knowledge that you are damned. The second is the desire to transcend this predicament, and the third is to voluntarily act on it. Yes and no, it becomes your decision. Damnation is the surrender to the unreal while salvation is the transcendence from unreal to real. Life with all its difficulties and trials is real. The human spirit is real. It is driven to break past the limits of the finite and to seek the infinite. The infinite is real because the human spirit is on a quest to seek it. Set your soul free, let it soar to greater heights and more fulfilling realities, and aim for the infinite for true happiness because only then can you be truly content.

my favorite parts here are his analogy with the spheres and his dealing with the traps of reason, coz it illustrates beautifully a point that i tried to make in another post about humanity not yet determining its potential and that reason(anton's 'human spirit' in his post, 'reason' for moi) has led us to the perceiving of our humanity and the limits of our potential, (hmm perhaps "potential limits" would better describe it since we always have had transcended perceived limits to our "potentials" as a race -- as anton illustrates very well with the spheres analogy) when i read that very very nice post. i came up with a comment, coz somehow that ultra-rational perspective was no longer strictly true for me (though anton and i share that trait, rabidly rational, even >;p)you see my rationalizations have come to accept the limits of reason that i have observed ( i could not anymore divorce the "divine"or more accurately the "experience/manifestation of the divine" in the human condition purely for intellectual reasons, i feel that the "divine"needs to be mixed in the cauldron of the human condition to truly understand it)so here's my comment:

langya, nice.. take a deep breath, pinaghirapan. i have a question in the spirit of trying to simplify all this.

whence this drive to seek the infinite? this need to transcend?
whence this perception of damnation and need for salvation, when our instincts and rationalization
necessarily limit our perception(as you argued, they are finite?
i have thought the same way for a long time ton.but i have not yet been satisfied with any answer to the questions except when i do not strip it of any divine notion:

whence man?
wither man?

i feel that if we limit the validity of any answer to deal with only human application to the human condition, we may fail to consider some notions that may help us find better answers and somehow place unfair limits to the humanity of man or to the human spirit,after all we haven't yet been able to grasp fully the humanity of man.. much less the human spirit.
i think an investigation on these would help a lot in shedding more light on these thoughts

i hope i haven't blabbed carelessly yet>:P

at eto pa

You Are Scary

You even scare scary people sometimes!

How Scary Are You?

Your Personality Is

Rational (NT) You are both logical and creative. You are full of ideas. You are so rational that you analyze everything. This drives people a little crazy! Intelligence is important to you. You always like to be around smart people. In fact, you're often a little short with people who don't impress you mentally. You seem distant to some - but it's usually because you're deep in thought. Those who understand you best are fellow Rationals. In love, you tend to approach things with logic. You seek a compatible mate - who is also very intelligent. At work, you tend to gravitate toward idea building careers - like programming, medicine, or academia. With others, you are very honest and direct. People often can't take your criticism well. As far as your looks go, you're coasting on what you were born with. You think fashion is silly. On weekends, you spend most of your time thinking, experimenting with new ideas, or learning new things.

The Three Question Personality Test

You Are 79% Sexy

Your Sex Appeal Is: Extremely High You're very sexy. You just have that certain something that takes over a room. You know how to attract, entice, and keep whoever you want. You are truly appealing.

How Much Sex Appeal Do You Have?

(giganahan pud! baliw!^_^)and we will end on this note nyahaha! tama na sunod2x na tripping.. til next guys!! hope you'll have fun taking those "tests"

mga kung anu-ano from my friend ^_^

Find out which Transformer you are at LiquidGeneration!

amen? amen!! sakyan!!

You are The Fool

The Fool is the card of infinite possibilities. The bag on the staff indicates that he has all he need to do or be anything he wants, he has only to stop and unpack. He is on his way to a brand new beginning. But the card carries a little bark of warning as well. Stop daydreaming and fantasising and watch your step, lest you fall and end up looking the fool.

What Tarot Card are You?
Take the Test to Find Out.

bom! ahahahahahahahaha! ahahahahahaha! waahahahahaa! ^_^ iam A fool!

You Are Elmo

Sweet and innocent, you expect everyone to adore you. And they usually do! You are usually feeling: Talkative. You've got tons of stories to tell. And when you aren't talking, you're laughing. You are famous for: Being popular, though no one knows why. Middle aged women especially like you. How you life your life: With an open heart. "Elmo loves you!"

