Only to the extent that we expose ourselves over and over to annihilation can that which is indestructible in us be found.

Pema Chödrön

Garcia, 1971

Imogen Cunningham

On Mount Rainier, 1915

Alphonse Mucha - La Nature, 1899

BREATHING UNDER WATER

I built my house by the sea.

Not on the sands, mind you;

not on the shifting sand.

And I built it of rock.

A strong house

by a strong sea.

And we got well acquainted, the sea and I.

Good neighbors.

Not that we spoke much.

We met in silences.

Respectful, keeping our distance,

but looking our thoughts across the fence of sand.

Always, the fence of sand our barrier,

always, the sand between.

And then one day,

-and I still don’t know how it happened -

the sea came.

Without warning.

Without welcome, even

Not sudden and swift, but a shifting across the sand like wine,

less like the flow of water than the flow of blood.

Slow, but coming.

Slow, but flowing like an open wound.

And I thought of flight and I thought of drowning and I thought of death.

And while I thought the sea crept higher, till it reached my door.

And I knew, then, there was neither flight, nor death, nor drowning.

That when the sea comes calling, you stop being neighbors,

Well acquainted, friendly-at-a-distance neighbors,

And you give your house for a coral castle,

And you learn to breathe underwater.

Sr. Carol Bieleck, RSCJ

from an unpublished work

Notting Hill 1970’s

“I am my own muse. 

I am the subject I know best. 

The subject I want to know better.”

Frida Kahlo

1962

Marie Curie

Jules Ferry

Ilonka Karasz

“Life is an experimental journey undertaken involuntarily. It is a journey of the spirit through the material world and, since it is the spirit that travels, it is the spirit that is experienced. That is why there exist contemplative souls who have lived more intensely, more widely, more tumultuously than others who have lived their lives purely externally.”

Fernando Pessoa

Toni Frissell -  Italy, 1945

Albert Arthur Allen, 1923

“You should view the world as a conspiracy run by a very closely-knit group of nearly omnipotent people, and you should think of those people as yourself and your friends.” 

Robert Anton Wilson

"Our happy life Chairman Mao gave us" 1954

Elementary lessons on sound. 1879

Jewish rabbi

American Colony archives; between 1910 -`20

child and doll, 1920

“What’s not a miracle? Which piece of the vase is less than another? Everything fits, everything belongs. None are lost. All will arrive. The one is the source of the many, returning is the motion of the Tao, and the science guys got it ass-backward. The universe isn’t flying apart, it’s flying together”

Jed McKenna, Spiritually Incorrect Enlightenment

“One doesn’t choose enlightenment at all. If anything one is more likely to be the victim of it, like getting hit by a bus. Arjuna didn’t get out of bed that morning hoping to see Krishna’s universal form, he was just having a bad day at the office when the universe flashed him.”

Jed McKenna

Demented Forever

Miroslav Tichý (1926-2011)

Malgré la fermeture de son studio et d’autres bâtons dans les roues, Tichý s’adonne à la photographie le plus souvent possible. On peut aussi dire que le DIY (Do It Yourself) est au cœur de sa démarche photographique car il fabrique lui-même son appareil photo fait de bric et de broc : carton, tuyau d’écoulement, bitume. Ses objectifs sont construits avec du plexiglas poli par du dentifrice et de la cendre de cigarette. Lorsque ses photos étaient développées (également par ses soins), il dessinait (parfois) sur ces dernières. D’après son biographe Roman Buxbaum, le premier commandement de Tichý est de ne pas rechercher la qualité. "Premièrement, tu dois avoir un mauvais appareil photo ! Et si tu veux être célèbre, tu dois faire quelques chose de visuellement mauvais pour que personne ne puisse le reproduire".

source

Relax into the moment and let the universe do the driving. If there was a secret to happiness in life, I’d say that was it.

Jed McKenna