A General Tale of Ordinary Madness

Negotiating with Neglect

2012-01-04T06:25:00.000-08:00

I love a strong black coffee in the morning, and I love a cold beer in the evening. I am sure I am not the only one. However, caffeine and alcohol are diuretics.

A diuretic is something that makes you need to piss. You end up taking in fluids, but lose them all too quickly, leaving you dehydrated. Yet the diuretics are often more attractive to us than what we really need: for example, we need water but drink beer.

We often appease ourselves in this way, with what I call, the diuretics of the soul.

We crave things, but we attempt to sate ourselves with something that falls short of the thing we crave. We crave adventure yet appease ourselves with watching action movies in the darkness of our living rooms. We let others play out the dramas we wish we had in our own lives, while we get to play it safe and appease our desires with poor substitutes.

The thirst of the soul is not sated, only suspended.

When we starve ourselves physically and psychically of the things we need to feel alive, we end up feeling empty and drained. We lose that thing that animates us…our souls! We lose the spark.

What I am talking about is not supernatural, mystical or overly complex. If we don’t get enough good quality water, or enough good quality food, we lose our energy. The equation is just as simple when it comes to our mental health. If we don’t give ourselves the balance that we need, then we will feel flat, down, and lifeless. We all know about the five portions of fruit and vegetables that we are meant to consume everyday, yet, there doesn’t seem to be the same awareness of what our minds need for that same healthy balance.

We need stimulation. We need freshness. We need to play. We need to exercise. We need interaction.

Of course, unlike with food and water, we will not necessarily die if we don’t have these needs met. They are needs of a different kind. However, like I suggested earlier, we risk losing our spark…the thing that animates us…our souls.

I am not saying that we should entirely quit drinking, smoking, eating tasty food, or any of that other stuff we love to do…for life is hard enough as it is, I am simply suggesting that we don’t live on a diet of diuretics, that we stop appeasing our souls with poor substitutes, and start giving ourselves what we need.

And, as a famous rabbi once said…yada yada yada

Self-Esteem Trees

2011-12-26T06:36:00.000-08:00

Self-esteem doesn’t grow on trees.

It would be preferable to many of us, if you were just able to pluck some self-esteem from the nearest tree, as if feeling good about our selves were a natural right of every human being, or at least that it should come easily. As is often the case, we want valuable things without cost. We want things that have worth to us, without paying for them. So many of us, are like closet shoplifters, that don’t have the courage to actually steal anything, but resent paying for the thing they want. So, we end up in the aisles paralysed between our conflicting desires.

Pilfering self-esteem as and when we find it from the pockets of life, is a decent enough ploy, but it is a tactic that rewards the minimal effort with a minimal pleasure. You get what you give. And so, there is nothing quite like getting down to business…putting in a bit of elbow grease. For many of us, our esteem, is dependent on someone else. We glue ourselves into relationships where someone else takes charge, and takes responsibility, while we glean off some of the profits, which can never be any thing more than crumbs from the table.

What if we became self-sufficient?

I don’t mean that we become hermits who never communicate with anyone. I am not suggesting that we ought to live our lives free from other people, even though there are times when that would seem idyllic. I am, however, suggesting that the satisfaction of looking after one’s self, far outweighs the satisfaction we might get from letting others do the dirty work.

Self-esteem only comes with sacrifice and hard work. It comes with perseverance and determination, and of course, sometimes we don’t have those, and so we slip back into the quicksand of our more protective selves. The more we slip back, into feeling crap about ourselves, the less likely we are to find the tools we need to change; like rummaging for a nail in a toolbox when you have no torch and the lights have gone out. In this scenario, one can become fixated with the task of finding the nail, and not try to sort out the lighting issue. Sometimes we need to go back to basics…you’d be as lucky to find self-esteem, without looking after the basics of your physical and practical well-being, as you would be to find that nail in the toolbox. Either way, it is no one else’s job to sort it out for us; there is only you, and the journey for your self-esteem is an entirely solitary one.

There is something better for us…not out there…not in the wide blue yonder…just in here. Inside, in that little room inside yourself, where you have those million secret conversations, commentaries, monologues and diatribes that no one else ever gets to hear. Maybe in those conversations with yourself, you can find a nurturing voice. A voice from yourself, to yourself and for yourself; a voice free from judgement and criticism, and free from wish and fantasy, free from the curses that you have whispered over your self for far too long. And maybe, if you find this nurturing voice, you will encourage a movement that will become a few movements, which will over time become the makings of a journey, or maybe nothing as grandiose as that…maybe just a wee trip to some place nicer than you where.

I wish you well for that journey

and, as a famous rabbi once said…yada yada yada

Learning to Limp

2011-11-06T15:16:00.000-08:00

Learning to limp

as natural and instinctive

as curling in foetal forms

to dampen the impending

anticipated pain

connected pains

pains of connection

as the tissue of our being

with heavy footfall

weighted unnecessarily by

our own hated burdens

on the

tarmac of our this and that

the frictions and abrasions

inevitable and impending

as certain as the passing

the

blows and grazes

contusions and lacerations

Then the injury

is gone

But loyally

we limp on

For we have learned to limp

learned to

curl

duck

clench

hold ourselves

in ways that give genesis

to their own ailments

and

counter-pains

tightened tendons

strained ligaments

Learning to live unwounded

Learning to live unbroken

Learning to live un-analysed-to-within-an-inch-of-one’s-life

Can be as hard as learning to walk…

For

The

First

Time

and, as a famous rabbi once said…yada yada yada

Love Thy Neighbour

2011-10-28T07:53:00.000-07:00

You have heard it said, love your neighbour as yourself, but I say…love your neighbour as they want to be loved.

It may come as a surprise, but, not everyone wants to be loved in the same way that we would like to be loved. Sometimes we care and love, and act that out without regard to how the other person might actually like to be treated. It’s a simple mistake, we simply forget to ask, and just bash on with our caring and loving.

This is often the case in intimate relationships. We can maintain beliefs in mystical connections at the expense of learning how to navigate the quagmire of real communication…real requests…and real listening.

It’s a little bit like buying a present for someone, and mistaking our own excitement about the gift, with the actual appreciation that person might have for it. Traditionally, the receiver has been socially obliged to be grateful regardless of the gift’s suitability. After all, at worst, it was a bad guess, and we all know we can put the rubbish present in the box with the other bits’n’bobs, or donate it to the charity shop.

However, when it comes to loving and caring, this kind of disparity can cause even more discomfort and unease, than an unwanted itchy jumper. Many of us like to believe that when we love another, the other is somehow essentially connected to us, and this can easily lead us to believing that the other is essentially the same as us.

It’s so easy to do, to mix up the pleasure of our loving intent, with what might actually end up being unappreciated, or worse, causing harm…like Bad Aid or Bad Intervention. People who are blindly caught up in the energy of their own good actions can do things that cause harm. Aid organisations injecting huge quantities of free rice or clothing can cripple the other’s economy in this exchange, whilst overbearing interference can undervalue the autonomy of the other.

We can end up caring carelessly.

But imagine this: imagine that we communicated honestly with one another, without fear of causing offence or upset, and suggested the ways we like to be looked after, cared for and loved, even if that meant we’d rather go-it-alone. Of course, the other person is not obliged to conform, but at least it would be out in the open. We could listen to each other’s differences and figure something out…something a little bit better.

And you never know, you might stop getting those itchy jumpers that you hate.

and, as a famous rabbi once said…yada yada yada

Be Blessed

2011-10-25T08:07:00.000-07:00

When the road doesn't rise to meet you,

may you find the subtle strength in your sinews

to let one foot fall in front of the other

down tracks untrod

into fresh unknowns

that are only yours

When the wind isn't at your back,

may you find your centre

and summon a gentle energy

that brings intention to move or stay

so that you are not blown by every breeze

When the sun doesn't shine upon your face,

may you close your eyes

and find comfort in the darkness

and an inner flicker of light

that can guide you without blinding you

And when the rains fall hard upon you

may you lift up your face to it

and let it wash you

drench you

until you stop thinking your life

And when you do not feel held

by God or anyone

may you begin to know yourself

in your separateness

and befriend your self

so that you can stand strong in a sea of others

that when they do come to hold you

you do not feel like half a person being completed.

For in the blessing is a curse,

and in the curse

is a blessing

and, as a famous rabbi once said...yada yada yada

Cowboys and Indians

2011-10-21T08:03:00.000-07:00

Colonel Muammar Gaddafi is dead. The world celebrates. Some feel a little queasy at the images being shown, but, for the most part, we are happy that this man of violence is dead. His tyranny is over and the world is a safer place without him.

It’s like the best cowboy movie ever:

The goodies killed the baddy. The world is a safer place. We pat ourselves on the back.

Well done!

But wait…hold on a second…is that good enough? Is that true enough? Does that do justice to all the people that have been killed by terrorists funded by Muammar Gaddafi and by Gaddafi himself?

Some think that it does. The simple story told, is where the baddy gave weapons to the other baddies, and the other baddies killed lots of goodies, and so the best thing is for the goodies to kill the baddy. This is justice…isn’t it?

Well, what if the goodies are just as bad as the baddies, but they like to keep our attention elsewhere? What if it turned out that the goodies were arming baddies all the time, and giving the baddies technology in order to undermine the civil rights of the other goodies that the baddy is in charge of? And, what if the goodies like to do business with the baddies as long as it is profitable, and only stop doing business with the baddies when the baddies stop letting them have their economic control of their resources?

If this is the case, then the story of baddies arming other baddies, who then kill goodies…actually applies in reverse to us…the goodies…and in that case, it would be as justifiable for the world to celebrate at scenes of western political leader’s dead bodies being dragged through the streets to scenes of celebratory gunfire. Many of the people that us goodies consider to be baddies, would of course celebrate that. But, I am sure that this idea would horrify us…us the goodies, in our comfy little democracies. Our leaders are unquestionably the goodies in our story…us the loyal citizens, who keep the cowboy story alive.

Of course, at the heart of the cowboy story, is the greatest cover-up in the history of mankind…and most of us find it hard not to revel in the glory of the cowboy, even though he is part of a system of ethnic cleansing and genocide. Those savage Indians need to be curtailed by the honourable man with his six-shooter, leather chaps and civilisation.

WHAT THE FUCK!!

When will we wake up and stop telling the same clichéd stories that are nothing more than a political sleight of hand, to draw attention away from our own sins and shames. We have the audacity to delight in the revolutions of people who want their civil rights and independence…and yet, we, the democratic western world [goodies] have been helping dictators and tyrannies [baddies] violently crush many more revolutions fuelled by exactly the same thing. We sell fighter jets to bomb villagers, we sell technology so that dictators can spy on their own people, we arm the biggest human rights abusers in the world, and we continue to do business, and therefore fund many more dictators and tyrannies, of course that is, until it suits us [the goodies] to do otherwise.

It’s all cowboys and Indians…and massive dose of bullshit!

And, as a famous rabbi once said…yada yada yada

The Day the World Changed

2011-09-12T04:11:00.000-07:00

The little boy pokes the little girl. She didn’t do anything, but her vulnerability was just too good an opportunity to let slip by. This was the case on every occasion. When she would walk down the corridor he would slip out a sly foot to make her trip up. He would call her embarrassing names in front of everyone in the playground. One day he even took a pair of scissors while in the art room, and cut a chunk of her lovely blond hair. There was no real reason for it other than opportunity, and the good feeling it made him feel every time he got the upper hand.

It was no surprise then, when one day in the playground, the little girl turned around with her face full of bottled up fury, and kicked the little bully square in the nuts. Despite her small frame it was the most solid crunching kick you could imagine, and the rest of the playground felt it, and pitied the little boy who could not maintain his normal bravado crumbling in tears. They all pitied the little boy, many of them oblivious to the endless months of torment he had dished out to that little girl.

The little boy shuffles awkwardly over to a teacher on duty in the playground and sobs, “She kicked me!!” It’s true: she did. She kicked him very, very hard.

This is a simple little story that I made up, to talk about something far more serious.

Yesterday was the ten-year anniversary of the attacks on the twin towers. But, this isn’t true enough. We tend to remember things in convenient ways, and hence forget, that is was actually an attack on the Twin Towers, and the Pentagon, and more people died on another flight that didn’t make its target. It was more than just an attack on the Twin Towers. A lot more people died, than just those in the Twin Towers.

The western media have been referring to this as The Day the World Changed. But the world didn’t change, and it is this kind of memory that will help to perpetuate all the behaviours that lead to terrible atrocities like this. Calling this, The Day the World Changed, is to draw a handy little curtain of ignorance over any modicum of cause and effect, and fixate on one terrible dramatic event. More specifically, it allows us to fixate on OUR terrible dramatic event, at the expense of any other. Nothing really changed, because the same cycle of violence, intimidation and exploitation has continued for hundreds of years, and to see this one event as isolated from all of this is as useful as calling the terrible event evil. Both responses allow us to point the finger at an evil villain while we wash our hands of our own crimes.

I told that simple little story at the beginning to highlight a very simple mechanic in human relationships, one that seems to be forgotten in the midst of being absorbed in our own sense of pain. Of course, when we feel pain, our attention gets greatly reduced, and we are rarely aware of much else other than what we just felt. But, given time to regain our posture and breathe again, we can allow our minds to take in a little bit of the wider picture, of circumstances and causes, and see where we lie in relation to it all.

To get to the point, it doesn’t take much of a skim through the history books to realise that the western powers have been doing whatever the hell they want, across the world, but especially in Africa, Central and South America, Asia and the Middle East, driven by lightly adorned self-interest. They have at best, simply exploited those people and their resources for economic gain. At best, they have intimidated, bullied and provoked. At worst, they have repressed, tortured, killed, imprisoned without trial and raped.

They have done this for so long that it earned them the title, The Great Satan. Many westerners play dumb, and can’t possibly believe why the West would merit such a title, after all, we are beacons of light in a dark world…they are primitive, we are civilised…they are underdeveloped, we are advanced. Of course, this obliviousness can only exist if we maintain a mind that never enquires beyond Big Brother, and Eastenders. It can only exist if we blindly accept what we are told without question, keeping the childhood belief in the benevolence of our authorities and governments, who only do what is good, and only do questionable things in extreme circumstances.

I am not a conspiracy theorist who thinks these attacks never happened, or that the American government orchestrated them to justify strategic interventions, and what would normally be unacceptable legislations.

I am also not trying to undermine the genuine feelings of loss that people felt. Three thousand people are three thousand people: it was an undoubtedly terrible thing to happen. But, I am saying that it would be better for us, not to get so absorbed in our own pain that we forget the obvious history of our relationship with the rest of the world. If we keep behaving the way we have, we will just feed more and more anger and resentment against us, and create armies of people whose rage will warrant even more terrible things. Even if we stopped being the bully today, it would still be understandable if there were a long legacy of hatred and bitterness toward us.

