Shaping reality (#790)

There is a way to move beyond my own expectations of what I think will be. I have to trust that events will will occur as they should. It is not up to me to force reality to become as only I believe it should be. I seem to want to be the master of how things turn out. Sound familiar? lol. I suppose it is my youthful vigor and passion for a better today and tomorrow that drives me to insert myself where I would be better off staying out of. It is because I don't trust the outcome to be as I think it should be. First, I am not the one who gets to decide what outcomes will be and second, I need to allow my trust in the whirligig of actions and motions, to be my greatest asset. It is as if long ago I came to some conclusion that without my personal interjection of thought or action things would be worse somehow. I am sure I based that on some early experiences of misguided assumptions and have let it grow into an array of mistaken behaviour. I can shape reality just by being clear about how and what I think and do. That's it! Nothing more than just reflecting back my stance or position. I do not need to orchestrate every detail of process in order to calculate a final conclusion. I know I say the words but living the action is quite a different story. It is so true that words are cheap and that actions really do define us. I have come to know my frailties and I work on repairing previous reactions and behaviours. It is a continual process and I am consistent in my awareness now to see how far I still need to go before I can start to be who I want to be. I will endure to improve and shape reality from a point of view that only encompasses my thoughts and actions and not my wilful insertion into manipulating and forcing predetermined outcomes I think should be.

The power to rationalize (#789)

We all have it and we all do it. In our little worlds we have sway and influence in what and how we interpret situations and actions. Whether it is on a large scale or a small scale, we are given our opportunities to define ourselves through our words. I am so very much aware of this now and have adjusted my voice of opinion and thought to the fact that what I say and do reflects back to others, who and what I am. I am wise in some respects to caution, as a method to critically think before offering words to express myself. That old saying of, "It is better to have people think me stupid than to open my mouth and prove it", has some bearing in how I react to confusion and chaos. Of course, I would rather offer words that don't prove me stupid, therefore I carefully apply my words in a way that accurately expresses my understandings. I do not live in the illusion that I know all things to some degree. I live in the reality that I know only a few things and not very well at all. It seems that most every post I submit has as a foundation the concept of humility. I am honored to be spoken to of things that are important and personal and as such respect that any answer I give must be in humility and thoughtful consideration. It is the same for me when I am in a situation where I am needing advice or clarity on how to proceed. I also look to those who offer a different perspective for me to consider. What this does for me is give me a new way to look at my problem and usually opens up other considerations for solutions. I am not looking to be told or to tell anyone what to do, I just want to help others and myself come to new rationalizations in order to solve or proceed in the proper way.

The weary mind (#788)

That would be my mind right now. I am tired and have too few thoughts to express anything that might be worth reading. I am compelled to write on a subject daily not so much as trying to forward a concept but to keep a promise I have made to myself to sit down and put words to print regardless of what is in my head but more about what is in my heart. I am in a place today that is unfamiliar but feels welcoming. That is what I feel today. I also get to set my eyes on new surroundings that will allow me to meditate and experience a different perspective. To say that my thoughts are scrambled would be to correctly identify my present condition. lol. I am so tired but I have a little work left to do before I lay my head down to sleep, and sleep I will since traveling through the night was our choice of transporting ourselves to this Emerald city. I am not as spry as I was in my younger years and fulfilling promises such as these is getting a little more difficult. I am at my sister Marie's now and being happy to visit and share of times present and past is enjoyable. It is always a comfort to have accomplished something worthwhile and have little surprise bonuses along the way. I will end now and soon sleep a much needed sleep. Until tomorrow when my mind has been refreshed. lol.

A trifling thing (#787)

How little significance I give to you and what you think as opposed to you and what I think! I am beside myself at times with incredulity when I think I know better for you. It is one of my undesirable character traits that I am in constant disarray with. As much as I know that I am wrong every time I do it, I still find myself doing it! My ego is in need of constant deflation. I also wonder how my ego grows on it's own without me giving it thought to do so? Apparently it is a leftover from a previous behaviour that I have not corrected, or put into place an alternative reaction. See how much fun it is to change through growth? lol. It is important however, and I must focus on it before moving on to anything else. How do I do that? I tell myself that humility is for those who actually know things and if I am not experiencing humility I do not know whatever it is that I automatically engage my mouth, ergo, ego towards. I must also remember that most of the things I have learned in the past are unique to my past and cannot be generically transferred to any similar situation of today. My ability to listen is directly proportional to my ability to talk. This, of course, is not new and all of us do this. What I need to do is to try to listen without preconceiving or constructing an answer before or during the act of listening. Not easy for me to do but I do believe that trying harder will eventually give me some success. I do mean well, but often meaning well and a positive outcome rarely coincide. I called the title of this piece a trifling thing only because it may seem trifling to those looking in on me, but know this, it is far from a trifling experience for me and those whom must endure my actions. Struggle is the context of my existence and this is one of many I am still waging against.

