Oh dear. I find myself agitated, frustrated, itching to get out of my own skin. I just saw myself in the mirror and I wasn't who I thought I would see. I just embarked on an adventure which turned out to be tedious. I just made my offering to the thin crowd who gathered to hear me. Why? Because I have not offered anything so interesting, so enticing, delightful or inspiring to keep them coming in the door. My expectations of myself seem to consistently exceed my accomplishments. Is this not the insanity of doing the same thing over and over and expecting new results?
Are all of my offerings this mediocre? How many of my hopes and aspirations have been mere self delusion? What greatness can I make of the decay and the rubble of my own ill-attended surroundings? How is this very frustration, edgy in boredom, torturous in lackluster related to the ground of being? How do I find the ananda, the joy that has no opposite from here? How do I make this aversion into a mark of true beauty?
Honesty has value, but dragging others through one's own boredom is more selfish indulgence than authentic honesty. I feel my closet is stuffed full with these sorts or scribblings, the ones you don't really want the world to be aware of. I will spit it out and run away as fast as I can to a better vantage point, one that must be more flattering. How could it get much worse than this? Oh now, don't tempt me to push that edge. This will soon give way to its opposite and so I pray my next inspiration is worth the scratching on the chalkboard that we all have to endure sometimes.
Wednesday, July 13, 2011
Sunday, February 6, 2011
Gasland and Sharklet technology
I really don't know where to begin. I watched the movie Gasland and that is where the connection to the bleakness is. Immediately I wanted to know how on earth we are going to brighten this bleak and stark reality. Wow, it seems to be far worse than I knew. Death seeps into the earth, the life giving waters, spews into the air, can it touch the ethers? Does it make the fires more dangerous?
I watched and saw perplexed by men who want to promote this "product" who know at least some of the cost to people living on the lands that have already been poisoned. I cannot begin to comprehend as my teacher said; "what would you have to think to think that?" I cannot begin to imagine. It seems to me that they are infected, corrupted by an illness that prevents them from seeing the value of life, of the natural world. I tried to imagine how we might really help healing, wholeness, holiness return to the land.
Then this morning I learned about sharklet technology, about the fact that patterning plastics prevents the growth of bacteria on them. Already used on marine products the new frontier, perhaps a more important one is in medical technology. Killing bacteria doesn't work. In fact the effort to kill all the bacteria manages to kill about 99%, but then the 1% left is the strongest 1%. Hospitals are losing patients to bacterias that are resistant to antibiotics. So creating an inhospitable environment for the browth of bacteria seems like a much better option.
I thought about the way that this country lays things down in haphazard disorganized fashion (mind you I am far from well organized in my own life and home). I have often wondered what it is about germanic cultures like Switzerland, Germany and Austria that enable them to function so much more efficiently on timelines. Driving through Switzerland I have seen architecture, parks and even grapevines organized into patterns that please the eye. I wonder if this organization actually reduces social/mental illness. I spoke to my friend who lives in Germany and she said there were some really devastating affects lingering from world war II. She also said that there is a much more diverse array of political orientation there which I compared to our more bi-polar leanings with a sprinkling of individuality. I am not terribly politically savy and I know the liberals and conservatives in this country are not quite all fitting into two comfortable baskets, but even so, as I understand it there are more diverse political groupings in Germany including a very strong green party which big business must contend with.
Back to my original idea: In Boston, at the museum of science there was an exhibit of M.C. Escher's work and on the wall there was a quote by Buckminster Fuller who said something like: I don't think about aesthetics when I begin to try to solve a problem, but if the answer I come up with is not elegant then I know it isn't right. Could the importance of organizing the shakti into more beautiful patterns also create environments in which unhealthy social attitudes simply do not take root and grow?
I think about the beautiful healing places I have been whether wo/man made or naturally evolved. I think it is true that the spirit of what grows in such places is far more healthy, whole and inspirational. I wonder how much is held together by the sri principle, how much must be cultivated with clear intention. I would have thought that the root of the environmental disorder was in the attitudinal positions of those living there, but how much can a truly beautiful and harmonious environment alter attitudinal orientation? Well, many questions arise as I write this like the beauty of the places where very wealthy people live who are willing to devastate the lives of others and the natural world. But still the question begs to be asked what can we do and how? And if we believe that mass consciousness grows as we heal in community then perhaps it is there that we need to organize the shakti to empower the healing as fully as possible.