The west has been a big bad bully for a very long time, and eventually, out-gunned and out-financed, some of those that suffered at our hands, let out their rage. They refused to be at the mercy of the West without a struggle and they found a way to fight this fight.

We have recently watched the Arab Springs, the Arab uprisings in North Africa that most westerners have revelled in, wishing success and victory for the rebels. Yet, somehow, we don’t put two and two together, that we have been the corrupt regime that has held the rest of the world to ransom. We have been the tyranny that has imposed our agenda on others, regardless of what they desired, and policed this regime ruthlessly.

The behaviour of the west in relation to the Arab Spring is exactly the kind of behaviour that has been detested by others for so long.

The Western powers, shake the hands of a mass murderer [Muammar Gaddafi] one day, and the next they denounce him and send in the jet fighters, wanting him arrested for crimes against humanity. The crimes against humanity of which they speak, were committed before the Western powers showed up, more than happy to shake his hand. They were shaking his hand because he is the key to large oil reserves. Historically, the Western powers, have only cared about human rights when has been in their interests to do so. Now that some other group will come to power, the Western powers are all hovering around like vultures, waiting to see who they need to pay-off to get the lucrative oil contracts.

The West loved Hosni Mubarak of Egypt, and were reticent to let him go. They praised his stable regime, while he had his armies cracking down on the crowds who wanted nothing but their civil rights. Of course they changed their tune when they felt it was too late. If the West really cared, it would have sent its fighter jets to Bahrain or Syria…but those initiatives wouldn’t have been as lucrative as the action against the Libya they once snuggled up to.

The British, for example, are well experienced at being the oppressive regime, and it wasn’t that long ago when they were shooting people who wanted nothing more than their civil rights. Typical of a tyranny, these marches for civil rights were banned, and so these people were breaking the law, and a criminal is a criminal after all and needs to be punished. Imprisonment without trial along with torture, were used decade after decade against these people.

Tactics used by the British in Kenya in the 1950s, were used in Northern Ireland. They colluded with their enemy’s enemy, helping them to do their dirty work, and getting them to do their dirty work, and making sure they got away with it, so that they didn’t get their nice uniform bloodied, and so that any trails of evidence would never trace back to the hierarchy.

If we take our minds of our throbbing balls for a moment, we might feel a little bit of pity for the other person’s pain. We might have a moment of revelation and realise that a response was inevitable. If there is to be change, there needs to be honesty. If there is to be honesty, there needs to be genuine enquiry. If there is to be genuine enquiry, we need to be willing to suspend how we like to think of ourselves, and maybe listen to how others perceive us.

Let’s learn from our mistakes.

Let us put two and two together.

Let us make the world a better place to live.

For there is no better tribute to our dead than that.

For there is no better gift to the living than that.

And, as a famous rabbi once said, yada yada yada

Never Forget to Remember

2011-07-12T04:53:00.000-07:00

Some of us, find it easier and safer, to stay locked to the negative. They jettison the positive experiences so as not to corrupt their loyalty to the hurt. They stay true to the trauma. They erect their behaviours around that trauma, like memorials to the loss: the loss of innocence. The betrayal of trust.

They root their identities firmly in that trauma. They scar themselves with newer, fresher pains, to keep themselves from straying from their secret vows to the trauma.

They must never forget. To forget would be to betray. To forget would be to blaspheme the holy name of the pain.

They parade magic charms around to make sure they don’t forget to remember. They tattoo themselves with their loyalties to make sure they don’t forget to remember. They march defiantly, with banners and flags unfurled, and make sure everyone else knows the reality of their pain. These are the muffled cries of loss, expressed with rage and triumph. Everyone else must know. Everyone else must hear this.

But, all the stories matter…every single story. All our loaded words and ways…all of them matter.

And, as a famous rabbi once said…yada yada yada

Thirty Miles of Wall

2011-07-12T04:01:00.000-07:00

I have read many accounts of family therapy; therapy that is initiated because a member of that family is crazy, and the others are concerned and frustrated. In some accounts, the rest of the family seem to be functioning normally, and appear successful, with the exception of this blip. They go to therapy to solve the problem of the crazy kid. In these accounts, it often transpires, that the family are scape-goating the child in some way or other, because it is easier than struggling with their own difficult feelings, their own craziness. It turns out that the ones who thought themselves the most normal, were the ones who were least in touch with their feeling-self; their under-functioning-self, and most in need of a good open, honest chat with a therapist.

I think the city that I live in is much like this. There is member of this family that is behaving badly and throwing rages and tantrums. These exhibitions are scary to watch, making us feel very uneasy. They seem crazed. We, on the other hand, are functioning ‘normally’, actually, things are going pretty well…we are successful and have good investments and growth. We are buoyed up in our commerce and all the little trophies that come along with that. We look at the crazy member of the family, and wonder what could they have to be crazy about…they have a big television, they have the latest video games, and the latest designer trainers and tracksuits…surely money will stop the tantrums!?

Why aren’t they happy? Why can’t they just play ball and get on with it?

We feel distant from them. We can’t understand what the problem is. We throw money and gifts at them hoping this will appease the rage and resentment. We wonder what our neighbours make of all this.

Us the normal, they the crazy, that is the difference we have created, and we use it to keep us safe and sane.

In the country where I live, there are walls that the-powers-that-be stuck up to keep us from them. There are about 30 miles of them, and we have accepted them. We have not torn them down in frustration fuelled by a desire to connect to the stranger on the other side. We have not taken hammers to them.

However, most of us don’t live near the walls, and don’t live in their shadow, and for those of us who don’t, we keep us and them apart by our habits…of thought and behaviour. We create another us and them. There are those that live in the shadow of the walls, and those that don’t.

Segregation is relatively quick and easy. When we feel threatened the easiest thing is to run to where we feel safe. We protect ourselves. We defend ourselves. We entrench ourselves. We don’t let our understanding or imagination reach to the other side of the divides.

I live in a city with walls. These walls divide communities. They are called peace lines. As far as I know, they exist solely in working class areas. When tensions flare up and conflict takes place, many, who don’t live under the shadow of these walls, are quick to point the finger…blaming these people for keeping us locked to the past. They are the crazy ones in this supposedly functional family.

It is a deeply limited analogy, but it’s as if, since the divorce of the parents, there are some siblings that have been locked in continual fighting and bickering. A divide has been drawn between them, as if putting them in separate rooms will solve the problem. It doesn’t, but, at least the parents don’t have to listen to it. The rest of the siblings try to pretend like everything is normal, and do their best to keep on functioning, never really expressing anything about what happened between their parents. They just focus on success, and wish their other siblings would do the same. There’s nothing to talk about after all, it’s all in the past.

It is this psychological separation between the functioners and the under-functioners, which I think is far too often over-looked. We pat ourselves on the back for doing well, despite our past adversities, and feel a bit embarrassed by the behaviour of our less mature siblings.

This is the segregation, whereby, the people that live in safer areas, with better housing and more space to breathe, keep themselves away from those other areas. We establish our own boundaries about where we go. We play it safe. We know the areas by name, but, we have never set foot in them. We might have seen them on the television, but never with our own eyes.

We keep alive the us and them, just as much as the people in the interface areas do, but we get to wash our hands of the violence. We don’t throw bricks, we don’t throw petrol bombs, and we stay on the safe side of the divide.

All the while, our behaviour keeps communities separate and alienated. We stay safe in our latte-drinking, Guardian-reading world, and look down on the Neanderthal behaviour of these backward people. If only they would embrace consumerism and success like we did, then our problems might be resolved.

The whole family needs to be part of the process. We can spend all our resources in fixing the problem kid, but, it is all participants in the system that require attention and change.

As long as segregation is the answer, the answer will always be a problem.

as a famous rabbi once said…yada yada yada

Backup Plans

2011-06-22T12:42:00.001-07:00

I have been learning to live with as much flexibility as possible. I have been learning to accept the unpredictability of life, and human behaviour. I have been learning to have back up plans. It has not been easy, but, it has been deeply rewarding even though I haven’t, and probably never will, fully master it.

Oftentimes we confront the unpredictability, of circumstances and people, with the rage of our disappointed expectations. We project our rage against the offender, who ought to have facilitated the world we wish existed.

Let me give you a rudimentary example. A person visits a toilet in desperation, quickly sits down, and evacuates their bowels with relief, only to find that there is no toilet roll. They are stuck, they are embarrassed, and they start internally dispersing the shittiness of their feelings within this predicament. This person easily starts to dwell on, the now-defunct fantasy, of all that should have been the case, the world that should exist, and what people ought to do.

Imagine, however, if that person was a person with a backup plan. They always liked to have tissue paper in their bag or pocket, and that in the same circumstance would have been able to rely on their backup…and still get to enjoy the fact that there was a toilet at all, and they still got to enjoy their relief. They would have left that toilet, still maybe having preferred that there had been toilet roll…and they might then have suggested to a member of staff that they need to attend to the toilet-roll-situation. They would have been more likely to communicate this in a much more affable manner, than the person who has a partially wet ass, and bruised ego.

The world will always, at some time or other, run against the grain of our ego. The world will always, at some time or other, go against the grain of our will.

How do we face up to it? Do we?

It seems to me, that we more commonly resist this kind of engagement with life, and instead continue to live in a world-of-unpredictable-humans, heavily armed and weighed down with expectations, with no backup plan. We instead chose to live in the abstract world of our rights to this or that, and the shoulds about the circumstances that we would have preferred, and the oughts about the ways we wished others behaved.

We sit there innocently with shit on our arses, blaming the world around us for not being better than it is. And, we can sit their as long as we want, but, sooner or later you’ve got to deal with it, unless an aid organisation hears of your plight and starts delivering you food parcels…and maybe some toilet roll.

And, as a famous rabbi once said…yada yada yada

Sustainable Living

2011-06-15T05:52:00.000-07:00

Sustainability is a word that most of us are now familiar with. We have heard it mostly used in relation to what is perceived by many to be a climate crisis. I believe that sustainability is a beneficial guide for us, as a species, but also as individuals. It is not an all-encompassing answer to the problems of the world, although I don’t think one of those exists, but, it is useful.

I’ll highlight two kinds of economies…deficit-based economies, and resource-based economies. The first is the kind that is employed in places like Britain, America and India. Any growth that they experience is fundamentally fragile, and as it expands, the bubble always threatens to burst. This results in economic catastrophe and collapse. Every penny that is spent is owed. The government owes, the banks owe, and everyone ends up writing bouncy cheques. There is no foundation to the figures, which becomes nothing more than an abstract proposition of consumer confidence and projected worth.

The other kind of economy is resource-based. This is the kind of economy that China employs [I am not advocating all facets of the Chinese economy!]. This is, what I see, as a smarter economic model, as it doesn’t gamble with what it doesn’t have. It works with its own resources, its growth is stable and consistent, and it does not have the fickle confidence of the deficit-junkies, who are buoyed up on the ether of the last financial high.

This economic insight has a lot to say about what we humans get up to behind the scenes. There is a term in the world of psychology: cognitive dissonance, and essentially, this is the psychological equivalent of a deficit-based economy. This is where the idea we have of ourselves doesn’t match up to who we are. We can sustain this disparity for some amount of time, but, depending on how great the distance is within ourselves, it will eventually give way. Some might manage to maintain this inner gulf until the day they die, but, it isn’t something I would aspire to, or encourage anyone to give a try. It is a massive drain on our inner resources trying to maintain big ideas of ourselves. We cannot keep doing it. It will eventually ruin the things we think we are trying to maintain.

Just like the population of Easter Island, that were so busy building impressive statues of human faces that they didn’t notice they were wiping out all the trees in the process. They destroyed the civilisation they thought they were revering. They killed the thing they loved. There is a big price to pay for big ideas.

So, I am trying to promote psychological sustainability. Look at what you have, cultivate your soul and grow what you need, and you will weather life’s storms with much more ease.

Ditch the faces, and keep the forests.

And, as a famous rabbi once said…yada yada yada

Selective Hearing

2011-06-15T05:43:00.000-07:00

We have all heard of the term selective hearing. It is commonly understood that people, some more than others, can hear what they want to hear, when they want to hear it, and play deaf when it suits them.

However, I want to take this commonly accepted notion, and open it up to include other things, because I think the act of selective hearing sheds light on other very human traits.

Selective Attention

Most of us, unless we have chosen to avoid it altogether, are surrounded by people, things, happenings and events. We cannot take everything in at once, and so, smartly, we are able to select what we think is important to focus on at any given time. This is an incredible ability that we have, and it happens so quickly, that most of us are entirely oblivious to what we have done…yet, we do it all the time, especially when we are out and about in the world of stimulation. We also choose, what not to focus on, for whatever reason…repulsion or avoidance. We are separating the wheat from the chaff so to speak.

Some of us focus intensely, so as to exclude as many other variants as possible…this is the kind of focus, that is sometimes romanticised as passion, but is often better described as obsession. This reduced focus, can be acted out in a variety of ways, but the crux of it is to limit one’s encounters with variables [variables being people]. We all do this to some extent, especially when we are needing to recover from having been out in the world of stimulation. We recuperate by losing ourselves in smaller, more-limited worlds, such as cleaning, television watching, fishing, instrument playing or computer tinkering.

Others, like to keep their attention as flitting as possible, not letting it rest on anything for too long. This is what I like to refer to as intentional scatty-ness. See no evil…feel no responsibility. Again, we may all do this from time to time as it suits us, but, we are essentially using the survival skills that are built into us as human-animals.

Selective Memory

This is the process whereby we start editing the story of ourselves. We have already made decisions about where to be, and where not to be; about who to be with, and who not to be with…and we have paid attention to what has suited us. But, on top of this, we then chuck out a lot of stuff as we internalise the things we experience. We start whittling down the experiences in a way that sits best with our idea of ourselves, and how the world is around us. This is like an actor rehearsing their lines before going on stage…they might read the words out loud, or into themselves, or write them down in journals or blogs. These are the pre-stage preparations that help us get ready for the performance, which we hope to go smoothly.

Selective Telling

This is the externalising of the rehearsed lines…the performance. Once we have swallowed down the medicine of our own memories, as bitter tasting as they may be, we then start to reaffirm those memories, by repeating our now-edited accounts of the experiences that forged them. Every time we repeat the story, we repeat an incantation, by which we reassure ourselves that the world is the way we think it is, and we are who we think we are. We ask for the nods and approval of others around us, as we tell ourselves these stories. If they do not nod and approve, we distance ourselves from them…they are not our friends. Our friends nod. We say we want to be understood, but, we are really saying that we want to be understood in the way that we understand ourselves. If they don’t align, they don’t understand.

