None of us have been here before.

The Zen of Mad Max.

YouTube video by LivSol108

"Business? Mankind was my business!"

None of us have been here before.

The Zen of Mad Max.

Here's insight we can use. In this short meditation, Rusty Ring favourite Peter Mayer sums up the lesson we all should have learned long ago, but that many – perhaps the majority – of us are still sulking over. Candid elaboration on the Zen notion of dependent co-arising, as applied to the human condition (a subordinate form I prefer to call co-dependent arising), the whole track consists of little more than Peter's own voice and guitar, enhanced here and there with a ghostly violin at the edges. It all adds up to power that commands attention, and a sedate simplicity our sort esteem. Another cut from Peter's excellent album Heaven Below. I've got this on frequent rotation these days, as I absorb demands to take arms against successive waves of faceless, vaguely defined offenders. Give it a click; see if it doesn't help to keep you on-task as well. _NOBODY ASKS_ by Peter Mayer Nobody asks to be born They just show up one day at life’s door Saying here I am world I’m a boy, I’m a girl I'm rich, I am sick, I am poor Nobody asks to be born No one is given a say They’re just thrown straight into the fray The bell rings at ringside And someone yells fight Some just end up on the floor Nobody asks to be born And no one’s assured Of a grade on the curve Or a friend they can trust Or a house where they’re loved And no life includes A book of how-to Because nobody has lived it before So to all the living be kind Bless the saint and the sinner alike And when babies arrive With their unholy cries Don’t be surprised by their scorn Nobody asks to be born

Attachment is still attachment, even when it's attached to something that's not attached.

Here's insight we can use. In this short meditation, Rusty Ring favourite Peter Mayer sums up the lesson we all should have learned long ago, but that many – perhaps the majority – of us are still sulking over. Candid elaboration on the Zen notion of dependent co-arising, as applied to the human condition (a subordinate form I prefer to call co-dependent arising), the whole track consists of little more than Peter's own voice and guitar, enhanced here and there with a ghostly violin at the edges. It all adds up to power that commands attention, and a sedate simplicity our sort esteem. Another cut from Peter's excellent album Heaven Below. I've got this on frequent rotation these days, as I absorb demands to take arms against successive waves of faceless, vaguely defined offenders. Give it a click; see if it doesn't help to keep you on-task as well. _NOBODY ASKS_ by Peter Mayer Nobody asks to be born They just show up one day at life’s door Saying here I am world I’m a boy, I’m a girl I'm rich, I am sick, I am poor Nobody asks to be born No one is given a say They’re just thrown straight into the fray The bell rings at ringside And someone yells fight Some just end up on the floor Nobody asks to be born And no one’s assured Of a grade on the curve Or a friend they can trust Or a house where they’re loved And no life includes A book of how-to Because nobody has lived it before So to all the living be kind Bless the saint and the sinner alike And when babies arrive With their unholy cries Don’t be surprised by their scorn Nobody asks to be born

