Looking South from Tanuri Ridge — Image by kenne
Archive for the ‘Robert M. Pirsig’ Category
Looking South From Tanuri Ridge Leave a comment
Over The Rooftop Sunset 1 comment
Over The Rooftop Sunset — Photo-Artistry by kenne
The place to improve the world
is first in one’s own heart and head and hands,
and then work outward from there.
— Robert M. Pirsig
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Quality Leave a comment
Greater Roadrunner Stalking A Tree Lizard In A Mesquite Tree — Image by kenne
Quality is a direct experience independent of and prior to intellectual abstractions.
— Robert M. Pirsig
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Riding The Arizona Trail Leave a comment
Utah Couple Riding the Arizona Trail from Utah to Mexico — Images by kenne
Our April 27, 2017, SCVN Friday Hike was trail #39 (Part of the Arizona Trail) out of the Gordon Hirabayashi Camp Grounds to the Sycamore Reservoir. The trail head is near the horse corral where we met a couple from Utah who spent the night at the campgrounds before continuing on the Arizona Trail to Mexico. Now, that’s a real adventure!
— kenne
We’re in such a hurry most of the time we never get much chance to talk.
The result is a kind of endless day-to-day shallowness,
a monotony that leaves a person wondering years later
where all the time went and sorry that it’s all gone.
— Robert Pirsig
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Believing In The Importance Of The Struggle — Robert M. Pirsig, Dead At 88 4 comments
Source: William Morrow/HarperCollins
It’s just a little after midnight in Tucson, and I’m having trouble sleeping. It could be that Joy is having surgery later today. It could be that in this age of hand-held technology, it was several hours ago I received a news alert on the passage of Robert M. Pirsig at age 88.
In the 1970’s I was interested in motorcycles — own a couple. It was a time in which I loved reading about technology and philosophy. So, in 1974 when I read a review of a recently published book, “Zen and The Art of Motorcycle Maintenance: An Inquiry into Values,” I went out and bought a copy.
The inside cover jacket begins with a quote from the book:
“ The study of the art of motorcycle maintenance is really a miniature study of the art of rationality itself. Working on a motorcycle, working well, caring, is to become part of a process to achieve an inner peace of mind. The motorcycle is primarily a mental phenomenon.”
What better way to write about the conflict between science and religion, and the nature of Quality in art than to have it as part of a motorcycle narrative of a trip Pirsig, his eleven-year-old son, and two friends took from Minnesota to California? As it turns out, the real journey was not a motorcycle trip, but a philosophic trip that centers on an insane passion for truth.
In February of this year, I posted a blog entitled, The Zen of Visual Imagery – Balancing Passion and Obsession, in which I reference the novel I have worshiped over the years. Whether in my own teaching of educational philosophy or photography, I can’t talk about life without referencing Pirsig for the truth. It is time for a Chautauqua.
–kenne
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Zion-Mount Carmel Highway Panorama Leave a comment
Zion-Mount Carmel Highway Panorama (Zion National Park, September 15, 2016) — Image by kenne
To live for some future goal is shallow.
It’s the sides of the mountain that sustain life, not the top.
— Robert M. Pirsig
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Yellow-eyed Junco 2 comments
Yellow-eyed Junco — Computer Painting by kenne
Art is anything you can do well. Anything you can do with Quality.
— Robert M. Pirsig
Becoming is Superior to Being 