It is all stuff. Who knows anything. Most of the time I am perplexed. The world makes me dizzy sometimes. When I get dizzy I react. I have strong energy and sometimes it overwhelms me. I often have to remember to be patient with myself. It is hard sometimes, but part of the true test on the journey. I talk about us as being diamonds, complex beings composed of many sides. I still believe this. It is one of the more insightful things I have learned in my life.

Sometimes I get caught up in fears that I am being abandoned. Sometimes I feel that I am being evaluated and judged by others and that I somehow get back into my shell and blow up at others around me. Sometimes the anger is hard to control. Sometimes I get caught up in my own drama. My reactions from the past still assert themselves.

Meh

It's all just stuff. I much prefer reading the hollywood magazine in the laundromat that details the latest adventures of the Kardashians, or who dressed the best or about the latest bachelor. He had commitment issues and is now ready for love now. How great.

Meh, it's all stories, it's all words. There is no negation of any of it, there is no justification of any of it. It all just is...

Don't mind me, I'm just a boy. Yes, I am a boy. I figured that out. So to get back to the point...


Is there a point, except...

A Philosophy of Life, 2003-revised 2011-my own journey

---in a future yet to be conceived—

A man and a woman are standing in a field. At one time it was beautiful. It was full of grass and trees, and flowers, invigorated by a fresh blue sky. Now it is a scorched wasteland, barren of all life except for the man and woman.

“Why are we here? What is our purpose in being here at this particular moment?” asks the woman as she looks into the horizon and turns to look the man in the eye.

“It is the truth we are seeking. Look at it, focus all your energy on it and contemplate its deep and eternal meaning. The meaning is right here in front of us. Remember that this wasteland was once beautiful, but now it is dying, and us along with it. Pretty soon we will die and the cycle shall be complete”

“We are a part of a cycle of forward motion that began at the creation of the universe. We are the final, living embodiment of matter and particles that have been perpetually in form since creation.”

“So, what it all comes down to is that death is the ultimate meaning of life?”

The man turns to the sea, and points out into the horizon, “this was once teeming with life, but now is mucky, lifeless goo. I was once full of that life, as were you. When we die, no one will remember us, what we accomplished and who we were.”

“What will happen once we die, when we are gone and there are no more voices?”

“We will be swept away by the sea of death. But this existence is only one point. We are joining something bigger. Every end is a beginning. Every beginning is an end. There is always something more wonderful beyond the horizon. It lies just out of the reach of our own perception.”

The man takes a big breath and looks deeply into the eyes of the woman. They share a glance. All that can be heard is the burning sun, and the sound of the listless sand being blown by the sterile wind.

“My love, do not fear this, for it is our destiny. It is what we were born for. It is our privilege to be able to witness the end of this. For it is the beginning of something so very great.

The woman nods, and caresses the man’s face. It is rough and firm. “So now we will hold hands for one final time and follow our path?”

“Yes, do not fear it”, grabs the woman’s hand.

“We are fulfilling our cosmic destiny, right now we are the most important things in the universe. Come on, we must go.”

They jump into the water

Eternal OM Meditation

Sit down, breathe deeply, and stay focused on your center. Think about this, you are in your spot. You are a small atom of a larger cell, feel yourself becoming a cell, and many cells and many pulsing life functions. Feel them all come together and you are the whole of it. Listen to the sound you make, be aware of the energies around you and your place. Slowly go up and farther, keep going farther up into the sky, feel the wind, and farther up into the higher atmosphere until the land is gone and the sky begins to mingle with outer space. You are between earth and space, keep going up farther until you begin to see the whole earth emerge from behind you, you see the continents gradually give way to a more expanded view that includes islands, oceans and seas. Be aware of the energies of every living thing currently below you, every little weed, every fish and sea creature at the bottom of the sea, every human and animal and everything that has life. Be aware of every distinct sound from the darkest sea chasm to the highest reach of habitable sky. Feel it all as it spreads out below you as you rise. Be aware of every sound. Listen for it, as every sound joins into a greater chorus, as you reach a point, in quiet space, just above the earth where the whole planet is visible in front of you. Acknowledge every living thing that is present on the earth. Now, sit in silence for about 30 seconds, center your energy, and listen to the combined sound of all life on the planet. Listen to the melody of the synchronized single note that it makes. It is the single voice of the planet, the collective harmony of all that has rhythm. There are billions of singers in a great choir that has been nonstop since life began in the planet. Every second it becomes a new choir as organisms wilt and bloom or dissolve or hatch or are born or take their final breath. From this ever moving diversity, you come and you are a part. Listen to the unclouded voice of life that this expanded perspective brings you. It is the OM.

