On healing...

Time may be your only solution
If there was another way -
A place to go, a pill to take
You wouldn't take it to heart
You wouldn't come back at all
You'd just self-prescribe
Until the end of days and the end of time
And you wouldn't be healed
Your broken parts revealed
In such strange ways on such strange days
On a long long road, made longer still
"Escape" is just "Pause and Deny"
A backwards walking, poorly portrayed allegory
For your joyful story
Lost and still waiting
A scramble to dress the wound
Overflowing with the fluid
To keep the flyer flying
To keep the pacer pacing
To keep this boat afloat when it's the ocean that's sinking
Aren't you thinking it's time to go?
Listen to the voice that says, "Let 'em go"
It's their turn, let 'em win
Let them roll and turn and twist and spin
And push and pull and have their day
Say their name
It's their day, it's their day
Fine, fine, let it be
Let it be that way
and rest
Another one is coming
But this day is done
As sure as the sun
and just like your breathing
Your life is coming as sure as it's leaving
Your love is flying as much as it's fleeting
All these comings and goings will surely be showing
Just learn to see this passing and pleading
As a need that is needing
A feed that is feeding
A sleep that is sleeping
Till all is quiet
Stillness
Clear
Time
Thought
No Thought
…
..
.
.
..
...
And you find yourself finding
A light lowly glowing
Remember your dreaming and let it have meaning
Breathe and be slow
You're back in your place
You must face your new face
So rise to your feet
and let your head catch up too
The morning can still feel
a little black and blue
But the light draws you in
And says "I have returned"
Get yourself up and let yourself into the day
Time has come again
To bail you out of the wages of sin
Live, I say live
Start the new revolution
Time may be your only solution

On or Off

On the nature of meaning...or lack thereof. We are here in this life trapped between everything and nothing. Neither is fully allowed through reasoning and careful calculated thought. We are absolutely responsible for choosing, either consciously or not, which our ultimate alignment will be. If there's an infinite and undeniable truth, a way, a light, a point and a reason, then the calculation finally asks "please prove it, show me". No authority in this world is available. If there's no truth, no point, no real reason and you wind down that deconstructionism road, you always end up at the bottom of all things with a problem as well. If your final statement is that there is no truth, then how can you be right? So here we are in this wild wonder, our minds trapped by reason in the purgatory of rational thought. And when you question all things, you tend to bounce faster and faster between the two extremes, for the middle is no place for people of action. The land of the selfish, fearful and slave-minded. And on the way out of this trap you make your choice...to be or not to be, that is the question indeed. It's our great opportunity to grow, to study, to think and compare. I do not fear any idea. I welcome them. They either eventually lead to the dark or the light. The on or the off. Meaning/Non-meaning. Its a chance to choose our quality and pick our side. And it's not so much a question of morality, as many would profess as the driving force. For with Positivity, morality springs forth and with Nihilism, morality serves no purpose. The choice comes first and dictates the latter. What keeps me on the life, light and meaningful side of the coin, even in the worst of storms, is the fact that we are here at all. When there could have been nothing, there is something. I know I want to be in line with that something. Call it what you will. It's a beautiful day and that means something to me because I choose to have a passion for the positive, to faithfully step beyond reason and make my choice.

