Tar Baby

I must not fear.
Fear is the mind-killer.
Fear is the little-death that brings total obliteration.
I will face my fear.
I will permit it to pass over me and through me.
And when it is gone past I will turn the inner eye to see its path.
Where the fear has gone there will be nothing.
Only I will remain.

–"The Bene Gesserit Litany Against Fear" from Dune, by Frank Herbert

Sigh.

The waiting continues and the tension thickens. Avoiding the sticky tar baby in the briar patch is becoming progressively more difficult and more and more effort is required to maintain focus. Thin envelopes have, not unexpectedly, started to trickle into my inbox. It's a measure of the relative situations of the astronomy job market in the UK and the US that I was shortlisted for three of the six UK positions I applied for, but so far only one of the 17 or so US positions.

Part of the problem is that I'm aware of the fact that much bigger tar creatures are potentially looming ahead, and indeed not necessarily avoidable. This is of course nothing new really. Suffering is always looming isn't it? Certainly without Right Thought and Right View and Right Action, etc... The Crunch is always lurking somewhere.

Meditation does help some. Indeed I've taken to using it quite a bit to try and maintain focus and stay productive. Still it doesn't always work, particularly when I get tired. (And of course tired doesn't always imply sleepiness. If only! Ah well, perhaps this would be easier if I was more practiced. Or perhaps not. I guess the "right view" would be who cares?

Anyway, I'm looking at trying to join a weekly Zazen group as well as the meditation classes Sunshine & I have been taking (which, among other things, are surprisingly light on the actual meditation). Supplement, supplement, supplement. Sunshine went to the evening mass at the local baptist church this weekend. She seemed to sorta enjoy it. My aren't we becoming quite the dabblers? All in the name of "getting integral" right? Plus, neither of us can manage to put together much of a "body module" at the moment, so we might as well push on "contemplation." I'm sure some shadow work would be in order too, but resources are tight at the moment in just about every way imaginable. So we take it a bit at a time.

Man, this is a rambling entry. I didn't have much of a focus in mind. It's really just an activity to keep my brain occupied on the train home. I'm not nearly good enough that I can meditate on the Tube yet, and I'm a little concerned about what my 'self' might get up to if I just let it wander aimlessly at the moment.

I think I may be developing a taste for dub reggae. I downloaded a reggae collection from iTunes the other day called Jonny Greenwood is the Controller, which is a collection of music from the Trojan music label compiled by Radiohead's creative "multi-instrumentalist" Jonny Greenwood, who has turned himself into a sort of musical jack-of-all-trades. Anyway, he seems to have pretty good musical tastes.

Rather rainy day today, Of course it's February in England, what do I expect?

Random, random, random....

My stop is approaching...

It is by will alone that I set my mind in motion.