Found a little book Blossoming Lotus, Sacred Centers in Ann Arbor, in the Ann Arbor Library the other day. It lists information of 12 spiritual organizations and their interviews. I find some interview answers inspiring. A little summary here (red indicates the answers I especially like):

What drew you to spirituality? What was the turning point?
Reading Buddhist writings, and the movie "Gandhi"
Reading Autobiography of a Yogi by Paramahansa Yogananada (x2)
Reading Gurijeff's Life is Only Real When I Am
Meeting with Rinpoche
First visit with Sai Baba, and the ensuing self-expansion
Spiritual guindance
Yoga class
Yoga camp and vows made
Be, see and be free. Guru is inner consciousness
New York lecture by Buddhist expressing, "no beginning and no end"
Heard words "it is destiny to live"

What was the first impression of Guru?
Awe-struck with boundlessness of energy field
A Divine vision because of glow and balance
Divinely majestic and loving
This man is holy
Love and compassion
This is a loving person
Merciful and miraculous
Brought far-reaching gratitude
Felt blessing beyond His person
Affable and intuitive
Dynamic and sensible
Stern and pithy
Eyes deeper than have ever seen before

What was initial instruction?
Be loving and compassionate
Be loving
"Believe in Love, have faith in Divinity and avoid cigarettes, gambling, meat, alcohol, and confrontation"
Have unity of faith in God
Go within the heart for truth to find
To reveal that Guru is inner consciousness
"Being alive and here and now is meaningful"
Calmly-abide in meditation
Meditate
Basic meditation
Just sit straight and keep still
Ngondro tantric preliminary practices....
Mantra initiation

What was purpose of instruction?
To develop quiet mind
Help find individual attunement with God
To initiate spiritual path
To purify body, mind and heart
To bridge spiritual awareness to the pursuit of material goods
To reveal truth, right action, peace, love and ahimsa (non-violence) to uplift the world
To create more loving world
To establish equality
To draw forth godly qualities
Be your own Guru
To faciliate the process of one-pointedness
To affirm and being on the right path
To achieve lasting concentration in comfort and oneness

What is value?
Meritorious thoughts, words and deeds for all sentient beings with love
Calms mind, body, and connects with spiritual inner knowing
Calming, relaxing, Self-revealing and knowing one's relationship with God/Goddess
Gives glimpse of enlightenment and soul's mission
To relieve suffering
Giant step for Humankind
More love and world peace
Calm resolution
To gain knowledge and peace
Inspires compassion and reverence for All Life
Evolution of the human species
Guarantees sense of purpose
Affirms ability for being kind

What is everyone after in the secular world?
Happiness x3
Basic happiness
Good family life and enjoyment
Love
Safety, joy and playthings
Material wealth, worldly success and excitement
Wealth
Personal possessions and individual success
Greed, ego and unreasoable desires
Fame and goods
Most are busy finding this answer

What does the spirit seek?
Happiness x2
Eternally lasting happiness
Harmony
Peace with reality
The Divine or God/Goddess
Relationship with God/Goddess
Merging with God
Merging with Brahman
Unifying Creation with its Creator
Freedom from clinging
Universality as wholeness
Full Self-realization

What is the benefit of having both secular (worldly) and spiritual pursuits or practices?
Virtuous behavior and community development
Helps create right action
Helps to support and anchor the other in reality
Helps raise collective wakefulness while relieving common stress
Equilibrium
Balance, equilibrium and omniscience
To introduce equilibrium and balance of mind, body and spirit
Comfortable existence to fulfill spiritual duties
Comfort and nearness to Divinity
Integration spreads goodness
Sets an example for using prosperity to help others
Reveals daily existing as evolving eternal life
Each inspires the other

What is the number one aim in life?
Spirituality
Spiritual growth toward freedom
Freedom
To know God/Goddess
Worshipping God/Goddess, and full Self-realization
Yoga or union with the God/Goddess
Achieving happiness
To achieve enduring happiness
To graduate forever from any dependency upon worldly life
Quiet of mind
Loving evolution
Constant engagement in promising and present moment immersion
Awakening

How does spiritual practice differ from religion?
Spirituality may transcend religion
Spirituality places emphasis on experience of pure spirit whereas religion may place it on spiritual leaders and the corresponding perceived theologies
Religion can be social attendance that may or may not lead to creating a spiritual life-style
These compliment each other
Religion has external focus whereas spirituality has internal focus
In the spiritual world, every home and every body is a temple
Spirituality is the heart of religion
Sppirituality may provide deeper understanding of the present life
Religion may be a bridge to well establishing spiritual practice
Daily focus is upon God's inner presence
Practicing with the spirit is beyond dogma
Spiritual practice may require a greater open-mindedness
Depends on viewpoint - spiritual practice is often inner world while religion tends to be outside organization. There could be no difference at all

