silent thunder

that's not the universe.... you can't fool me. you guys went and made an animated self portrait of me.... and it's not even my birthday!!!

wtf

Words and thoughts tend to reinforce their own return as well in my experience. Once spoken, soon repeated it seems with me... so becoming aware and selective over what I allow myself to ponder mentally and support vocally is becoming crucial. With me... a charged thought engenders an emotion and a phrase is then often spoken, which reinforces the emotion and engenders another similar thought which adds inertia to the emotion and then more phrases are spoken... if I'm not able to catch the moment of the hook, it can be quite the ride before I settle again. Mental fasting and a very selective diet of media/books/conversations/ is invaluable now. As it relates to speaking or writing, this quote always resonated. "remain silent, or say something better than silence."

I relate to your pain Owledge. Not sure if these words will bring you any relief, but they helped me immensely so I'll share. One of the most pivotal and impacting pieces of advice I ever received was this. Stop taking it personally, the universe. Whatever is happening. Stop taking it like it's aimed at you and meant just for you. It's not. It isn't about you. It's just happening. It's just the universe. The universe isn't happening to me. Even when there's a person yelling in my face and pointing their finger at me, telling me 'it's all your fault!'... it's not. The universe isn't happening to me, it's just happening. "Stop taking the world personally." A dear friend uttered those words to me when I was about to leave my marriage with my infant son, while being abused daily over a period of weeks by my wife, and her parents who had moved into our home at the time. That simple phrase ignited a realization that shifted all of the energy and relief began to cultivate instantly in my awareness. It has never faded, only grown more reinforced as I now embody that great old taoist phrase, I had heard so many times before, but never understood. "the Sage is in the world, but not of it." It's not happening to you... it's just happening. People in suffering will lash out and look for reasons to pinpoint and hang their reasons on... this is just another dance. Their words and actions are just noise. As neutral as the babbling of water over stone, or wind through leaves, even when my name is attached to the sounds. The other thing that I realized was related to this same time and these same people and that is... "Some people come into my life, just to teach me, or to remind me, that there are people I cannot allow to remain in my life if I want to be healthy and thrive." Between these two bits... much of my suffering in life was dissolved. I wish you well mate. That kind of heart hurt is awful to endure, but you are already proving you are stronger than it, because you are not giving up, you are here, seeking and sharing. I guess one final thing comes to mind: Share everything. Grief and Joy. Because when we share our grief, it decreases. And when we share our joy, it grows. So share it all.

This is such a great idea! I used to memorize entire plays of Shakespeare, Ibsen, Checkov... now I feel lucky if I remember my mate's phone numbers and my grocery lists. My gal and I are doing something like this, this Summer with our son, to work out our brains and to get more poetry in the house. I started last week with a sonnet. Quick and simple. Start with an easy victory to set the tone and lay a few easy bricks on the foundation. Mostly, I'm just looking forward to having a fresh flow of poetry in the house again, no grand ideas that I'll be reclaiming any of my old mnemonic prowess.

no doubt! Lately I generally prefer to not let go until my feet are firmly rooted.

Nice, although, the secret for me is letting go... and exhaustion seems to be my chosen means to this end...

I really appreciate fasting. I pursued it originally for the affect on consciousness, vibration and body awareness, but soon realized that what I had heard about fasting as an effective means to aid the body in healing old, persistent injuries is wonderfully true. In addition to also providing many benefits to blood ph, sugar, cholesterol levels as well as the rise in awareness, it has become part of my routine. It's also changed how I relate to food in general. When I read about intermittent fasting I realized with just a little more attention to some snacking, I was already living this way as a natual occurence of listening to my body and not just eating because it was a cultural mealtime. I generally am not very hungry in the mornings so have usually eaten all my food in a twelve hour window anyway. Now my body routinely craves emptiness and so fasting happens regularly. Usually four days. It is very natural. I set no goals for it like I used to. I no longer seek to extend a fast with intense willpower. I fast as long as I am joyful about it. During the fast there is no problem cooking for and sitting with others as they eat. I am joyfully empty and really enjoy it. There is no sense of being deprived. When it's time to end the fast... that in itself is like a mini festival. And I find eating less often, two things manifest naturally. 1) Whenever I do eat, it is with more awareness and presence in general now. Something I appreciate immensely. and 2) When I eat less often, I become much more selective for what I am willing to eat, when I do eat. More and more I am turning away from old favorites, in favor of foods I know will leave me feeling energized and light after eating. I generally choose meals based on how I will feel after, than for taste. It's a win win. The body gets so many benefits from being empty for a time: sugar, cholesterol, pressure, some weight loss and healing. Mind and body awareness expands in a lovely manner... and the return to food when it's time, is simply ecstatic. Joy all around. I highly recommend it.

What bird is screeching? Fools talk and Sages listen. Whose voice is that now? oh mine... right. well then... carry on my wayward suns

I'm going to pick up a copy, thanks for sharing. That looks like a fun ride.