When the killing time comes (#786)

When the killing time comes, I heard this line in a cowboy movie once and unfortunately it is still true today. I personally advocate for no killing time, however no one listens and heeds me. The reality of life in this era of ours is that people kill people for reasons that have brute behavior as it's intent. Those who must kill to stop the brute behavior are also forced to do so against high principled ideals. I find myself having faced the moral and ethical dilemma of, is any killing right? No it isn't. But in those cases I must live with the wrong of an action to stop the worse wrong from continuing. It all comes back to will I defend myself and others for the sake of not letting someone else kill them and/or myself. How utterly unfortunate to have to make that kind of decision, yet in today's world that decision is precisely the one we as a nation and a species are being forced to make. There are forces within our species who have no conscious about killing and some of them are in positions of high power. Our society is continuing to evolve and it is at a point where the best of our society is being tested by those who are the worst of it. If killing to keep from being killed is the recourse then the guilt ridden duty of having to kill must rest on our shoulders as we bear the circumstance of it. Our past history is fraught with despicable events, regardless, we must not abide any actions of our species that actions brutish behavior toward ourselves without an appropriate response. When the killing time comes is a phrase that I hope future generations must never have to know. Yet for now it is our comprehension in ways that still anger and revolt decent beings against brutish and dishonorable ones.

The better part of ourselves (#785)

My attitude of optimism has been an occasional topic for discussion, especially in the face of overwhelming evidence that suggests pessimism should be my outlook. Under normal circumstances that would be a valid point of contention. However, I choose to not let valid points of contention control my hopes and dreams. Obviously I am aware of the situations around me and their implications. I just choose to see beyond them and trust in the true nature of humanity. Even more than that I raise the spectre of reality to an alarm so that others may see that even in the worst of apprehensions, expectations and assumptions there is a value which can supersede them. A hope for the greatest of our wills to coalesce into a force of care and wonder that will defeat any and all odds when the nature of our lives, and highest principled ideals, are threatened. This inner resolve I have does not come from any one source but from many that have been achieved throughout history. It also comes from sublimity, a powerful peace that when all things are measured, the best of humanity will be displayed. This place of sublimity is within all of us and cannot be reached by fear. It is a place we have to find individually for ourselves. You will know it by the sheer humility of insight it provides. We humans are still the great undiscovered country. We have qualities about us we have yet to unveil, even to ourselves. It is curious to me, (lol. Of course) that others get glimpses of these qualities of ourselves that we have yet to understand. The absolute brilliance of humanity, human beings, is the greatest adventure we could ever take and yet never have to leave anywhere. It is also how I have come to become an optimist about the world around me even when reality suggests the opposite.

Expanding the envelope (#784)

This is a no-brainer! Our human "envelope" is flat and in need of expansion. The status-quo is not a testimonial to our greater strengths. We are still in the dark ages of applied reason. Perhaps we will grow from our current dilemma of selfishness and greed, a paradigm that seems to have grown roots so deep that extracting them is painful and excruciatingly slow. I do believe we will eventually withdraw from this backwards and brutish behaviour but a time of wrestling must occur before it will be withdrawn and a new paradigm of cooperation and common welfare is implemented. That is the expansion of the envelope of which I am alluding. It is a bit simplistic for me to challenge us all to better ourselves when most of us are already doing that same thing. It is the least among us, those with power and the unwillingness to change, whom are the ones offering the most resistance to changing to a more humane existence. The old arguments of tradition and privilege are not sustainable any more, yet they are being clung to with an almighty will of fervency. The time has come for the envelope to be stretched out to it's limit of bursting to allow for the dignified human instincts of care and wonder to be the dominant traits humanity can exhibit. I will continue to call for the insights of optimism and respect as the catalyst for our vision of the future and the tools we need to attain them. Every child is the son and daughter of our species. Every adult is a parent of our species and finally every mature senior is a beloved wise sage when given the opportunity to express informed knowledge. We are the greatest species of potential and real possibility to have existed in our human era. It will be up to us to create the society and conditions necessary for that dynamic to continue and flourish.

A greater overview (#783)

This post is about outlook. An overall outlook on the circumstances and situations we find ourselves in as life continues for us. It is at times that I get overwhelmed and start to feel frustrated and helpless by the general weight of all the activity necessary for me to live my life. I could get to a cynical place if I didn't have an overall point of view. I know that society is structured to keep us busy in a positive way as opposed to anarchy or chaos. It is an artificial structure designed to maintain order. It is far from perfect or even fair. I have no illusion about that. In other words our social structure is a work in progress. I keep that in mind as the weight of my responsibilities grows proportionally larger with my greater involvement in society. As I improve the quality of my life, I also create more responsibility for myself. It is in this creating more responsibility that I often understand the overwhelming aspect of my decisions and how they effect not only me but others as well. No one is born into a state of being where they feel no anxiety or apprehension at facing new or unknown paradigms. It is a learned behaviour and with practice comes precision. The fear of all the constant changes would smother me if I wasn't able to rise above all the activity in my mind and see that I am alive and gifted with opportunities that matter and that I choose to continue because I feel the strength to improve. All of which is happening in my life is normal, regardless of the newness of it to me. It is just motion, which I do regardless of choice. For me, I know that I get to rise my head above the din of movement and reflect on the notion of my being alive and able to do so many things. This always refreshes me so that I can put my nose to the wheel of life and move forward as I see I should.

