Kōan Fragments of a Distorted World #9 (with a nod to Lawrence Ferlinghetti’s book "Pictures of the Gone World")

Decades ago I read the book “Zen Mind, Beginner’s Mind (1970)” by Shunryū Suzuki; what stays with me is the title, one of my mantras put into practice, ever-reminding of being present and doing things with the awareness of a beginner’s mind; in other words, paying attention as if day one at a job, and not assuming I know everything or even much at all. With everyday chores or anything one has done umpteen times, beginner’s mind keeps you fresh and alert, or as the book states: “In the beginner's mind there are many possibilities, but in the expert's there are few.”

Then there’s a book I have not read but the title also stays with me. Alan Watts' “The Wisdom of Insecurity (1951).” Personally, that serves as a reminder that it is OK to feel unsure or insecure. I know from experience that simply allowing those feelings, rather than trying to deny or over-compensate for them, helps me grow wiser, and it is wiser not as an answer to a question rather wiser as to the potentials of a situation. When a situation arises or someone is behaving a certain way, I can check the memory bank of experience: ‘Oh, I’ve seen THIS one before and what tends to happen next is....’ Or, 'THIS is new to me, what feels like the best way to respond?'

It’s an ongoing learning experience. As to world affairs, my beginner's mind wonders: If there are so many experts nowadays, why are there still so many problems?

speaking of seen this one before
It only took President Biden a little over four months to display the kind of behavior a lot of folks abhorred Trump for. During a speech at Joint Base Langley-Eustice in Hampton, Virginia, he suddenly commented on a young girl's appearance:

"I love those barrettes in your hair, man. I tell you what, look at her, she looks like she’s 19 years old, sitting there like a little lady with her legs crossed."[1]

Ok so like aside from the obvious creepiness, referring to a young girl as “man” is just plain awkward, not to mention verbally lazy. Yet the potus (puppet of the united states) can't hide behind a mask of corporate-state shenanigans. “The manager’s amendment to the U.S. competitiveness bill senators are now debating on the Senate floor includes a $10 billion authorization for Blue Origin, the space flight company owned by Jezz Bezos, one of the world’s richest men.”[2]

So let me get this straight, the US wants to put up $10-billion to help a man who eats Ben Franklins for breakfast? Something is rotten in Bidenmark. Or as Gil Scott-Heron spoken worded it in 1970:

“No hot water, no toilets, no lights / But whitey's on the moon … The price of food is goin up / And if all that crap wasn't enough / A rat done bit my sister Nell / With whitey on the moon / Her face and arm began to swell / And whitey's on the moon.”

speaking of misappropriated language
Don't you just sleep better at night now that FedEx and Amazon are suddenly devoted to Earth?

From the creepily titled article “Amazon’s New Algorithm Will Set Workers’ Schedules According to Muscle Use”:

"Despite what we've accomplished, it's clear to me that we need a better vision for our employees' success,” Bezos wrote. “We have always wanted to be Earth's Most Customer-Centric Company. We won't change that. But I am committing us to an addition. We are going to be Earth’s Best Employer and Earth’s Safest Place to Work."[3]

So, why the billions for space flight?!

But wait, there's more ... sacrilegiousity: “Amazon’s New ‘AmaZen’ Program Will Show Warehouse Workers Meditation Videos.”[4]

From the Chinese “Ch'an,” Zen is a Japanese flavor of Mahayana Buddhism and Taoist ways. Misappropriating the name of an ancient spiritual/religious way of life is akin to the distorted use of Native images and English words for sports teams. Is nothing symbolically or verbally sacred?

Apparently not. “The light … it comes from within,” says the all-electric Cadillac Lyriq TV ad, then, “... the impact we make, comes from the energy we create.”

there are people in every so-called thing
Part of the problem with so-called energy efficiency and slogans is that they get talked about in abstract terms with lack of respect for personhood and lack of concern for the effects on actual living beings, both human and non-human.

FedEx's new slogan “We’re making electric vehicles our priority because Earth is our priority. Our goal: carbon neutral by 2040” cries in the face of a proposed lithium mine at Thacker Pass in Nevada, lithium being a key ingredient for electric vehicle batteries. Thacker Pass is part of the traditional homelands of the Shoshone and Paiute People that the mining threatens to destroy. To learn more and take action to stop the mining, see:

“People of Red Mountain Statement of Opposition to Lithium Nevada Corp’s Proposed Thacker Pass Open Pit Lithium Mine“

& Protect Thacker Pass & here.

go with the flow has gone mainstream
As to a world gone Commodities R Us:

“The concept of liquid modernity was developed by the Polish sociologist Zygmunt Bauman... Personal contact and relationships were trivialized, being intermediated by electronic devices and the internet in liquid modernity... Economic relations were superimposed on social and human relations... so people started to be strongly analyzed not for what they are, but for what they buy. The idea of buying also entered social relations, and people started to buy affection and attention. … In liquid modernity, having is more important than being. The trivialization of friendship and dating are reflections of this way of life that prioritizes consumption and objectifies people.”[5]

So what would we do if things change as drastically as a year of Covid-19 hinted at? Here's a Zen Earth techno-kōan, a footnote from “Writing with awareness of the Earth and the techno-sphere” by Katie Singer, an article worth reading:

“'In 1989, when the USSR broke up and Cuba lost its oil supply, overnight, Cubans traded their cars for bicycles; turned parking lots into farms, and shared their available electronics with neighbors so that the country could survive. Could this serve as an example of a possible response to the techno-sphere’s damaging, unsustainable growth?' - Faith Morgan, “The Power of Community,” 2006.”[6]

NOTES:
[1] “AT EASE, JOE! Biden slammed for ‘creepy’ comments about veteran’s daughter as he compliments little girl’s legs & says she ‘looks 19’”

[2] “Senate competitiveness bill includes $10B authorization for Bezos space company”

[3] See here.

[4] See here.

[5] See here.

[6] “Writing with awareness of the Earth and the techno-sphere.”

Mankh (Walter E. Harris III) is an essayist and resident poet at Axis of Logic. His forthcoming book is Moving Through The Empty Gate Forest: inside looking out. In addition to his work as a writer and small press publisher, he travels a holistic mystic pathway staying in touch with Turtle Island. His website is here.

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