I've been a huge Dickens fanboy since a Christmas in high school when I decided to read his most famous story. You know, from an actual book. The kind with no battery. That was the initial infection. By the end of my undergraduate years I'd read every novel, travelogue, and short story Dickens ever wrote. Followed, in the throes of detox, by several biographies and critical essays, including Orwell's succinct and brilliant analysis of Dickens' place in British culture. But since those student days I've wanted to write a sequel – more properly, a conclusion – to his most famous work. Because the man left _A Christmas Carol_ unfinished. In it, as you will recall, bitter old miser Ebenezer Scrooge is visited by four ghosts – or one ghost and three bodhisattvas – who convince him to lay off being a bitter old miser. (Note that in so doing, Dickens invents psychoanalysis fifty years before the fact. Further proof of his visionary genius.) The story closes on that catharsis, as Scrooge becomes slightly foolish and a lot nicer to those in his circle, and, we're assured, faithfully keeps Christmas to the end of his days. And there Charles Dickens abandons his greatest novel, leaving us with nothing more than this uplifting but ultimately anæmic introduction. And they call _Edwin Drood_ a tragedy! Because what Dickens takes to his own grave is the story of how Scrooge's overdue rejection of the scarcity model went on to raise a swelling wave of economic and social development, the force of which was still carrying, not just Tim Cratchit, but indeed Tim's great-grandchildren, generations thence. The belief that greed and stinginess are good business was coin of the realm in Dickens' day, as it remains in ours. But there's no evidence that this pat excuse for egotism is exact. Fact is, having this reality abruptly kicked up his backside by his business partner and three unrelenting enforcers, my man Ben (who was, lest we forget, uncommon sharp) re-entered the world on the day after New Year's and started ploughing wealth into the neighbourhood: creating infrastructure, developing resources, improving standards, and generating something vastly more valuable than simple jobs: opportunity. And that's not all. He also straight-up turned Queen's Evidence, plying his legendary flint and synoptic command of commercial law to defend the exploited from the predators he used to ride with. Soon those former homies just stood down when they learned Scrooge and Marley Ltd had the account; you don't win against those odds. Because S&M (you thought that name was a coincidence?) will bulldog you on every point until you never even recoup your losses, let alone profit. And the ironic part is that Scrooge actually got richer for all of this. Probably a lot richer. Because a lot of competent people who'd only served to keep him in gruel prior to that haunted Christmas Eve were paying their rent and thinking bigger. If the Ghosts of Christmas had thought it through, they would have added some economics to that field trip through his life. Asked him how his amiable and generous old employer Feziwig got so prosperous; shown him what a waste of earning potential were all those ruined present lives; and especially, how rich he totally wasn't by the hour of his death. Scrooge dies in the same crappy flat, surrounded by the same paltry rubbish. If he'd made more money, it hadn't accomplished anything. Not even for him. In the end, it's just a total waste to have a guy like Scrooge simply stand down. Because if it's true that the first thing you do when you find yourself in a hole is to stop digging, it is as well that in that moment you find yourself standing beside (or beneath) a pile of soil, holding a shovel. My thoughts this holiday season; may they be worth the penny. Wishing us every one the happiest of Yules, and a fruitful new year. _(1915 Arthur Rankham illustration of Jacob Marley auditing Scrooge_ ["Business? Mankind was my business. The common welfare was my business; charity, mercy, forbearance, benevolence, were all my business. The dealings of my trade were but a drop of water in the comprehensive ocean of my business!"] _courtesy of William Pearl and Wikimedia Commons.)_

The title of this post is a line from _Mad Max: Fury Road_ , the 2015 instalment of the _Mad Max_ film series. Much has been said about these Australian productions. Unlike virtually every other movie "franchise" (a fast-food industry term that often denotes similar entertainment), it contains no weak links: every release is genetically different, and all five succeed both as stand-alone works and episodes of the larger story. Reasons for this are highly speculated among film geeks. Suffice it to say that creator-director George Miller came into cinema with no formal training (he's actually a doctor – odd how often that happens) and aside from not knowing any better than to just go out and make a movie, he's also a bit unhinged. In the best possible way, I mean. Anyway. _Fury Road_ is a tale for our times. Made on the very cusp of the current collapse, it takes place, like all _Mad Max_ movies, in a thoroughly collapsed world that was fanciful when the series began. In this respect, it's hard not to read it as allegory – nay, prophecy – of all that's pounding down on us now. I don't want to spoil this epic for those who've yet to see it, but to service my theme, I'll just say that unlike previous _Max_ films, _Fury Road_ has two protagonists: the titular figure, whom we know well (though played by a new actor), and Furiosa, a newcomer who is in many respects his female prosopopoeia. (English. Use it or lose it.) The two share a common if involuntary struggle – the old, damaged, half-crazy man, and the younger, vital, ultimately righteous woman – and in the end, Max quietly issues her the above warning. The Zen of which is undeniable. As a young man, I was determined not to give in to the hypocrisy and self-centred self-destruction of unworthy authority. Not to serve it, certainly, but also not to enable it. This is why I get both Max (who's my age) and Furiosa. I understand the ambition to cast down the wicked, even if no-one else has your back, and the danger of accepting that crusade at heart-level, on behalf of others; you can't stop fighting without defecting. In Zen we have an uneasy relationship with activism. Classic teaching condemns it outright, as wasted effort at best, and multiplying delusion at worse. The fact that this means we've given de facto (and sometimes active) support to unspeakable evil over thousands of years renders that reading of our practice unsound in my eyes. In the late 20th century, Thich Nhat Hanh came up with the notion of Engaged Zen, of which Kevin Christopher Kobutsu Malone became the head of the arrow in North America. That Kobutsu was ultimately crushed by his ministry in no way invalidates it; if anything, it's a mark of honour. But it does go to Max's point. I never served like either man, but I've experienced that crushing. And I think all Zenners should consider this thing that I wish I'd learned much younger than I am now. That the main reason inquity always prevails is because it isolates its opponents, leaving them outgunned and outnumbered. And that's why you can't beat evil without accepting it. If that makes no sense, you're in the right room.