An eye-opening walk (#782)

Yesterday late morning I had an opportunity to walk about 2 1/2 miles back to my apartment and I took the opportunity. I thought a good refreshing walk would help me get some exercise and let me see the world around my domicile. I walked down a major business corridor for most of the trip. This is what I saw, very little car traffic, some foot traffic but otherwise no real hustle and bustle of activity that I was expecting to see on a business/retail main road. What I saw instead was about a third of the office spaces and retail outlets closed or for lease. What I also saw were very few cars in the parking lots all along the 2 plus miles I walked. It was about 11:00 am and I would have thought that there would be customers moving in and about the shops along the way. What I saw was not that but an eerie silence of activity. No business was immune. Fast food restaurants, repair shops, tattoo parlors, gas stations/stores, drinking establishments, grocery stores, the small strip malls with a wide variety of offerings, antique shops, pawn shops, auto dealers, no business had any kind of activity I would expect from a midday Tuesday. If anyone doubts that our economy is at a standstill I recommend taking a stroll down any business corridor and see the inactivity for yourself. I know this is only my little part of the world but the consistency of inactivity was and is troubling. If most of us have little to no money to spend to keep commerce healthy, we are all heading into uncharted territory for most of us. There is a sense within me that life is about to change for all of us and it is not going to be necessarily for the better. For sure things will be different and the look of what we become is about to take shape. An eye-opening walk indeed!

The heart and mind are inseparable (#781)

You might as well give up fighting against it, you will just lose! lol. Both the heart (emotion), and the mind (reason) must collaborate and effectuate together. Why do I say this? Simply because I have the experience of doing them separately and have found confusion and incongruity as my reward. I know that this is just me as a baseline but I also observe what others have also "accomplished" by not combining the two in their actions and decisions and similar results to mine occur. If you do not have faith in something bigger or grander than yourself then nothing I say here matters unless you can justify the logic. I actually do see a pattern in life. Most do not and subscribe to chaos or predestination as their model. I see both! In some areas there is no sense, rhyme or reason to what happens in the present. In some areas we can actually control our destinies through feeling our emotions and standing on our principles. What you say? Let me use the example of "true love". I know a lot of people think this is an illusory concept, I disagree. But putting that aside for a moment, let's say it is real and only happens once in a lifetime. If it is missed then do we settle for less than true love? If it is recognized but the one whom the true love is directed toward has not the same feeling, what is to be done? In these types of situations, we have the choice to decide our fate. Whatever decision we choose, hopefully it will be based upon our inner principles we live by. Whatever we decide to do or not do we have the choice as ours. This is where I come in with the heart and mind being congruent. When both are in synchronicity the answers to these types of dilemmas reveal themselves to us and allow us to see our present and future without the veil of confusion.

I must always remember the child within me (#780)

Whenever I start to let my thoughts reason out scenarios about what is happening in my life I must remember that I am still that child who was so young not that long ago. Why? Because it is who I always will be. I may gain in experience and intellectual knowledge but the person who takes it all in is still me. I will always be my inner child. That is the most important thing for me to remember. It is where my innocence resides and innocence is how I wish to see my world. I have already lived through manipulation and cynicism, which is ever present if I let it be. I choose not to do so. I want the rest of my life to be about the childhood insights about how life should be and not about how it would be if I didn't care. We all have the power to turn our viewpoints of life into what we want them to be instead of what they shouldn't be. It is that simple. I am not saying that life will suddenly be wonderful with us by changing our viewpoints but it will be less worse because of it. Everything happens for whatever kind of reason, I get to make my change on my terms, without anyone else forcing me to do so. When I have left this existence, I will have left circumstances behind me that had value as opposed to circumstances being detrimental. I do not wish for any selfishness on my part to be my overwhelming legacy. I am a child of this Universe and as such my life within it must represent who I am. Who I am is inside me, that child I spoke of who was the first light of reason and consciousness established in my memory. I am the inquisitive one who loved being around others. I am the child who could never stop trying to do the right thing regardless of how hard it was. I built within me a principled foundation. I am back on that foundation after having abandoning it for the allure of illusion. To my good fortune, I have rediscovered that child within me.

Embrace your passion (#779)

I don't give into that old behavior that used to dictate to me what is appropriate to feel or express anymore. As an example, "I am a man and as such should not let emotion factor into how I reflect myself out to the world". That old mindset we were fed as youngsters was a machismo of illusion. No one I ever met could live up to that persona. We are all human and as such victims or victors of our emotions at different times. It is natural to feel despair and it is natural to feel joy. Neither can be regulated to have no bearing on us. This is why I say embrace your passion, in whatever form it appears, since it is you and what you are experiencing. There is no blueprint for how we handle what we experience. It is new to us and constantly happening until the day we are here no more. Never again will I let someone tell me not to be who I am. My experiences with the five senses I have been given are mine and mine alone. What I do with them of course is beyond me and requires some sensitivity on my part. Nonetheless, I will not hide nor disavow their reality from myself. None of us are mutually exclusive from each other. Life in this existence has taught me that we are inter-dependent. As such I must be wise in how I display my passions for circumstances but being wise does not mean to be in denial of my passions. It just means that there are appropriate moments for displaying them. As I continue in life and learn more about humanity and what it is that is at the heart of our species, I know for certain that every bit of who we are is important and should not be delegated to some lesser status by Dogma or Mores. As much as we need each other we should wisely adapt our individualness and our inherent self as much as needed without subjugating our passions and senses to some illusionary man-made construct.

