Podcast Benomtad

The queen bathes in the stream in the garden with her angelic babe, a scene of pure life and innocence.  Into this scene slinks the power-hungry cook, who manipulates the scene to look like that of a beastly killing, leading to the imprisonment of the mother and his absconding with the young princeling.     The story goes from one of God's grace to one of greed and justice.   (From a discussion on the Brothers’ Grimm’s “The Pink (Carnation)”)   Thank you for watching!  If you’re interested in the full discussion, see below:   The full video episode: https://youtu.be/1a8GjTiQYNM   Audio episode: https://benomtad.podbean.com/e/the-pink-carnation-by-the-brothers-grimm/   The Podcast Playlist: https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLMIlJwXEK2vqfEOVgfclRgZNXO4boyP3T   The Episode Playlist: https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLMIlJwXEK2vqg2DhM7puvzo3VNwUsShLf   For more in this podcast, please go to: Podbean: https://benomtad.podbean.com Apple Podcasts: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/podcast-benomtad/id1748320863 YouTube: https://m.youtube.com/@scissorsandpaper/videos Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/show/4kJPGlaJjGVyLa9AKhci6t?si=8XXrX9FUT3CU71reCfA5kQ X: https://x.com/Benomtad Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/benomtad   I plan to conduct more interviews with various guests, so please check back later for those.   Pink Carnation Girl Photo by Alka Rautela on Unsplash

A queen was without child, and an angel came to her and told her she would have a child who would have the power of wishing.  After she had the child, the cook, who knew of the son’s ability, staged the son’s death and blamed the queen, who was imprisoned by the king for seven years.  The cook, who was afraid the son would have him discovered, had the boy wish for a palace to live in, and then a beautiful companion.  The cook would go out and hunt like a nobleman every day.  But soon, he was again afraid the boy would tell the truth, and told the girl to kill him, on pain of death.  She refused, but he persisted, and she eventually told the boy of the plan. He had her kill a hind and present the cook with the heart and tongue.  He had the cook turned into a poodle   The girl was afraid to accompany him back to his kingdom, so he turned her into a carnation and put her in his pocket, and they walked with the poodle chained behind him.  He visited his mother in the tower, then worked as a huntsman for the king, and during a feast he wished for others to bring up the topic of his mother.  He revealed the truth to the king, who rejoiced and freed the queen.  Hot coals were poured down the poodle’s throat, and then he was executed; the father and queen soon died of grief and relief.  The boy and girl were married.   Chapters: 00:00 Reading of the Story 10:25 The Ambivalent Power of Wishing 12:25 Like the Garden of Eden and Corruption of Greed for Power 16:34 The King’s Gullibility 18:40 The Upside Down Kingdom 22:41 The Cook Feels Himself Losing Control 29:21 Why Does the Boy Turn the Cook into a Black Poodle? 36:26 Returning Home and Seeing Mother in the Tower 40:11 Why Does the Prince Refuse to Sit Next to his Father? 43:19 The Prince Wishes His Mother Into the Room 50:33 The Queen’s Virtue 53:32 The Ironic Power of Wishing 54:58 Final Reflections   Thank you for watching!  If you’re interested in the full discussion, see below:   The full video episode: https://youtu.be/1a8GjTiQYNM   The Podcast Playlist: https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLMIlJwXEK2vqfEOVgfclRgZNXO4boyP3T   For more in this podcast, please go to: Podbean: https://benomtad.podbean.com Apple Podcasts: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/podcast-benomtad/id1748320863 YouTube: https://m.youtube.com/@scissorsandpaper/videos Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/show/4kJPGlaJjGVyLa9AKhci6t?si=8XXrX9FUT3CU71reCfA5kQ X: https://x.com/Benomtad Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/benomtad   I plan to conduct more interviews with various guests, so please check back later for those.   Pink Carnation Girl Photo by Alka Rautela on Unsplash

When the false bride finally arrives, the true bride again almost dies.  Ian sees this as a kind of initiation, a test to see if he will finally know who she is and remember his promise--and who he really is. (From a discussion on the Brothers’ Grimm’s “The Twelve Huntsmen”)   Thank you for watching!  If you’re interested in the full discussion, plese see below:   The full video episode: https://youtu.be/-yZySp8Qshs?si=pDyETKJjS7546OZC   Audio episode: https://benomtad.podbean.com/e/on-the-brothers-grimms-the-twelve-huntsmen-the-guys-of-truth/   The Podcast Playlist: https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLMIlJwXEK2vqfEOVgfclRgZNXO4boyP3T   The Episode Playlist: https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLMIlJwXEK2vr3DwaH1OZBg239-GJ7AE6x   For more in this podcast, please go to: Podbean: https://benomtad.podbean.com Apple Podcasts: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/podcast-benomtad/id1748320863 YouTube: https://m.youtube.com/@scissorsandpaper/videos Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/show/4kJPGlaJjGVyLa9AKhci6t?si=8XXrX9FUT3CU71reCfA5kQ X: https://x.com/Benomtad Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/benomtad   I plan to conduct more interviews with various guests, so please check back later for those.   Huntsman Photo by Kam on Unsplash   Lion Photo by Alexas_Fotos on Unsplash   Princess Silhouette Photo by Baran Lotfollahi on Unsplash

Death of the King A Prince, betrothed to his Beloved, is called away, for his father the King is dying.  He gives his ring to his love and says he will marry her when he is king.   The Promise At his father’s deathbed, bereaved, he promises to marry the King’s chosen bride for him.  He forgets his previous promise.   The Disguise The princess almost dies of sadness, and her father says he will do whatever he can, and she asks that eleven maidens like herself in form and face be found.  Together with her, the twelve are dressed as huntsmen and presented to the new King, who does not recognize any of them but accepts them as his company.   The Tests However, the wise Lion advises the King that they are no ladies.  Two tests are devised, but another advisor on the ladies’ side helps them pass them, and the monarch dismisses the beast.   Truth Revealed, the Prince is Made Whole The king and the Huntsmen spend time together well, but the soon-to-be Queen arrives, and the true beloved almost dies again.  The king rushes to her and recognizes her, taking off her glove and seeing his ring.  They marry, the other princess is dismissed, and the lion is brought back into the king’s company.   Please join us for this tale of disguised truth, true disguises, getting lost at home and finding the truth in the woods!   Chapters:  00:00 Introduction 00:13 Reading of the Story 05:54 The Symbolism of a Dish vs. a Key 08:05 The Dying King vs. a True Love 15:15 Forgetting the Wish 22:20 A Wily Leader in a Sick Social Order 27:42 The Power of Twelve 30:45 The Truth Revealed in a Challenge 34:35 Death & The Prince’s Character 41:35 Suddenly, the Magical Talking Lion 48:29 The Lion’s Relaxed Character 49:45 The Lion’s Tests 55:55 Why the Women are Disguised as Huntsmen 57:55 Why the Princess Almost Dies Twice 1:00:58 Why are the Girls Hunters? 1:05:05 Hunting in Stories and Maturity 1:08:40 The Prince Almost Loses All 1:10:55 Our Suspicion of Instinct and the Narrowing of Rationality 1:21:17 The Truth of a Disguise 1:26:12 True Compassion Leads to Insight 1:30:11 Compassion: The Lifeblood of Society   Thank you for watching!  I love and have faith in dialogue.  Please leave a suggestion for new guests, topics, or this conversation.  How I can expand this Open Minded Thought and Discussion?  And if you’re interested, please check out the following:   The full video episode: https://youtu.be/-yZySp8Qshs?si=pDyETKJjS7546OZC   The Podcast Playlist: https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLMIlJwXEK2vqfEOVgfclRgZNXO4boyP3T   The Episode Playlist: https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLMIlJwXEK2vr3DwaH1OZBg239-GJ7AE6x   For more in this podcast, please go to: Podbean: https://benomtad.podbean.com Apple Podcasts: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/podcast-benomtad/id1748320863 YouTube: https://m.youtube.com/@scissorsandpaper/videos Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/show/4kJPGlaJjGVyLa9AKhci6t?si=8XXrX9FUT3CU71reCfA5kQ X: https://x.com/Benomtad Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/benomtad   I plan to conduct more interviews with various guests, so please check back later for those.

I summarize John Vervaeke (& Allan Bloom) on problems of religion in modernism.  They often focus on identity, dogma, or stand for nothing.     People don't go to it because it does not speak to them.  So why are people turning more to Orthodox Christianity?   (From a discussion on Religious Revival and Renewal)   Pew Article: https://www.pewresearch.org/religion/2025/12/08/religion-holds-steady-in-america/?utm_source=chatgpt.com   Richard Reeves’ Post: ​​https://x.com/RichardvReeves/status/2002400790208463046?s=20   AP Article about Modern Orthodoxy: https://apnews.com/article/young-converts-online-eastern-orthodoxy-eef496dcd83a061d90a0b7aba33b6113   Thank you for watching!  I love and have faith in dialogue.  Please leave a suggestion for new guests, topics, or this conversation.  How I can expand this Open Minded Thought and Discussion?  And if you’re interested, please check out the following:   The full video episode: https://youtu.be/LP-tJ1JhOyg   Audio episode: https://benomtad.podbean.com/e/religious-revival-for-cultural-renewal/   The Podcast Playlist: https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLMIlJwXEK2vqfEOVgfclRgZNXO4boyP3T   The Episode Playlist: https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLMIlJwXEK2vr3DwaH1OZBg239-GJ7AE6x   For more in this podcast, please go to: Podbean: https://benomtad.podbean.com Apple Podcasts: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/podcast-benomtad/id1748320863 YouTube: https://m.youtube.com/@scissorsandpaper/videos Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/show/4kJPGlaJjGVyLa9AKhci6t?si=8XXrX9FUT3CU71reCfA5kQ X: https://x.com/Benomtad Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/benomtad   I plan to conduct more interviews with various guests, so please check back later for those. Cathedral Photo: Photo by K. Mitch Hodge on Unsplash

Is there a religious revival in America?  We used data from Pew to answer this question, and we talk about cultural malaise and how religion falls on deaf ears, and how it may speak to us again.   Chapters:   00:00 Introduction 00:30 Meditation & Contemplation 10:09 Key Questions about the Religious Revival 12:46 Religious Decline Has Stopped 15:40 Why are People Turning Away from Religion? 24:34 Traditional vs Liberal Mass 28:23 There’s No Such Thing as Dragons 32:23 Narrow Philosophy 35:42 Strange Philosophies in Our Time 37:21 Where is Our Agora? 42:50 The Need for Community and Meaning 49:15 Why I Started this Podcast  50:52 A New Religious Way Out of Our Zombie Life   (From a discussion on Religious Revival and Renewal)   See this doc for description ideas: https://docs.google.com/document/d/1Ek66Ru4HpNJtYQWP6crrus5-Z_x-3aBKV5RnD7lGcE0/edit?tab=t.0   Pew Article: https://www.pewresearch.org/religion/2025/12/08/religion-holds-steady-in-america/?utm_source=chatgpt.com   Richard Reeves’ Post: ​​https://x.com/RichardvReeves/status/2002400790208463046?s=20   AP Article about Modern Orthodoxy: https://apnews.com/article/young-converts-online-eastern-orthodoxy-eef496dcd83a061d90a0b7aba33b6113   Thank you for watching!  I love and have faith in dialogue.  Please leave a suggestion for new guests, topics, or this conversation.  How I can expand this Open Minded Thought and Discussion?  And if you’re interested, please check out the following:   The full video episode:   Audio episode:   The Podcast Playlist: https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLMIlJwXEK2vqfEOVgfclRgZNXO4boyP3T   The Episode Playlist: For more in this podcast, please go to: Podbean: https://benomtad.podbean.com Apple Podcasts: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/podcast-benomtad/id1748320863 YouTube: https://m.youtube.com/@scissorsandpaper/videos Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/show/4kJPGlaJjGVyLa9AKhci6t?si=8XXrX9FUT3CU71reCfA5kQ X: https://x.com/Benomtad Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/benomtad   I plan to conduct more interviews with various guests, so please check back later for those.

