Both "good" and "bad" are impermanent states

How can we do permanent "good" in a dynamic environment? Yesterdays "good" turns into tomorrows "bad" - perhaps better to question the notion of do-ership and agency all together - not in a way that leaves us believing we are powerless, but rather in a way that we acknowledge that what Reality needs to happen will happen, through us or through another...its a very delicate dance and perhaps getting our small "i" out of the way will make for a more elegant and suffering-less performance....

Rav Kook, of blessed memory, wrote a lot about how the seeming individual will (ratzon prati) works within and merges with, the general will, the Divine will.

The Rambam (Maimonides) the great Medieval Jewish philosopher and physician described the fluidity and context dependence of "good" and "bad" a 1000 years ago, and advised it best to adopt a stoic "wait and see" attitude of reserving judgement.

פירוש הרמב"ם על המשנה בברכות, ט, ה

[ה.] חייב אדם לברך על הרעה כשם שמברך על הטובה כו' – מה שאמר: כשם שהוא מברך על הטובה – רוצה לומר, לקבל אותו בשמחה ולב טוב ולכבוש כעסו, וייטיב נפשו כשיברך "דיין האמת", כמו שיעשה בשעה שיברך "הטוב והמטיב". וכמו שהיו אומרים החכמים ברוב דבריהם: "כל מה דעביד מן שמיא – לטב". וזה דבר שכלי אצל בעלי השכל, ואפילו לא הורה הכתוב עליו, לפי שיש דברים רבים, נראים [שתחילתם רעה, ויהיה אחריתם טובה רבה, ויש דברים, נראין] בתחילתם טובים, ויהיה אחריתם רעה רבה. ועל כן אין ראוי למשכיל להשתומם כשתבוא עליו צרה גדולה, מפני שאינו יודע סופה; [וכמו כן אל יפתה לבבו וישמח שמחה שלימה כשתבואהו טובה לפי מחשבתו, מפני שאינו יודע סופה].

She made me do it officer

The Talmudic imagination: you got to love it...they boldly went where no men had gone before. One of the Taludic sages Rava ( literally 'the great one' )says in Tractate Yevamot folio 53b, that a man can never be considered forced to carry out a sex act, because an erection comes only willingly. In response Rabah, R. Chiyah and others conceive of bizarre alternative circumstances, such as a man falling from a roof with his erect penis (erect because he was planning on sex with his wife) landing in another woman's vagina. Or someone literally inserting the man's penis (erect because he planned on sex with his wife) into another woman.

Sadly, perhaps, I have not experienced either of these possibly delightful scenarios, but they cum to mind because there is another Jewish legal principle "“ones Rachmana patreh” — that the Torah does not hold a person accountable for an involuntary act. With same sex marriage on the public agenda in Australia at the moment, what is the halachic take on it? Well of course that depends on which authority you ask, and if you shop around Jewdiciously enough you will find one that confirms your world view. ( As is the case with all religions and their adherents.) So if for one individual same sex attraction is involuntary, hard-wired, genetic, then the Torah's explicit prohibition and punishing of homosexual intercourse - presumably penetration - would not apply, but would apply to someone who is bi curious and can seemingly 'choose' between hetero or homosexual relationships.

Rava's claim is that erections are always voluntary, and therefore the male who penetrates another male's body is liable for sanction and punishment. The other rabbis attempt to come up with scenarios where penetration was not a voluntary act. ( "He made me do it officer")
What has always fascinated me about these 1800 year old texts is how all subjects are discussed with equal gravitas, and how creative the arguments and counter arguments are.

Pregnant with Eternity

Isn't it amazing that the Hebrew word for "world" is the same as the Hebrew word for "universe" and the same as the Hebrew word for "eternal" and all of them come from the root ayin- lamed-mem which means "hidden". Perhaps it is to suggest that something eternal is hidden beneath the appearances of this ephemeral world...I think Blake knew this when he wrote:

To see a world in a grain of sand,
And a heaven in a wild flower,
Hold infinity in the palm of your hand,
And eternity in an hour

https://theshalomcenter.org/node/1453
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The Kings Cross debate: What is the point of only addressing the supply side, with curbs on alcohol, or pre-limting "pokies" (poker machines), or the "war on drugs", or censorship of pornography, without simultaneously addressing the demand side? Cultures which do not offer people pathways to bliss and ways of serving the divine leave people trying to self-medicate with addictions of one sort or another - either because they want to feel more, or because they want to numb out and feel less. The cure for addiction is bliss, and bliss comes from gratitude, and gratitude comes from questioning our assumptions about the way things should be.
“A thought is harmless unless we believe it. It’s not our thoughts, but our attachment to our thoughts, that causes suffering. Attaching to a thought means believing that it’s true, without inquiring. A belief is a thought that we’ve been attaching to, often for years....Life is simple. Everything happens for you, not to you. Everything happens at exactly the right moment, neither too soon nor too late. You don't have to like it... it's just easier if you do." Byron Katie