The title of this post is a line from _Mad Max: Fury Road_ , the 2015 instalment of the _Mad Max_ film series. Much has been said about these Australian productions. Unlike virtually every other movie "franchise" (a fast-food industry term that often denotes similar entertainment), it contains no weak links: every release is genetically different, and all five succeed both as stand-alone works and episodes of the larger story. Reasons for this are highly speculated among film geeks. Suffice it to say that creator-director George Miller came into cinema with no formal training (he's actually a doctor – odd how often that happens) and aside from not knowing any better than to just go out and make a movie, he's also a bit unhinged. In the best possible way, I mean. Anyway. _Fury Road_ is a tale for our times. Made on the very cusp of the current collapse, it takes place, like all _Mad Max_ movies, in a thoroughly collapsed world that was fanciful when the series began. In this respect, it's hard not to read it as allegory – nay, prophecy – of all that's pounding down on us now. I don't want to spoil this epic for those who've yet to see it, but to service my theme, I'll just say that unlike previous _Max_ films, _Fury Road_ has two protagonists: the titular figure, whom we know well (though played by a new actor), and Furiosa, a newcomer who is in many respects his female prosopopoeia. (English. Use it or lose it.) The two share a common if involuntary struggle – the old, damaged, half-crazy man, and the younger, vital, ultimately righteous woman – and in the end, Max quietly issues her the above warning. The Zen of which is undeniable. As a young man, I was determined not to give in to the hypocrisy and self-centred self-destruction of unworthy authority. Not to serve it, certainly, but also not to enable it. This is why I get both Max (who's my age) and Furiosa. I understand the ambition to cast down the wicked, even if no-one else has your back, and the danger of accepting that crusade at heart-level, on behalf of others; you can't stop fighting without defecting. In Zen we have an uneasy relationship with activism. Classic teaching condemns it outright, as wasted effort at best, and multiplying delusion at worse. The fact that this means we've given de facto (and sometimes active) support to unspeakable evil over thousands of years renders that reading of our practice unsound in my eyes. In the late 20th century, Thich Nhat Hanh came up with the notion of Engaged Zen, of which Kevin Christopher Kobutsu Malone became the head of the arrow in North America. That Kobutsu was ultimately crushed by his ministry in no way invalidates it; if anything, it's a mark of honour. But it does go to Max's point. I never served like either man, but I've experienced that crushing. And I think all Zenners should consider this thing that I wish I'd learned much younger than I am now. That the main reason inquity always prevails is because it isolates its opponents, leaving them outgunned and outnumbered. And that's why you can't beat evil without accepting it. If that makes no sense, you're in the right room.

The world does not need another activist. The world does not need another defender. The world does not need another patriot. The world does not need another Buddhist. The world needs calm, rational adults. Please be one.

"Business? Mankind was my business!"

True when I wrote it. Perhaps due for minor adjustment.

We've got three choices.

That's what the Tibetans call it, when you try to force your delusions on objective reality. You find a snake. It's an animal; it should have legs. But where are they? It has no hair in which to hide them, no feathers, no shell. Well, they must be inside. So you squeeze. I picture the unoffending reptile, coiling around my wrist: bug-eyed, silent, indignant. You want it to have legs. You'd feel better if it had legs. You insist it have legs. In the end, you'd rather it were dead, than it go on existing without legs. But the thing is, it has no legs. And that's only a problem for you. _(From_ Rough Around the Edges _[manuscript in progress]. Photo of_ Epicrates cenchria _, the rainbow boa, courtesy of Rawpixel.com and a generous photographer.)_

