Wednesday, June 22, 2011

Parade Day

There's a perpetual parade passing along the main street in my mind. It's made of all manner of characters. Some are in drag, some are on stilts, some on floats and some floating along, grounded by tethers and guided by others wearing white face. As I pass among them, I'm dizzied by the deluge of sights and sounds, characters and costumes. They all seem to ooze enticement, promise treasures or have interesting tales to tell. And I'm often caught up in the current and stride along with of one them taking in his story. Although the tides tug and characters hug, I've learned that being amid the parade doesn't really give me the most effective perspective.

Fortunately, I have an all access pass to a balcony that provides me with an overview of the continuing cavalcade. From there I can see which work together and which bump into each other. Which meander and which are steadily fixed on target. Which are happy and fun and which are just plain silly. I see which ones are loners and which are bound together in a string of “follow the leader”. And I see the tandem juggling acts, with multiple balls bouncing back and forth - feelings inspiring thoughts that strengthen their seed feelings, and thoughts inspiring feelings that provide proof the idea's significance.

Most importantly, I see the parade, as what it is. A non stop festival of frivolity that isn't as all encompassing or defining, as it seems. It's useful for my living, but not necessary for my being. It's of me, yet I'm not of it. It's a good thing, just better when viewed from above. So now I can live with it, rather than for it.

Stock up on sparklers. Clean out your kazoos. Unfurl your flags. And bounce on up to a balcony. Your procession is well underway. Breath it in, and enjoy the show.

Sunday, June 19, 2011

Potentially So

We see ourselves as our habits; however, our habits are just one possibility of who we may be.

I have never killed anyone, but the possibility is there. I have never literally sacrificed my life for another, but I could. So am I a murderer or a martyr? No. I've held back because of fear, and risked my life on a whim. Am I a coward and a fool? No. I've been impatient, helpful, lazy, dismissive and playful. Does that make me any of the above? Of course not.

Actions and attitudes are temporary conditions of our existence. There seems to be some mechanism that lures us back to familiar grounds, but there's nothing that mandates it. We aren't carved of stone, created as such and destined to be just that. We are potential incarnate. We can be as we choose.

Deprogramming old habits isn't easy, but it's much easier when armed with the realization that our tendencies are not given traits. This allows us to shift our focus from what we've done to how we want to be. To move from expectation to inspiration.

So, how do you want to be today?

Saturday, June 18, 2011

A Losing Aspiration

We all maintain a journal that attempts to recount our personal life stories, helping to explain and justify who we are. We each keep a running tally of our totalities, including our likes and dislikes, our strengths and weaknesses, our responsibilities and hobbies, our regrets and dreams, our friends and foes, and everything else that defines us. This, in and of itself, is not a problem. Our troubles arise when we mistake our stories for our Selves. Once convinced that the tale is the truth, we contort what we experience to support our illusions. Which also isn't really an issue, unless we wish to live honestly.

It's easier to see that we're separate from the houses, clothes and cars that define us, because we can step out of them. If only we could step outside of our selves … Oh, wait – we can!

If we wish to find our Selves, we must first lose our selves.

Shutter Speed

In a way, our brains are kind of like photographic film. If we want to record a clear and detailed image, we need to allow for sufficient exposure/attention time. Some things or events are dull, to begin with, and need more time than the norm. Others are dramatic and radiate exceptional brightness, thus requiring less. And, by nature, different cameras take in varying spectrums better.

We can tell, in the moment, if it's done yet, or if it's taking at all~. So, regardless of circumstances and distractions, if we think/feel that something important to record, we need to be mindful and give it adequate attention.

Of course, it helps to take the lens cap off.

Friday, June 17, 2011

Let it Flow. Let it Flow. Let it Flow.

Whether it's the cars behind us, the air above us or the flowers beneath our feet, people often ignore the world trying to happen around them. In doing so, they often become impediments to the flow of existence that's just trying to get along, everywhere, all the time.

We're like individual cells in a vast being. Cells all have their own lives and objectives, but their greater purpose is to facilitate the well being of the whole. We call cells that conflict with that entirety, cancer.

We're under no obligation to be considerate, and many take full advantage of this. But how does it make you feel when others ignore and interfere with your ambitions? How would the world be if absolutely everyone was completely self absorbed? How would it be if everyone consciously accommodated others' activities? Nobody likes a clog in the drain. Why would anyone want to be one? “Do unto others ...”