New Horizons (#778)

Funny how I think! New horizons are the unknown and therefore a change from something that had been previously familiar. I choose to look at circumstances in life this way because deep down I am an optimist about life in general. It is during the hard times that I find the greatest reward because of my outlook. I am a persevering type person and when the unknown strikes me I stand my ground and wait for the next moment. All things in life are a gift and there is no expectation on my part about what I am due. It is just humbling sometimes when the future is thrust upon me and I am not sure what to do. Of course when times of change include improvement or positive events the outlook toward the horizon is one of confidence and anticipation. Those types of changes require little thought as to impact of acceptance. What I am referring to are the changes that come at us sideways or from behind where a loss or negative event is in control. The place in time where fear, in it's many forms, is the greatest emotion within our world. It is times like that when I rely on my sense of the greater ideals I subscribe to. I have to pull out all my coping mechanisms as a buttress against the fearful doubt which would consume me. I am no different than anyone else in regards to how we, as a species, react to similar stimuli. I am also no different than anyone else in how I use what is available in order to maintain hope for the better to be an end result. This is where I get to when I talk about new horizons. I am able today to realize and accept that no matter what happens to me in life I will always come out okay if I am still alive. Life is the one and only true need I have to keep. Everything else will be what it will be regardless of my best intentions. I can only hope that the best I do will somehow be reflected out to others and be a guiding force for my own destiny.

The need to be different? (#777)

I know that the importance of knowing or establishing my identity was paramount in my mind when I was growing toward maturity. It is funny now that when I look back on those times that I was who I am all along but I just did not know it! What I have learned is that the private thoughts I had were an amalgamation of my ideals. If I thought mean and unworthy thoughts it was who I was. If I thought good and helpful thoughts it was who I was. Not the kind of thoughts that are temptations or fantasies but the kind of thoughts that expressed my empathy and concern for others and things. My values, which in my case have always been in me, are who I am. I may not reflect back or express them correctly every time but nonetheless they are within me. As I have matured into adulthood and have found that dealing with and working through my fears and my actions, my thoughts seem to align in a more consistent way. I am still a work in progress, but the progress is moving in the right direction. What has this got to do with the need to be different? Simply that once I had identified who I am, I am not in any need to be different. I want to be the same as everyone else, as long as that parallels consistent human improvement. I will say that the right to be different, because practically we cannot all be the same, is something I cherish and will enjoy but it is not a need for me to be different as a coping device. I am content in my soul that I am a human worthy of life and worthy of expression. This has filled the vacuum or hole in my soul that often-times in my younger days turned me from improving myself, to in many ways destroying myself. I no longer fight the battle of who I am and the need to be different, but instead enjoy and celebrate the similarities we all share and embrace our human qualities with a positive passion.

The great motivator (#776)

What is the great motivator? The cycle of life is the great motivator. Just knowing that we continue to perpetuate ourselves is what makes for the enduring effort to make life better in any way, shape or form. Our children need to see that their parents have this interest above all others as our number one priority. It allows the younger ones to see our heart and determination up close and personally. We teach them the heritage most deserving of a species that cares for itself and wants better as well. We can always improve our society through finding ways to express ourselves in a more accurate way as well as by acting in ways that exemplify our highest ideals. If a person is not living up to their best potentials then they should not be held up to esteem. We owe each other the best of who we are not some illusion of that. I have found out that life is too short and any purposeful procrastination within life is done with arrogance as it's genesis. We are all the same within our species, where we differ is in outlook. I know that life is tougher for some and easier for others. Conditions and circumstances within society are not evenly metered out. Regardless, everyone of us has the same opportunity to make choice after choice after choice. We, each individually, get to make our own choices. What we do with that is on us. We must begin somewhere and the only really significant place to start is with ourselves. I will reiterate, life is different as to societal factors for all of us, some good and some bad. But every choice we make from this moment on gives us back our equality and purpose for living. That being, making this existence better for those who follow us than it was for ourselves. I wish us all the best!

Mind numbing boredom (#775)

There was a time when I could not take silence or peaceful quiet moments without feeling anxious for something to happen to change the inactivity. I was the complete follower of motion at all times. Even when I was bone-tired from exerted energy, I still needed for something to be happening other than complete nothingness. I am surprised I even settled for sleep. lol. Even in sleep though, I was most of the time rewarded with some action in the form of dreams. My, how I have changed. My evolution from those earlier chaotic times of my formative and later early years has come about to the opposite extreme. I do not seek out movement as the principle of the first order, nor do I create some action or activity to placate some need within me to be living all I can within how ever long I will actually be alive. That point right there gets to the impetus for my earlier need to be surrounded by motion. The fear that my life would not last long enough to be able to apply my senses to many varied opportunities this existence offers. I suppose it is a testament to my actually having lived beyond the early fear I felt that has allowed me to change my outlook on constant motion. I thrive in boredom today. lol. I know that too much boredom can be seriously damaging to my psyche and inter-personal relationships so I do regiment myself toward being inclusive in areas where that inclusiveness offers positive influences. But overall, the concept of sublime peace is attractive to me. I wish to slow my physical activity to the point where my mental activity can draw in my surroundings with clarity and focus. I am a creature of my surroundings more so now then ever and it is well satisfying to me. The maturity of how my life is appropriately evolving is illustrated, considering my age and physical abilities, and is directly proportional to my mind being pleased with the idea of boredom as a luxury and a sought after consequence.