A natural place

We all have places to go when we need to breath. The quiet natural escapes from cars and signs and TV and buildings and blogs and roads. I'm always seeking out more of these places, and I miss the ones that I can't regularly visit. The first place I found was a place on the far west side of Boundary county, not 30 miles from the Canadian border. It was a waterfall on Crystal Creek in the midst of the Selkirk Mountains. After reaching the remote parking lot, already miles from civilization, there was a mile or so hike into the darkened woods. Large, old growth trees towered overhead, the kind of trees that are separated by space but so full above that they cause a shadowed and secret place even on the sunniest of days. A cool and restful place, especially on hot summer days. Then the dirty trail wound up a steep hill to an exposed, dry, red rock overhang. Suddenly proportions are larger than expected. The outcropping dangled you a hundred feet over the magnificent waterfall below. White water, the rocks shining in the sun and the cool shadows all around. A good place to read a book or just sit alone or with someone and just be okay. When I lived in Maine, I had a few places that I'd go to find that kind of magic. I'd walk the breakwater in Rockland and get in touch with that cold and violent ocean or let the sun set on a perfect day. The breakwater is a wonderfully long (4,300 ft) man-made rock path that leads out into Rockland's harbor to an old lighthouse. Sometimes the wind is up and the sea is rough and the water surges up and over the rocks and can make for a certain level of excitement and danger that draws you in. On other days I'd climb Mt. Battie in Camden on a beautiful day and sit and look over the quaint harbor town. A barely marked trail started at the end of a seemingly dead end street. It ran up a somewhat challenging trail around roots, rocks and the native trees. It finally reached a moss-covered rock dome, the kind of trail that makes you feel good about wearing the appropriate footwear and yet it doesn't completely wear out your energy. It just wakes you up enough to really enjoy the view at the top. In Colorado, I've had the chance to scratch the surface of a few lovely places around Manitou Springs and Red Rocks. In California, so many places just take your breath away. In New Mexico, the desert rolls out forever and lets you know there is space for everyone. In Arizona and Utah the red earth and the green plants make the most beautiful contrast, something you can stare at and never be bored. In Oregon, the mountains mixed with a rain forest make for a place that exists nowhere else on earth. In the gulf, where the water meets the sand, the warmth and clarity of the ocean begs you to stay forever...and maybe part of you does. And here in Virginia, I take the time to regularly visit the Noland Trail in Newport News for walks and runs, and although it's surrounded by the city, it's a beautiful place to enjoy. I ride the mountain bike trails of the Yorktown and Williamsburg area and my soul takes a deep breath, in and amongst the forest. I get out to the western part of the state in the warm weather and camp with my friends in the mountains. We play music, we drink too much, smoke our minds, we build fires and forget that we're supposed to feel like we're roughing it. These are the places that I seek more often then not. The places where I can feel like I am a part of this fine place. Where that moonlight is reflecting off the water. Where the breeze is light and the sun is rising. Where the smell of the ocean overpowers the rest of the world. Where the trail leads around the corner to a new place.

Silver

Optimism is the gift we give ourselves. We choose our fate, our opinion, our assesment and our future through our will and actions. We choose our point of view. The world can lay upon us through our own acception of that which we feel there is no control over, or we can choose to view the events of our lives as a growing and learning experience. The truth is the rock upon our dramatic waves will crash. In time we can learn to be the swift current which is drawn and optimized by it. In every situation we can decide how to react, if we are wise. To be molded in truth is to be at one with your life. Our mouths profess the very things that will come to pass. We hold the very power to direct our fate and to learn from our mistakes. Listen to the words you are saying. There is silver everywhere. In each dark cloud that comes to dampen our spirit, the choice is still ours on how we view it. Be an optimist and joy will come to you. Everyone will rise and fall, but the optimist will appreciate the experience as a wholistic adventure that is a precious gift and a reason to celebrate each day. Pain is inevitable, it's a part of each moment. Joy is too. You can focus on either. The wise will smile in face of adversity and the cluttered soul will dispair in its rise. I would rather smile and be filled with joy, then drown in the ever deepening pit of hoplessness. We shall rise. Just look for your silver and you will find it.

The intensity of it all

Chills. Like spires through my veins. My mind and body fuse. I am set upon an idea. I exude a look and presence of pure intensity, one that has me and yet I have channeled and control. We are symbiotic. This feeling of tapping the source and trembling the foundations of the Earth and I am not afraid. I feel alive. This is where I belong, where I mean what I say, where I act as I am. It is who I am, one-hundred and ten. Whatever it is that I truly involve myself with, the bond is inextricable. Its left me broken down to nothing. Its brought me to the highest places. I don't know if it's a value I learned or something I was born with. I question whether I should work to decrease this spirit in me or if I should accept and embrace it within myself. In the past I have blindly allowed it and used it's power to accomplish many selfish motives, which ultimately led to other's suffering and my own. I let it into the love I've been a part of and it has served to show me such wonderful and selfless emotion that set me beyond all that I have seen, then turned and took it all away again. If I decrease it, am I not simply decreasing myself? If I embrace it, do I not doom myself to this violently extreme pendulum of emotion, of pride and humility, of gain and loss. Part of me envies those more collected and less prone to such a range of intensity. Part of me feels sorry for those that would never dare experience the emotional extremes life has to offer. Maybe we don't really have a choice over how our hearts bleed. Some more, some less. Is it nature? Is it nurture? Does it matter if we can't change it? We do however have a choice as to what to do with the blood. I make music, I write, I create with all that excess, when it has nowhere else to go...it goes here.