For the sake of contributing to creating a more harmonious world, and setting a laudable example for others to emulate, shouldn't we pay attention to the rest, and try to stay out of the way – or even be helpful?

Just a thought, flowing from the big brain, through mine.

Thursday, June 16, 2011

Our Most Challenging Blessing

Our lives present us with many challenges. They can be arduous, painful, confounding, unjust and spirit testing. All help to make us wiser, stronger and more adaptable, in their aftermath. But there's one that we just can't shake – choosing.

Free will, which far too many neglect to utilize, is both a blessing and a curse. Frequently, our choosing comes from the default selection center, “Just like before please” or “I'll have what they're having”. We can't help but to rely on habits, to some extent. If we had to stop and consider every single thing we do, we'd get very little done. But when relying on habits, becomes a habit itself, we become little more than automatons.

We can make educated guesses, but we can't prognosticate. None of us one can. So, time and again, we're left with the option of following the rut or leaping into the abyss. If we stay to the well worn pathways, we can delude ourselves into thinking that our errors are the fault of those who came before. If we take a leap and land with a crash, we may feel foolish or be called even worse. So our grade school worries steer us to follow the pack, to believe the commercials, to trust twisted logic and to hand the rudder over to the tides.

It takes a wise man to play the fool. Life's not a contest, or any kind of test. It's an adventure into the unknown, a grand experiment in what if, a chance to leave the first footprints and an opportunity to laugh and learn from falling on our faces.

Me? I choose choice, whenever possible. Eyes wide open, the unknown eager to be embraced, traditions be damned, knowledge and understanding dangle like luscious fruits from life's over burdened tree, feet freed from firmament, my Tiffany ego plummets toward rocks or clouds, curious to see what happens next.

Wednesday, June 15, 2011

Do Be Do Be Do

Admittedly, not the most inspired or creatively phrased lines of scat, but perhaps old blue eyes was trying to convey a little wisdom, subliminally.

While conscious, we have two options – doing and being. “Doing” includes acting, communicating, and thinking. “Being” is remaining attentive and engaged, without doing.

Of the two, being is typically the most challenging for us; or at least, the less familiar. But it's while we're being that we're the most sensitive and receptive. There are cues and clues presenting themselves to us, all the time, which we aren't able to pick up on while we're engaged in doing.

But these smoke signals are pointless, if we only be. They're here to guide us in our doing. The vast majority are mired in their doing, but to become entrenched in either side of the equation is debilitating.

The trick is to consciously balance in the middle, and freely float back and forth between the two. Inspiration and acting. Connection and communicating. Insight and thinking. 'Tis best to let the partners dance together.

And here's their song now – Do be do be do, do do be do be, do be do be do, ...

Friday, June 10, 2011

Horsin' Around

You can lead a man to knowledge, but you can't make him think.

Wednesday, June 8, 2011

What it is?

It's a rare person who maintains an honestly scientific eye for the truth – even in scientific circles. Most seek to prove that existing theories or beliefs are correct. They feel obliged to defend the notions that they've learned, hatched or had handed down to them. They tend to see only those things that fit into their preconceptions; or, to forcibly interpret things that conflict with their notions until they mesh, acceptably. Although this may be more comfortable, it's not exactly realistic, practical or wise.

I was talking with a substantially overweight lady the other day who was explaining to me that she didn't consider herself fat; rather, called herself “healthy”. No doubt, it made her feel better. No doubt, it's about as contrary to the truth as possible. Being overly over weight stresses backs, hips, knees and ankles. It greatly increases the risks of diabetes, heart disease, breast cancer and organ failure. And it limits potential by making everything from breathing to climbing stairs more strenuous and taxing.

She's hardly alone in her delusion. I was a teen the first time I heard that particular substitution of terminology. Some might say that she's better off living with the illusion, so that she feels better about her self. I think that condoning any embrace of lying to oneself sets a horrible precedent. Once it's presumed an acceptable practice, the pattern will begin to pop up any and every where. It may be cute when tykes think that closing their eyes shrouds them in a shield of invisibility, but we hardly want our children to grow up planning their lives around such notions.