The vibrancy of life (#774)

I am feeling such a pulse of energy about life and what is happening in our world. Not that everything is wonderful and progressing in a common sense logical way, but in that the time is now for the rebuilding of our foundation for civilization. There are many chaotic and confusing concepts being forwarded with not much thought given to their true value and the existing status-quo is obviously in need of change. Both of these dynamics of society, improving society and illogical course corrections for our society, have opened a vacuum or portal for a real earnest attempt to recreate the purpose for society. Our human evolution both physically and intellectually demands that a re-evaluation of who we are and what we should be doing can take place. What we have now has become obsolete and so are the reasons for it. We are no longer in need of class distinctions, rather we are in need of equal opportunity. We are no longer in need of those who must think for us, rather we are in need of equal opportunities for all to be educated. We no longer need those who pursue goals of self-interest above those who would pursue goals that forward our whole society. We no longer need those whose vision cannot see beyond the immediate crisis, rather we need those whose vision goes well beyond our lives and the generations of lives to follow. We are in a period of time that is crucial as to opportunity. No one has an answer for the past but together we all can have an answer for the present and future. The great struggle for humanity is between those who can see the future as a better and more intelligent place and those who have what they need and do not wish to jeopardize that. Even in an imperfect world we can still have both.

A startling event (#773)

I was fortunate to be in an automobile accident early this morning and I have been blessed to feel the effects of it. Yes, lemons out of lemonade! I am alive and grateful for that fact. Once again I am reminded that life is sacred and the loss of it is not to be allowed if at all possible. I feel the effect of the accident and for that I am grateful. One minute here and the next, gone! I realize the fragility we all share and taking things for granted is an attitude easily obtained. This type of instantaneous event opens my eyes once again to how disconnected I get to the pure pleasure of being alive. That moment when the knowledge that nothing I can do will change the outcome of something outside my control is the one place I need to remember how it feels. The feeling was anticipation. No thought, nothing but what is happening in slow motion all around me. I can say this with some certainty, the fear was not the controlling emotion. I have somehow passed into a plane of living where acceptance of what happens outside my control is natural regardless of the circumstance. Don't get me wrong, I did everything within that moment to secure myself in as safe a way as possible but the knowledge that I had no control, and was just a visitor to my own mortality, became abundantly clear. From the earthquakes in Japan to Haiti, we are just ornaments on this planet, here to decorate the dynamic of the inanimate nature of existence. We are the anomaly here, us and our fellow animals and other living creatures. Again, I am determined to advocate from the limits of my reason for the best of what we humans are capable of for the simple reason that what we do today can influence and make the future better for our children. This post makes sense to me but I have been up for two days and I feel a little less than sharp. lol.

The spirit of humanity (#772)

For many years in my life we Americans have been immune to the real problems that the world has and is dealing with. Our shores have for the most part been secure from the outside dangers that are more prevalent on other continents. In a sense it has dulled our senses to the sharp resolve others on our planet have honed. We have become aware of the troubles others experience but somehow we feel we are above such things. Well, we are not and we had better awaken to that fact. By awaken, I mean for us to become more aware of "what" is happening and the "why" of it as well. There is mass poverty in our world and as such there is mass despair. When the concept of hope, is replaced with nothing to lose, the danger that radical intentions will rise to the thinking of the angry is eminently real. What has happened here, in America, instead is the cavalier attitude that we are not all interconnected. That somehow there are those who are not worthy of the respect of life and are to be ignored into oblivion. A selfish attitude has been stirred into the thinking of otherwise rational human beings and an ill wind of ideology is about to blow down a once formidable civilization. I hear the clarion call of returning to justice as a response to the deepening din of elitism. It is coming in the form of many thousands who fill the state capitol at Madison, Wisconsin. An awakening to the fact that not only are our social ideals, that we hold dear, are under attack but the very principles of fairness and justice as well. Not since the sixties have I felt such a rousing of our American spirit toward the humanity most all of us wish to see. Some do not and that is our dilemma but the powers of those few who would thwart us can be overcome through sheer volume of effort, not unlike the effort currently being shown in Wisconsin.

There aren't any deserves (#771)

Tell me, do you have the time to fight for what is right in your and others' lives? Because if you don't have the time to fight what you get may very well be what you don't want. Do not assume that the right thing will happen whether or not you participate in it. Change is brought about through struggle. There is no other natural course for change to happen, outside of devastation through our wills or through mother natures. What I mean by "there are no deserves" can best be understood in the context of the movie "Unforgiven". When Little Bill, (Gene Hackman) is lying on the floor with Will Money, (Clint Eastwood), standing over him with his rifle pointed down on him. Little Bill says incredulously, "I don't deserve this" and Will money says, "there ain't no deserves", and then proceeds to shoot him to death. "There ain't no deserves", is mostly true, none of us deserve anything except basic human rights. In Little Bills case he thought he was above the law because of his sense of what justice was. The only sense of what anything is must be based on the idea that we all share in it. None of us get to make the rules greater for ourselves than anyone else. As we are not allowed to add extra for ourselves we are also punished for not standing and defending our own rights. When we abdicate our thinking and actions over to others because we are not prepared to stand for our own principles, we then actually get less than what we deserve. Everything in life must be fought for with an intensity equivalent to our principles. I know this post may seem a bit confusing since I am not feeling it's free flow but the essential point remains, nothing for something equals something else. We have to put value to the changes we wish to see, otherwise they will likely become changes we had not hoped for. "What we obtain too cheap, we esteem too lightly: 'tis dearness only that gives everything its value".-Thomas Paine (The American Crisis)