The Sesame Street Personality Quiz

this takes the cake ^_^ROFLMAO

to my friends, you believe this or you don't(the links below) about me >;p pero eto na yung resulta nung quiz:
tipo
personalidad

Qoutable Qoute ^_^

There is probably no point in my going into your questions now; for what I could say about your tendency to doubt or about your inability to bring your outer and inner lives into harmony or about all the other thing that oppress you - : is just what I have already said: just the wish that you may find in yourself enough patience to endure and enough simplicity to have faith; that you may gain more and more confidence in what is difficult and in your solitude among other people. And as for the rest, let life happen to you. Believe me: life is in the right, always.

And about feelings: All feelings that concentrate you and lift you up are pure; only that feeling is impure which grasps just one side of your being and thus distorts you. Everything you can think of as you face your childhood, is good. Everything that makes more of you than you have ever been, even in your best hours, is right. Every intensification is good, if it is in your entire blood, if it isn't intoxication or muddiness, but joy which you can see into, clear to the bottom. Do you understand what I mean?

-- Rainier Maria Rilke "Letters to a Young Poet" (google it to get the whole perspective^_^)

Reason, Assent and Doubt

It is apparent through my posts in this "blog" of mine that i'm a big fan of reason and i put great store by it. i do, and for the longest time it has been my rod and guide and it has served well, too most times. but i have also observed the arrogance of reason and have been guilty of it too.not too mention the traps of reason that i've fallen for time and again. and most times this was due to a simple thing: i have ignored assent. I turned a blind eye to the assent that resonates through my being.. because reason was oh so much more logical and conclusive. and there was the fact that my reason can run ring s around my assent >;p kinda like Sophistry, my reason was so much more better at arguing/"reasoning out that my assent didn't stand a chance. and instead of finding out why assent and reason were at odds, i just ignored assent .. para mas madali. it was oh so much harder going down that road vs. just swallowing reason hook line and sinker. of course it always turns out that i was just fooling myself and going for the easier solution(trust in the difficult remember?^_^)

so what is this "assent" i'm talking about? in this case what i mean by assent can be compared to "gut feel" only deeper because this comes from the core of your being, rather than you r gut *heh* >;p also assent is not divorced from reason itself because reason is part of your being, this is shall we say a "knowing" or we come to the last ingredient a "doubting" within you that may fly in the face of your reason, at first glance. but whenever resolved, it is more reasonable. go figure. lolz. this "assent or this "doubt" that comes from inside your being can be a very powerful tool for one to rein in reason when it goes wild or give it discipline/direction it sorely needs from time to time... you see,reason has a propensity for the complicated(a need for explanations rather than a need for knowing) and thus more vulnerable to deception/self-deception(wat is better explained may not necessarily be truer) while assent is inherently geared to the simple(a knowing more than an explaining), it is shall we say faith-like and a natural counterweight to reason

(again, rainier maria rilke had a fine thing to say about this in his"letters to a young poet",here it is,what rainier labels doubt i label assent, and they can be interchanged too ^_^:

And your doubt can become a good quality if you train it. It must become knowing, it must become criticism. Ask it, whenever it wants to spoil something for you, why something is ugly, demand proofs from it, test it, and you will find it perhaps bewildered and embarrassed, perhaps also protesting. But don't give in, insist on arguments, and act in this way, attentive and persistent, every single time, and the day will come when instead of being a destroyer, it will become one of your best workers - perhaps the most intelligent of all the ones that are building your life.

and so you see Rainier and i seem to be in an agreement on this... reason, and assent/doubt working hand in hand will serve you well in the enterprise of building your life(read: journey of being)

andstill percolating... ^_^

Qoutable Qoute

Man, can only be truly human if he is pierced through and through with the divine
- taken fromFr. Horacio dela Costa,S.J.when he was talking about St.Ignatius in his book Selected Homilies and Religious Reflections(the qoute is not verbatim though, i just remembered i experienced a powerful assent when i read that - or words to that effect in the book, or maybe i can fool myself and attribute that to me hahaha!)

Absence of evidence does not mean evidence of absence.