Insanity at it's best

So here's a mystery. Why do we all embrace a little insanity from time to time? I don't know anyone that doesn't. Granted there are those who get so very lost in it and those that never come back. We make up realities that cover the gaps in our lives that we can't explain, the parts we refuse to accept or seem impossible. Then, while we're in that state of confusion and grasping for reason, we find others in the same place looking for answers. If you haven't been there yet, you will be. If you're there right now, you could go off in so many directions. Some are harmless and interesting, some give you direction while you find yourself, still many others are dangerous and destructive. Some the world's best art comes from this state of instability, maybe because it let's people know they are not alone in feeling so crazy...in fact it's perfectly normal, if not a little off center. Center is boring anyway. It seems that religion preys on these troubled minds at times. Certainly every religion starts out as a cult of the insane and either grows to become part of the social norm or is extinguished for being so radically different that it is clearly a mythical manifestation of some nut job's bad acid trip. It's not just religion though, psychiatrists, psychologists and therapists tap into this mania. Drudging up ugly history and prescribing pills to counter this naturally occurring phenomenon. It's all a big race to get back to sanity, to get your feet back on the ground and stop questioning every emotional, literal or intuitive experience's relevance. Here are your pre-packaged answers: it's God, your parents, the traumatic events that recently or not so recently plagued you, take 6 months, read some books, get some exercise and take a nice long bath and everything will be okay. And usually it is. The kicker is that no one is immune to being in touch with this type of thinking and how they interpret it is a personal journey. Thus, some truth must exist to what we call insanity. If everyone is working on this mystery at one time or another, then there must be something to it. Maybe there is more going on then that which we can explain. How hard is that to accept? Science and such has explained much of what humans took to be mysteries for all but recent history. What new discoveries await us? What new senses can we learn to develop? What empirical evidence will come to light concerning the soul, our great frontier? Why can't we pull this together? Some people have the hardest time just letting, the unexplained remain as such. Maybe it's okay to accept that parts of this experience won't be revealed specifically. Maybe we're just lucky to be here and it's a waste of time to worry so much the pieces that fit without our understanding. Miracles and tragedies happen everyday, must we know their reason? Maybe so, it seems that is part of what connects us, our need to have the mystery resolved. Funny that the thing that connects us all is also the very thing that keeps us apart.

