Podcast Benomtad

A soldier returns from the wars, and now that his parents have died, he seeks shelter with his brothers.  But they reject him, and he wanders, penniless and starving, into a field.  The wind shifts, and a sly man in a green coat appears.  The soldier is to kill a bear, and he does so unflinchingly, so the green frocked man offers him a deal: if he wears the bearskin, which is what he will be known...

The story teaches that one wants to find the good-hearted, but hard-working parts, and bring in the creative magic, and over time, alchemize the tyrannical ruler, and overcome him, without ruining its good nature.  The sharpshooter follows that way, not knowing exactly what is happening, to a place he does not understand that is said to be at the edge of destruction.   (From a discussion on “Go to...

The Brothers Grimm’s “The Fisherman and His Wife”   A fisherman lived with his wife in a miserable pigsty by the sea.  When he went fishing, he pulled up a large flounder, a prince who began speaking with him and negotiated his release.  The fisherman simply let the talking fish go, leaving a trail of blood behind it.  Back home, his wife, surprised that he did not ask for anything, sends him back...

The first two sons of the king’s gardener are passive, choosing the pleasure inn over the shabby one, and they end up as condemned robbers.  These hedonistic brothers ignore wise advice and go instead with their senses.  Their passivity may be rooted in their upbringing.  They may be like the pleasure-seeking erotic man who keeps expanding the outlets for his desire and eventually step on someone’...

In “Awakening from the Meaning Crisis,” Ep. 13, “Buddhism and Parasitic Processing,” John Vervaeke, based in Stephen Batchelor’s idea that we’ve gravely misinterpreted Buddhism in the West, outlines how we might understand core parts of the Buddha’s teachings.  For suffering, he interprets it as a form of parasitic processing, a reciprocal narrowing of the connection between oneself and the world....

On appearances: Robin Hood voluntarily descends in society.  That way, he can see what is happening on the ground.  Perhaps those who truly speak to the people attract all sorts.    For the full video episode: https://youtu.be/vtACZtly05A   Audio episode: https://youtu.be/uslCz3O2V_k   For more in this podcast, please go to: Podbean: https://benomtad.podbean.com Apple Podcasts: https://podcasts.ap...

Did the evil stepmother queen in “Snow White” grow a bit from then to this story?  Well, she is still trying for unchanging beautiful perfection.  She does not go the way of nature.  (From a discussion on Jonathan Pageau’s “Rapunzel.”)   Thank you for the likes! A comment and a subscribe really helps us out!     For the video episode: https://youtu.be/eX0YUp4bTn0   Audio episode: https://benomtad....

The king’s best hunter shoots a bird, wounding it, and it begs him to not kill it, instructing him to bring it home, put it on a window sill, and strike it.  When he does so, it turns into a beautiful woman and they marry.  She sees that he is wearied by his daily hunting and instructs him to borrow money from everyone he knows to buy silk.  She summons two youthful magical helpers and they craft...

The Brothers Grimm’s “The Golden Bird”  A king’s garden is robbed of a golden apple, and he sends his three sons, one at a time, to discover the culprit.  The first two fall asleep, resulting in two more missing apples, but the youngest son shoots a feather off the thief–a golden bird–with an arrow on the third night.  The king finds it’s so valuable that he sends his sons, one at a time, after it...

Robin Hood & the Tinker: The Sheriff of Nottingham sends out a warrant for Robin Hood’s arrest.  Local men don’t want to take it up, but a Tinker from out of town brags he will serve it.  Robin Hood is able to get him drunk and avoid a fight, but then has to fight him down the road.  The Tinker breaks Hood’s staff but the outlaw calls his men, and they make him one of their own.   The Shooting...

The lack of taking in feedback of authoritarian and totalitarian regimes.  With many adherents of these ideologies, anything is justified.  We are reflecting on Howard Pyle’s Robin Hood, where the outlaw hero gives feedback, often rough, to the leadership of an illegitimate and rapacious regime.   RH on Project Gutenberg: https://www.gutenberg.org/files/10148/10148-h/10148-h.htm   Jonathan Pageau’...

An old woman lives alone in a small cottage in the woods, with bitterness and her rapunzel cabbages as companions.  She prizes the plants, however, attending them relentlessly.  Now a newly-married woodcutter and his pregnant wife live nearby, and the woodcutter eyes the greens in passing because his wife craves them.  The crone notices his taking one and says she’ll take what is most precious sho...

