The Cowled Crow Flies Again!!!

After over a year of not posting anything new I have decided to revisit my blog once again.  Interestingly enough my blog ended up serving a purpose I had not originally intended.  I got a job a couple of years ago at boarding school for "Troubled" teens, and part of what I did there was help out with their 12 step program and my blog post were helpful when used as readings or discussions points for the group.  So having basically left my blog to the scrap heap I have decided to revive it and bring it back from purgatory.  My blog will now serve at the very least as a place to stockpile this kind of material so I can use it as a database for the future.  Who knows maybe someone will stumble on it and find it worth a look as well.  I will begin by re-posting some of my old blogs (or maybe better describes as editing) I had to give them a bit of a face-lift because of my lack of writing prowess, though I am sure it will still offend the local grammar nazi.  While I am at it I hope the fast approaching New year finds your well and hopefully mine does too!

The Mastery of Magic

When does ones action or desires become a part of a persons being, or become them? This is a question I posed to myself in thinking of behavior modification both of others and of myself.  One of the reason this question is an interesting one is it goes back to the very essence of can a man change who they are? Can we change our base desires and shackle our very nature becoming who we desire to be rather than who we are by nature?  I think those are very important questions to ask oneself whenever a person is striving to morph themselves into a better or different version of themselves. One person once told me that it is harder to change the will of a man than to will the moving of a mountain. In many ways I think this statement is very true for ourselves and others, if we don't have the will or want to to do something then simply put we won't.  Nothing short of magic will set us from our coarse.
Through study and personal experience I know that one can change themselves down to their very nature.  This is however very difficult and takes a large amount of Will and discipline which is why very few people can  master this "Magic".  To illustrate how it is done I will use an example of the circle of mastery.  This is Merlins Three Degrees of Wizardry.

The Three Degrees of Wizardry(classes)
1. Incantation: The medium of their spell casting is speech.
2. Hand Wizards: The medium of their spell casting is gestures of the hands.
3. Will Wizard: The medium of the spell casting is thought.

Looking at these three degrees Incantation is the least skilled form of wizardry, Hand Wizards are the more skilled, and Will Wizards are the most.  This is rated in the matter of of time it takes each to cast a spell.  The Incantation wizard must recite long spells in order to cast a spell which would not be ideal when things get hairy.  The Hand Wizard simply has to do a form of movement or gesture with their hands and their magic springs to life which of coarse can be quite fast.  The highest form of wizardry is the Will Wizard which over time and practice needs only to think of a spell to cast it.
These degrees exemplify how a person can know that they have changed who they are. It all starts with a person beginning to tell themselves they want to change (speech) and letting others know as well.  Over time and after making some of the mental preparations involved in making a change the person begins doing the things which denote the change they want to make (hands).  They begin taking the actions they need to for instance if a person wanted to live a more healthy lifestyle they would first have to tell themselves of the changes they need to make(incantation) and then start making those changes (hand/action) such as exercising and eating more healthy.  This leads us to the last stage and the one in which one knows they have changed.  To use the example I gave earlier the person has decided they want to live more healthy so they decided what changes they need to make and then they put those decisions into action, then over time they begin to stop craving the unhealthy foods they used to, they begin doing the stuff without much thought or action which points to the fact that they have changed (thoughts).  Over time of doing the thing that which was so difficult in the beginning the person becomes the change that they wanted to make.  The "Magic" of it all is that it is easier said than done.  People tend to forget that all change requires work on their part.  For the caterpillar to change into a butterfly it must go through the anguish of working its way out of the cocoon it has wrapped itself in.  Finding that reason to put yourself through that pain is the spark of magic one needs to make it through the change which they seek. If they can find that reason that motivator they will realize that they are able to Master Magic.

Chasing White Rabbits

You have probably noticed that I quite enjoy Lewis Carroll's Alice in Wonderland, and that it has many lessons which can be learned from that one story when comparing it to life and the way in which people think and behave.  Therefore I have decided to do a few post outlining certain characters from the adventure and what parallels they have in the real world.  We will do this as is explained in the book" Start from the beginning and when you come to the end stop," as if there were any other way in which to examine and tell a story.