The Carnation is the Prince: The carnation the heroine burns at the beginning of the story IS the prince at the end.  He requires her to speak, but she freezes up, so he has to go into a stone... So she has to go through trials until she can freely express.  But he is always there when she is ready to speak.   (Discussion on “The Carnation Youth;” A Clip from the Episode “Perfectionism, Tragedy, and Creative Blocks”)   Thank you for watching!  I love and have faith in dialogue.  Please leave a suggestion for new guests, topics, or this conversation.  How I can expand this Open Minded Thought and Discussion?  And if you’re interested, please check out the following:   The full video episode: https://youtu.be/8_o0x6Z7ixc   Audio episode: https://benomtad.podbean.com/e/perfectionism-tragedy-and-creative-blocks/?token=6f91a2f5ea7cd671ae5de554c8681a61   The Podcast Playlist: https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLMIlJwXEK2vqfEOVgfclRgZNXO4boyP3T   The Episode Playlist: https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLMIlJwXEK2vq-TnaienDlJJ1ZdTknAqVn   “The Carnation Youth” full text: https://archive.org/details/talesofenchantme00eell/page/22/mode/2up   For more in this podcast, please go to: Podbean: https://benomtad.podbean.com Apple Podcasts: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/podcast-benomtad/id1748320863 YouTube: https://m.youtube.com/@scissorsandpaper/videos Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/show/4kJPGlaJjGVyLa9AKhci6t?si=8XXrX9FUT3CU71reCfA5kQ X: https://x.com/Benomtad Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/benomtad   I plan to conduct more interviews with various guests, so please check back later for those.

The Echo of Orpheus: Narcissus' repulse of Echo reminds me of another vain god, Orpheus, master of music.  Both end up being served by poetic justice.   We see perfectionism in this, and in the refusal to join in, to dance in life, leads to destruction.   (A Clip from the Episode “The Myth of Narcissus: Seeing Only Oneself”)   Thank you for watching!  Please check out:   Audio episode: https://benomtad.podbean.com/e/the-myth-of-narcissus-seeing-only-oneself/   The Podcast Playlist: https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLMIlJwXEK2vqfEOVgfclRgZNXO4boyP3T   The Episode Playlist: https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLMIlJwXEK2vq-TnaienDlJJ1ZdTknAqVn   For more in this podcast, please go to: Podbean: https://benomtad.podbean.com Apple Podcasts: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/podcast-benomtad/id1748320863 YouTube: https://m.youtube.com/@scissorsandpaper/videos Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/show/4kJPGlaJjGVyLa9AKhci6t?si=8XXrX9FUT3CU71reCfA5kQ X: https://x.com/Benomtad Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/benomtad   I plan to conduct more interviews with various guests, so please check back later for those. Narcissus Flower Photo Photo by Kier in Sight Archives on Unsplash

We read and discuss the Spanish Folktale “The Carnation Youth,” F. Scott Fitzgerald’s tragedy both in life and in “The Great Gatsby,” and Ian’s struggles with the creative writing process.     Chapters:   00:00 Introduction 00:12 Reading of “The Carnation Youth” 10:05 Letting the Perfect be the Enemy of the Good 14:25 Why Does She Burn the Carnation in the Fire? 24:33 The Carnation is the Prince 29:10 The Carnation Girl’s Second Chances 33:10 Creation & the Erotic 39:13 Why Are You So Afraid? 49:01 Trust, Do What You’re Supposed to Do… 51:56 Meeting the Impossible Challenge 55:53 Stoic Gods 59:11 F. Scott Fitzgerald’s Tragic Life 1:07:05 The Great Jay Gatsby and Hope 1:18:08 Renewal in Death of Tragedies 1:24:59 Attraction to Tragedy 1:30:28 Stoic Framing and Feeling Out of Joint 1:36:18 My Creative Struggle May be Misapprehended 1:41:46 Talking About the Creative Struggle   Thank you for watching!  Please check out:   The full video episode: https://youtu.be/8_o0x6Z7ixc   The Podcast Playlist: https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLMIlJwXEK2vqfEOVgfclRgZNXO4boyP3T   The Episode Playlist: https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLMIlJwXEK2vq-TnaienDlJJ1ZdTknAqVn   “The Carnation Youth” full text: https://archive.org/details/talesofenchantme00eell/page/22/mode/2up   For more in this podcast, please go to: Podbean: https://benomtad.podbean.com Apple Podcasts: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/podcast-benomtad/id1748320863 YouTube: https://m.youtube.com/@scissorsandpaper/videos Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/show/4kJPGlaJjGVyLa9AKhci6t?si=8XXrX9FUT3CU71reCfA5kQ X: https://x.com/Benomtad Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/benomtad   I plan to conduct more interviews with various guests, so please check back later for those.   Clip Intro Music “A Baroque Letter” - Aaron Kenny

This pool is a metaphor for the mind.  But there is a "healthy narcissism" that is developmentally-appropriate.   (A Clip from the Episode “The Myth of Narcissus: Seeing Only Oneself”)   Thank you for watching!  Please check out:   Audio episode: https://benomtad.podbean.com/e/the-myth-of-narcissus-seeing-only-oneself/   The Podcast Playlist: https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLMIlJwXEK2vqfEOVgfclRgZNXO4boyP3T   The Episode Playlist: https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLMIlJwXEK2vq-TnaienDlJJ1ZdTknAqVn   For more in this podcast, please go to: Podbean: https://benomtad.podbean.com Apple Podcasts: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/podcast-benomtad/id1748320863 YouTube: https://m.youtube.com/@scissorsandpaper/videos Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/show/4kJPGlaJjGVyLa9AKhci6t?si=8XXrX9FUT3CU71reCfA5kQ X: https://x.com/Benomtad Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/benomtad   I plan to conduct more interviews with various guests, so please check back later for those.   Clip Intro Music “A Baroque Letter” - Aaron Kenny

When you lack a feeling of substance, you need to be propped up by others.   (A Clip from the Episode “The Myth of Narcissus: Seeing Only Oneself”)   Thank you for watching!  Please check out:   Audio episode: https://benomtad.podbean.com/e/the-myth-of-narcissus-seeing-only-oneself/   The Podcast Playlist: https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLMIlJwXEK2vqfEOVgfclRgZNXO4boyP3T   The Episode Playlist: https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLMIlJwXEK2vq-TnaienDlJJ1ZdTknAqVn   For more in this podcast, please go to: Podbean: https://benomtad.podbean.com Apple Podcasts: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/podcast-benomtad/id1748320863 YouTube: https://m.youtube.com/@scissorsandpaper/videos Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/show/4kJPGlaJjGVyLa9AKhci6t?si=8XXrX9FUT3CU71reCfA5kQ X: https://x.com/Benomtad Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/benomtad   I plan to conduct more interviews with various guests, so please check back later for those.   Narcissus Flower Photo Photo by Kier in Sight Archives on Unsplash

Echo was cursed to only repeat what others had said, and fell in love with Narcissus, who shunned her.  She wasn’t the only one Narcissus treated coldly.  He found himself in a grove with a pool of water, and, falling deeply in love with what he saw when he bent over it, he was mesmerized until he died.   We discuss this myth, using Bulfinch’s version, and go on to discuss psychology, philosophy and spirituality against the background of Narcissus, his rejection of Echo, and being lost in the pool.   Chapters:   00:00 Introduction 10:25 The Pool 16:22 The Reflection of Narcissus’ Pool is What the Mind Sees 22:34 Narcissus Rejects Love for Another 27:30 Attachment Theory 36:40 Divorce 48:40 Rousseau & Amour-Propre 57:26 Why Narcissists Don’t Seek Help 1:07:45 Narcissism and the Ecological Crisis 1:08:45 Realizing True Nature and Narcissism 1:15:28 An Antidote to Ecocentrism 1:21:10 Vervaeke’s Narcissism: Unearned Positive Regard 1:30:34 Dialogue as Spiritual Practice 1:33:44 Echo’s Touch Repulses Narcissus 1:37:08 The Echo of Orpheus 1:42:30 On the Edge of Narcissus’ Pond 1:50:00 The Decline of Social Media: Cultivating the Mask 2:12:30 A Surge in the Need for Religion 2:18:02 Not Forcing the Religion   Thank you for watching!  Please check out:   The Podcast Playlist: https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLMIlJwXEK2vqfEOVgfclRgZNXO4boyP3T   The Episode Playlist: https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLMIlJwXEK2vq-TnaienDlJJ1ZdTknAqVn   For more in this podcast, please go to: Podbean: https://benomtad.podbean.com Apple Podcasts: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/podcast-benomtad/id1748320863 YouTube: https://m.youtube.com/@scissorsandpaper/videos Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/show/4kJPGlaJjGVyLa9AKhci6t?si=8XXrX9FUT3CU71reCfA5kQ X: https://x.com/Benomtad Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/benomtad   I plan to conduct more interviews with various guests, so please check back later for those.

A father had seven sons, but no daughters, and wished for and finally got one.  His sons went to get water for the Christening, but dropped the bucket into it.  They did not know what to do, so they stayed out, and the father in his frustration wished them to become ravens, and so they did, and flew away.  Now the daughter grew to be healthy and beautiful, and did not know of her brothers.  But one day in town she heard others talking of them, and she felt guilty.  She decided to go out and find them, encountering bodies at the ends of the cosmos, sacrificing her finger in a glass mountain, and meeting a strange mountain creature.  But the ring she brought reminded them of their human lives, and with the help of the stars, the daughter is able to restore her family.     Join us for a short meditation, the reading of this tale, and a discussion of it!     Chapters:   00:00 Introduction 00:15 Short Breathing Meditation & Oasis Contemplation 08:08 Reading of “The Seven Ravens” 14:16 The Theme of Sacrifice in this Story 15:59 Pagan Worldview Seeping Through this Story 21:54 The Image of the Glass Mountain 24:22 The Wish in Folktales 25:35 The Celestial Symbols 28:04 The Theme of Sacrifice & Closing Thoughts “The Seven Ravens,” trans. Lucas & illus. by Arthur Rackham: https://en.wikisource.org/wiki/The_Fairy_Tales_of_the_Brothers_Grimm_(Rackham)/The_Seven_Ravens   (A Clip from the Episode Grimm’s “The Seven Ravens:” Sacrifice for Family)   Thank you for watching!  Please check out:   The full video episode: https://youtu.be/VVukeVNsl6A   The Podcast Playlist: https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLMIlJwXEK2vqfEOVgfclRgZNXO4boyP3T   The Episode Playlist: https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLMIlJwXEK2vq-TnaienDlJJ1ZdTknAqVn   Lumsden’s “Beauty and the Beast:” https://en.wikisource.org/wiki/Beauty_and_the_Beast_(Lumsden_and_Son)   For more in this podcast, please go to: Podbean: https://benomtad.podbean.com Apple Podcasts: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/podcast-benomtad/id1748320863 YouTube: https://m.youtube.com/@scissorsandpaper/videos Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/show/4kJPGlaJjGVyLa9AKhci6t?si=8XXrX9FUT3CU71reCfA5kQ X: https://x.com/Benomtad Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/benomtad   I plan to conduct more interviews with various guests, so please check back later for those.   Clip Intro Music “A Baroque Letter” - Aaron Kenny

When you've  got your basic needs met, like the father does when he takes shelter in Beast's castle, one looks for transcendence, including beauty.   This is another story of the emptiness of the palace symbol.   (A Clip from the Episode “Beauty and the Beast: The Need for Beauty”)   Thank you for watching!  Please check out:   The full video episode: https://youtu.be/G3AhWHN4Gyc?si=kJxXDtlQT7Q3rv0c   Audio episode: https://benomtad.podbean.com/e/beauty-and-the-beast-the-need-for-beauty/   The Podcast Playlist: https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLMIlJwXEK2vqfEOVgfclRgZNXO4boyP3T   The Episode Playlist: https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLMIlJwXEK2vq-TnaienDlJJ1ZdTknAqVn   Lumsden’s “Beauty and the Beast:” https://en.wikisource.org/wiki/Beauty_and_the_Beast_(Lumsden_and_Son)   For more in this podcast, please go to: Podbean: https://benomtad.podbean.com Apple Podcasts: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/podcast-benomtad/id1748320863 YouTube: https://m.youtube.com/@scissorsandpaper/videos Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/show/4kJPGlaJjGVyLa9AKhci6t?si=8XXrX9FUT3CU71reCfA5kQ X: https://x.com/Benomtad Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/benomtad   I plan to conduct more interviews with various guests, so please check back later for those.

