I hold the most archaic values on earth ... the fertility of the soul, the magic of the animals, the power-vision in solitude.... the love and ecstasy of the dance, the common work of the tribe.
Interpretation
The quote emphasizes the importance of ancient values related to nature, community, and personal experience.
Gary Snyder's quote reflects a deep appreciation for essential, timeless values that connect humanity to nature and each other. He highlights the significance of the soul's fertility, the beauty and wisdom found in solitude, and the joy derived from communal activities like dance, suggesting that these aspects are fundamental to a meaningful and harmonious existence.
In practice
During a community gathering focused on nature conservation.
Being the Stream Meditation is not just a rest or retreat from the turmoil of the stream or the impurity of the world. It is a way of being the stream, so that one can be at home in both the white water and the eddies. Meditation may take one out of the world, but it also puts one totally into it.
We . . . must try to live without causing unnecessary harm, not just to fellow humans but to all beings. We must try not to be stingy, or to exploit others. There will be enough pain in the world as it is.
Nature is not a place to visit. It is home.
In the belly of the furnace of creativity is a sexual fire; the flames twine about each other in fear and delight. The same sort of coiling, at a cooler, slower pace, is what the life of this planet looks like. The enormous spirals of typhoons, the twists and turns of mountain ranges and gorges, the waves and the deep ocean currents - a dragonlike writhing.
Forests in the tropics are cut to make pasture to raise beef for the American market. Our distance from the source of our food enables us to be superficially more comfortable, and distinctly more ignorant.
Wherever man exists, he finds the need to redesign, to recreate the world. A more beautiful world, purer, sweeter smelling and more colorful. A garden is probably the spot where the hopes for civilization are best captured. In fact, man defines himself by his garden. My Grandmother standing wordless fifteen minutes Between rows of loganberries, clippers poised in her hand.
The Spirit is the first power we practically experience, but the last power we come to understand.
In music, in the sea, in a flower, in a leaf, in an act of kindness... I see what people call God in all these things.
First would be the literary side, then the spiritual and philosophical. The political side is required principally because of the necessity of the current Russian position.
We are governed, our minds are molded, our tastes formed, our ideas suggested, largely by men we have never heard of. This is a logical result of the way in which our democratic society is organized. Vast numbers of human beings must cooperate in this manner if they are to live together as a smoothly functioning society.
Without memories, without hope, they lived for the moment only. indeed, the here and now had come to mean everything to them. For there is no denying that the plague had gradually killed off in all of us the faculty not of love only but even of friendship. Naturally enough, since love asks something of the future, and nothing was left us but a series of present moments.
In a sane, civil, intelligent and moral society, you don't blame poor people for being poor.
Subscribe for the occasional hand-picked quote. No noise.