It is the great spirit of life.

What a beautiful thought it is to think about what lies in space outside of our planet and its song. How many songs are there on other worlds? In the universe, how many songs vibrate through space? The universe is alive with sensation, feeling and sound. The song of the earth is absorbed into space, liberated from all constraint except the flow of eternity stretching outward into the cosmos. It keeps going and going until it all meets in a great harmonic energy. This is the sound of the universe.

OM

To the great cosmic sun—energize us, keep us strong, let us feel you

Dimensions--Part 1

I am going to talk about dimensions. In my life the idea of dimensions has been taking greater meaning on many different levels (dimensions), and like dimensions often do, they often intersect and interact. I find that the more I concentrate on a certain dimension, the more aspects of other dimensions in my life come to the surface.

In this entry, I will also talk about archetypes. Archetypes are useful in describing someone when getting at the essence is impossible. This is because we are all so much more complex than any expression can really articulate. Archetypes are useful because they allow us to draw up in the moment sketches of different individuals and how those individuals interact, and react, with each other.

Earlier in this week I had a nice supper with a couple of friends I will refer to as wise woman and noble strength. We had a nice supper and much discussion. We were chatting about ourselves and how we appear to the world, and how we interact with others. The topic came to the face that we present to the world. Wise woman remarked that whenever she sees me, I am always displaying a different side of myself. She compared it to a diamond, a whole and complete object that shines out many distinct sides. The diamond is perfect yet shines out a different side.

Of course, all three of us could relate to that analogy. We each had many sides and often out of necessity we may have felt it necessary to censor certain angles, so we can better get along with, and relate to, the world around us.

I thought about myself. In my youth I was bullied and had few friends. I adopted a persona of meek passivity as a way of dealing with it. This was for a number of reasons; first, it allowed me to get it over with as quick as possible. Second, it was a way I had in deflecting attention away from myself. In doing this, I would not be a target. Third, it allowed me to take advantage of brief moments of reprieve when I would be temporarily made a part of the group. Yet one truth is that I have always been a deeply sensitive individual. It was easier for me to often lie down and play dead, than to try and fight back. My sensitivity made it difficult for me to fight back, for in such intense moments all I could do was keep it together.

Yes, perhaps at some level I was too sensitive. Sometimes sensitivity and meekness can be mistaken as passivity and weakness. When other do not fully understand us, it is easy for them to take the hostile angle. It makes it easier than fully understanding the weak individual. I look back to one bully that stands out above all else from my Junior High school years. I will call him frightened bully because he saw me in my vulnerability and was enraged by it. He didn’t know what to make of me, and would always look at me with such sharp contempt. The contempt was piercing in his eyes, and there were times he came close to spitting on me. I did nothing to warrant his hate, but that is really beside the point. The point is that my sensitivity could feel the energy of pure hate radiating toward me. In those moments I became docile because docility allowed me to get it over with as soon as possible. It was never because I felt I was weak, and felt I deserved it, it was because that reaction was the only reaction that I could do in such moments so as to play the dummy.

One incident sticks out. It was about sixteen or seventeen years ago. It took place in the gym changing room just after class. We were all getting dressed and getting ready for lunch break. I am not certain what led up to it, but suddenly his rage intensified, and he cornered me. I could feel it. He came up to me and began to mercilessly berate me. Talking me down and such...Anyway, He took hold of my neck and was ravenous with his rage. At this point even some of the other boys were saying he should cool off and that he was going too far. I could feel his contempt for me strongest at that time. Suddenly, he took me and rammed my head into a wooden coat hanger. I was shocked, and dizzy. I was immobile, as the boys began to leave the changing room. One asked me if I was ok. I silently nodded. I waited for everyone to leave. I just sat there in my shock and I cried. I cried so loud and so honestly. This moment set me on a track that I would stay on for ten years. I went forever into my shell and I never left it. It was safe and warm. Who cared if everyone else was going to dances and parties, and having dates and playing sports and all that normal stuff that boys do, all I cared about was preserving my dignity. For the rest of junior high school, high school and the first few years of mature adulthood, in my shell was largely where I stayed. I would go to school (and later university) do what I needed to so, and come home and use the internet. I would chat on IRC, and I would just stay at home. I would rarely venture out unless I had to.

