Fakir

A video made in 1965 by the French television.
Here.

Immoderation and excessiveness

I was really shocked when I saw a picture (then videos) of the 7th yoga gathering in Times Square NY: an important amount of people doing asanas in one of the most famous public places in the world, among cars and by-passers.
A public statement?
Marketing?
I find this to be a scarry phenomenon.
Yoga is a personal practice not a circus act!
The huge industry that developped and continues to grow around "yoga" brings billions of dollars each year, but the more marketized yoga gets, the more it is made "chewable" and "available" to the masses, the more it becomes a physical exercise with the aspirations of a "spiritual" practice. There is nothing traditional about the way we, Westerners, do yoga. And yet all groups lay claim to such a heritage.
What a mess.

Ear and sound

It all started with an Alfred Tomatis (founder of the Tomatis Method) article on the energetics of sound and mantra listening (fascinating article but I'm too lazy to write about it right now) and this led me on youtube searching for more videos on his method and, as you well know, once you're on youtube you're bound to make all sorts of Hesse-an discoveries. So this search led me for some reason to the tuvan throat singing then to throat techniques then to ave maria tuvan style then to comments then to Bobby McFerrin. I never realized how amazing this fellow was!!!!!!!!!!!!
This is an excellent video in 10 parts with him and some neuro scientists. Worth to watch!! Part 1/... just follow the lead.

Fresh air

I have indulged these past days in reading Stephen Batchelor's Buddhism Without Beliefs, a book after my own heart. Since it is a non-dogmatic approach to the dharma (several translations possible, but let's say "teaching of the Buddha"), it can profitably be read by anyone who dares question their most cherished beliefs.

The book is filled with enlightening and common sensical remarks, but the one that struck me the most is probably the following:
"An agnostic Buddhist eschews atheism as much as theism, and is reluctant to regard the universe as devoid of meaning as endowed with meaning. For to deny either God or meaning is simply the antithesis of affirming them. Yet such an agnostic stance is not based on disinterest. It is founded on a passionate recognition that I do not know. It confronts the enormity of having been born instead of reaching for the consolation of belief. It strips away, layer by layer, the views that conceal the mystery of being here - either by affirming it as something or denying it as nothing."
In order to be able to confront the mystery of life as it is, one obviously needs a lot of training. Decades of conditioning have to be brought to consciousness, then gently put aside. Tout un programme.

Here are the three parts of an excellent talk Stephen gave on "Buddhism and the art of imagining": Part 1/ Part 2/ Part 3.

Ch'an Buddhism

John R. McRae podcast on "Rethinking the Rhetoric of Meditative Experience in Chinese Buddhism" : here. Yey!
Also, the introduction written by the same author to Introduction to Zen Buddhism: a history.