From Catherin Ingram’s Dharma Dialogues via our new friend at An Expedition to Find the Edge of the Earth:

Question:

You say that this divine is playing itself out, but let’s look at the suffering on this planet. For instance, there is an ecological destruction that is creating a living hell for people and other beings who are not awake in this dream, as we can easily see here in India. We are creating a desert of this Earth and poisoning our land, waters, and air. Many more people will face starvation and live in degraded circumstances. Worldwide tensions will increase, and so on. People who are primarily interested in spiritual matters, at this particular point in history, are sometimes accused of being selfish. What do you feel about rendering service to the world, and from where does the passion arise for service if this manifestation is seen as a dream?

Answer by Poonja:
Having known the supreme state, our own Self, from inside there arises compassion. Automatically we are compelled. It’s not service. Service has to do with somebody else. When the command is compassion, there’s no one doing any service for anybody else, as when you are hungry you eat. You are not in service to the stomach, nor are the hands the servant when they are putting food into the mouth. Like this we should live in the world. Service is the responsibility of the Self. Otherwise who is doing this service? When the action is coming from the ego, there is hypocrisy, jealousy, crisis. When the doer is not there, then compassion arises. If a person is realized, then all his actions are beautiful. (Formatting mine.)

Laura and I have a lot of animosity towards Peace Corps. I will speak for myself in saying that my motivation for service was exactly as Poonja describes. There was very little compassion in it, but plenty of hypocrisy, jealousy and crisis. I’d say this is common among Peace Corps volunteers and in the organization itself.

Although it’s relevant to our time in Peace Corps, I’m actually posting this in response to a conversation that Laura and I had yesterday. The difference between service and compassion is the difference between why I joined the Peace Corps and why I helped a friend figure out some tough personal issues this weekend. For me Peace Corps was all about sacrifice, helping my friend was about abundance. Service is sacrifice, a reassignment of deficits. Compassion is abundance, an overflowing of love and understanding. Service is a battle to vanquish suffering, compassion is a channel for life to heal itself.

It’s time for a Singularity post! IEEE Spectrum has dedicated their latest issue to the Singularity. Let’s check out the highlights…

Vernor Vinge breaks it down:

In that event, I expect the singularity will come as some combination of the following:

The AI Scenario: We create superhuman artificial intelligence (AI) in computers.

The IA Scenario: We enhance human intelligence through human-to-computer interfaces—that is, we achieve intelligence amplification (IA).

The Biomedical Scenario: We directly increase our intelligence by improving the neurological operation of our brains.

The Internet Scenario: Humanity, its networks, computers, and databases become sufficiently effective to be considered a superhuman being.

The Digital Gaia Scenario: The network of embedded microprocessors becomes sufficiently effective to be considered a superhuman being.

A PDF who’s who of the Singularity. (There’s my crush, Eliezer!)

Christof Koch and Giulo Tononi contributed a very interesting article on the nature of consciousness. It explains:

To be conscious, then, you need to be a single integrated entity with a large repertoire of states. Let’s take this one step further: your level of consciousness has to do with how much integrated information you can generate. That’s why you have a higher level of consciousness than a tree frog or a supercomputer.

In suggesting that there are levels of consciousness (cue Mr. Wilber), we can conclude not only that something like AI or the Internet could take on human or higher consciousness, but that humans experience a range of consciousness and can expand it. Singularity research will help us understand what consciousness is and how it can be increased.

In general, a machine passes a Turing Test when it can convince a human that it too is human. This usually involves a high level of adaptability of response. For example, my pocket calculator can figure out square roots much more quickly than I can but it can’t make toast. It doesn’t even know what toast is. True intelligence requires not only depth of knowledge (which computers are very good at) but also breadth. Does higher intelligence equal higher consciousness? Does greater range of experience lead to greater consciousness? I think so. Expanding my comfort zone and pushing my edges feels like gaining greater consciousness. Every time I break through an edge I feel like a bigger, more inclusive being. Greater range is good for us and for computers as we all evolve towards higher understanding.

