the significance of

What is the significance of life? Some say it's love, others say it's accomplishment, others yet say it's to be enjoyed. I'm having one of those days where I can't find a reason to be alive when it's certain that I will die. Depressing? I suppose it is, but there's opportunity in these moments to unearth a big ball of crap wadded up from cyclical material life.

My question is, if it is love, accomplishment, enjoyment, etc. why is there so much suffering in the world? How do we go about our business of enjoyment everyday with no concern for our fellow humans being murdered, uneducated and set up for failure? Is there some special secret to turning a blind eye? Or is it just accepting that it's 'just the way things are."

I know one thing for sure, I don't know what the meaning of life is. On more serene days sometimes I think I catch a glimpse of it staring at the sky or passing a most peculiar looking tree. Those are very solitary moments in time where you can actually see everything at once and its perfectly balanced, but just for a second, and then it's gone. All the sorrow, pleasure, remorse, reluctance and revelation returns.

Some people say you just have to find a way to deal with it. Laugh when you can. Love often. Be yourself and stay sane.

I want to know what everybody else thinks, not to change my mind (it's not made up,) but to garner a wider perspective of humanity. So, what say you?

slippery nothingness

it wasn't in the slippery nothingness of the rain on her shoes
but the dry immobile crustiness of life at her feet
straightened hair
narrow in brow
led not astray
but without stray
like the rays of some lost sheltered lamb
in the eyes of a mother's womb
she wept.

the secret lives of men and women

I'm home sick again today by popular colleague demand and in between napping I was leafing through a book I stumbled upon awhile back. I was at the Half Priced Book Store looking for answers to my current dilemma's through the accidental finding of another's words meant just for me. The book is called "The Secret Lives of Men and Woman" and is a series of dark secrets put out there by real people leading real lives. The author put himself out there to receive and publish these cloak and daggers on behalf of people to get it off their chests.

The book is fraught with things like the following:

"I mailed her an anonymous newspaper article about infidelity so that she would be suspicious." 

"I once gave LSD to a possum." 

"I committed adultery hoping it would be more than just a F&^k. I was wrong!" 

"When my husband comes home drunk and passes out, I steal money from his wallet."

You get the picture. In a way this book is very sad. It's troublesome to think about all the disappointments, fears, resentments and general unhappiness on our backs. At the same time I applaud the author for the creative endeavor in providing people the opportunity to drop off a load.

I have secrets of my own and I'm about to off one. It isn't so much a secret as a story I've never told anyone, because it would probably freak people out. Nonetheless, it is a true story and it did, in fact, freak me out.

As you may have read in a previous post, I am an avid Out of Body experiencer. I had a period in my early twenties where I spent time researching and experimenting extensively with it. I was just working and doing little else, so I would take a nap every day and go fly around the world.

I started doing things like flying out the window, looking around to see what was happening in the neighborhood and quickly drawing myself back in to look outside and see if things matched up. It turned out they often did. A particular car in a driveway, a dog in the yard, someone mowing the lawn or a piece of equipment on a patio, etc. I was shocked at this phenomena of being able to be out in the real world without my body (vehicle.) Yes, I am aware there are other possible explanations for this, but I was there...

Well, one day with no planning on my part I visited my significant other in one of these experiences and discovered he was doing drugs. I left my body easily and floated about carelessly until I 'was taken' to a building I knew to be his workplace. He was there walking down a hallway. I 'walked' next to him and he was talking in his head, saying things like, "this is the last time." "After tonight I'm not doing this anymore." "God this is stupid, why am I doing this." There were stairs at the end of the hallway and he went down and gave money to a man and took a bag of cocaine.

When I came back to the 'real' world I couldn't figure out what the hell was going on. Was that real? Had I gone into a lucid dream? What was happening. It was massively confusing mind madness. Well, he was supposed to come over that night after work. I waited and waited, he never came, never called. I tried calling him, nothing.

I couldn't exactly confront him under the circumstances or just ask point blank. How crazy would that sound! Especially to a born again Christian who already thought I was a witch for being an astrologer. So, I kept my mouth shut and sure enough found out shortly thereafter that he was in fact using drugs and blowing me off because of it.

All this to say, I've never told anyone this and I have visited other people on these travels, albeit unintentionally. But it's freaky to know it's a possibility and what that might all mean.

Have a secret? Anonymous comments are welcome...

There is also a website filled with secrets by the books author http://www.postsecret.com.

Enjoy.

the biggest crime

"Well the pale morning sins of forgotten things, she plays a tune for those who wish to overlook. The fact that they've been blindly deceived by those who preach and pray and teach, but she falls short and the night explodes in laughter. "

- The Lion's Roar

 

I haven't been saying much lately, my will has denied the enormous pressure of words backed up in my brain, but I feel compelled to say this. I'll say it once and I'll keep it brief.

It is my humblest of opinions that the most offensive crime one can commit on another human being is to treat them as though they are not good enough exactly as they are; human, flawed and imperfect. To teach and treat children and adults alike that they 'should' be a certain way, that somehow they would be better if they went against their natural inborn ways of looking, thinking, feeling and doing is truly insidious, unintelligible and straight up cruel. Although I may take ridicule for saying so, I feel that murder is almost more humane. And these crimes on human nature are what lead to the crimes more commonly referred to as crimes.

Now, I'm not saying that offering guidance or assistance to others to improve themselves is wrong. But to truly and intentionally put those thoughts into someone's mind is also a crime on humanity because in doing so the confidence and drive to put oneself out into life to make it a better place with ones unique gift is now tainted with all that is fear.

It is not a wonder there is so much violence, hate and cruelty in a world where we do not see that I am you and you are me. We inhabit the same place, habituate the same, struggle the same struggles and feel the same feelings.

The upside is we can do something about it.

And that's all I have to say right now...

it's all personal

Having spent time researching submitting poetry and writing I've noticed a common banality. In many of the submission guidelines they drone on and on about not writing about yourself. I find this curmudgeonly in the sense that HOW CAN YOU NOT write about yourself? Even if you're writing fiction you're still living through a set of characters and spinning their reactions from your internal feelings and intuitions about life and the characters.

image from here because I'm too lazy to make one.

In my humblest of opinions, this is comparable to asking for a facade, asking for something fake. And even if you're faking it, it's still personal, because YOU'RE faking it. It can only be faked in the way that you are capable of supplying said fakery.

I do have a point, maybe. It's like people. The people who are closest to us don't care about any face we can put on, they would find that drab and for lack of a thesaurus; superficial. What is the point of expressing oneself in interaction if you're only expressing a fabricated part of you. Why would writing, singing, dancing, living and being pose any difference.

In short. It's all personal. Life is personal. Experience is personal. Love is personal. Sex is personal. Routine is personal. Pets are personal. Children are personal. And WE are; personal. Although my eyes see something other than what you see, when we take the time to breathe in someone elses exotic perspective, we connect with that which is larger than us, because we know; somewhere, somehow, somebody else is muddling through the same shit that we are.

The end.