Born in the USA – Schuylkill County, Pennsylvania

February 21, 2026 ~ quantumdreamer ~ Leave a comment

Following the Evans thread this morning I came upon my great grandmother Annie Morgan. Who was born in Schulkil County Pennsylvania in 1890.

In the 1891 census they are back in Aberdare. Her parents must have popped over there between 1881 and 1891…It turns out she was the first teacher in the family…

Perhaps they offered some Welsh coal mining expertise… the family is all about steel and coal.

Around forty years ago we had a visit whilst in Wales from two American women claiming to be relatives.

Perhaps when David and Elizabeth were in Pennsylvania they were staying with relatives in or near the so called Welsh Tract…

Does this mean that I can claim American citizenship by birth?

Far out…

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These below excerpted from Wikipedia

The Welsh Tract, also called the Welsh Barony, was a portion of the Province of Pennsylvania, a British colony in North America (today a U.S. state), settled largely by Welsh-speaking Quakers in the late 17th century. The region is located to the west of Philadelphia. The original settlers, led by John Roberts, negotiated with William Penn in 1684 to constitute the Tract as a separate county whose local government would use the Welsh language. The Barony was never formally created, but the many Welsh settlers gave their communities Welsh names that survive today. A more successful attempt at setting up a Gwladfa (Welsh-speaking colony) occurred two centuries later, in the Chubut Province of Patagonia, Argentina.

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Thomas Holme’s 1687 map of Pennsylvania. “The Welch Tract” appears to the left of center.

Prior to the arrival of Welsh settlers, the land of what would become the Welsh Tract was inhabited by Indigenous peoples, such as the Okehocking band of the Lenape.

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Schuylkill County is a county in the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania. As of the 2020 census, the population was 143,049. The county seat is Pottsville. The county is part of the Northeast Pennsylvania region of the state.

The county is part of the Pottsville micropolitan statistical area, and borders eight counties: Berks and Lebanon counties to its south, Dauphin and Northumberland counties to its west, Columbia and Luzerne counties to its north, and Carbon and Lehigh counties to its east. The county is approximately 47 miles (76 km) west of Allentown, the state’s third-largest city, and 97 miles (156 km) northwest of Philadelphia, the state’s largest city.

The county was created on March 1, 1811, from parts of Berks and Northampton counties and named for the Schuylkill River, which originates in the county. On March 3, 1818, additional territory in its northeast was added from Columbia and Luzerne counties.

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19th century

Schuylkill County was created via an Act of Assembly on March 1, 1811, from portions of Berks and Northampton counties. More land was added to the county in 1818, from Columbia and Luzerne counties. At the time of its creation, the county had a population of about 6,000.

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The numerous jobs in the mining industry comprised a catalyst for mass immigration to Schuylkill County from the British Isles and Europe in the 19th and 20th centuries. As mines became more numerous (by 1846 there were 110 operators in the region and 142 collieries in Schuylkill County) and more complex (in 1846 there were 35 collieries below water level), mechanical breakers, steam locomotive, it became more labour-intensive both for accomplishing mining tasks and supporting mining’s peripheral industries. Such industries included manufacturing of explosives, metal screens, pump components, piping, and timber for support. This led to an influx of population into Schuylkill and other anthracite counties to fill these jobs.

Beginning with the Irish immigration in the 1840s, which was fuelled by the Great Famine and followed the end of the Civil War, immigrants from Eastern Europe, including Poles, Hungarians, Lithuanians, Slovaks, Rusyns, Ukrainians, and Belarusians (which were usually known as Ruthenians), often from the Austro-Hungarian monarchy, settled in Schuylkill County and laboured in the county coal mines. By the 1880s and 1890s, thousands of Italians immigrated to the county in pursuit of mining jobs.

Llanfihangel y Pennant – Trail Ends – Who are You?

February 20, 2026February 20, 2026 ~ quantumdreamer ~ Leave a comment

Some people may think me a bit of a bastard. Well that may be true.

Tracing back along the maternal grandfather line to the village punished by the English for harbouring the fugitive Owain Glyndŵr I have come to the end of the electronic trail.