Priorities(what's really worthwhile)

another important thing in this journey of being, i think. specially when it comes to purpose.. is discerning priorities in the myriad of choices that will come to you but there is a good guide, you only just have to discern what really is worthwhile(and the "being" post can guide you as well - (1)trust in the difficult haha --(2) and usually transitory thing s don't have as much value as things eternal, go figure -- but this is obvious, why bet big on things that do not last?) -- but there is a danger here if one is cynical and/or dishonest with the self, you can say and even argue very well that nothing lasts! and you are absolutely right. nothing does last in the material world. and poor you if your purpose and meaning rests solely in it -- it won't be long that you'll be convinced of the absurdity of life, and despair is but a short hop from there. but of course since we are aware that being human means using reason, we are a bit better off now since reason delves into the abstract, the realm of ideas -- where i can hazard a guess that that is where the word "ideals" came from^_^ .. "being " i think is a mix of the transitory and the eternal.. being is a work in progress, it does not stop because humanity has yet to determine the limits of its potential and though reason has helped us perceive our humanity it has also opened vistas that reason itself cannot fully comprehend, for all we know this journey of being, leads to or ends in, the eternal. and each of us who dare travel this road contribute our infinitesimal bit, and if enough bits are put in, the cup may finally runneth over and our purpose accomplished, i wonder where that leads^_^? aah, the limits of reason =) [the first A Prayer Shared post should be perfect after this >;p *heh*]

Purpose (Be True!)

it can be said that i am obsessed by purpose, i don't know if that's a good thing or if that's a bad thing. It's just that i hate wasting precious time if i can't see the purpose of something i am doing, most specially if i don't agree with the purpose. but of course i have learned to be more mellow about it, coz i now spend more time trying to discern things(the purpose) compared to when i was younger when i thought my intellect was KING!>;p you could say i was pretty judgmental then, i went with my initial knee-jerk intellectual reaction.. if my reason didn't agree with what i thought the purpose of a thing is.. i usually condemned it and left what that was disgustedly, and didn't care anymore for arguments to the contrary. i was a judgmental prick, that's why i missed a lot of worthwhile enterprises early in life, now i have learned to sloow down, sit back and to really consider, but only recently mind you^_^. that's why i started this blog only now(it all seemed so pointless/purposeless to me then. haha).
but there it is.. i still have to "get the point"^_^. that's why, when i heard of the book "the purpose driven life" and that people where so into it, recommending it left and right.. i kind of just grinned and shrugged.. isn't that supposed tobe always the case?? and i have a peeve about stating the obvious.. it gets my goat , so to speak^_^ bu t then again i should've been glad, since because of that book, a lot more people wer more aware of purpose.. parami na kami mamromroblema nito, ahahahahaha.

so there it is: purpose.or paraphrased: "what's the point?" this is so tied up with "being" thatyou just can't separate them.. purpose and being. you have to "be" first, to really discern your purpose.. and "being " means you got toget to know who, what you are..it is always a work in progress until you get that "assent" from within the core of your reason and being.. and then it is still a work in progress only more purposeful haha(see one of my first posts entitled Being)

And this is a brief discussion of my early journey in this(drumroll please).. i first asked:"who am i?" and when i thought about it, i could only say "i am me." which was too accurate and too absurd too since i will not really learn anything about me that way^_^ so i asked"what am I?" and then amazingly, pinalampas ko sarili ko and didnt answer"i am what i am!", consequently the answer was something that i could work with(haha!):"tao, ungas!" ayun. tao daw ako according to me, hehe,then ""tao?"ano yun?wat does that mean, really?" stupid questions, 'no?
actually it was great because now i knew wat i was not(hayup, halaman, diyos, etc)!so i really had something to start with in trying to discern purpose.. the next question was"so wat makesme a "tao"?(don't you just love the filipino language and its "non-sexism?haha, translate tao to english in that context^_^)and an obvious answer arose quite quickly:"nag-iisip ako"(paraphrase Descartes:"i think therefore i am tao!"hehe) and the conclusion I came up with wasn't too long in coming...

Shouldn't it be my first responsibility, knowing aught else but that: "i think, therefore i am tao", to develop my Reason?(what makes me tao) so that i can be onwards to being "truly " tao. after all if we don't try to realize our potentials we're better off not having existed at all.a lion must be a lion, a fish truly fish, and a tao truly human di ba? and that for me is what was meant in the exhortation:"Be true."