Maintaining my innocence (#770)

Where is my core? It is within me in a sense of location but in the sense of giving my core a name, I would call it my innocence. The first way I looked at life from my brand new fresh eyes. Everything about me that I think or was taught to understand came from the beginning of my innocence. Of course when I was born I had no knowledge at all. I was as purely innocent as I could be before my life began to be clouded with information, misinformation and confusion. That is the turning point for all of us humans as we begin our lives. We are given the best at times and not the best the rest of the time. It clouds our judgements and turns and twists us in ways that affect our lives irrevocably. I have been fortunate to have come to a place where my life had a chance to re-evaluate itself and the time to do it. I have been re-examining my motives and categorically jettisoning those non-principled thoughts and actions from my life and replacing them with ideals that make me proud to put to action and defend. I have to go back to my innocence to make this happen and start my thinking about what is right and honorable all over again. A "do-over" or "mulligan". It is as if the first part of my life I lived to learn and the second part of my life I am now applying what I learned. I cannot take back or do anything about the former but the latter I can, and I do, to the point of admitting my deficiencies, regardless of their genesis. I am content with myself to do the best I can now in the present, while still acknowledging the past and being hopeful for the future. It all comes down to me starting over in the one place where my innocence resides, at my core.

On being an honorable example (#769)

What is the driving motivational force behind the principled reasonings of my life? What is my life and how will it appear to those when I am no longer here? One major clue is what does my life look like now to those who are closest to me? I have a process that is hinged upon some high notion of everything I do is just one more step in becoming the better and best of who I can be. I live my life trying to improve on the humanness of myself. I know I have the best of our species within me and it is my hope to live in that best as much as I am able. What I do with this gift of life should represent the struggles that have happened previous to me in order to improve life. I guess it does all winnow down to vision. What is my vision for the world and my place within it? I see us living in a society that encourages instead of belittles. I see our society as striving to answer questions that help us all understand the nature of the universe and our place within it. I see our society as a place where helping each other rise to new heights is valued above our own personal comforts. I see a society that prides itself in displaying it's greatest attributes with honor and a sense of humble pride! I see a society where humility and reverence for the unknown is the baseline and bold courage the pinnacle in the quest to make it known. I see our society as a bastion for free thinking that abides by the rule of "no harm". "If" our species can survive the elements that are thrown at us by the physical universe we may have a chance to also survive the obstacles we throw at each other without due care given to the least of us. What I am today is an earnest effort to be reflective of what I have always wanted to be, a man who despite his own limitations, can reach out and create a world around me that is indicative of the greatest we have to offer.

Who we are (#768)

How do I know who I am? That is the question I try to examine and define in my blog. It is my contention that we are curious and compassionate, with a will to survive. How did I get to that? I looked within myself and examined the actions of those around me. I obviously have seen many forms of actions and the reasons behind them. It is more than actions and reasons though, it is intent of principle or purpose that gives me the insight into our overall activities and by extension, our natures. Even when bad things are done, the intent behind them has some, albeit twisted, noble ideal. We are made up of the best of who we have become over time. An evolution of our species is ongoing and change is the process of that evolution. We cannot be pigeon-holed into any permanent genre, we are free-flowing into all genre's and like water we will flow to areas that are continually new to us. This tells me of our nature to be curious. We have this curious instinct within us that craves to know. We are also a society that learns from each other in ways that help us express our need for each other. We need interaction with our species and by extension a void within us is filled through common hopes and dreams, especially emotional ones. Our compassion for each other is our bond to help assuage real fears about the unknown. Which leads us finally to survival. The struggle we focus on our will to breath from our first interaction with this reality to our daily maneuverings all at the core fitted around keeping our lives here in this existence with a determined resolve. This is who we are, curious, compassionate and survivors. Other, urges express themselves through our actions but they are secondary and only able to exist if any of the three natures I contend, are not in usage. The absence of any or all of our natures brings out the worst of what we are capable of and have no positive future in the continuing evolution of our species, humankind!