My great-great-great grandmother Catherine got knocked up as a teenager and was sent away into service {there’s shame on her mind } to a house just North of Harlech. Ten years later she was back home with my great-great-great-great grandmother Dorothy down as pauper and then washerwoman at Pen-y-bont. Catherine had three more illegitimate children over the years. Catherine’s son my great-great grandfather was initially down as a Hughes. With my great-great-great-great grandmother down as mother at age 47…

No doubt the likes of:

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John Hughes 1813-1878 Hen Gapel Nant Gwynant a Oerddwr uchaf

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Might not have approved of Catherine. I don’t think he is a direct bloodline relative but he looks dour and fire and brimstone.

Imagine a Welsh preacher’s accent…

“You shall burn in the fire pits of hell for your lustful and dire sinful transgressions!!!”

My great-great grandfather stayed with Dorothy until he got married. Suddenly in 1871 she was living in a more posh house and he had converted to Jones.

Later Catherine was found living as a widow, though she never married, with a John P Jones {head of family} and her fourth child. She is down as sister to John which may have eased the gossip in Ffestiniog.

I suspect that he was the knocker-upper and hence my great-great-great grandfather…

In 1827 Dorothy may have married Hugh at Llanfihangel y Pennant. She was already a widow in 1841.

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Should I wish to research further I need to visit this isolated church north of Dolbenmaen. The roads here are poor and single track.

The trail ends here. There is an impasse.

In 2007 I looked into taking over the lease of an outdoor centre then owned by Hillingdon Council in order to run an outdoor training centre and place of retreat. The lease was encumbered by various Lottery grant rules and was a nightmare. I suspect the rules have lasped.

It has since been bought and refurbished as Brynkir Coach House

Click here

Back then I met the land owner also a Jones in Beddgelert. He was clearly a big cheese. Jones’s family had sold a part of Snowdon to the National Trust. He was maybe a distant relative

Brynkir, known as Cwm Pennant is just down the valley from Llanfihangel y Pennant.

Maybe one day I’ll swing by the church and ask to look at the register of births, marriages and deaths… I can look at the graves. They were probably too poor to trouble the monumental mason

The trail ends here.

I have a working narrative that is self-consistent now.

Spooky – Who Are You ? – Gwrach

February 17, 2026February 17, 2026 ~ quantumdreamer ~ Leave a comment

Last night we watched an episode of “Who Do You Think You Are?” with Greg Davies.

His search was uncanny in similarity to mine Tremadog , Nantmor etc.. It was so close as to be spooky. He visited places I know well.

So I have been back on the ancestry bus.

In 1841 one of my relatives lived here..

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Somewhere between Sygyn Bach and Cae Du at Sygyn Isaf {not shown on the map}.

Here is the mill…centre left on the map.

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It is rumoured than one of my realtives was a witch…

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Regional Nepotism in Buddhist Narratives ?

February 16, 2026 ~ quantumdreamer ~ Leave a comment

Although my mother, when sun tanned could negotiate discounts from the Indian traders in the market in Gravesend, I am not of Indian nor Asian genetics. If she wore a sari and a bindi she could pass as Sikh. Yes one could say the Celtic migration had a terminus in a valley to the South East of Snowdown. I was however born a ginge…

As an outsider I note how many so-called previous lives of Buddha are in the general geo-location of Northern India – Himalayas- Afghanistan. He is often a prince and sometimes Brahmin. I note that the vast majority of Tulku rebirths are in Tibet – Nepal – North India – Bhutan area. If not there then there must be some familial nepotism. Tulku begets tulku out of some follower or nun. I have never heard of a Viking incarnation. Once Buddhism spread East we did not get a sudden burst of Icelandic Bodhisattvas. The streets of Rio were not awash with them dancing at carnival.

My scientific mind notes this discrepancy. It seems unbalanced.

Surely a Bodhisattva reincarnating for the benefit of all sentient beings would not restrict themselves geographically or demographically? Global impact in isolated countries high up in the mountains is not likely to be high. Skilful means suggests ploughing other wider fields.

There is a kind of perhaps spiritual snobbery. After all the Vedas and Buddhism predate Christianity and Islam. Only the pilgrim skilled in meditation, asceticism and vegetarianism can get enlightened. Beer and twice cooked chips are verboten, interdit. Turmeric is a must.

It is illogical that someone should only be born in the same geolocation if they are to garner a wider experience. If you have not tried rollmop and aquavit…you have missed something.

