THE SOUND OF ONE HAND CLAPPING 
The sound of one hand clapping!!! What does that sound like to you, do you start to unravel certain meanings to that in your mind? Have you taken it metaphorically? Or, and I'm being a little bit cheeky here, have you already Googled, wikipedia'd or sent a text to Aqa (all questions answered). This struck me the other day when I was thinking of an old Koan from my Martial arts days ‘No man who can see the stars is ever alone.' As my knowledge and wisdom has grown over the years, my understanding of that simple saying has visited many trains of thought, and feelings
These days when do we actually sit with something??? Allow our own essence to search out a meaning just for us??? Or feel our way to a resonance or a question???
A Koan is a story, dialogue, question, or statement in the history and lore of (Zen) Buddhism, generally containing aspects that are inaccessible to rational understanding, yet may be accessible to intuition. There is the nub, we can Google, Wiki or Aqa all we want but we are merely serving the rational mind to the detriment of intuition. As always I'm not saying you pick up your placard and march on Westminster with your ‘down with Google' message, (although with the sneaky introduction of software to trace peoples movements recently by Google it wouldn't be a bad idea - but that's for another blog.)
Information is literally at our fingertips these days, and as with all things - money is a good example - it is not the energy of something it is the way we interact with it that is important. In many circumstances our lives can be enriched and stimulated by the instant information available to us, but also it can make it too easy for us, and sometimes when something comes to us easily we don't value it enough, or pay scant regard to it. I guarantee a cup of tea brewed around the campfire you built yourself will taste like nectar compared to a free cuppa at a hotel conference.
More importantly even than not valuing the information we had to earn, is that we didn't intuit that information for ourselves. The amount of people I see these days who can't be on their own is amazing. If they aren't actually with someone, they are texting or phoning someone, or with distraction (TV / computers / music) The art of quiet reflection is being lost, the art of sitting with yourself and your thoughts and feelings is being lost, and by default the art of intuiting is being lost.
That was the purpose of a Koan; they are especially designed for one purpose; this purpose is to open the mind that has been closed by habitual responses to the world and reality. Those that know me know I trust my connection implicitly, and I love the Dali Lamas speech where he says ‘Believe nothing, not even if I say it myself, unless it resonates in your heart as a truth to you.' We are if we aren't careful, in danger of becoming drones, sheep, zombies living robots conditioned purely by habituated responses and what we are fed by society - strong words maybe, but what do you think??? 
So... you can Google the sound of one hand clapping and get Yakuboji's slant on it.... ‘What is the Sound of the Single Hand? When you clap together both hands a sharp sound is heard; when you raise the one hand there is neither sound nor smell. Is this the High Heaven of which Confucius speaks? Or is it the essentials of what Yamamba describes in these words: "The echo of the completely empty valley bears tidings heard from the soundless sound?" This is something that can by no means be heard with the ear. If conceptions and discriminations are not mixed within it and it is quite apart from seeing, hearing, perceiving, and knowing, and if, while walking, standing, sitting, and reclining, you proceed straightforwardly without interruption in the study of this koan, you will suddenly pluck out the karmic root of birth and death and break down the cave of ignorance. Thus you will attain to a peace in which the phoenix has left the golden net and the crane has been set free of the basket. At this time the basis of mind, consciousness, and emotion is suddenly shattered; the realm of illusion with its endless sinking in the cycle of birth and death is overturned. The treasure accumulation of the Three Bodies and the Four Wisdoms is taken away, and the miraculous realms of the Six Supernatural Powers and Three Insights is transcended ‘
OR YOU CAN SIT QUIETLY AND REFLECT ON WHAT IT MEANS TO YOU. THERE IS NO RIGHT OR WRONG, JUST A BEAUTIFUL TRANSCENDANCE AS YOU REMEBER HOW TO OPEN YOUR MIND AND BREAK THE SHACKLES OF THE JUNK FOOD OF SOCIETIES HABITUATED RESPONSES. 
Finally...My old martial arts master's slant on ‘no man who can see the stars is ever alone.' Was that if you were sitting on your own at night looking at the stars, someone somewhere was looking at the stars too and you would be joined in that act... That felt ok to me... but these days I feel that the stars themselves are a reference point for the universe and we are all connected to ‘source' we are all one... who knows what it will mean to me in 2010, but one thing's for sure I won't be looking for my answer on the net.
Jules x