In the beginnings of the novel everything seems normal in Alice's life she seems to be an ordinary girl with ordinary thoughts and problems.  Suddenly something catches her attention, enter the White Rabbit which is one of the most discussed and misunderstood symbols in the whole story.  The white rabbit seems to Alice the perfect distraction from the cares and troubles of her everyday life.  There is nothing to peculiar nor notable about the character himself other than the anomaly of him wearing a Pocket-Watch and being late for something.  The fact that she decides to follow this rabbit to the extent that she is, tells us more about Alice then anything else and the fact that it leads her to the drama and perils of the adventure is also telling.  Alice would never have even noticed this White Rabbit if she weren't looking for it in the first place.  Moreover the rabbit wasn't looking for her but she for the rabbit, the distraction to take her away from the seriousness of life.  

The Rabbit itself is a symbol of spring which signifies change.  For we know that rabbits procreate and a fast rate and have the potential to change their population size very quickly if not kept in check.  The pocket-watch that he wears is of coarse a symbol of time and the fact that Alice is chasing a white rabbit wearing  a pocket-watch alludes to the act itself being something to fill the time.  If we further delve into the White Rabbit and what he is in the story he serves as a herald to the queen which also furthers the symbolism of him being connected to change.  For why does one chase Which Rabbits? It is because one is looking for a change in their state of mind, or even in the physical life.  The fact that the White Rabbit is late and seems to be in the state of urgency during most of the story is another telling thing, for we know that a rabbit in the real world would have no such sense of urgency except when perhaps escaping a predator.

Knowing the before mentioned symbolism of the White Rabbit and tying the two together we get a better picture of what is alluded too.  Placing importance and urgency on the distractions of life ties up time which considering how short life is is urgently needed elsewhere.  Many such things exist in our lives whether it be drugs, video-games, TV, or other manner of recreational activities which are meant more for minor distractions in life yet end up oftentimes becoming the major subject of some peoples lives. Don't get me wrong It is good to chase White Rabbits now and then but when that becomes the major focus of a life your life takes no more psychical meaning in the temporal world then a white rabbit dressed up in finery with a pocket-watch.

In life many a White Rabbits will catch your eye, yet knowing how long the chase them, and when not to at all becomes the challenge.  Until our next adventure in wonderland here's to finding that balance in our lives so they not only end up being a children's tale.

   

Fast Car to No Where

Another year has come and gone and I find myself revisiting my little nook(my blog) in which I invested so much time in the past but now needs a good dusting, and a good dusting it will get.  My blog is after-all suppose to be a place where I hoard thoughts and ideas that for whatever reason I find meaningful, and I have had many of those which I haven't shared in a good amount of time so I guess its time to step back into the fray and got to it.
I've found myself as the Tracy Chapmans song "Fast Car"  a song which has always held a special significance to me.  I think it signifies my own plight in this life well..  The song tells a story of a young woman living in the projects whom has quit school to take care of her alcoholic father.  During the song she talks of wanting to work hard to get money so she can buy a fast car and speed away from her life of poverty in the projects.  Throughout the progression of the song you see her slowly begin to submit to the life in the projects, instead of breaking the cycle her family is in, she becomes a part of that cycle.
In this song the "Fast Car" become a proverbial road to nowhere.  The I'll do it tomorrows and the lack of the right breaks in life becomes a killer of inertia that one through their hard work would have gained.  At times I find myself (as many others) putting in the work for a successful life yet not catching the breaks needed for the  pay offs one so frantically searches for.  There was a study done in which brain waves were studied and they were able to determine what a person was going to do six seconds before their bodies in fact did the act.  This makes me wonder what in those six seconds determines whether the person actually puts those thoughts into action as opposed to someone who doesn't.  Perhaps it is a "Pavlovian" response for some after a certain amount of trying yields no results. Whatever the cause of one "burning down" their old goals and sending them to the scrapheap is  of little importance  for the end result is the same.
This blog for me has become an old book lost in the back of the library which the librarian keeps in hopes that someone, will someday dust it off and give it a read.  That is of coarse the allure of writing to me is in that it is literally controlling ones thought patterns for a few moments and taking them on a journey to where you want to take them.  The journey can both be to everywhere and nowhere at all, a journey which dirties no mans boot but yet takes the same tread of their minds.  My own version of a "fast car to no where, yet somewhere nonetheless. That my friends may be clear as mud to some while a magnifying glass to others.