This for me seems slightly problematic in the around the camp fire tales of Buddha. The other problem I have is with the notion of many Buddhas stretching back millennia. The human vehicle was according to archaeology not as intellectually advanced and capable. All those millennia ago it did not look human.

How could a Buddha be Neanderthal?

There is an evidenced based narrative chronology which errs from the verbatim understanding of canon and Mahayana canon more so. If these are meant to be metaphor and parable, there is less problem.

Nevertheless is seems strange that Buddha only hung out there or thereabouts…

Not Career Threatening…

February 16, 2026February 16, 2026 ~ quantumdreamer ~ Leave a comment

This blog is not, for me, career threatening. I do not have to worry about people thinking me whacko or fruit loop. It will not affect my ability to get a job nor secure any research grant income. I do not have to publish or perish, nor do I have to suck up to others in order to secure a conference invite which would enable me to profess in public about my work. I do not have to furnish evidence of peer esteem. There is no performance related metric in which I am obliged to demonstrate citation number or H-index.

It is a more moot point whether it might inhibit venture capital funding. Given my age and inactivity that is highly unlikely anyway.

I don’t have hordes of social media followers nor am I in “the” media. I have no media presence which could be cancelled on the baying whim of the horde or hive. I am not at risk of losing monetised social media content.

There is no compulsion for me to firm up or write down my ideas. In an academic sense at the age of 61 it is highly unlikely that I could come up with anything new. I am well past my sell by date and the best before has receded into the dim mists of history.

Over the years I have emailed a dozen or so current academics about dreaming and to date only one has replied. An interaction with me is perhaps career threatening for them…

On the cards this week is more DIY in the yellow kitchen. I have nearly finished the deep {using chemicals} clean which means we are good to go with the paint and decorate.

Being and old fart is less stressful…

Who Are You ?

February 14, 2026 ~ quantumdreamer ~ Leave a comment

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I woke up in a Soho doorway
A policeman knew my name
He said, “You can go, sleep at home tonight
If you can get up and walk away”

I staggered back to the underground
And the breeze blew back my hair

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Come on, tell me, who are you? (Who are you?
Who, who, who, who?)
Ah, who the fuck are you? (Who are you?
Who, who, who, who?)

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Songwriters: Peter Dennis Blandford Townshend

Who Are You lyrics © Spirit Four Music

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Following on from the recent dream I am back on the Llyn peninsula near Pwllheli at a time when my life was in flux. We had left Zambia because of the troubles at the birth of Zimbabwe. My life trajectory going from an English prep school to the grown up school proper was broken. Nchanga Consolidated Copper Mines were no longer going to pay my school fees. I was about to be thrown from a small genteel school of around a hundred boys aged under 13 into a mixed sex comprehensive of 1500 pupils up to the age of 18.

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I was there, on the beach, with Quadrophenia questioning the various aspects of myself aged ~ 13. I did not want to be on that family holiday. I took long solo walks along the beach in the wind and the sometimes rain. I felt alien and that I had come from another planet…I sensed many different aspects of myself, the rule of the four being one.

The question as to who or what I am or may be, has perhaps been posed by others too. People want to know…they like guarantees.

I have traced my maternal blood line back to several generations who lived in Beddgelert and environs, near Snowdon. Near to the river which flows from Glaslyn the beautiful blue lake at the cwm half way up Snowdon. The family then headed South to the Rhondda in search of work digging coal. Given the common nature of the surnames involved it was not trivial. Looking for a specific Jones in Wales…There is no surprising pedigree just a very simple story of economic migration. Some of the houses in which my relatives lived in Beddgelert have been on sale. The English took the census and they required data on which languages people spoke. They may not have been entirely welcome in the village.

So who the fuck am I?

Unlike the TV show about genealogy I also have hints at previous incarnations. They cannot be proven by documents or micro-fiche.

My status in the world is as a retired “anglais”. I am an immigrant. I cannot vote nor take public office here. I am bunched together with a whole group of expat Brits many of whom have some kind of story, most of whom do not fit the conventional rat-race-greasy-pole life any more. In Brittany the further you are from the coast the cheaper the housing. We are in the grey-zone. It is unlikely that I will change the circles I move in. Our lives revolve around doctors, supermarkets, DIY stores, garden centres and strolls on the beach or in the countryside.

