Neil April 22nd, 2010
Training Your Focus – Enhance Your Reality
How is your focus? Do you find it easy to concentrate for longer chunks of time or are you easily distracted? Do you enjoy doing the same thing at the same focus level over and over again, or are you easily bored?
I used to think that focus is a function of pleasure: I can concentrate on this because I like it. I do some stuff better than other because I like it. While loving what you do can keep your concentration high, at least in the beginning, maintaining a constant, high focus is not a function of pleasure at all. It’s a function of will.
Focus can be trained. It can be enhanced, it can be shaped the way you want. It can serve you well, if you treat it well. In today’s post I’ll share some of my observations regarding focus and how one can work this tool the same way you work your muscles in your daily workout.
Read the rest to enhance Your Reality
Neil April 20th, 2010
Job 22 – New International Version – BibleGateway.com
26 Surely then you will find delight in the Almighty
and will lift up your face to God.
27 You will pray to him, and he will hear you,
and you will fulfill your vows.
28 What you decide on will be done,
and light will shine on your ways.
29 When men are brought low and you say, ‘Lift them up!’
then he will save the downcast.
The Book of Job in the Hebrew Bible is considered the oldest book of the bible. A very complex literary work dealing with the problem of evil.
I am being taught that light shines on the good way!
Neil December 30th, 2009

“Concerning all acts of initiative and creation, there is one elementary truth –
that the moment one definately commits oneself, then, Providence moves, too.”
–Van Goethe
(thanks to Amy Deputy for the card)
Neil December 19th, 2009
with thanksgiving
Tao 43
The softest of all things
Overrides the hardest of all
Only Nothing can enter in to no-space.
Hence I know the advantages of Non-Ado.
Few things under heaven are as instructive as the lessons of Silence,
Or as beneficial as the fruits of Non-Ado.


Pocket Classic Tao Te Ching
Lao Tzu, John C.H. Wu
Neil December 18th, 2009
TAO 8
The highest form of goodness is like water.
Water knows how to benefit all things without striving with them.
It stays in places loathed by all men.
Therefore, it comes near the Tao.
In choosing your dwelling, know how to keep the ground.
In cultivating your mind, know how to dive in the hidden deeps.
In dealing with others, know how to be gentle and kind.
In speaking, know how to keep your words.
In governing, know how to maintain order.
In transacting business, know how to be efficient.
In making a move, know how to choose the right moment.
If you do not strive with others,
You will be free from blame.


Pocket Classic Tao Te Ching
Lao Tzu, John C.H. Wu
Neil September 16th, 2009
The best of man is like water,
Which benefits all things, and does not contend with them,
Which flows in places that others disdain,
Where it is in harmony with the Way.
So the sage:
Lives within nature,
Thinks within the deep,
Gives within impartiality,
Speaks within trust,
Governs within order,
Crafts within ability,
Acts within opportunity.
He does not contend, and none contend against him.
Tao 8

Neil June 9th, 2009
Trying to control the world?
I see you won’t succeed.
T’ien hsia shen ch’i
The world is a spiritual vessel
And cannot be controlled.

Those who control, fail.
Those who grasp, loose.
Some go forth, some are led,
Some weep, some blow flutes,
Some beceome strong, some superfluous,
Some oppress, some are destroyed.
Therefore the sage
Casts off extremes,
Casts off excess,
Casts off extravagance.
- TAO TE CHING by Lao-Tzu Translated by Stephen Addiss, Stanley Lombardo
Neil June 4th, 2009
“The artist’s language is a sensual one, a language of felt experience. When we work at our art, we dip into the well of our experience and scoop our images. Because we do this, we need to learn how to put images back.”
Neil June 1st, 2009
“Stop telling yourself that creativity is a luxury and that you should be greatful for what you’ve got.”
“Creativity is a fact of your spiritual body and nothing that you must invent.”
The Artist’s Way - Julia Cameron
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