Better to guard your inner virtue, nurture your vital essence, protect your spirit, treasure your breath, and avoid talking too much.
Ho-Shang Kung
**************************
Hello Margie
**************************
In other words keep your cards close to your chest,
Mr. Kung has some good advice here, a check list of tasks which if they don't make us happy at least help us from becoming miserable,
Where's your inner virtue? Do you remember where you put it? Did you stow it away in the bottom drawer of your bureau and forget about it. Well, if so it's in a good safe place, but maybe you should remove it, air it out and have another look to see if you are still living according to it's rules.
You know what your vital essence is and where you put it. It's what makes you who you are and who you are is important to the world so don't let that essence get to sagging and attract some weeds. Give it some sunshine and some TLC. The world needs it.
Why does your spirit need protecting? Because there is an army, disorganized but strong, out to maraud and plunder you out of all that keeps you looking up and forward and facing life with a gleam in your eye. So post a watchman on the tower, fill the moat and don't let enemy through the door.
To be able to walk and breathe is the purest metaphor for freedom. We breathe, that's inspiration. We take in air that's fresh, that's rejuvenation. We experience the aromas of nature and learn her invisible secrets. All things to treasure greatly.
And lastly "avoid talking too much."
I'll say no more.
DB - The Vagabond
Never give up.
************************
Showing posts with label talking. Show all posts
Showing posts with label talking. Show all posts
Tuesday, May 29, 2012
Sunday, March 14, 2010
Claudio's Song
Our chief defect is that we are more given to talking about things than to doing them.
Nehru
*************************
Yesterday afternoon I had a conversation with a woman I've known for many years. We're former colleagues. She's a stage manager. I was reminded about another conversation we had one day. During a break in rehearsal we were sitting together and I was talking about the role, the play and about acting in general. She listened to me with attention. Finally she said "Why do you talk about it? Why don't you just do it?" The question took me back a step. Of course I was doing it. Most of the day was spent doing it. I didn't realize I was spending my free time and her free time talking about it. I had to come up with an answer. If not right then, eventually.
I finally concluded that I talk about it because I enjoy talking about it. I enjoy analyzing things, particularly the art of acting. That's why it tends to show up so often in this journal. If I just talked about it and didn't do it I would be all mouth and no meaning, as we so often see these days on TV.
There's a rule in public speaking which goes: Tell them what you're going to say. Say it. Then tell them what you said. The same rule could be appplied in any of life's activities, although it's probably advisable to forget the first. Do it. Then tell them what you did. If you do it then you have the right to talk about it.
On the other hand you can do what my friend suggested, do it, and not talk about it. I think most of the doers in the world are not the talkers. The doers are those who identify the problem, gather the proper tools together and fix it.
Unfortunately, as Nehru points out, the world is full of the other kind. Go to any civic board meeting, any town meeting, any tenants association meeting and hear the talk. The Latest Up To The Minute News? A few tid bits of information then talk. A fact finding committee? Talk. A board meeting? Talk. The court is in session? Talk. Congress? You guessed it.
Someone, I don't remember who, perhaps you do, once described a committee as that which keeps minutes and wastes hours. I like the old saying that a camel is a horse designed by a committee.
One of my favorite stories in the history of music is about the origins of opera. There are musicologists who will disagree with me about this, but it is open to opinion, and here's mine. During the Renaissance artists were trying to recreate ancient Greek drama which had recently been discovered. They didn't know much about it so they formed a committee, called the Camerata, whose task it was to come up with a consensus, design formal elements and put down some rules of writing and composition. They met for a long time, took expert testimony, learned a little bit about how the ancients sounded and looked. They were carefully and conscientiously designing a camel.
While all that discussion was going on, another man, Claudio Monteverdi, who was basically a song writer, invented opera. Monteverdi was a doer not a talker and when his first opera appeared on the stage everyone knew this was a new art form and it was exciting. Sung drama.
Opera is such an important art form that people are still writing them today, joining story, words and music into a theatre piece on the grand scale of the ancient Greeks. And thanks to Claudio we hove operettas, musical comedy and probably a few MTV videos,
I'm a talker as well as a doer. There's no one around here to talk to so I write. But at least I don't talk about writing. I do it.
DB - The Vagabond
********************
Weekend Contest Answer.
There were 3 winners (actually 4).
The Grand Prize, a set of aluminum doilies, goes to Barry of the Email Lions
Second prize to mrs. miss alaineus of the Blogspot Tigers
And a tie for third place between the Amazing Sister Act of Val and Krissy also of the Tigers.