Although I was once a practising scientist and academic. I don’t identify as such. It is useful to point this history out from time to time so people are not floored with surprise when I ask questions.

I have a selection of narratives which can be used to explain and narrate various aspect of this life. The input, putative as it may be, from previous lives adds an extra dimension of sorts. It has no obvious practical application. It is a bit like finding out my relatives worked in the Sygun copper near Dinas Emrys, Arthur’s fort. It is interesting but has no real world application.

Who as a question implies both a name, an identity and some kind of social status or significance in the world. In America I would be a nobody. I am not rich, I am not famous and I wield no kudos or power. Trump might call me a loser.

I have a passport and a carte de séjour. I have an official on-paper identity. I have a social security number and a tax account.

I have indeed woken up at a night bus stop lying asleep on the pavement near Soho. Replete with a skin full I had missed the last tube train and was attempting to catch a bus home. I have had a few encounters with Old Bill… the cops, after significant nocturnal refreshment in central London hospitality establishments.

People want to know who you are, to whom you are affiliated before they will believe you or trust you. They want to know if any interaction with you might add to their kudos. They want to know, “what is in it for them?”

Because I am a nobody and a loser people are unlikely to listen to me. There is no social benefit, no socio-political gain. Quite the contrary any interaction with me is probably socio-politically risky.

This is the rub, unless you are anyone, unless you have some kind of pukka institutional or congregational affiliation, nobody wants to know.

Nobody wants to know or interact with a nobody. Which is quite funny if you say it over.

Unless you have a reputation, supported by referees there is no acceptable evidence. You may not even exist if there is no one to vouch for you.

There is a tendency for people to imagine that they must know more than an unknown nobody because they are a big cheese affiliated to other cheeses. They can be arrogant and snobby.

People want to know, “who the fuck are you?”

If you cannot answer that…

Is Tantra Poppycock ?

February 12, 2026February 12, 2026 ~ quantumdreamer ~ Leave a comment

There is a tendency for people to pooh-pooh things without ever trying them. They may rely on the witness of “some bloke down the pub” or on the collective omniscience of their own peer group.

In the previous post I have put a link to “The Tantra of the Blue-Clad Blessed Vajrapāṇi”

There are no gonads or well-ness orgies therein. No V-scented candles or merch.

I would encourage any doubter to sit alone in a room at night with a few lighted candles and incense sticks and then read aloud the full translation. Many might think that Tantra and magic are poppycock few of these would have the balls to do what I have just suggested.

The only reliable way to learn is personal experience. The true test is in the act and not the words.

Place your bets if you dare…

Approach a Tantra like this one with a wrong attitude and you will FAFO, as the saying goes.

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A lot of people are sure in front of and with their peers, less so in the wee small hours on their own.

The translation of the Tantra linked to in the previous post shows that it is a spell of some considerable age and has many facets some of which are powerful even lethal. It is very well crafted.

I have always approached anything to do with Vajrapani with the utmost respect. My intuitive response to the first of the dreams today was to turn towards Vajrapani practice.

I personally am OK reading the Tantra because I am in control of my emotions and have a generally benign intent. Although I have not been granted any permission from a lineage holder, I am reasonably safe. I have a good instinct and in me there is very little dark or nasty. My self-assessment is probably realistic. For me I am not trying to use it or abuse it.

I have spent a lot of time on my own doing things which might freak others out. I have learned a few things on the way.

A lot of people imagine themselves skill full, clever and resourceful. They may be foolhardy enough to bet their “magic” against that of others. Which in itself shows a poor understanding and a lousy intent.

Somethings are beyond our ken. Each of us would do well to remember that.

I was toying with an idea the other day and I do not know how people might respond.

The question was, “how would people respond if, in all earnest, I offered to perform an exorcism on them?”

I guess it would depend on circumstance. Exorcism is a Tantric rite…

How would you respond if someone offered to exorcise you?

Is exorcism poppycock too?

Awareness of Potential and Perturbation in the Web of Life

February 11, 2026 ~ quantumdreamer ~ Leave a comment

I think it fair to speculate that I have a better awareness of the potential of things, where they might go and what they might morph into, than many. I kid myself that I can see scope out of a potential. I have a big picture preference. I can envision bigger scope.

I am not an eejit nor a gobshite.

