What gets me is the people who complain about the emptiness and the void can't live without it. I have seen people get addicted to it. I seen some sabotage their happiness for it. There's nothing wrong with dealing with it. Shit everybody has to deal with it.

I'm a very competitive person and it sometimes gets me when people quit without trying. I have seen people purposely lose just to avoid a bigger moment then complain that they never have any luck when it comes to winning.

I know I went off in a different tangent but your article made me think of that for some reason.

Not that they're lying.

Which is more scarier homework or skydiving?

Having said this, I second Kelly's addition.

I don't think you jumped the shark but sometimes we're harder on ourselves or have stuff going on in RT.

I think this tied things up real nice. Great thoughts here.  Excellent.

Lets start here:

None of us are immune to this, regardless of how right we think we're living.  It is particuarly hard to recognise and maintain control over these 'wants' instead of these controlling you.  Anything that takes us away from our essential being is not good, in my books.

Growing pains are natural.  But some are so scared of pain, they don't allow themselves any growth.  Pain is elemental and a part of life and it really is incumbent on each of us to learn how to deal with it properly in our own way.

I see this as an analogy to the Dao De Ching idea of the uncarved block.  The abyss, emptiness, uncarved block or whatever are all the same, as far as I'm concerned.  In working towards understanding these ideas, I believe we become much more at peace with ourselves because we can see the folly of filling our lives up with petty, needy desires. 

Exactly, mate.  Rock the fuck on!

Oh yeah, take some pictures of those trees.

Huntsville sounds really nice as does the weather.  And your hotel room.  Hope you enjoy the course and your stay there, mate. 

As for the photo, well I don't know how I feel about it.  While I'm not a moralist or a wowser, I have mixed feelings about capital punishment.  The crime he committed was atrociious, for sure, but does his death actually change anything?  It certainly doesn't stop others from committing similar crimes.  Ah but this is the place to discuss capital punishment so I won't do any more hijacking.

I love traveling...and especially by myself.  I like to go local, find a little mom and pop place, sip coffee and watch people.  Decaf though, or I can't stand myself.

Hope you enjoy your alone time.....and learn something....oh and there is always one of  "them" in a class (someone for whatever reason everyone else will always remember more than the actual material of the class)...if you can't figure out who it is..then its probably you.

hahahaha

Have a good one!

i get the idea of what it means, but could someone fill me in on the background?

I enjoy JU.  It has pretty good interaction.  I can't say as I feel either way about the new format.  I guess I like it. Certain functions don't work for me (when I read a post and then it has the links on left for recent posts by that blogger) but I think it's a new feature so I can live with out it.

I come and go a lot.  I need to.  I'm checking JU out everyday lately, and I shouldn't. It's a procrastination technique.  I thought I would blog everyday, but I don't. 

I originally started the blog so that my family back home could check in with what I am doing but apparently, they can't be bothered to click a link.  They will call me, and vice versa, but  reading a blog just isn't their thing.  I also don't want to blog about work.  I am consistently amazed at people's ability to misconstrue things so I just avoid work-related posts.  Sometimes, that's all I have on my mind though.

Your skydiving experience is kinda like my first sexual experiences. My first time was with an "instructor" and I was scared as hell and it before I knew it it was over. The second time it was with an "instructor" again and this time I was instructed to repeat over and over "I will think of my instructor's satisfaction". Again I was scared and despite looking in circles and at horizons it was sadly over all too quick. The third time I was told by said "instructor" I will be doing it all alone.

I had started a poetry blog on blogger which is gone now. I just don't think JU is much for poems and I wouldn't get as much response here on that sort of thing.

However for a general social board, I like this place better than some others I've tried. I'll leave and miss it and come back again. etc.

Ditto!

I hang around because I'm still happy to know so many of you! I do enjoy the site because of you guys.  Except when there isn't much interaction it does get boring and that's up to us all isn't it?  We each tend to lose interest because one or the other isn't writing anymore or responding anymore...stuff happens!  I will be back often when things have calmed down a bit around me, for now, I'm on and off and on and off.....but not jumped ship! 

Rose...that is so much fun. My husband and I did that on our trip to Hawaii. It was very exciting. They even have those wobbly rope bridges to walk across. I say do it!!!!!

You know what I'd like to do? Zipline.   It's probably pretty wimpy, but to me, it would be adventerous.

I am happy you finally got to get mother nature to cooperate with you...crazy dude...

As for the Lotto I say we all should play it and whoever wins has the biggest party, well not the biggest party but the best party ever.

Now all we have to do is play it.

I try to log on frequently, but when you work on a computer for a profession, it's hard to want to sit in front of one voluntarily, even though its for pleasure.

Good people here, but am missing a few, and greatly annoyed by several who actually appear to be well liked. I mainly stick to reading my friends in my sidebar, but do peek around from time to time at others.

Summer (and my break) is here, though, and I'd like to spend some of my time on JU.  Hope others do as well.

Actually, its rare that I do comment. I don't like getting involved in the melodrama of these forums or any others.

Well that would be one hell of an occasion.  We wouldn't have to go looking for trouble, it will be sitting at the bar waiting for us.

One of these days, mate, one of these days...