The point here is not that I am sharing my story, wanting pity and/or admiration for my nobility of spirit, the real point is that often out of necessity we do the best we can to cope with our lives. We do what we need to do, and this doing often involves censoring parts of ourselves so as to maintain our own balance. How often do we look at others and not really know at all? For years frightened bully would often emerge from my mind as a divisive figure. I would see myself as kind and sensitive and forgiving and non judgemental and all this good stuff, then memories of him would emerge and I would start having these vicious fantasies where I would get him pinned down in a powerless position and beat the shit out of him while talking down to him. Often over the years, he would emerge as an archetype to challenge my own conception of self. We often try to think the best of ourselves. We often try to see the other as the evil one, or the misunderstanding one. We often find it easier to blame the other so as to make our own inner turmoil less important.

Well, the honest truth is that we are all complex beings. We are complex in and with ourselves, and we are complex in our interactions with others. Scared bully and a few others like him put me through terrible pain, yet the truly beautiful experiences, friendships and accomplishments of my life emerged through my experiences with him and others. It fortified me and made me aware of the depths of my own self. I have never been able to rest in easy honesty with myself. I have always been aware of the different sides of myself. I have always been unsettled in my position. This is a beautiful thing, because the more unsettled you are, the more you are driven to explore yourself and come to terms with yourself. The more you are forced to confront yourself. This is the true gift.

Some Poems...

Eyes at Art show, May 2011

there are so many bright eyes
so many smiling, happy eyes
clear and fresh eyes
eyes living in the moment
inspired by art and music
as each sees each piece
in a unique way

immortality is seen
in the eyes we pass everyday

I often ask, “Is it all a dream?”
of course it is! Our lives are dreams
and part of an expansive universe
it is expressive by nature
as it endlessly perceives
through wide, eager eyes



The Vision

where does the vision begin?
could it be here or in the field?
On the leaf or in the tree
on the concrete desert after a shower
or the edge of a snowy abyss?



Sitting in Bannerman Park—the nucleus

It is the nucleus of the cell
of the heart of experience
capturing moments of life
living moments of fresh undertaking
expression, from here to infinity

Mysticism...in a sense

What is a mystic? I had a discussion with a friend about logical and scientific explanations on the “unexplainable” and it brought up the question, “What is a mystic?” My friend suggested that mysticism is not the same as science. This made me think based on my own interest in the scientific realm. Topics of exploration like cells and chemistry and galaxies and stars have made me think about mysticism in a wider sense. This is what I said in the chat:

You said earlier that this Gaia theory guy was not a "mystic" but perhaps scientists like him are a kind of mystic because they are also reaching for things that cannot be seen by the naked eye or comprehended by the mind right away. They are unearthing things that might easily go completely unnoticed, whether it's by a physicist, chemist or biologist or whatever.

I suggested that mysticism as it applies to the metaphysical can easily be applied to rational science. When we look into the sky and see the stars, we yearn to see what’s beyond the stars, when we look at a plant, one of many plants, we encounter in our lives, we might ponder all the complexity of the plant. It’s like we ponder its germination and growth and how it interacts with its environment and how it creates chemicals and engages in photosynthesis and all sorts of complex chemical reactions. The whole engagement of one plant can be said to be a mystical experience because much of what goes on is a hidden, magical process in that we don’t know what’s going on. The chemists and biologists examine the minute little cells that create the chemical reactions, and the smallest parts of the plant, while the chemists explore the larger relation of the plant to the ecosystem it is a part of and how it creates oxygen. I further said to my friend that:

...seeing and experiencing and coming into contact with something more than what you know like atoms and cells and chemicals and distant stars and all manner of things that are still on this "level" of reality but they are still brought into focus, into conscious awareness by the scientist one could argue that all this stuff is also very metaphysical in a very physical sense.