Your thoughts and comments are welcome, as usual.
I watched and saw perplexed by men who want to promote this "product" who know at least some of the cost to people living on the lands that have already been poisoned. I cannot begin to comprehend as my teacher said; "what would you have to think to think that?" I cannot begin to imagine. It seems to me that they are infected, corrupted by an illness that prevents them from seeing the value of life, of the natural world. I tried to imagine how we might really help healing, wholeness, holiness return to the land.
Then this morning I learned about sharklet technology, about the fact that patterning plastics prevents the growth of bacteria on them. Already used on marine products the new frontier, perhaps a more important one is in medical technology. Killing bacteria doesn't work. In fact the effort to kill all the bacteria manages to kill about 99%, but then the 1% left is the strongest 1%. Hospitals are losing patients to bacterias that are resistant to antibiotics. So creating an inhospitable environment for the browth of bacteria seems like a much better option.
I thought about the way that this country lays things down in haphazard disorganized fashion (mind you I am far from well organized in my own life and home). I have often wondered what it is about germanic cultures like Switzerland, Germany and Austria that enable them to function so much more efficiently on timelines. Driving through Switzerland I have seen architecture, parks and even grapevines organized into patterns that please the eye. I wonder if this organization actually reduces social/mental illness. I spoke to my friend who lives in Germany and she said there were some really devastating affects lingering from world war II. She also said that there is a much more diverse array of political orientation there which I compared to our more bi-polar leanings with a sprinkling of individuality. I am not terribly politically savy and I know the liberals and conservatives in this country are not quite all fitting into two comfortable baskets, but even so, as I understand it there are more diverse political groupings in Germany including a very strong green party which big business must contend with.
Back to my original idea: In Boston, at the museum of science there was an exhibit of M.C. Escher's work and on the wall there was a quote by Buckminster Fuller who said something like: I don't think about aesthetics when I begin to try to solve a problem, but if the answer I come up with is not elegant then I know it isn't right. Could the importance of organizing the shakti into more beautiful patterns also create environments in which unhealthy social attitudes simply do not take root and grow?
I think about the beautiful healing places I have been whether wo/man made or naturally evolved. I think it is true that the spirit of what grows in such places is far more healthy, whole and inspirational. I wonder how much is held together by the sri principle, how much must be cultivated with clear intention. I would have thought that the root of the environmental disorder was in the attitudinal positions of those living there, but how much can a truly beautiful and harmonious environment alter attitudinal orientation? Well, many questions arise as I write this like the beauty of the places where very wealthy people live who are willing to devastate the lives of others and the natural world. But still the question begs to be asked what can we do and how? And if we believe that mass consciousness grows as we heal in community then perhaps it is there that we need to organize the shakti to empower the healing as fully as possible.
Your thoughts and comments are welcome, as usual.
Saturday, November 20, 2010
Follow up or the second half of the piece of trident
I just reviewed the clip of Jill Bolte Taylor and realize that part of what I was trying to say is that I got slammed into my right hemisphere by the early traumas that I sustained and that connection has sustained and motivated me throughout my life.
Like a murder of crows healing me only in my case it was the melting tar and the sparkling dew. And these things would make my heart dance to life and I knew that what was possible was barely acknowledged and that even though I did not know the boundaries of my own capabilities I was certain that the others around me did not either. I was certain that their perceptions fell far short of what we are all capable of, perhaps of necessity. Perhaps we need to evolve gradually for any meaningful integration to be accomplished.
Soft and continual support. There it is again. Open to grace. Soft and continual support. Receive it, imagine it, invoke it. And I want to invite Leonard Cohen to this dance where the vikrukti gives way to the illumination of new possibility as we dance on the edge of the universe as yet unfolded.
Like a murder of crows healing me only in my case it was the melting tar and the sparkling dew. And these things would make my heart dance to life and I knew that what was possible was barely acknowledged and that even though I did not know the boundaries of my own capabilities I was certain that the others around me did not either. I was certain that their perceptions fell far short of what we are all capable of, perhaps of necessity. Perhaps we need to evolve gradually for any meaningful integration to be accomplished.
