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.

Spinal Tap My Brain Freeze

It has been a long time since I have wrote anything, on this blog or otherwise.  There have been several times in which I sat down and started trying to write something and have been unable to do so.  It has almost been as if my brain has been totally burned out of all its creative juices.  Many things  I suppose could have been attributed to it, life as of late has come at me pretty hard. Admittedly I have found myself at a big lack of motivation to do so also, probably attributed to the fact that it hard to write things for others when your pretty sure nobody is reading it, which I know is contrary to what I said was my original reason for writing it.    I have also been "Going Poe" on myself as of late due to my lack of grammatical prowess , I find simple ridicules mistakes when I read my  own writing so I am sure others have done the same and been scared off while reading my blog.  As of late however I have been looking for an outlet and a place to organize my thoughts once again.  Therefore, I shall redouble my efforts and begin once again to write in this blog whilst remembering my original reason for writing the blog in the first place.
For my first blog back I have decided to sit down and elaborate a little on why I think my brain has been frozen whenever I sit down to write a blog.  In thinking on this subject  I find myself first turning towards the fact that as of late I find myself bogged down in many left brain activities.  The "Left" side of the brain is of coarse the side of the brain that controls logic, and reason. Though the left side of the brain is quite often the side in which the world is most focused on and seems most worried about it does very little to promote the creative thought one which my logic is organized when writing.  A balanced use of both sides of my brain has always been something I have prided myself on, which unfortunately has been a luxury I cannot afford.  The rigors of being a parent with two children under the age of four with house, financial, and altruistic worries has retarded my creativity.  The brain like any muscle may atrophy if it is not appropriately exercised.  This lack of exercise has left the right brain(if one doesn't know which right brain in-tales one  should see the diagram at the bottom of this blog).
To give my brain a bit of a spinal tap I have spent a big portion of my day drawing and exercising that side of my brain.  I have even given myself to start writing things with my left hand instead of my write to make sure I use every opportunity to release the ice and muck from my brain.  I find my life has more color and meaning when I strive to balance myself and now I find myself not only having things to write about but motivated to do so.  So if you find yourself in a similar situation or even just a bit of a rut I would take this opportunity to give your Brain Freeze a Spinal Tap.

    

Bigots Against Bigotry

Life in our society can be very interesting, with so much social turmoil present in so many different facets of our life whether it be religion, government, or science.  Tolerance is a word that everyone turns too thinking that all of the worlds problems would be solved if people were more tolerant of others. When people tell others to be more tolerant  however, deep down they really aren't wishing for tolerance they are thinking the world would be better if people were more tolerant towards me and my beliefs.  For why would they be preaching for others to be tolerant if they themselves hadn't already decided they couldn't tolerate the intolerance?
As you grow more and experience more life you come to realize that people all have very different motivations and backgrounds which lead to differences in opinion, wherein to obtain a world with so called "perfect" tolerance it would have to be one without beliefs and individuals. Logically for a world with perfect tolerance to work the world itself would lose its diversity and everyone would conform to a certain universal belief system or no belief system at all.   The reason for this is we live a world of right and wrongs, and that is not just in a religious aspect. As infants from the moments we gain our senses we start learning and deciding the "rights" and "wrongs" of life in learning or how the world works and how we ourselves are suppose to interact with this world.
In other words while living in a world of good and evil, of rights and wrongs, perfect tolerance cannot be obtain unless one decides to not take a stand for either or admits that neither exist.
 Our life experiences are so different and varied that of coarse each individual is going to have different beliefs on what is "right" even without religion, government, or science.  Because of this fact I find myself struck with a profound sense of irony when you see pictures of people holding signs labeling others as bigots when they themselves are participating in a form of bigotry against another belief.  We can tolerate only as much as our own tolerance allows, which makes it a folly goal to try to preach tolerance.  Instead we should teach RESPECT, respect for others and respect for ourselves.  If we respect peoples ability to be an individual, there is no level of tolerance which can be surpassed, but a common standard for everyone.  One cannot always agree with or tolerate the actions and thoughts of another, but one can always respect another.  In that way we wont have those participating in the oxymoron of decided they cannot tolerate what they see as injustices any longer preaching tolerance, and people who have decided to label another a bigot because of their own bigotries.

The Higher Your Vantage Point

Have you ever found yourself wondering why certain people whose lives by comparison of your own seem to have a better outlook on life? For instance an disabled man who seems to be overly positive about all that life has to offer even though menial task which you take for granted are unavailable or difficult for him.  Ones perspective on life of coarse as we all know makes all the difference in ones quality of life, which makes it important to know why one persons is great and the other can't seem to make it out of their own shell.
Life as we know was never meant to be easy and seemingly the harder it is for the individual the more the person accomplishes in the end.  In thinking of the differences between the one whose perspective is a negative one and the one that is quite the opposites we can think of these perspectives as being from different vantage points.  For instance us who walk on the ground as God intended with nothing but our legs, would have a much different vantage point then one who walks around on stilts.  Sure the person on the stilts life may be much more difficult then ours but they are able to see the path in front of them much more clearly than those of use who reside on the ground.  Elaborating more on this same topic and thinking more on it in depth one must conclude that it is the difficulty of these individuals lives that in and of itself leads to this higher vantage point.  It is this same vantage point that makes their lives though they may not accomplish as much as the rest of us in earthly terms of life makes them feel more fulfilled with the lives they lived. Doing something that challenges yourself, standing on these stilts even though it is difficult sticking to whatever it is until your accomplish what you set out to makes the journey all the more full-feeling when the journeys over.  For in life as in sports, the higher the degree of difficulty the action you have performed is the more the sense of satisfaction which is gained after you have accomplished your task. As the man walking on stilts bares the pain and burden of walking on the stilts, he has also paid the price which needs to be paid for the higher vantage point which enlightens us all.