The following is a ym conv with my good friend melvs who commented early in this post of mine nyahaha, the conversation helped me expound more(you are in da spot melvs!!^_^:

Toby Melvin: labo pa din no?
Toby Melvin: hehe
jedi nikz: our purpose is to BE
jedi nikz: hehe
jedi nikz: watever THAT is
Toby Melvin: korek!
Toby Melvin: ahaha
Toby Melvin: pero dude, it is what you think it
Toby Melvin: is
Toby Melvin: and not what is given
Toby Melvin: kung sabihin nilang tae ang pupose mo, pare you won't believe them
Toby Melvin: pero if they say better shempre, you agree and you go for it
Toby Melvin: di ba?
Toby Melvin: hehe
Toby Melvin: or i may be wrong, what do i know
Toby Melvin: ahahaha
Toby Melvin:
jedi nikz: nah no one can tell you your purpose as an andvidual, You discern it
jedi nikz: but being something, some purposes are intrinsic to that being
jedi nikz: like us..
Toby Melvin: yan ang tamang word - intrinsic
jedi nikz: we are something, tao tayo
jedi nikz: so being tao, it is intinsic that our purpose is to realizethat being.. be truly tao di ba?
Toby Melvin: tama dude
Toby Melvin: yan din yung sinasabi ko e
Toby Melvin: ahahaha
jedi nikz: tama ba conclusion ko? does you reason assent to that conclusion?
Toby Melvin: yan din yung sinasabi ko eh
jedi nikz: post iko tong conversation natin dun haha
Toby Melvin: i mean yan gdin yung thought ko
Toby Melvin: go ahead dude

Qoutable Qoute

I am Innocence!!!!^_^

Qoutable Qoutes

look around you isnt your very exsistence proof of something so much greater than life itself?

Awareness of the Essentials

are you awake or are you asleep?

most people spend their whole lives asleep..

Qoutable Qoutes

collection of qoutes that moved me..possible take-off points in coming posts^_^

"Seek freedom and become captive of your desires. Seek discipline and find your
liberty.
-The Coda"
Chapterhouse Dune
by Frank Herbert

"I never saw a wild thing sorry for itself.

A small bird will drop frozen, dead, from a bough
Without ever, having felt sorry, for itself."

-- D.H. Lawrence

"All governments suffer a recurring problem: Power attracts pathological
personalities. It is not that power corrupts but that it is magnetic to the
corruptible. Such people have a tendency to become drunk on violence, a
condition to which they are quickly addicted.

-Missionaria Protectiva, Text QIV (decto)"
Chapterhouse Dune
by Frank Herbert

"Humans are born with a susceptibility to that most persistent and debilitating
disease of intellect: self-deception. The best of all possible worlds and the
worst get their dramatic coloration from it. As nearly as we can determine,
there is no natural immunity. Constant alertness is required."

-The Coda"
Chapterhouse Dune
by Frank Herbert

Really love the last one, glad i found it =) so very true and so very apparent ^_^all of us have been victims haha. eternal vigilance and honesty is required.

A Prayer Shared

The Serenity Prayer

God grant me the serenity
to accept the things I cannot change;
courage to change the things I can;
and wisdom to know the difference.

for the full version.. google it. haha!^_^

Accountability

every individual is accountable ultimately to the self -- without delving further into this we can see the truth in this statement.
logically then.. "the formation of that self demands our utmost care and attention."(text in red is taken from "Chapterhouse Dune" by Frank Herbert). Are we giving it any thought at all?do majority of people see the need for this?how about the people you know?
This is what's been bugging me for so long since I assented to the propositions that:

• Man is a rational being
• Reason is what separates us as creatures from animals
• Reason is one of the two greatest gifts(grace) Man has received from his Creator (from God - the other being faith imho)
  

And it took the reading of the Dune series to finally have a proper introduction for me to try and discuss the topic^_^

now it can be argued by Theists that man is ultimately answerable to God, and reasoning men that the creature is ultimately answerable to the creator -- and i do subscribe to both ideas.. i would like to deal with "tao-tao lang muna" for a start, to accomodatethe most people including my atheist friends (they think they are, but.. will talk about this in another post) -- (we will try to go further in later posts perhaps?) .
so there it is "formation of that self demands our utmost care and attention"... the next question would naturally be.. how do we start going about it?and my basic answer to that is simply:"Learn the basics."(we can review and start with the proposed "essential human questions" on a previous post to set us off on our way.Learn more about yourself and what has formed you into what you are now since we were not as active formers-of-selves before we have come to realize the statements being presented here.. other things(be it persons, the environs, groups we were part of , and still part of) were responsible for forming our current "selves".. so let's try and start with the basic:

