Tilda Moose's Typography

My focus is appallingly narrow for now, concerned with begging for benefits so I can just pay the rent and bills, and even if I had any financial security which I have yet to see, I still don't know if my condition is getting worse, nor if I'm doing enough to help it. Very much a crucifixion sort of feeling. Struggling while a bit fucked. I don't like it.

There's always the option of whether I succumb to feeling overwhelmed or not. I prefer not; more ideas are possible then.

We all have to live within limits. It's not until your health goes, or your income disappears, that you realise how finite a lifetime is.

I'm clearly long overdue for a good meditation, to just let go of these jangling chains of thought. Only the body is sick. Only the wallet is empty. My mind can still expand into profound calm, despite it all.

A Moose's Musings

Seems I must declare my findings to the world, as I uncover them. As much to share the truth of any good news, as to invite dialog to purify the ideas further.

As you may know, I'm shit scared of getting ill and dying, quite often every day and night. I'm depressed about it and I drag my arse through the day, hoping not to bring others down around me. But I seem to have been finding more mind hacks to cope. I seem to have distilled the following terror-quenching ideas, mostly based on the notes of numerous venerable Buddhist masters. I can't claim to have discovered these things first hand through insight meditation etc., but will be meditating on them for sure:

1. There's nothing. Ajahn Chah reportedly said this to Ajahn Brahm. Makes sense to me, if everything we perceive is automatically labelled by our minds. There seems to be an option to turn this default mode lightspeed labelling machine off, at least for periods of time, if not forever. It means to me that everything we are snarled up in, is hollow, empty, devoid of lasting self-existence. That's good news to me. There's nothing unless we say otherwise. It's perfectly ok to let go of all ideation, conceptualisation, thought process, automatic thinking, computations. The calm mind can soar to infinite heights and depths when unfettered by earthly concerns, and so it should, because it's the best gift in the universe. There, see... I forgot about being scared for my situation. Which is the more helpful state to abide in?

2. Being reborn may be optional. Being born at all is no weirder than being born again, in my view. Currently in my little lifetime, I'm tired, sick, dying. I've been chasing all the safety, fame, fortune, trappings, posessions etc. that any normal person might, and it's just bloody exhausting. I wouldn't want to live another human life if there's a choice. But what about the Bodhisattva view – such love for all sentient beings, that infinite rebirths are no problem to them if it helps others? This is as far as I can see, so far.

3. Suffering is based on clinging, ie. both longing for stuff and hating stuff. I have repeatedly verified that if I want what I haven’t got, or hate what I have got, I suffer. It hurts, it's inconvenient, it leads to additional mental loops and rabbit holes. However, if I can learn to let go, there's nothing to crave nor despise. This is deeply nourishing for the tired care-worn mind.

4. This life is an opportunity to awaken to the possibility of no more death and rebirth. Fortunately I have taken a great interest in enlightenment, meditation, good conduct that leads to liberation; the refuge of the Buddha & Dharma & Sangha. I am supremely interested in the idea of no further birth and death, as seems promised if we realise the ending of greed, hatred and ignorance. There's just my niggling unclarity regarding the Bodhisattva view, of refusing Nirvana until all sentient beings are freed from ignorance etc. I'm chewing on this, dear friends.

This is supposed to verify me Mastodon

It's big good news to me that we are better advised to not crave delightful things, nor hate abhorrent things. What transcends these, they say, is cultivating a detached state of equanimity, realising that all pleasant and unpleasant things will pass, and abiding in a permanently available state of consciousness that is unaffected by craving nor hatred. In other words, it's good news that happiness is not permanent; one can make inferential inroads from this fact.

My upbringing, my neurodiviersity, my culture... all conspired to make me believe that I should always have something to look forward to, be happy about, strive for, fight for/against, worry about gaining or losing, etc. This describes a pretty constant state of suffering, never settled nor satisfied, seeking and not finding.

All this also failed spectacularly to inform me with any credible stories, myths, legends etc. of how it is we are here; how birth and death work; what it may be to be unborn and undying; what happens when loved ones die; how the individual relates to the planet and the cosmos; whether individuality is as much an illusion as reality is; and so on.

Not until my second cancer and its continuation over the last 6 years, did I begin to dismantle this ready-made idea that life should be a certain way. What seemed so solid, is arguably hollow and void; just a label, a descriptor, while conditions last. The self-identity of “I”, “me”, “mine” is reportedly as faulty as can be. The same goes for that table over there... see Lama Zopa Rinpoche: How Things Exist (Teachings on Emptiness), p.44 “How a Table Exists”.

The avoidance of identifying with a separately existing self, appears to offer multiple panaceas. Namely, if I don't really exist as I thought and was taught, then who is there to get upset, be offended, live or die? This seems to me to be how some masters are able to endure dentistry without anaesthesia, insult without hurt, genocide without retaliation, death without fear.

It's approaching superhuman, but then why shouldn't we.

Thich Nhat Hanh is an enduring hero of mine. He carried the can so much further and harder than I ever will; left an incredible legacy of philosophy, poetry, study centres, social media bots spouting his wisdom, hopefully traceably correct.