There is also a Glossary section in the end. Here are some commonly used or misused words:

Bliss - Seeing, hearing, tasting, smelling and touching all creation with eternal gratitude for existence

Consciousness - Being in love

Divine equalities - Self-acceptance, commitment, trust, meticulousness, ecstasy, divine immediacy (patience), completeness, gratitude, service, discipline, reverence and harmony of spirit-minds and all bodies as the real Self out pictured from the mind's third (inner) eye or vision

Enlightenment - Borrowed intuition from the Original source of All Knowledge

Eternal - Bearing the mark of Absolute Grace

Freedom - Uncovered purity of soul, and experience in limitless space

God - Everything

Goddess - Everyone

Happiness - The state of complete peace and relaxation filled with intermingled innocent smiles

Knowledge - The feeling completely satiated, satisfied and nurtured nutritionally...

Lord - 1) Master of one Self; 2) a humble guide; 3) a sanctified spiritual torch bearer

Love - The square root cause of running, flowing, streaming and spashing waters of eternal life

Master - Anyone that knows how to wash dishes and feet, too, with sweetness and lightheartedness everyday for literally and figuratively an eternity

Peace - Even, light and easy breathing and posturing

Perfection - The quality of self-acceptance

Spirit - The life of life

Truth - Ceaseless, benevolent and pure atomic energy

Universe - The ability to recognize only the real Self throughout constantly changing phenomena and expressions

Yesterday I got two emails from old friends from my LA era. JF who does not believe in the marraige institution decides to get married. MJ informs his friends and family of the tragedy--he met Susan two years ago; their baby was born last Saturday morning; by the evening Susan had lost all consciousness and passed away within two days. (She suffered HELLP.) I was so struck by the news all day that I felt physically sick. All I could tell MJ was, to focus on the positive sides of Life--life that brings birth and grows and continues on.

JJ once comments that I often complain about relationship troubles, something very minor when comparing to another friend's loss of a mother. Is it true that in the face of life and death, all other troubles become insignificant? W thinks it unfair when someone worries about family inheritance or enjoys two lovers, while someone else has to worry about tomorrow's bread or to wait for a date.

I think my friend K is the most misfortunate man I know. He lost a eye as an infant; his soulmate wife died of cancer; a few of his brothers and uncle died; a vicious wife who sent him to despair; lost job, house, car, children, wife (bad) and more within a few weeks; being cheated by employers; getting deported by foreign government; poverty.... In the few years I know him, I see him in misfortunes of all scopes--relationship troubles, money problems, legal battles, and life and death.

How do we compare the extent of misfortune? Are my worries truly insignificant? I do not know. I do feel strongly and my emotions do get affected powerfully when I hear about other's misfortune. Recently I have been feeling very down about the death penalty case in Singapore--this fascist country is going to hang an Australian young man (of Vietnamese origin) for drug trafficking, ignoring all pleas for clemency from around the world--prime minister, UN officials, present Pope and past Pope included--to spare his life. Nguyen Tuong Van, 25, was caught three years ago while carrying heroin in an effort to raise money to save his twin brother in debt. He broke the law and should be executed according to law, but what about according to Man? Where is Man in respect to law? Singapore government says that the law cannot be changed for one man. Any government and law that is so inflexible is inhuman. When I first read this news two weeks ago, I was watching the movies Capote (2005) and In Cold Blood (1967), and there were scenes of hanging. I had nightmares of it. (I tend to become very personal when I read news stories like this. A few days ago I thought a great deal about the Jordan woman who planned to set up suicide bombs with her husband but in the end she fled after her husband set up his bomb. What horror she must face, thinking about her act of terror while her forever condemned husband is no more? Why are there so many unhappy people in the world???)

Back to what I was saying about the various extents of misfortune and unhapppiness. Someone once told me that life gives everyone different challenges. Yes, what would life be without challenge? We all have to overcome the obstacles in front of us, to see life as a personal journey. We do need to count our blessings even in the times of adversity, but to compare misfortunes with others in order to feel lucky would not bring us the joy and peace we need.

Know that everyday I have done my best to live, to learn, to love, and I shall find peace, and perhaps, happiness.

