The Local East Village has just published a new interview with Dharma Punx’ Josh Korda.
Hey, any meditation teacher who loves Mastodon and the Wu-Tang Clan is my kinda meditation teacher.
Check out the interview here.
And thanks to the mighty Sam DeWitt for the heads-up on this one.
The mighty Sam DeWitt writes to send this one on:
I saw a link for Daft Punk’s music video “Derezzed“, which comes from the new version of Tron (“Tron Legacy”), and also looked at one of the new trailers and saw a few overtly Buddhist references.
Interesting (well, maybe…), in that Jeff Bridges maintains a practice and in a recent interview said that he talked with the producers about perhaps bringing some Buddhist ideas to the project. So here is a frame from the music video with someone in full lotus, then 2 frames of Jeff Bridges’ character, one in a kneeling meditation pose, then a close-up of him rising where they seem to have made certain that you can catch his mala beads.
You have the true Dharma/Eagle Eye, Sam. Thanks for sending!
I’ve seen a lot of references to meditation and/or Buddhism in advertising over my past few years of tracking them. Some, arguably, have been inspired. Some have been funny. Some have been perhaps unfortunate, or even inappropriate.
As for what word might best describe this new commercial… all I’ve got, at first blush, is “weird.” *
Reader Sam DeWitt — who spotted the commercial and sent it on — playfully writes:
Who would have thought that the real reason we should cultivate wisdom and compassion via meditation is so that we can create skins for our iPhones?
I might have to re-think this whole thing!
What do you think?
Do you think there’s room for such idealized, hyperstylized, depictions of meditation — even when they’re put to use for moving product rather than, say, inspiring us to honestly look at the contents of our minds, as they are, in the present moment?
Or do you think such co-optation is in some way harmful?
* Note: having now watched it a few times, I’m still not totally sure what I think of the ad but I do have to say that A) that seems like a LONG way to go to sell such a simple thing, and B) If I said I didn’t enjoy watching it, I’d be lying.
Great headline, but say it ain’t so*, Ram Bomjan. (See here.) …And in case you didn’t know: Bomjan, the so-called “Buddha Boy” of Nepal, is considered a modern-day Buddha by some, and is eyed with supspicion by others. Either way, he makes for good copy.
From another account: “The victims said, Bamjan, with the help of a local, brought them to a local’s house and thrashed them saying they were trying to scuttle his meditation.”
Hm. Well, that’s disappointing. But I can’t say I don’t understand it!
* Update: turns out he can’t say it ain’t so….
A favorite Buddhism-and-pop-culture story continues. Via Nepal News:
Meditator Ram Bahadur Bomjon, dubbed by people as “Buddha boy”, has reappeared at the base of the Churia hills after six months, state-owned news agency RSS reported.
Buddha boy Ram Bahadur Bomjon Bomjon who left his meditation place at Halkhoriya Daha six months ago for Gadhimai Mela with a view to stop animal sacrifice in the Mela had disappeared from midway before reaching the Gadhimai Mela venue.
Bomjon was found at the foothills of Churia hills during a search carried by a team led by Chairman of Namobuddha Tapoban Conservation Committee Bed Bahadur Rama, the report said.
Lama quoted Bomjon as saying that he went to Churia foothills in search of a quiet place to complete his six-year meditation as he was disturbed by noise in Halkhoriya.
Lama said there was no difference in the physique of the mediator. According to Lama, Bomjon plans to return to the village next year and share his knowledge and teachings.
Bomjom who had been meditating in Halkhoria under the security arrangement of the committee used to disappear for a few days before reappearing in the past as well.
More on BB, including video, here.
Okay, so Lost’s “dharma” sort of petered out. Good thing there’s ABC-TV’s “10 Things I Hate About You” to reign in the slack. (Except, the show’s now over.)
About the show’s finale, via Entertainment Weekly:
10 Things I Hate About You wrapped up its under-appreciated one-season run on ABC Family last night, and, quite frankly, I don’t know what went wrong here. The dialogue snapped, the plotlines crackled, and the characters popped — not easy to do in the tired high-school genre. [...] The two-part, hour-long series finale — which was clearly not intended as its swan song, since it ended on a cliffhanger — brought us all of the things we fans have grown to love about this show. Kat, characteristically, took up Buddhism, bringing on a hilarious (but still respectful) send-up of the school “meditation collective.”
