travel!!

Going through my photos to put them on the website, I had such a longing to travel again. It really is a wonderful thing, a true eye-opener. You live your life in a certain manner, and accordingly perceive it a certain way. You do this within a society that provides a framework of reference for your character, morals, and beliefs. Then you go to another country where people live in an entirely different manner. Their attitude towards life would be frowned upon in another country, but in their country it is successful, and they as human beings are content. It really drives home the point that life is not always the way that we see it, that it is a broad and intricate tapestry ,and we should occasionally pull our face away from studying a few threads from a narrow distance, and look at the whole tapestry from a different angle so that we can appreciate its beauty and design.
We are partly shaped by our experiences. When we gone though a wide range of experiences it helps to shape us into a more complete, adaptable and durable human being.
Neural networks in computers work by training a system by feeding it input, until it is able to successfully master any input. The training is dependant on the learning it receives. Now, human brains also work with neural networks. The more broad and diverse that the training is, the better the end result.
That is partly why I find people that are too entrenched in a culture to be brittle and narrow minded. I have learned that culture can be important to give someone a base. But they should not hold unto their culture at all costs. Sometimes it is not what is needed for their personal development.

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How to really gain

I received this in the mail from a friend:“While walking out of work on the public holiday, I grabbed a fruit juice fromone of the fridges.
As I cross the road I see a beggar in an old gown scratching throughthe bin for some food. he pulls out an old Iced Tea can and pourssome of the remaining liquid out that has ash, insects and other thingsfloating on the top. Without thinking, I cross the road again to him,push his hand down with the can in his hand and asked him to pleasenot drink that. I gave him my juice instead and have never seensomeone so happy. That made my women’s day.”
it is something that i see with every day. when you spend money on yourself, it gives a certain amount of satisfaction. buy something for someone that really needs something, see their real joy, and see how much more you gain from it.
and it is not really about charity, or being soft or too liberal. the yoga teachings state it simply, that the more advanced a human is, the more they realise how closely they are connected to other humans, and other beings. in fact, this is a direct test of someones state of development.
the simple man cares only about himself. then as he grows through lifetimes, he starts to care about his family, then his tribe, then his race, then his nation, until eventually he cares about all people. the advanced human does not feel peace until all of his fell0w humans, know happiness.
the reason behind this, is how closely we are linked. ultimately, we are one being. if you hurt another, you hurt a part of yourself. when we treat the poorest being with compassion and dignity, we are honouring the source from which we all come. because we all have the same spark inside of us, some just have more rubbish around the spark. but that spark is there, and gives them their divine nature.

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It doesn't matter

I had been neglecting something very important the last few months, and that was daily yoga and meditation. When I resumed the practice, I was quickly struck by how valuable it is, and the lack of recent practice explained my recent uneasiness.
There is one realisation that strikes me very powerfully when I sit in meditation. You withdraw into your centre, get in touch with your core, and everything else around you fades in significance. This leads to the understanding that this would be possible whatever the surrounding circumstances were.
In other words, what is happening around you, the circumstances that you find yourself in, can not really affect you, who you are, what you are made of. That is always the same. And when you understand that, it makes it easier to face whatever comes in your day. Because it can not really affect you. Nothing can really change what you are.
It is partly to come to this understanding, that Life throws us the curveballs that it so loves to pepper us with. Because through the endurance of suffering and tragedy and triumph and despair, as we learn its separation from ourselves and our state of being, we start to come towards some very powerful knowledge.

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test 2

is this blasted thing working yet?

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