I begin to read The Upanishads. I have spent three days reading the Introduction, and am tempted to copy down every single sentence. It is a timely remainder for me to see where I am now in my search for happiness, for the ultimate union with Eternity. The Introduction, written by Juan Mascaro in Summer 1964, is calm and inspiring. The joy to be closer to the One is much greater than the joy in gaining more knowledge of the One (when reading Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance last week).

First, a list of the words appeared in Introduction for the One, recognized by the capital letter, in alphabetical orders. Totally interchangeable.

All, Atman, Being, Beloved, Brahman, Consciousness, Eternal, God, He, Infinite, Knower, One, Self, Spirit, That, Universe

Second: some paragraphs I like, with my notes in blue. Many passages are from poets and other books of wisdom. So many people have been in the Presence of the One?

Gold made the rivers to flow. They feel no weariness, they cease not from flowing. They fly swiftly like birds in the air. -- Rig Veda 11.28

Brahman in the Universe, God in his transcendence and immanence is also the Spirit of man, the Self in every one and in all, Atman.

God must not be sought as something far away, separate from us, but rather as the very inmost of us, as the higher Self in us above the limitations of our little self.

Definition of God: "Not this, not this"; "Thou art That". (That which cannot be defined is God, like Quality in Zen and Art, like Tao...)

Only the Eternal in us can lead us to the Eternal, only when the transient has become Eternal can a man say, "I am He".

... Why? For the joy of creation. Why is there evil? For the joy of good arising from it. Why darkness? That light may shine the more. Why suffering? For the instruction of the soul and the joy of sacrifice. Why the infinite play of creation and evolution? For Ananadam, pure joy. (Creation and evolution are pure joy.)

In the rising from non-Self to Self, from unconsciousness to consciousness, and from this to supreme Consciousness, there is a process of unselfishness. The more the lower self is forgotten in good works, and in the realization of the beautiful and the true, the quicker becomes the process of evolution.

The self-training for the vision of the unity of Atman and Brahman is called Yoga.

The law of evolution called Karma… since our Spirit that was never born and will never die must come again and take to itself a body, that the lower self may have the reward of its works. The great evolution flows on towards perfection.

Who knows God becomes God. -- Mundaka Upanishad

After the death of the lower self, when the small drop of human consciousness has become one with the ocean of Consciousness... (My ocean. The Ocean. It is a nice analogy.) It is not a death, but a victory over death, a rising and resurrection.

The joy of the final union is felt... "water falling from heaven into a river or fountain, when all becomes water, and it is not possible to divide or separate the water of the river from that which fell from heaven; or when a little stream enters the sea so that henceforth there shall be no means of separation".

"All seemed a world in flower, and I was the soul of this world." -- Margall. (Tot semblava un mon en flor / I l’anima n’era jo.) (Beautiful!)

Each one of us is a centre of life, a unique event in the universe, and whatever our external relations to people and things may be, the absolute fact remains that we have to live our inner life alone even as we have to die our own death. In the infinite struggle of man to know this world and the universe around him, and also to know the mind that allows him to think, he comes before the simple fact that life is about thought.

Love is infinite liberty.

Atman, the mystery of our life, the light of our soul, the love which is the source of infinite joy, the vision of the good and the beautiful which is the source of everything beautiful or good that man can create upon this earth, is something which is above reason and therefore it an never be attained by reason alone. "He is unknown to the learned and know to the simple." Kena Up. (Unlearn everything to gain true Knowledge.)

"You can never come to the reality of creation by contemplating it from the point of view of destruction." Rabindranath Tagore

"It is not thought which we should want to know; we should know the thinker."

To the soul the flower is an object of joy, and to the poet it can be a thing of beauty and truth: a window from which we may look in wonder into the Beauty and Truth of the universe, and the Truth and Beauty in our own soul.

All things on earth, from a flower to a human being, can be an object of love or contemplation, an object of intellectual interest, and an object of possession. In the first case they give us the freedom of joy in the Infinite; in the second they give us that knowledge which is power; in the third they give us the chains that bind us to matter, drag us down to the darkness of death, to the miseries of competition for selfish power, instead of cooperation for unselfish joy.

"When one sees Eternity in things that pass away and Infinity in finite things, then one has pure knowledge.

"But if one merely sees the diversity of things, with their divisions and limitations, then one has impure knowledge.