So, what am I getting at here with all this babble? I am suggesting that the popular account of the human experience, is one that turns a blind eye to the script, stage, curtains, makeup and lighting. We talk about ourselves and our lives, and the things that concern us, as if they were factual. Our desire to convince others of what we feel and how important those feelings are, lures us into evoking the name of Truth and Fact.

Behind the scenes there is so much going on, like a busy production room. Of course, this is not for public viewing, and for a lot of people it would ruin the performance. I am trying to say that we are all story tellers. We are all participant and active, in the story of our lives, even if the story we tell is one of helplessness, and hopelessness. Of course, the helpless and hopeless, would never want to admit that they have anything to do with the scripting of that particular play.

We are not the performance.
We are not just the performance.
We are the script writer, the director, the actor, and the performance.
So, what kind of story are we telling?

And, as a famous rabbi once said…yada yada yada

An Addict's Guide to Eating Disorders

2011-05-23T07:06:00.000-07:00

There are some people out there who don’t like the term ‘connection junkie’.

Even though I use the term a lot, I am aware of its limitations, in the same way that all words are limited when it comes to conveying what we mean. However, having said that, I believe that those that have most issue with the term are those who are most likely to be harbouring the instincts, behaviours and habits, which I associate with being a ‘connection junkie’.

So why use it? What am I trying to get at?

The reason why I feel the term is limited is mostly to do with the universality of these traits. They are universal, because we have all been born, and have all felt in some primordial, wordless experience, what it feels like to be connected. So, I do not sit outside, looking in at these strange people, for I count myself in amongst them. Some people do not like the term ‘junkie’ because it denotes something negative, however, just as with other addictions, the longing for connection is often one that is covered up, hidden and denied. It is this hidden aspect of our desire for connection that can become toxic and harmful in our relationships.

But, why would anyone want to hide their desire for connection, especially if this is common to all human beings?

It may seem strange to some of you, but not everyone goes about meeting his or her needs with ease. We can carry all sorts of complex feelings that we keep hidden from view. This is where I will draw a parallel between what I term, being a ‘connection junkie’, and eating disorders. I am not overly satisfied with the term disorder, for I think there is often an abundance of order and ritual in these supposed disorders. But, if we were to look at the behaviours related to food as eating disorders, then the behaviours I am referring to may be viewed as social disorders.

Both participants exhibit complex feelings about something that many of us hold as being simple. Meeting our needs, especially when it comes to the most basic needs, like eating, sleeping, shitting, and drinking, need never be a complex thing for most of us. Yet, with those struggling with eating disorders [and social disorders], the need and the satisfaction both become a problem.

To take this further, I think that some people could be referred to as social anorexics, some as social bulimics, some as socially unhealthy, and some as socially obese. These terms are only as useful as they are useful. They only serve to illustrate the similarities between the meeting of social needs and the meeting of our nutritional needs.

The social anorexic has a deep need and hunger, but hates themselves for needing at all. They punish themselves for having the need, by starving themselves of the thing they need.

The social bulimic, sates their need with gusto, and then goes to the opposite extreme, attempting to rid themselves of their gluttony. They may experience ecstasy in the connection, but feel guilt at the loss of control they experience in the ecstasy, like the whiskey remorse of the drunk…they promise themselves they will never drink again.

The socially unhealthy, is just someone who has a bad diet, but even bad diets can kill. These are people who associate with people that do them no good, and bring no richness into their lives. The company they keep provides no nutrition and instead leaves them with problems and upsets that fuel other problems and upsets.

The socially obese, are those who just can’t stop, and don’t know how to be contentedly alone. They feast on the connection and feel irritable if they aren’t feasting…the connecting is comforting, and the separateness is at best simply a problem to be overcome, and at worst, something that terrorises them when awake, and even in their dreams.

Like I say, these comparisons are very limited, but, they may serve to shed light on the complex issues that many of us struggle with when it comes to meeting our needs. It seems like society is trying to get to a better understanding of mental illness. I think this begins with being honest about our own longings and habits, our own fantasies and fears, our own wishes and disappointments.

There is no such thing as normal, however, we can all get our bearings in whatever situation, circumstance and landscape we find ourselves in, and move to somewhere else. No matter where we stand, we can move, and move to somewhere better. We need never do this to please anyone but ourselves, but, that is half the battle for connection junkies like you and me…learning to do things for ourselves, to please ourselves, to invest in ourselves, and not for anyone else’s sake but our own.

And, as a famous rabbi once said…yada yada yada

Staving off the Hunger

2011-05-18T06:12:00.001-07:00

Connection junkies come in all shapes and sizes, as many shapes and sizes as there are people. Some connection junkies are very obvious in how they play out their addiction. They cling in very open ways to almost everyone they come into contact with. They lift people up onto fantastical pedestals where the innocent pawn’s humanity is irrelevant. Even though they may hardly know you, they may have high expectations of how you are going to live up to your role. Of course, this behaviour leads to many betrayals and letdowns, and creates a museum of Judases.

However, there are other less obvious connection junkies, whose behaviour almost seems to suggest that they are not addicted to human connection. These are the people that rarely socialise, and isolate themselves for long periods of time. Their behaviour seems to suggest that they don’t need people and don’t need human company, as if they don’t desire that kind of stimulation.

This behaviour is like a magic charm, whereby, the participant hopes to convince them self of that very thing. They starve themselves of something that all human beings require in some measure for an ordinary balanced life. It may seem, and they would be adamant about this, that they do not require what others require…as if they are built differently. However, the truth of the addiction will always slip through in other behind-the-scene behaviours.

Often, with these closet connection junkies, they satisfy their needs for company and affection, and their desire to care, nurture or parent, with non-humans [pets or strays]. I am not suggesting acts of bestiality here, just innocent acts of much needed affection. These interactions with non-humans stave off the desires for human interaction, and more importantly, overt the likelihood of misunderstandings, obligations and social guilt that the person has encountered in their past.

Instead of going on a journey, whereby the person re-learns, re-evaluates, and re-lives new patterns, that shed social guilt and the inevitable dissatisfaction that comes with it, they enter a stasis. Within in this stasis, nothing changes, and the person does not grow. The instincts remain the same, and so, when the person does venture out into the populated world again, they encounter all the same kinds of old familiar feelings; the kind of feelings that had them hiding away in the first place.

It is not that animals are much different from humans [they eat and shit and fuck, they are competitive, and they seek to meet their needs at all cost] the only difference is that the connection junkie projects less expectation onto them. They are spared the pedestals and the significance.
The connection junkie may claim that they don’t expect anything from humans, but, often this is a protective statement, much like the person that exclaims, “I don’t give a shit!” when they blatantly do. “I don’t expect anything” covers up the disappointed fantasy of the better parent, which then gets transferred on to the better friend, or the better partner.

Underneath the numb façade lie catacombs, full of the bones of interred wishes.

And, as a famous rabbi once said…yada yada yada

Back to the Drawing Board

2011-05-05T07:29:00.000-07:00

It seems to me, that we humanoids often live life, on the basis of some kind of primordial blueprint, about how life ought to be. This includes all the fittings and fixtures, which in this case, are the people and circumstances. We often walk around like frustrated architects, grumbling about how the building isn’t going according to the plan we have. The real thing doesn’t match the blueprint.

The thing is, when it comes to our own lives, we don’t have any builders working for us. We might like to have a team of builders and craftsmen, who are devoted to helping us accomplish our goals, but we don’t.

And so, it seems like the building site of our lives is one, where all the others around us, have their own blueprints. Their blueprints don’t match ours. The only person that is going to be able to build anything like what you have in your plan is you.

If you do attempt to keep living your life, along the blueprint-builders line, you will become increasingly frustrated, as it becomes increasingly apparent, that those other people on your site, aren’t actually there to help you. They’re not even there to make you a cup of tea, although they might.

You might also find that the designs on the blueprints you were using, on the basis that all those other people around you were there to assist, are no longer achievable. You can either bust your balls [if you are a ball-owner] trying to build the mansion you had in mind, or, you can downsize, and build something that won’t kill you.

So, what does this mean for us?

It means, we might become less frustrated, annoyed, angry and disappointed, if we stop operating from the pretext that life ought to be a particular way, or that the people around us, ought to be pleasing or appeasing us, in some way or other. They aren’t. They simply aren’t.

It also means that we might want to reassess the standards that we are judging our lives by. If we are building our happiness, pleasure, contentment or satisfaction, on the foundation of others conforming with our ideals…then we are setting ourselves up for a life of frustration and resentment, with at least a little sprinkling of bitterness.

Some of us have already realised that there aren't any others involved in our building schemes, and are now mournfully sitting with their crumpled up blueprints, looking listless and forlorn.

So, what are we to do?

It means assessing and reassessing the circumstances of our lives, letting go of at least some, if not all of our weightier wishes, and start working with what we’ve got.

It means that we may well ditch the Corinthian portico, plinth and pillars, and build a log cabin.

And, as a famous rabbi once said…yada yada yada

If Women had Penises

2011-04-30T03:34:00.000-07:00

If women had penises, would they piss on toilet seats? I ask this, as a man, who is often disgruntled to find yellow piss on the toilet seat, or rim of the bowl…those things that ought to be comfortingly white.

To be honest, there is probably not a single person with a penis, who hasn’t pissed on a toilet seat at some time in their lives. So, I suppose this is a question of consideration, and maybe women are more considerate than men.

Obviously, there are men, who are more than happy to rip off a piece of toilet roll, and wipe up their accidental spillages. However, I imagine that if women had penises, there would be a higher percentage of them that would wipe up after themselves.

I am attempting as you might have noticed, not to take a moral high ground on the matter. I am even wary of using the word considerate to describe those that wipe the seat. I just wonder why this difference exists. Why do some think beyond their own little moment, to the feelings of the next random urinating-participant, whilst others don’t think about anything, other than their own experience and their own piss?

Those that do wipe up after themselves, including myself, have often cursed loudly [inside our heads] at the inconsiderateness of the previous messy pisser. So fucking inconsiderate!! But, what is it to be considerate? Is this just a process of socialisation, whereby, the adults in our lives attempt to replace our childish behaviour with adult behaviour? A process that replaces childish selfishness, with adult considerateness…is one that has some people feeling proudly, like they play ball…disgusted at the others, who don’t seem to give a damn.

If this process I have described holds any truth about the human experience…then why do men in particular, seem more prone to inconsiderateness when it comes to pissing, than women? Are girls brought up differently than boys? My best guess is that boys are parented differently than girls. Of course each individual responds to that parenting in different ways. There is no uniform response to any style of parenting. Many conform to the parental regime at many levels, and yet, keep some parts of themselves sacrosanct. They cherish a little part of themselves, that remains childish, unsocialised, and unadulterated…this part remains stubbornly subversive.

And, I believe, that toilets for some, represent the whip of conformity, and that leaving piss there around the toilet bowl or seat, is the mark of defiance. The yellow mark of defiance against the tyranny of socialisation.

If my theory holds some water, then, a high-powered business executive is just as likely to leave their piss on the toilet, as a teenager is. The more one has conformed to their socialisation and its language the more hidden the subversive elements will be. The rebellions can come in many forms, and in some ways, maybe leaving piss on a toilet seat is fairly harmless, compared to gunning people down, in an ‘out-of-character’ rage.

Also, maybe boys have a mechanism within themselves that kicks in at different times: a don’t-give-a-fuck mechanism. This mechanism is evident in women, but, I will hazard the opinion that men exhibit this more commonly, and more often. It is a rebellion against being parented, and it is my best guess, that boys are allowed [by parents, and by society] this rebellious response, more than girls. I believe it is harder for a girl to rebel against the will of her mother, much harder than it is for a boy.

Being able to not-give-a-fuck is not something entirely negative. It is negative to the conforming group, who see these people as heretics, philistines or scoundrels [or in this case – inconsiderate]. However, the not-give-a-fuck mechanism is necessary in the journey towards personal fulfilment. It is necessary in shedding the need to please others. There is a minimal kind of empty-happiness that can be attained by pleasing others, but, it is nothing compared to the fulfilment that can be found once one stops-giving-a-fuck.

And so, although I would prefer everyone to wipe up their piss, I can appreciate, that being considerate is quite often a pain in the ass. Social conformity, to whomever, is a behaviour that is often riddled with feelings of obligation and guilt. If you feel guilt in your life you are probably also burdened with feelings of obligation, and are probably struggling with your urges to be yourself, and do what you want to do, over and against, what you feel someone else would want you to do.

If this is the case, maybe you can have a little meditative time, where you imbibe the spirit of the rebels, the revolutionaries, the philistines, the heretics, and maybe even the inconsiderate pissers.

And, as a famous rabbi once said…yada yada yada

Taking Risks at the Bookies

2011-04-14T11:23:00.001-07:00

I was walking past a Bookies the other day, and I saw a guy walk in to place a bet, but, before he went in, he locked his bicycle up to the railing.

I thought this was a great example of the often-contradictory ways we approach risks and gambling.

The same man that was going in to the bookies to hand over his hard earned money, in the hope of his proverbial horse coming in...locked up his bicycle, securely to the railings. That was obviously a risk he didn't want to take.

This is conjecture, but, there is a good chance that he spends more money gambling on horses, than it would cost to replace the rickety bicycle he locked up, a few times over.

The thought it provoked was about how we often deal with risks in different ways. There are risks we feel that are acceptable, and there are often risks that we take in our lives that create hidden contradictions that we would probably prefer to ignore.

I want to talk about risks and about gambling. We are all gamblers, even the goody-two-shoes out there, and the good living. We are all doing secret little exchanges. These exchanges involve the trading of risks.

Let me explain.

Imagine someone, anyone, and imagine that they are interested in trying something out, but afraid of causing upset to some they care deeply about. This person risks not discovering their own personal satisfaction, and instead, risks living constantly in that fragile thinly iced world, where they feel forever responsible for the feelings of parents or partners.

Imagine someone, anyone, who feels something very strongly about a relationship they are in, but, is terrified of rocking the boat, and upsetting the status-quo if they revealed what they felt to those around them. This person risks not living openly as they are, and instead risks living a life of masks and window dressing.

Do you see what I am getting at?

I am not suggesting that we all go bungy-jumping and backpacking. But, I am suggesting that if bungy-jumping and backpacking are something you have always wanted to do, but you have been afraid of what other people will think because you happen to be a high-powered business executive...then you might want to reconsider the exchange of risks.

Maybe you want to go work with Orang-utans in Borneo. Maybe you want to become an investigative journalist, writing stories that mean something to you. Maybe you want to go dig wells to provide people with uncontaminated drinking water. Maybe you want to quit the job that has been sucking your soul dry for far too long, and try working for yourself. Maybe you want to go see the world. Maybe you want to ask that person out on a date, that person who makes your heart beat faster every time you pass each other in work. Maybe you want to reveal what you really think, and what you really feel to the people you care about. Maybe there is a relationship that is fractured that you would love to heal.

