New Year, Apparently New Social Media Activity

For the past year, I’ve been participating in the #365Grateful project on Instagram. The premise was that, everyday, I posted a picture of something that I was grateful for. My subjects ranged from animals (lots and lots and lots of cats), hikes, babies, gardening, books, nature, food, old pictures of me and my family and friends, and random moments of goodness throughout my day. It was fun for a while and it certainly helped to make 2014 a hell of a lot more tolerable and uplifting than the previous four years.

Unfortunately, over the past month, it’s gotten to be a bit of a chore. I think a lot of that had to do with the fact that I was just fucking over the whole thing. It was quite nice for a while but it definitely ran its course. Throughout 2014, I noticed a couple friends had featured “100 Days of Happiness” posts, and I was fairly jealous with how much smaller their timeframe was. Being stuck with the same idea for a year was certainly an inspiring challenge, but it’s not something I want to do again. This also taught me that I have way too much willpower for my own good. So, from here on out, I’ll be doing different “100 Days” campaigns.

I’d like to continue to use Instagram as a tool to inspire and motivate me, and I feel that different campaigns throughout the year focusing on varying subjects will keep me engaged. It’ll also allow me to flex my photographic and creative muscles in different capacities.

My first campaign will be #100DaysOfPresence.

Like most people, my mind tends to race. And by race, I mean it makes Nascar look like a toddler’s dump-trucks. It will go from one thought to the next with blinding speed. One minute, I’m thinking of Burger King’s Oreo Pie and the next, I’m wondering what reviews of the new Smash Bros. games are like. The most ridiculous part is that I can’t even recall the train of thought that led my brain from pies to Pokémon beating the shit out of each other on a stage from Zelda.

I could really use a few moments of calm throughout my day. Not that my days are crazy by any means. I’m actually fairly certain that my days are more relaxing than about 75% of Americans because I’m already pretty decent at reducing stress and seeing the bigger picture of things. However, it will be nice to focus more on breathing, the body, and just being instead of awkward moments form fifteen years ago or constantly reworking potential blog posts that I never finish (except for this one, yay!).

#100DaysOfPresence will force me to create a healthy new habit while also (hopefully) making for some interesting pictures. I will post pictures of one moment per day when I experienced presence. The picture will be about a moment when I took a moment to just be.

I’m probably not going to be posting these to Facebook too often, though, as I regularly felt like I was clogging up peoples’ newsfeed with unnecessary pictures. I’m also fairly certain that I’m going to be spending less time on Facebook overall starting on the 1st. It seems to have lost its utility for me. These days, I find much more inspiring and enlightening information via Twitter, so I’ll be posting there more predominantly in the coming weeks. Feel free to follow me there. I’m sure I'll occasionally post to Facebook, though.

Here's to 2015! May it suck considerably less than 2014, which sucked way fucking less than 2013. Happy New Year, everyone!

PS: thanks to my friend E for introducing me to #365Grateful in the first place!

Dark Infinity

This story owes its existence to Yann Tiersen's new album, Infinity, which served as both soundtrack and inspiration:

Dark Infinity

Sound rushed over me and consumed me. Specifically, the sound of waves. I woke up on a beach with warm water being pulled in and out underneath me. The waves were only a couple of inches tall, and they crashed into the side of my body with a pleasant sensation. Through a groggy fog, I became aware of a thought that wondered how I hadn’t drowned.

I slowly stood up and brushed some sand off of my pants and shirt, though removing it all would have beeen entirely Sisyphean. In one of my pants pockets, I found a collection of heavy rocks. It was night, but thanks to the almost-full moon that peaked through the clouds above, I was able to see a fair amount of my surroundings. The water, and I don’t know if I’ll ever know if it was a lake or a sea or an ocean, stretched out in front of me until infinity, culminating into a black line on the horizon that my mind imagined. To my left and right sides, the shoreline went on for what looked like miles. It, too, stretched beyond the limits of my current perception. Since nothing of note besides vastness took place in front or on the sides of me, I turned around to see what happened to be behind.

The moment I spun around, light and airy circus music began to play, which seemed all too convenient as a brightly-lit carousel suddenly illuminated itself atop a hill nearby. It spun and spun with no riders, all light and magic with only a highly-confused audience. I merely observed it until it and the music stopped. As soon as it stopped moving, its lights blinked out of existence and it returned to the inky night from which it came. I could no longer see it or the hill it sat on.

Playful mechanical sounds started emanating close to where I saw the carousel, and suddenly, another lit hill exploded into my perception. It was filled with dozens of mechanical animals and creatures who made music together. Small red-eyed monkeys played cymbals, bears beat their drum sets, a horse in a ranger hat played a guitar, and a feminine unicorn plucked a golden harp. Together, their sounds created an excited and playful symphony of child-like emotion and sensation. It seemed I was being presented with a show, albeit a strange and slightly sinister one.

The animals had their fill and disappeared once they stopped playing, much like the carousel. I stood waiting for another hill to present itself with a new musical and mechanical wonder, but one never came. Further up, the beach eventually turned into a grassy meadow, and so I wandered in that direction on a small stone path lit by the moonlight. As I walked, I heard sorrowful horns play in the distance with low and long notes that hung in the humid air like dreadful shadows.

The meadow was large and I could just make out the edge of a forest that seemed to surround me. From within the trees, someone spoke to me in a terse, echoey voice that seemed to be warning me of something. The words were there, but they were spliced up into incomprehensible pieces that I couldn’t understand. Not so much a different language, but more of a recorded voice that was chopped to bits and reassembled into something darker and foreboding.

Oddly, I felt no fear, only a faint curiosity. I didn’t seem to be in any immediate danger, but my current circumstances were certainly beyond eerie. I still had no idea how I came to be where I was. My mind moved from darting thought to fleeting feeling as I continued my slow saunter up the stone path. The moon, much like the hills from before, instantly disappeared and left me in the dark, despite the fact that it was nowhere near the horizon when I last saw it. It was as if someone flicked a switch and turned off the moon. This seemed to be the most reasonable theory as then, in the next moment, close to where the moon had last been, a hazy sun appeared in what was now a bright blue sky. My eyes had issues adjusting to the change in light, and so I stopped walking and closed my eyes until I felt they had reacquainted themselves to the staggering brightness.