Soft and continual support. There it is again. Open to grace. Soft and continual support. Receive it, imagine it, invoke it. And I want to invite Leonard Cohen to this dance where the vikrukti gives way to the illumination of new possibility as we dance on the edge of the universe as yet unfolded.
A half a stick of trident...
I've got my half a stick of trident and I'm ready to roll... What is this imprint of shock you keep dragging near to me? I see a chance to make my offering and there among the ashes she rises again and again reminding me that there are hurts that have not healed. Somewhere underneath the scars are buried and rise up to the disapproval of certain others.
I am not the kind one she thinks and seems to want to place her arc of feelings in front of me. What happens to make them keep dragging these moments up as I am trying to make the gift of love and healing. Is it in the eyes of disapproval that I must be released?
I stand before him questioning and he seeing my uncertainty becomes impatient. He seems to know how much I have been given to understand, but does he know that I have also had the pain of the world dredged up from the inside?
No, probably not the worst of it. Enough? How much? How can I know what it is relative to? And then I have the desire to show how beautiful those imprints are that cut into what never was a "normal life" Why do they seem to resent me?
I feel myself walking out in the cold but unable to withstand the harder of the two kinds of cold. My hands shake now? You have no idea how happy I have become. If you read this then how can you know how beautiful my life has turned out to be. But still she pulls from the inside of me to get out somehow to find her own place in it all.
I can't tell you who or what she is except to say that she is like the tangled strands of my own DNA and RNA the places where expression began. The places where I in haste shut down until further notice. How does the soft continual support reach in and soothe her? She accepts the offer with the edge of grief that is hope in a darkened corner.
I have failed to show you how beautiful this is, at least for the moment, but I will keep trying. Perhaps the day I can reach to the angriest youth in the room and make a difference, perhaps then she will accept my success as meaningful.
The day came and went. I did not think I could be happier. It was a day of devastation 33 years prior. That same cold and wet November day, even a Wednesday. Wednesday November 17, 1977. The punk rock scene was exploding in Bromley England, but I didn't know their rage overseas could match my own in that little room of confinement. That room that set the boundary I would never forget. "You are not acceptable to society as you are." Of course it was my behavior, but it was also my beliefs and it was their pathologizing.
Four years later she would speak from within, telling me of this future happiness that I knew was true but could not believe. And now that so much of this is behind me I am still searching for my place. I get little glimpses that I have managed to do somethings of value, but this pressure persists. Divine dissatisfaction?
Oh, I forgot I was trying to reach for a way to show how beautiful even the most painful parts are. No, I have not succeeded yet. I will try again, perhaps even tomorrow. The thing is that the cuts cut into what could have been a "normal" existence and there is a sadness to that, but they revealed not only the hard painful side, they also revealed the exquisite light and beauty in an immediate and breathtaking heart opening big gasp take it all in kind of way. I hope I do find a way to tell this story because it really is beautiful and it is the only one I have to tell. For now I will compare it to the contrasts in the Lord of the rings when the darkness threatens but the light of the elven realm shields the innocence at least for a time.
I am not the kind one she thinks and seems to want to place her arc of feelings in front of me. What happens to make them keep dragging these moments up as I am trying to make the gift of love and healing. Is it in the eyes of disapproval that I must be released?
I stand before him questioning and he seeing my uncertainty becomes impatient. He seems to know how much I have been given to understand, but does he know that I have also had the pain of the world dredged up from the inside?
No, probably not the worst of it. Enough? How much? How can I know what it is relative to? And then I have the desire to show how beautiful those imprints are that cut into what never was a "normal life" Why do they seem to resent me?
I feel myself walking out in the cold but unable to withstand the harder of the two kinds of cold. My hands shake now? You have no idea how happy I have become. If you read this then how can you know how beautiful my life has turned out to be. But still she pulls from the inside of me to get out somehow to find her own place in it all.
I can't tell you who or what she is except to say that she is like the tangled strands of my own DNA and RNA the places where expression began. The places where I in haste shut down until further notice. How does the soft continual support reach in and soothe her? She accepts the offer with the edge of grief that is hope in a darkened corner.