I am not saying that there is any guaranteed outcome to any of these ventures. They are indeed, all ventures, and they are indeed all risks...but, in the exchange of risks, we may want to look at what it is we are risking in return for maintaining the status-quo; what we are risking for maintaining our habits.

Let's not risk living an unsatisfying life. We only have one.

And, as a famous rabbi once said...yada yada yada

Copycats

2011-04-10T02:08:00.000-07:00

The term Concentration Camp, which most people probably associate with Nazi Germany and Poland, was a word that was born out of the experiences of the Boers and the British during the Second Boer War, in the late 19^th Century. The Boers [Dutch farmers who had settled in Southern Africa] were on the more uncomfortable side of this experience, as the Boer women and children, who I imagine were as innocent as you need innocent people to be, got locked up in camps. This was an attempt to demoralise the Boer fighters.

They Boer civilians weren't exactly 'looked-after' in these camps. They may not have been gassed, and may not have been put to slave labour, but, many died of neglect, malnutrition and disease. There are many ways of describing these kinds of camps, but, it was the British that referred to them first as 'Concentration camps'. Of course, they weren't the only ones in history to lock up innocent people...anyway, what I am saying, is that the Germans who participated in the Nazi schemes, weren't the first to dream up such things. They were very efficient copycats.

I also want to draw your attention to a quote from a very famous British politician, Mr Winston Churchill, who uttered these, unfortunately not-as-famous-as-they-should-be words:

“I do not understand this squeamishness about the use of gas […] I am strongly in favour of using poisoned gas against uncivilised tribes.”

12^th May 1919, War Office

He said these words in relation to the Kurds, who were obviously causing him an irritation, which of course, as we all know was a problem shared more recently, by another famous man, who indeed also didn't seem to understand the squeamishness, and certainly, didn't seem to have any himself. Another very efficient copycat.

Of course, this kind of stuff may not shock any of you out there...your eyes may be wide open to the hypocrisy of the Civilised Nations of the Free World.

But, for some, the understanding is that these terrible atrocities happen in darker, more backward places. They maintain the belief that, genocide for example, is a side effect of being primitive and uneducated. It is fuelled by under-evolved beliefs, and uncivilised societies. These understandings point the finger of blame at inferior cultures and races...civilised fingers, pointed at primitive indigenous peoples, instead of at the supposedly civilised leaders of the capitalist ['democratic'] nations. This understanding can get sanitised by acts of charity. It is often this kind of understanding that drives programs to educate ['teach English'] these primitive peoples, and maybe, help heal their beliefs with something a little more Christian.

I want to introduce you to another character: King Leopold II of Belgium. He managed to negotiate a massive chunk of Africa for himself: The Congo. In the Congo, Leopold was happy to maintain a policy of exploitation of the countries resources, especially rubber, and exploit the people, and kill anyone who didn't comply. Of course, he didn't kill everyone, only a few hundred thousand. The rest were punished by having their limbs hacked of with machetes. Leopold obviously didn't do it himself, he was just at the helm, being civilised and Christian. So; steal the rubber, hack off limbs, and kill a few thousand people...that was the policy of the civilised.

Of course, we see this kind of thing going on in Africa to this day...but, the Africans weren't the first...and, as you can see here, I am kind-of suggesting that the blueprints for what we might consider to be great evils in primitive societies, were generally drawn up by people who were considered by the rest of the world to be more civilised, and we have ended up with very efficient copycats.

And, as a famous rabbi once said...yada yada yada

Paralysing Plethora of Paths

2011-04-06T05:40:00.000-07:00

We all have paths that lie in front of us. Of course, there are paths that don’t lie in front of us too. There is no single person alive that has all the possibilities in the world in front of them. Due to circumstances and genetics, body and psyche, and all sorts of other things…our paths have already been whittled down.

This is a good thing, and a useful thing, for the full gamut of possibilities would simply paralyse every single one of us. We wouldn’t be able to decide what to do. Some people fantasise about winning the lottery, as if, having lots of money, would bring the equivalent amount of possibility. Yet, the money and the possibilities don’t make it any easier to start a journey along a path.

In fact, I reckon, that the more possibilities we have, the more unhappy we become. One of the things humans deal with the worst in life is indecision. It seems that having a plethora of options is not congenial to the human temperament.

Some people genuinely don’t have clue what they want, and no sense of direction as to where to go, and what road to head out on. For them, attempting to choose might feel incredibly daunting, and induce the paralysis experienced by those who have too many options. These mapless ones have to make do with winging it, venturing down unknown paths. At best, these sojourners can learn to be pragmatic, willing to change and reassess at any given moment. For them, the road can be neither good nor bad, just preferable or not.

However, some of us have already begun on our journeys toward our satisfaction. We know all too well the path that lies in front of us; yet, we get scared from time to time. The further up the path we travel, the more scared we get, even though this is the journey we wanted and we chose. We falter. We stumble. We hanker after that place that lies behind us, as terrible as it is…that place where there is an abundance of possibility. We fantasise about a return to that no-man’s land where we have not chosen anything. We want to return to the crossroads.

When we start journeying toward our satisfaction, we often have to confront the dew of our dreams. When we have lived in the no-man’s land between the fantasy and the fear…the journey that will teach us about our capabilities and our limitations, threatens to disillusion us. This is why, even as we journey along paths we have very-much chosen, we may desire to return to the crossroads. We would often, rather keep our fantasies and dreams, as just that. We may be afraid that the actuality of the thing we longed for, might actually just be ordinary…just a different kind of ordinary. Not amazing…but a very acceptable kind of ordinary.

But, maybe that is the thing we are most afraid of finding, at the end of the road.

And, as a famous rabbi once said…yada yada yada

Attack of the Eye Pluckers

2011-04-04T09:03:00.000-07:00

When the rain comes on, hard and heavy, we pull our hoods up, or we pop open our umbrellas. But have you ever noticed, how, once inside those protective little worlds, how oblivious people tend to become? You can witness the hooded-ones walking out in front of cars. With their vision restricted, they don't have the same view of the real dangers. We all know far too well, to watch you don't get your eyes gouged out, when the umbrellas go up in the rain. The people that wield these eye pluckers, seem to be in another world, slightly more removed from the general reality outside of their portable shelters.

This isn't just a word of caution to you, to be careful when you are walking with your hood up, or when you are wielding an eye-plucking umbrella. Although, it is that too. But, the observation I really want to make is this:

Life rains down on us. It just does. It is not for us or against us...it just does its thing regardless. From the day we are born to the day we die, we live through sunshine and showers, heatwaves and storms...but, when life rains down on us, we tend to put up protective shelters. We put up our psychological hoods, and our mental umbrellas, to shield ourselves.

But, let us bear in mind, that when we are protecting ourself from something that we can't avoid, we often bring about hazards, that we can avoid.

We shield ourselves from the rain, and get knocked down by a car.

There are many ways in which we exhibit this behaviour. Maybe you will recognise it in yourself. I know I have seen in myself many times. Sadly, it seems, that we often continue to keep up our hoods and umbrellas, even after the rain has stopped. With hoods up, we can end up isolating ourselves from contact with those around us...with our umbrellas swinging around, we may push people away, who understandably want to keep a safe distance.

This is also known, as shooting yourself in the foot!

And, as a famous rabbi once said...yada yada yada

Caviar Monkeys

2011-02-25T16:43:00.000-08:00

If I were a monkey

who had been fed on caviar

for the first few years of my life

I could end up

spending the rest of a short life

holding out for caviar

refusing to find sustenance elsewhere

or I could learn to palate

other more sedate flavours

from other sustaining foods

that would help me survive

and the reality is

that those more sedate

maybe even mundane foods

would provide better nutrition for me

me, the little monkey

with a penchant for caviar

the luxurious foods

would have long term ill-effects

and I think this is the case

with significance

for this is the thing we are fed

in our early formative years

and we can end up hankering

after continued significance

starving ourselves

of the ordinary satisfactions

that initially taste too bland

even, too repulsive to stomach

and we get the gag reflex

because something in our mind

has already chosen the repulsion

and has us gagging

like a white Westerner

at at beetle grub

and we hanker for the luxury and starve

or we learn to live more ordinary lives

and, as a famous rabbi once said...yada yada yada

Safe Side of the Divide

2011-02-08T04:55:00.001-08:00

How could they do that?

How could they lock innocent people away

women and children too

in concentration camps

and starve them

let them get so skinny

they were like walking skeletons

until they could walk no more

could only crawl on their knees

until they could crawl no more

and just lay there in squalour until

death came to save them

from that torture

You,

the British

I thought you were meant to be more

civilised...than that

I thought you were meant to be more

christian...than that

but, maybe that was then

and they were harder, more desperate times

and maybe now

maybe now

you are more decent and fair

and more humane

but, is it any different

now

any different,

for the liberal or conservative

democracies of the west

but maybe nothing has changed at all

and our way of life

that we have been told

is simple, pure

and innocent freedom

is nothing more than consumerism

paved on the back of slaves

that we never have to see,

built on a foundation

of genocides

that were nothing more than the legacy

of all the things done

to create our freedom loving societies

which we fail to see

from the safe side of the divide

and, as a famous rabbi once said...yada yada yada

In memory of Lizzie Van Zyl...lest we remain naive

Better the Devil you Know

2011-02-07T10:36:00.001-08:00

The essential difference between an escape and a distraction is to do with location. With an escape, you go somewhere else, but, with a distraction you stay right there where you are.

Many people that think they are escaping, are simply engaging in the act of distracting. This is so, because, there are no easy ways out. There are no get-out-of-jail-free cards in life outside the illusion. In a world where the jails, are the lives we have created and maintained for ourselves, and the bars of the cell are our behaviours...freedom can only exist in change of habit.

With a distraction, we don't go anywhere, we just whirl stuff around in front of ourselves to take our focus off where we are standing. As soon as the distraction has lost its momentum, we get the dawning realisation about where we are, and see that we haven't budged an inch, and start feeling anxious and hungry for another distraction.

We might call our distractions 'escapes', hoping to convince ourselves that we have gone somewhere else alogether different, when this is rarely the case.

Have you ever seen the movie Collateral?

Jamie Foxx's character in the movie, is a taxi driver who has fooled himself into thinking he is escaping his life-as-it-is, when actually he is hooked on his life-as-it-is. His behaviours are so fixed and unchanging, that he appeases himself by staring at a postcard of a sunny destination. This is a destination he will never arrive at because he is distracting himself. Distracting himself enough, so that he can avoid the difficult and daunting movement that freedom necessitates.

But, what is he, and what am I, and what are we distracting ourselves from?

Change

Terrorised by the devil we don't know

People don't want freedom, they want comfort

Or, at least, they want both,

and for the most part

will sell their freedom in exchange

for the subtle lure of comfort

and true escape and true change

will only come

when we put freedom over comfort

I would encourage you to watch the movie Collateral

and watch a story about

an ordinary man's

battle with two devils

for

when the devil we know

is killing us slowly with boredom

maybe its time to take a ride

with the devil we don't know

and, as a famous rabbi once said...yada yada yada

Lest we Forget

2011-01-25T05:07:00.000-08:00

We get together and remember

our tragedies and our losses.

communites large or small

sharing its grief or disbelief

and we say,

it is good to remember

lest we forget

and we remember

our holocausts and genocides

and we maybe hope

that by remembering

we will prevent these

horrifying acts

from ever happening again

but,

how do we remember,

and

what exactly are we remembering?

I ask these questions

because I think we can insulate ourselves

from the realities of

what humanity has proven itself to be

by remembering

with a sense of disbelief

we can keep ourselves separate

from the vile evil-doers

as if they were born of hell

and we were born of heaven

we can remember

in a way that helps us

keep a mythology

about human progress

intact, and unedited

this kind of remembering

keeps ourselves

lost in a little mist of innocence

where we stay

baffled and bemused

by the acts of others

and we would far rather

stay that way

than find out

that all those

perpetrators and victims

were ordinary people

like you and me

that fell either side

of that all too fine line

that any one of us

could find ourselves

on the wrong side of

but, isn't that is too close for comfort?

so lets forget

lest we remember

and, as a famous rabbi once said...yada yada yada

Fixing the Leaks

2011-01-14T07:01:00.001-08:00

I think that we oftentimes convince ourselves that avoiding things is easy, as if to avoid the difficult and the challenging, were to embrace the stress-free life. Some have become so used to avoiding things, that they call themselves lazy, as if this behaviour has become a part of their identity. We may even come up with clever meaningful stories about why we don't do particular things. We can avoid things for all sorts of reasons. It can be from lack of self-belief, fear of failure, or addiction to established comfort zones, or any number of self-created, superstitious, narcissitic narratives. However, it is erroneous to think that the avoidance is easy, and energy-saving.

Avoiding things is an action. It has a hidden intentionality behind it. It is a repackaged resistance. It drains energy in hiddens ways, that will leave us lethargic and apathetic. It steals the energy that we could otherwise be putting into addressing our fears, and steals the opportunity of finding a truly personal fulfilment. Personal fulfilment, can only come through challenging our fears, and expending energy in that general direction. Our fears communicate to us what matters to us. Fear is the field in which our treasure is buried. We can leave it there and never find it if we so wish.

Avoidance is resistance. Resistance expends energy, but it is a use of energy that is like a leak in the system. It drains away under the surface, and you lose the energy you need for things that might be important, significant or meaningful to you.

If we are not putting ourselves to things, if we are not challenging ourselves in some way or other, or if we are avoiding the things we fear, we will end up with lives that feel stagnant, repetitive, mediocre, empty, boring, meaningless and without worth [and I don't speak of meaning and worth as ontological realities, not that it matters].

We can not expect to have lives that feel meaningful and significant, if we do not channel our energies into tasks, if we do not challenge ourselves, if we do not take some risks.

Things...what are those things? Those things we avoid. A broken relationship? A risky vocational venture? Being truly ourselves with others? The better life?

Fix the leaks...divert your limited energies...direct them toward living the fullest life you can muster, in this blip of time we call life. Not because we must, not because we are obliged to, not because of what others might think, and not because it matters...just because you might feel alive again, and we all know, even if only from distant memory, that that feels good.

And, as a famous rabbi once said...yada yada yada

Another Ordinary Year

2011-01-12T04:07:00.000-08:00

Another day has passed

just another day

indistinct in many ways

except that,

because we humanoids live

on this semi-spherical ball of matter

that rotates around

a big burning ball of fire

we have seasons

and our species

has created rituals around these changes:

it has celebrated the arrival of light,

and prepared itself for seasons of darkness

we call this the passing of time:

how many winters we have lived through

how many springs we have experienced

and with the arrival of spring

we experience seeing life unfurl

from out of its more recoiled winter state

and this seems to resonate within us

to greater or lesser extents

as if all the world

were shifting away from a wintery survival

toward a more unhindered expression of life

thriving, and pushing out

reaching toward the light

the light that brings life

and with this light

we might feel lighter

and with this light we

might feel slightly

more free

a little more mobile

a little more unimposed

a little less oppressed

more able to try

more willing to risk

and

what might we try?

what might we risk?