Still running

I first started running when I was about 16. I wanted to run in Bloomsday with my Dad and brother. Bloomsday is one of the world's largest "fun runs" and it's held annually in the spring in Spokane, WA. It's called a fun run because of the distance - 12K, which works out to 7.45 miles. To anyone starting out running, 7.45 miles is a formidable distance to run. The challenge of completing such a feat was enough to get me out the door as a teenager. I began by running as much as I could of the two mile loop that wound around my rural, mountain, northwest home. Before long I was able to run the loop with some ease and I upped the mileage to 3 miles by running out into the valley that exploded below our little house in the hills. Then 4, then 5, then 8. I attempted the 8 mile loop twice before the big run. I don't think I actually ran the whole way, but I went as far as I could before walking. That first Bloomsday I cramped up around 7 miles and had to walk. The pain and anguish of it all was enough to seriously disspoint me. I ran in the last few hundred yards, but I knew I should have trained better, ran smarter and something about the fact that the challenge was not over made me discover a love for running that has stayed with me. I've always been goal oriented, always planned, executed and overcome...but this running thing is different. With running, you make your goals, you execute, you overcome...but it still has you. The moment you let off or lose your concentration, you have to start all the way over again. Running isn't something you can put in your pocket and say it's yours. It only allows you to catch up to your potential. And there's more. So much more. Running is your chance to reset your mental clock, to realign your priorities, to examine your life and let your mind find it's peace. It's the best place to make decisions, to tap into creativity and to allow those things that trouble you to drift away. And your body is just the same in a physical sense. Your lungs expell all the crap you've been breathing in. Your heart beats in perfect rhythm with your steps. Your muscles align. The food you've eaten becomes the fuel for this machine that is awake, aware and alive. Endorphins surge through your system and the mind, body and soul are cleansed. You can't help but feel happy, why wouldn't you? Of course, if you've never run, or only run a little bit without any direction or plan for where you might want to let it take you...then running sucks. It's hard, hard because the body needs to work up to the place where it feels comfortable with this activity. That initial hump is tough, and it's something that will keep a person from reaping the rewards of running if they let it hold them down. To those in that situation, I say, run somewhere beautiful, only run as much as you feel comfortable with, keep the run enjoyable. Make a plan to run 3 times a week, but keep the runs short and approachable. Preparing for a run in certain ways can make it that much more easy to enjoy as well. As far as food and eating goes, basically, don't eat anything heavy before running - run on a near empty stomach, it's just lighter and easier to get yourself around and you can eat your heart out afterward...although you'll probably just want lots of water...which is great for you. Don't overly concern yourself with carbs and vitamins and all that bull. However, I'd avoid carbonated drinks before a run too. Think about it, you're basically shaking up a Pepsi for a half an hour inside your intestines while you are running...that won't feel good. I prefer a more common sense approach to diet. If you feel like eating healthier foods, then do it. If not, well at least you are exercising. I love Pepsi. I love pizza. I just try not to take that stuff in all the time and especially not when I'm about to run. The nice thing is, the running actually starts to dictate a healthier diet. After running, many times I find myself craving a nice piece of bar-b-qued chicken or a baked potato, instead of a hamburger and fries. And you end up drinking more water which also curbs your appetite. The diet comes after the running, that way I don't force anything on myself, I just allow my body to tell me what I want to eat. I'm training for my third marathon (26.2 miles) right now and I'm excited about it. I'm excited for a number of reasons. First off, I'm making a nice vacation to southern California out of it, which makes for a good time. From a running perspective, I'm psyched because this will be the first marathon that I will run with complete confidence in my ability to complete it skillfully and in the best shape I can remember being in. In my first marathon, I cramped up at 20 miles as was forced to walk...talk about flashback to that first Bloomsday. My determination set in and I returned the next year to prove to myself that I could actually do it, and I did. It was tough, but I ran it with the notion to simply survive the entire thing. No cramps, no walking, okay time. Now a few years have passed and I've run a number of shorter runs, half-marathons and such in the interim. My attitude is different now, I am more mature, smarter, focused and confident. This year I will run very well. I am a runner. It is a part of my story.

I don't feel so good

I had too much to drink last night. I didn't get stupid. I didn't stay out too late. I didn't even have that much fun...and now I feel like crap. Yay! I would ask, "why?" but I already know the answer. I just didn't have anything else to do, no good reason to be responsible and it was payday. It would be nice to know ahead of time when a night is going to go that way. I would slap myself in the face and say, "Stay home, read a book, go to sleep!". I think I'll do that tonight just to make up for last night. Of course, I am one to look for the silver lining. Here's what mine is today: Everything about today is going to slowly get better. My head will clear up. My stomach will stop churning. I'll realize I can rest and relax. I'll probably go for a run and my attitude and outlook will turn positive again. Maybe I'll hang out with some good friends or play some music or get some good rest tonight. In any case, all things are relative. When you start out a day this low, it's like winning the lottery just getting back to normal.

Yeild

Let 'em go. Let them win. Let them have it. It's okay. Breathe. If your day is past or your time has not come yet, be at peace. Let them run and flow past. Regain your strength, know that all things grow and recede. Be at peace. It is a fool that strives to always be in the lead, a success unending, an unfailing driving force of your personal mission in life. Work towards whatever end you are intended to work toward, but know that you must yield at times as well as succeed. It is the nature of all things to come and go, and to strive against nature, is to live in disharmony. Sufficiency is a far greater goal then to endlessly conquer and dominate. The fact is, sometimes you will and sometimes you won't. To rest comfortably in this understanding is to be at peace and to truly enjoy life. Love teaches us this. Patience is rewarded and its rewards taste sweeter than those that are forced. When you are winning, win with grace and thankfulness. When you are losing, lose with grace and thankfulness and there shall be peace.