• ano ka?obviously, tao.and here are the other guide questions(what makes a "tao" tao?,what differentiates the "tao"?, what defines a "tao"?)this seems to be a nice place to start and this will lead to a lot oflearning that will be very essential in forming our "selves" to be truly "tao", so go on read, ask, discuss about it, and though i found my own answers to this i wouldn't want to color your perceptions with it, coz i knowthat i do not know much and i am very fond of stories.. specially from other people, they're how i learn, searching for stories and trying to see if i assent to them, and if i do i try to find wiser heads than me to discuss them or test them out with others, peers ideally but anyone reasonable generally to see if they too assent to the story/lesson.

now you may be wondering why i'm talking about this, i'm no philo teacher or nor wannabe wiseman, i am just a serious traveller in this journey of being who has been put into mentoring situations more times than normal(ayan confirmation na abnoy si yours truly@-@) and thus recognizing the general need for some guidance of most people me included, thus i began this blog after having been encouraged by my friends to write down my thoughts and what i have been saying in the hopes that more people can be reached daw(as if may sense pinagsasabi ko ^_^) and hopefullymoved to action, if moved by wat i had to say. but more than that they drove me to see the need to record wat i had to say kasi "sayang" daw though di ko pa makita kung bakit"sayang" since most of wat i say has been said already, in a better and more effective way than i possibly could, and recorded too..that's why dami ko excerpts sa blog ko hehehe pero bhala na i've decided to do so, albeit slowlyand shyly hahahaha.. so bear with me and do please post your comments or questions or reactions, violent or otherwise coz those will be my fuel to go on and share some more what little knowledge, learnings i have managed to gather in my nook.^_^ abangan... but then again, i'd rather talk than write hahaha!^_^

Duty - an excerpt (Book recommendation)

rare are the authors today who wrote to by/usingtheir convictions and fearlessly try to expose it and not just to please their target audience.past authors had stories to tell AND a lessons to impart(a contemporary author Terry Goodkind does come to mind in his Sword of Truth Series), or at least they tried to... such are CS Lewis, Ayn Rand, JRR Tolkien(LOTR Collection),Frank Herbert(Dune series/Collection).. so much so they are almost like philosophical dissertations done story-telling like, they still amaze me (word for the moment "amaze") in this case.. this one in particular comes from Robert Heinlein(during the 1950s i think), a sci-fi writer, and from a not so well-known story that was made into a cartoon series/and movie in the 90s, you may have heard of it, Starship Troopers, and the story's protagonist is of course the half-Filipino Johnny Rico, amazing how Rizal and the Philippines must have affected mr. Heinlein.. he also mentions Ramon Magsaysay here but only as a space craft, a battleship -- in a time when the y were named after the"greatest men" the human race produced.. amazing!(that word gain)!


"...Mr. Dubois then turned to me. "I told you that `juvenile delinquent' is
a contradiction in terms. `Delinquent' means `failing in duty.' But duty is
an adult virtue -- indeed a juvenile becomes an adult when, and only when,
he acquires a knowledge of duty and embraces it as dearer than the self-love
he was born with. There never was, there cannot be a `juvenile delinquent.'
But for every juvenile criminal there are always one or more adult
delinquents -- people of mature years who either do not know their duty, or
who, knowing it, fail....."

i'll be adding qoutes from that story here in the hopes it may move some of you to read it and hopefullyextract a nice learning experience from that great story teller

"...The basis of all morality is duty, a concept with the same relation to
group that self-interest has to individual. Nobody preached duty to these
kids in a way they could understand -- that is, with a spanking. But the
society they were in told them endlessly about their `rights.' "
"The results should have been predictable, since a human being has no
natural rights of any nature."

Mr. Dubois had paused. Somebody took the bait. "Sir? How about `life,
liberty, and the pursuit of happiness'?"

"Ah, yes, the `unalienable rights.' Each year someone quotes that
magnificent poetry.

Life? What `right' to life has a man who is drowning in
the Pacific? The ocean will not hearken to his cries. What `right' to life
has a man who must die if he is to save his children? If he chooses to save
his own life, does he do so as a matter of `right'? If two men are starving
and cannibalism is the only alternative to death, which man's right is
`unalienable'? And is it `right'?