Maybe we might risk living again

and, as a famous rabbi once said...yada yada yada

A Pleasurable Resolution

2011-01-12T03:24:00.000-08:00

Keep your vices

Keep your guilty pleasures

Let your new resolution be

to get rid of the guilt,

not the pleasure

isn't life difficult enough

and short enough

so why would we want to deprive ourselves of pleasure?

Yet,

guilt drives so many of us

and we will get caught up

in purging ourselves

of our

unacceptable behaviour

less controlled behaviour

childlike behaviour

human behaviour

purge ourselves for our failings,

we the priest, we the sinner

handing out our own penance.

Do not steal away from your life

instead,

add to your life

bring more and more richness to your life

let it be textured

let it be pleasureable

find as many things as you can to find pleasure in

these may be new activities

and fresh experiences

you have never before explored

make it your goal to free yourself

from guilt

from shame

make it a year for finding ways

to live more fully

to live more freely

of course,

we may not even have that many pleasures in our lives

as we currently exist

or the things that were once pleasureable

have lost their enjoyment

so adding pleasure to our lives

may require us to breach our defences

may require us to jump the fences

may require us to say

FUCK IT

to our own retinue of

self-created and borrowed

legalities and principles

that help us to justify avoiding

risk and change

and when it comes down to this

down to the nitty-gritty

it becomes a decision

over an exchange

of pleasures

the pleasure,

of the status quo

the comfort and convenience

of doing what we have always done

even if this no longer brings anything

that we might honour with the name pleaure

and

the possible pleasures

that we might discover

as we test and try

and experiment

with things we have never done before

or re-encountering things

that used to bring us

pleasure

imagine we resolved to enjoy our lives as much as possible

without feeling guilty for it

imagine that for the rest of your life

you increased the amount of pleasure in your life

without worrying about what anyone else thought

increasing your potential for pleasure

opening up opportunities for pleasure

dropping your resistances to unknown pleasures

day by day, year by year

would you ever regret that?

and, as a famous rabbi once said...yada yada yada

Ye Must Be Born Again

2010-12-28T10:27:00.000-08:00

In some of my recent scribblings, I described two sets of behaviours. One of the ways I described was stiff-stanced and stubborn, independent and isolated. The other was a more floppy stance, which is so dominated by others or dominating others, that there is no perceivable centre. The question I want to ask myself now is this: is there a middle way, somewhere in between those two, that would offer us a more long-lasting enjoyment, that wasn't destined to collapse at any given moment?

My best guess however, is that the alternative isn't in the middle...I think it is another story all together. It is still a very human story, but, it is as different as an earth-centric view is, to a solar-centric view, and similarly, we are not the centre of this newer story.

In this new account, we are not as important as we once thought. We do not matter that much. We are not that significant. This sheds a new light on all our little self-created dramas, but it is unpalatable for many. Some of us like the serious solidity, or the hyper-connectivity far too much, to want to give them up. Neither of these survival strategies work well...they leave us lacking, and at some point we may even realise it. We may find ourselves in ever repeating circumstances, and realise that the only common denominator is our spot in the middle...and yet still...we would rather stay there than start in a new direction.

Ye must be born again!

Who would have thought such words would come out of my mouth, or venture into my scribblings. This is a religiously baffling concept, that in my view was intended to be baffling. Unfortunately it has become hijacked by self-righteous condemners. Can it be redeemed, to have life once more? Could we find new meaning in it?

Of course, I don't believe that you must be born again, after all, you can do whatever the fuck you like. We can all do whatever the fuck we like, whether we choose to or not. We don't have to be born again at all. We can continue to live as we live, for as long as we want to. Some are more than happy with they way they do life, and living and relationships. For us others, we have suffered frustrations and disillusionment, we have fallen foul of expectations and disappointment. We have found ourselves at either side of the stiff-floppy spectrum, and yearned for something easier and simpler, something that seemed at the time, too far out of human reach.

Most people around us, just pat us on the back, and hope that our next lovers [friends, colleagues etc] will be better suited to us, and that circumstances will change in our favour. Most people around us are just as afraid of change as we are, and are just as willing for you to maintain your status quos, as they are to maintain their own.

However, patting eachother on the back, and reinforcing unsustainable behaviours, does not promote the better life for anyone. Instead, I want to utter words that speak of redemption.

To be born again:

from darkness, into the light

from womb into wildness

from bondage* into freedom

from heaviness into lightness

from lethargy into vitality

from dependency into dance

from clinging into loosening

from poverty into adundance

from blaming into journeying

from expectation into acceptance

from disillusionment into fresh vision

from disappointment into recrafted stories

this may sound like mystical mumbo-jumbo to some of you

and for some, they need it to remain as mystical mumbo-jumbo

so that they can avoid the kind of self-awareness

that might evoke uncomfortable change

but, for some others

they may seek out the paths

as faint as they may be

and start putting one foot in front of the other

and start moving slowly and hesitantly

toward somewhere better

not emptily for the sake of others

but in the good-enough act of self-nurturance

it will never look the same in each person

for we are all emerging out of our own histories

into tellings and retellings of our tomorrows

there are no answers,

but there are scents we might follow

there are traces and signs of ways

and in this,

I wish you well

for oftentimes the road does not rise to meet us

and, as a famous rabbi once said...yada yada yada

*not referring to the enjoyable kind of bondage ;0)

Cosy at the Crossroads

2010-12-21T05:51:00.001-08:00

Oftentimes we mix up freedom with possibility.

This is the mistake of capitalistic democracies, that sell us the idea of freedom but appease and sedate us with lots of options, however, it is a very human mistake. We think that freedom is the availability of possibility, and so we sit at the crossroads surrounded by hundreds of avenues, and we set up camp at the crossroads, thinking that we are free-er there.

Yet, freedom, in a seemingly paradoxical way, is expressed through choosing a path to venture on. What I am suggesting, is that freedom is best expressed with intentional self-limitation. Does that make sense?

It isn't actually paradoxical at all, it is simply the contrast of the illusions we like to maintain about ourselves, and the reality of what we are actually doing. Of course, no-one can really tell what the illusion or reality is for each individual...these are the kinds of secrets we can even keep from ourselves...the truth about what we are doing, and why we are doing it. Do we keep ourselves hooked on the idea of freedom, but stay appeased by the availability of options? Only we can tell the truth about that...to ourselves, and for ourselves.

Of course, in admitting that we have set up camp at the crossroads, we encounter the reasons why we haven't set off on any of those roads. We encounter our fears, anxieties and probably a vast arsenal of protective thoughts, that help to keep us safe and sound in the status quo. Hedged into our safer worlds with stockpile of rusty excuses.

Maybe we fear failure,

by the standards of significant others

by the more impossible standards we have set ourselves.

Maybe we fear success,

afraid, that to succeed is to offend someone.

Maybe we feel that the world is set against us;

that good things just don't happen to us.

Maybe we are afraid of doing what we want

for fear of upsetting someone else.

Maybe we are afraid that if we set off on one path,

that we will miss out on another.

Maybe we are just afraid of leaving the safety

because we have become addicted to ease.

There is obviously a time for both of these things at different times in our lives. A time for venturing out on a new path that we have chosen, even if only temporarily. There is also a time to reflect on what possibilities are available to us; which of those lie open, and which of those need effort and commitment. All the time, weighing up the investment of our efforts against the reward we get from the risks.

Wherever you are at...I wish you grace for yourself,

and godspeed for the journey if you choose to go on one.

And, as a famous rabbi once said...yada yada yada

The Robot and the Slouch

2010-12-21T05:50:00.000-08:00

I was watching one of my favourite movies last night: The Last Samurai

This will come as no surprise to those that know me, as I have watched this movie more times than I can count. Each time I watch it, I get new things from it. The last time I watched it, I was drawn to something new...discipline.

To be honest, I have never really been drawn to discipline, in fact, it would be more accurate to say I have up until now been repulsed by discipline. Maybe the repulsion to discipline is something like a teenage allergy, that some of us never grow out of. It is probably a far-too-adult word for the growing child, who is enchanted by the idea of independence, but resisting at all costs the journey toward self-responsibility.

Discipline is necessary in order to live the life we want, unless we want to slouch back and avoid expending any energy. Neither of these is right or wrong, just different...different ways of living our limited lives.

In this movie, the American Captain Algren, has been captured by the Samurai. Enemies defeated in battle, would normally be killed rather than allow them to live in the shame of their defeat, however, the leader of the Samurai, Katsumoto, seems to be entering into a newer understanding, and is keen to learn from his captured enemy. This also allows the opportunity for Algren to learn from the Samurai, and he is attracted to their way of life. As he watches them go about their daily life, he notes:

"They are an intriguing people. From the moment they wake they devote themselves to the perfection of whatever they pursue. I have never seen such discipline"

Like Cpt. Algren, I was attracted to this. It made me reflect on how I felt about discipline. I realised how I would have done so many different things with my life, if I had applied discipline. I didn't though. I chose comfort, convenience and ease over and above risk, purpose and effort. I have been telling a story about possibility and freedom, that has helped me maintain a blindspot to my risk avoidance, and helped me maintain my comfort zones. Possibility and freedom, were an avoidance of intentionality and purpose.

Maybe discipline just got thrown out, like the proverbial baby with the bathwater...the bathwater being obligation and duty. I have great personal issues with feelings of obligation and duty. They are laced with feelings of guilt for non-participation and separateness. There is a tension between the two...one is an over-active, hyper-sensitive defense against the other, yet they fuel eachother. Either way, there is something I lost, that might have been useful to me.

If I had utilised some dicipline, I would probably be much more toned and muscular than I am. I would probably be eating much healthier. I would probably have published a book, or at least attempted to. There are hundreds of things I would probably have done in my life, regardless of whether any of these things have any real value, I simply know that I have wanted them at some time or other.

Discipline, from what I can tell, is a choice not to choose; a decision not to decide. This need not become an obligation, or a duty, although this is what I think happens in the whirlpool of the brain, similarly to the way in which the things we want to do, somehow become things we should do.

I find it hard to get up in the mornings, yet, the other morning I got up at 5am, because I was to get a train at 6.30am. When the alarm went off, I got up. The night before, I had decided not to decide, I had chosen not to choose. It wasn't obligation, it was getting what I wanted. I know I would get more of what I wanted if I got up earlier everyday, but, this is the kind of thought, that becomes tainted with anti-expectation, comfort-maintaining defenses.

Don't get me wrong: I don't want to be a robot, I don't want to take myself too seriously and I don't want to surrender all my vices. I also don't want to be a slouch. I am sure there is somewhere in between. Just a little of this kind of discipline would definitely bring far more things I want into my life...it could bring richness and reward. I'd even settle for little seasons of discipline.

To choose not to choose...to decide not to decide...to override your resistances.

And, as a famous rabbi once said...yada yada yada

Getting into the Christmas Spirit

2010-12-19T04:48:00.000-08:00

Families are the place

that we develop our own

particular preferences

for participation

and

for separation

we discover our own desire

for belonging

and

for escaping

for being together

and

for being alone

depending on the role we played in our family

we will get greater or lesser rewards

for belonging and participation

and

greater or lesser reward

for separation and escaping

the former reward coming from the others

who pat us on the back for participating

the latter reward coming from ourselves

for there is no one else around to reward us

those that don't participate are often seen as selfish

selfish, for having other ideas

selfish, for having other desires

selfish, for having other values

selfish, for having other priorities

selfish, for having other beliefs.

This is the nature of conformity

within any system

and families

are a system like any other

with its instigators and enablers

with its scapegoats and martyrs

with its saints and sinners

with its blacksheep and bumlicks

Christmas is a family time

Even for those without families

it is a family time

we all know it,

even if we locked ourselves away

in bomb shelters,

that Christmas

is a family time

and, as Christmas time approaches

for some they get excited,

because of what they experienced in their families

either through actuality,

or through edited memory

and for some

this excitement and anticipation

is reversed,

triggering something more like

a sense of dread

and foreboding

The participators and conformers

tend to not understand those that

experience this dread and foreboding

and wonder why

they just can't get along

telling them that they are making it

more difficult for themselves

if only you played ball,

life would be so much more enjoyable

and so it might

and, as a famous rabbi once said...yada yada yada

Same Same but Different

2010-12-13T11:43:00.000-08:00

I remember in my granny's latter years, her pointing at people in public places, along with a highly audible commentary on the world around her. Of course, the rest of the family, hid their heads in shame, and tried whispering urgent hushes to try and stem the flow of commentary that seemed to be gushing out from her dentured mouth. We knew the people she had targeted in her commentary had heard...we felt embarrassed.

We see children do this all the time. They point, and exclaim...and, well, that is about it. But, the beauty of these exclamations lies in their being unadulterated. Of course, we laugh-off the cute little child's exclamations, but less easily the older person's. The comments of both, often embarrass us, yet, we feel more socially awkward being associated with the older person's, as if it was us who had uttered them. Some strange blurring of responsibility occurs.

But, what I want to highlight here is, the human capacity to notice difference. Of course, many of us these days, now that we aren't having to beware of Wolves and Bears, live in a bit of a switched-off daze. But, before the numbness kicked in, we had alive eyes, curious eyes, eyes that wandered and noticed. The way we start to make sense of the world is by noticing the difference between one thing and another.

Between myself and another...mine and yours...hot and cold...tasty and disgusting...flesh and plastic...sky and sea...dog and cat...cow and sheep...boy and girl...man and woman...familiar and strange...usual and unusual

This is a very useful tool, necessary for our survival. We normalise, and almost stop seeing the familiar, and our eyes are set to respond to difference...to things that stand out. Why I am pointing this out is, in our post-modern world of political correctness, let us not lose our appreciation for noticing difference. Let us not attempt to homogenise the world around us, by convincing ourselves that we are all the same. Let us not feel bad because our gaze lingers a little longer on someone with different skin to ours, or that it ignores all those with similar skin colour. This is not racism. Racism is not the same as noticing difference. They are not the same things.

I think the word Racism, is a dehumanising word, created by self-righteous liberals [not that all liberals are self-righteous], to separate themselves safely from the feelings of others. The liberal rests self-assured that they themselves are not “racist”, too enlightened to hold such backward views, too educated to think in such tribal ways, far too civilised to be wary of difference.

Difference exists. There is nothing wrong with it, or noticing it. It is what we do with it that matters. Some of us feel threatened by difference. I think that much of this is just baggage from our ancestry, where the stranger was a threat, or at least a potential threat until proven otherwise.