I have been taking a great interest in the possibilities of all that are outside of my vision. Many may (validly) argue that much new age thought, like belief in fairies and angels and ascension and star people and all these other ideas are not approached logically, as if logic was a prerequisite for understanding reality, and that everything must adhere to a certain sense of logic. It is true that one cannot be taken in by every whim and every flight of fancy that one encounters in life. It is important to be able to really discern experiences and such. Yet I would suggest that we need to let faith guide us at times, as I said in the discussion with my friend, faith is about “opening up, expanding the physical which is what "metaphysical" to me seems to be about.” It seems to me that this is where rational science and multidimensional spirituality can find unity. It’s said that every experience pushes the barrier a bit further. Even now, scientists are still probing many aspects of earth based reality in order to get more of a view of the whole process, and they are also sending probes and aiming high powered telescopes into space to discover new stars and planets. Even then, each of these new planets may have an atmosphere and a landscape that e cannot even dream of. They are in the same reality, the same physical existence, yet are so different. So, with experience, one can come to a greater understanding of wholeness and connectedness. So angels and all manner of other wonderful possibilities can be just as real as the flowers we pass or anything else we see. It’s just a matter of having the right tools to see and understand them in a more complete way.

I am coming to understand that our best insights may not be from the respected, sources that we rely on for our inspirations and our knowledge. There comes a point when we may bare the necessity of following our own intuition because there are so many things being said that it is easy to be confused. We must re-rely on ourselves and our own insights. Sacred texts are important and hold great power, but they are the guide and we may come to a point where we have to let it go and really explore our own insights in the way that we incite them. I said to my friend that:

I am not afraid of my thoughts and insights. They are powerful results of a life spent on the periphery trying to understand it all. I have been perplexed and twisted by “culture” as I saw it, but at the same time, gaining much freedom in the process. As I sit here now, I am free, from many things that I see now would have held me back from my expansion.

I appreciate the insights that can be found in learning from the wisdom of others. Wisdom is a personal thing in that we can only find it ourselves. Wisdom is exploration and experience of yourself. It is expanding your own field of awareness. In another place, I define wisdom as:

every moment when we are made aware of the whole of ourselves and how
we interact with our environment. It is the awareness of the deep
interconnections of experience.

It seems to me that, “Mysticism is nurturing the spirit however you look at it.”

Accomplishment

I have always had a mixed relationship with the idea of accomplishment. On one level, I want my accomplishments to be recognised as beneficial to people I know and maybe even society at large. On another level, I have often found it the height of my own stress when I think about accomplishments mattering. It's as if there is so much emphasis placed on the picture that we paint of ourselves and how we are positioned in society. For many people, myself included, there is currently an intense form of mediation going on. We are trying to reconcile our own inner guidance, spark and truth with the socially expected progression with jobs and degrees and respectability. Throughout my busy day I encounter so many moments that allow me to consider my own sense of self in relation to my journey. More specifically, I have many opportunities to come to a better understanding of myself and my own impulses and desires and intensities in relation to the greater world. This is both the greatest liberation and the greatest test.

I entered my twenties a very closed off and angry person. My childhood and youth were spent in a state of alienation from my peers. Teachers would often be bewildered by me. They would be bewildered by my unwillingness to play with other kids and join in with games. They couldn't understand why I was an outsider, a misfit. I remember one day in grade six. It was recess and a beautiful late spring/early summer day. I was sitting alone on a bench facing the sports court where the other kids were playing. My teacher came up to me and asked me why I didn't go and join in with the others. He said it in a tone like I was choosing to be an outsider, and choosing to be a misfit. I remember that in that moment I felt a kind of peace just sitting there, watching and not feeling under any pressure to join in. Joining in has always often seemed to cause me extreme pressure. It's not good or bad, it's just as it is.

I had an interesting discussion last night with two lovely friends. One of the friends (who I think very highly of and am not afraid to say it) said to me that I wouldn't have thought as highly of her two years ago. I laughed, and said, "if you had met me ten years ago you would have seen a different person." In many ways the person who I was ten years ago was unlikeable. This not because I was actually unlikeable, but that I had a greater protective shield at that point. I was very good at pushing people away. I was afraid of being repelling to people. I couldn't understand why anyone could ever want to be friends with me. I often thought, "look at me. Look at how pathetic I am compared to the glowing superstars around me" and when anyone sincerely wanted to be my friend, a reflex would kick in and I would push people away. I was afraid.

Yet something my other friend (a lady who is wise and beautiful) said made perfect sense. It is a perspective I draw on myself when chatting to other people with similar concerns. We may go through our experiences, we may put up our shields, and we may appear negative and angry, yet the essence of who we are is there. It is love and beauty and peace and kindness. It is who we are. Sometimes it may get masked behind neuroses and other issues, but it is there.