I was correct about there being a forest nearby. It stood in front of me and to my sides. It formed a wide and curved entrance into its depths, which seemed welcoming in the sunlight. I could still hear the sound of the waves washing up along the shore behind me. The forest, while mostly green and verdant, also had intricate crystal trees that swayed in the slight breeze, much like their traditional counterparts. These trees were all sorts of soft colors. Light yellows and blues mixed with light pinks and purples throughout every tree, and they crunched and clinked like glass when the wind blew through them. I approached one, touched it, and found it to be quite warm, warmer than the air. I could hear quiet music coursing through it and so I put my ear up to its trunk. The sound continued unabated, quiet, clanky, and melodic, as if some creature below the tree were playing its roots like a xylophone. I moved to another tree and found the same song rising from its roots. I wondered if all of these crystal trees were being played in the same way by the same creature below the soft and loamy dirt. The song then changed to a steady beat of the same tone. Perhaps the creature wanted to tell me that my time as its listener had ended.

My stone path continued into the forest and I followed it in between the living and crystalline trees. The next sound to find my ears was a woman’s voice, heavily accented, describing a nearby scene:

“In the forest, there was a house, inside the house, there was a table. On the table, there was a coat. In the coat, there was a pocket. Inside the pocket, there was a stone. Inside the stone, there was a key.”

The recording of the voice played on repeat. I walked into a house that was just off the path and found an old, worn coat sitting on a small wooden table. I picked up the coat and felt inside one of the large pockets and, expectedly, found a heavy stone. I removed the stone from its pocket and put it into pockets of my own.

The windows inside the house were all open and I could hear the wind picking up outside the small shelter. I left the house and closed the door behind me. In the sky, the sun began to flicker. This worried me as there were no other light sources around. It blinked, stretched, and distorted itself. I wondered if the sky were a hologram or maybe a massive screen.

It darkened to dusk. Dark grayish green and purple clouds stretched across the sky. There was no sun or moon to be seen. I continued on my stone path.

Far away birds chirped and sang, which warmed my heart as this was the first natural sound I had heard besides the wind and the waves. They sang their good-night song and I wondered if their delightful voices came from actual birds at all. Since they sounded so distant, I knew I wouldn’t see any of these birds anytime soon.

I kept walking through the dusk. It grew no darker or lighter and remained a strained gray.

I heard a spotlight turn on and a large light illuminated a clearing in the woods nearby where two children danced in a circle, holding hands. A chorus sang out softly, “keep us warm and see us through the night. Don’t be scared. Just hold my hand.” The children danced and danced in a circle with contented smiles, completely unaware of my existence. As I walked closer to them, the voice transitioned into a sad violin and the spotlight shut off, sending the dancing children back into a veiled darkness. I called out to them, but no one responded.

After a little while longer, the path ended at a precipitous cliff with a woman facing away from me. Dressed in a simple white dress, she stared straight ahead into the clouds above the high cliff. I realized I could hear the crash of the waves below, but this time, they sounded much stronger. Much angrier, and much more hungry. It wasn’t cold, but snow began to fall. The woman looked up into the sky. I assume she pondered the snowflakes. She then stepped forward and disappeared over the cliff, as calmly as possible.

I ran forward trying to rescue her, but ice had formed on the path. I slipped, fell, and quickly careened towards the cliff myself. I flailed wildly, trying to grab onto anything nearby in a vain attempt to save myself. The plants recoiled into the ground to avoid my touch, guaranteeing my quick descent. The wind turned into a gale and blew me over the edge.


In no time, I was in icy cold water. The woman was nowhere to be found. I couldn’t move. I descended into dark infinity.

Things to Come

I've spent the better part of three years trying to find a job that brings me happiness and peace of mind. Of course, I've come nowhere close. A little more than a month ago, while my previous job was coming to an end and I was looking forward to moving back to DC to find another job, I was struck by the thought, "what would getting a job in my field really bring me?"

My internal dialogue (the telltale sign of a true madman) continued:

"Well I need money. I would be able to afford nice things, too, which I haven't been able to do for quite some time," I reasoned.

"Would having those nice things really bring you happiness? You were so excited for that new phone last year and now you spend at least half an hour a day yelling at it," the wiser me replied.

"Okay, maybe not."

"Plus," the wiser me continued, "you claim to want to reduce inequality throughout the world and all those nice things you want only reinforce inequality. Most products are made in factories in developing nations by struggling people working in horrible conditions and for next to nothing in terms of wages. They're then sold to people in developed countries who have to struggle just to make ends meet to afford these products. The only people truly benefitting from this whole system are the uber-rich and from what we've seen on TV and with limited interaction we've had with this class, they're certainly not happy either. Look at the Housewives of Whatever County: what a collection of miserable assholes. So this entire system based on producing, owning, and profiting off of nice things is bringing absolutely no one true happiness or peace."

"Fair enough. But money is kind of essential. My current life isn't exactly sustainable. I need to be able to afford a place to live, and a car if I don't live in a big city, and stuff to put into that apartment or house."

"Would any of that bring true, lasting happiness?"

"I suppose not. Okay, so I don't truly need any 'stuff.' But a job, especially working in a nonprofit, would allow me to make a positive difference in the world," I countered.

"All these nonprofits in DC and all the government offices require an insane amount of energy to run, thereby exacerbating the problem of climate change. You may feel as if you are doing great things in the short term, but in the long term, you are only damaging those whom you want to serve. Not to mention, having a job, even if it is one for a well-meaning nonprofit, only entangles you in the web of never ending consumption which we just identified as a system that perpetuates unhappiness in everyone involved."

"I can't just not have a job! How would I afford to eat?"

"Do something radical, like join a monastery."

"Well, shit."

Fast forward a few weeks to today and I may have found that radical thing. I decided not to move back to DC for a few reasons, primarily because things were already fighting me even before I got down there and the government shutdown really complicated my plans. I'm currently unemployed as I put in my notice at my previous job a month and a half before I was supposed to move and didn't feel much like staying once everything fell apart. I've applied to all of two jobs since I'm quite burned out on the whole job searching / résumé deal, but I've spent a lot of time reading in parks, which has been nice. Especially since I haven't had a proper vacation in years.

The other morning, I woke up and started reading a really inspiring article on Huffington Post about travel. I forgot the premise, exactly, because I was still a groggy and snotty mess from this sinus cold, but it's in my bookmarks! And I suppose the point of it was to inspire me to read similar blogs from people who left the rat race behind and somehow subside on travel (and apparently alcohol) alone.