And if one selfishly sees a thing as if it were everything, independent of the One and the many, then one is in the darkness of ignorance." -- Bhagavad Gita: VXIII. 20-22

What a wonderful relation do we establish with a human being when in spite of his limitations we see his Infinity! But if we merely consider him as an object of intellectual curiosity, a fixed number in static statistics, or even as a mere machine whose work we can buy and sell, we degrade both him and ourselves.

To see a World in a grain of sand,
And a Heaven in a wild flower,
Hold Infinity in the palm of your hand,
And Eternity in an hour.
-- Blake

Sometimes it seems I don’t want to understand another person. It is not because I am unable to. I believe every normal person is capable of understanding another human being. When I don’t actively seek to understand another, to forgive and to love, it’s because I feel I need to be understood too, and I am afraid that if I open up my mind and heart to show understanding to another, the other person will be satisfied with being understood and stop to understand me in return. This negative behavior only appears when I am weak and needy; then the negative leads to more negatives. One way to be out of the bad cycle is to first break apart from the issue at hand, find a new place to enter positively, and then let the positive generates more positives. When I am strong and when I am my true Self, I have no selfish desire and I become pure love.

Richard 问了很多很好的问题。很多很好的问题是不能用语言来回答的（道可道，非常道。名可名，非常名）。正如你所说，问题问来问去总是这些。寻找答案的时候，不要完全依靠头脑。要用心（故常无，欲以观其妙；常有，欲以观其徼）。

>相较于2000年前，我们是否还是走在我们自己的小径上而不是宇宙的灵魂里面？
>为何人们创造了神，而且人们想要知道上帝的精神？
>为何我们不愿挑战自己的存在，为何我们自认为是关于我们自身的一切？
>为何改变是如此的困难？（历史将是一个很好的例子）

这 里你所说的“我们”和“人们”，其实是你自己。我相信世界上、历史上，已有不少人能够说自己是走在宇宙的灵魂里面的，只是不在灵魂中的人不肯相信而已。创 造神的人是不需要知道上帝的精神，因为他们已经知道了（人神合一，爱为真义）。那些离开宇宙之心的人，才会不明白，才会提问。

"It is not thought which we should want to know; we should know the thinker." Kaushitaki Upanishad

整体的改变是不可能的也是不需要的，因为宇宙本身就是具循环性的，大大小小的循环，正如生命，周而复始。其中个人的改变和进步，通过学习、置疑、反省、挑战等，是得到解脱、达到归依的唯一途径。

如果总是在问大问题，问人类为何，问历史为何，问科学如何，问宗教如何，把精力都花在自己之外，问题会越来越多的。

而你知道吗，有朝一日，象所有在你之前发现的人一样，你将发现，所有的答案都在你自己心里。

>令人不安的设想，令人不安的伟大灵魂，霍金。
>不幸的是他也在试图将所有的物理，化学和人文科学组合起来，构成GUT，最后的大统一理论。
>那就是上帝的精神，那就是真理，那就是绝对！
>
>然后请回答我，这已经发生的一切到底是为何？
>而我们又该如何和为了什么给他们赋予意义

霍金不是绝对。相对论不是绝对。科学不是绝对。宗教不是绝对。一切这说那论的都不是绝对。最终的绝对在你心里，在每个人的心里。

已经发生的一切是为了给你提供心灵上的映照，让你知道，你的问题，世世代代都有人在问。你不是孤独的。等你找到答案，你也会成为一面明镜，照映后来寻找答案的人。


又及，昨晚正在想这个问题，想霍金和当代科学的理论，是否也可以归为一种新形式的创世记。真巧。今天在找一些创世记的传说来看，因为去年我自己也糊里糊涂写了一段《创世记》之类的文字，想印证一下。

下面这段很美。Creation, Rig Veda

====

起初没有空气，没有天空，没有水，没有死亡，也没有永生。
夜与昼皆不存在，只有“一”在呼吸。
随后创世开始了。
谁也不知道这一切是如何发生的。
“一”甚至也不晓得。

——《梨俱吠陀》

原文@玛雅咖啡：为何？by Richard Wung

为何这宇宙选择了目前的这种状态而允许我在这里思考它？为何在一族同时存在的历史当中它要让我在这里对他和我自己提出诘问？
为何是我，为何是这样，为何我要问为何？
希望在哪里，为何我想知道希望在哪里？

相较于2000年前，我们是否还是走在我们自己的小径上而不是宇宙的灵魂里面？
为何人们创造了神，而且人们想要知道上帝的精神？
为何我们不愿挑战自己的存在，为何我们自认为是关于我们自身的一切？
为何改变是如此的困难？（历史将是一个很好的例子）