A rich merchant with three sons and three daughters– the eldest daughters hold out on marriage to a Duke or Earl, but the youngest, aptly-named Beauty, does so to stay with her father a few more years.  The merchant falls in his fortunes, and they have to move to the country.  The men apply themselves to husbandry and tillage, and Beauty to housework, but the eldest stay lazy.   One day, the merchant gets a letter about a ship arriving with effects of his and he sets off, asking his daughters what they would like.  The eldest ask for goods of luxury, but Beauty only for a simple rose.  When the merchant arrived at port, they went to law with him about the goods, and he left poor as before.   Glad, however, to return to his family, the merchant got lost in the woods as a storm brewed.  He spied a castle lit from top to bottom in the distance and took shelter there.  Strangely, the beautiful manor was unoccupied, although a large meal was set out.  He ate and eventually began to explore the house and its luxurious apartments.  Sleep overtook him in one of them.   In the morning he was delighted to see arbours outside, and went to them, dining on chocolate mysteriously set out for him on the way.  Remembering Beauty’s gift request, he took a rose, but then a ferocious beast appeared and set on him.  For his abuse of hospitality, he would die, but the merchant pleaded with the Beast, mentioning his daughters.  The Beast said to return with the daughter, who must willingly enter into marriage with him.  He was allowed to leave with a gold-laden chest.   Despondent, the merchant returned home.  The sisters blamed Beauty for her gift, and the brothers wanted to kill the beast.  However, the merchant knew they did not stand a chance, and Beauty would not hear of her father’s going back without her.   Beauty, despairing, was visited by a fine lady in her dreams the first night.  The lady said she was pleased with Beauty’s reasons for staying there, and that she would be rewarded.  Beauty lived at the castle, dining alone with beautiful music and books, and not seeing her suitor until he appeared at nine every night.  She was horrified by his appearance, but over time she began to have affection for  him, and to look forward to his visits.  She would not consent to his nuptial offer, however, and when she saw in a magic mirror that her father was sick with longing for her, she asked to return home for a week’s visit.  Beast consented, but warned her he might die of grief should she not return in time.  He gave her a ring to lay on her bedside before sleep.   Beauty woke up back at home, finding her sisters have been married off and her brothers gone to the army.  She is surprised at the trunk of clothes near her bed.  Her sisters came for a visit, but when the week was up they conspired and feigned tears to make her stay longer, thinking the beast would devour her in rage at her tardiness.  She consented, but worried after the Beast and one day dreamed of him sprawled out on the lawn.  After an additional week, she lay the ring at her bedside and was joyful to wake up in the palace.   She could not find the beast, however, and was despondent when she found him outside as in her dream.  She consented to marry him, and he became a handsome prince.  He’d been transformed by a fairy and was not allowed to tell the conditions of his liberation.  Beauty was overjoyed to find her family living in the castle, but her sisters were turned into stone for their envy and malice by the same lady who’d appeared to Beauty in her dreams.     Please join us as we read and discuss this English translation of Beaumont’s “Beauty and the Beast,” a story about virtue and vice, just desserts, and judgment, and the transformative power of beauty.   Lumsden’s “Beauty and the Beast:” https://en.wikisource.org/wiki/Beauty_and_the_Beast_(Lumsden_and_Son) 00:00 Introduction 00:43 Brief Meditation 05:43 Reading of Lumsden’s 1820 version 39:28 Ideal Feminine Virtue 41:15 Class in this Story 42:30 The Youngest is Prettiest 44:18 Beauty is the Only Complete Person 46:15 Difference between this story and “Cupid and Psyche” 49:20 The Empty, Ugly Palace 57:14 Why are Beauty’s Sisters Transformed into Statues? 58:45 The Beast Lacks Wit 59:45 The Significance of the Rose 1:03:31 The Power of not Being Deceived by Appearances   The full video episode: https://youtu.be/G3AhWHN4Gyc?si=kJxXDtlQT7Q3rv0c   Audio episode: https://benomtad.podbean.com/e/a-fairy-tale-of-a-good-but-endangered-boy/   The Podcast Playlist: https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLMIlJwXEK2vqfEOVgfclRgZNXO4boyP3T   The Episode Playlist: https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLMIlJwXEK2vq-TnaienDlJJ1ZdTknAqVn   For more in this podcast, please go to: Podbean: https://benomtad.podbean.com Apple Podcasts: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/podcast-benomtad/id1748320863 YouTube: https://m.youtube.com/@scissorsandpaper/videos Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/show/4kJPGlaJjGVyLa9AKhci6t?si=8XXrX9FUT3CU71reCfA5kQ X: https://x.com/Benomtad Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/benomtad   I plan to conduct more interviews with various guests, so please check back later for those.

Hans, beset from childhood with violence from his parents, finally makes it in life, and is to be the king of his wife’s town.  However, the people riot when the learn he is blind, and he and the princess are banished.  Only when they come to a stream and learn from a blind mouse how to cure his sightlessness do they return to fanfare.     Are the people right?  They did not want a king who could not see.   (A Clip from the Episode “A Fairy Tale of A Good but Endangered Boy”)   The full video episode: https://youtu.be/uwukpEQrSys   Audio episode: https://benomtad.podbean.com/e/a-fairy-tale-of-a-good-but-endangered-boy/   The Podcast Playlist: https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLMIlJwXEK2vqfEOVgfclRgZNXO4boyP3T   The Episode Playlist: https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLMIlJwXEK2vq-TnaienDlJJ1ZdTknAqVn   For more in this podcast, please go to: Podbean: https://benomtad.podbean.com Apple Podcasts: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/podcast-benomtad/id1748320863 YouTube: https://m.youtube.com/@scissorsandpaper/videos Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/show/4kJPGlaJjGVyLa9AKhci6t?si=8XXrX9FUT3CU71reCfA5kQ X: https://x.com/Benomtad Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/benomtad   I plan to conduct more interviews with various guests, so please check back later for those.

VonSchönwerth’s “The Knight’s Sash” is a story about an intrepid son without a father, who continually does his duty, eventually wins love and devotion.  We summarize and then discuss the story. A hunter’s widow and her son, Hans, were always wandering around, but they espied a castle in the forest, and the giant living there eventually married his mother.  He loved hunting, and one day he saw a tree with no branches, and a knight’s sash at the top that he got.  Written on it was: “Whoever puts me on will have superhuman strength.”  He shot a deer and carried it home.  The giant and the mother started worrying about the boy’s strength, and the giant feigned illness and they told Hans the only cure was lioness's milk. Hans went to a lioness in a nearby cave, who was standing in a submissive gesture, and he threw away his weapons and embraced her.  She followed him home and his parents cooked up another mission.   Not far away, a giant’s castle supposedly had apples growing on its grounds that would cure his stepfather.  The giant was out robbing and looting, and Hans picked some apples, and then broke into the castle and found a princess tied up, stark naked.  He started a bonfire in the yard and that attracted soldiers from her country, who offered to take Hans with them, but he refused, for his father was sick. Hans’ mother noticed the sash, and she prepared a bath for him so he would take it off.  The giant poked out Hans’ eyes and threw him out of the castle.  Hans traveled with his lioness, and almost died of thirst, but the lioness jumped on the cart of a passing wine merchant and revived him with the wine.  The merchant took Hans to the city, and the princess noticed him from her window, and she ran down, embraced him, and took him to an oculist who made him artificial eyes.  Her father the king was happy to have a successor, but after the wedding, the people rioted, not wanting to be led by a blind man.   Hans and his wife wandered.  One day they came to a brook, and they witnessed two mice, one blind being led by the other, who washed the blind one’s eyes, and it regained its sight.  The princess did the same for Hans, and they returned joyfully to the town.  They lived happily until Hans died, whereupon the lioness lay down in his grave until she too died.   00:00 Introduction 00:43 Short Breathing Meditation 04:55 Summary of “The Knight’s Sash” 12:05 A Short Story Chock full of Information and Drama 14:07 A Giant Threatened by Hans 15:56 Hans, Son of a Hunter 18:05 Hans and His Mother Find a Castle in the Woods  25:00 Nonviolent Hans 25:54 A Giant and a Bad Father 27:50 A Bad Father Threatened by Hans 32:14 Maturing, Dutiful Hans, is Thrown Out 37:53 Hans, Guileless with His Parents, Gets a Lion  45:50 Why Aren’t the Princess and the Lioness Ever Seen Together? 47:56 The Marauding Giant and His Dead Father 51:13 The Tale’s Good Father & Hans’ Brokenness 52:45 Hans is Helped by his Wife 54:34 The Stark Naked Woman & Hans’ Bonfire 1:00:45 Hans Finally SEES at the Story’s End 1:03:30 Hans’ Power from Lowly Creatures   The full video episode: https://youtu.be/uwukpEQrSys   The Podcast Playlist: https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLMIlJwXEK2vqfEOVgfclRgZNXO4boyP3T   The Episode Playlist: https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLMIlJwXEK2vq-TnaienDlJJ1ZdTknAqVn   For more in this podcast, please go to: Podbean: https://benomtad.podbean.com Apple Podcasts: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/podcast-benomtad/id1748320863 YouTube: https://m.youtube.com/@scissorsandpaper/videos Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/show/4kJPGlaJjGVyLa9AKhci6t?si=8XXrX9FUT3CU71reCfA5kQ X: https://x.com/Benomtad Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/benomtad   I plan to conduct more interviews with various guests, so please check back later for those.   Clip Intro Music “A Baroque Letter” - Aaron Kenny

LL and I do a short breathing meditation, then a zoom out contemplation.  After checking in about recent challenges, we discuss Marcus Aurelius’s Meditations, Book 12, Entry 36, the last in the book, seemingly shortly before his own death, which discusses one’s place in the cosmos and the relation to death.     Man, thou hast been a citizen in this great state [the world];121 what difference does it make to thee whether for five years [or three]? for that which is conformable to the laws is just for all. Where is the hardship then, if no tyrant nor yet an unjust judge sends thee away from the state, but nature who brought thee into it? the same as if a prætor who has employed an actor dismisses him from the stage.122⁠—“But I have not finished the five acts, but only three of them.”⁠—Thou sayest well, but in life the three acts are the whole drama; for what shall be a complete drama is determined by him who was once the cause of its composition, and now of its dissolution: but thou art the cause of neither. Depart then satisfied, for he also who releases thee is satisfied.   Gratitude to Standard eBooks for the translation: https://standardebooks.org/ebooks/marcus-aurelius/meditations/george-long/text/single-page#book-12   00:00  Introduction 00:47 Invitation to do an Exercise Snack 01:23 Brief Breathing Meditation 08:07 Zoom Out Contemplation 16:02 Reflection on Zooming Out 18:10 Spirituality Without Dogma?  22:23 Daily Spirituality Despite Bad Decisions 33:20 Anger is Usually a Secondary Emotion 35:17 Magical Thinking in Difficult Situations 40:50 Marcus Aurelius’ “Meditations,” Last Entry: “The god who lets you go is at peace with you.” 48:27 Coming to Terms with Death & Chuang-Tzu’s Dialogue with a Skull 53:37 Near-Death Experiences (NDE) & Acceptance   The full video episode: https://youtu.be/Vz5ZMbFuMZ0   The Podcast Playlist: https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLMIlJwXEK2vqfEOVgfclRgZNXO4boyP3T   The Episode Playlist: https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLMIlJwXEK2vq-TnaienDlJJ1ZdTknAqVn   For more in this podcast, please go to: Podbean: https://benomtad.podbean.com Apple Podcasts: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/podcast-benomtad/id1748320863 YouTube: https://m.youtube.com/@scissorsandpaper/videos Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/show/4kJPGlaJjGVyLa9AKhci6t?si=8XXrX9FUT3CU71reCfA5kQ X: https://x.com/Benomtad Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/benomtad   I plan to conduct more interviews with various guests, so please check back later for those.   Clip Intro Music “A Baroque Letter” - Aaron Kenny

The Gold Child goes into the dangerous forest full of thieves and conceals his skin with a bearskin, and passes through unmolested.The Gold Child goes into the dangerous forest, full of thieves, and conceals his skin with a bearskin, and passes through unmolested. In life, in spiritual development, it is a mystery what will happen next.  Sometimes we are saved by the feminine.  Goldchild’s wife talks to her father to save her husband. (A Clip from the Episode “The Gold Children, by the Brothers Grimm”)   The full video episode: https://youtu.be/_yr9eluzFtY   Audio episode: https://benomtad.podbean.com/e/the-gold-children-by-the-brothers-grimm/   The Podcast Playlist: https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLMIlJwXEK2vqfEOVgfclRgZNXO4boyP3T   The Episode Playlist: https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLMIlJwXEK2vq-TnaienDlJJ1ZdTknAqVn   For more in this podcast, please go to: Podbean: https://benomtad.podbean.com Apple Podcasts: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/podcast-benomtad/id1748320863 YouTube: https://m.youtube.com/@scissorsandpaper/videos Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/show/4kJPGlaJjGVyLa9AKhci6t?si=8XXrX9FUT3CU71reCfA5kQ X: https://x.com/Benomtad Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/benomtad   I plan to conduct more interviews with various guests, so please check back later for those.   Clip Intro Music “A Baroque Letter” - Aaron Kenny

