...

...if there was some sort of sign pointing in a direction these every days may be a bit more navigated. Just finding the destination could be a sufficient way for all the passing of time. Whole lot of time just waiting to be passed. Life is going in the way it was designed. A succession of past moments to moments, bringing what is the current moment. I remember when it was all such a big fuss. Everything was way too slow all of the time. Itching in my own skin just to get as far away from where here was. Planning, planning, and then planning some more. It's what I was taught to do. Make a plan, see it through, and then make another. These winters when everything has that coat of frozen over it. Then the sun shows up for a bit and the frozen turns into a black and gray wet sludge. Feet get cold and still nothing seems to want to move. Sleeping with the heater on just to wake up with that awful coat of hot air on the top, bottom, sides, and tongue of my mouth. Water please.

a moment with neurosis...

calm, still, and unsettling. chaos, an unbreakable sound. diseased and disturbed skin, ripple like the polluted waters. swim, still inside of me behind this glass where I can see you. they stare at nothing. lost and left alone. a stone in the soil. an island has survived the tide. creeping further along as the movement is documented so terribly wrong. silence underneath the water. fill me to death so the stone can float to the island it knows as home.

pray...

in this great forgetfulness
words lost in words
world lost withing
individual self a personal truth alone
so far removed
defines some hell
I pray in silence for us
blinded by reactions
this distraction stripped
away all our hope of freedom from ourselves
turned us to slaves
digging us, the hopeless, separate graves
shovel the earth away
I pray in silence for us
that our mother saves
I come to you humbly
with naked truth
that I be shown a new way
on the hands and knees of the bruised
on the ground that we abused

our conscious minds...

...seem to be neverending wells that we are privileged enough to fill with whatever we want. Some believe that it is when these wells are at an empty, or maybe open is a better word, place that information is better received because there is less preconceived thoughts or beliefs abound to dismiss the new or rather the alternative ideas. Much like the way that children are said to be better learners than adults because their minds are coming from much more empty beginnings. Honesty and truth at that point seem to be much more of a feeling, raw and full of instinct, from the heart instead of a structured manifestation of what one thinks to be true or false in the mind, allowing a much more broad spectrum of information to be obtained without cancellation based on what one considers fact due to previous conscious commitments. How often we find ourselves not really listening to what someone is saying because in our minds we are telling ourselves "yeah, whatever", "I already know that", "that's not the way I learned it", or in some cases "that's bullshit, you're crazy", therefore cutting ourselves off from the possibility of learning something different than what we think we know, occurs more and more often the older we get. The notion of right and wrong is very consuming and is often jumped to for conclusion when in reality we could, and in most cases should, realize that thoughts and ideas are merely just different from person to person. Right and wrong are two things that I believe come more from the heart than the mind. Like good and evil. It would seem that the distraction of our minds and what we personally think to be true is the source of one person (person A) doing something that they think is right while another witnesses that person doing something wrong because of their (person B) personal thought structure. This is what keeps us separated as humans, this ultimate distraction that we use as a catalyst to push ourselves further and further away from loving ourselves and each other. This distraction that keeps us moving so far away from the good in our hearts. The amount of struggle and suffering that we put on ourselves and others because we think we know what's what is really quite astounding if one ponders it for a moment.

Why?

Could it be that we heard something that someone said once and liked the way it sounded? Did we read the way we think out of a book or a number of books that were put into our hands at some point? Are we without motivation to question and investigate our own thoughts as to why they are the way they are? Did we also forget to do that when the information was placed in front of us? Have you ever thought what one person or a group of people have to gain if the information they are giving to you is being believed as it is being received? Do you ever find yourself disliking people and ideas that you don't know for no other reason than what you think you know about them? Are you afraid of what you don't know because of what you think you do know?

This distraction is a repetitive cycle. To me it is plain, clear, and obvious why I am struggling and suffering when I am caught in it. To be in fear to me is painful and I am aware that my fears are, although maybe coming from outer sources, forced on by my inner self. It is truly sad when I find myself in such a righteous state of mind that my pain transforms itself into being something that I actually trick myself into thinking feels good and right. I am quick to realize more and more that these are just my feelings spinning out of control and know better and better all the time now how to bring my feelings closer to my source. In my heart I know that it is painful to feel alone and separated from other people. In my heart I know that it is painful to feel that others are out to harm me. In my heart I know that it feels good to love and evil to hate. In my heart I know when my mind is interfering.

Most of us in the world are faced with countless venues that we receive information through in our daily lives from a very, very young age. We are taught so many things. We have the conscious ability, the resources, and in my opinion responsibility, to ponder many different possibilities with every piece of information we receive. We get caught up in our thoughts and lose awareness of our hearts. Our current state of affairs the world over should be enough proof that this is a global human trait. Maybe some event will trigger a reaction in our consciousness to become more aware of the good and love in our hearts. Maybe not. In any case, I feel that we need to establish new ways of learning that abolish our will to judge others and strike each other down. Being more mindful and open to what we believe and how we can better work together with those that might believe different things is becoming more and more important as our population continually grows. We need to realize that right now the reality of the situation is us vs. us, instead of believing what we are told, that it's us vs. them.

I do believe that our conscious minds are neverending wells that we are privileged enough to fill with whatever we want. We just have to make sure that we are the ones filling them. With our hearts in the right places.

missing...