It was not the first time I've researched this. Not by a long shot. And it wasn't even the first time I researched this because of an article I read on Huffington Post one morning. It was, however, the first time I was inspired by something like this and felt that I could actually do it. It seems these travel bloggers have created a very clever pyramid scheme of sorts that involves affiliate links, sponsors, clicks, and a bunch of other stuff. Each and every one of them specifically say that anyone can do it. I'm anyone, so I guess that means I can do it. All I have to do is work (yet another) crappy job so I can save up some money and then off I go! Possibly. In the spring.

My tentative plan is to start a travel blog based on volunteering in various assignments around the world. I want to make positive contributions to this planet and if I can't do by finding a stupid job, I'll do it this way. I'm planning on staying with an assignment for at least two months as that was a really good time to get the feel of a place while I traveled for grad school. "Slow travel" is better for the environment and would most likely lead to less burnout on my end, as well. Also, the most expensive part in this whole experiment will be the flights, so staying in a place for a longer period of time will help reduce costs and will allow me to travel longer.

The only thing I'm a little worried about is the fact that flying around a bunch of places is horrible for the environment, but I won't be flying too often compared to other travelers and I'm hoping to maybe plant a bunch of trees wherever I go to offset my carbon footprint.

Of course, I'm a bit worried about money, too. However, if I can monetize my travel blog in a similar way to these other bloggers, I shouldn't need more than $15,000 a year at most, especially if I will be volunteering mostly in developing countries. By not having a car, an apartment, or a bunch of other stuff, I will drastically cut down my expenses compared to most people my age, but I'll be able to do a bunch of amazing things while contributing to society and maybe learning a few useful skills along the way. I can make money through writing, selling some travel photography and possibly through teaching English if need be. A lot of the volunteer places I've seen provide housing, which will be a considerable help with expenses, and some even provide food. This could be a pretty cheap and yet absolutely amazing endeavor. I've already found some incredible volunteer opportunities that I can't wait to try, particularly volunteering with a Buddhist temple in Thailand that specializes in caring for tigers. The tiger temple would absolutely blow my freaking mind.

My car has conveniently given me a timeline of six months until I leave as it won't pass its next inspection in April. This will give me some time to prepare and save a few thousand more dollars to help fuel this trip, even if it's just for a year.

Transformative things are on their way and only because my twenties were such a miserable failure at being successful by Western standards. It's about time I stop playing by the rules set by Western society since they've failed so many people already, me very much included. I'm going to show myself and the world that happiness and peace are possible with very little money and no traditional "career." Fuck my twenties, fuck this shitty economy, and fuck rampant consumerism. Now that I know it's possible to turn my back on all this negative crap that brings no one peace or happiness, I fully intend to do so. I hope you stick around for the ride.

If Buddha Were A Verb...

So I’m about to pick up everything again and move to DC, and for what? Because I want to find a job. I started thinking about this whole “needing a job” thing over the past week and a half or so, and I’m fairly surprised as to where my chain of thought has gone.

DESIRES JUST FUCKING SUCK

One thing I’ve come to understand this past week is that achieving a desire or goal only opens up the space for more desires. We’re conditioned to constantly march forward wanting new things instead of stopping to appreciate what we have. I don’t think I’ve ever heard of anyone saying, "yes, I finally got the job (or car, or house, or spouse) that I want! Now I can give up on my quest for more, rest easily and enjoy life." If I got lucky enough to land the job I've been trying so hard to get for three years, would I be truly satisfied? Most likely not. Getting that job would bring more money, which means I'd finally be able to afford a new phone, a new car, travel, a TV, my own place, and so on and so forth, so I'd never be finished wanting. I'd just be working to buy more stuff which I'll eventually need to replace in a year or two anyway. Not to mention I’d probably want a promotion in two to three years, so this job that I’ve desperately wanted for so long wouldn’t bring any sort of lasting happiness at all. Even when it comes to less consumerist and materialistic things, I'd want a partner, then some kids, then good outcomes for the kids who I'd want to provide for, so even desires that aren't materialistic just bring more desire.

So what the fuck is the point of achieving a desire if doing so only brings more desires? It seems awfully fucking futile to me.

More and more, I feel that the only way to escape this society in which so much is wrong and unequal because everyone’s trying so damned hard to achieve their desires despite the obviously large amount of harm it’s doing to the planet is to completely turn my back on society as a whole. I don't want my work to go towards benefiting an evil corporation that exploits people for profit. I think I would rather work a menial job at a small nonprofit and live simply.

NONPROFIT BLUES

I’m also now questioning the point of working for any nonprofit at this point, which is what I’ve wanted to do for years. I don’t think I am interested in a fantastic career because careers are fleeting and rarely make people truly happy. Not to mention, careers just end up damaging someone else, no matter what it is. If I were to work for a nonprofit, I’d still need nice clothes (which would be made by kids in Asia or South America who work twelve hour days), I’d need to use technology for the job (so a phone and computer would have to come from some kids in Asia, too), my apartment and my office would both contribute to climate change pretty severely and climate change will most likely affect the poorest people on Earth first. Despite all this, would my meager work at the nonprofit be a net gain for the planet? The more I think about it, the more I think my answer is ‘no.”

I also question the work of most nonprofits when overpopulation is such a huge issue that no one is talking about. Sure, we can alleviate poverty and hunger, improve the rate of infant mortality and access to immunizations and better health care, but all this just means more people to feed and more people to employ. The Earth truly can’t handle this, so what’s the point of bringing all of these people into a global economy based on power and plunder if they’re just going to be a miserable middle class cog like I currently am who will only end up contributing to climate change in the long run?

It truly is a terrible thought, but we simply cannot afford to bring 7 billion people into the middle class. If everyone on earth were all of a sudden able to afford an American middle class lifestyle, the ecosystem would collapse.  7 billion people driving cars, building houses and walking around with their eyes glued to their phones would result in catastrophe. This "middle class" deal only works because billions of people are left foraging for scraps throughout the world. They live on pennies and dollars a day, connected to this system of exploitation only because they're a warm body and those of us with money need shiny new things. This isn't okay and at one point, it's going to have to stop. I’m left wondering how can we do anything if almost everything we do, from the littlest of tasks like doing laundry, harms others due to the effects of climate change? Interconnectivity is apparently a bitch.

