Ram Dass names the laugh at the top of the ladder, and it is the Buddha’s smile with sound.
“Beyond the humor of survival, of gratification, of power, there is a humor that is filled with compassion. It is reflected in the tiny upturn in the mouth of the Buddha, for he sees the humor in the universal predicament. This giggle is without malice. It is a cosmic giggle, the delight in the fun of it all.”
— Ram Dass
This giggle is without malice. It is a cosmic giggle, the delight in the fun of it all.
Ram Dass ranked humor on a ladder. At the bottom, the humor of survival, the joke that gets you through. Above it, the humor of gratification, and above that, the humor of power, the laugh at someone’s expense. And above all three, a humor that is filled with compassion: the one reflected in the tiny upturn of the Buddha’s mouth, because he sees the whole predicament at once, that beings suffer because they are lost in the appearance, and that the suffering is not final.
This is the last reading of the Clearing, and it is the right one, because it is the expression the other thirty-nine were leading toward. Not solemnity. Not the grim face of someone who has understood something hard. A giggle, without malice, at the fun of it all. Ram Dass heard it first in his guru, and said it seemed to come from outside the whole arrangement. Read the passage, then sit for a moment, and notice what your face is doing.
Where today was the giggle available, and did you let yourself have it?
If you have read all eight courses, you have read forty of the Map’s teachings and walked its shape once, theme by theme. The Clearing has done its work, which was to set the orientation. The rest of the site is built for what comes after.
The Map holds everything, cross-linked, for wandering. The Dispatches are the long readings, where one recognition is followed from one tradition into another. The Signal reads albums, films and games as carriers of the same recognitions. The Body Politic asks what the traditions noticed about civilizations, not just people. The Collections gather teachings around a single question; there is one for when someone has died. And Today puts one teaching in front of you each morning, if a morning is all you have. Go wherever is still warm.