"I don't explain anything. In beingness I am nature and my own nature... explicitly, completely, saturatedly... unfettered, collosal and infinitesimal simultaneously. there is no truth, or untruth to be grasped... no understanding, no comprehension to be gained or lost. sit here with me, or not. nature is"

the untruths and false teachings and outright lies I have encountered, believed and rejected in my life have served me as much as the truths... Truth is served when untruth is revealed, so for me, there is no sense of wasted effort, or lost time, or ruined... anything in the teachings that came and have dropped off due to their nature.

Yea, I'm with you on that Brian... long ago I stopped wearing any corporate or commercial logos on my body. They are often energetically nauseating and nearly always dampening. On my last few vehicles, I've taken to removing all dealer stickers as well as the company logos as well. Though my wife prefers I leave her vehicle alone, so I comply.

There are two forms that flow through me which have a fixed set of movements as they were shared with me... and my intent is to always allow those movements to flow through me in the order they were shown to me when I play with them. These forms were taught to me for a purpose, were designed for a purpose and as such, I have not intentionally altered them... though as I go back through my journals and original notes (usually review them once or twice a year), I often note there are points of the form that have become personalized without intent or my conscious directive. I usually note them in my log, then with intent, go back to the original series of movements as taught. Over the last few years, a series of Wu Wei'esque movements have begun to arise and flow through me spontaneously. These flows arise without any intention or warning and there is a very natural progression to them, one naturally flows to the next, but there is no forward anticipation, expectation, nor guiding, or willful direction of any kind. I would like to point out that these impulses of wu wei have never manifested during my forms work. This sort of thing always comes upon me outside of my forms work. I will suddenly embody the impulse to breath and flow with Qi and the flow dictates very naturally the cycle of movements and as quickly as they arise, they express, then dissolve. While this is Qi Gong, it is a living embodiment of structureless structure. The movements that manifest, the hand positions, hip rotations, footwork, arm position and flow are all familiar, yet they manifest without forethought and arise seemingly from the body itself. Thankfully I work in a field where I am supported in my random behaviors and so I can freely embrace this and allow it without much more than some curious stares and sometimes a question or two... (and it's particularly fun when it pops up at say the grocery store, and I do with it and there I am, a modern Viking, flowing around the produce section with avocados in my hands while giggling). I imagine what it must look like from the outside which causes the giggling and I remember this quote... " and those who were seen dancing, seemed insane, to those who did not hear the music." In the end, it's all vibration, frequency and resonance. Every movement, breath, word and thought. All the way up and all the way down. As above, so below. As within, without.

I have a memory, perhaps it's self created or corrupted, but it related to an Egyptian mystery school and used the term Djedi. Something about pillars of light, keepers of light or some such. Perhaps this influenced Lucas' choice of his Jedi name as well. Prior to that, I had only noted the links to Samurai culture.

brown teeth with white skin... I sit and hide from the sun then dance in the rain

aye... I seem to be made entirely of small things. while always part of something large. while I would rather remain silent or say something better than silence. I fail at this consistently. accidentally, gloriously... rarely silently though thunder like light persists the intention abides... idly persistent, despite beliefs oh look, it's raining

I swear... sometimes I get in my elevator and it just giggles at me while we sit there...

While it peaks my curiosity from time to time to go to an old thread and not see all that was originally contributed due to later edits and deletions, any annoyance from that has faded and I now embrace it. No one owes me anything here. I have received far more than I have offered already and will never be able to balance those scales. As one insight can liberate the ignorance of prior decades and lives... then this too may drive one to to remove, or alter words and interchanges. And while the original exchange will always remain with those who co-created it... what a grand opportunity we have in the written, ammendable word, to go back and alter our piece to suit the new realizations we arrive at on our paths.

"number nine..." ~ John Lennon

Hey there. I seem to fit your criteria and am curious about the survey. Send one my way and I'll fill it out. Cheers and welcome to the Bums.

7 years of riding a bicycle through NYC traffic taught me the intrinsic value of timely movement and full patience concurrently and set the stage for the later development, not taking the world peronally. Then 17 years of LA traffic made impatient desire to get anywhere faster dissolve eventually as survival matter... it was either that or go insane and harm my health with rage. And one of the pivotal realizations that allowed patience to really manifest and bloom for me was to stop taking the world personally. Nothing is happening to me, conditions are flowing around and through and with me, not at me. And I'm just as much a part of it as any other part. That, or perhaps it's still another fallout of the sheer spiritual/mental exhaustion brought on by decades of seeking. More and more I suspect this exhaustion to be the catalyst to much of my current state of awareness and being. So there's a release and in that, patience just is... it is not sought, or maintained, or propped up and no effort or doing is required.

The Red Turtle Animated feature. No dialogue. Yet a powerhouse of a story. I highly recommend it.

A day of mourning, never celebration for me. War is failure. I'm with Harry on this topic, today and all days.