Re: Bob's 'Self-aggrandizing ignorant' Count: Was: What databases have taught me

From: Marshall <marshall.spight_at_gmail.com>
Date: 29 Jun 2006 23:44:00 -0700
Message-ID: <1151649839.966346.322450_at_x69g2000cwx.googlegroups.com>


Keith H Duggar wrote:
> Marshall wrote:
> > Bob Badour wrote:
> > > I wonder why it pisses you off. Regardless, it shows
> > > strength of character to say it in spite of your
> > > emotional response.
> >
> > Oh, I don't know that it's anything more complicated than
> > vehemently and publicly disagreeing with someone and
> > discovering in the end that they were right and I was
> > wrong.
>
> "There is something to be learned from a rainstorm. When
> meeting with a sudden shower, you try not to get wet and run
> quickly along the road; and do such things as pass under the
> eaves of houses; but you still get wet. When you are
> resolved from the beginning, you will not be perplexed,
> though you still get the same soaking. This understanding
> extends to all things." -- Yamamoto Tsunetomo

Oh, my. Samurai philosophy in c.d.t.

Actually, I've kinda done the bushido thing to death. Read Book of FiveRings, Zen Flesh Zen Bones, etc. before it was cool. Moved in to a dojo shortly after college. Lived there for a year and a half. Up at 5:30, sword or staff for an hour from the senior apprentice, tend to the shomen, fix sensei's coffee, train in every class. Sensei kicks my ass every day, twice when I'm not paying attention. Later, trips to Japan, live in the dojo there, get yelled at for any damn thing, rice until you never want to see it again, bugs as big as your hand. Training and more training. Collect the leaves in the forest around the Aiki Jinja. Scrub the benjo.

The countryside is quite pretty.

> Accept that as humans we are inevitably wrong from time to
> time. It is simply nature. Resolve yourself to this fact and
> gain peace from the acceptance. Then the rainstorm becomes a
> refreshing change from the aridity of perfection.

I was taught the don't-flinch-in-the-rain thing, and the same thing for sunshine. To this day when someone drops a plate in a restaurant and it shatters, everyone jumps except me.

But I most identify with the monk who said, "My Zen is this: when I am hungry, I eat; when I am tired, I sleep." And when I act like a dumbass, I get mad at myself, and then I stop.

Draw, cut, return.

Marshall Received on Fri Jun 30 2006 - 08:44:00 CEST

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