Note: Eliezer called this “IEEE Spectrum’s sad little attempt at Singularity coverage” so the articles might not be very interesting to those of you are big Singularity nerds. However, I think the idea was to acquaint a broader audience with the Singularity rather than hash out the nitty-gritty of Singularity theory.

The title of this post comes from a Slate article criticizing programs like One Laptop Per Child. The article looks at the effectiveness of a computer distribution program in Romania. The Romanian children who received computers on average did worse in school, showed less interest in higher education and those who did show interest in college were no more likely to go into computer science. Surprise, surprise.

In my village in Georgia, kids would ditch school to go play Counter Strike at the NGO run computer center. I’m sure that similar situations exist all around the globe as well-meaning Westerners attempt to close the “digital divide“. A computer without internet access, without a printer, is essentially a PlayStation. I think it would be great to give the poor children of the world PlayStations.

Who doesn’t love a little GTA?

This weekend the YNow kids and I went *camping* at Harbin Hot Springs. Harbin is a little hippie getaway north of San Francisco. Clothing is optional.

Yep, I spent the weekend with a bunch of naked people. I am very self-conscious about my body. Usually even wearing a swimsuit in front of people is stressful for me so I wasn’t sure how this would unfold.

There were about 20 of us caravaning up to Harbin and my car arrived first. It was a very warm day and the boys took their shirts off immediately. I figured this was my chance to get things started without a big, intimidating audience so I followed their lead (swim top still on). This was probably the most interesting part of the weekend because as the other cars arrived I could feel my self-consciousness increasing, especially as people voiced their surprise that I was so quick to disrobe. Rather than shriek and put my shirt on again, I just stayed with the discomfort until it burned off. I followed the same pattern in taking off my shorts, swim top and finally bottoms. I was naked! It was uncomfortable for a few minutes, but those feelings burned away quickly. I survived!

This weekend was really freeing in a lot of ways. I got much more comfortable with my body and with my friends. The body image edge is a big one for me and this weekend really helped me conquer a big part of it.

My friend D was also nervous about nudity, so we agreed to take our bottoms off at the same time. On the ride home we both felt triumphant over our fear, ready to take on the next challenge. I think this is an important point in spiritual growth: once you’ve taken your pants off, they’re off. Sometimes we get so enamored of the high that comes with breaking down a barrier that we try to repeat it; we keep putting our pants on just to take them off again. D and I left our (figurative) pants at Harbin and said, “Good riddance!” We can now use that power to break through our next edge.

Which brings me to the OneTaste update. I’ve been trying to keep the OT posts to a minimum for a few reasons:

1. My parents read this blog.
2. People from OneTaste read this blog.
3. Other friends read this blog.
4. Laura is not a fan of OneTaste.

OneTaste is the biggest thing going on in my life right now. I have been giving a different story to each of those four groups of people about my experiences there. I’m done with that. For better or worse, I am going to be blogging more about OT and everyone in my life will have equal access to my writing. That’s kind of scary right now, but it feels more authentic.

I’m planning on moving into the OneTaste residency program in July. It will be nearly impossible for me to keep OT out of the blog once I move in. It’s hard to expose things that are truly important to you, that’s why I haven’t shared my decision to move into OT prior to this post. I’m eying the “publish” button on my WordPress dashboard with trepidation. What will happen when I share this with the world?

And thus I remove my pants…

Here you go: http://www.gamesvine.com/random/IngeniousPersonalityQuiz/

Make sure your pop-up blocker is on.

I came out as a 5 on this quiz, although I am more likely a 1.

I spend a considerable amount of time chained to a computer during the week. Of course I use that time to expand my consciousness and educate myself on global affairs of the highest order. For example, I thoroughly enjoy using Google Trends to find out which countries are perviest. (Yeah, I made that word up. Feel free to adopt it as your own.)

Let’s see Google Trends in action: Take a relatively benign term like “sexy feet” and you learn that Syrians are foot fetishists. Who’d have guessed?