As to liberty, the heroes who signed that
great document pledged themselves to buy liberty with their lives. Liberty
is never unalienable; it must be redeemed regularly with the blood of
patriots or it always vanishes. Of all the so-called `natural human rights'
that have ever been invented, liberty is least likely to be cheap and is
never free of cost.

"The third `right'? -- the `pursuit of happiness'? It is indeed
unalienable but it is not a right; it is simply a universal condition which
tyrants cannot take away nor patriots restore. Cast me into a dungeon, burn
me at the stake, crown me king of kings, I can `pursue happiness' as long as
my brain lives -- but neither gods nor saints, wise men nor subtle drugs,
can insure that I will catch it....."

rant

o boy.. i'm bored. i'm spending too much time online.. wasting my time again for the nth time.. posting funny coments t o my friends' accounts can only entertain you for so long. wasted asround 9hours today geez.. nobody even to talk to.. kahit sa net! ngyn pinagtritripan ko na tong blog nato.. and this post will not amount to much, or make sense much..i need to get back to work!! sheesh! left extremeties, wake up!!! not used to bumming around it's making me crazy.. all over again. does this go on cycles? i sure hope not. i really need someone to talk with, bond with i guess.but why? why the need? malamang kulang na talaga ako sa pansin feeling ko i'm slowly disappearing ala fading away.hehehehe drama pero yun nga feeling ko --... been out of circulation for how many months now? going on 7? can't imagine being in prison for 20 years!!7mos pa lng ako and not technically in prison nababaliw na ako, ano pa yung 20 years????siyetnamalagket. i'm still well-off considering. now if only the left arm/hand would only wake up more.. sooner it'd be very nice.. -sigh- but patience and prayer is everything.. hand in hand dapat tlga yan sila. i should stop whining now and try to make sense and be more positive. senxa na o dear reader, i am not like this, it just has been too damn lonely lately.. and only since last late december have i known insecurity- correction that'd be October it all came crashing down nung december, lumala kumbaga. but that's another story hahaha! abangan.... hopefully not in vain>;p

hmm i'd like to talk about kipling for a change Rudyardkipling that is -- very good writer/poet, very posititvespecially yung If nya and yung epitaph of a gentleman

If

If you can keep your head when all about you
Are losing theirs and blaming it on you;
If you can trust yourself when all men doubt you,
But make allowance for their doubting too;

If you can wait and not be tired by waiting,
Or being lied about, don't deal in lies,
Or being hated, don't give way to hating,
And yet don't look too good, nor talk too wise:

If you can dream -- and not make dreams your master;
If you can think -- and not make thoughts your aim;
If you can meet with Triumph and Disaster
And treat those two imposters just the same;

If you can bear to hear the truth you've spoken
Twisted by knaves to make a trap for fools,
Or watch the things you gave your life to, broken,
And stoop and build 'em up with worn-out tools;

If you can make one heap of all your winnings
And risk it on one turn of pitch-and-toss,
And lose, and start again at your beginnings
And never breathe a word about your loss;

If you can force your heart and nerve and sinew
To serve your turn long after they are gone,
And so hold on when there is nothing in you
Except the Will which says to them: "Hold on!"

If you can talk with crowds and keep your virtue,
Or walk with kings -- nor lose the common touch,
If neither foes nor loving friends can hurt you,
If all men count with you, but none too much;

If you can fill the unforgiving minute
With sixty seconds' worth of distance run --
Yours is the Earth and everything that's in it,
And -- which is more -- you'll be a Man, my son!

there it is, an almost complete guide nicely done in almost perfect rhyme and meter, amazing. now if only more people would take this to heart and try to make it their own..there surely will be better persons out there in the world.when I can make this truly my own, i surely would be better all - around, and also where it will count the most presumably too. and it goes without saying that this applies to daughters too. but did i really have to point that out?^_^

Try it why dontcha?

ok, get to this site and click"take the test"underthe Jung Typology Test topic.. and take the test d-uh =).. after taking it..take the time to read the descriptions of your results(there are two description links in the results page. bookmark those pages, fun to reread them and get to know psychology's/Jung's take on your current personality type.. it does change.^_^ then post those links in your web pasge or blogger if you wantand dare.. its nice. me, ahm too private to post it but i will give it to those who ask. specially ifthey also have done the test and promise to supply me with thir results.. suffice it to say that i am an "INFJ", i know people who are "INTJ" and "ENTJ" pretty accurate descrips too, it was creepy haha except for the "ESFP" person - who claims the descrip was waay off^_^

oh yeah, the results page also has some career guidance options that were creepy too , take time to read and you may just know/realize something that may help you in deciding what to do/not do in life .. anything to make life a bit easier for evryone! miniimize error repeatition, always my motto!Good Luck, have fun!!