My friend said she gets impatient easily. I get impatient easily. I don't like staying in one place for too long without making progress. If I don't make that progress, my issues and self critical voices try to kick in and tell me that I am idle and should make plans...should do something. Yet the point of all this is this. It is that our journey is like a flower, awakening in the morning. In the darkness of early dawn, it is all closed off and dormant. Over time, as the sunlight intensifies, it gradually opens up more and more. It is not forced. It follows it's own natural rhythm. Sometimes we can become impatient with it because it is not going as fast as we would like, but it is still progressing in its natural way. Even if we may not realize it in our moment, we are opening, and blossoming.

The beautiful thing is that all will come together. One day we will awake and suddenly we will be aware that we are blossomed, and we are ready to share with the world. It is a process. There is no need for shame or bewilderment or fear or sadness. The process is what's important.

Aug 30, 2011

My Life as a Narrative

I was walking home from the grocery store a couple of nights ago with a friend. It was calm and warm and beautiful. We had mushroom garlic pizza. In that walk I began to share with my friend bits of my own life narrative. I began with a remark as to how I am very secretive about my past. I often prefer to keep it quiet. It’s a part of my presence, in a sense, to keep much of my history hushed up.

If we look at it in one way, we are who we are now and the past doesn’t really exist. It is a collection of dream like images that remain in our mind at times, but really have no more substance. When I am really spaced out (i.e. in deep thought), I remember life moments and they are not linear, but float around as if in space. I may remember my first day of high school and suddenly jump back farther in time to grade four and when I used to hang around with my friend Jamie, and was in Mrs. Nason’s class. The first day of high school was fifteen years ago, my friendship with Jamie was twenty years ago. Mrs. Nason died of cancer in nineteen ninety three, and Jamie was killed in a freak car accident in two thousand and six. I remember having conversations with these two individuals. For a moment in life we shared the same classroom. I remember when I was in grade six (just before she died), I was in the school choir and we went to play at the school district music festival. I remember that night clearly. Mrs. Nason was in the audience. I remember looking at her and smiling, she smiled back. She looked so weak, yet so peaceful. We went up on the stage and sang. That was the last time I saw her, because she died not long after.

Later on in grade six, our class went to the museum on a field trip. This was only a few months after Mrs. Nason died. I remember we were in a room, in front of a table with newspaper on it. I remember that we were making paper mache. I remember one of the pieces of paper had her obituary. I read it, and I remember being quite stirred by it. It was unnerving. I remember feeling how weird it was that of all the papers I could find, and of all the pages I could discover and all the obituaries I could uncover, it would be this one...

I often remember such individuals in my life. It is true that even the simplest or transient interaction we may have with another have the potential to present complexities that are so vast that we could explore them for hours and not really grasp it all.

One evening a few weeks ago I was at the Rooms art gallery in St. John’s, NL. The Rooms is built on the top of a hill. It is a tall structure with windows that allow you to look out from the top floor and get a truly panoramic vision of the city. On that evening, I went to the lookout area where there was also a knitting circle meeting. They were chatting away. I approached the lookout window that overlooks downtown St John’s, and the whole downtown area just suddenly morphed into a single unit. The streets I walk, the landmarks I remember and the houses and everything became dense and compact. Even as I looked downtown and saw places I visit on a daily basis, it all had a quality of being out there in a way that was distant and unfamiliar. I was at a vantage point out and above it all. I saw the wholeness of much of my life and I felt disconnected from it. In my viewpoint was my house, friends houses, coffee shops, churches and banks I visit daily. In that moment, I came to appreciate the truly disjointed and at times spacey nature of experience and memories. We may be living moments. We may be sharing experiences with others, and suddenly we may be at a place outside and above it all when even the familiar can become, if only for a few minutes, a long past dream like memory.

Aug 29, 2011

Untitled Moment

Sometimes we just have to rely on the moment
When we find something, we scribble it down
And then sometime later
Come back to it,
And try to figure it out
---Me

in the midst of great changes
the poems go beyond the momentary eye
far deeper than any single sensation
broader than a lonely thought
before there is truth there is conscience
and before consciousness is poetry
of humble thoughts baked
in the deep heat of anxiety


(C) 2010 Mark Brown

A Quote from life

“The vines will wither. Even in withering they are beautiful. It is all a part of a beautiful process.

