Learning to code includes memorizing syntax, comprehending logical flow, and an intuition of design. This includes learning the basic units of code (e.g. if, and, for, def), the behaviour of code components (e.g. loops, generators, functions), and knowing how to combine these into a synergistic whole. Object-oriented program is an advantage which heralds its own recommendations by the...
This is what I’ve worked out. This is the progress I’ve made. This the set-back I’ve experienced. This is my recommendation for the best way forward. It seems like Emotions form a substrate of the conscious entity, that is separate in the same way that the physical body is separate from the mind, but irreducibly connected in the same way that the physical body is. Just because...
Bhikku Nyanaponika Thera wrote a short book entitled The Power of Mindfulness, in which he describes four principles which may assist understanding the benefits, aims, and strategies of meditations. These he lists as: The functions of tidying and naming The non-coercive procedure Stopping and slowing-down Directness of vision Thera describes unofficial four powers for meditation, Regarding...
I may lose myself and be lost in the tangles of associations and prompts and distractions and imaginations and judgements and intuitions of the mindless mind. Sati (bare attention, mindfulness) is an exercise in the moment, and a propensity developed with training. The arising and leaving and intending-towards sati increase and decrease with practice. The Pali texts describe sati as a hot pan...
Last November I started learning to code python[I]. In 5 weeks I hope to have finished creating a card game. Learning python Briefly: codecadamey, Learn Python The Hard Way, The Python Game Book, Foundations in Python Networking, reddit, stackexchange, python standard library documentation, prolog challenges, codewars, checkio. A review of this process needs to wait for another day. What sort of...
David was a historian at the institute. The machine had been cold, like the look on his father’s face when he cried. The noises that erupted from it felt uncoordinated and overeager, like the dreams where he could not stop running and falling. The nurse had been friendly, like the voices in his head when there was no one else to tell. The doctor had been professional, like a salesman, like...
A boy lost in the woods. The path is a dragon to be fled, cobblestones made of logical paradoxes to be solved. There is a sign pointing to freedom and wealth. There are warnings; a cacography of leaves and bare twigs, foretelling failures and eternal damnation. The spirits sing sweet songs, gossamer echoes of Ariadne’s thread. “Here is freedom, here is choice.” But the boy...
When I first met Adam he was picketing cigarette sales outside a convenience store. When I think of him now, I think of his bulging eyes, sweaty stubble, the smell of aniseed as he leaned in confidentially to whisper something he thought must be a secret, but back then he was clean shaved and suited and not prone to whispers. “You got a light?” I didn’t. “That’s...
Samma vayama right effort is the 6th of the eightfold path. I shall not give up my efforts until I have attained whatever is attainable by perseverance, energy, and endeavour. We share in four great endeavours: Prevent the arising of unarisen unwholesome states Abandon the unwholesome states that have already arisen Arouse the wholesome states that have not yet arisen Maintain and perfect the...
I have been on an epic journey. I have travelled a countless distance and endured unmeasurable inflictions. This is my story. It began with a breath I learned to sit with the breath and discovered great subtleties of silence. In time these places of bliss became distracted by moments of tension. I tugged on the thread. At the end of the tension was a discomfort, small and ambiguous. It was a...