Finding Your Point

"A Point in every direction is the same as no point at all."(The Point)
Taking a bit of a trip down memory lane I decided to watch a cartoon which as I child I used to watch frequently "The Point" a mind product of the late Harry Nillson.  For those unfamiliar with the the story it is about a boy who is born into a world with people with pointed heads when he himself has no point.  This eventually leads him to being banished from his town into the "Pointless Forest".  During his journey through this "Pointless Forest" he comes to the understanding that everything has a point or a purpose so he must also have a "point". Upon this realization he returns home and shares his insights to the villagers of his town, upon doing so they all lose their points and he gains his own.
   Upon finishing watching this cartoon I found myself thinking about how the world always does appreciate something when they can easily decipher it's "point".  How we often determine a persons worth by determining what the persons point is to society, to history, and to us.  If a person does not conform or tick one of the before mentioned points for us their lives mean nothing to us, that is both and long and short of it.  Due to this fact I find myself struggling to see what my point is to this world, for outside of my immediate family I have very little point.  It makes it easy to see what my point is to the few I have one for, but I find myself asking what is my point to myself.  I feel I may be as a point that points in every direction which makes me have no point at all.  Life would be easy if we could simply follow an arrow at our feet and have it give us each direction, and let us know we are where we should be in our lives.  If each of us have a compass spinning inside of us perhaps finding our point to ourselves is simply picking a direction inside ourselves and following it.

Inside the Crows Nest

The Crow one of the worlds smartest animals, is known for hoarding objects inside its nest.  If one were to examine the nest of a crow one would find things which would have no rhyme nor reason being in an avian creatures nest.  A scrap of shiny metal, a piece of broken glass, toys, and knickknacks, this is because the crow as many other animals is attracted to shiny objects.  This behavior shows an uncanny sense of ownership, and also if analyzed from a survival standpoint seems a bit counterproductive for the nest is suppose to be a place of safety for the crow. Unknowingly because of its strange hobby the crow makes it's nest into a beacon to attract predators. I find myself wondering how much we as human beings also make our homes "a safe harbor from the outside world" into a beacon for predators, for crows aren't the only ones who find themselves attracted to shiny objects.
Our own uncanny sense of ownership in a very real sense does become a beacon to not only predators, but the darkest parts of our own nature.  This concept is easy to comprehend from a predator standpoint, for those with the nicest houses and most expensive adornments become thieves fodder and are the most desired targets.  Taking this deeper than just the superficial and cosmetic, taking this to our own personal "nests" in which we ourselves reside, "our minds" it becomes a whole different creature.  What Shiny objects have we surrounded ourselves with? What shiny objects have we brought home and made part of us which make us beacons for predators, toes in the door of our minds for darkness? Nothing is more telling than the nest in which we roost.  

The Grey Walker

I have decided to re-visit my post which was called "Those Who Walk the Grey" to further elaborate on that topic.  The reason for this was not just to update my picture which I have done to better exemplify the idea being shared, but also because I have been seeing this premise show it's head in more aspects of my life.  In the war between good evil there seems to be more then simply piety needed, but an ample understanding of the darkness and what it the nature of it is.  As one who has studied psychology I can tell you that there is much peril to gain an understanding of the inner workings of them who both wrought and have touched evil.  To understand the darkness that dwells in others one must venture that darkness themselves. That is not to insinuate that to understand a heroine addict the person trying to help them must try heroine, but  that their mind must touch much of what the mind that used the heroine has touched.  To help the individual overcome the psychological need for their behavior one must in-turn sully their own hands to pull those that dwell in darkness toward the light.  Becoming a mediator of that which is needed one must find the middle ground of the individual to find who they in fact are underneath all that which can be perceived by the naked eye.  One must find the whites and grays of the individual to see what led them to the black.  Their base need and desire which led them into the dark places in the first place.
The one who walks the grey will be perceived often times as black by those who think themselves white and white by those who think themselves black so that their touch will have significance on them.  Showing those that walking darkness the light, and showing those in the light where they touch the shadows.  For in this land which men would paint in black and white, there are no such colors of men only varying shades of grey.  No non-subjective truths nor provable lies for the universe is vast and our minds narrow.  So I must walk the grey finding virtue in those who have lost it and immorality in those who see themselves as moral.  Sully my hands so that others can forsake the dirt. For in a world of black and whites one must walk the grey.