VAGINA

Ashley Wells, Dhr. Seven, CC Liu, Wisdom Quarterly; Eve Ensler, Krista Tippett (onbeing.org)

These new uniforms breathe much better than the old ones for better cycling (Telegraph).

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What the?!

One day the neuroscientists asked the Tibetan Buddhist monks to come into the lab to meditate. The monks only having a vague idea of what the scientists were after agreed and came in.

What's this supposed to measure? (RF)

But as they were about to be fitted with helmet like neural sensors to "scientifically" observe consciousness or the analogues of awareness, they all laughed and asked, What are you doing?

The scientists dutifully explained that the flexible helmets were built with an array of metal sensors that would touch their scalps and pick up minute electrical fluctuations in wave-like patterns... No, we know all that! the monks exclaimed. But why aren't you putting the sensors over our hearts?!

Tibetan monks in meditation (Laura Murphy)

Dumb scientists, dumb Americans, dumb the whole Western world -- don't you know the seat of consciousness is experientially at the heart? YOU can test that. Sit in meditation and locate the "mind door." It's greenish and reflects conscious experience just around the heart, not that goo-crammed cranium. When will popular-science catch up? We know that secret (black budget)-science already knows.

Hey, guys, you can't say [CENSORED]!

New science: The experiment that "proves" the brain is the source of consciousness is applying mild electrical stimulation to the exposed brain. When this area is touched, one relives a memory. Did you know there are more neurons all along the lining of the gut and others in the heart. Why not apply mild electrical stimulation there? Know what will happen? Same thing as the brain!

The body is holistic, consciousness holographic; every cell knows, and every cells contains the same instructions. Knowing is not limited to the body or any seat of awareness: the sensitive tissue in the eye, ear, nose, tongue, skin, or heart. Want to suffer from severe depression? Let doctors remove a portion of your colon, where most of the serotonin and other neurotransmitters are. Want to knock someone out? Punch him/her in the heart or head. But be careful as it could kill the person, who is likely to go unconscious and into shock or arrythmia. Science is not very scientific, never living up to its own ideals. It's almost as bad as religion in this regard.

What is consciousness?

But isn't it interesting that we all believe what we are told by science? "Consciousness"  (vinanna, manas, cittas, mano, a PROCESS defined in exacting detail by the Enlightened One in terms of five phenomenal groupings and particles and mind-moments) is in the head, between the ears, behind the eyes? Poppycock! The ancients had it right, as do most children. It's in the heart, the heart. Where is the origin of the world? Well, not the heart; that's the center of conscious experience. The origin of the world is... mmm, we'll let Eve tell you:

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• Buddhism understands consciousness; science does not
• The Association for the Scientific Study of Consciousness

France to Facebook Corporation [which, in league with FBI, spies on Americans]: We'll tell you what counts as "porn" on social networks; you won't tell us (independent.co.uk).

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The Body After the C-Word

"The Tepidarium." Why the Dickens do we despise Victorian art? (dailymail.co.uk).

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Salomé (Gustave Moreau, 1876)

Eve Ensler has helped women all over the world tell the stories of their lives through the stories of their bodies. Her play, "The Vagina Monologues," has become a global force in the face of violence against women and girls.

She herself also had a violent childhood. And it turns out that she, like so many Western women, was obsessed with her body yet was not inhabiting her body. But she did not know she was not inhabiting her body -- until she got cancer. More
 

The Disease of Being Busy Our overscheduled lives leave little time for contemplation and reflection. How do we enable each other to pause and reflect together and ask how our hearts are doing? (Omid Safi)

Pussy Riot in a courtroom cage, circa 2012, with Nadya T. on right (nytimes.com)

The Tree of Contemplative Practices An illustration of contemplative practices showing the breadth of meditation and mindfulness within traditions. It certainly opens up one's understanding about how these disciplines take root and manifest themselves in our lives, no? (Trent Gilliss)

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