Experiencing family and friends dying around him in Vietnam, dodging death several times himself, yet still finding the compassion to see the humanity in both the oppressor and oppressed – these were the conditions to compress this man's soul into a kind of diamond. Our world is unarguably so much richer for his experiences and contributions.

A particular concept that he promoted, that I love, is what he calls 'interbeing'. In this, we investigate the deep interconnection between all people, creatures, phenomena.

[He] created this practice to help people develop the insight of the interconnected nature of reality and the human experience, which could then lead to a “collective awakening”.[9]

So, by looking and seeing more deeply into ~

the interconnectedness of life, what gives rise to what, what each and every thing depends upon to be and become, . . it certainly helps to calm my chronic cancer/death anxiety that's fairly recently become unbearable. How?

No health means no wealth. Can't, and don't really want to, party on a sick body or mind! So the priority is gratitude and reverence for the incredible fact of experiencing conscious life in a human lifetime, and make the most of every remaining breath of it. Therefore, the stuff and things we amass in this lifetime ought to be of far less concern than maintaining a fit vehicle for this temporary little earth life.

Not clinging to this life, given its demonstrably temporary and changeable nature. I throw myself upon the open oceans of the universe to carry me, as they already have and likely will a little further.

Not clinging to moments, memories, nostalgic narratives; nor plans, imaginings, or speculations.

While I still have the gift of the present moment, I can practice compassion, love, gratitude, kindness, curiosity, repairs, healing. If I can bring any of these to just one other, my life won't have been a waste.

I've been asked to contribute to a mental health related survey, which might turn into a helpful community-led resource perhaps. My own general ideas are as follows...

Stories and your personal experience of anxiety.

• This will be a rich vein.

Helpful tips and coping mechanisms.

• I guess these came later, after time for reflection. Could make an interesting harvest.

Recipes, poems and positive affirmations.

• Keto, Keats, and keep on keeping on.

All facetiousness aside, this call for papers fills me with some warmth. I hope the project brings knowledge and liberation.

Good morning. May you find this brings you peace and joy, happiness and prosperity.

I've been alive 56 years in this body so far. Not much wrong with it, just a tiny bit of cancerous activity which I'm trying to starve, and a lot of autism-ADHD I'm coming to terms with quite late. I'm back on intermittent fasting and ketogenic eating, quite enjoying the results, and remaining ever hopeful of the apoptosis and autophagy required to eat up the cellular malfunctions. I don't expect to live forever; I'm just trying not to lose an organ if I can avoid it. Death doesn't scare me; living miserably obviously does.

I've become so sick and tired of the last few years filled with chronic fear of my death and suffering, from not knowing how this cancer will play out. I've had no enthusiasm for work, life, rest, anything... I have been dead while feeling barely alive. All in the mind, not so much any problems with the body.

I have turned increasingly to Buddhism, and sought refuge in the Buddha, Dharma, and Sangha, ie. * i) the idea of self realisation and liberation from suffering, * ii) the teachings thereof, and * iii) fellowship with those also practicing this path. This has given me quite some courage to let go of my clinging to this little life and its temporary gains, which has been of immense help.

But a chance reading of some wise-looking words on Quora the other night [insert citation], while searching for how to not fear death, helped me contextualise my scared little lifetime in terms of a bigger picture. I've been able to put down some heavy mental baggage and walk a little more freely as a stardust citizen, less bound by the culturally imposed belief in a one-off mortal life.

It's fucking evident that my culture is shit poor when it comes to cheerful, light-hearted stories and myths about how we are here, how we live, and how we die. If only my folks had told me from the start that no matter how much love there exists in the world, we're only here for a brief look around.

Sure, be all you can be, love your heart out, fight evil, and try not to die... but don't cling, don't hoard what decays and costs rent, let go and live lightly, love fiercely, live and die well-educated and curious. That advice would have been preferable to my silently inheriting the invisible threads of multigenerational cPTSD, where the neuroses of our ancestors ring on in us like haunted bells.

Unless we square up to the issue and get help de-fusing those unexploded bombs of fear, loss, anger etc. inside us, we remain vulnerable to suffering. Choosing to start finding deep solutions to these issues is our duty, if you ask me.

Wishing you all eternal peace and liberation.

Lama Zopa Rinpoche: How Things Exist (Teachings on Emptiness) https://www.lamayeshe.com/sites/default/files/pdf/386_pdf.pdf

Optimal and pre-industrial diets https://www.quora.com/What-are-humans-truly-meant-to-eat

Vegan ketogenic recipes https://www.delish.com/cooking/g4837/vegan-keto-recipes/

Certainly looking forward to finishing some music off for my partner's belly dance group shortly.

Feeling bloody awful at the state of the world, while inequality yawns its widest, and shit-eating inferiors run roughshod over carefully established laws and rights.

The feeling that I must do something about this, does not leave me. It's rather hard to know what to do. I am hopeful for the voices I notice around me these days.

If cancer or a rogue bus doesn't get me first, I shall aim to continue in my pursuit of art and science, unhindered by the modern slavery problem of finding the rent money while I'm not so gainfully employed.

TEAR THIS KILLING MACHINE TO FUCKING PIECES WE COULD BE GODS BUT SOME OF US ARE STILL RATS