A fisherman catches a gold fish, which makes a deal with him: he’ll have a nice big house if he lets the fish go, on the condition he tell no one how he got the house.  The man objects: and what’ll I have to eat?  The fish says the cupboards will be full.   Back home, his wife, decked out in finery, itches with curiosity, and he eventually tells her, and their house disappears.  This happens once more, but on the third time, the fish has the man take the fish home, cut him up, and distribute him, making two gold children, horses, and lilies.     His gold children, itching to leave, are cautioned by their worried father.  “I must and will go!”     They come to an inn, where they are jeered at.  One returns home and the other goes on.  He comes to a forest, which is thick with thieves, and the people warn him.  “I must and will go on!”     Both horse and man clothed in bearskin, he ventures into the darkness.  Within, he hears voices on either side of a bush, debating whether to rob him, but they allow the seemingly worthless victim to go on.     Out of the forest now, he meets the most beautiful woman he has ever seen, and asks her to marry him.  She agrees, and they are betrothed.  But then her father returns, and seeing Gold Man’s rough accoutrement, he intends to kill him, but his daughter intercedes.  Still, he must peek behind the curtain, and the next morning sees a magnificent gold man beside discarded bearskins.     But the happy husband, following a dream, decides to hunt a stag.  His worried wife objects.  “I must and will go on!”     In the woods again, the stag just escapes his aim, but a curious cottage catches his attention.  At the door, a witch asks him what he is doing there so late, and her little dog yips at him incessantly.  He threatens it, and she touches him with her forefinger, turning him to stone.   Back home, the other gold man sees the gold lily droop, and he goes out to save his kin.  At the cottage, he threatens to shoot the witch, and she touches the statue with her forefinger, returning him to human form.  The long-lost brothers embrace and return to their respective homes, and live happily the rest of their lives.   The full video episode: https://youtu.be/_yr9eluzFtY   The Podcast Playlist: https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLMIlJwXEK2vqfEOVgfclRgZNXO4boyP3T   The Episode Playlist: https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLMIlJwXEK2vq-TnaienDlJJ1ZdTknAqVn   For more in this podcast, please go to: Podbean: https://benomtad.podbean.com Apple Podcasts: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/podcast-benomtad/id1748320863 YouTube: https://m.youtube.com/@scissorsandpaper/videos Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/show/4kJPGlaJjGVyLa9AKhci6t?si=8XXrX9FUT3CU71reCfA5kQ X: https://x.com/Benomtad Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/benomtad   I plan to conduct more interviews with various guests, so please check back later for those. 00:00 Reading of the Grimm’s “The Gold Children” 11:00 The Wife’s Arrogant Restlessness 12:23 The Father-in-Law Doesn’t Kill the Golden Opportunity 13:49 The Gold Fish’s Sacrifice 15:45 The Fisherman, and Adam and Eve 17:30 Similarities and Differences to “The Fisherman and His Wife” 18:08 The Golden Tulips, Horses, & Children 19:23 The Golden Children Go out into the World 20:15 The Golden Brothers Separate 21:15 The Dangerous Journey 21:48 The Bearskin 28:58 The Father’s Proof 30:15 The Golden Fish is the Story’s Throughline 30:41 Losing the Thread 39:00 Dr. Goldchild and Mr. Goldchild 41:15 The Grimm’s Dreams & Immovable Stone 45:00 The Timid Brother’s Boldness

In the fairy tale time logic, the fisherman's son practically becomes a priest after he is born, and after he leaves the house he doesn't see his parents again.  But he is not done with the watery bargain he is doomed within from birth.   When he makes it to the castle, he is shown in royal garment, signalling he is ready to be the heir to the kingdom.  But he is still not united with the feminine--either of his wife, the princess, or the mermaid he is owed to.   Now when he goes out hunting, in spite of his wife's warnings, he is dragged underwater by the cthonic feminine mermaid.  (He also forgets his mother's warnings.)   And with that, the contract made by his father is fulfilled. A “like” and “subscribe” really helps us out!  Feed the playful beast with your comments!    For the full video episode: https://youtu.be/da9FBQpg8JI Audio episode: https://benomtad.podbean.com/e/von-schonwerth-s-the-red-silk-ribbon/   The Podcast Playlist: https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLMIlJwXEK2vqfEOVgfclRgZNXO4boyP3T The Episode Playlist: https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLMIlJwXEK2vq-TnaienDlJJ1ZdTknAqVn For more in this podcast, please go to: Podbean: https://benomtad.podbean.com Apple Podcasts: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/podcast-benomtad/id1748320863 YouTube: https://m.youtube.com/@scissorsandpaper/videos Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/show/4kJPGlaJjGVyLa9AKhci6t?si=8XXrX9FUT3CU71reCfA5kQ X: https://x.com/Benomtad Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/benomtad About our guest: Ian Reclusado is currently off exploring the poetic wilds of psychology, neuroscience, and spirituality.  He also offers guidance services for those interested in delving into their own inner wilderness. You can find his weekly dispatches at www.thekindknife.com or follow him on Instagram: @ian_reclusado I plan to conduct more interviews with various guests, so please check back later for those.  

“Little Red Cap:” A little girl, beloved by her grandmother and known for her red cap, is sent by her mother to bring her grandmother a meal.  Little Cap assures her mother she’ll follow all directions, and goes off on the trail.     She is not afraid of the wolf when she sees him, and he peppers her with questions, learning of her destination, where he’ll get two victims.  They walk together and he points out the natural life around them she is not paying attention to.  She raises her eyes and runs after nosegay after nosegay off the path for her grandmother, and the wolf runs ahead of her.   At G-ma’s house, the wolf pretends he’s Cap, gaining entry into grandmother’s cottage, devours the old woman and disguises himself as her.  Little Cap, arms full of flowers, is surprised to see the door open, crying “good morning” as her mother had admonished, and walks in.  The famous dialogue proceeds, with the little girl noticing the wolf’s features, crescendoing into his devouring her.     Wolf, sated, snores loudly, drawing the attention of the Woodsman, who goes to check on grandmother.  He snips open the carnivore’s stomach and his meal pops out.  Little Cap fetches stones, and they fill the wolf’s belly with them and he falls dead.  Grandmother is revived with the cake and wine her granddaughter brought.   Another time, Cap took cakes to her grandmother and was approached by another wolf, and they shut the old Greybeard out after she arrived, and he lurked.  Grandmother got Red Cap to carry sausage water outside and pour it into the trough, and the wolf, smelling it, slipped off the roof and drowned in the trough.  And Little Red Cap was free of the wolf menace.   00:00 Introduction 01:05 Little Red Riding Hood Reading 08:59 Beloved Little Girl Goes Out to Visit Grandmother 10:23 Mother Sends Riding Hood Off 12:10 Naïve Hood 14:21 The Wolf’s Knowledge 16:04 Finally, Red Cap Feels Unease 17:33 Stories End with Her Being Eaten 20:02 Crafty Red Riding Hood 20:51 A Didactic Tale 22:20 Wolf vs Red Cap 22:52 Red Cap’s Innocence and the Wolf’s Lust 26:08 The Wolf’s Sinning 28:05 The Hunter vs. the Wolf 28:38 The Female Characters Weaknesses 30:01 This Tale Warned You 32:50 The Second Wolf & Sausages 34:30 The Black & White Contrasts of this Story Heighten its Drama   (A Clip from the Episode “The Red Silk Ribbon” by Franx Xavier Von Schönwerth)   A “like” and “subscribe” really helps us out!       For the full video episode: https://youtu.be/mAiR-CU4Qtw   The Podcast Playlist: https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLMIlJwXEK2vqfEOVgfclRgZNXO4boyP3T   The Episode Playlist: https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLMIlJwXEK2vq-TnaienDlJJ1ZdTknAqVn   For more in this podcast, please go to: Podbean: https://benomtad.podbean.com Apple Podcasts: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/podcast-benomtad/id1748320863 YouTube: https://m.youtube.com/@scissorsandpaper/videos Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/show/4kJPGlaJjGVyLa9AKhci6t?si=8XXrX9FUT3CU71reCfA5kQ X: https://x.com/Benomtad Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/benomtad   I plan to conduct more interviews with various guests, so please check back later for those.

The mermaid's deal with the fisherman: she gives him an abundant catch without telling him, and then takes it away unless he'll agree to her demand.  In order to get his livelihood back he must sacrifice his child to her.  He appeals to a higher authority in a Christian society, and this forstalls the child offering.  These complexities and moral ambiguities remind me of great power negotiations, which, unlike those within a country and a system of laws, are more like those done in a state of nature. (A Clip from the Episode “The Red Silk Ribbon” by Franx Xavier Von Schönwerth)   A “like” and “subscribe” really helps us out!       For the full video episode: https://youtu.be/da9FBQpg8JI   Audio episode: https://benomtad.podbean.com/e/von-schonwerth-s-the-red-silk-ribbon/   The Podcast Playlist: https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLMIlJwXEK2vqfEOVgfclRgZNXO4boyP3T   The Episode Playlist: https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLMIlJwXEK2vq-TnaienDlJJ1ZdTknAqVn   For more in this podcast, please go to: Podbean: https://benomtad.podbean.com Apple Podcasts: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/podcast-benomtad/id1748320863 YouTube: https://m.youtube.com/@scissorsandpaper/videos Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/show/4kJPGlaJjGVyLa9AKhci6t?si=8XXrX9FUT3CU71reCfA5kQ X: https://x.com/Benomtad Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/benomtad   About our guest: Ian Reclusado is currently off exploring the poetic wilds of psychology, neuroscience, and spirituality.  He also offers guidance services for those interested in delving into their own inner wilderness. You can find his weekly dispatches at www.thekindknife.com or follow him on Instagram: @ian_reclusado   I plan to conduct more interviews with various guests, so please check back later for those.   Photo by Ivan Jevtic on Unsplash   Clip Intro Music “A Baroque Letter” - Aaron Kenny

Why Dionysus May Be the Patron of Theater: A well-told story will shake you and has the power of psychological transformation.  A death to your former self.  A communal experience with a large part of those you grew up with and knew well, seeing a story that you knew deeply, with the reflection of your reactions in the chorus on stage.  It seems that Greek theater could be a transformative religious experience.    (A Clip from the episode “Dionysus: Death, Rebirth, Transformation”)   A “like” and “subscribe” really helps us out!  Feed the playful beast with your comments!      For the full video episode: https://youtu.be/B6fIc44N64s   Audio episode: https://benomtad.podbean.com/e/dionysus-death-rebirth-transformation/   The Podcast Playlist: https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLMIlJwXEK2vqfEOVgfclRgZNXO4boyP3T   The Episode Playlist: https://youtube.com/playlist?list=PLMIlJwXEK2vp52ueLUpkSJqwk7PfCK93s&si=eITFu_OlAEpWYheR   For more in this podcast, please go to: Podbean: https://benomtad.podbean.com Apple Podcasts: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/podcast-benomtad/id1748320863 YouTube: https://m.youtube.com/@scissorsandpaper/videos Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/show/4kJPGlaJjGVyLa9AKhci6t?si=8XXrX9FUT3CU71reCfA5kQ X: https://x.com/Benomtad Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/benomtad   About our guest: Ian Reclusado is currently off exploring the poetic wilds of psychology, neuroscience, and spirituality.  He also offers guidance services for those interested in delving into their own inner wilderness. You can find his weekly dispatches at www.thekindknife.com or follow him on Instagram: @ian_reclusado   Background Photo by Alexandro Pasqualicchio on Unsplash Statue Photo by MIGUEL BAIXAULI on Unsplash   I plan to conduct more interviews with various guests, so please check back later for those.