Pakistanis seem to be into “college girls“, the Dutch are “kinky“, and Italians love their “escorts“.

See kids, learning about other cultures can be fun!

However, I hereby warn you that you might get creepy insights into yourself if you play with Google Trends too much. When checking out “vegan” I was surprised to see my hometown of Pleasanton, California as the #2 location for that search term, while “raw food” has Pleasanton at #3. It got even more bizarre when I checked “Ken Wilber“, Pleasanton was #2 again! I thought it couldn’t get any stranger, until I tried “One Taste“, and Pleasanton came up at #1. Clearly, I am a product of my environment. Ha!

We’re down to the wire. Today is our last day together in the apartment. Laura will be off to Indiana and I will be bumming around the Bay Area until I go to Spain on the 19th. Both of our lives took unexpected turns in the last couple of months we had together. We’ve spent more time apart lately than we have in the past year and a half. I think it was our way of preparing for the shock of the move.

When you spend as much time together as we did, especially last summer, you get to know a person pretty well. Our lives are so intertwined that most of our post-Peace Corps memories involve each other. Ups and downs, big surprises and new paths we never saw ourselves taking have arisen in our time together. I feel like Laura knows me better than anyone ever has. I never have to explain a back-story or give her my rationale for my actions, she already knows. I trust her completely.

Even though I know we will always be friends, it’s just not going to be the same when she leaves. I won’t be able to tell her about my bus rides home. We won’t have our marathon philosophizing sessions. We won’t have our long walks. I won’t say good morning and goodnight to her everyday. It just won’t be the same.

Still, I feel so incredibly lucky to have had this time together. Laura has completely changed my outlook on life and encouraged me to open up and be myself. She is there for me no matter how many times I make the same mistakes. She is the most understanding and insightful person I know. I feel privileged to call her my best friend.

I know that Laura will be successful in whatever she pursues. I look forward to visiting her in Indiana and, of course, Sakartvelo. We’ll still be blogging together and I’ll be calling her often (she’ll probably get sick of my calls), but even though our friendship won’t end tomorrow, this does mark the end of an era.

Please enjoy this retrospective, mainly for our own benefit:

This is gonna be it. Yes, Universe…we’re ready

The Long Tail

მოწყენილი და მთრალი ვარ

“Can I just make a brief interjection to our meeting? It’s unrelated. Laura and I have been officially approved for lesbian lover health coverage” EAB

And what are you by profession?
A peddler
And what do you peddle?
Goods.
Be Gone! You may not peddle goods here.

Emily: What should we do?
Emily: Want to watch TV?
Laura: ehh
Emily: We’re so…
Laura: …
Laura: I dunno what
Laura: so…
Emily: We could talk
Emily: We could have a talk

“I’m gonna buy a grape farm ”

L: We’re both pregnant. Fuck it, man.
I: Jesus Christ. You’re right.

“I can’t believe this is life.” -J

Emily: I think we should get dressed up for our business meeting.
Me: Are we even going to wear shoes?
Emily: Even shoes!

We’re like deconstructionist postmodern hippies. — L

Laura says: hey have you checked out our blog?
MDR says: i looked briefly once
MDR says: i thought it looked dangerous
Laura says: dangerous?
Laura says: why?
MDR says: getting inside your heads? the two of you together? it would be overwhelming

I: Time froze for a year. I don’t want that to happen.
L: Well, it would be weird. I’ll give you that. Like hey, I’m conscious of the passage of time, are you?

It may be that as a couple you find conventional ideas and opinions very unsatisfactory, and you are in a constant state of rebellion against them. — My and L’s joint astrological chart

Of course he fucking lives in a car! — L

L: It’s like the worstly navigatable site I’ve ever seen.
E: That was like the worstly navigatable sentence I’ve ever heard. Is that even a word?

L: Oh, I just made that up.
J: Well we will make ours better for the sake of money.
E: MONEY!

L: Who do I care if I’m late?
E: Who DO you care?
L: WHO do I care?