Last night I had a restless night because “the dreaming” was highly perturbed. There were multiple events running into each other mostly pertaining to people from my UK past.

After things have had a massive “car crash” what might arise out of the debris, the ashes, is difficult to anticipate. “Car crashes” can be like a dose of salts, a good clean out. The reboot may not be successful; the system may not have a good recovery point. The dreaded blue or black screen of death may persist for a long time until a way forward is found. Things grind to a halt in the car crash.

Of late something weird has been going on with my computer and network. Google has been complaining and asking me for Captchas which suggests that something is off and perhaps someone is playing “silly buggers” remotely.

I am aware that the contents of this blog have the possibility to “explode”. There are some/few to whom what is here may be of more than a little interest. I would put the likelihood as low but the potential impact of a wide scale happenstance as high. With publicity things could easily get out of hand. There are perhaps some who would not want this, others who might.

It has a very low probability – high impact scaling in my mind. It is potentially big but it won’t happen.

On one level what I am saying as an ex-scientist is that I have “evidence” for prior incarnations reaching back thousands of years. Were I still a gainfully employed practicing scientist at a top university, such a claim would be more “interesting”. As it is I am just another weird eccentric British expat living in rural France. Maybe I have lost the plot entirely? This is an easy thing to suggest in PR terms.

Dr Whacko McNutjob…

It is an easy sell. One many would buy.

The potential for all this to change both suddenly and to a large degree exists. Potential may never manifest.

The phenomena of last night and to an extent still this morning suggest that a large scale perturbation in the web of life is ongoing…The jungle drums are sounding…

Something is up…

I am unclear as to any easy mechanism for it to involve me directly and/or in person.

I am not sure what excuse or justification anyone could make to me in order to explain {con}. I cannot see what might be cobbled together which would offer credibility. An open and honest approach is very unlikely because that is against normal modus operandi and the desire for control. People who like cunning plans do not understand honesty nor approaching with open hands and open hearts. It is alien to them.

Before sleeping last night I revisited the idea of a “Quantum Telepathy” patent application. If I am going to write something that might be more fun than a novel, though one could morph into the other.

I wonder if Whacko McNutjob would be an acceptable name for deed poll…

“If you’re a permanent resident overseas, you cannot change your name by deed poll.”

I would have to move back to the UK to do this…

Maybe it is all in my imagination and there is no hoo-ha going on…

How Likely Am I To Bullshit?

February 10, 2026February 10, 2026 ~ quantumdreamer ~ Leave a comment

It is common these days to hype, over egg , big up , exaggerate and overstate. This is a kind of infection which is sourced in the USA. One of the problems I had way back was that in writing grant proposals one had to overstate and oversell, stretch the limits of possible commercial applicability. It went against the academic notion of considered writing and into blagging so that the politicians could be sated with their need to blag the fuck out of everything. For example claiming that the UK might, in fantasy land, become a “Science Superpower”. A sound byte is not reality it is an advertiser’s tag line.

Although I can pitch and sell, to an extent, it is not my default. There is a time and a place.

About nine years ago I attended an “entrepreneurs” event in the home counties. I was given a chit saying that the value of said event was £3,000 and was not taxable. There were about fifty people there seeking help with preparing a business plan / pitch. The majority of whom were fantasists prone to over stating and bullshitting. There were so many “apps” being hyped that I got bored.

I offered to speak. Having been part of a big successful fund raise. The offer was not taken up. I was not one of the “gang”. Their loss not mine. I was probably the only person in the room who had raised millions on the back of a business plan I wrote. They wanted to teach me how.

The trouble is that if you are prone to bullshitting and over hyping you may imagine that everyone else is too!! This is not a bad working hypothesis but it is not universally applicable.

As a rule of thumb I am not obsessed with the sound of my own voice and do not love to be the centre of attention spouting forth endlessly from my soap box. I’ll speculate that I will research, think, research some more, think some more, and prepare to a greater extent than most.

My personal assessment is that I am not a gobshite prone to gobbing off.

If someone wants to look into things I will encourage them to see if they can add to what I have already found out.

My own self assessment is that I am not prone to bullshitting. I will not wing it in a pitch. I will be well prepared.

