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Cake day: June 11th, 2023

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  • The basic skill of mindful meditation is to be aware of thoughts as they arise and in doing so avoid the trap of being identified with them and captured by them. Without needing to obtain a saffron robe and head up a mountain for a few years, you can just accept that your mid is going to start its “This fool needs to be schooled!” routine and (almost) instantly understand that you don’t need to school the fool despite the strong inclination to do so.
    Not only doe this free you from the rarely productive effort of schooling fools, but helps get you past the feelings so that you can better judge when you want to spend the effort to school a fool, then do so without the emotional baggage which will undermine your lesson.

    Like all such things, the more you practice, the easier it gets. Given the overwhelming number of active fools and their endless reinforcements, you’re going to get plenty of practice.

    As for trite advice concerning molesting vegetation, exposure to the elements, pursuing nominally rewarding activities, etc. the underlying wisdom of keeping a healthy grasp on the big picture such that judgements of how to spend the limited resource which is our attention can also be reinforced by your practice.

    With that deep insight and wisdom out of the way, keep schooling the fools*. We are those fools and we need schooling from time time. Do it with kindness and as much skill as you have for the good of us all.

    *[Some of those fools are, of course, trolls. Even then, your audience is larger than the troll.]