There’s gotta be a better way to bring these people out of misery and into some semblance of security and comfort. I’d say “happiness,” but who in our country or society is truly happy? We’re all left wanting a bunch of shit, whether it be immaterial or material, and once we obtain it, we want just end up wanting more shit because that’s what we’re trained to do as consumers. If money and a whole bunch of expensive things were really able to bring happiness, I think the Real Housewives of wherever would be a hell of a lot less bitchy. But all these reality TV shows based on the lives of rich people show is how truly fucking awful and miserable the 1% seems to be. So why in god’s name do we aspire to be rich in this country when it just means more problems?

AS ALWAYS, THE BIGGER PICTURE INVOLVING POLITICAL AND ECONOMIC IMPLICATIONS

Plus I can't help but notice that a deep -- and very large -- part of me recognizes that the "American Dream" of a stable middle class lifestyle is unsustainable for this planet environmentally and economically. It is incredibly selfish of me to want a new phone, a new car and a house because all of these things are both destructive to the environment and rely on an exploitative system of capitalism. Is it fair that I can afford an iPhone when the person who slaved in a factory to make it can barely afford to feed themselves? All this technology is made by super poor people to sell to middle class people who are only a few steps away from being poor, all so that the rich can live in comfortable, gated communities. And if this is the situation, which I really think it is, then I really don't want a new iPhone because it won't bring me or the people who made it for me any sort of lasting happiness or peace. None of us are happy about this current set up, so why do we continue it? Plus, that the materials that go into creating said iPhone require damaging the earth through mining and manufacturing, and the carbon involved in the whole assembly and shipping process is probably pretty hefty.

So here I am, contemplating the most basic assumptions of American society in a way that only a severely underemployed twenty (almost thirty) something can. Many of my fellow citizens haven't had to confront this kind of thinking before, or were at least able to keep it at the fringes of their mind because they had comfort and security, but that isn't the case for most of us anymore.

I've had similar thoughts before, and they're all very Buddhist. But I've always been able to ignore them so I could pursue my next goal. However, I'm very quickly running out of ideas and I'm getting pretty damned sick of having to invent new goals so often. And now that I see how purposeless goals and desires are, I just don't see much of a point in continuing this struggle.

And because I'm me, I can't divorce my experience or my thoughts from the politics of the bigger picture. The 1%, the ruling class, the haves, they all depend on our continued participation in this imaginary and exploitative system. Our current form of capitalism thrives on our insecurities and our unhappiness. Despite billions of dollars spent on advertising, obtaining the newest toy, or anything else for that matter, rarely results in adding to our sense of inner peace or long term happiness. Once we get it, do we really feel any sort of lasting satisfaction? I know if I were to run out and get a new iPhone tomorrow, the newness would wear off within a week, so why do we all drive ourselves so crazy over these things?

The fact that we're conditioned to want the latest and the greatest objects doesn't help this problem, either. This is all done to make sure we keep working so that we can make more money to buy something new and exciting and all this does is retain the current political and economic status quo. The rich stay rich because the poor spend their money on things created by the rich.

WHAT SHOULD I DO / BUDDHA’ED?

So if getting a job at a nonprofit would only bring more desires, would my time be better spent setting an example as a monk or someone who turned their back on this system and now lives very simply? All I hear is about how dreadful the economy is, how jobs might be returning, but they’re paying much less than they did five years ago. It seems we’ll be lucky to find any job that keeps up slightly above the poverty level and if that’s the case, I’d just rather not participate in this absolutely shitty economy at all.

I had a thought last week that I think I'd be very happy (or at least more at peace) living in a tiny shack with a huge garden and some books and a bike. Fuck an important career, a nice car, a nice house, etc. I honestly think I'd be happier with that than an apartment in DC because I’d always be looking to improve the apartment in one way or another. If I continued to get better jobs with more money, I’d want to move into nicer places, too. However, if I force myself to live simply in a small, cheap place with meager features, I don’t think I’d want to constantly improve it.

Right now, all I want to do is just take my toys and go home, except I don't know what my toys are or what home would entail. Immersion into a Buddhist monastery perhaps? I'm pretty much of the mind that Buddha got it right, but how many people in the history of humanity and monasticism have achieved Enlightenment? The Buddha also didn't believe that an ascetic or monastic lifestyle were necessary to reach Nirvana. He didn't achieve his lofty status until he left being a monk behind.

I really have no idea what to do with myself. I'm giving DC a year and if I don't feel happy, peaceful or content, or if I can't make peace with these ridiculous thoughts, I'm throwing my hands up in the air and joining a fucking monastery because this whole society just isn't doing it for me on any level anymore.