In the dream before the notion of car crash is presented. One can see in the Dragon’s Den TV programme that many pitches are car crashes. They are ill-prepared despite the fact of show back catalogue. Some try to bullshit which goes wrong. Some people have lives which lurch wildly from crisis to crisis. Their whole life is a car crash. We could sat Katie Price is an example of an ongoing car crash.

If you bullshit you are prone to car crash.

If you are well researched and prepared, less so.

Many “great ideas” and cunning plans result in car crashes, sometimes severe and extensive motorway pile ups.

You can make your mind up as to how likely I am to bullshit.

Am I more likely to bullshit than you?

How Things Pan Out…

February 8, 2026 ~ quantumdreamer ~ Leave a comment

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I think it fair to say we never really know how things are going to pan out. Sometimes hindsight and retrospect enable us to re-frame our narratives concerning how we got here, wherever here might be.

I can say that my “future” at the turn of the century looked markedly different to how it turned out and actually is now. I doubt even the greatest “seer” could have pictured what happened and how we live our lives now. The divergence of imagined future and subsequent actuality was large.

Aside from what goes on in the dreams, it is more straightforward to suggest an on-going likely trajectory now than it was back then. For a start the number of variables in life are reduced as is the dramatis personae.

Of course there could be an influx of new and new people but given the circles we move in, the likelihood is low.

We will have provisional answers on the major events of 2026 in a few months. One of these question marks we have a good indication on already.

I have been toying with an idea and that is about leaving the wheel of rebirth. In the hagiographies this is often represented as quasi-miraculous perhaps to generate aspiration. Maybe it is a whole lot simpler than that. Perhaps all one needs is to have seen a lot, experienced a lot and to be essentially {in its core meaning} used up. If one is used up and has zero residual ambition there is no driver to take on another body, another slab of meat. One becomes quiescent and has not the impulse to energise another biological form. This idea is perhaps more logical that others. The urge to be reborn ceases and it is no more complicated than that. No desire – no rebirth. No want – no rebirth. No greed – no rebirth. The list goes on.

Maybe it is a kind of boredom that allows one to escape the wheel. I have been there, seen that, done that and now at last, I have the t-shirt. I have learned along the way.

What hindsight may also suggest is the role others have had in our lives. How we perceive that role may differ from how they do. We may learn a little about for what purpose we called them forth into our lives. We may have missed the point entirely. Too often we berate and blame instead of considering. The way modern life is lived, lacks patience. In our haste we miss so very much.

Maybe that is it, no more drama…

Siddartha said, “stop being such a drama queen and like a cart follows an ox you will find satisfaction, serenity and peace. In time, after you have discarded your pink feather boa and ludicrous overreactions, you will be free.”

I have an inkling that many obsessed with complexity and intellectual masturbation fail to see the buddha-field of simplicity…

You never know what life has in store for you, nor how things will pan out.

All you every really have is now…

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Chapter VII: The Venerable (Arhat)

⁹⁰ There is no suffering for him who has finished his journey, and abandoned grief, who has freed himself on all sides, and thrown off all fetters.

⁹¹ They depart with their thoughts well-collected, they are not happy in their abode; like swans who have left their lake, they leave their house and home.

⁹² Men who have no riches, who live on recognised food, who have perceived void and unconditioned freedom (Nirvana), their path is difficult to understand, like that of birds in the air.

⁹³ He whose appetites are stilled, who is not absorbed in enjoyment, who has perceived void and unconditioned freedom (Nirvana), his path is difficult to understand, like that of birds in the air.

⁹⁴ The gods even envy him whose senses, like horses well broken in by the driver, have been subdued, who is free from pride, and free from appetites.

⁹⁵ Such a one who does his duty is tolerant like the earth, like Indra’s bolt; he is like a lake without mud; no new births are in store for him.

⁹⁶ His thought is quiet, quiet are his word and deed, when he has obtained freedom by true knowledge, when he has thus become a quiet man.

⁹⁷ The man who is free from credulity, but knows the uncreated, who has cut all ties, removed all temptations, renounced all desires, he is the greatest of men.

⁹⁸ In a hamlet or in a forest, in the deep water or on the dry land, wherever venerable persons (Arhanta) dwell, that place is delightful.

⁹⁹ Forests are delightful; where the world finds no delight, there the passionless will find delight, for they look not for pleasures.

Dhammapada (Max Muller)