In a world that seems to be anti-racist, and politically correct, it is almost awkward to express the differences we see in each other, between us and those around us.

I want to point out the difference between noticing or talking about difference, and having an ideological point of view that thinks there should be racial hierarchies.

I want to differentiate between those who feel anxious about difference, and those that hold an ideological point of view that thinks there should be racial hierarchies.

I am of the mind, that prefers the open acknowledgement of individual difference. I prefer this, over and above, the attempt to see generalised similarity. Similarity too often is nothing more than making another in our own image, squeezing others into the mould we have already cast; domesticating the wild things that make us anxious.

So, let us celebrate difference, and let us celebrate that we notice it, because we probably wouldn't be alive today if we didn't.

And, as a famous rabbi once said...yada yada yada

Tangled up and Rational

2010-12-13T11:02:00.001-08:00

In my opinion

our rational faculties

are best used

to do

something like

reading the stars

in order to navigate

the seas we find ourselves in

When our reason and rationale

are used to create

nothing more than worlds of control

which we lose ourselves in

and constrain ourselves with

we cannot move freely

we cannot be pragmatic

we become well-thought out

well-read, and well-wise

but weighted down

and tangled up

we know the laws of logic

but

we do not know our own hearts

we know the arguments

inside out

but,

we don't really know

what side of those arguments

we want to find ourselves on

I have probably said this

hundreds of times before

but,

I think that rationality

is just a grandiose word to describe

a process of internalising;

and this internalising

is not much more

than knitting and weaving

a security blanket in our minds

that we can retreat to

from the anxieties and frustrations

we experience in a world of others.

we can be fooled into

respecting rationality too much

smart, intellectual, clever, wise, intelligent

who gives a shit if we are

knowledgeable or clever

if we do not know how to live well

or if we cannot figure out what that might look like

at best,

we might use our rational faculties

to help us in the midst of our existence

to know ourselves

to know how to meet our needs

to know how to relate to others,

in ways that are mutually beneficial

to know how to make our way through our everyday,

without falling over or blowing up or burning out

at every unpredicted move of an other

or every unexpected swell of our own feelings

at best,

our rational faculties,

help us to live

rather than hinder us in living

help us to move

rather than paralysing us

What would our society look like if it

respected people who had achieved this

and took them as our model of success

imagine a society that held well-being

as a measure of our success in life

rather than

financial gain, academic gain, vocational gain

and, so, let me end with this seasonal blessing:

may we use our brains

to find our hearts

like Magi,

searching out

the birth of something

promising

and, as a famous rabbi once said...yada yada yada

When I Feel Shit

2010-12-13T10:34:00.001-08:00

Recently, I had been feeling as shit as I have felt for a long time

low, shit, down, depressed, down in the dumps, negative, meh

whatever you want to call it,

my only inkling was that this feeling [or these feelings]

were gathering over a period of weeks

and over that period of weeks,

it became harder and harder to differentiate

the potential triggers

throughout those weeks,

it is not that I didn't have great moments

and it is not that I didn't feel alive;

it is just that those feelings all seemed counter-posed

against an inner gravity that was aiming somewhere else

and,

this is me just saying

that I know it is easier to write

about how to relate to our feelings well

when you aren't in the midst of them

when you aren't in their hold

my initial instinct

still remains the same in these times

and that is

to withdraw,

to batten down the hatches

seal myself away

curl up in a little ball,

sometimes a proverbial one,

sometimes a literal one;

to create a cave of control

where I am not connected

I slouch into an

attempted state of not thinking

not thinking about caring

as if to not think about caring

is to not care

and to not care is to not connect

This is 'Cave time'...the shut down

Cave time, isn't always

as dark and defensive as this,

and is often just

a much needed time

of recuperation

to be alone

to be unproductive

and unobliged

and unsocial

but

recently

the cave was a womb;

a darkness,

that looked enough like death

to feel safe.

So, I know it is fucking hard

to survive ourselves in the midst

of our own storms,

or those generated from others,

but,

what I want to emphasise is...

...it is a very useful thing,

in the times of ease and plenty

to prepare our minds

for the the times of difficulty

We learn to the read the stars

so that in the rough seas

we can find a way through,

without getting too lost

We find our own personal stars

create our own charts

to map our souls

so that we may discover ourselves

to the edges

And, as a famous rabbi once said...yada yada yada

Not Self Centred Enough

2010-12-05T12:22:00.000-08:00

There are those that stiffen when threatened, but there are others that give themselves up entirely.

These puppets and puppeteers never learn who they truly are; only ever feeling valuable, when they are accommodating and pleasing others, or expecting others to accommodate and please them. They only feel alive in a nexus of need. They need to be needed, or need to be needing...with bulging eyes aimed at an other. They may feel bereft of meaning in their lives when those others, who play their parts in this drama of need, leave for one reason or another. The puppet flops to the ground, the puppeteer feels obsolete.

In the wake of separation the distraction evaporates, the reflection is left still, and the face is not recognised, or found to be repulsive.

The emptiness gets filled with tokens, trinkets and charms, chosen over and against the terrifying possibility of discovering who they are, and what they want. Terrorised by the thought, that they may discover an insatiably hungry soul for which no satisfaction could be found. It is a far easier thing to know or guess what someone else wants and to attempt to satisfy that, even if the attempts chronically backfire...than it is to go on the journey of knowing what you want. Alternatively, others look to someone to hold responsible for meeting their needs;others who will be scape-goated and blamed when those needs aren't met.

These positions are maintained with a toolbox of blind-spots and self-ignorance. Preferring to write stories of trust and betrayal, hope and paranoia, than attempt anything like discovering the truth. The truth about themselves...the truth about the world out there. Their stories are laden with power dynamics and agendas...control, trust, manipulation, obligation, duty. All of which are stories that provide a scapegoat at the ready; a sleight of hand to avoid what is really going on under the surface.

For some, this surface is dead calm, an eerily dead calm, that has no life or animation about it. It may come across to some as a lovely peaceful demeanour, or for others just entirely bland and uninteresting. A façade of calm that hides inner-rages and venomous bites.

For others, it is a turbulent surface, with squalls of giddiness and and a flurry of emotional gestures, which often attracts people with its curious texture. But, what lies underneath could be anybody's guess, the storminess utilised as a distraction to avoid the still reflection.

How do we relate to others?

What relational habits do we have?

Do they work?

Are these questions we want to ask, or ones we want to avoid?

How far would we go, to avoid asking these questions of ourselves?

Do we stiffen when we come into contact with others...or do we give ourselves up and over entirely...is there another better way?

And, as a famous rabbi once said...yada yada yada

Why the Stiff get Injured

2010-11-17T08:35:00.001-08:00

Some of us have become so composed with adulthood that we have become rigid, and we have lost the strength of flexibility. As life breaks against us, those with flexible ideas of themselves, sway a little, absorb a little, and remain intact. For those who have become rigidly sane and adult, they set themselves up for a breakdown. When faced with the forces of life they come crumbling down. Their idea of themselves shatters into pieces.

Why is this?

It is because our identities are anchors that we made as children: adolescent and pre-pubescent pragmatism, grasping at any available material to hedge ourselves against the uncertainty of existence outside of a womb, away from the undivided attention of doting mothers [for those that had them]. As our caregivers start putting their own needs above ours, we start the project of identity formation, for those that were neglected, this may start far earlier. We were already behaving in particular ways, accumulating a little repertoire of habits, but, these were always fairly responsive and pragmatic.

What were once responsive and pragmatic habits, soon become concrete. Our identities become protective walls that help us to feel safer in a world that abounds with the wills of others. In a world where others have beliefs about how to live, and how we should behave, and who we ought to be, we can feel like we are blown around by the waves created by other's beliefs, feelings and expectations.

They solidify, become strong, rigid, stubborn and immobile. They lose the playfulness of childhood. When they fall they hurt, and they find it hard to return to their feet. They take themselves, and the things they put themselves to, seriously. They weigh everything down with meaning, and nothing has lightness any more. It is life without surprise, and although this disappoints, it is exactly what their repertoire of behaviours is designed to do...reduce risk, reduce possibility, limit options.

No alarms, no surprises.

Stoic until we crumble. Strong until we slump. Stubborn until broken.

And serious about it all until the bitter end.

And, as a famous rabbi once said...yada yada yada

When I Die

2010-11-16T05:45:00.000-08:00

When I die...

I would like to be buried in the most environmentally friendly way. I would also prefer that the disposal of human remains wasn't commercialised, and that money didn't change hands over it, but, I guess everyone needs to make a living in some way or other. For some, it is the disposal of human remains, and all the little rituals that go along with that. But, if we didn't live in that kind of world, I would like to be burnt in the back garden, and the remains put in the wee brown compost bin, to be recycled with the leftover bits of pie and potato peelings...or just scattered into the wind somewhere.

I suppose burning bodies pollutes the air a bit, but, I like the image of it. I like the idea of the body being fairly quickly reduced to ashes. When they say “ashes to ashes” at a coffin-funeral, I kind of feel that it is slightly ironic, because, they only throw in some token ashes. It seems as if people are still clinging to the body...wanting to keep it intact for as long as is possible.

I remember seeing in a film, years ago, a scene where they sent the dead body of a slain warrior on a wooden raft, into a lake and then a lone archer shot a flaming arrow up into the air...which arced down onto the raft, setting it ablaze. Now, that is the way to go. A bit on the romantic side, and looking back, I think that movie was incredibly cheesy, and to be fair, I haven't exactly live a very warrior-esque life.

I remember being in Indonesia and learning about how they disposed of their dead. They wrapped their dead relatives up in the Sarongs that they wore most of their lives, and buried them within twenty-four hours in their gardens, or plots of land, which most people seemed to have. I like that. It seems nice and simple. No middle men. I also liked the way the would keep fish, and they would shit into the fish pond and the fish would eat the shit. Tell you what, those Indonesians have some pretty good ideas. But, that is beside the point.

In Tibet and Bhutan, they wrap up their dead and then carry them up to the mountain tops or out on the high plains, and leave the body there for the vultures, and the other carrion feeders. I love this. It seems to embrace the circularity of life and death. That the death of one thing leads to the life of another.

Realistically, what will actually happen, is that my family [which, depending on when I die, will be my parents, or my siblings, unless I outlive them all. I won't have children of my own, so it won't be them] will bury me in a coffin, and have a church service, where some pastor of a Baptist church that I never attended, will recall stories, based on the information they fished from my siblings a few days before the funeral. They will probably do their best to do justice to who I was...and this will probably be something along the lines of:

He wasn't afraid to ask the hard questions. He was a deep thinker, and liked to share his thoughts with everyone. He wandered away from the fold, but, just as the Father welcomed home the prodigal son, so the Lord will welcome him into his arms, and will say, welcome home my child.

Which will be lovely for all those gathered. The loveliness of the sentiment might evoke a few tears. A few of my friends who actually know me might smirk a little, and know that I would probably have had a laughing fit at the attempt to Christianise my legacy...but, it would be lovely, and touching and would bring a tear to all but the coldest of hearts.

I quite like the prodigal narrative. Maybe I could accept this as a trade off. To be fair, it would sit more easily with me, than the attempts I have seen to hijack people's funerals and turn them into an evangelistic event. Pastors, ministers, vicars and priests, getting fresh unsaved into their pews for the first time in a long time. And what, with a dead body in the midst just to add gravity to their human lot, it is an opportunity not to be missed.

So maybe I'd let them get away with the prodigal version of my story, if they let me have a Tom Waits song played as the people came in, and then another on the way out. I really like Tom Waits. I would maybe have them play Kentucky Avenue on the way in, and Come on up to the House on the way out. I'd like that. Maybe I could get them to read some Sheldon Kopp from the pulpit, but, I think that'd be asking too much. I'm more likely to get a rendition of one of the lost-thingy stories...the coin, the sheep...something about the Lord coming to look for the valued-stray.

Well, if he finds me, he'll find me in a coffin, not really paying much attention to the readings or recollections. I'll be out-of-it, so to speak...

out of breath

out of my mind

out of the loop

out of control

control...control...control...letting go...letting go...letting go

and as a famous rabbi once said...yada yada yada

Dance Kid, Dance!

2010-11-14T05:14:00.001-08:00

Dance

Go on dance! She says

The child crosses his arms against his chest

In defiance

The child is almost lost in the swirling of her skirt

as she sways, attempting to animate him

No!!

No dance!! the child says

She eventually ceases her attempts,

and turns back to a conversation

and outside of her gaze

unwatched

he does a dance

his own dance

hoping no one will notice

I will resist your attempts to make me dance

not because I do not want to dance

but you coax

and you coerce

and the more you do

the more you steal my desire

for the satisfaction

I get out of dancing

which is sometimes felt

to be fun, freeing and liberating

unless someone is whipping me

or pointing the loaded gun

of emotional blackmail at my feet

the parental face of disappointment

the partner's sexual disinterest

punishing the bad behaviour

of not conforming

dance kid, dance!

go fuck yourself!

And, as a famous rabbi once said...yada yada yada

The Things we Lost in the Fire

2010-11-10T04:35:00.001-08:00

Children are not innocent.

I have probably mentioned this before in my blogging, that I see childhood innocence as nothing more than a romantic story, dreamt up by disillusioned adults who hanker after the things they lost in the process of becoming adult-erated. It is then projected back onto the children in an act of objectification. Parented into nice, cute, lovely, caring creatures.

Children are need-meeters. They learn to do all kinds of things in order to meet their needs. They are often cruel, malicious and manipulative. But, of course, we don't want this to be the case. We want our spawn to be little darlings...princes and princesses...untainted by the human gene...born of a more heavenly sperm.

Really, all that has happened, is that the children got adult-erated. They got socialised. The parents rewarded the behaviour they liked, and punished the behaviour they didn't. The parents conform to society's ideals [which is nothing more than a whole big bunch of people] and the child conforms to the parent's ideals. A little cycle of people-pleasing and social conformity begins. It is wonderful when it leads to us getting what we want without too much bother, so that the pleasure gained, outweighs the energy expended engaging in social etiquette; and so we might actually get something out of being nice, cute, lovely and caring. However, much of the socialising causes resentment and frustration, as other more primal methods, feelings and desires get tucked neatly away in Pandora's box.

From the no-man's land of adulthood [which we probably experience as being the high ground]; we judge the behaviours of children and older people, and adults who aren't adult enough; we study them and write books about them. It as if we have made this socialised state of adulthood, the standard and the ideal, by which we measure other behaviours.

The things we adore in children, are so often the same behaviours that we find repulsive in adults. Often the things that we call mental illness, are things that are variations of childhood behaviours exhibited by someone we deem to be too-adult for it to be acceptable. They have not been socialised adequately...not trained into being self-aware enough, composed enough, considerate enough to participate normally with all us other people-pleasers.

