My Apologies

How did it get so late so soon? It's night before it's afternoon. December is here before it's June. My goodness how the time has flewn. How did it get so late so soon?  —Dr. Seuss

     This is just a small announcement concerning this blog. No, I don’t intend to stop writing on it. BUT, as you may have noticed, new content has become more sporadic over the past year or two, in fact ever since I stopped being a monk and, also, a member of the leisure class. Now I have to pay bills, work for a living, interact with other humans to a higher degree (including my sweetheart)—and I also have increased my video content, thereby allowing me less time and energy to write.

     Beyond this, the time and effort dedicated to navigating Samsara in a reasonably responsible way, as a householder, have allowed me less time to philosophize. It’s no wonder that philosophers tend to be renunciants or else members of an aristocracy that are not required to work for a living.

     So I have the choice of writing less often for this blog, or to hastily slap together something in order to maintain my routine of posting something at least once every weekend. So, as you may have perceived, I have chosen to write somewhat less for this blog. Better quality than quantity, I suppose. On the other hand, I am uploading content on YouTube and Bitchute at least once a week now, with most of it being Buddhist Question and Answer videos, interviews (including people other than my friend Brian Ruhe), and discussions of Buddhism and Buddhist texts. 

     I sincerely apologize for the decrease in written content, and the decrease in careful thought and planning that go into what I’ve been writing lately, as of course I no longer sit around all day in a cave or meditation cabin, thinking about what to write.

     Anyway, by way of an update on my lay life, as opposed to the life of this here blog, I do hereby announce, for those of you who don’t watch my Q&A videos, that last month I proposed marriage to my sweetheart, she said “Of course,” and we are now engaged. Also, yesterday I wrote a letter of resignation to my current employer, as I was offered a job doing pretty much the same work at a different sheet metal shop but paying much better. So I’ll still be working at a sheet metal shop, but making better money and having more paid time off, so maybe I’ll be able to take the time to edit books, or write more involved blog posts, or something.

     Aside from dedicating more time and energy (both physical and mental) to making a living and all the other things laypeople are required to do, my life has been relatively happy and fortunate. Also I finally have grown a beard (when I was younger I always thought I could never grow a good one), and have healthier skin than I had as a monk, though thirty years of sitting for hours a day in the full lotus seem to have weakened my lower joints somewhat. I hobble and limp around sometimes now, which was not the case when I was a monk unless I happened to be experiencing a bout of gout at the time. I’m getting old. To this day I have no regrets over submitting my resignation to the Bhikkhu Sangha.

     And so, worry not, I am not ending this blog, though as a layman with bills to pay I have to practice a kind of “time triage” and do what appears to be most urgent, with, I have to admit, plenty of time for rest and relaxation. And who knows, maybe someday I’ll edit, and maybe even write, a few more books. Be happy.