I have failed to show you how beautiful this is, at least for the moment, but I will keep trying. Perhaps the day I can reach to the angriest youth in the room and make a difference, perhaps then she will accept my success as meaningful.
The day came and went. I did not think I could be happier. It was a day of devastation 33 years prior. That same cold and wet November day, even a Wednesday. Wednesday November 17, 1977. The punk rock scene was exploding in Bromley England, but I didn't know their rage overseas could match my own in that little room of confinement. That room that set the boundary I would never forget. "You are not acceptable to society as you are." Of course it was my behavior, but it was also my beliefs and it was their pathologizing.
Four years later she would speak from within, telling me of this future happiness that I knew was true but could not believe. And now that so much of this is behind me I am still searching for my place. I get little glimpses that I have managed to do somethings of value, but this pressure persists. Divine dissatisfaction?
Oh, I forgot I was trying to reach for a way to show how beautiful even the most painful parts are. No, I have not succeeded yet. I will try again, perhaps even tomorrow. The thing is that the cuts cut into what could have been a "normal" existence and there is a sadness to that, but they revealed not only the hard painful side, they also revealed the exquisite light and beauty in an immediate and breathtaking heart opening big gasp take it all in kind of way. I hope I do find a way to tell this story because it really is beautiful and it is the only one I have to tell. For now I will compare it to the contrasts in the Lord of the rings when the darkness threatens but the light of the elven realm shields the innocence at least for a time.
Thursday, October 14, 2010
Kali Mama's Grace
Something's gotten hold of me and I realize I am dissolving into being consumed by her Grace. It is a very specific kind of Grace. She is the one who can digest all that is not wholly supportive to the emanation of my fabulousness. Isn't that a mouthful?
I don't mind feeling a bit weak at the moment. I want to be dissolved. And I feel this as the only way that I can be the vessel for change. I can only use my free will on the microcosm that is me within the macrocosm of life. And that is saying a lot! I realize I may be speaking gibberish to anyone who might desire for whatever reason, to be reading this post. I guess this is yoga/shadow work 101. On Tuesday as I was in parigasana (gate pose) holding the portal open to her (the illuminating darkness who can consume and digest even the most vile of dangers) I was envisioning my hailing her into the out there, but I guess I knew I was a little off in my perspective.
So, here I am this morning just dissolving and welcoming her into the places that scream for isolation. You know the spots? The ones that just don't want to engage or let go or feel just about anything at all. Well, maybe you are lucky enough not to have any corners in your being like that, but I think this work is bigger than just us. At least I like to think it is like the story I heard of the Buddha getting to the gates to heaven and saying "no, sorry I am not coming in until everyone else can too." Well, I am really not a Buddhist, but I like this image and I think there is a way in which we are all in this together, willingly or not.
So, I think if I let her clear and penetrate the darkest corners of my being that is actually doing a lot for the change I would like to see in the world. I hear my teacher's words: "You are sufficient unto your own joy. There is nothing which you are lacking and nothing you need to purge." And so I contemplate what it means to have a space inside cleared of stagnation. Well, I guess that is the point right there. It is about bringing back into the flow of Grace whatever has been resisting and dealing with the fear that made some part of me cling to the rocks (or whatever metaphor works for you).
In case you were wondering, this feels a little bit like being sick, but I think it is mostly an alignment issue. I wanted to offer myself into the service of what I can heal in the world, having been presented with a harsh look at some of the worst, the gruesome (murder and vicious cruelty in what are usually pockets of safety) and the loathsome greedy selfishness (Michael Moore's latest movie : Democracy Now).
And then I learned that one of my dear friends is recovering from a stroke. I just saw her in class on Saturday! I can't imagine her not coming back with insight, humor and tremendous courage. However, this sort of thing can really shake a person up or transform their lives forever! I don't know how to be of any direct help to these situations. So, I hope the work I am doing bears fruit in the world out there.
I myself am standing, sitting and lying in the best sort of Grace as I contemplate some of the hardest things about life. I can't speak for anyone else, but this is what I live for. Don't get me wrong I love the joyful moments too, but I love to watch the overcast sky turn to colors and hues of variant depths and shadings. I love texture and the amazing ability of life to evolve into something completely new and different and really, think about it! How does it do that over and over again exponentially?