We learn and evolve much better, and direct our actions far more intelligently, when we see things as they are; and then, adjust our views and beliefs to accommodate any new evidence. It may sound like a no brainer, and I suspect that a large percentage of folks assume that they do just that, but reality would disagree with most.

Religious fundamentalists and scientists can be two peas in a pod here. Feel good fantasies become die hard beliefs that no amount of evidence can dislodge. And, if it's not proven by committee, repeatable and measurable, it's obviously not real. Both close ones eyes to possibilities and close ones mind to new ways of conceiving. Previous generations, whose understandings would be laughable today, were confident in their unquestionable grasp on things. The same will surely be said of us in the future. Truth, as a concept, has to expand and evolve to accommodate our ever clearer understandings, as we crawl toward seeing an ultimate truth.

Where ever the tendency comes from, how ever it manifests, and when ever it became engrained, it can be undone. But reprogramming takes a long time, a lot of work and powerful dedication. The desire to see and know the untainted truth, as it reveals itself, has to be systematically absorbed and integrated ever deeper and more holistically. You have to want to be bathed in, and filled with, welcoming silence more than you want to entertain whatever floats through your field of awareness. You must wish to know the truth more than you wish to feel that what you think, know or believe is accurate. The roots of these yearnings need to reach as deeply as your most primal motivations.

If you haven't been there, you can't conceive it. If you've only heard tales of it, your conception is a far poorer representation than the others abbreviated phrasings of their fractured memories of their partial viewing of it. You need to go there to begin to know it, and there are places that you can't know how to get to. Creativity, intuition, invention, revelation, insight, compassion, ... none of these can be born from a logical progression of thoughts.

There's a whole world and an infinite universe out there, and to be self limited to the boundaries of a particular neighborhood is silly. How can one ever expect to make new discoveries when unwilling to go beyond the familiar? How can people ever expect to know themselves when they're obscured by junkyard sculpture representations of who and/or what they are? How can anyone not want to know the truth, on its own terms? And, how can anyone imagine that they actually know just what it is?

Sunday, June 5, 2011

Anticipation

Being present is really much more active than it sounds. It's not like we finally arrive at a lounge where comfort abounds, servants attend our every need, weather conforms to our moods and there's never any decisions to make. It's not a place or a state that we settle into, at all.

Being attuned with the flowing moment demands as much involvement as balancing on one foot does. With practice, it feels more natural and becomes more stable, but without dedicated attention, balance wanes. Even if it was possible to become perfectly still in absolute balance, the world happens. Water falls and flows, wind stops and blows, and the earth moves beneath our feet. Internally, our past calls out to us, fears and fantasies paint imaginary scenarios that we call our future, and every bit of fluff floating down the stream of thought beckons to be held.

Stillness coexists with chaos. This truth is undeniable. So, focus can't be on finding or maintaining an illusory ideal; rather, it has to hover in anticipation, reaching out with all senses and sensibilities to detect the very next thing, the instant it arises.

We learn to trust that the body is capable of balancing itself. In fact, our efforts to achieve and/or sustain balance with our minds is counter productive. So we willfully establish our intentions and consciously observe, but the balancing, itself, happens from elsewhere.

Similarly, we can't think our way into the silence that accompanies our being present; and, thoughts simply can't keep pace with the now. To be present, we have to set our intentions, (initially) place ourselves in an accommodating environment with some dedicated time, and allow the quietude to manifest within and around us, as we simply observe while steadily maintaining clear intent to see purely.

The thinking/reasoning mind has a rather high opinion of itself. And in truth, the guy's got game. But if/when it tries to intercede in the act of balancing, listing and swaying will surely follow. Our bodies know what to do and will skillfully tend to themselves, if we just get our dreams and doubts out of the way.

As consciousness is freed from the confines of the assumed and expected, a torrent of awareness, understanding and questions can begin to flow. The thinker then feels an urgent need to label, analyze, judge, decipher, categorize and prioritize these experiences, in an attempt to integrate them into the “known”. Assimilation is much more honest, complete and detailed when not slowed down by or filtered through thought, which, by its very nature, only deals with the past or future. Our beings know what to do and will skillfully tend to themselves, if we just get our dreams and doubts out of the way.

Do you feel it? The present has its knuckles curled and is swinging them toward your door, right now.