A prayer Shared

whew ! daming kong pinost hahahathough karamihan excerpts pa rin ^_^ pero at least meron ng ganito.. a'hm blogging! lolz! and i would like to start a tradition for every significant "blurts" i get.. like one i had ngayon.. after these blurts i'll try to find a newly encountered prayer to post here that fits what i have been blurting about.. basta kung ma-connect ko ilalagay ko and fortunately meron akong isa ngyn wehehehehe ^_^ (this one has humor in it pa, these Jesuits are something else hahaha see for yourselves:

Patient Trust

by Fr. Pierre Teilhard de Chardin, S.J.

Above all, trust in the slow work of God.
We are quite naturally impatient in everything
to reach the end without delay.
We should like to skip the intermediate stages.
We are impatient of being on the way
to something unknown,
something new.
Yet it is the law of all progress that is made
by passing through some stages of instability
and that may take a very long time.

And so I think it is with you.
Your ideas mature gradually. Let them grow.
Let them shape themselves without undue haste.
Do not try to force them on
as though you could be today what time
-- that is to say, grace --
and circumstances
acting on your own good will
will make you tomorrow.
Only God could say what this new Spirit
gradually forming in you will be.

Give our Lord the benefit of believing
that his hand is leading you,
and accept the anxiety of feeling yourself
in suspense and incomplete.
Above all, trust in the slow work of God,
our loving vine-dresser.

Amen.

To be or not to be

you know? that really is the question!. and it disturbs me greatly that most people don't really give a damn!=)they want to "keep it real!" (keeping it real.. to which the indefatigable Chris Rock retorts:"yeah.. real dumb!^_^) and i guess ole Chris has got a point. after all, what can you really know, or truly learn when you don't even try to ask, much more seek for the answers to, the "essential humanquestions"... who am i? what am i?where do i come from(whence man?)?where am i going(wither man?)?i thnk it was Socrates who once said.."the unexamined life is not worth living." and you all know where he was coming from when he said that....i'll blurt it out anyway:"what was the point?"

Being

i would like to start with this kumbaga: define. so here's the initial definition:

Being means: not numbering and counting, but ripening like a tree, which doesn't force its sap, and stands confidently in the storms of spring, not afraid that afterward summer may not come. It does come. But it comes only to those who are patient, who are there as if eternity lay before them, so unconcernedly silent and vast. I learn it every day of my life, learn it with pain I am grateful for: patience is everything!

And you should not let yourself be confused in your solitude by the fact that there is something in you that wants to move out of it. This very wish, if you use it calmly and prudently and like a tool, will help you spread out your solitude over a great distance. Most people have (with the help of conventions) turned their solutions toward what is easy and toward the easiest side of the easy; but it is clear that we must trust in what is difficult; everything alive trusts in it, everything in Nature grows and defends itself any way it can and is spontaneously itself, tries to be itself at all costs and against all opposition. We know little, but that we must trust in what is difficult is a certainty that will never abandon us; it is good to be solitary, for solitude is difficult; that something is difficult must be one more reason for us to do it.

Journey of a thousand Miles

and this is my first step. well this is it. melvin will be tickled pink^_^ i will try to really blog here rather than just post excerpts from articles i've read that moved me.. as in my friendster blog. i will still do that but i'm sure i'll have my reflections/reactions recorded too(pwede ko gawin sa frendster but hey, sometimes it's nice to start afresh>;p

and to keep me "rockin'" let me put this excerpt from Edmund Campion ^_^ as an added inspiration:
from Campion's "Brag"(google it, or wiki edmund campion, it's fun to know some of the exploits of the Jesuits):
...The expense is reckoned, the enterprise is begun; it is of God; it cannot be withstood. So the faith was planted: So it must be restored.

^_^ God bless us all!!!