The Orangest Flowers of Orange and the King to No One But Himself

Somewhere far from here,
Where bright green weeds grow high along the roadsides
And the moon hangs overhead during lazy summer afternoons,
A king plants his flowers.
He does it in mind for someone special,
A little girl who could use a lot of cheering up.
He owns a small house with a white picket fence
And is no king to anyone but himself,
Which probably means that he is no king.
Do not tell him that.
The king saunters along, sewing small seeds as he goes.
A willy nilly toss here, a deliberate drop there,
He plants his flowers.
Impatient as most kings are, he wills the seeds to crack open
Once they've been buried by earth.
The little plants wriggle and writhe as they wake from their dormancy below the ground,
Following the demands of their planter,
The king.
They slowly spout,
Each one,
As they stretch themselves out beneath the midday sun.
Little green stems begin to grow, reaching for the wispy clouds drowsily passing by above,
Their grasp missing the frozen droplets suspended in the sky by a few thousand miles.
The king observes his tiny verdant minions and his stout little frame jumps for joy,
His small plump hands wave with glee.
Even the orange bushy hairs on his head smile.
Well, they would if they only had mouths and muscles.
The king to no one but himself is pleased with his day's hard work
Of throwing and willing
And sits down on the ground,
Careful to avoid any toddler plants
But happily crushes an ant with his hefty and tiny bottom.
Ants carried off his daughter one day
And he has never seen her since.
Ants and the king are not the best of friends.
The plants continue to grow and grow
Until they reach a respectable height
Where they decide to bloom.
On each stem,
There is first a small bud.
Then there is a big bud.
Then the bud opens up and spits out what could be a flower
To the sound of "ptheh."
As soon as the flower bursts into existence,
Its taste for the color orange is well known.
Each flower has five long droopy petals,
One for each of the king's daughters.
The fist for the daughter who was carried off by gnomes.
The second for the daughter who was carried off by ants.
The third for the daughter who choked on a crumb of bread.
The fourth for the daughter who was carried off by hummingbirds.
And the fifth is for the daughter who,
Understandably,
Is currently too terrified to leave the house.
A great father does not a king automatically make.
The flowers twist a little before turning to face the sun.
They sing to the sun the king's praises, for he brought them to life.
Their songs dance through the sky, happily finding their way upward,
Filling the clouds with joy along the way.
The king is pleased, though he cannot hear the songs of the flowers,
As their voices are so quaint and soft, due to not having the proper vocal chords.
In fact, he is so filled with happiness and self-esteem that he can do nothing else
But loll off into an afternoon nap.
The flowers continue their songs next to the napping
But highly content
King,
And they sing with every piece of chlorophyll in their body.
They sing towards the sun with such will that they begin to uproot themselves.
Roots slowly rise from the ground,
Tickling their way through the soil.
Once all of the roots find themselves above the dirt,
The flowers realize that they have just given themselves legs.
Dozens of soft, spindly legs.
Each flower dances a short dance.
Some even link leaves and dance in small circles together,
But the dancing doesn't last long.
The flowers see the king,
Fast asleep,
And decide to surprise him.
They quickly scuttle off towards his house, their roots leaving thin trails in the grass and dirt.
Hundreds of orange flowers amass outside of the house,
Their stems and leaves bristling with excitement,
Their roots bouncing slightly up and down.
They find their way in through an open window,
Carefully wiping the dirt off their roots on the windowsill before entering.
They are respectful flowers.
The flowers begin to explore each room.
The largest room has some plain chairs and a bookshelf only one-quarter full.
The kitchen is average and small with some average wooden bowls on an average wooden table.
Certainly no trappings for a king and his family,
But,
Of course,
This is no ordinary king.
This king's sheer ordinariness is precisely what makes him,
As a king,
Completely unordinary.
Behind the extraordinary king's average kitchen,
There is a staircase which leads to a small hallway surrounded by smaller bedrooms upstairs.
One bedroom door is slightly ajar
And out of the crack floats soft snoring.
Every flower slowly walks in.
Quickly, they fill the room
And surround a small bed,
Upon which naps a small girl in an orange dress.
Off in the distance,
There is a faint squawk of a crow.
The flowers take no note of it,
As they haven't any ears,
Though the girl hears it,
But only in her dreams.
There, she is playing with a giant fluffy teddy bear in red pants in a field.
The teddy bear wears a straw hat.
Also, the teddy bear is so tall that atop his hat atop his head sits a crow,
Who is so far away that his squawk is barely heard.
The real squawk, however,
Happens not on a straw hat on the head of a giant, fluffy teddy bear whose puffy privates are appropriately covered,
But in a tall tree right above the napping king.
He hears it
And it stirs him.
He wakes, groggily.
First he notices the flowers are gone,
His entire afternoon's work suddenly missing.
Next he sees the lines in the grass and the dirt,
And the direction they appear to move in:
They move along some small hills,
And surely come to a startling conclusion at the base of an open window in front of his home.
Back in his daughter's room,
A few flowers lightly rub some pollen beneath the small nose of the little girl,
To ensure she continues her slumber.
Across the field,
The king then sees dozens of orange flowers,
Stems and roots and all,
Pouring out of a window on the second floor.
The stream of bright orange and green continues to flow from the window to the ground outside,
As the king's little legs carry him slowly over the hills.
No matter how fast he pumps his plump legs,
He has no hope of catching the light and agile flowers,
Who are currently carrying his resting daughter out her window,
Over the waterfall of flowers,
And down onto a soft bed of petals and stamens on the green grass below.
The flowers scuttle off with his daughter and the king follows after them at a pace which is terribly quick for him, but incredibly slow for the flowers.
They bring her to the tallest hill in the field and begin digging with their roots.
Hundreds of flowers help to move the ground to create a pleasant bed of dirt and soil for the daughter of the king.
The king continues his pursuit,
But is a couple of hills away before he spots the flowers again.
He rushes over to the flowered hill,
But all he sees is a mass of orange flowers with five petals,
Rooted firmly in the ground.
No sign of his daughter,
No sign of will or thought or consciousness on the part of the flowers.
But just because the king can't see it, doesn't mean it's not true.
With the king back among them,
The flowers sing a song,
Explaining to the king that his daughter will provide them with more than adequate nutrition.
Far more than enough to make their petals and flowers so beautiful
That they will be the talk of the countryside for generations to come.
That is,
If all the flowers don't consume the children of the countryside first.
A population not decimated by carnivorous flowers is necessary for gossip.
Once again,
The king cannot hear the song of the flowers
And in his rage,
He violently pulls a flower from the dirt,
As if it were but a mere weed.
The flowers begin to cry in pain,
Shocked at the barbaric actions of the king,
The man who brought them to life.
Their cries float to the skies,
Unheard by the king,
But heard by the clouds,
Who react in anger.
Their mood and color darken,
Their rage flashes in bright sharp lights throughout the sky
Until finally,
The sorrow for the flowers overcomes the clouds,
And they begin to cry.
The dark sky opens up
And a deluge of rain comes forth,
Soaking the flowers and the king.
Despondent and lost,
The king wanders back to his home,
Where he decides that his next daughter will be trained in the arts of self-defense
And will always carry a garden hoe

Humanity is to Tall Termites as Earth is to a Titan Tree.

Huh. I seem to have logically proven that we were designed to destroy the planet and thereby ourselves.

I figure I’ll save everyone the time of reading this by stating my thesis outright: logically, I have proven that, as creatures of this planet being subject to its rules of life and biology, we were predestined to destroy it. If one believes that life was consciously created by some sort of god-like being, then we are merely serving our purpose by contributing to the destruction of this planet and any benevolent act to try to save it goes against what we were apparently created to do.

EARTH AND HUMANITY ARE WIRED FOR SELF DESTRUCTION

The Earth was destined to get to this point: polluted, filthy, war-torn, ravaged and dying a very slow and painful death from the inside out. And we were designed to bring it there.

The primary purpose of any living organism is to survive, and not only to survive, but to reproduce to ensure the survival of not only itself, but of the species. This, taken to its logical end, means unbounded and unbridled population growth and similar levels of resource exploitation to obtain this. Sure, the planet had some checks to try to keep any species from becoming too prolific like disease and larger and larger predators, but one species was bound to come along and break all the chains that held it back from expanding too much too quickly. Our planet is simply too fertile and lush to have not created a species as powerful as us.