I don't mind feeling a bit weak at the moment. I want to be dissolved. And I feel this as the only way that I can be the vessel for change. I can only use my free will on the microcosm that is me within the macrocosm of life. And that is saying a lot! I realize I may be speaking gibberish to anyone who might desire for whatever reason, to be reading this post. I guess this is yoga/shadow work 101. On Tuesday as I was in parigasana (gate pose) holding the portal open to her (the illuminating darkness who can consume and digest even the most vile of dangers) I was envisioning my hailing her into the out there, but I guess I knew I was a little off in my perspective.
So, here I am this morning just dissolving and welcoming her into the places that scream for isolation. You know the spots? The ones that just don't want to engage or let go or feel just about anything at all. Well, maybe you are lucky enough not to have any corners in your being like that, but I think this work is bigger than just us. At least I like to think it is like the story I heard of the Buddha getting to the gates to heaven and saying "no, sorry I am not coming in until everyone else can too." Well, I am really not a Buddhist, but I like this image and I think there is a way in which we are all in this together, willingly or not.
So, I think if I let her clear and penetrate the darkest corners of my being that is actually doing a lot for the change I would like to see in the world. I hear my teacher's words: "You are sufficient unto your own joy. There is nothing which you are lacking and nothing you need to purge." And so I contemplate what it means to have a space inside cleared of stagnation. Well, I guess that is the point right there. It is about bringing back into the flow of Grace whatever has been resisting and dealing with the fear that made some part of me cling to the rocks (or whatever metaphor works for you).
In case you were wondering, this feels a little bit like being sick, but I think it is mostly an alignment issue. I wanted to offer myself into the service of what I can heal in the world, having been presented with a harsh look at some of the worst, the gruesome (murder and vicious cruelty in what are usually pockets of safety) and the loathsome greedy selfishness (Michael Moore's latest movie : Democracy Now).
And then I learned that one of my dear friends is recovering from a stroke. I just saw her in class on Saturday! I can't imagine her not coming back with insight, humor and tremendous courage. However, this sort of thing can really shake a person up or transform their lives forever! I don't know how to be of any direct help to these situations. So, I hope the work I am doing bears fruit in the world out there.
I myself am standing, sitting and lying in the best sort of Grace as I contemplate some of the hardest things about life. I can't speak for anyone else, but this is what I live for. Don't get me wrong I love the joyful moments too, but I love to watch the overcast sky turn to colors and hues of variant depths and shadings. I love texture and the amazing ability of life to evolve into something completely new and different and really, think about it! How does it do that over and over again exponentially?
Saturday, September 25, 2010
Monday, September 20, 2010
Today I am a crocodile
I have the distinct impression that I am an old croc wallowing in dark waters. I
feel the heaviness of mud as my eyes hover just above the surface. I am cold of
heart and don't want to move. I only know a feeling of wanting to be near the
earth. I like the light that is gentle, not forcing away my solitude. I like the
company of others who let me have my space. I have no heart for idle chatter and
shy away from the busy-ness beyond my borders. I want less to sing than to moan.
I want less to move than to float. I own my own territory with assured-ness of
my own ferocity. It is not cruel it is merely protecting the sanctity of my own
desired experience. That life that became me this day wouldn't have it any other
way. For now I am this not that. Only for a while will I hold down the errant
desires that lead me toward glee. For now I honor the right to be dark and cold
and wet. For now I honor the distinctiveness of my own present moment
experience. And for now I am met only by those who know how to honor such places
in themselves.
feel the heaviness of mud as my eyes hover just above the surface. I am cold of
heart and don't want to move. I only know a feeling of wanting to be near the
earth. I like the light that is gentle, not forcing away my solitude. I like the
company of others who let me have my space. I have no heart for idle chatter and
shy away from the busy-ness beyond my borders. I want less to sing than to moan.
I want less to move than to float. I own my own territory with assured-ness of
my own ferocity. It is not cruel it is merely protecting the sanctity of my own
desired experience. That life that became me this day wouldn't have it any other
way. For now I am this not that. Only for a while will I hold down the errant
desires that lead me toward glee. For now I honor the right to be dark and cold
and wet. For now I honor the distinctiveness of my own present moment
experience. And for now I am met only by those who know how to honor such places
in themselves.
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