从印度传说的乌龟塔，中国的天圆地方，到地心说，到日心说，到牛顿定律，到星系，到星云，到背景辐射，到普朗克的量子理论，到爱因斯坦，从狭义到广义相对论，我们仍在向着同一个方向寻找着什么？
以 我们为中心的宇宙，静止的宇宙，运动着的被普适的时间所描述着的宇宙，再到相对论中不存在普适时间但拥有宇宙常数和光速恒定的宇宙。现在Stephen Hawking开始描述黑洞的内部和宇宙的起源，他挑战了以上的一切，正如自17世纪以来的所有科学家们一样，他也相信我们处于准确描述宇宙的前期。而这 一信念早在人类最早的信仰中就已经被实现了。所有宗教都能准确的向他们的信徒描述宇宙。在宇宙的开端之前，时间存在么？若存在，则已存在了无限久。为何不 是继续无限久？以上的所有为何都将无解。

令人不安的设想，令人不安的伟大灵魂，霍金。
不幸的是他也在试图将所有的物理，化学和人文科学组合起来，构成GUT，最后的大统一理论。
那就是上帝的精神，那就是真理，那就是绝对！

然后请回答我，这已经发生的一切到底是为何？
而我们又该如何和为了什么给他们赋予意义

相信你们对于人比我了解的多，请缓解我的痛苦
多谢

Talking to Mike about the book Zen and Art of Motorcycle... I often get confused with these two words--deductive and inductive. I know which one is which if I think through it. Deductive thinking is to define some knowns and rules at the beginning, and from them deduce everything else. Inductive learning is to learn by example. We want to come to our own "definition" of quality. Mike says nowadays we can define things inductively rather than deductively. I think at some point back up the road one has to show deductively how one can define something inductively. Anyway, I say to Mike that "deductive thinking sucks", and we have a good laugh about it. It is only some philosophers who want to learn the world strictly deductively. Everyone else knows about their world inductively, the world with the philosophers in. The philosophers think they know how to think better, but the laymen just laugh at the crazy philosophers. Who do I want to be? The philosopher who thinks he knows? Or the layman who knows not to think?

Let not intellectual pride or the laziness of dullness deny us the light of true Reality.

I have been wanting to write something about creation and creationism. In my random studies over the last year and half, I have come across a few creation myths (e.g. Hindu, Maya, Egyptian). Because of my own experience, I feel a warm affinity toward them. People always amaze to find the parallels in these stories; I think it's only natural. These are only different metaphors of the same "event" in the spiritual sense. Creation stories cannot and should not be judged and measured using reason and logic alone.

Sometimes I wonder if our modern science and our scientific inquiry into the origin universe would one day be generally regarded as a metaphor for creation. I believe when one's search is throughout or lucky, one would encounter the Creator.

Why am I thinking about this now? I am reading about ancient Egyptian history and learning about their myths. Every time I come across someone who claims to have a vision of the Creator, I feel close to him, because I have had similar experience. I am remembering an after-creation piece I wrote last year, out of sheer joy of the knowledge and presence of the creator. Everyone has a name for the Creator. I should choose a different name than "god". Let me re-write my last piece using "Shan" for the One.

There, is, Shan.

Shan creates everything and everything is Shan.

One day (Shan creates too, that day and the concept of days), Shan is bored and decides to take the form of Jo. All Shan has to do is to make sure Jo comes into being. Shan thinks to Himself, "It might be fun to be born in a communist country on the planet earth. A girl perhaps. I am her creator, her director, her actor, and her audience. I will let her be curious, confused and restless. I will let her wonder about who she is all her life. She is me, but she is to look for me everywhere--in nature, in stars, in science, in music, in words, in math, in reasons, in love, in void, in the company of others that I create and impersonate--in all things I create. Because I create everything and everything is me, she will see me everywhere, and she will see me in herself if she is lucky enough (of course I decide how lucky she will be). Aha, this can be a fun project!" Shan likes a universe full of fun, and He enjoys playing games with his creation. The more complex the game, the more fun He has; otherwise He get bored--I would if I were Shan. (OK, I am.)

Shan has infinite projects. Sometimes He impersonates one who asks no little questions but works deligently and lives happily. Through his simple life, the beauty and the ingeniuity of Shan are expressed visibly. This brings Shan great satisfaction.

Sometimes Shan forgets about his projects. Sometimes He abondons his projects. He is only Shan.

Shan is everywhere, at all time. He is showing me who I am, now. Everytime I see Him I must record it.

Shan, is, here, now.