A fisherman employed by a Count that paid him well for how big his catches were suddenly stopped catching fish and was let go.  Sat out on water, weeping.  Mermaid came to him and said she was the one who gave him all the fish and then took them away, and that if he wanted more he’d have to give her something he didn’t know he had.  He agreed and caught a large load. Went home and shocked his wife with the news– she told him she was with child.  They were saddened but said they’d make the boy be a man of the cloth, and comforted themselves with the catch, which the man brought to the Count and thereby became re-employed.   When the boy, whom they named Lucas, was of age, he took the vows, but he could not perform his first sermon because he was promised to the Mermaid.  So he became a cooper (maker and repairer of casks and tubs) and went on the road with that. One day he saw a bear, a fox, a falcon and an ant quarreling over how to divide a horse’s carcass.  Lucas gave the fore- and hindquarters to the bear, the back to the fox, the innards to the falcon and the head to the ant.  He walked away but the bear sent the fox after him to express their gratitude.  The animals gave him the power to change into any of their forms at will.  He burst out laughing and went on. To test his power, when he came upon some partridges pecking at grain Lucas turned into a fox and got as many of the birds as he could carry.  He then went on and came to an inn, where he had the birds roasted.  After he went to sleep behind the stove.  Four men entered and started playing cards, and one amassed quite a small fortune.  Lucas became an ant, crawled over, transformed into a bear and overturned the table, scattering the money and frightening the cardplayers into fleeing.   Lucas took his “catch” back on the road and came to a town with a black flag and people in mourning.  A king had three beautiful daughters and had decided to make the middle his heir, but the sisters looked so alike that people could not tell them apart.  Anyone who could choose the middle could marry her, but if he failed, he’d be executed.  Many had tried unsuccessfully, and that was why the town was in mourning. Lucas decided to try his hand, and he espied in the castle, which was surrounded by a deep moat, a garden, and in it three beautiful girls.  He flew as a falcon into it and allowed one to capture him.  She put him into a golden cage in her room and went to sleep, and he emerged as a man in splendid clothing and took her hand.  He professed her love to her and she said she was the middle.  She tied a red silk ribbon around her finger to distinguish her from her sisters. The next day, Lucas showed up at the castle to claim his bride.  The king and others mourned for this handsome lad to be the next victim of the executioner, who was getting ready off to the side.  But when the three daughters were presented, the middle stepped forward slightly and he saw the ribbon.  Everyone rejoiced at his pick and he was made heir and they lived together happily for years.   One day Lucas wanted to go off hunting, but his wife had a bad premonition and asked him not to go, but he insisted.  Carrying a deer he’d killed, he ignored his mother’s warning to stay away from water, and he was snatched below by a mermaid.  The wife heard the news and mourned him at the stream, and the mermaid came up and said not to worry, that he was happy.  She asked to see her husband and she was shown his face, offering her golden comb, and by giving away her ring, then her slipper, he was allowed to progressively emerge until he was in his wife’s hand, and can you imagine, he then turned into a falcon and escaped. The mermaid disappeared and came back and blew blue sand into the face of the queen, who turned into a dragon.  The kingdom was again in trouble, and the king announced the need for help throughout the land.  A magician came and asked if the princess could endure the difficult cure.  Three ovens of progressive heat were procured, and she was put into each one, emerging first with soft skin, then split out of the skin, then naked as herself, each time cooled with water.  Lucas threw his cape on her and they lived happily ever after now that the mermaid no longer had claim to them.   00:00 Introduction to VonSchönwerth’s Newly Discovered Tales 03:04 Summoning of the Muse for Odysseus, Another Lost Man 04:49 Summary of Von Schonwerth’s “The Red Silk Ribbon” 11:05 The Mermaid’s Blackmail 15:36 Nature She Giveth and She Taketh Away 17:12 From Priest to Caskmaker, Lucas Struggles on the Mermaid’s Line  21:01 Lucas and the Four Animals  28:01 Interest in the Wisdom of the People 29:10 A Wily Man Searching for Higher Things 32:49 Getting in Touch with the Father 36:31 Ignoring the Feminine and Dragged Down to the Depths 42:07 The Princess and the Mermaid 46:11 End of the Story: The Prince Must Be Drowned 51:33 Complications and Cross Forms in Stories 57:57 Folktales and the Unknowns of Parenting 1:00:46 You Have to Offer Something Real in Life, Something Vital 1:05:29 The Warning of the Mermaid

We talk of the danger of applying strict logic to every situation, without using discernment.  But we live in a world with a lot of mystery to our brains.  So you must have wisdom to best know how, when, and how much to apply logic.  Our conversation meanders to Lois Lowry’s “The Giver,” where there is a rigorous discipline around the use of words.  Ian opines that there is an overemphasis on belonging in this society, and he contrasts this with strong man fascism.   (From a discussion on Howard Pyle’s Robin Hood: “Little John Lives with the Sheriff”)   A “like” and “subscribe” really helps us out!  Feed the playful beast with your comments!      For the full video episode: https://youtu.be/CwFVbACPD0s   Audio episode: https://benomtad.podbean.com/e/howard-pyle-s-robin-hood-little-john-lives-with-the-sheriff/   The Podcast Playlist: https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLMIlJwXEK2vqfEOVgfclRgZNXO4boyP3T   The Episode Playlist: https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLMIlJwXEK2vrUkxUzteCd27I81Q7bJgW9   For more in this podcast, please go to: Podbean: https://benomtad.podbean.com Apple Podcasts: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/podcast-benomtad/id1748320863 YouTube: https://m.youtube.com/@scissorsandpaper/videos Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/show/4kJPGlaJjGVyLa9AKhci6t?si=8XXrX9FUT3CU71reCfA5kQ X: https://x.com/Benomtad Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/benomtad   About our guest: Ian Reclusado is currently off exploring the poetic wilds of psychology, neuroscience, and spirituality.  He also offers guidance services for those interested in delving into their own inner wilderness. You can find his weekly dispatches at www.thekindknife.com or follow him on Instagram: @ian_reclusado   I plan to conduct more interviews with various guests, so please check back later for those.

The king appoints his handsomest soldier to be his bodyguard and sends him to a nobleman with a beautiful daughter.  He tells the daughter not to speak to any soldiers, but she and he grow intimate.  After there is a baby, the nobleman sends the bodyguard away for three feathers from the tail of a dragon who lives on a glass mountain.   On the way, he comes to a country where the king has lost a golden chain, and he is only allowed to leave when he promises to learn how to get it from the dragon.  The second year he does the same with a king with a barren fig tree, and the third with two men who cannot stop ferrying people across a river.   At the glass mountain, the dragon’s wife tells him to hide, that she is not supposed to talk to anyone, but she ends up getting the feathers from her sleeping husband after he comes home and finding out the information.  The soldier, on the way back, tells the ferrymen to declare, “I am free!” after their last trip with him, and they are.  He then reveals the poison fruit buried under the fig tree, and in the sixth year of his journey, he tells the king where to dig to find the golden chain, and he is rewarded with an army.     Upon returning, he sees the nobleman has been reduced to selling his dishes in the market.  He has his men smash the dishes, then again the next day when the nobleman still does not recognize him.  The father then recognizes his son-in-law, who is now allowed to marry his daughter, he himself is restored to the court, and they live happily ever after.   00:00 Podcast Intro 00:37 Summary of Von Schonwerth’s “The King’s Bodyguard” 06:26 A Drunken Storytelling   09:05 The Highest Man  11:32 A Very Intimate Relation, but It’s Not Enough 13:55 The Tyrant and Beauty 17:14 The Slick Feminine and the Glass Mountain 19:47 The Heroism and Beauty  of the King’s Bodyguard 24:26 The Nobleman, Hoarding His Daughter, Helps out Everyone 26:12 Beauty, Celebrity and Artifice 27:20 What’s with the Dragon on the Glass Mountain? 32:26 Make Yourself Small in the House of God 36:46 Not Knowing Your Task Until You Set Out 40:55 Proper Fear of the Lord 45:28 Judas and The Circuitous Rightness of Relations 51:27 Bad Leads to Good in Right Stories 54:33 Don’t Bring God Bad Vibes 56:16 Breaking Hoarded Plates and Daughters 1:01:10 The Bodyguard’s Useful Respect and Dutifulness 1:04:39 The Hurdle Philosophy and Aggressive Moral Emotions 1:10:24 Let People Have Their Suffering 1:15:27 Buddha, is There a God?   1:22:59 Uncertainty 1:24:11 Plausibility, not Certainty 1:29:16 Not Everything is a Problem   (A Clip from the episode “Von Schönwerth’s “The King’s Bodyguard”)   A “like” and “subscribe” really helps us out!  Feed the playful beast with your comments!      For the full video episode: https://youtu.be/8OCLI6nTEfg The Podcast Playlist: https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLMIlJwXEK2vqfEOVgfclRgZNXO4boyP3T   The Episode Playlist: https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLMIlJwXEK2vq-TnaienDlJJ1ZdTknAqVn For more in this podcast, please go to: Podbean: https://benomtad.podbean.com Apple Podcasts: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/podcast-benomtad/id1748320863 YouTube: https://m.youtube.com/@scissorsandpaper/videos Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/show/4kJPGlaJjGVyLa9AKhci6t?si=8XXrX9FUT3CU71reCfA5kQ X: https://x.com/Benomtad Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/benomtad   About our guest: Ian Reclusado is currently off exploring the poetic wilds of psychology, neuroscience, and spirituality.  He also offers guidance services for those interested in delving into their own inner wilderness. You can find his weekly dispatches at www.thekindknife.com or follow him on Instagram: @ian_reclusado   Background Photo by Alexandro Pasqualicchio on Unsplash Statue Photo by MIGUEL BAIXAULI on Unsplash   I plan to conduct more interviews with various guests, so please check back later for those.   Photo Credits: Thiago Zanutigh on Unsplash Jonathan Kemper on Unsplash

The Princess’s Personal Agenda in “Knapsack, Hat & Horn”   I view this as a cautionary tale: be respectful of someone with great power.  This story also resembles the Von Schönwerth story “The Scorned Princess,” and I talk about that story.     (From a discussion on the Brothers Grimm’s ”The Knapsack, the Hat, and the Horn”)   Thank you for the likes! A comment and a subscribe really helps us out!     For the full video episode: https://youtu.be/EzBlLxcd57M   Audio episode: https://benomtad.podbean.com/e/the-brothers-grimms-the-knapsack-the-hat-and-the-horn-summary-and-discussion/ For more in this podcast, please go to: Podbean: https://benomtad.podbean.com Apple Podcasts: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/podcast-benomtad/id1748320863 YouTube: https://m.youtube.com/@scissorsandpaper/videos Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/show/4kJPGlaJjGVyLa9AKhci6t?si=8XXrX9FUT3CU71reCfA5kQ X: https://x.com/Benomtad Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/benomtad For the related “Bearskin” video episode: https://youtu.be/4oT1UC1ReKM Or the Audio: https://benomtad.podbean.com/e/the-brothers-grimms-bearskin/   For the related “The Scorned Princess” episodes: https://benomtad.podbean.com/e/von-schonwerth-s-the-scorned-princess/ Or for the video:  https://youtu.be/F6gC0Sk9qJQ?si=K5ADs6vN2GXCT9uX   Thumbnail Photo Credits: Photo by Carolin Thiergart and Hal Gatewood on Unsplash   I plan to conduct more interviews with various guests, so please check back later for those.

