The ZBA Manifesto
Sep. 8th, 2008 04:04 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
liveonearthfrom http://store.zbaassociates.com/manifesto.html
1. It's okay not to know. It�s okay to be vulnerable. No one has all the answers. We value and learn from the questions and the asking.
2. We are learning to appreciate the mystery and sacredness of our lives and the mystery and sacredness of life.
3. Life is short. There is no escape from old age, sickness, and death. Death is a great teacher. Recognizing the shortness of our lives provides motivation to live fully in each day and in each moment.
4. We understand the importance of taking regular quiet time for ourselves. Through reflection and by slowing down we develop an appreciation for life and we increase our capacity for understanding.
5. We are learning to trust our inner wisdom. Our bodies and minds are amazing, unexplainable, and unfathomable.
6. It's okay to be uneasy, to be uncomfortable, to grieve, to feel pain. Recognizing when something is off, feeling the depth of loss, experiencing pain, is the first step toward change and growth.
7. Practice active listening, listening deeply to yourself and to others. Listen to others without formulating your own ideas. Listen to yourself before speaking.
8. We all seek balance in our lives, balancing work and family, balancing our inner and outer lives, balancing what we want to do and what we must do.
9. We are learning that we can be fully ourselves in all situations, at work, as parents, as children, as friends, as lovers.
10. Being ourselves at work is vital to our health and happiness. Our time is too valuable to sell, at any price.
11. Each moment is precious. In every moment we have an opportunity to discover, to grow, to speak the truth.
12. Each moment is ordinary. In every moment we can realize we are fine, just as we are. Nothing else is needed.
13. We appreciate what is paradoxical. What may at first seem contradictory or beyond our understanding may be true. After all, who is it that is breathing? Who is it that dreams? How is it that these hands effortlessly glide along this keyboard?
14. Age is a state of mind. We have the opportunity to grow to be more like ourselves every day.
15. Developing intimate relationships is a vital part of our lives and our development. Intimacy requires openness, honesty, and vulnerability.
16. Real, honest open communication is highly valued, and takes real skill and effort.
17. When we slow down and learn to trust ourselves, joy arises naturally.
18. When we slow down and learn to trust ourselves, creativity arises naturally.
19. Self-knowledge and understanding require persistence and perseverance. Developing awareness and balance is an ongoing, unending process.
20. Self-knowledge and understanding require discipline. Whatever path we take requires structure, guidelines, and feedback.
21. Self-knowledge and understanding require courage.
22. Diversity is essential. Our differences enrich our lives. There is no �other,� just as our right hand is not a stranger to our left hand.
23. A simple rule to follow is do good, avoid harm. Of course, this is not simple or easy.
24. There are many paths and many practices toward developing awareness and personal growth.
25. Our everyday lives and activities provide fertile ground for developing growth and understanding.
26. We can learn to appreciate the gifts we�ve received from our parents and to forgive them. We understand
on a deep level all we have received from the generations that have come before us.
27. We feel a deep responsibility for our children and for the generations that will come after us.
28. We can all act as change agents. We can choose to take action in improving and healing our environment and our society. There is no shortage of issues to address, of healing to take place.
29. We are all change agents on a personal level, we either create healing amongst those we live and work with or we create stress.
30. We can choose to act as change agents in relation to our communities.
31. We can choose to act as change agents in relation to our society or on a global level.
32. Everything we hold as dear will one day change and disappear. Every business that now exists will one day cease. Every person now alive will one day die.
33. At a deep level, we realize that we are neither in control nor not in control. Our task is to paddle the boat, with awareness and integrity. The flow of the river is outside our doing.
34. We all have the power to find peace and happiness in the midst of change and impermanence.
35. We have the power to heal ourselves, our communities, and our planet.
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Lovely stuff!
Date: 2008-09-10 01:04 am (UTC)In the end it got real simple: I discovered a book called "A Concious Life" by Fran and Louis Cox, the central idea of which is that huh huh to become a grown-up takes only the passage of time whereas to become a mature adult calls for a good deal more.
;-)
Anyhow, they break the book into 7 basic principles. And 7 is a very nice number to work with. (Have you looked into mandala principle?) So that was just what I needed.
Anyhow, this by way of greets ... I really appreciated your response in that post to Buddhists.
Oh, hey, just realized I forgot to mention this ... what you were saying was very much like Ane Pema Chödron's book, "Start Where You Are". (She's sooooooooooooo clever! huh huh)
so ...
p.s. to pick a gnit: that tremendously huge list of tags in the side-bar makes your LJ very hard to load for those of us who don't have fast machines. If it gets much larger that will be impossible.
Re: Lovely stuff!
Date: 2008-09-10 01:18 am (UTC)I am not a "real" Buddhist, I must disclaim, because I do not "believe" in much of the stuff that is associated with the religion. Reincarnation, etc. I like the notion of learning to be who you are beyond thoughts and ideas, and I like the feeling of compassion for all beings.....so that is why I listen in on the Buddhists.
I don't know what Tashi Delek means, but I have a feeling that it is good. Thank you.
I'm sorry about the massiveness of my tags. I'm not going to shrink the list, because I USE them....
I'm going now to see what you have out there in LJ world that I can see. Do you want to be "friends"?
Re: Lovely stuff!
Date: 2008-09-10 04:10 pm (UTC)My library has gotten a lot smaller over the years. Now I find myself going back to a few standards again and again, especially when it comes to dharma. (FWIW the old line is "to know one text well is to know them all". Grazing is a wonderful way of avoiding practically everything.)
Ah, well, the spirituality VS religion meme ... an endless debate. Nice to just blow it off, but actually at root it goes to the core of human affairs, with about as much dignity as we see on a second-rate soap opera. But that's the reality ... detaching from that is deadly.
"I don't know what Tashi Delek means ..."
Google is our friend!
;-P
"I'm not going to shrink the list, because I USE them...."
848 of them? I can't imagine how ... I mean, as a tech_docs specialist, I can't imagine how the list in the sidebar creates any functionality.
HeyHo
p.s.
Date: 2008-09-10 04:56 pm (UTC)I just came up with http://hfx-ben.livejournal.com/878900.html ... detaching from the distraction, what fuels my fire comes to mind effortlessly and spontaneously!
cheers