The respect for life (#767)

Nowhere in our make-up as humans is there a genetic chromosome that forces us to be destroyers of our species and nowhere in our conscious can an attitude of destructive behaviour ever be allowed to be acceptable. It is basically inhumane to treat each other in a way that would declinate our curiosity and compassion toward each other. Some of our citizens have justified in their minds a sanction that raises some souls in a hierarchy above others. By doing this they have allowed themselves to be our caretakers by proxy. The delusion it must take for inhumanity to justify itself as necessary action within someone's mind is unfortunate. Not only for the unfortunate one but those who are affected by the unfortunate one's actions. For any to think that they are mightier in thought than some of the greatest minds that have ever lived is pretentious and illustrative of a mind that has closed itself off to reality. For almost every example, the great documented minds of our time have always looked upon humanity with a care and humility that should have spoken volumes about how their souls viewed the chaos of the world some humans created and the shortcomings most humans have had to endure within it. We all started out as innocents. We had all the same opportunity to view the world with the best of intention. How that then morphed into an amalgamation of deceits and illusions is problematic and worthy of our investigation. We, as a species, have the ability to understand and even "gut-feel" the right of a thing as well as the wrong of a thing. We must all take into account our own judgment of circumstances and make the logical sense of them. One small wrong temporary solution to a problem is not the correct answer; instead one right major overhaul of thought and action is the answer for good to a problem that requires as much. In living life with the best of all our intentions, as the guide for living, we will then by proxy be respecting life as it could be.

You are as young as you feel (#766)

I may be older in years but I am still very much enthusiastic about life. There was a period I went through where I was cynical about the future and my place in it but I have moved away from that type of thinking. Life and my expectations of it had fallen short of my hopes and going to the extreme of losing my hope got me to cynicism. I am now aware that my expectations were the problem and as soon as I gave those up my life has improved, and again, my life is being filled with hope. The quality of my life is what I pursue in whatever shape or form that reveals itself as. I am renewed with a sense of my eager childhood to explore and discover new and exciting thoughts and ideas about the nature of our species and the activities those natures entail. I fully understand the shortness of the typical life-span and take little or nothing for granted. The vigor of life is an emotion of euphoria, either tempered or full-blown, however it is experienced and experience it I will. I am wise enough to know that my physical body is not what it was when I was twenty so I have to moderate some activities based upon actuality. I may not be as energetic as I once was but the determination and will is still there in abundance. I wish to never again lose sight of the gift life, for the limited time it is available. Being young I had a hard time distinguishing the true time span of a life. Being older now, I know how fast time flies by and there really is no time to waste in putting to action my senses, emotions and thoughts before they are a distant memory, as I will soon enough become myself. I have found that I will always feel like the child I remember myself being and until I am done, I will strive to do just that!

Life is too short (#765)

The beauty of having a little bit of wisdom is that every now and then I get a chance to use it. It also gives me a chance to hear my own words and thoughts within a real life situation. It is important to remain objective but to also not sugar coat the point I am making. The quicker we get to solutions for troubles in our lives the better everyone else around us is, however it does require us to acceptable to the idea of an option for solution. It is eventually simple to recognize the correct solution for us. It is something we already knew but were fighting against doing. It is hard for us sometimes to crystallize our thoughts and emotions when we are caught up in them. We need to hear someone else formulate our troubles in ways that give us a different perspective, thus allowing us to see the trouble in a clear and understandable way. Our emotions are our greatest gift but at times our worst enemy. Just because love is felt for someone in a way that is earth-shattering does not make it it right to be in a relationship with that person. Love has to be equally felt and expressed in both trust and respect for a relationship to have a chance to work. Anything less is disjointed and less than worthy of either to be in. Life is too short for the head games that come with an unequal yoking. No yoke is preferable to an unequal one. The benefit of waiting to find the right kind of relationship is that when it does appear, you will be ready without the tie of some lesser contract with another. In my own personal case I have spent time alone outside a relationship so that if and when the time happens for me and another to feel the same love for each other I will be available as well as I hope she is as well. I have to trust in something outside of my own thinking in this regard or I will, like I have done in the past, create a relationship on the best I can expect or who is available and eventually destroy that and waste both our time while I am at it. Life is too short for that anymore!

Where fear ends and courage begins (#764)

Fear has a place within our lives to serve as a caution when danger is eminent. It is a tool we should learn to value in situations where it is most applicable. To let it become a tool for areas of our lives that do not require it is not right thinking. Yes, thinking. I know that fear is an emotion but that is all it is. A reminder that something is uncomfortably felt, like being scared. Despite this "reminder", time still moves forward. We must condition our minds to move through fear as well. Just because we are afraid of something or someone, does not mean we cannot still take to an action beyond the fear. This is what is called courage. When you feel fear but still act in defiance of that fear, even if you endanger your own life, you are then in courage. This applies to the physical world and the thought world equally. It may seem that the physical world has a greater chance of destroying us but to give in to fear in our mental and reasoned world, destroys us in another way that makes physically dying attractive in contrast. When we bow down to fear we lose our identity and worth. We announce to no one in particular that we would rather live being subjected to others than to possibly die defending our rights as humans. When we feel fear we are but at the the crossroads, it is there that we can choose to leave fear and be courageous; or stand in fear and become a coward. Life has it's complications enough to allow us to become both in our lifetimes. I have examples in my life where I have been a coward and also courageous. I know more now than I did before and understand that I have a choice each and every time to choose my course of action. I understand that being afraid is just the place you are before you make a choice to either be cowardly or courageous.