Ian and I discuss the Greek-Roman god Dionysus-Bacchus.  He reads an Orphic poem and then I gloss various stories put together into a narrative in Edith Hamilton’s Mythology.  This is a fascinating discussion of a god with opposing features: of gentleness, compassion, and persuasion, but also of wild revelry, frenzy, and terrible violence.  We discuss this divinity of the vine, of natural vitality cultivated on a structure, and of rebirth after dissolution, whose product leads to new “creativity” and destruction.  He is a god of death and rebirth, and hence, of transformation, and we talk about his spirit’s contribution to the transformation and rebirth of individuals in life and civilizations in their lives.    A “like” and “subscribe” really helps us out!  Feed the playful beast with your comments!      For the full video episode: https://youtu.be/B6fIc44N64s Audio episode: https://benomtad.podbean.com/e/howard-pyle-s-robin-hood-little-john-lives-with-the-sheriff/   For more in this podcast, please go to: Podbean: https://benomtad.podbean.com Apple Podcasts: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/podcast-benomtad/id1748320863 YouTube: https://m.youtube.com/@scissorsandpaper/videos Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/show/4kJPGlaJjGVyLa9AKhci6t?si=8XXrX9FUT3CU71reCfA5kQ X: https://x.com/Benomtad Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/benomtad   About our guest: Ian Reclusado is currently off exploring the poetic wilds of psychology, neuroscience, and spirituality.  He also offers guidance services for those interested in delving into their own inner wilderness. You can find his weekly dispatches at www.thekindknife.com or follow him on Instagram: @ian_reclusado I plan to conduct more interviews with various guests, so please check back later for those. Chapters: 00:00 Introduction 00:12 The Meaning of BenOMTAD 01:01 Format of this Episode 01:25 Recalling the Oracle 02:46 Ian on the Orphic Hymn 04:05 Edith Hamilton’s “Mythology” on Dionysus 14:56 Thoughts on the Murder of Pentheus by the Maenids 18:05 A Possible Earlier Version of Dionysus 23:26 A Dionysian Lineage 26:45 Humanity Born from the Titans, in this Telling 28:20 Gold Leaf Possible Evidence for Dionysus’s Role in Creating Humanity 30:46 This Interesting Side Myth 32:25 Liking the Multiple Local Myths and Thinking of Renewal 34:51 We are an Ultra Social Species 36:04 Multiple Facets of Dionysus and Renewal 37:16 Dionysus’ Rebirth from Semele 39:03 Unwelcome Dionysus 40:17 A Bit on Nietzsche’s Dionysian vs Apollonian 42:53 Why Dionysus May Be the Patron of Theater 44:22 The Transformative Place of Theater in Greek Culture 50:58 How is Dionysus Transformative? 59:42 The Direct Metaphor of Grapes to the Character of Dionysus 01:05:14 Orpheus 01:14:30 Theme: If You Do Not Dissolve in the Transformative Process, You Will Be Destroyed 01:18:50 Balancing the Dionysian and Apollonian in Meditation 01:19:18 How Orpheus Lost His Faith 01:26:18 A Prophetic Warning for Our Civilization 01:28:29 This Balance is Also Our Challenge Every Day 01:37:32 If We Don’t Have Faith, It Could Come and We Won’t Even See It 01:41:25 My Own Story of Ignored Creativity 01:44:03 Our Intention with This Podcast

If you’re mindful, you’re better able to connect to and serve others.  How does one get so?  Getting back to what naturally arises.     (From a discussion on Von Schönwerth’s “Anna Mayala”)   Thank you for the likes! A comment and a subscribe really helps us out!     For the full video episode: https://youtu.be/ZGx8Odijcvo   Audio episode: https://benomtad.podbean.com/e/von-schonwerth-s-anna-mayala-forbidden-love-and-time-forever-lost/   For more in this podcast, please go to: Podbean: https://benomtad.podbean.com Apple Podcasts: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/podcast-benomtad/id1748320863 YouTube: https://m.youtube.com/@scissorsandpaper/videos Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/show/4kJPGlaJjGVyLa9AKhci6t?si=8XXrX9FUT3CU71reCfA5kQ X: https://x.com/Benomtad Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/benomtad   “The Turnip Princess:” https://a.co/d/2enoGJS   Thumbnail Background Credit: Michael Hystead on Unsplash   Inset: Photo by Nik on Unsplash   I plan to conduct more interviews with various guests, so please check back later for those.

The Sheriff, out hunting with the town notables, wishes John were with them.  The bugle calls, and back at the castle, John awakens.  He thinks of his compadres over in Sherwood– the green men, and sees how he’s grown fat in the six Fall and Winter months with the Sheriff.  He goes to the pantry and asks the Steward for some meat and bread, and the fat man, envious of John’s closeness to the Sheriff, says it’s too late for breakfast.  John stomps over to it and breaks into the larder and starts to partake, and knocks the guard out when he intervenes.   The cook, spit in hand, runs over at the commotion.  The Steward bribes him to stop John, and he draws his sword and the Steward flees.  John reasons with the cook– one of us might go to Heaven by the end of the day, how about doing so on a full belly?  They size each other up respectfully as they fill up on pie and sack.   Time to fight: they draw and withdraw to a large corridor, but after an hour no one has gotten the better of the other.  Leaning on their weapons, they reason that they’re the strongest of the lot of the place, and John tempts the cook with the promise of camaraderie with the Green Men, so they abscond with the Sheriff’s food and silver.   Back in Sherwood, the men are merry at John’s rejoining them.  But Robin Hood’s face is grave: the Sheriff has not done wrong and does not deserve this recompense.  John moves to rectify his error and goes out to the Sheriff, drawing him to the group with promise of a herd of jumpy game.  The Sheriff despondently drinks with Hood and is sent back to the town bigwigs with a big lumpy sack of silver.  And that is the tale of how Little John ended his tenure with the Sheriff of Nottingham.   Thank you for the likes! A comment and a subscribe really helps us out!     For the full video episode: https://youtu.be/CwFVbACPD0s Audio episode: https://benomtad.podbean.com/e/howard-pyle-s-robin-hood-little-john-lives-with-the-sheriff/ For more in this podcast, please go to: Podbean: https://benomtad.podbean.com Apple Podcasts: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/podcast-benomtad/id1748320863 YouTube: https://m.youtube.com/@scissorsandpaper/videos Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/show/4kJPGlaJjGVyLa9AKhci6t?si=8XXrX9FUT3CU71reCfA5kQ X: https://x.com/Benomtad Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/benomtad   About our guest: Ian Reclusado is currently off exploring the poetic wilds of psychology, neuroscience, and spirituality.  He also offers guidance services for those interested in delving into their own inner wilderness. You can find his weekly dispatches at www.thekindknife.com or follow him on Instagram: @ian_reclusado   I plan to conduct more interviews with various guests, so please check back later for those.

Ian and I discuss McLuhan’s difficult Playboy interview where he answers questions about his philosophy of technology.  At the core of our concern is how to live well, connected to people and ourselves as embodied beings, as information technology advances.  Perhaps appropriate to the topic, we do struggle some to get ahold of his philosophy and how to go forward with this concern.     McLuhan’s 1969 Playboy Interview: https://web.cs.ucdavis.edu/~rogaway/classes/188/spring07/mcluhan.pdf   Thank you for the likes! A comment and a subscribe really helps us out!     For the full video episode: https://youtu.be/BNXtidQ8ndQ Audio episode: https://benomtad.podbean.com/e/marshall-mcluhan-technology/ For more in this podcast, please go to: Podbean: https://benomtad.podbean.com Apple Podcasts: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/podcast-benomtad/id1748320863 YouTube: https://m.youtube.com/@scissorsandpaper/videos Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/show/4kJPGlaJjGVyLa9AKhci6t?si=8XXrX9FUT3CU71reCfA5kQ X: https://x.com/Benomtad Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/benomtad   About our guest: Ian Reclusado is currently off exploring the poetic wilds of psychology, neuroscience, and spirituality.  He also offers guidance services for those interested in delving into their own inner wilderness. You can find his weekly dispatches at www.thekindknife.com or follow him on Instagram: @ian_reclusado   I plan to conduct more interviews with various guests, so please check back later for those.

an: Rousseau seems to have an inherent faith in nature, in its goodness.  If you believe in that, you have something to aim for, to return to that.  I: Rousseau also says that most virtues are negative.   (From our discussion “Rousseau, Happiness, & Modernity”)   Thank you for the likes! A comment and a subscribe really helps us out!     For the full video episode: https://youtu.be/V1QQJTyUlBY   Audio episode: https://benomtad.podbean.com/e/rousseau-happiness-modernity/   For more in this podcast, please go to: Podbean: https://benomtad.podbean.com Apple Podcasts: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/podcast-benomtad/id1748320863 YouTube: https://m.youtube.com/@scissorsandpaper/videos Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/show/4kJPGlaJjGVyLa9AKhci6t?si=8XXrX9FUT3CU71reCfA5kQ X: https://x.com/Benomtad Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/benomtad   About our guest: Ian Reclusado is currently off exploring the poetic wilds of psychology, neuroscience, and spirituality.  He also offers guidance services for those interested in delving into their own inner wilderness. You can find his weekly dispatches at www.thekindknife.com or follow him on Instagram: @ian_reclusado   I plan to conduct more interviews with various guests, so please check back later for those.

Three brothers, tired of poverty, go out into the world.  In the forest, they come to a hill of silver and the first brother decides to load his pockets and return home.  The second does so with a hill of gold, but the third goes further into a much-larger forest, one of unknown breadth.  There, starving, he climbs a tree to look around, wishes for food, and finds a knapsack that always provides a feast.   Going on, he finds a succession of coal-burners who live on potatoes.  He trades them the knapsack for each of the unused gifts they have, using one of those gifts– a squad of soldiers at his beck and call– to steal back his feast sack each time.  Returning home and unacknowledged in his shabbiness, he raises raises cain with his brothers and punishes them, drawing the attention of the neighborhood and then of the king, but beating all opposing forces back.     He uses his superiority to negotiate with the king and demands his daughter’s hand in marriage.  She also rejects him because of his appearance, but she tries to guile him out of his gifts.  He is able to successfully counterattack each time and eventually destroys much of the kingdom, taking the life of the king and his daughter in the process.  He then ruled over the whole land.   We summarize and then discuss this tale of ambition, risk, luck, gifts and judging based on appearance.     Grimm's "The Knapsack, the Hat, and the Horn"   Three brothers, tired of poverty, go out into the world.  In the forest, they come to a hill of silver and the first brother decides to load his pockets and return home.  The second does so with a hill of gold, but the third goes further into a much-larger forest, one of unknown breadth.  There, starving, he climbs a tree to look around, wishes for food, and finds a knapsack that always provides a feast.   Going on, he finds a succession of coal-burners who live on potatoes.  He trades them the knapsack for each of the unused gifts they have, using one of those gifts– a squad of soldiers at his beck and call– to steal back his feast sack each time.  Returning home and unacknowledged in his shabbiness, he raises raises cain with his brothers and punishes them, drawing the attention of the neighborhood and then of the king, but beating all opposing forces back.     He uses his superiority to negotiate with the king and demands his daughter’s hand in marriage.  She also rejects him because of his appearance, but she tries to guile him out of his gifts.  He is able to successfully counterattack each time and eventually destroys much of the kingdom, taking the life of the king and his daughter in the process.  He then ruled over the whole land.   We summarize and then discuss this tale of ambition, risk, luck, gifts and judging based on appearance.   (From a discussion on the Brothers Grimm’s ”The Knapsack, the Hat, and the Horn”)   Thank you for the likes! A comment and a subscribe really helps us out!     For the full video episode: https://youtu.be/EzBlLxcd57M   Audio episode: https://benomtad.podbean.com/e/the-brothers-grimms-the-knapsack-the-hat-and-the-horn-summary-and-discussion/   For more in this podcast, please go to: Podbean: https://benomtad.podbean.com Apple Podcasts: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/podcast-benomtad/id1748320863 YouTube: https://m.youtube.com/@scissorsandpaper/videos Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/show/4kJPGlaJjGVyLa9AKhci6t?si=8XXrX9FUT3CU71reCfA5kQ X: https://x.com/Benomtad Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/benomtad For the related “Bearskin” video episode: https://youtu.be/4oT1UC1ReKM Or the Audio: https://benomtad.podbean.com/e/the-brothers-grimms-bearskin/   For the related “The Scorned Princess” episodes: https://benomtad.podbean.com/e/von-schonwerth-s-the-scorned-princess/ Or for the video:  https://youtu.be/F6gC0Sk9qJQ?si=K5ADs6vN2GXCT9uX   I plan to conduct more interviews with various guests, so please check back later for those.  

Attention is your light, and that can build if you can keep your attention on it.  It can grow, and we can see it more truly.  Instead of increasing our attention, however, we often instead look for something that seems bright to our minds right now, what is salient, and so forth.  Do not take the world as it presents to you now.   (From our discussion “Rousseau, Happiness, & Modernity”)   Thank you for the likes! A comment and a subscribe really helps us out!     For the full video episode: https://youtu.be/V1QQJTyUlBY   Audio episode: https://benomtad.podbean.com/e/rousseau-happiness-modernity/   For more in this podcast, please go to: Podbean: https://benomtad.podbean.com Apple Podcasts: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/podcast-benomtad/id1748320863 YouTube: https://m.youtube.com/@scissorsandpaper/videos Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/show/4kJPGlaJjGVyLa9AKhci6t?si=8XXrX9FUT3CU71reCfA5kQ X: https://x.com/Benomtad Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/benomtad   About our guest: Ian Reclusado is currently off exploring the poetic wilds of psychology, neuroscience, and spirituality.  He also offers guidance services for those interested in delving into their own inner wilderness. You can find his weekly dispatches at www.thekindknife.com or follow him on Instagram: @ian_reclusado   I plan to conduct more interviews with various guests, so please check back later for those.

