good Easter

Blessed to be alive and kicking this good Easter pre sunrise! the light returns. the crucifixtion and death gets filtered from my reading of Dante remembered this song which reminds me of the zeitgeist in a transforming epiphany moment.. so Tibetan Buddhist. played 26years ago April 30, 1988 in the Burgess dj set at the Last Party, the Saint. finding the meaningful is always just being open to it. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2-KGiwGn1d8

thoughts on how research happens

Paradigm and paradigm change are integral in research. In my Methods of Research bibliography is an Open Society Institute video on their drug policy advocacy around the world. 

http://www.opensocietyfoundations.org/voices/what-world-can-learn-switzerlands-drug-policy-shift

As ever one's  personal experience is just that, one's personal experience.  Most of my interest in drug policy has been in terms of clinical social work since 1982 with clients having substance abuse concerns. Caregiving as presented in the work of Ann Burack-Weiss has so informed my practice. I routinely refer to mindfulness as per Buddhist thought.

Policy is another lens. In my experience, luck has had it that I have known several drug policy advocates who are also tied to the Open Society. The first is a Swiss legislator who I visited in Zurich in the early 1990s and was then involved in the work presented in the Open Society video. I also observed the experiment to allow drug use in a Zurich park. My trips were in the time of my doctoral study in cross-national social policy, and I visited social work programs in Berlin and Rotterdam. 

Secondly, I have known the strategic planner for Open Society programs throughout the world and heard about initiatives since the 1990s. Third, I have done recent consulting with a drug policy organizer in San Francisco whose program is funded by the Open Society.

The work of these advocates as well as my lens as a social worker qua researcher are examples of how research can and does happen, and is utilized. The Zurich project initiated as action research  for real life social welfare activity and is presented as a case study video (case study is a method of intense focus on a case, group, community,  program or policy).  My friend at Open Society has put together resources around the world about drug policy, i.e, meta=research. The San Francisco activity is  case study and action research: the process of needs assessment and implementing solutions with real time evaluation feedback.

Thinking from the lens of Kuhn, paradigm shifts. Drug policy is changing as data analysis shows best practices from real life activity. There are many ways of knowing. 

Obama and zen for me

Thinking of Michelle Obama's comment that "for Barack, success is not about how much money you make. It's the difference you make in people's lives!"

How congruent that thinking is with mine. Naikan method.

naikan zen method

contemplating 3 questions

1. What did this person do for you? all the concrete things, their worries,      pleasures..

2. What did you do for this person?

3. What trouble and worries did you cause them?

from Mom to current people in one's life.. to strangers.. the bus driver...

"The point is... someone cared for us or we would not have survived." -Brazier, Zen Therapy

Lucid Dreaming

The structures of lucid dreaming: timelines, sounds, visuals, feelings.. Reading "Tibetan Book of Living and Dying" again. The best book on how to meditate, understanding the inner process when one dies, doing phowa, dream consciousness. 

Anoche, involved in 1912, 1945, 1953, 1987 Berlin (at least in Wilhelmine buildings and the Anhalt Hauptbahnhof). Time travelling with Mrs. von Ameringen, a Brigitte Mira lookalike, in sort of a spy/adventure dream.. figuring out who wanted to "silence" von Ameringen. I love the films of Brigitte Mira especially her work with El Hedi ben Salem!

http://www.guardian.co.uk/news/2005/mar/25/guardianobituaries.filmnews

maart altar

photographed my current art altar. I have had such altars since 1977 and my cross-country hitchhiking journey to SF/Oregon and back to Brooklyn. In SF, encountered the Mexican and Native American altar concepts. What with all of the religious artifacts, photos of people, objects, make some sort of montage to capture the essence. Two major posters.. collage of angels, prayer cards, medallions, religious symbols, Walter Benjamin's Klee angel, photo of Tede's window in SF, Scholem's kabbalah sefiroth; the other of men important to me.. evolving.. only Obama, Einstein and Tagore on today. In the far right lower is a poster of Our Lady of Guadalupe. Under the large poster are my collection of Buddhas.. those $1 to $5 objects sold on the subway, streets, etal in NYC. My crystal ball from Gumps department store in SF. A Zurich panorama of Saint Regula holding her head (after being martyred).

peace, hugs, compassion