I've been a huge Dickens fanboy since a Christmas in high school when I decided to read his most famous story. You know, from an actual book. The kind with no battery. That was the initial infection. By the end of my undergraduate years I'd read every novel, travelogue, and short story Dickens ever wrote. Followed, in the throes of detox, by several biographies and critical essays, including Orwell's succinct and brilliant analysis of Dickens' place in British culture. But since those student days I've wanted to write a sequel – more properly, a conclusion – to his most famous work. Because the man left _A Christmas Carol_ unfinished. In it, as you will recall, bitter old miser Ebenezer Scrooge is visited by four ghosts – or one ghost and three bodhisattvas – who convince him to lay off being a bitter old miser. (Note that in so doing, Dickens invents psychoanalysis fifty years before the fact. Further proof of his visionary genius.) The story closes on that catharsis, as Scrooge becomes slightly foolish and a lot nicer to those in his circle, and, we're assured, faithfully keeps Christmas to the end of his days. And there Charles Dickens abandons his greatest novel, leaving us with nothing more than this uplifting but ultimately anæmic introduction. And they call _Edwin Drood_ a tragedy! Because what Dickens takes to his own grave is the story of how Scrooge's overdue rejection of the scarcity model went on to raise a swelling wave of economic and social development, the force of which was still carrying, not just Tim Cratchit, but indeed Tim's great-grandchildren, generations thence. The belief that greed and stinginess are good business was coin of the realm in Dickens' day, as it remains in ours. But there's no evidence that this pat excuse for egotism is exact. Fact is, having this reality abruptly kicked up his backside by his business partner and three unrelenting enforcers, my man Ben (who was, lest we forget, uncommon sharp) re-entered the world on the day after New Year's and started ploughing wealth into the neighbourhood: creating infrastructure, developing resources, improving standards, and generating something vastly more valuable than simple jobs: opportunity. And that's not all. He also straight-up turned Queen's Evidence, plying his legendary flint and synoptic command of commercial law to defend the exploited from the predators he used to ride with. Soon those former homies just stood down when they learned Scrooge and Marley Ltd had the account; you don't win against those odds. Because S&M (you thought that name was a coincidence?) will bulldog you on every point until you never even recoup your losses, let alone profit. And the ironic part is that Scrooge actually got richer for all of this. Probably a lot richer. Because a lot of competent people who'd only served to keep him in gruel prior to that haunted Christmas Eve were paying their rent and thinking bigger. If the Ghosts of Christmas had thought it through, they would have added some economics to that field trip through his life. Asked him how his amiable and generous old employer Feziwig got so prosperous; shown him what a waste of earning potential were all those ruined present lives; and especially, how rich he totally wasn't by the hour of his death. Scrooge dies in the same crappy flat, surrounded by the same paltry rubbish. If he'd made more money, it hadn't accomplished anything. Not even for him. In the end, it's just a total waste to have a guy like Scrooge simply stand down. Because if it's true that the first thing you do when you find yourself in a hole is to stop digging, it is as well that in that moment you find yourself standing beside (or beneath) a pile of soil, holding a shovel. My thoughts this holiday season; may they be worth the penny. Wishing us every one the happiest of Yules, and a fruitful new year. _(1915 Arthur Rankham illustration of Jacob Marley auditing Scrooge_ ["Business? Mankind was my business. The common welfare was my business; charity, mercy, forbearance, benevolence, were all my business. The dealings of my trade were but a drop of water in the comprehensive ocean of my business!"] _courtesy of William Pearl and Wikimedia Commons.)_