The battle for the human identity (#763)

We are fighting amongst ourselves to establish our future. There is no other player or force involved in this battle outside of ourselves. Instead of all of us looking inward at the best of who we are with a view toward being even better; many of us choose to look at the world and the illusions it offers for satisfying some concept of how life should be lived, the basis for which is not on our similarities but segregating us through our differences. If you had any thought to why I have chosen to amplify my blog on the concept of what human nature is, you hopefully will conclude it is because I have to start at who we are before I can describe how we should be. "In the beginning", such a powerful imagery. Yet it is in the beginning of the history of human civilization that reminds us we can do better, if we can survive first ourselves and then anything nature may throw at us, it will be that we were able to recognize and correct our mistakes. It is this surviving ourselves that is my focal point today. Somehow our actions in the beginning were "unfortunate" in our struggle to survive. We used tactics that are cruel and inhuman to advance ourselves through time that are less than honorable yet somehow acceptable through illogical reason or excuse. To the Universe in general, I do apologize for our species and our inability to rise up to our better natures. It is not my place to accept blame alone, but it is all of our place to apologize together. No one of us is greater or lesser than another. It is our privilege and honor to be different but not in the truest sense of life, but in the less significant ways which help us define our own destinies. The sooner all of us can understand our equal place in this existence the greater chance we have of then reflecting out our best instincts. All in the hopes of giving us satisfaction within our souls and a real opportunity to combat what is left out there in the greater unknown.

Compassion, curiosity and the will to survive, really? (#762)

How did I ever get to these three instincts of compassion, curiosity and the will to survive being our only three true instincts? For me, I used my own experiences to help me define this theory of mine, I went back into my earliest memories as a guide. I remember being awe inspired by everything around me! Much like the look on the face of a baby as the baby takes in all the new experiences through the baby's senses. My little body was incapable of doing what I needed to do in order to understand things beyond my reach. I was curious about everything! I knew nothing except that I was somewhere I was unfamiliar with. There was another dynamic, besides being curious, within me as well. That being my dependence on the ones who cared for me. I felt some of my first emotions when I saw the happiness in their faces when attending to me. Since my early youth these two instincts, (curiosity) and what I generalize as (compassion); ie love, care, empathy etc..., have matured and expressed themselves in more enlightened and evolved ways in my life. I feel a gladdening within me that is constantly renewing my internal happiness. When I am in pursuit of knowledge or discovery of some previous unknown to me I am in one of my favorite modes. When I am caring about and expressing emotion toward something that touches my heart I am also in one of my favorite modes. When I experience a lack of either of these instincts, and a lack of the will to survive, which does occur from time to time, I find that my thoughts and contemplative actions are of lesser principled ideals and not truly worthy of my attention. The denial of any or some of these instincts creates lesser human traits that are not natural but learned. All of this has led me to my theory that without compassion, curiosity and the will to survive I have nothing left that exists within the better and best of human principles.

What is representation? (#761)

It is interesting to see what some people in political power call representation. I have lately been witnessing some examples of politicians doing what they deem as right or in the best interests of citizens yet not come out among us in any two-way conversation. It has become a patriarchal scenario with a barrier between those who have been elected and those who elected them. Of course if you have lots of money you can pay to see a representative at their numerous political fundraisers. There just seems to be a disconnect between those who are voted in to lead us and their ability to connect with us. It is why I call into question the meaning of representation. Honesty derives a sense of empowerment that allows the honest one to hold their head up and look people in the eye when conversing. It is a way for us to see the conviction of our leaders through their contenance, in conjunction with hearing their verbal vision, that helps us understand the problems we face. All we seem to get now are one-minute soundbites that are recorded or given in a forum that does not allow for public interchange. Thus the disconnect I was referencing. My problem with this current paradigm with political messaging and the alternative of actually living in and amongst the constituency is that the former is abundant and the latter is non-existent. With the disconnect as the dominant reality we lose our identities to an illusion. When those who are voted in to represent us are living in a world that is not of our current dilemmas, then a loss of identifying with the constituency occurs. The courage it takes to be a leader is never to be taken lightly, conversely, the honor of walking in courage reflecting the values and struggles of a constituency is a necessary requirement needed to be an effective representative.

My memories (#760)

It is always great to look back on my life and see the good things that have happened. Certainly bad things have happened as well but not so bad that it disrupts the overall goodness of my life. My memories reflect back to me the way I have been, mostly kind and open to be friends with most anyone. I have had some loves that touched my heart and gave me a sense of worthiness. I have been a few places and done a few things that were awesome and exciting. Mostly though my life is just the day to day existence of doing what needs to be done as to routine and responsibilities. Within the structure of my normal processes are those moments when fate comes around to smile it's warmth on me. Those are the memories that matter. Those that require from me a value in return for nothing. When I have given of myself, I am eventually rewarded in some way that I remember, not always within the same circumstance but in a way that shows me that things do eventually come full circle. I have been the giver in these situations and the receiver. It is important to note that when an emotion for a thing or person is translated into and action, a feeling is established along with the memory. Do I want to have joy with my memories or some other less deserving emotion? It is with pleasure that I remember the best of what existence has for me when it comes my way. I prepare myself for it by trying to be the best human I can be. I never know when fate will smile it's warmth on me, but if I act and think like it will at all times, then when and if it does, I can live and remember the best parts of my life. My memories are really all I have that remind me of who I am. I want to be reminded that I was the me that I always hope to be.