Going into wholeness or connection, on the one hand, or solipsism and individualism, on the other hand.  It seems one can find one’s way to solipsism if one does not “return to school,” and patiently gain virtue so that one can hold one’s gifts non-egotistically and share them with the world.  And where the world goes depends on how people use their gifts.  From a discussion on the Brothers Grimm’...

LL and I read and discuss this lovely folktale.  A man had three sons, the youngest called Dummling (Simpleton), who was mocked and sneered at.  The eldest son wanted to hew wood in the forest, and his mother packed him cake and wine.  On the way, a small grey man greeted him and asked him to share the food, but the son refused, saying he would have none left.  At a tree, he cut his arm and return...

We summarize Howard Pyle’s Robin Hood’s Prologue, on the green-clad Robbing man’s origins and his meeting, being beat by, and joining forces with Little John.  Then we discuss Robin Hood as a proper response to the illegitimate and ravenous leader as well as his being a trickster figure that draws attention to problems in leadership, which lead either to corrections or bigger problems and even sys...

Robert Pirsig, of “Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance,” also had an awakening experience, where he said he was in touch with “quality,” the key concept of his metaphysics.  But he ended up hospitalized, and we talk about how these experiences need others, an understanding community, teachers, tradition and so forth.  Ian says that the biggest danger, however, is trying to cleave to it.  Oth...

A poor woodcutter sends his son to the high school to have a better lot in life, but the money runs out before the son can complete his studies.  He returns home and embarks on his father’s living with a cheerful spirit.  They don’t have money for a second axe, and he tells his father to borrow it from the neighbor.  At noon, the son sets off deeper into the woods to look at birds’ nests, ridicule...

We discuss mystical experiences and higher states of consciousness.  We start with an awakening account of a Japanese business executive and Zen student, referenced below.  Higher states of consciousness can help us see the underlying unity of things, including of those with ourselves, and make us more compassionate and less egocentric.  In other words, they increase meaning in life.  We also disc...

A man and a woman long for a child.  The woman looks out of her back window into the walled garden of an enchantress and desperately desires the Rampion (Rapunzel) plant.  Her husband goes to get it for her, but is confronted by the intense gaze of the enchantress.  He reasons with her, and she negotiates: he can leave with it if they give her their firstborn.  The wife consumes the wonderful sala...

The image of the dark, ruined castle as the unconscious mind.  Then there is a series of steps going deeper and deeper, and silent.  And after Hans' repeated bouts of suffering, the princess is able to speak.  People don’t want to suffer without encouragement.  And even after his first maturing transformation, he is still dependent.  The princess leaves him, which is a part of your soul, the daimo...

The king’s groundskeeper doesn’t know what to do with his son so he kicks him off the farm with anger.  Hans goes out into the world and encounters a dark, ruined castle.  Inside, all is silent.  Exhausted, he wants to rest, and a woman in black gives him food and wordlessly points to the bed.  Three days he endures torture from dark figures, and the woman, now in white, saves and marries him.   R...

The loneliness of the tyrant.  Swiveling head, eyes leery of plots real and chimerical.  Ian: the need for power to that degree can only come from a misunderstanding of power as the means of procuring some basic need.     Thank you for the likes! A comment and a subscribe really helps us out!   And please link to or comment with someone I should check out or talk with!   For the full episode, go t...

Ian and I continue our discussion on Aristotle’s idea of Character and the Golden Mean, bringing in other ideas from wisdom traditions and our experiences.  Join us for this wide and deep dive into the mind and reality! Thank you for the likes! A comment and a subscribe really helps us out!   And please link to or comment with someone I should check out or talk with! For more in this podcast, plea...

To free yourself, some people probably have to change their lives.  Tony Soprano or an oppressive dictator cannot grow spiritually and stay in their positions. Thank you for the likes! A comment and a subscribe really helps us out!   For the full episode, go to: https://benomtad.podbean.com/e/aristotle-character-wisdom-and-foolishness-part-1/ Or for the video:  https://youtu.be/fbq7IX9gPbU   For m...

Aristotle, Character, Wisdom and Foolishness, Part 1  Plato gave us an early psychological theory, that the mind has three parts: a man (rationality), a monster (appetite), and a lion (honor-seeking).  Harmony between the parts helps bring one away from self-deception and illusion, and closer to reality, including the good. Further, Aristotle gave us the idea of character, which we develop by mind...