Sunday, March 29, 2015

love;

Love; love my darling,
like you know only how to





love. Love as if the remnants of your shattered heart
have created more room for





love. Love in a way that vibrates
from the very essence of your being.





Love without limitations, without conditions,
do not make contracts with





love--instead let it take you
away from what holds you in stagnant tepidity. Let





love hold you instead. Let it have you,
move you and permeate everything you create; everyone you touch.





Love should coat your warm skin like water--
as it dries, prickling you with the chill of being alive.





Love is life.
And love, love is what lives on.





Tuesday, March 24, 2015

stop and smell the roses

 


so much music lately: the Biggie track on the last post, then today's thoughts on creating the song you dance to for life, finally tonight's soundtrack as provided by OutKast.

Remember OutKast? Im glad I did. Because tonight I needed the reminder that "roses smell like poo." I needed the reminder that my shit stinks. Just like everyone else's. *

Truth is, we all have our shit. We all have our bad habits, and our good ones that we insist people acknowledge and love and admire us for--the good habits that often are the true source of the problem. At times our so called good habits get the best of us. They become a source of justifying our actions, avoiding our truth, pretending we are ok when we are straight up not ok. They transform into our love languages, our cover ups, our control mechanisms. Sound dark and heavy? It was, until I played this song:

ms Jackson

"im sorry". Big words. Biggest words. Bigger than "I love you." Because they say "I love you" at the same time. They say that you care more about the person you are apologizing to more then you do about your so called good habits. It doesn't need to mean you are wrong, that you are awful, and especially does not need to be an easy escape: "im sorry", (can we just have sex now?) ...y'know what I mean...all it means is...you're sorry.

Tonight I am sorry that my habit of avoiding confrontation got in the way of clearing the air between a good friend and I. When I could have had the love for this person, I chose to walk away and uttanasana--forward fold--in the other room. I did it to clear my head....only to come back and say nothing. Saying nothing got me to making pasta on my own and feeling like I had a thousand things to say. Most of which were questions for myself: how did my avoidance of confrontation contribute to the confrontation? How does my sponge like absorption of other peoples energy permeate my being so that I am no longer clear on how I, personally, truly feel? How does my desire for people to be in their own truth no matter how shitty it is stop me from taking a whiff of myself? Tonight, I smelled pretty bad.

How often do we let our comfortable ways of being get in the way of our being present? Avoiding confrontation has served me (admittedly only to some extent) as I was growing up, and while working in the false stress of the hierarchy of a kitchen; now avoiding confrontation only serves me to avoid being real.

Being real, being honest, showing our bad habits along with our good and recognizing both as integral parts of every human being that we love (and even those we don't**) takes courage. As much courage as it takes to apologize. But if we are to exist in any medium that allows us to be free, compassionate, genuine beings, than we need to be willing to be a light when others are not ok, and acknowledge openly when we are not being one.

So tonight was a bit dark and heavy. Only because I let it be. And then I let it not be, because as much as what I could have would have should have said might have changed the encounter, only we can change our ways of being, seeing, and feeling: our moods so to speak. An apology, no matter how late, will help with that. So will some good music.

Because I know you want to hear it

and the one that made me dance

***


*paula Abdul?! And yes, this vid gets cheesy with the last little commentary, but "one last look at the past"?--that's some good shit;)

**only love, c'mon.

***I don't know if this vid will work, but you can find it here

Monday, March 16, 2015

Soul finding: the essay

In about four different ways i have written about the last couple of days in a series of very non-descript ways. This will be the fifth.

In other words, vague generalizations, bits of wisdom without the bits of detailed experience from which they came from, perhaps a few metaphors, and overall an estranged roundabout tale are to follow. Read at your discretion.

First note a couple of details that most of you already know:

1: i am currently living in Marseille, thousands of miles away from home and life as i have known it, gratefully taking some time to figure out just what it is i know about life and what it is i want to know once i have lived it.

2: i am a terribly (sometimes i like to think wonderfully) impulsive being. Hence Marseille.

So Marseille. Perhaps you know. Perhaps we had the chance to talk before i left. Likely you asked why i was coming here, and likely i shrugged, smiled, and replied, to eat/drink/smoke/write and generally live without pants for awhile. Likely now, having seen the photos, you know i just eat and do yoga. Well, i also think too much.

And one of the things i have been thinking about is how much we can never know about ourselves no matter how much thinking we do. There are some things we only discover when we stop searching our souls, and watch oursoulves (note: that was a typing error that i think is quite perfect...) respond to circumstance.

There has been much searching of my soul since this whole adventure began, and long before that. This past weekend, though, was less about searching and more about finding; i have been forced to see things i didnt want to see. Perhaps feel is the better word: felt things i didnt want to feel. Le sigh. It is humbling how the universe grants you the circumstances or the people that take you right to that place of uncomfortable acknowledgement of self, or give you the answer that works for every one of your questions and then you try to pretend like you didnt ask--but you cant.

As this happened, i watched myself receive these answers, and tried not--as a wise friend once guided me--to confuse being critical with being observant. Criticism comes from the ego; observation comes from a place of love. I pass on her words to you now, that even if you are left confused about who you are being, it is only a part of the process of unfolding into a deeper sense of self. Sometimes we know what is within each layer, but choose to keep ourselves folded up tight; other times we had no idea what was waiting to be unravelled. This weekend as my impulsive side took over, and i was taken away from the search and right into reality, i chose to see what was there for me. And feel what was there for me. I learned the difference between justification and acceptance--that excusing behaviour is not the same as seeing its purpose--a lesson, admittedly, i will likely find myself relearning. I sat still with the discomfort. And i moved my body through it. And let sleep dissolve some ideas. And let some understandings keep me awake. And i wrote the shit out of all i came to know.

And if you dont know, now you know--as a wise rapper once said.

Well, actually. You still dont really know--but i warned you of that. I wrote more openly to myself, because in the end, the only one who needs to see and know every intimate truth, to be in accepting observation and willing growth, is oursoulves. (i love that!)







Soul finding: the poem




"Hows the soul searching going?"
He asked.
He asked without me telling him
that is what I was doing.

He knew.
Who puts their life on p a u s e
to do anything but go searching?

Only, when he asked,
I realized I was not searching at all--
I was finding.

I am finding.

Without even looking
I am finding
exactly what I was looking for.
Answers to questions that are all the same.

Who am I?
Who am I and where do I stand:
creating boundaries and l e a p i n g past them?

What am I willing
to see when I look back
and how far can I look a h e a d

Without losing me here; now?

I am not lost.
I am finding. Bits of truth
in the way that you might learn a lesson
the hard way;

by seeing what is hard to look at
and feeling e v e r y t h i n g.
And instead of trying to change

what I find,
I am learning to love
every part of my soul.

Love every part of your soul.

Be willing to let go
of the search.
Allow yourself to observe without criticism.
Feel without judgement.

What is there to judge?
You are a changing,
growing human

Who lives to learn
and learns to love
e v e r y bit of your soul

by letting it show you

that you are not lost.
You are not wrong.
Your greatest self is waiting there
to be understood

and expressed.
Waiting to set roots in truth
and grow freely.

What is f r e e d o m?
It is what is there for you
when you love everything you find.

Love, your soul.