The beautiful Veri and Anna Mayala were in love, but she was poor, and her many suitors were grievous to them.  But finally, they were to be married, and on that date imaginative “Crazy Veri” got a roebuck from the woods for the feast and was walking back to the village.   At a footbridge, his mind wandering, he noticed the moon had already risen, and its reflection shone in the water.  He grew melancholy, and was drawn by sweet melodies.  He saw a beautiful pair of legs, and a woman plopped on his shoulder.  She looked into his eyes, saying he would forget his bride, but he went with her.   Some time later, Anna Mayala was to be married.  She walked with her mother of the same name, and a wild man ran up to them, trying to take the bride, saying he’d been gone but he was the rightful groom.  He was pushed away, and then seen in the town from time to time, until he was seen in the parson’s house, and then no more.     More time passed, and a Franciscan monk would come to the town occasionally, liking especially to stay with Anna Mayala and her husband.  When her husband died, she realized who Veri was, and he told her his story.  Down below, he’d had several children with his wife, but her feet were bound with ribbons, as were the childrens.’  He eventually discovered their webbed, clawed feet and wished for a normal child, and when it came it horrified the mermaids and they devoured it.  At this, he cried out and was sent back to our world.   Later, when Anna Mayala died, Veri passed away kneeling at her bedside.  Two white doves flew out of the window.  When Anna’s daughter grieved out loud at the stream, the waters overflowed into the house and did not stop roiling until the priest sprinkled holy water.  Receding, child corpses were left behind.     Every anniversary of Crazy Veri’s death, the stream overflows its banks, and the moon is no longer reflected in its waters.   Join us for this summary and discussion of the German tale of wildness, forbidden love, longing and lost time! (From a discussion on Von Schönwerth’s “Anna Mayala”)   Thank you for the likes! A comment and a subscribe really helps us out!     For the full video episode: https://youtu.be/ZGx8Odijcvo   Audio episode: https://benomtad.podbean.com/e/von-schonwerth-s-anna-mayala-forbidden-love-and-time-forever-lost/   For more in this podcast, please go to: Podbean: https://benomtad.podbean.com Apple Podcasts: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/podcast-benomtad/id1748320863 YouTube: https://m.youtube.com/@scissorsandpaper/videos Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/show/4kJPGlaJjGVyLa9AKhci6t?si=8XXrX9FUT3CU71reCfA5kQ X: https://x.com/Benomtad Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/benomtad   I plan to conduct more interviews with various guests, so please check back later for those.

About the Merchant’s son’s character: Early in life he showed faith in his father, himself, the world… How did he change?  When he goes back home he is not recognized by the sentries of his hometown.  Then he changes into the shepherd’s garb.  Perhaps there is something of another world to him, and he isn’t to return to this world?    (From a discussion of “The King of the Golden Mountain,” by the Brothers Grimm)   Thank you for the likes! A comment and a subscribe really helps us out!     For the full video episode: https://youtu.be/lwZ6kpPHHlk   Audio episode: https://benomtad.podbean.com/e/the-brothers-grimm-s-the-king-of-the-golden-mountain/   Compare: Von Schonwerth’s “The Scorned Princess:” https://youtu.be/F6gC0Sk9qJQ   For more in this podcast, please go to: Podbean: https://benomtad.podbean.com Apple Podcasts: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/podcast-benomtad/id1748320863 YouTube: https://m.youtube.com/@scissorsandpaper/videos Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/show/4kJPGlaJjGVyLa9AKhci6t?si=8XXrX9FUT3CU71reCfA5kQ X: https://x.com/Benomtad Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/benomtad   I plan to conduct more interviews with various guests, so please check back later for those.

Back in the time of small kings, one was riding forth with his retinue from the castle to go hunting.  Three sisters who were watching their cows saw them, and the eldest pointed to the king and said she would marry him, or none.  The second girl answered from the other side of the hill, pointing to the one on the right and saying the same thing.  The king had the three sisters brought to him and confirmed what they had said, and he married the eldest and two ministers married the other two of the beautiful sisters.   Now when the king was to go away, he asked the two sisters to watch his wife, who was about to give birth.  They were without child, and when the King’s son was born, they took it and threw it into the river.  A bird flew up, scaring them away and singing about the baby’s tomb until God’s word comes.  The sisters do this with the next son and daughter over a few years, telling the king that the children were dogs and a cat.   On the last word, the king angrily has his wife thrown in prison.  Meanwhile, in the country a fisherman and his barren wife have raised the three children.  The eldest son is rejected by the other boys as a foundling, and when he is of age, he pesters the fisherman until he lets the boy seek his real father.  The prince comes to an old fisher lady at a great body of water, and says she won’t have much luck.  She carries him over the water to search for his father, but he becomes lost in the land beyond.  Next year, the same happens with the 2nd son when he goes to find his brother.  Finally, the daughter goes out to search, but she wishes the fisher lady good luck, and she is given a wand and told what to do: she is to walk on the road past a great dog she is to ignore, through a castle, where she is to drop the wand, then go to the tree growing from a spring beyond.  She is to take back a glass of the water and the caged bird and strike the dog with the wand.     Now on the way back, the princess finds her brothers and when she strikes the dog it becomes a handsome prince.  They all go back to the fisherman’s house and hang the caged bird on the wall.  Eventually, the second brother goes out hunting, and when he is tired he plays his flute.  The king finds him and asks who gave him permission to hunt there, and he says, “No one.”  The king learns of his supposed father, and they go back to the fisherman, for the king knows him to be childless.  There, the bird sings the truth of the perfidy of the sisters.  The king frees his wife, she is revived with the water from the spring, the false sisters are burned, and the daughter married the handsome prince.   (From a discussion on the Brothers Grimm’s “The Three Little Birds”)   Thank you for the likes! A comment and a subscribe really helps us out!     For the full video episode: https://youtu.be/Dn_-L4xDwh0   Audio episode: https://benomtad.podbean.com/e/grimms-the-three-little-birds-summary-and-discussion/   For more in this podcast, please go to: Podbean: https://benomtad.podbean.com Apple Podcasts: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/podcast-benomtad/id1748320863 YouTube: https://m.youtube.com/@scissorsandpaper/videos Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/show/4kJPGlaJjGVyLa9AKhci6t?si=8XXrX9FUT3CU71reCfA5kQ X: https://x.com/Benomtad Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/benomtad   I plan to conduct more interviews with various guests, so please check back later for those.

The character of Bearskin: courage, but then he learns perseverance with his seven years of living Hell.  He must live truly wretchedly; he cannot even pray.     (From a discussion on “Bearskin,” by the Brothers Grimm)   Thank you for the likes! A comment and a subscribe really helps us out!     For the full video episode: https://youtu.be/4oT1UC1ReKM   Audio episode: https://benomtad.podbean.com/e/the-brothers-grimms-bearskin/   Von Schonwerth’s “The Scorned Princess:” https://youtu.be/F6gC0Sk9qJQ   For more in this podcast, please go to: Podbean: https://benomtad.podbean.com Apple Podcasts: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/podcast-benomtad/id1748320863 YouTube: https://m.youtube.com/@scissorsandpaper/videos Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/show/4kJPGlaJjGVyLa9AKhci6t?si=8XXrX9FUT3CU71reCfA5kQ X: https://x.com/Benomtad Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/benomtad   I plan to conduct more interviews with various guests, so please check back later for those.

JJ Rousseau wrote in “Emile” that his principle aim in teaching his student is to feel the beautiful of all sorts to fix his tastes on it and prevent his natural appetites from corruption.  In this podcast I try to introduce Ian to Rousseau’s thought and we go off into the wilds of conversation.   Thank you for the likes! A comment and a subscribe really helps us out!     For the full video episode:   For more in this podcast, please go to: Podbean: https://benomtad.podbean.com Apple Podcasts: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/podcast-benomtad/id1748320863 YouTube: https://m.youtube.com/@scissorsandpaper/videos Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/show/4kJPGlaJjGVyLa9AKhci6t?si=8XXrX9FUT3CU71reCfA5kQ X: https://x.com/Benomtad Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/benomtad   I plan to conduct more interviews with various guests, so please check back later for those.

A wealthy merchant loses his ships, and a dwarf appears to him with an offer: sacrifice the first thing that touches you when you come home, and I will help you exceed your previous riches.  He is dismayed, however, when his son runs up to him, and twelve years later, that son belongs to the dwarf.   He is clever, however, and negotiates with the little man, who lets him be sent off into the river by his father.  The boat capsizes, and his father goes away, grieving.  The boy survived, however, and eventually makes his way to a dark castle, where he meets a princess in the form of a snake.  He endures torture a few nights and has his head cut off, and so frees her from her spell.  She gets the water of life and revives him, and he is now King of the Mountain.     He lives happily with her and has a son, but he desires to go back and visit her parents.  She gives him a ring that can whisk him anywhere, but she warns him not to transport her to his parents.’  When he goes home, he is unrecognized, first for his rich garments and then for his borrowed shepherd’s cloak.  He then brings his wife via magic to prove his story, but his wife leaves him with the child, and he only  has her slipper.   He makes his way to a mountain with three giants fighting over their magical inheritance: a sword, a cloak, and a pair of shoes.  He swindles the giants out of these items and makes his way back to the Golden Mountain, where he finds his wife is to be remarried.  Made invisible by the cloak, he takes his wife’s food before she can eat it at the banquet.  She leaves, and he curses her for her betrayal in her room, and going down to the hall, tells the assembled bigwigs to leave.  When they try to seize him, he decapitates them all with the sword.  He alone is now master, and again King of the Golden Mountain. (From a discussion on “The King of the Golden Mountain,” by the Brothers Grimm)   Thank you for the likes! A comment and a subscribe really helps us out!     For the full video episode: Audio episode: Compare: Von Schonwerth’s “The Scorned Princess:” https://youtu.be/F6gC0Sk9qJQ   For more in this podcast, please go to: Podbean: https://benomtad.podbean.com Apple Podcasts: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/podcast-benomtad/id1748320863 YouTube: https://m.youtube.com/@scissorsandpaper/videos Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/show/4kJPGlaJjGVyLa9AKhci6t?si=8XXrX9FUT3CU71reCfA5kQ X: https://x.com/Benomtad Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/benomtad   I plan to conduct more interviews with various guests, so please check back later for those.

Ian talks about various strands of Buddhism, including Tibet and its philosopher rule, and Zen’s founder’s saying a lot of words about the problems with expressing things with words.  This is within the larger context of Buddhism in the West and the Meaning Crisis.   (From a discussion on “Awakening from the Meaning Crisis, Ep. 13, Buddhism and Parasitic Processing”)   Thank you for the likes! A comment and a subscribe really helps us out!     For the full video episode: https://youtu.be/9TU3BUjLumw   Audio episode: https://benomtad.podbean.com/e/vervaeke-buddhism-parasitic-processing/   For more in this podcast, please go to: Podbean: https://benomtad.podbean.com Apple Podcasts: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/podcast-benomtad/id1748320863 YouTube: https://m.youtube.com/@scissorsandpaper/videos Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/show/4kJPGlaJjGVyLa9AKhci6t?si=8XXrX9FUT3CU71reCfA5kQ X: https://x.com/Benomtad Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/benomtad   About our guest: Ian Reclusado is currently off exploring the poetic wilds of psychology, neuroscience, and spirituality.  He also offers guidance services for those interested in delving into their own inner wilderness. You can find his weekly dispatches at www.thekindknife.com or follow him on Instagram: @ian_reclusado   I plan to conduct more interviews with various guests, so please check back later for those.