I had no idea. (Being childless, it has never occurred to me for a second to watch any ABC Family programming.) Want to check it out? You can watch it here. It’ll cost you 99 cents, until Friday the 28th, after which it’s free.
Thanks to my friend Sam DeWitt, who sent news of this video clip with the message “Here is Josh Korda (our teacher at NYC Dharma Punx) interviewed on CBS Doc Dot Com. America will never be the same!”
CBS’s own caption for the clip: “Dharma Punx in New York City mixes the tradition of Buddhism with the ideology of punk rock. Dr. Jon LaPook talks with teacher Josh Korda about how the seemingly different connect with the help of meditation.” Check out the video, after the jump. (more…)
With the news that Twin Peaks — David Lynch and Mark Frost’s unlikely ABC smash hit — is celebrating its 20th anniversary, now seems like a fine time to re-present this appreciation from the Horse’s archives. Enjoy.
A MAN LAYS DYING on the floor of a jail cell between two mountains of the Pacific Northwest. Not even two weeks ago, despite his middle-age, he’d had a head of youthfully dark hair; now, it is completely, shockingly, all-white. The sprinkler system of the sheriff’s department that holds him has been set off, creating the effect of a tumultuous indoor downpour that rains down upon the white-haired man and his captors.
One of his captors — the very one who has most doggedly pursued him — is kneeling down. The white-haired man has committed the kind of unthinkable crimes that would disgust and shake most of us to the core, but Special Agent Dale Cooper instead remains very much with the moment. He holds the white-haired man, stroking his hair, comforting him even as the horrors of his crimes are finally admitted between last gasps. Then, Cooper speaks. The words come to him naturally:
“Leland,” he says, “the time has come for you to seek the path. Your soul has set you face to face with the clear light and you are now about to experience it in all its reality, wherein all things are like the void and cloudless sky, and the naked, spotless intellect is like a transparent vacuum, without circumference or center. Leland, in this moment, know yourself, and abide in that state. . . Look to the light, Leland. Find the light.”
Though spoken as much from the heart as from the head, Coop’s words are not truly his own. Compare them with this famous passage from The Tibetan Book of the Dead, meant to be recited to the dying as they pass on:
“O, nobly-born [so and so by name], the time hath now come for thee to seek the Path [in reality]. Thy breathing is about to cease. Thy guru hath set thee face to face before with the Clear Light; and now thou art about to experience in its Reality in the Bardo state, wherein all things are like the void and cloudless sky, and the naked, spotless intellect is like unto a transparent vacuum without circumference or centre. At this moment, know thou thyself, and abide in that state.” [W.Y. Evans-Wentz (translator and editor), The Tibetan Book of the Dead (Oxford, Third edition, 1957)]
Leland, though in his final moment, is surprised, almost smiling, in response to Coop’s urging that he find the light: “I see it!”
“Into the light, Leland,” Coop says, ” Don’t be afraid.”
And with that, Leland Palmer is dead.
It’s unusually moving; hardly your typical primetime TV jailhouse scene.
But this is no ordinary jailhouse, and it’s certainly not ordinary TV.
This is Twin Peaks, where nothing — not family, not FBI-men, not even the owls in the trees — is as it seems. (more…)
New York City’s Interdependence Project has been, as they say, taking meditation to the streets. First there was their November 2009 “Sit Down, Rise Up” 24-hour meditation marathon in the windows of ABC Carpet. (Video here.) Now, the IDP has gone underground to bring meditation to light.
This new public meditation — which the IDP calls an “Inter-Act,” and which Director of Arts and Communication Josh Adler describes as “a new type of performance art and civic engagement” — took place in an NYC subway tunnel: the one at Port Authority to be exact. A “challenging environment to try and meditate in,” to be sure. So, how did it go?
Well, the cops may have not liked it so much, but there surely can’t be a problem with walking meditation when sitting doesn’t work. And, as Adler states, the IDP intends to keep going. To join them, visit the IDP or treeplays.com.