Arguably, something set up a set of rules on our planet (or Universe, if you want to go out that far), pressed play, sat back and stayed silent while this experiment of life has worked its way out. Whether that something was mere random chance, a universal consciousness, god, aliens, or god-like aliens, we currently don’t know and humans, in our current form, may never know simply because it looks like we’re not meant to have the tools we currently posses for that much longer. All of the scramble to unravel the mysteries of Life, the Universe and Everything might all be washed away in a giant tidal wave, or eradicated by a zombie apocalypse much sooner rather than later.

It seems, though, that the rules of Life, The Universe and Everything, at least here on planet Earth, dictate that a dominant and intelligent species will, regardless of intentions, pillage and destroy the planet simply because of the laws of biology and evolution in their current state. Reproduction, survival of the fittest and consumption as the most basic instincts of our bodies essentially mean that, without any predators, we will continue to expand until we exhaust our planet. Human population growth in the past few centuries has been staggering and we only seem to be getting more and more prolific. It would be dangerously naive to assume that humans can continue this exponential growth without disastrous consequences for our environment. Where the hell will we fit four billion more people? We’re going to tip the scales towards catastrophe pretty quickly as there simply aren’t enough resources for all of humanity. We’re going to destroy ourselves and we’re going to take the entire planet down with us.

If you believe that all of this is merely the structure of life and that life is simply the product of chance, then that’s fine. But if you have any gnostic, spiritual or religious tendencies, then this theory creates a bit of a problem. It means that God, Nature with a capital n, Aliens, or whatever, created us with the intention of us getting to this point of calamity and most likely past it. Our creator knew we could destroy ourselves and our planet with wild abandon. Simply put, we were wired for self-destruction.

SLAVES TO OUR DNA AND EMOTIONS

In the Astronomy class I took as an undergrad, out of the many fascinating things I learned, one small idea in particular stood out to me: we, and all living things, are merely slaves to DNA. Our DNA is what drives us to survive and is what ultimately drives us to reproduce, only to ensure that more and more complicated strands of DNA are created and sustained. At its most basic level, life seems to be solely about the replication of DNA and we, as inhabiters of living bodies, are subject to this.

I suppose the frightening part to this is that I’m starting to notice that our emotions, for all their complications, are simply body-based reactions to external stimuli designed to ensure our survival and, in the end, the planet’s and our destruction.  The first point is that we are nothing more than animals. Regardless of whether or not you believe in a soul, at our basest level, we are creatures of this planet, created on this planet and subject to the rules of this planet. And as described previously, the most basic rules of life and being an organism on Earth include striving for survival and reproduction. If one observes animal behavior, most of it hinges on obtaining food and water or obtaining the best possible mate.

Envy is a very good example of how our emotions are designed to ensure survival and proliferation. It’s an emotion particularly designed to feed our desire for dominance in society. If someone has something we want, we become envious because that something guarantees that person higher societal status. However, societal norms keep us from behaving in outlandish ways to acquire whatever we’re after. If we were left to our own barbaric desires, we would steal whatever they had. Or, at worst, we would kill the owner to obtain it. As animals, having high status assists us in obtaining the best possible mate, which, of course, ensures the continued survival of the fittest.

We experience envy because someone who has something we don’t threatens our ability to obtain the best mate. This is likely because the person who has what we’re envious of will get the better guy or girl, possibly leaving us with someone inferior. Nice cars, lots of money, and a big house don’t necessarily guarantee success in finding a mate, but I don’t think anyone will argue that they help.

The need for sex is something that is hard-wired into every animal capable of it, and the primary biological reason is to bring about more life. Once again, we just find ourselves committed to slavery by our DNA as the price for inhabiting these mortal forms. Love is just an extension of this need to reproduce, as well. We feel it so strongly because, short of eating, sex is a one of the most important biological tasks, at least according to our DNA. Perhaps we are wired to feel love so strongly as motivation to reproduce. I suppose, then, It could be argued as well that we care so much about our kids because we’re designed to, and we’re just playing out that role embedded in our code.

Really, so much of what we do is just animal and ape-like behavior but with more advanced tools in a more complex society. We can pinpoint typical dog, cat, and other animal behavior, and we attribute much of their actions to their species, but if that’s the case for so many creatures, why not us, too? Sure, we’re a bit more advanced than them intellectually, but we’re still animals.

But, I guess realizing and understanding that emotions are predetermined reactions hardwired into us through our DNA helps one to be freed from the roller-coaster ride that is emotionality. Once one recognizes that our emotions were evolved in our bodies for the purpose of survival and obtaining reproduction, they have less of a sting than they used to and aren’t able to control us as easily. Maybe if everyone understood why we feel what we feel, we’d all be a hell of a lot less emotional.

IMPLICATIONS FOR CLIMATE CHANGE

Here’s one thing we rarely hear when talking about climate change: the Earth, ultimately, will be fine whether or not we solve this problem.  It’s going to get a hell of a lot sicker before it gets better, but it will recover, and the recovery may take millions and millions of years.

This has been something I’ve been fighting with since I got home from Beijing. What most people are concerned about when they speak about stopping global warming is really the survival of humanity. We worry about our lives, the lives of our children, grandchildren and if we’re really forward thinking, maybe our great-grandkids, too. Rarely is the actual health of the planet truly involved, and when it is, it’s only a desire to retain the Earth as we currently know it. I personally would hate to see the beautiful biodiversity on our planet wrecked because of our selfish actions, but knowing this is the outcome of my current lifestyle doesn’t stop me from eating meat, driving a car and pursuing my dreams. I don’t think anyone will dramatically alter their lifestyle until some major catastrophic event happens, but we’ve seen so many of these crazy climactic changes happen over the past few years. Katrina should have been a turning point. The major wildfires and droughts we’ve been experiencing should be turning points. Hurricane Sandy should have been a turning point. But none of them have been, and they have all been fairly major events. I suppose it will take the loss of a major U.S. city populated mainly by rich white people to possibly force us to ever change. And at that point, maybe we’ll start to see these major storms and climate changes as immune responses of the Earth as a colossal organism to try to rid itself of a disease, infection, or sickness. 

We are, at worst, a pretty major flu that the Earth is experiencing. Who knows, maybe our purpose is to help strengthen the immune system of our planet, much like exposure to bacteria and germs strengthens our immune systems. Perhaps we were created to doom the Earth because the Earth is some sort of galactic villain at heart, vibrating on a level of consciousness and awareness that we can’t perceive. Maybe we were created, in our greed and arrogance, to kill a greedy and arrogant superbeing.  Or, maybe, we were created by evil aliens to kill a benevolent superbeing. Speculation is fun.