A child playing with its genitals in the middle of a group of people, or walking about naked.

An older person, staring at people they find fascinating, and making some overly-loud remark.

An adult, cursing and swearing loudly, publicly, and without control

A child pointing at someone with a different skin colour to theirs.

An adult, singing operatically to themselves in the middle of a busy city street.

We feel a little embarrassed when we encounter these kinds of things, depending on how close we are to them. They represent our own disavowed parts of ourself that we lost in becoming conforming adults. The things we lost in the fire.

We too often see that not behaving normally, is a disability, when it is probably a most precious thing. If only we stopped feeling embarrassed by the behaviours of others [or ourselves when the time comes]. So much of what we do for those with mental illness, we claim is for their own good, yet, I get the feeling that we do much of it to appease our own feelings of awkwardness and embarrassment.

We imagine them to be in distress, or are they more likely in oblivion?

We sedate them to ease their distress...or is it to ease our discomfort?

We call something wrong, so that we can get to play at being right.

We call something evil, so that we can get to play at being good.

We call something childish, so that we can get to play at being adult.

We call something weak, so that we can get to play at being strong.

We call something crazy, so that we can get to play at being sane.

The more we disavow the child in ourselves, the more of a good-adult we become. We often like what it is to be a good-adult: independent, capable, strong and composed. After all, we all get some sort of kick out of being able to do things for ourselves, even if not all of the time. Yet, it seems that the more we perform well as a people-pleasing, well-behaved adults, the less able we are to deal with the inevitable weaknesses when they come along...and they will, as life does its thing.

Often the good-adult, fantasises about the childish behaviours they see...the playfulness, the care-freeness, the obliviousness, the lack of consideration for those around them, their unabashed selfishness...but they could never behave that way themselves. They may even disavow the child in themselves so much, that they detest these behaviours when they see them in others. Filled with feelings of anger, repulsion or disgust; they live in a tyranny where the only acceptable state of being, was one of rational, intelligent, and cultured composure.

There are other ways to grow and develop...where we don't lose altogether the primitive, the pagan, and the playful. We can become capable without losing sight of our uncertainty. We can become social creatures without losing sight of our own satisfaction.

So, look again when you see the abnormal behaviour, and look to see if it isn't wonderfully childish, and have a little look at what you are feeling, and see if it isn't a sense of social awkwardness at an unadulterated way of behaving.

Maybe in doing so, we will rediscover the good things we lost in the fire, and maybe even learn to play again, and get a little crazy.

And, as a famous rabbi once said...yada yada yada

Everything in its Own Time

2010-11-09T04:42:00.000-08:00

"There is a time for everything under the sun"

Ecclesiastes, Chapter 3

Yes, here I am, quoting the Bible. I love the Bible, it is a great collection of extremely diverse writings, and I think I appreciate it more now that I have stopped reading it in a devotional way. When I was a Christian I was all too keen to squeeze what I read in the Bible, into my already formed, pre-tailored, protestant evangelical doctrine. I probably still squeeze it a little, but, I have less pre-formed beliefs that I require the text to align with. In fact, as a Christian, I was the least likely to give the Bible a fair hearing. I was really only hearing what I wanted to hear, whilst trying to discern whether my interpretations were doctrinally correct or not.

Anyway...that's beside the point...back to the Bible:

Just as the writer of Ecclesiastes [and honestly, it is highly unlikely to have been King Solomon] says, there is a time for everything that happens under the sun. Of course, everything that happens, happens under the sun [or the moon]...but, the writer isn't writing about some sort of metaphysical reality. They are writing about their experience of being a human in a world were things come and go. This is something that every one of us has to experience. We can't avoid it, although many try to hedge themselves against it.

Instead then, of a metaphysical statement, we have a more existential, more human piece of writing that guides us toward making our peace with the coming and the going of all things: the transience, the absurd and arbitrary lot of the human.

What is the alternative to making our peace?

There are many things in life that are beyond our control, and yet, despite them being outside of our control, we often still attempt to mould these things with our wills...or alternatively, we resent them, spending our limited energies in fostering the bitterness of redundant wishes. So, the alternative is to struggle, strain and strive, to no useful end. We expend our energy, wanting what cannot be had, or wishing for life to be different than it is, or fantasising about another version of our selves that we have never been.

We wish for sunshine when there is rain. Wish for Spring, when it is Autumn.

I think this applies to our feelings, and this is what I want to focus on. I don't think we can control our feelings [this isn't entirely true...but, I think the attempt is damaging in the long term], nor do I think we should. However, I do believe that when we stop resisting our feelings, and attempting to control them, the more able to grow along side them in equity, not in tyranny. A lot of energy is wasted when we feel bad, shameful or guilty, about feeling a particular feeling. Let me put it like this:

Feeling shit about feeling shit, doesn't make feeling shit any better.

Do you know what I mean?

I am saying something like this...dance with your feelings. Sometimes that dance will be an extravagant tango, at other times a slow waltz, at others a more melancholy swaying...and sometimes your feelings won't want to dance, and you might be lucky to get a game of scrabble or a short stroll out of them. But, whatever it is, don't resist them. If you feel shit because your feelings won't tango, then accept a humble game of scrabble.

I am sure we have all experienced this scenario, at one end or the other: someone attempting to coerce another to dance. Instead of accepting the hesitation to dance, one partner engages in emotional bribery to get their desired outcome. This emotional bribery, usually does nothing but congeal the hesitancy...which then solidifies into something closer to a rebellious protest.

There is a good chance, that the person might actually have gotten up to strut their funky stuff on the dance floor, once they had seen the fun being had by the others. They would have wanted to join in, to participate, but on their own terms. The attempt to coerce, or to make the other feel bad for not playing ball with their whims, doesn't actually get the desired result. It is a waste of energy. Even if the person does give in, the energy that is generated, is weighted with, not a little, residual reluctance and resentment. Dancing isn't dancing if it is forced...dancing is at best an expression of freedom and liberation.

So, does this make it any clearer?

Feeling shit, about feeling shit, doesn't make feeling shit any better

There is a time for everything under the sun. A time for giving birth, a time for dying; a time for planting, a time for harvesting; a time for killing, a time for healing; a time for knocking down, a time for building; a time for tears, a time for laughter; a time for mourning, a time for dancing; a time for throwing stones away, a time for gathering them; a time for embracing, a time to refrain from embrace; a time for searching, a time for losing; a time for keeping, a time for discarding; a time for tearing, a time for sewing; a time for keeping silent, a time for speaking; a time for loving, a time for hating; a time for war, a time for peace.

and, as a famous rabbi once said...yada yada yada

Looking After the Things that Matter

2010-11-08T04:10:00.001-08:00

If you own a waterproof jacket,

here's a few tips on how to look after it

to get you through another winter:

When you get a new jacket,

you will notice that the rain

beads in little droplets on the outside of your jacket

many people mistake this for

the waterproofness of the jacket,

[the waterproofness is actually a separate membrane

adhered to the inside of the outer fabric

or in cheaper jackets, it is coating, often protected

by a drop-lining of mesh or fleece]

however, what makes the water bead

is actually the water repellent treatment

on the outer fabric,

which prevents the outer fabric

from getting soaked through

which would effect

the overall performance of the jacket

and the comfort of the wearer.

the water repellency is key

to the performance of a waterproof garment

and it is essential for

all those "breathable" materials

that the sales assistant probably raved about

when you were in the store making your purchase.

The water repellency will not last forever

and can get coated with dirt, dust and debris

which love soaking up water

therefore, defeating the purpose of the jacket.

These water repellencies can be restored,

so that the water is beading again,

and as good as new.

The trick, is to stick your jacket, all zipped up

into a tumble dryer, and put it on a low heat

for about half an hour...or more

[check the care instructions on your jacket just to make sure!]

to check it out,

just splash some water onto it

to see if the water is beading again.

Depending on the jacket,

this can be done numerous times

without the need for "reproofing"

If this process hasn't worked,

then you need to wash your jacket,

and then re-proof your jacket

again, let me emphasise

that this is not the "waterproofing"

although the process is referred to as "reproofing",

you are really restoring the water repellency.

If you go into any outdoor supplies shop

you should be able to buy a little treatment set

which usually consists of

one container with a non-detergent soap

and one container with the water repellency.

You must not use normal detergent on your jacket

as this will ruin most waterproof jackets and

will leave detergent residue on the outer materials

which will absorb water, rather then repel it.

The process goes:

clean out your washing machine of detergent

[put it through an empty cycle]

30° wash with the soap

30° wash with repellency

then

tumble dry on a low heat

so, why am I telling you all this?

Because sometimes things are so valuable

we fear tinkering with them

people spend hundreds of pounds on

snazzy waterproof jackets

but, often, never take the time

to learn how to look after them

A Skinny Soya Democracy to Go

2010-11-07T04:38:00.000-08:00

I often think

that Freedom

is the window dressing

for Democracy

and that we don't actually get

what it says on the tin

what we get

are a million extra choices

to make in our lives

that are expressed

in the important realms of

margarine selections

and

television channels

furniture sets

and

fashion parades

gizmos and gadgets

holidays and hangovers

we believe in free-dom but,

what we bought into...

[while we were distracted

by the gazillion

paralysing

consumer choices

that are so inconsequential

that we have become

too giddy and shallow

to be arsed with

a change]

...was the free-market

for afterall

freedom is far too much like hard work

[and it is]

when what we really want

is comfort and convenience

and democracy does no harm

like all those nasty tyrrannies

[except that they do harm

to their own people

whereas we-the-free

do harm to people

that are far enough away

that we the voters don't

give a flying-fuck

unless we get free airmiles

with our flying-fucks]

and,

would you like an

environmentally friendly reuseable bag

with your purchases today?

and, as a famous rabbi once said....yada yada yada

Harbour in the Eye of the Storm

2010-11-04T07:14:00.000-07:00

The jar did the rounds of those gathered. Each tested their strength against the lid that refused to loosen. Hands clasped around this unbudging lid, some faces screwed up slightly in the effort, and others went a little more red-in-the-face than they would have liked. Of course, the jar was passed around the men at first, as if they were more capable, or maybe just to appease their fragile sense of masculinity. But, when no success came, one of the older women present, picked up the jar and with deft and experience, gave the lid a knock on the side of the table. After which, she opened the jar without strain; no bulging blood vessels, no red face, no strange groaning noises...just ease.

That little knock had broken the air-tight seal that was there to keep the lid from opening easily.

Sometimes we go to things hammer and tongs...and think that the amount of energy we are putting into something is what will yield rewards. The more we want a task to be accomplished, the more and more energy we invest in it. We often keep doing this without ever questioning the way in which we apply that energy. There are nearly always, more insightful and more creative ways to go about meeting challenges in our lives, and those ways can bring about the achievement of goals with less stress and strain.

Often the energy that we use in relation to our challenges, is stress, worry and anxiety. All of these ways of engaging with the challenges in our lives, drain our limited resources. Of course, these responses are justified, but, they aren't necessarily successful, and are for the most part detrimental.

Stress, worry and anxiety, drain energy that could otherwise be invested in some form of betterment. Neither of the three habits here, actually do anything really, other than drain our limited energies. In fact, most of them exist in the place of actually putting ourselves to making some situation better. Disguising themselves as useful, they slip into our lives while we are ruminating, milling things over, internalising, freaking out, wishing things were different or better, hoping for something to change, fantasizing about something else. They are wolves in sheep's clothing.

Those same energies could be used to engage intentionally with the problems we face, to seek out solutions, or make attempts at improving situations. Or, if the problem is actually beyond the reach of our control...we could invest our energies in making peace with all the things we cannot control in our lives. The more we know what we are actually doing, the less room there is for the toxins of stress, worry and anxiety, to poison our brains. A poison that can paralyse, or at best, hinders our progress, and clouds our vision.

Stress, worry and anxiety will never fully go away, but, we can journey. Some will question this, and defend their stressing, and their worrying, and their anxieties, as if they were old friends that they couldn't possibly leave behind. Some will simply not be convinced that we could live our lives without any of these, and to be honest, I am not saying that we can. But, I do believe that we can improve things. Like the martial artist who knows that getting stressed in times of conflict is actually detrimental to their performance, making them more clumsy and foolhardy; they put themselves to journeying, learning how to be empty-minded when necessary. We aren't all martial artists, but, we can learn something from them. It's a something that is a little bit Zen.

We can begin to improve things for ourselves. We cannot dictate what challenges life will throw at us, but, we can make little shuffling steps into better positions, where we are better balanced, and can be more intentional. The more passive we are in relation to the challenges that face us, the more the stress energy builds. The more intentional, the less room there is for stress, worry and anxiety.

It's not easy. It involves change. It requires a little, dare I say it, faith.

And, as a famous rabbi once said...yada yada yada

7 Easy to Follow Steps to Happiness

2010-11-02T10:53:00.001-07:00

I reckon that we humanoids imagine happiness to be a natural thing for us to feel, as if happiness were written into our DNA, and that we will gravitate towards it. I don't know about you, but, from my observations of my life and those around me, I don't think this is the case at all.

There are obviously different varieties of ways to feel happy, and I know there is much semantic dispute about what it means to be happy, but, lets just stick with a very general notion of happiness for now. If we can imagine what it is to feel sad at the loss of something, then we can imagine something at the other end of that scale, which might feel something like the opposite of loss...something like abundance. For now, let's call that kind of feeling "happy."

There are a variety of ways in which to experience this, but, honestly I do not believe it comes naturally. I think we, just as naturally gravitate towards stress, anxiety, self-pity, guilt, shame; as we do towards happiness. Of course, we may find ourselves stumbling into happiness, just as we may find ourselves stumbling into sadness...stumbling around into feelings.

So there is the sense in which circumstances arrive, that feel outside of our control, and so it seems that they chose us, rather than us that chose them. This would be like the death of a loved one, a sadness unchosen, but intensely felt. However, it is also like those accidentally arrived at experiences of happiness...like the unplanned chat around an outdoor fire...and that can also feel just as unchosen.

I think so many of us want to remain passive to life. Passive both to loss and to abundance. We don't actively engage with loss in our lives, finding a sense of peace with it; a peace that would enrich our futures in a life filled with losses. I also think that many of us want to remain passive in relation to happiness. They think it is their right as a human being. They think that they can live in any way they want, and expect to feel happy, or expect happiness to come knocking at their doors. Either of these is a passive engagement with life, living lives of immutable routines and rituals, comfort zones and control zones.

We usually avoid sadness, but, mostly long for happiness. And yet, it seems like we put more effort into avoiding sadness and loss, than we do into facilitating happiness. So, even though loss will come throughout our lives, without much we can do about it, this is not the same for happiness. A sense of loss cannot be cultivated, but a sense of happiness can. I certainly think we can learn to deal with loss in more useful ways, but, loss is something that will happen.

