Free Free Free!
I can hardly believe that this is my hundredth post. It feels like a celebration is in order, but I’m not sure how to do that on a platform of this nature. All of this is free to everyone, with no fees or advertisements. It has always been a repository for my thoughts that were often inspired by the perspective of others. It has provided order to what can be a jumble sale in my mind.
Although many of the things that I wrote about were thoughts I held during times of suffering, this blog has given me a place to transform them into something meaningful, instructive, fun, and soulfully profitable.
But I have noticed that when things are free, people don’t always value them. If the items at the Salvation Army didn’t have a small price tag, it would be an actual free-for-all, with the attending chaos. People would lose respect for the dignity of themselves and others. And as the saying goes in the comedy world, people laugh harder at a show they’ve paid to see.
Although there are no financial transactions on this site, there are ones of time and energy on both sides. So, I will charge you a few minutes for your reading enjoyment, with something better than the free and traditionally devalued fortune cookie. A fortune cookie isn’t from Asia, it tastes bland, and its oracular sayings are fairly superstitious and devoid of meaning.
What is from Asia, however, is the richly varied, tasty, and meaningful I Ching, or Book of Changes that Confucius consulted regularly, which has been held sacred for millennia. It’s not like a horoscope, or a reading of Tarot cards, or palms, or auras, or anything of that nature. I don’t know what it is, but my experience of it is sort of like playing dice with someone who can read your mind. They may know you, but the roll is the same as it would be for a stranger. You’re not going to win baby a new pair of shoes or lose your shirt, but you may find an interesting space for meditating on the way the world and people change, as an Immutable Law of The Way Things Are.
The Way Things Are is the Law of the Past. The Law of the Future is What Now? The Change from one to the other lies within that ungovernable space of the present moment. That space is where we find the dime that turns, the brick that falls, the hinge, the keel, the burst of inspiration, the epiphany, the startled realization, the spin on the axis, the chance, the nudge, the shot, the pitch, the tweak, the flux.
For fun, I consulted this Book of Changes for something I could give away in the spirit of celebration and accomplishment. Here are some excerpts from the reading I received:
The cast hexagram is titled Inner Truth, and seems fitting to my proposed question: What should be the topic of my 100th post? It goes on to say, "The gentle wind ripples the lake’s surface. The Superior Person finds common ground between points of contention, wearing away rigid perspectives that would lead to fatal error."
Ok, my antennae are up, because I would rather not be led to fatal error. How do I avoid that? Apparently, by finding tranquility.
“The subject discovers a key to Tranquility by first gaining insight into his own nature, then turning that vision outward. By resolving inner conflicts and being at peace with himself, he learns to gain insight into others. In effect, he enters another, sees with the other’s eyes, listens with the other’s ears, feels with the other’s heart. He then returns to his own center, with new perspective and understanding.”
If there has been any obvious aspect of this blog, it is that I have received and presented insight from the perspective of others. The time I’ve spent crafting it has been tranquil, but not sedate. I feel calm, energized, enlightened and entertained every time, and I have wished the same for my readers. My ideas have always originated with someone else; those who have been kind enough to share their wisdom. Because it was freely offered, it is freely given.
The Changing Line, upon which this reading sways: “Finding himself, his serene inner flame radiates warmth that draws others near. He does not Do; he just Is.”
If you have drawn near and felt warmth, then I do hope you feel you have indeed won a Grand Prize. I know I have, by your coming. Thank you.
To Jennifer: I'm forever indebted to your guidance from under the Teal Arbor that started me down this road of riches.