I think we’re beginning to understand that we are just mere cells in a giant body. Who knows, our cells might be aware of our consciousness, but to our current state of understanding, they’re just teensy little creatures living and dying in us until they get out of hand and kill us one way or another. As above, so below, and such. Just as cells are created, do their jobs, reproduce and die so that we might continue on, we are doing the same exact process for the giant organism on which we live, which happens to be a giant blue and green ball floating through space.

One could argue that all of us trying to save the world are doing the exact opposite of what being an organism on planet Earth seems to be all about: consuming anything and everything and reproducing as much as possible. Those of us working to save humanity and the planet look to be preventing what might need to happen: humanity and the current state of the Earth, through climate change caused by free market economics, unrestrained population growth, religious fundamentalism, and other factors, seem to be meant to destroy ourselves and our planet.

And, of course, once our Sun decides to go supernova, all of the greenhouse gases we’ve released and toxins we put in our soil and gun laws we’ve implemented won’t matter a damned bit because our little planet will be fantastically destroyed, hopefully in something as awesomely fun to watch as a Roland Emmerich destruction scene.

So, global warming looks to be predestined if you believe that the creator of life was a conscious being. I suppose that the question is, then, do we willingly and knowingly destroy most of the biodiversity on our planet because we are merely fulfilling DNA’s apparent extended purpose or do we rise above our most basic urges? Then again, perhaps a more pertinent question would be: do we assume, in probable arrogance, that we know better than whatever created us and buck our apparent purpose as the dominant species of this planet by trying to be some benevolent force that attempts to heal and cooperate rather than destroy and compete?

TIME TO BE AN OPTIMISTIC DEVIL’S ADVOCATE

While writing this, I did think a few times about how cynical it seems; that we’re nothing more than tall termites whose purpose is to consume, reproduce and ruin.  Maybe, instead, we were wired to have this insatiable desire to eat, destroy and propagate so we could rise above it.  Maybe whatever it was that created us created us with the intent to destroy everything in our path to see if we can overcome our most basic urges and until we begin listening to our better angels, we won’t be able to contact aliens or meet with god or move into the next evolution of consciousness or whatever the case may be. Perhaps being hard-wired for extermination means that we were created with the test built in us.

My theory about emotions and love being strictly ways that DNA guarantees further propagation is limited. It could be that we were wired to have sex and reproduction be such important impulses so that we would be forced to experience love because apparently love is the guiding force behind the Universe according to so many religions and spiritual doctrines. I sat down with my cat last night and realized that my theory doesn’t account for the love we have for pets. Obviously, the model is imperfect and I can’t speak to the ultimate purpose of these incredibly long chain of events. If I could, I would be very rich. Very rich, indeed.

The Chicken Dance at Denny's: The Lowest Point in My Life ... So Far.

This week, in an attempt to make a shit ton of money really fast, I took a job as a server at a new Denny's restaurant that opens in a couple of weeks. So far, it just might be the worst thing I've ever done. They're training all the servers in a giant group, and for the most part, it's a complete shit show. But all you really need to know right now is that if I were to arrive late to training, I would have to perform the Chicken Dance. Understandably, this has thoroughly terrified me enough to leave early all week. Today, however, was an exception.

Unfortunately, I left a couple minutes late this afternoon because I was desperately applying to jobs with the federal government in an attempt to escape from whatever circle of hell this is. On the drive in, I knew that if I were to arrive late, the Chicken Dance would of course be my punishment. I had some time for my imagination to take over and I imagined myself arriving late and the trainers would single me out in front of everyone to do the Chicken Dance. I imagined myself replying with, "yanno, I don't need this job that badly, so I'm just gonna head out. I hope your store does well and I wish you all the best of luck," and I would turn in my apron and walk out with my dignity partially in tact. Thankfully, I arrived with 5 minutes to spare, so all of my fretting and imaginative scenarios were for naught. Or so I believed.

After sitting down, the trainers gleefully awaited for people to arrive late like hungry vultures with name badges. After a few kids arrived late and were found to have had valid excuses, the trainers announced, "since no one was late we all get to do the Chicken Dance!" Because it is apparently "fun." They actually said this. Twice, maybe three times. "It's fun!" I suppose one person's idea of fun is another person's idea of a torturous hell. The Chicken Dance is my torturous hell.

Everyone began looking around in disbelief and horror. I thought to myself, "surely, woman, you jest!" except it was more like, "holy fuck, they've got to fucking be kidding, this isn't fucking fair, what the fuck can I do to get myself the fuck out of here right the fuck now?"

The trainers pulled up a video on youtube and began to play it. It was, in fact, the Chicken Dance. This was actually happening.

They then began to dance. Their fingers flapped, their arms waved, and their asses twisted to the floor in a paralyzing display of brazen shamelessness, which, remember, was supposed to be "fun!" I looked on in terror. For the first thirty seconds, which felt like hours, let me tell you, no one danced but the trainers. We all stood there with our arms at our sides, mouths agape at what was occurring before us. It was gruesome, a veritable blood bath. They noticed this and called us out on it. No one moved. We were all too terrified. All of us were thinking, and some of us were vocalizing, that this wasn't part of the fucking deal. We arrive on time, we avoid the Chicken Dance. We arrive late, we are punished. Severely. That was the agreement, yet the trainers continued to flap away.

In my mind, I had rehearsed arriving late like a douche and deserved to have to do the Chicken Dance. That I was prepared for. I was not prepared for this curve ball of awful, not to mention I had just gotten boxed in by the I'm-Too-Excited-About-Denny's trainer woman from Texas. She waved and flapped and twisted right next to me while threatening us with a four hour training on the Chicken Dance if we didn't join in. There was nothing I could do and nowhere else to go.

I begrudgingly began to dance.

At this point, we had successfully managed to kill a minute and a half of the video, but there was still a minute left to dance. So I waved and flapped and twisted while my heart broke and I died a little inside. Okay, maybe a lot. I watched the progress timer bar on the video inch its way across the screen in a slow march to death and ached for it to mercifully go faster. The girl next to me danced because it spread like a virus. There were, however, stragglers on the outside of the group who had more dignity than me and refused to dance at all. They were too-cool-for-school teenage girls. I envied their tenacity and ability to buck authority even in the most pressing of circumstances.

