Now that was a good read!

Most books I read and move on to the next book. Lots of them I enjoy, and a few of them I enjoy so much I regret coming to the end, knowing I'll never again get to read it for the first time.

Some of them have an impact on me at the moment, and a rare few I know they'll have an impact going forward. Like this one.

One of my buddies is a huge Richard Wagamese fan. She has all his books, and has suggested I read them. So in the library I saw this one and grabbed it. Then it grabbed me.

He starts with the Seven Grandfather Teachings: humility, courage, respect, love, honesty, truth, and wisdom.
I was instantly reminded of the Buddhist eight fold path: right understanding, right intention, right speech, right action, right livelihood, right attention, right concentration, and right meditation.

The words are slightly different, but there's a lot of overlap there. Wagamese goes into more detail about the teachings, using parables, personal life examples, and suggestions of the paths to walk to learn more. It isn't a long book, only 190 pages, with lots of full page images, and the language is simple and eloquent. You could read it to a child and they would understand the words.

But a thoughtful adult reading it stops and has their brain melted for a while. There is a lot to think about. Wagamese started from a place of childhood abuse, separated from his culture and his people, and gradually progressed back to his heritage. Most of us would call his a difficult life involving addictions, homelessness, jail, and probably other situations he doesn't talk about.

In contrast, if you're reading this blog, you've probably lead a privileged life by the standards of most people. Yes, you've had difficulties, but for most of us they're what's called 'first world problems.' But in lots of ways most of us are just as disconnected, and just as fucked up by our relentless search of more and our fear of the other. Very few of us, me included, can honestly say we walk gently on the earth.

There is lots to think about while reading this book. I'm typically not an underline or write in the margins kind of guy, but I wanted to. This is the rare, extremely rare book that I've borrowed from the library, and now want to go buy to reread more slowly, to think about what it says and what it means and what I'm here to do.

More colour for you. Again, these are photos of a real thing, not a Photoshop construction.

Driftwood of the Day