Philosophy is an experience of life. It is recognition of all the wonderful sensations that we experience. It is in speech. To me it is in silence. We sit in silence and we become immersed in the energy. It is powerful. It is fresh. Even if we are limited by the perceptions of our fleshy form, we can be open to the potential around us. It is all quiet. It is noisy. It is a dream. It is real. It is a poem made out of many inspirations-musicians, passing memories, deep colourful sexy expressive eyes that see all and reveal even more.

Again, this is all just words from one person who sees it all in one way. Of course, there are as many perceptions as there are those who can perceive. It is all feeling. There are many perceptions to feel. If one person sat back on one afternoon and felt, there would always be a new way to feel. The feeling is ongoing. It is an interpretation-a hermeneutics of life. It is the Tao; that being who rolls onward simply because it is like this, but more. Read the Tao, live your dream, engage in life.”---My Journal

Memories of Life

There are many places to go. There are many scenes to see. They unfetter your eyes and allow you to see the whole journey. The horizon is tantalizingly laid out in front of us. Yet it is also clouded by a mist. As you keep moving, there is always more.

Perceive the motions in every moment. If you choose to, live in solitude. Bypass the noise of the outside. Find your life inside you, “My what a view!” Dig deeper and deeper as you mine the marsh of your mind.

Right now, we are all here. We don’t know for how long we will be here. We are all in this grass field. We are incubated by the sun. We are all flowers; white and purple and pink and yellow. We grow and are nourished by the sun and rain. There are no weeds. We are all present in grace, arched up as we face the great creator.

We are never aware of how long it will be. It could end now. We could go to seed and rejoin the universe. Our essences could drift into new experiences. I write it out, and feel the breeze. Take each season as it is. Each contributes to grace. As the sun warms you, take notice so for in that moment when your body rejoins the earth, your soul will ascend to be with the wind, sweet and fresh and nourished.

As for me, I am accepting many things about my journey. I am accepting that there will perhaps be little engagement of the social or sexual kind for me. I have had a few experiences, and they were just moments of lust taking full force. The lustful experiences left me feeling sullied, and somehow wasted. I don’t mean this in any moralistic sinful way; I mean it in a way that speaks to the deepest seeds of true passionate fulfillment deep in me. Encounters only satisfy a stifled surface urge, that once satisfied seem like wasted exertions of energy. Encounters bring only sadness and exhaustion.

I write and as I write I become aware of the progress I have made in my life. My diction has become stronger as I have refined my ability to observe and experience existence. I have developed my vocabulary naturally. It’s 12:12 time to make a wish...

Just last night I was at an open-mic series of performances in downtown St John’s. One guy got up at the very end of the show and began reading out of his travel journal. He would read bits and pieces and then say “Nope, nope” as he moved past parts that were illegible or that he didn’t want to read. This travel journal was a work in progress. It captured experiences he had not even two weeks ago up until that very night. He traveled from Boston up through New Brunswick, PEI, Nova Scotia and arrived in St John’s NL. He stood up there on the dim stage with his little pen size flashlight reading excerpts from his journey.

It was late at night. I was tired, getting ready to leave soon. I was touched by the rawness of his experience as life lived. I remember saying that life is not the final polished form found in poetry books or refined novels, life is the experience of living and expressing that living and sharing it.

I enjoy meditating with like minded souls and sharing cookies and tea afterwards. I have a meditation group I go to, and after our sitting we sit in the kitchen and drink tea and eat cookies. The cookies are sometimes Jam-Jams, sometimes Oreos, or sometimes fudge cookies. I enjoy eating the cookies, piled up so abundantly in a big bowl, and dipping them into my Tetley tea. I enjoy finding crumbled and soggy remains of the cookie at the bottom of the teacup and scraping them out with the spoon. These little bits taste best of all because they are saturated with all the wonderful tastes of the evening. One of my spiritual sisters said that this is meditation Newfoundland style, where we all sit around for a chat with tea and cookies after meditation. She remarked to her friend (both are Newfoundland women) how traditionally Newfoundlanders sit around and chat with a big pot of tea and homemade bread and jam before bed. The cultural significance of simple, sweet foods and intimate group chats is one of the greatest gifts that living in Newfoundland has given me.

A Discourse on Life

I think of everyone who I have met on my journey. At different times and places are stories remembered of shared moments with kindred spirits. Some are dead now. Some I only knew for a little bit of time. I look back now, and I am vindicated by time. I am fresh this evening as I type this. It is a beautiful, cool July evening. I am inspired, and my friend Jack is laying peacefully next to me...Jack is a dog.