Pacifica62 came in just under the wire for 4th place.
Which two items do not belong on this list?
-------------------------------------
Cuba
Guatemala
Iceland
Ireland
Madagascar
Manhattan
Puerto Rico
Rhode Island
Sardinia
Sicily
Sri Lanka
Tasmania
The answer is Guatemala and Rhode Island. All the rest are islands.
Thank you folks.
Now here comes the Sunday Puzzle.
********************
Sunday Puzzle
The bear went over the mountain to see what he could see.
A secret word opens the treasure chest.
Can you discover the secret word?
I'm found at MacDonald's.
I'm good for a view.
I don't take to camels.
But I might be on your shoe.
Good luck.
DB
****************
Nehru
*************************
Yesterday afternoon I had a conversation with a woman I've known for many years. We're former colleagues. She's a stage manager. I was reminded about another conversation we had one day. During a break in rehearsal we were sitting together and I was talking about the role, the play and about acting in general. She listened to me with attention. Finally she said "Why do you talk about it? Why don't you just do it?" The question took me back a step. Of course I was doing it. Most of the day was spent doing it. I didn't realize I was spending my free time and her free time talking about it. I had to come up with an answer. If not right then, eventually.
I finally concluded that I talk about it because I enjoy talking about it. I enjoy analyzing things, particularly the art of acting. That's why it tends to show up so often in this journal. If I just talked about it and didn't do it I would be all mouth and no meaning, as we so often see these days on TV.
There's a rule in public speaking which goes: Tell them what you're going to say. Say it. Then tell them what you said. The same rule could be appplied in any of life's activities, although it's probably advisable to forget the first. Do it. Then tell them what you did. If you do it then you have the right to talk about it.
On the other hand you can do what my friend suggested, do it, and not talk about it. I think most of the doers in the world are not the talkers. The doers are those who identify the problem, gather the proper tools together and fix it.
Unfortunately, as Nehru points out, the world is full of the other kind. Go to any civic board meeting, any town meeting, any tenants association meeting and hear the talk. The Latest Up To The Minute News? A few tid bits of information then talk. A fact finding committee? Talk. A board meeting? Talk. The court is in session? Talk. Congress? You guessed it.
Someone, I don't remember who, perhaps you do, once described a committee as that which keeps minutes and wastes hours. I like the old saying that a camel is a horse designed by a committee.
One of my favorite stories in the history of music is about the origins of opera. There are musicologists who will disagree with me about this, but it is open to opinion, and here's mine. During the Renaissance artists were trying to recreate ancient Greek drama which had recently been discovered. They didn't know much about it so they formed a committee, called the Camerata, whose task it was to come up with a consensus, design formal elements and put down some rules of writing and composition. They met for a long time, took expert testimony, learned a little bit about how the ancients sounded and looked. They were carefully and conscientiously designing a camel.
While all that discussion was going on, another man, Claudio Monteverdi, who was basically a song writer, invented opera. Monteverdi was a doer not a talker and when his first opera appeared on the stage everyone knew this was a new art form and it was exciting. Sung drama.
Opera is such an important art form that people are still writing them today, joining story, words and music into a theatre piece on the grand scale of the ancient Greeks. And thanks to Claudio we hove operettas, musical comedy and probably a few MTV videos,
I'm a talker as well as a doer. There's no one around here to talk to so I write. But at least I don't talk about writing. I do it.
DB - The Vagabond
********************
Weekend Contest Answer.
There were 3 winners (actually 4).
The Grand Prize, a set of aluminum doilies, goes to Barry of the Email Lions
Second prize to mrs. miss alaineus of the Blogspot Tigers
And a tie for third place between the Amazing Sister Act of Val and Krissy also of the Tigers.
Pacifica62 came in just under the wire for 4th place.
Which two items do not belong on this list?
-------------------------------------
Cuba
Guatemala
Iceland
Ireland
Madagascar
Manhattan
Puerto Rico
Rhode Island
Sardinia
Sicily
Sri Lanka
Tasmania
The answer is Guatemala and Rhode Island. All the rest are islands.
Thank you folks.
Now here comes the Sunday Puzzle.
********************
Sunday Puzzle
The bear went over the mountain to see what he could see.
A secret word opens the treasure chest.
Can you discover the secret word?
I'm found at MacDonald's.
I'm good for a view.
I don't take to camels.
But I might be on your shoe.
Good luck.
DB
****************
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