Religion and the new world drama

What a time to be alive. The crashing wave of information is causing a steeply increasing aversion to all things religious. We are getting exposed to so much more than any other generation and this is just the beginning. A new world view philosophy is inevitable. In our grandparents time, it was difficult to learn about what other people around the world were thinking about space and time, sex and drugs, God and life, taxes and economic structures. Most information about other cultures was fouled with stereotypes, misinterpretation, fear, hate, misunderstanding and lacked respect. In our grandparent's grandparent's time, it was all but impossible to know much of anything about life outside of their own fishbowl. In less than 100 years, self education has become a matter of satifying curiousity, the entire world's philosophy is at our fingertips with the ease of a click. It was not so long ago that knowledge used to be a land reserved for wealthy families and tainted with the stench of entitlement or twisted by the ambitious, self serving wims of obsessive thinkers or rigidly controlled by powerful governments and religious bodies. Now Joe Blow can read about becoming a Bodhisattva and check out real time satellite footage of the Mekong river while having an IM chat with a Danish stripper and enjoying a Hot Pocket (those should be on the list). There is an ingrained fear of this new reality driven by organized religion especially. Aren't we the lucky ones though? I mean, fear is not of God. We should be joyously learning all these things. I am simply finding that we're more alike than we realize. Everybody laughs and cries, suffering is no fun, sushi is awesome, love is the best, lies are the worst. Strick dogma is beyond passe', it's negative and destructive. Listen to this beautiful music, enjoy and be thankful for this day, be free, treat others as you would be treated, take care of this lovely planet, remember your soul, explore and discover, create something.

Lies are the worst

Dishonesty is beyond my reasoning. I really don't get it. There was a time when I would tell lies to get what I thought I needed out of life. I would cheat the system, I would stack the odds and all the time what I was really doing was setting up a big fall for myself. It's one of those sure things in life. Lies lead to a downfall. They catch up with you. The truth always comes to the surface...always. Feel free to test that theory. So maybe I do get it, why people lie, they just haven't learned the hard lesson of how you end up hurting yourself and others through allowing something less than true to surround you. It's not necessary I say. Living honestly lets me always have a clear conscience, even if sometimes I have to tell people things I would rather not. The truth is beautiful in that way, honesty outshines the bitterness of some cold truths. It's truly the nature in which you behave that defines us, not what you do but how you do it, not what you've done but how you did it, not where you go but why you're there and not where you've been but why you went. Motivation is the heart of all matters and the soul's intent is always being stamped on everything you touch whether you expose it or not. The hidden agendas eventually make themselves known, the lies tell on themselves and you must choose to be their champion or to face the truth from the get go. Maybe I'm just tired of wasting time. I'd rather be up front about everything then have to wait for the truth to come out. The nice thing about living this way is that it really makes you think about how all things will effect others since we will always be owning up to our actions. I have no trouble with making up lies anymore, but I do have a new problem. It's hard to understand why anyone lies. Don't lie, live in love and honesty. It will be okay. In fact, it will be better.

Emotional Armor

I was born wide open to this world. To the opinions and the weight of all these people's emotional baggage. Sharing the load. Years later I'm just now fighting to keep from building up a callous layer to protect myself. Should I convince myself to only carry the loads that seem wise to invest in? I don't think it's right to deny pure emotion. Even now as I write this I'm debating. What's the value of being brought down by mild disappointment? Are we supposed to learn how to brush off the trouble brought when others let us down? On the other hand, are we suppose to feel it right down to the marrow, to know it, to own it and move past it? It seems as though the latter is the righteous path but the first is the wise one. When righteousness conflicts wisdom, which path is to be chosen? Wisdom is the culmination of learning but it is limited to human understanding and personal experience...where wisdom can only go so far, righteousness is the sublime infinite. When we are born, we don't question suffering, we just suffer and survive. We are born perfect and then slowly learn to be wise throughout our lives. When we seem to be getting to the point where we know how to treat each other in our elderly years, our time on this Earth is gone. Love and forgiveness is both righteous and wise, and so that is the path I will choose. To suffer this wound and to forgive and forget it too.