...people is a difficult place to be sometimes. Sitting with these emotions and memories with inklings to just get up and go to them. Realizations that memories are not tangible places that are possible to get back to. So just sitting with them. Wanting to see how people have changed since the last time. Moving around so much in my life I feel like home is spread out so vastly because there are so many people that I care about in so many different places. Some say that it's just part of growing up, but I am at times stubborn to let go. Life sure is busy and people live it, that's for sure. To put it all on hold would be very difficult for a whole lot of us, but it would be really nice to be able to see everyone that I miss right now. Selfish because it would be extra nice if everyone just came to me. When I first got back from the orient I was planning on just taking a big trip to all the places where people I care about are. Three months later I am still in the same spot that the plane from India took me to. Life started happening and then it picked up the pace a bit. I am playing music in one project, auditioning for another either today or tomorrow, and just got offered a teaching job that actually pays really well in the cities. First meeting is tomorrow at four. None of this is negative in any way at all. I am very happy to be involved with everything that is going on right now and feel very lucky. But it's hard to adjust to commitments after spending so long without them. Especially when I want to pick up and go to all the people I love and care for that are not in the twin cities area. It sure is a blessing that life is long and filled with so many moments. That is the key element to be aware of. Patience. Not to be confused with apathy. Just the awareness and ability to take it easy, slow, and relaxed.

Calling those in my heart right now and telling them how much they mean to me is how this is gonna go down. Gotta go

all good things...

...take time and patience. Often times I get struck with an idea of something I could be doing that would make me happy and satisfied. A project or endeavor that requires a certain process of execution and with that process comes a series of events that will not always get me what I desire at day's end but instead may take weeks or even months to accomplish. Through this time the process can seem mundane and a waste of time and energy because it's not always easy to keep the big picture in sight. I find it easy to lose patience and get frustrated by this. It might be that life is often in a state of go, go ,go, and it feels like it's moving so fast that parts of it are passing me by while I am trying to put in time and energy towards a goal. I get distracted by other things that are going on around me and by things that other's are doing. Then, before I know what happened, the idea or goal is lost and I've moved on to another endeavor thinking, what ever happened to what I was doing two months ago. Spontaneity can be a beautiful thing, but the ability to focus is just as important to me.

Ideas must be nurtured in the way that one might nurture an existing entity that has been taken under the wing. Proper attention and awareness is necessary for nourishment and growth, much like a plant. The growing process can be very slow going much of the time but that does not allow the nurturing to stop. I am very good at becoming bored, planting a bunch of seeds all at once, and then later find myself overwhelmed because too many things are going on at once and I am at a loss of the energy necessary to keep everything in a state of forward motion. Most of the time that is when certain things are given up and that never feels good.

I find it very important that breathing is always happening. If it's important for me, then I must allow it to be important for every one and everything else, no matter how slow it seems to be going on.

choices

Ah, the curse of consciousness. The choices that I make are pretty consistently made in a very spontaneous manner. I am able to do this because of the choices that I have made when the structure of my lifestyle comes to mind. I am pretty much a single man with nothing holding me in any particular place. Sometimes the choices that are made in a matter of very short passing moments have the ability, in a consequence reaction, to follow me for a very long period of time. Those that I have hurt in my past without even bearing much thought on what I am choosing and how that is affecting other people is a very real situation.

I had a discussion with my sister the other day about the subject. She was confiding in me things that have happened to her and her inability to forgive and forget some of them. People need to break down within themselves choices they have made and come to a place where they are able to forgive themselves. Maybe not necessarily forget, but forgive so that acceptance and the will to move on is attainable. Our point of forgiveness is very personal and can be very difficult to reach sometimes but the acceptance in being responsible for the suffering our choice may have introduced others to cannot be dictated by our own forgiveness in self. I do believe that accepting that responsibility cannot be met until we are at a place of self awareness through self acceptance and forgiveness, but the path to make something right only gets more difficult when we are ready to confront those we have hurt.

Our defenses always want to run to claims that the hurt person is to occupied with living in the past. We are so quick to grant ourselves the right of forgiveness and aren't capable of granting others the same. It's very hypocritical to take the necessary steps in forgiving ourselves without the will to listen to others, who want to forgive us as well, and grant them the right to take the steps necessary to reach their own personal point of forgiveness. Giving only ourselves closure does not erase the action. This is something that I am becoming more aware of getting back in touch with people that are close to my heart. I feel that being aware of this is a step in the right direction when it comes to being more mind full of choices that I make in the future. I am thankful for moments of realization like this.

I let someone down who I cherish very much once. It was a death in the family situation and I was not there how I should have been. This introduced the demise of a relationship. I was not aware that sometimes just a physical presence, one without the answers or solutions, is all that another needs sometimes. My ego felt like I wasn't helping because nothing I was saying seemed to be doing any good. So I distanced myself. This choice, which at the time was made without much thought as if it was common sense, and the way that someone who put their trust in me has suffered because of it, has brought itself back in the fold as communication has been reopened. I find that in communicating about this has made me realize just how much that choice and my forgiveness in self with the matter has subconsciously taught me that I owe it to the other person the right to be still angered and hurt with me. Because it took me a very long time to accept it withing myself and now I understand that I need to provide closure for the other person. It is not always the most comfortable conversation, but I feel that I have learned a little better how to listen to others and accept responsibility for my actions without being defensive. This to me is a step forward and I appreciate the person wanting to forgive me, allowing me to go through the experience.

The way that I effect others is something that through time I am becoming more aware of. The importance that I treat people with the integrity, heart, and respect that I give myself is very valued to me. It is fascinating just how difficult it can be sometimes but always very much so indeed worth it. What is a life without these fascinations and difficulties? A walk through the motions in a park of illusion. At least that's what I think.