A soldier returns from the wars, and now that his parents have died, he seeks shelter with his brothers.  But they reject him, and he wanders, penniless and starving, into a field.  The wind shifts, and a sly man in a green coat appears.  The soldier is to kill a bear, and he does so unflinchingly, so the green frocked man offers him a deal: if he wears the bearskin, which is what he will be known by, for seven years, without washing or dying, he will have great fortune.  But if he fails, his soul will go to the devil.   Bearskin agrees, and wanders the world wearing the devil’s green coat with its unlimited gold underneath the beastial covering.  After some time, rejected by humanity, he despairs at an inn.  However, hearing the cries of another man, he asks what is wrong.  The man has debts he cannot pay to support his family.  Bearskin pays them and the man offers his daughter’s hand in return.   At the man’s house, Bearskin is surprised at the man’s three daughters’ comeliness.  However, the eldest two are shocked at his appearance and reject him outright.  The third, however, quietly assents to pay her father’s debt.  Bearskin takes a gold ring, breaks it in two, and inscribes her name on his half and his on hers.  He says if she can wait for him for three years and pray to God for his life, they can be married.   Bearskin then wanders the world, giving alms to the poor that they may pray for his soul.  At the end of the contractual term, he returns to the clearing.  The wind shifts and the Devil reappears, looking at Bearskin angrily.  He moves to re-exchange their coats, but Bearskin insists he cleans him first.  After, he disappears and Bearskin, handsomer than ever, acquires a velvet coat and white horses.   Riding to the father’s house, he is not recognized and taken for a great general.  The eldest daughters ply him with wine, and laughing, leave to put on their best dresses.  The youngest, silent, remains, and Bearskin pushes a wineglass to her with his half of the ring in the bottom.  Finishing the glass, she sees it and fits it perfectly to her own, hung around her neck with a ribbon.  They embrace, and the sisters, returning and realizing what happened, run out of the house in jealousy and rage.  One drowns herself and the other hangs herself.  The Devil in his green coat knocks on the door and thanks Bearskin, for he has gotten two souls instead of one.   Thank you for the likes! A comment and a subscribe really helps us out!     For the full video episode: https://youtu.be/4oT1UC1ReKM   Audio episode: https://benomtad.podbean.com/e/the-brothers-grimms-bearskin/ Von Schonwerth’s “The Scorned Princess:” https://youtu.be/F6gC0Sk9qJQ   For more in this podcast, please go to: Podbean: https://benomtad.podbean.com Apple Podcasts: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/podcast-benomtad/id1748320863 YouTube: https://m.youtube.com/@scissorsandpaper/videos Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/show/4kJPGlaJjGVyLa9AKhci6t?si=8XXrX9FUT3CU71reCfA5kQ X: https://x.com/Benomtad Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/benomtad   I plan to conduct more interviews with various guests, so please check back later for those.

The story teaches that one wants to find the good-hearted, but hard-working parts, and bring in the creative magic, and over time, alchemize the tyrannical ruler, and overcome him, without ruining its good nature.  The sharpshooter follows that way, not knowing exactly what is happening, to a place he does not understand that is said to be at the edge of destruction.   (From a discussion on “Go to the Verge of Destruction and Bring Back Shmat-Razum”)   Thank you for the likes! A comment and a subscribe really helps us out!     For the full video episode: https://youtu.be/NrumhRwhgvI   Audio episode: https://benomtad.podbean.com/e/go-to-the-verge-of-destruction-and-bring-back-shmat-razum/   A Video Reading of the Story: https://youtu.be/8rgwtL5amZM   Go to the Verge of Destruction and Bring Back Shmat-Razum: https://www.gutenberg.org/files/50011/50011-h/50011-h.htm#chap14   For more in this podcast, please go to: Podbean: https://benomtad.podbean.com Apple Podcasts: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/podcast-benomtad/id1748320863 YouTube: https://m.youtube.com/@scissorsandpaper/videos Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/show/4kJPGlaJjGVyLa9AKhci6t?si=8XXrX9FUT3CU71reCfA5kQ X: https://x.com/Benomtad Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/benomtad   About our guest: Ian Reclusado is currently off exploring the poetic wilds of psychology, neuroscience, and spirituality.  He also offers guidance services for those interested in delving into their own inner wilderness. You can find his weekly dispatches at www.thekindknife.com or follow him on Instagram: @ian_reclusado   Searching for the Search: https://zenyogagurdjieff.substack.com/p/searching-for-the-search?r=h5jz7&utm_medium=ios&utm_campaign=audio-player   Compare: “The Crane Wife,” a Japanese tale: https://youtu.be/etGR9Ir7rBM?si=thXvw8cnp3pJ_sMU   I plan to conduct more interviews with various guests, so please check back later for those.

The Brothers Grimm’s “The Fisherman and His Wife”   A fisherman lived with his wife in a miserable pigsty by the sea.  When he went fishing, he pulled up a large flounder, a prince who began speaking with him and negotiated his release.  The fisherman simply let the talking fish go, leaving a trail of blood behind it.  Back home, his wife, surprised that he did not ask for anything, sends him back to wish for a nicer home.  He goes back, and the water is a bit murky now.  He sings a ditty, letting the flounder know this is against his wishes, and the fisherman and his wife’s house is a cottage with animals and a yard no sooner than the aquatic prince gives the word.   But the man’s wife increasingly hounds him to order better and better housing, and more and more power.  They ascend the social order, growing higher to the heavens, angering the sea and making themselves more and more anxious, until the linear story becomes a circle.   Please join us for a reading-commentary on this story, followed by discussion!   Thank you for the likes! A comment and a subscribe really helps us out!     For the full video episode: https://youtu.be/9ss-E5nyXo8   Audio episode: https://benomtad.podbean.com/e/the-brothers-grimm-s-the-fisherman-and-his-wife/   For more in this podcast, please go to: Podbean: https://benomtad.podbean.com Apple Podcasts: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/podcast-benomtad/id1748320863 YouTube: https://m.youtube.com/@scissorsandpaper/videos Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/show/4kJPGlaJjGVyLa9AKhci6t?si=8XXrX9FUT3CU71reCfA5kQ X: https://x.com/Benomtad Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/benomtad   I plan to conduct more interviews with various guests, so please check back later for those.

The first two sons of the king’s gardener are passive, choosing the pleasure inn over the shabby one, and they end up as condemned robbers.  These hedonistic brothers ignore wise advice and go instead with their senses.  Their passivity may be rooted in their upbringing.  They may be like the pleasure-seeking erotic man who keeps expanding the outlets for his desire and eventually step on someone’s toes.   (From a discussion on the Grimm’s Bros.’ “The Golden Bird”)   Thank you for the likes! A comment and a subscribe really helps us out!     For the full video episode: https://youtu.be/2MNCaPiE9DE   Audio episode: https://benomtad.podbean.com/e/the-brothers-grimm-s-the-golden-bird/   For more in this podcast, please go to: Podbean: https://benomtad.podbean.com Apple Podcasts: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/podcast-benomtad/id1748320863 YouTube: https://m.youtube.com/@scissorsandpaper/videos Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/show/4kJPGlaJjGVyLa9AKhci6t?si=8XXrX9FUT3CU71reCfA5kQ X: https://x.com/Benomtad Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/benomtad   I plan to conduct more interviews with various guests, so please check back later for those.

In “Awakening from the Meaning Crisis,” Ep. 13, “Buddhism and Parasitic Processing,” John Vervaeke, based in Stephen Batchelor’s idea that we’ve gravely misinterpreted Buddhism in the West, outlines how we might understand core parts of the Buddha’s teachings.  For suffering, he interprets it as a form of parasitic processing, a reciprocal narrowing of the connection between oneself and the world.  And for moving towards enlightenment, he shows how it might be the opposite of that, a kind of Platonic ascent, famously outlined in “The Republic.”  Ian criticizes this, and we discuss how suffering and enlightenment might be different and how true Buddhism is alive and well in the West.  Both approaches may be useful in reducing suffering and increasing insight and wellbeing.   Thank you for the likes! A comment and a subscribe really helps us out!     For the full video episode: https://youtu.be/9TU3BUjLumw   Audio episode: https://benomtad.podbean.com/e/vervaeke-buddhism-parasitic-processing/   For more in this podcast, please go to: Podbean: https://benomtad.podbean.com Apple Podcasts: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/podcast-benomtad/id1748320863 YouTube: https://m.youtube.com/@scissorsandpaper/videos Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/show/4kJPGlaJjGVyLa9AKhci6t?si=8XXrX9FUT3CU71reCfA5kQ X: https://x.com/Benomtad Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/benomtad   About our guest: Ian Reclusado is currently off exploring the poetic wilds of psychology, neuroscience, and spirituality.  He also offers guidance services for those interested in delving into their own inner wilderness. You can find his weekly dispatches at www.thekindknife.com or follow him on Instagram: @ian_reclusado   I plan to conduct more interviews with various guests, so please check back later for those.

On appearances: Robin Hood voluntarily descends in society.  That way, he can see what is happening on the ground.  Perhaps those who truly speak to the people attract all sorts.    For the full video episode: https://youtu.be/vtACZtly05A   Audio episode: https://youtu.be/uslCz3O2V_k   For more in this podcast, please go to: Podbean: https://benomtad.podbean.com Apple Podcasts: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/podcast-benomtad/id1748320863 YouTube: https://m.youtube.com/@scissorsandpaper/videos Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/show/4kJPGlaJjGVyLa9AKhci6t?si=8XXrX9FUT3CU71reCfA5kQ X: https://x.com/Benomtad Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/benomtad   I plan to conduct more interviews with various guests, so please check back later for those.

Did the evil stepmother queen in “Snow White” grow a bit from then to this story?  Well, she is still trying for unchanging beautiful perfection.  She does not go the way of nature.  (From a discussion on Jonathan Pageau’s “Rapunzel.”)   Thank you for the likes! A comment and a subscribe really helps us out!     For the video episode: https://youtu.be/eX0YUp4bTn0   Audio episode: https://benomtad.podbean.com/e/jonathan-pageaus-rapunzel-summary-and-discussion/   For more in this podcast, please go to: Podbean: https://benomtad.podbean.com Apple Podcasts: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/podcast-benomtad/id1748320863 YouTube: https://m.youtube.com/@scissorsandpaper/videos Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/show/4kJPGlaJjGVyLa9AKhci6t?si=8XXrX9FUT3CU71reCfA5kQ X: https://x.com/Benomtad Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/benomtad   I plan to conduct more interviews with various guests, so please check back later for those.

The king’s best hunter shoots a bird, wounding it, and it begs him to not kill it, instructing him to bring it home, put it on a window sill, and strike it.  When he does so, it turns into a beautiful woman and they marry.  She sees that he is wearied by his daily hunting and instructs him to borrow money from everyone he knows to buy silk.  She summons two youthful magical helpers and they craft a tapestry of the whole kingdom, down to the smallest detail.  At her direction, he takes it to the marketplace to sell it for whatever is offered.  The merchants are struck dumb, but the mayor, traveling through, offers a very high price for it.   Back at the palace, the mayor shows it to the king, who is so impressed he forces him to sell it to him for a much higher price.  Wanting to commission another such work, the mayor goes to the hunter’s home but falls in love with his wife.  He tells the king, who then dispatches the mayor to get rid of the hunter.  Baba Yaga meets the mayor in a wasteland and tells him to send the hunter on a quest from which he’ll not return.  The king summons the wife to his castle, but she escapes him, flying through a window in bird form.   The hunter’s wife gives him a ball he is to follow on his way and a towel he is to use rather than any he is offered.  It brings him to a castle with women who recognize their sister’s towel, and they help him by summoning the animals of creation.  Only a lowly and old frog knows where to find the Shmat-Razum.  He is given a bowl of milk in which to carry the guide.  When they cross a river, the frog increases in size and the hunter rides him over it.   He hides in a cave where there is a table set, and spies on two old men who eat and are waited upon by a servant.  When the men leave, the hunter offers to be the new master of the servant, who is glad to have someone who is grateful for his help.  On their way back, Shmat-Razum begins to carry the hunter, and they fly fast as the wind.  In the middle of a large lake, they stop and are visited by three merchants, who exchange their magical gifts for the hunter’s servant.  On their way, though, the servant abandons them and returns to his grateful master.   Upon returning to his wife, the hunter uses the magical gifts to establish a beautiful castle and gardens on the shore.  The king, looking upon the success with envy, sends troops who are defeated by an army from one of the gifts.  The king is killed in the battle, and the hunter and his wife are free, prosperous, and unhounded by rivals.   We read and discuss this tale and related ideas.   Searching for the Search: https://zenyogagurdjieff.substack.com/p/searching-for-the-search?r=h5jz7&utm_medium=ios&utm_campaign=audio-player   Thank you for the likes! A comment and a subscribe really helps us out!     For the full video episode: https://youtu.be/NrumhRwhgvI Audio episode: https://benomtad.podbean.com/e/go-to-the-verge-of-destruction-and-bring-back-shmat-razum/   For more in this podcast, please go to: Podbean: https://benomtad.podbean.com Apple Podcasts: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/podcast-benomtad/id1748320863 YouTube: https://m.youtube.com/@scissorsandpaper/videos Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/show/4kJPGlaJjGVyLa9AKhci6t?si=8XXrX9FUT3CU71reCfA5kQ X: https://x.com/Benomtad Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/benomtad   About our guest: Ian Reclusado is currently off exploring the poetic wilds of psychology, neuroscience, and spirituality.  He also offers guidance services for those interested in delving into their own inner wilderness. You can find his weekly dispatches at www.thekindknife.com or follow him on Instagram: @ian_reclusado   I plan to conduct more interviews with various guests, so please check back later for those.