Stop with the war already

Enough. Enough war and killing and hard lined bullshit attitudes and political objectives and patriotism-polished justification. Enough. Don't kill anyone. Stop. It needs to stop. Everyone needs to grow up. The look in our leaders' eyes is that of angry children who only know how to play punch for punch. Everyone needs a timeout in the corner to think about what they've done. All the weapons need to be destroyed. That is the answer. Who cares if it's not practical or pragmatic. Who cares if it's impossible. Love each other, forgive each other. That is the answer. Abandon hate, mistrust, fear, and lies. Stop the rise of violence. Bring peace. Taking one life is the same as taking the entire universe. Who gives anyone the right to do that? Why argue over something so simple. History teaches us that we only fight and fight, kill and kill, over and over. Why can't we be better than that? Who is teaching these values of death and fear? Love is the answer. I believe in love and will not abandon it. How long will it take for the world to know love for everyone? So many opinions to overcome, so many people who never mature, so far to go. I can only be an example. Let's all be examples.

This film is on a maddening loop...

Somebody said these lives come and go. You'll be here again. I believed the idea in principle but it seems you have to experience some things first hand before you really take them to heart. My cycle is big and it takes a long time for me to go around the sun. But I have. I'm talking about my mood, my outlook on life, my particular position in life. Each time around I seem to be getting better at recognizing mistakes and worse at letting myself fail. I just went through a very rough spell. Two years or so of watching my life dissolve away. It's happened before. It will again. This new life of mine is going to be different, better than ever, I'm sure. I am filled with thankfulness for yet another go-round.

I got a job

I got a job when I was 13 working for a tree farm in Idaho. Child labor laws be damned. I worked for two months that summer. 40 hours a week in the sun weeding seed beds and enduring racist Native American remarks from the inbred mountain idiots that I had for coworkers. My Dad would drive me and drop me off at 6 in the morning and I rode my bike the 3 or 4 miles home down the gravel canyon road at the end of the day. I sat in the dirt and drank Gatorade from my giant cooler jug. For lunch I ate the Frito's and PB&J sandwich that my Mom packed that morning. When I came home from my first day I collapsed on the living room floor and slept until I had to go back. The farm owners were indifferent to the needs of their employees, clearly possessing a much deeper fear of not paying their bills. The solution, overwork and micromanage their employees to be triple sure they are all working, all the time. And we did. I saw people being fired on the spot a number of times for simply not being able to keep up. We kids worked alongside migrant workers who were getting paid less than us to do even more work. They were happy enough to be employed despite the endless harshness bestowed upon them by both fellow workers and supervisors. A mental lashing for being born on the wrong latitude in the wrong time. It took one serious shower every day to get the layer of dirt off. The best part of the day was the end. I would ride down that canyon road as if I were flying, at the bottom of the long winding drop through the trees the road turned to pavement and I swear I was the God of speed and Lord of the wind. There are times I miss riding home like that. There are times I miss it all. By any standard it was a rough job, especially in our new age of hygienic cubical isolationism. Maybe I just miss being a kid, with loving parents and a good home, having a terrible job I knew I could quit at any time instead of having no choice but to find a good job that I can't leave. We're never really happy until we accept that life is pain.

I love you

What a wonderful thing to hear, better to say, better yet to be certain you mean. Love causing such boundless perfection. Even in the face of complete loss. You know love, when you know love. It's going to be okay. It forgives and forgets perfectly. Always renewing and freshly supplied. Never failing. I love you, I love you, I love you. And I mean it.

The nagging need to be alive...

Whatever it is, it's probably only going to last for a while. Your cold, your bad hair day, your dying mother's last will and testimony, the planet Earth (or are we calling it Urantia now?...whatever), the love of your Hermit Crab, your new shoes, this thought. And what is it to stand for something? For your family, for freedom, for the right to live the way you wish to, for a church, for the world, for a leader, or for a follower's belief. Everything under the sun passes away and is already dead and gone a million times over...or not. I'm right here typing these things here in the forever moment filled with beauty untold, with the chill of winter biting the tip of my nose, endless thoughts and some tasty chex mix...bold party mix, to be precise. So I say to you unfaithful, you fools in your madness all around, swine, foul, unworthy ones just like me, be alive and know this life is a precious gift, a chance to be. God loves you.