In fact, I believe that often in striving for ornamental abundance, people set themselves up for more and more of the experience of loss: unnecessarily. It is this kind of abundance that I think is a diuretic appeasement to the experience of true vitality. Ornaments and tokens, in exchange for living our lives intentionally.

I suppose here, I am revealing my understanding of the happiness that I want for myself : vitality

This word may mean nothing to a lot of you. It is closer to the word well-being than it is to the traditional western sense of happiness. I don't particularly like the word well-being, let alone the word happy. The latter, I dislike, because it often seems like candy-floss neon-lit nonsense, or alternatively, an ideal state that no-one has ever experienced, just something that we the unhappy drool over, assuming that other people have it and we don't. The former word, I dislike, mostly because of the self-help association. Although I am deeply encouraging of people helping themselves, that is not often the image we have of the self-help genre.

Many of us imagine hyper-sensitive, fashion-unconscious, allergy-ridden, co-dependents standing awkwardly in the book aisles, reading titles with bulging wishes, and weak wills: titles like How To Win Friends and Influence People; 7 Steps to Successful Living or How to Spice up Your Sex Life. Something in these stereotyped images, tells us of our own repulsions, our own disavowed selves with whom we are, at least mildly, disgusted and repulsed. Our weaker selves, that we would rather hide in the closet for a rainy day or a breakdown. Our incompetent selves hidden in shadows, gazing out adoringly at the reflections and images of more-capable selves, super-capable selves, the great acheivers. What we wish we were, but fear we aren't.

I don't like alot of the methodoligies, or the driving themes behind alot of these books. I don't like books that whip you like a tyrrant, into being acceptably successful. Nor do I like the textureless idea of human experience, that says we ought to be happier, be sharper-dressed, cheesier-smiled; generally, that we ought to be behaving like better humanoids...sit, roll over, play dead. Nor, do I like those that laden humans with far too much significance, as if we aren't all going to die...afterall, we can't be giving too much of a fuck if we smoke, or drink a bit too much, piss a few people off along the way from the cradle to the grave.

But, despite all the shite out there, they mostly suggest that there is something that we can do, and that we all have the tools to do it, and it is within our powers to bring about these changes.

There is a chosenness, a choice about how I will do life, about what I will create for myself, which goes beyond the natural. It goes beyond what comes easily. It doesn't always come knocking at my door every morning looking to play. With vitality comes intentionality.

When I sit naturally, I slouch.

When I do what I do naturally, I generally do nothing much at all.

When I behave naturally, I get a sore back, get dehyrdrated, get lethargic, get apathetic, and find it hard to change any of the above.

None of this leads to any sense of general happiness. Of course, for some, they do a little exchange with their inner devil, swapping happiness for easiness...the new language of convenience is contentment. Contented with less. No more desiring more. No parental intrusion and judgement, just doing what comes naturally to you. We will suffer seemingly eternal boredom to sustain this contentment.

So, unnaturally, I attempt to sit up straighter...not all the time...just when I have it in me to do it. I attempt to drink some water after I have naturally worked my way though a 4-cup caffetiere of strength-5 Java. I attempt to put myself to doing something, like washing the dishes or tidying my house, even though my natural inclination is to leave it alone. I attempt to cook a meal with some nutrition in it, even though it seems far easier for me to pop into the chip shop to get a Cheesy-Beano and cover it in tomato ketchup. I attempt, only occassionally, to go to bed before midnight, even though my inclination seems to be, to sit up watching movies and drinking beers until 2am.

Here, I have described the kinds of ways, in which our natural inclinations, do not lead to an ideal state of being, or anything close to it. Of course, there is nothing wrong with any of those things that I do...don't be confusing me with a moralist...these are simply different kinds of behaviours. Some behaviour seems to lead me toward more pleasant feelings, the others tend to lead me toward less pleasurable feelings.

Vitality...libido...mojo...Chi...Ki...energy...

whatever you want to call it...can be cultivated, nurtured and developed. It is not a piece of candy-floss handed to you by an all-giving benevolent parent. It is more often an ordinary, but intentional, repositioning. It is holding yourself differently. It is looking, and breathing, it is about hearing and sensing, it is about becoming alive...flourishing. It is an often slow journey of changing habits, that often seems as daunting and impossible as an act of alchemy, but, little shuffless can help us reposition into a place that is more conducive to vitality. Every day, we shuffle a little to the left, a little to the right, stand up a little straighter, become more responsive and alive.

Cultivating vitality does not mean that we will be immune to suffering, it just means than we are more likely to suffer-well. It will not make anyone immune to death, but, it may allow us to face our fates well. It does make us insusceptible to loss, but, it may let us lose well.

Happiness seems like the kind of feeling that is dependent on circumstances. It is that kind of happiness that is attached to sentences like:

I will be happy when I have (...)

I will be happy when (...) is different

You get the idea. But, vitality is not dependent on any circumstance other than the ones immediately within our control. It is right at our finger tips...and no matter what your circumstances are, you can access it. It doesn't feel like happiness, nor does it exclude happiness. So, don't be put off when you don't get the high and the fix...and the crash. That is what common happiness gives you. Even in the midst of loss, you can experience vitality.

I am no master, and no guru. Take everything I say with a pinch or two of salt. I am as prone to being full of shit as the next guy, I only hope that I am a little more eloquent with my shit. But, I do feel, that the more I shifted my gaze away from the neon-lit version of happiness, and more toward the more ordinary journey of vitality...the happier I have been.

And, as a famous rabbi once said...yada yada yada

It's Only Natural

2010-11-02T07:47:00.000-07:00

Sure, it's only natural!

It just doesn't seem natural!

Naturally!

It just didn't seem like it was in his nature!

She was so good natured!

They only do what they do naturally!

Natural is a funny word, used to facilitate many different things, for the people who use it. I have heard it used to define the unpassable boundary in the self, that says, this is who I am, this is what I do, and you are going no further! It defines the essential self that is unquestionable, an essence, which I have come to understand as mostly a collection of habitualised behaviours that have been fused together with a sense of personal identity, often in defiance against another's will.

I have also heard the word natural used to describe the desire for things to be easy; for things to happen "naturally". This kind of use, reinforces a kind of passivity, that sees intentionality as artificial. It becomes difficult then to separate effort and attempt, from a sense unnaturalness. For example, natural encounters with the opposite sex, or naturally occurring friendships: wishing they would happen with a kind of magical natural ease, effortlessly slipping into the satisfied life. The wish for a different kind of self, free from anxiety and expectation, obligation and disappointment. The fantasy of an easier life, with less resistance: an unopposed will.

I have also heard the word natural used to justify something, as if, by calling something "natural" it had more credence and validity. For example, sexuality commonly is discussed in terms of the natural/unnatural. The religious right-wing call some sexual preferences or behaviours natural, and others as not [of course, it is exclusively their own behaviours that they deem natural]. Those who fall foul of this religious sentiment, also seem commonly drawn to use this same differentiation, except that they want to be included in what is seen as natural.

This kind of use of the word natural, has a sense of moral validity, which I think is the legacy of a belief in God creating order out of disorder. This is an idea which was then glued together with Aristotle's notion [and scores of other philosophers thereafter] of man being rational animal, as if set apart from the other creatures...as if nature was God's divine order, and humans at the top of the spiritual food chain. So, when we find something repulsive, or see humans doing something we don't particularly understand, we call it "unnatural."

Funnily enough, this sense of what is natural, seems exclusive to humans. So for many, religious and non-religious alike, to behave like an animal is not natural for a human. It is this kind of theology that fuelled the condemnation of sex-from-behind [doggy-style], as being like the animals. The missionary position was more dignified, and therefore more suitable for the human...to look eachother lovingly in the eye, whilst making love: the missionary position. Even though, the people that came before them [excuse the pun], had been naturally doing it doggy-style quite happily for centuries before...and with probably a greater number of orgasms too!

Sorry...going of on a tangent there...

People also seem to use the word natural similarly to the way someone might recall a scientific fact, or recite a philosophical quote, in order to back up something they already believe. They name drop like fuck, as if renowned names could act as anchors in the sea of existential uncertainty. This seems more like an insecurity, looking outside of the self for authority, like a child to a parent; as opposed to finding that sense of authority embedded in their own personal experience. We find ourselves still hankering after objective truth and certainty; the fantasy of a unifying story that we could all get to if only we could see more clearly: the fantasy of a good-enough-family.

I initially started writing this, in relation to question of whether it is natural to be happy. Then I realised that there was enough to flesh out, simply in the way that we understand what is natural.

And, some would say, that if happiness isn't natural, it isn't happiness at all.

And, as a famous rabbi once said...yada yada yada

Head in the Fire

2010-10-29T08:44:00.000-07:00

If I told you to put your head in the fire

would you do it?

What about, if got lots of my mates to tell you

to put your head in the fire?

Would you do it then?

OK, well,

what about if I got lots of articles

printed in glossy magazines

and put on the shelves of shops around the world

telling you that you should stick your head in the fire??

would you do it then?

If I told you to do anything you didn't want to do

or that you didn't think was for your own good

would you do it?

So, if you do end up sticking your head in the fire

whose fault is it?

Who is to blame,

if you care about what I say

feel connected enough to my words

feel that they have power over your feelings;

whose fault is that?

Do we get pissed off

when trusting in

what others say about us

backfires on us?

Will we throw a tantrum

and attempt to shift the blame

onto the person

who betrayed our trust?

Do we get pissed off

because we long for some

good-enough parenting

and hope that society

is going to take on the role

of the all-sufficient caregiver

But it is nobodies job

to look after us any more

that is up to us,

the stabilisers are off

Be strong

Be independent

Be successful

Be a brave wee soldier

Be pretty

Be a good girl

Be a little princess

Be a perfect mother

Be nice

Be caring

Be gentle

Be lovely

There are a million voices

out there

and the only one you should listen to

isn't

it isn't out there

it is inside you

and the sooner we can all learn

to stop giving a shit about

what other people say

what other people think

and start living our own lives

for ourselves

the better

otherwise you'll find yourself

down at the emergency ward

with a burnt face

and, as a famous rabbi once said...yada yada yada

Fuck Plato

2010-10-28T06:20:00.001-07:00

Fuck Plato

and his ideas

and fuck Aristotle too while you're at it

reifying reason

puffing us up with thought

thinking ourselves into

all kinds of entangled narcissisisms

lulling us into the illusion

that we are greater than

the beasts

of the air and the earth

but

I could learn more about

life and living well

from watching the birds in the forest

or from the furry critters

that scramble around

in the autumn leaves,

than I could ever learn

from a beardy

navel-gazing

philosopher

of course

we can't blame them entirely

for our own shite,

our own disenchantments

they just spewed out ideas

that enough of us latched onto

something in the human

must have hungered

for a language that made us better,

the kind of better

that is less animal

and more divine,

less driven by impulse

and more ordained by god;

justified and set apart

holier than the rest of creation

more significant

more important

maybe that is the hunger

we all have locked within

to be more important

to be more significant

and all you need

is to stick a beardy philosopher

with big words and big ideas

into the same room

as a meaning-hungry human

with a few glasses of wine

for us to start believing

that we are more

significant

important

entitled

for us to start conjuring up

the audacities of colonialism

the civilising project

post-Plato

we felt civilised

no longer base and carnal

no longer primal and savage

and we saw that

disavowed animal-self

in those savage others

as we roamed

the earth that we thought was

now magically ours

unsurprisingly

we found them to be uncivilised

they had shamans

we had philosophers

they had paganisms

reverence and respect

we came loaded with disease:

smallpox, rationality and reason

and, if that's the kind of better

that western thought has given to the world

then you can shove it up Plato's arse sideways

and, as a famous rabbi once said...yada yada yada

The Blame Game

2010-10-28T04:56:00.000-07:00

You make me feel this

you make me feel that

he made me feel so bla bla bla

she made me feel so yada yada yada

you would be amazed,

once you catch on to this

how often humans do it.

if you just switched on

to the conversations around you,

your ears would constantly prick

as you hear all the inventive ways

that humanoids have

for shifting blame onto others

now

this is not to say that

they are not experts at blaming themselves too

but that is often a fall-back plan

once our attempts at blaming others have fallen through

but, both self-blame and other-blame

are change-avoidant behaviours

that maintain the status quo

so, if you are happy with the status quo of your life

then just keeping playing the blame-game

it is a sure-fire way to keep yourself

exactly where you are right now

and you might even be able to manage to maintain

the same state for years and years to come

wouldn't that be good?!

Imagine how else we could use our limited energies

if we stopped putting them into

shoddy methodologies

and if we stopped

telling stories

of blame

maybe instead

we would invest those same energies

into creating for ourselves

an ordinary kind of satisfaction

that was not dependent

on the performance of others

in our narcissistic dramas

and, as a famous rabbi once said...yada yada yada

The Soul's Black Hole

2010-10-27T05:22:00.000-07:00

When we focus on

what we don't have

we can end up

with our gazes becoming fixated

by the magnetism

of a black hole

a black hole

in your soul

that exists like

an infants desire

to have everything

every whim and wish

fulfilled instantly

by an omniscient goddess

a desire that becomes a demon

if you don't find salvation

on the dry land of the ordinary

for there is a far greater,

deeper, vaster ocean

of things you do not have

in your life

compared to the little island

of what you do have

and if your eyes get locked

by the pull

of that black hole

it will blind you

to the ordinary things

that are good enough

and that are

under your nose

right under your feet

good enough family

good enough friends

good enough pleasures

good enough escapes

good enough vices

so, here's a toast to what I have

for I declare that it is good

good enough

for once I was adrift in the ocean

and though I cursed my lot

at being shipwrecked on this

little piece of land

I have come to see

that it is

good enough

good enough for me

to be satisfied until I die

and, as a famous rabbi once said....yada yada yada

How Life Ought to Be

2010-10-26T05:06:00.001-07:00

The world is not fair

or unfair

the world simply

does not care

about me or you or anyone

and there is no way

that life ought to be

for there is no

pre-ordained standard

by which life can be measured

no standards

except ones we conjure up

in our imaginations

born

out of the

quagmire of our frustrations

as our infantile wishes and wills

get ignored, again and again

by a world that is not watching

and though we might prefer

the world to be a better place

inhabited by more considerate people

or prefer life

to be easier and more equal

filled with more opportunities

or prefer

that we had

more freedom and justice

or prefer that

you were more appreciated

or that you had more significance

or prefer that there was less

crime and corruption,

disease and dying,

suffering and sickness

it is not

that it ought

to be that way

it is just

because you wish it was

and if this, we come to accept

then morals are nothing but

a blank cheque

and we'd maybe be better off

talking about how we would like it to be

for ourselves, for others or for me

do something about it,

or make our peace with

the world that does not see

just continue moaning

about how life ought to be

and, as a famous rabbi once said...yada yada yada