The title of this post is a line from _Mad Max: Fury Road_ , the 2015 instalment of the _Mad Max_ film series. Much has been said about these Australian productions. Unlike virtually every other movie "franchise" (a fast-food industry term that often denotes similar entertainment), it contains no weak links: every release is genetically different, and all five succeed both as stand-alone works and episodes of the larger story. Reasons for this are highly speculated among film geeks. Suffice it to say that creator-director George Miller came into cinema with no formal training (he's actually a doctor – odd how often that happens) and aside from not knowing any better than to just go out and make a movie, he's also a bit unhinged. In the best possible way, I mean. Anyway. _Fury Road_ is a tale for our times. Made on the very cusp of the current collapse, it takes place, like all _Mad Max_ movies, in a thoroughly collapsed world that was fanciful when the series began. In this respect, it's hard not to read it as allegory – nay, prophecy – of all that's pounding down on us now. I don't want to spoil this epic for those who've yet to see it, but to service my theme, I'll just say that unlike previous _Max_ films, _Fury Road_ has two protagonists: the titular figure, whom we know well (though played by a new actor), and Furiosa, a newcomer who is in many respects his female prosopopoeia. (English. Use it or lose it.) The two share a common if involuntary struggle – the old, damaged, half-crazy man, and the younger, vital, ultimately righteous woman – and in the end, Max quietly issues her the above warning. The Zen of which is undeniable. As a young man, I was determined not to give in to the hypocrisy and self-centred self-destruction of unworthy authority. Not to serve it, certainly, but also not to enable it. This is why I get both Max (who's my age) and Furiosa. I understand the ambition to cast down the wicked, even if no-one else has your back, and the danger of accepting that crusade at heart-level, on behalf of others; you can't stop fighting without defecting. In Zen we have an uneasy relationship with activism. Classic teaching condemns it outright, as wasted effort at best, and multiplying delusion at worse. The fact that this means we've given de facto (and sometimes active) support to unspeakable evil over thousands of years renders that reading of our practice unsound in my eyes. In the late 20th century, Thich Nhat Hanh came up with the notion of Engaged Zen, of which Kevin Christopher Kobutsu Malone became the head of the arrow in North America. That Kobutsu was ultimately crushed by his ministry in no way invalidates it; if anything, it's a mark of honour. But it does go to Max's point. I never served like either man, but I've experienced that crushing. And I think all Zenners should consider this thing that I wish I'd learned much younger than I am now. That the main reason inquity always prevails is because it isolates its opponents, leaving them outgunned and outnumbered. And that's why you can't beat evil without accepting it. If that makes no sense, you're in the right room.

The title of this post is a line from _Mad Max: Fury Road_ , the 2015 instalment of the _Mad Max_ film series. Much has been said about these Australian productions. Unlike virtually every other movie "franchise" (a fast-food industry term that often denotes similar entertainment), it contains no weak links: every release is genetically different, and all five succeed both as stand-alone works and episodes of the larger story. Reasons for this are highly speculated among film geeks. Suffice it to say that creator-director George Miller came into cinema with no formal training (he's actually a doctor – odd how often that happens) and aside from not knowing any better than to just go out and make a movie, he's also a bit unhinged. In the best possible way, I mean. Anyway. _Fury Road_ is a tale for our times. Made on the very cusp of the current collapse, it takes place, like all _Mad Max_ movies, in a thoroughly collapsed world that was fanciful when the series began. In this respect, it's hard not to read it as allegory – nay, prophecy – of all that's pounding down on us now. I don't want to spoil this epic for those who've yet to see it, but to service my theme, I'll just say that unlike previous _Max_ films, _Fury Road_ has two protagonists: the titular figure, whom we know well (though played by a new actor), and Furiosa, a newcomer who is in many respects his female prosopopoeia. (English. Use it or lose it.) The two share a common if involuntary struggle – the old, damaged, half-crazy man, and the younger, vital, ultimately righteous woman – and in the end, Max quietly issues her the above warning. The Zen of which is undeniable. As a young man, I was determined not to give in to the hypocrisy and self-centred self-destruction of unworthy authority. Not to serve it, certainly, but also not to enable it. This is why I get both Max (who's my age) and Furiosa. I understand the ambition to cast down the wicked, even if no-one else has your back, and the danger of accepting that crusade at heart-level, on behalf of others; you can't stop fighting without defecting. In Zen we have an uneasy relationship with activism. Classic teaching condemns it outright, as wasted effort at best, and multiplying delusion at worse. The fact that this means we've given de facto (and sometimes active) support to unspeakable evil over thousands of years renders that reading of our practice unsound in my eyes. In the late 20th century, Thich Nhat Hanh came up with the notion of Engaged Zen, of which Kevin Christopher Kobutsu Malone became the head of the arrow in North America. That Kobutsu was ultimately crushed by his ministry in no way invalidates it; if anything, it's a mark of honour. But it does go to Max's point. I never served like either man, but I've experienced that crushing. And I think all Zenners should consider this thing that I wish I'd learned much younger than I am now. That the main reason inquity always prevails is because it isolates its opponents, leaving them outgunned and outnumbered. And that's why you can't beat evil without accepting it. If that makes no sense, you're in the right room.