Life: post-retreat bliss and dissertation work

I’m still ‘cruising’ or ‘coasting’ (terms denoting when one’s mood is lifted about 3 points on a 1-10 scale following a short retreat or vacation) from my weekend in Bozeman.

Matthew is as impressive and energetic as ever, demanding that we deal with issues in our lives that make our time on the mat (meditating) difficult. Mostly he means dealing with things in our past that keep coming up: resentment, grief, and incompletions. Some people found his intensity difficult, but others were thankful for his frankness: you can’t solve psychological problems with spiritual means (i.e. meditation).

I wish I had taken notes. I always listen better when I’m taking notes. Luckily I have those I took at the retreat back in ’04 where he discussed some of the same topics. The notes have been a fantastic guide for me in my own reflections on life, as well as my fledgling attempts to teach Buddhism as a way of life to others. Matt said he’s working the themes into a book that should be out in the next year or so.

Dissertation Work

The dissertation is coming along brilliantly, I think. It is always hard to gauge exactly how it is, considering that I have 40 pages, over 12000 words to keep track of. And then I still have to complete the final section, about another 2000 words, give or take.

The ‘brilliant’ part is that I seem to understand all of the material that I am reading now – whereas before it was all either completely opaque or at least quite foggy. Now it comes to me clear as day and the only work is in representing it as I see fit so that it all makes sense and supports my arguments.

One piece of good news that I’m keeping on the wraps for the most part is that my dissertation has been accepted (as judged from an abstract I submitted a month ago) to a major conference in Hawaii in January. All I need to do is raise about $1500 and I’m there 🙂 So….

Click here to give me some money!

We’ll see how that works out. Really, I think if everyone who reads my blog gives just one or two hundred dollars, I could get there. If this fails I’ll hit up the folks and the discover card. Either way, I’m going. And just think… you could help make it happen. Enough of my cheap pleas.

Back to work on the dissertation.