E: Why is everyone at your work quitting?
L: Going to hell that place is.
E: Do you like how I eat the sesame seeds off my Ak Maks first?
L: Mm hmm. I do like that.

TI: What you know about that?
L: Not a lot.

L: You know what I really need to steal, some of those yellow note pads. Those are useful in a business setting, right?

No, this is called ingenuity. Think Georgia. They use fucking old books as napkins. — L

E: Maybe I’m Truman Capote reincarnated.
L: Why do you say that?
E: The movie said he died in 1984.
L: Yes, but there probably isn’t any time in the universal soul, so you could be anyone. Why would you be him?
E: I don’t know, but I couldn’t be say, Frank Sinatra because he died when I was alive.
L: Yes, but if there really is no time, you could be.
E: Maybe I’m you!!!

I think I can take my life to the next level. I just can’t be lazy and not do it. — L

Everywhere you turn around you’re still hanging around with yourself. — L

I purposely try not to hear of things. — L

I always shower many times. — L

OMG. I’m posting on your wall and I’m sitting next to you! - L

“What up my nerds?!”

Send me to Vegas now. On someone else’s dime. Let me forget, there on the red carpet among the bells and whistles. And when my glass falls to the floor and I stumble in, broke and broken, it will be fine, because my head will be spinning.

Last night I was lucky enough to attend a lecture by Nicole Daedone, the founder of OneTaste. I’ve been spending a considerable amount of time hanging around OT lately, so I was very interested to see what the founder was like.

During the first half of the lecture, Nicole explained the vision of OneTaste. Here is my take on what she said:

By being receptive to all that life has to offer and fully experiencing every moment, good or bad, we can be fully alive. As individual points of consciousness, we are the bridge between source and the material realm. The evolutionary drive of consciousness is to know itself. The more we explore and embrace life, the closer we come to reunification with source and thus, ultimate freedom. If I can delve deeply into fear, anger or hatred and know it fully, it no longer has control over me. You may be able to keep the lowest lows at bay by maintaining a constricted sphere of experience, but in doing so you also reject the highest highs. Every time I expand my circle of experience to encompass more aspects of life, I get that much closer to the Universal or God.

Furthermore, by being fully open and embracing what is I allow the Universe to work through me. Rather than constantly swimming upstream, thinking I am going to become this or that, go here or there, I can embrace my true essence and go with the flow. With the entire stream of Tao propelling me, how can I truly be hurt, alone or afraid? The Universe will do what it wishes with me regardless of my overt cooperation or awareness. I can struggle against that flow with all my might, but it will not change the course. Why not embrace it and love every minute of the ride?

Nicole also noted that there are two types of people on the path, those who hope they have found the way to enlightenment and those who know they have no choice but to persevere no matter what the cost. I almost laughed out loud because I am firmly planted in the latter camp and fully hate it. Thanks, Universe.

If you are interested in OneTaste’s philosophy, practice, or community and you live near San Francisco or New York City, I highly encourage you to stop by and check it out. I am happy to to chaperon anyone near SF. Drop me a line and let’s connect!

(If you are in the Bay Area and between the ages of 18 and 29, check out YNow, the youth division of OneTaste.)

I was going to post about Mystery of Existence’s recent use of Byron Katie’s Work in coming to terms with the mainstream rejection of the Big Mind Process. It is a beautiful use of the Work to turn around the assumption that “They shouldn’t reject the Big Mind process”, an assumption that I shared. Then I began exploring Mystery of Existence more in depth and I couldn’t contain my post to that little topic.

I can’t figure out the name or gender of the author of MoE, but he or she is not only very insightful and a gifted writer, but an artist as well.

That is incredible.

MoE also has an eloquent discussion of one of the more bothersome (for me) teachings of Christianity: blessed are the meek.

More great examples of Byron Katie’s Work: on animal abuse, American stupidity, and self doubt.

Plus they blog about spiritual lessons in Star Trek. Can’t beat that.

Hope you enjoy Mystery of Existence as much as I do. I’m always happy to bring good blogs to your attention.