The time seems so vast. In this period, it all converges. It doesn’t matter if it was when I was two years old, or six or fifteen or twenty or twenty five or thirty or last week, today or now, it is all a part of the collage. Each is a quote from my life.

Nice Recipe

Flax Nut Sesame Seed Oatmeal Cookies-Makes 100 cookies—A recipe from life

Ingredients: 3 cups dry rolled oats; 1 cup whole what flower;1/2 teaspoon baking soda,1/4 cup splenda;1/2 teaspoon cinnamon, ground; dash of nutmeg; dash of ginger; 1 cup raisins; 1 cup sesame seeds;1/2 cup of nuts; 1 cup pitted dates; 1 cup light orange juice; ¾ cup water; ½ cup flaxseed oil; ¼ cup butter

Directions: Spray baking sheets with Pam or use non-stick baking sheets. Preheat oven to 350”F. In a medium cooking pot, cover and simmer until soft: pitted dates, light orange juice and water. Combine the dried oats, whole-wheat flower, baking soda, Splenda and spices, add the raisins, nuts and the sesame seeds and mix well. Once dates are softened, pour mixture, melted butter and flaxseed oil in a blender and puree until smooth. After this, pour wet mixture into the dry mixture and stir until well combined. Place small amount of dough on baking sheet and bake cookies for about 15 minutes, Enjoy! The recipe can also be used to make granola bars. Spread mixture out evenly onto greased baking sheet. Once done, let cool and cut into granola bar serving sizes.

Transience

A Thought

"Perhaps we are living as a dream within a fragile bubble, blown by a shadow that is the manifestation of a sleeping giant. When the bubble pops and the giant awakens, as he rubs his eyes, yawns and stretches and eats his oatmeal and begins his morning, “Will he remember us and the existence we all had in the collective history of our universe?"---Me

Wouldn’t it be wonderful if our whole universe was one big dream? I often think it would be incredible to really meditate on our real place in the whole universe. This brings me to a meditation I found interesting. It’s called the death meditation. It goes like this:

“Keep yourself consciously aware for some minutes that the body upon
which your hands are working is mortal, that it – he or she – must
sooner or later die, and that in this sense right now beneath your
hands is the flesh of a being who faces death. The poet Rilke says
of life and death hat “to affirm one without the other is a limitation which in the end shuts out all that is infinite.” In the same spirit
think of your own actions as a celebration: a ritual of the hands
offering acceptance and praise of this inevitable death.”
---Book on massage meditations

I saw a beautiful little beagle puppy yesterday on my walk downtown. He is eleven weeks old and he licked my face. I was moved to tears. I hope that this puppy has a full and happy life in the way that a dog can have a full and happy life. I want everyone to have a full and happy life. I want everyone to have all the sweet love they need.

I want it for myself. I love beautiful friendships and the love that such relationships bring. I am fortunate to have discovered many such relationships over my life. Yet I yearn for the wonderful experience of just being able to touch and kiss and share with someone more special.

Hmmm...is it anything more than desire? At the same time, on my path is such desire the sacrifice I have to make? Sometimes I am uncertain how to proceed with my desire. The answer to such issues like desire is not simple for me. I find it easy to reflect on such things in my mind during rainstorms

Re-encounter your moments; experience the signs that are yours. Live as if you are living for your own spirit. Nurture your spirit. I have had great experiences that have nurtured my spirit. My spirit is nurtured more and more every day. I am thankful for what is opening up for me.

Spirit is a feeling. It is how we know that we are who we are. I know that in my desire I am unable to settle for anything but that which will give me all the experiences and learning and deep sensations that I desire. I know that I have high expectations of myself. I have always had high expectations of myself.

Excerpt from my journal

Cultivating an orchard of experience
every tree is planted
in a particular moment of sensation
the soil is the fertile ground
of the infinite sound

a journal is a beautiful thing
it collects the scattered expressions
fears, inspirations, hopes
scribbled onto obscure margins

life is a feeling
there are many such feelings
they are all over

life is feeling

"it is always being written"

streams of thought are like streams of life
you never know where, or how, they begin
you never know how and when they end

yet it is certain nonetheless

From my Journal

whatever happens is anyones guess
we feel, we want
we anger and we love
we thirst for the sweet juices
that life experiences offer

all that we feel
and want, and express
and learn, is our experience

yet, what happens when
the body we inhabit dies?
where does that accumulated life go?

how can we really know?