Recurrent Learning Hall

101711 Recurrent Learning Hall

I was in the dream among a group of people. As the conversation went on, all of a sudden, I suspected that this was a dream and that I probably could take off into the air. It felt strange though,because if this was not a dream,I could certainly make a fool of myself among all these people. So I just jumped up into the air and was so glad I was right. I was able to keep going up. I left the people behind and flew out.

I kept on going in the air along a railway and scanning the houses beneath. I wondered why I was following the railway, maybe so that this is something familiar? Next thing I knew, I arrived at a learning place where I have been in recurrent dreams. This is like a learning hall, but in the back of the hall, there is a place for me to either tutor or mentor the students there. I felt particularly familiar with the rare portion. From the rare portion, we can enter the learning hall, and then also to the front yard which is a bit hilly.

I came to the lunch room and lunch is fresh salad and vegetables, along with just a few Chinese dumplings, designed by the nutritionist from my work. I praised what a healthy lunch and we can even have dumplings.

Then I found a room in the back where I can catch some sleep there as the class ends. My cat was making some noise in the room and woke me up.

In this place, sometimes it became many more rooms and sometimes the whole place would beccome very tall, very grand, and there would be filled with many decorations that enhance the whole atmosphere. I need to find those journal entries or tape recordings to remember the details.

Act or forever in fear

I just saw a Frontline featuring report on PBS about a contemporary artist who has been drawing attention and followers from all over the globe. His name is Ai Weiwei

While watching him, I was totally captivated and moved by this fearless and selfless individual, almost like watching the big belly Buddha, with the kind of lightheartedness, depth and immenseness that just speak directly to our core. Many ordinary people in China and in the world also feel that he speaks out for them. But he is more than just speaking out. The fearless and selfless spirit of him is something else.

"There is just no slightest fear in him anywhere. He just has this ultimate freedom to do whatever he wants." "He very truthfully conveys his simple and sincere reaction to political and social phenomonans in his artwork." "He exposes and confronts the corruptions and problems in China." "Usually Chinese people are subtle in their showing of disagreement or defiance. He is different. He scolds the government, using the most aggressive words and act." "He would even put his own life on the line."

He has this unique approach of taking a camera to document his surroundings, many are just very simple slice of a moment in time, such as a face, two items side by side together, his cat sitting on the ground....When video taping devices are placed around his house, or when he was followed, confronted, filmed,photoed..he simply take out his smartphone, camera, or video recorder to film them right back and broadcast it in real time on the internet.

People all over are worried about him. Then bad things started to happen. He has been house arrested, beaten, stopped when trying to go out of the country, and his house and studio have been demolished. The demolition of his place was documented by himself and is going to be another large scale of artwork.

Many compare him to Andy Warhol but better. I would equate this way of acting with the truth, the freedom, the fearless, and the selfless. This is the way of nothingness and everything else.

And I really want to know how he can act so strongly and fearlessly.

I remembered how hard it was to step into a new existence without my ex. I still remembered how I did it. It was scary. Every day and every moment, you try to put one foot in front of the other, but do not believe your foot is worth a movement, or do not feel you have any strength left to move your foot, or do not believe next step would be any better, or you are even consumed by the negative doom that all there is is hell,what foot?....Trying to give up the lifeline would mean confronting the same thing------the unknown, the fear, the weakness of moving those feet, the doom.

Security is inside, freedom is outside, and fear stands in between.

I still haven't had to confront with living with no life line. Having been so earnestly building a life of our own capability, we continue to maintain it, and are kept in this self created ego trap. We feel fearful of break out because we have never known what outside really is like.So we continue to stay inside of this secure ego trap. I broke free one layer of fear, but have never broke out from this ultimate layer. So I continue to be in fear, yet I really want to break free so badly.

Here is this individual who is standing right outside of the fear trap, so free, so selfless.

"Why would you keep doing this? You make us so worried. They are going to do bad things to you," his mom said to him. " What is there to worry about? If they are going to do bad things to me, we don't have control over that."

"We need to act. We need to go through it and to feel every bit and details of it. This is the only way to know it( and get over it)."

I realize that standing inside of the fear trap looking outward trying to come up with something to prepare for the feared situation doesn't work. But this is what has been our excuse to stay in.

The only way to beat fear is to go through it. That's the only way to know every bit of it and that's how you can beat it.

"People thought I am not afraid.I am actually most afraid, but I would say I am very brave. We need to act because if we don't act,( the result of not acting would be worse than acting).

I figure what he mean was that if we act, the worse thing that could happen is to die,but if we don't act,the wrong continue on. The "something" he believes in outweigh his own existence.

This has been very clear in my awareness, but he did provide the one more enlightening step: "Act."

What else is there to said or analyze??