It was easily the most awkward two minutes and forty-three seconds of my life. A 28 year old world traveler with management experience who not only graduated with a master's degree, but is also a published academic author, was forced to perform the Chicken Dance at a Denny's in front of high school girls. I can't even begin to describe how I felt afterwards. The two most accurate words are "horrified" (I typed horrified, horror, horrible, and other variants at least eight times in this blog. Thank god for thesauruses) and "shamed," though they obviously don't do my experience yellow-feathered justice.

They rewarded those prisoners who dutifully followed orders in what I felt was a lavish gesture of generosity, probably due to the sudden onset of Stockholm Syndrome. And what was my reward? A light up Denny's pen.

I sat down a defeated man. Any pride or self confidence I may have had prior to arriving at Denny's tonight has now been stampeded by dancing chickens in Denny's aprons. I will have nightmares of those three minutes for the rest of my life. As I sat down, my face was bright red and I was sweating from such unprecedented levels of embarrassment. When the dust settled, I thought, "that's it. That was the worst moment of my life. I've officially hit rock bottom."

Throughout the rest of the training, which involved terrible slideshow presentations, I kept thinking to myself, "life can't possibly get worse than this." But no, now I think it can. They could've forced me to do the Chicken Dance naked covered in Denny's whipped cream while singing a Nickelback song. So, while this was single-handedly the most embarrassing experience of my life, I at least have something to look forward to.

Addendum: I have decided that if I ever write any sort of autobiography or memoirs at some point in my life, this chapter will be known as Moons Over My Humiliation. Bam.

A Spiritual Crisis

This is a four thousand word fairly focused mess of the current state of Ed. Being that it’s so long, I’ve broken it into four sections and I will outline it all a bit here in the first paragraph like a true former academic. In the introduction, I’ll give background to my current situation, chronologically, physically and spiritually. In the second section, I'll offer a critique of the Law of Attraction. It had served me well for years until about six months ago, but now my entire spiritual house of cards is in shambles, which leads me to the third section. There, I’ll discuss the elimination of attachment, seemingly the last resort to my current spiritual crisis. If the Universe isn’t playing by the rules I thought it had played by for so long, the only thing I have left to do is give up on being attached to any rules at all. Unfortunately, the final section on my current spiritual crisis isn’t particularly happy and it pokes holes in much of what I’ve thought was true for so long. I now find myself completely lost and without purpose and faith for the first time in my life. Fun! Feel free to skip the first three sections and read the last one, entitled "A Spiritual Crisis" if you're just looking for a summary. The rest of the stuff is just me being incredibly thorough.

INTRODUCTION

Right now, I’m just trying to make sense of life and the Universe through philosophy and spirituality. I thought I had a really good grasp on things until my life went and shat all over itself and now, I’m standing back thinking, “hmm.. all of this stuff about positivity, desire and attraction is all just bullshit,” which turns my once rock-solid belief system into a transparent, gelatinous mess much like red jello, except considerably less tasty.

Here’s a quick summary of my twenties in case you’re new to Ed: I graduated with a semi-useless degree in photography at 21 and wasn’t sure what to do with myself, so I took a job teaching people with disabilities in college. Turns out, I loved the job and helping people, so I stayed with the company for 4 years. During that time, I tried multiple times to get into graduate school, each attempt failing more miserably then the last. Finally, my perseverance paid off and I got into a ridiculously amazing program that allowed me to study and live in London, Leiden (outside of Amsterdam), Vienna, Geneva and Beijing for two months each. It was the best year of my life and I thought my luck had finally turned around. When I got home from Beijing, I got stuck in Buffalo due to money problems, but moved to Washington DC in May last year in an attempt to find a job in international development. The six months I spent in DC were incredibly trying, and ultimately, the risk I took failed when the temp agency I was working through dropped the ball and only gave me 20 hours a week after three months of full time work. I couldn’t pay my bills and had to move back to Buffalo as I ran out of money. It’s now three months later and I’m still stuck in Buffalo, unemployed, miserable and with absolutely no clue what to do next. It’s...slightly strange to be able to summarize 8 years of my life in one paragraph.

Anyway, I was so convinced that if I just wanted something enough and that if I just worked hard enough, it would magically come true. The only thing standing between me and my dream of a job in international development was just how intense my desire was: either I could give up and say I lost, or keep trying like a stubborn son of a bitch, knowing that it was going to come true at some point. I did focus on my goals and took a bunch of risks while trying really fucking hard to make my dreams come true, and all that has happened in the past year and half has been constant struggle coupled with massive disappointment.

To those people that would have called my previous actions and beliefs idealistic and naive, I suppose you were right, but I would have rather been an idealist than a realist anyway. Unfortunately, being an idealist and an optimist has gotten me nowhere, so I’m forced to become a realist because my life sucks right now. I have to confront the beliefs that got me here as I’ve spent eight years and a shit ton of effort chasing a dream. At this point, regardless of how many steps and risks I’ve taken and how much I wanted it to work out, I’m in a pretty sucktacular place.

A CRITIQUE ON THE LAW OF ATTRACTION

So I’m questioning a lot of what I used to believe. A big part of this is the supposed spiritual Law of Attraction, which dictates that like attracts like, so if you’re an optimist and believe positives things, positive things will be attracted to you. This was me for a long time. Before, during and after my graduate school experience, I truly believed that I had drawn amazing experiences to myself because I had completely changed my belief structure to reflect this Law of Attraction. Logically, because I was manifesting amazing things for myself (I’d say living around the world for a year was pretty amazing) and because I so completely believed that more great things would be coming my way, my life should have been on a pleasant incline towards awesome.

This is the type of idea promoted by books like “The Secret,” which promote rampant and egoic materialism covered in safe, faux-spirituality that caters to those in the New Agey crowd more interested in materialism than true spiritual development. The premise is that if you want a new car and a pretty spouse hard enough, the Universe must obey your selfish requests and part like the Red Sea, as if we are all our own personal Moses. I always thought that this was crap since there are droves of people out there trying to be actors and rock stars, and it only happens for a very small percentage of them. So what about the others? I’m sure that for most of them, their desires and skill sets were strong enough, it’s just that our society doesn’t have enough room for tens of thousands of actors and rock stars. Still, I subconsciously agreed with the premise. Plus, I thought that because I had wanted to help people through a career in international development, my not-so-selfish desire would be granted by the Universe. I was optimistic, I wanted to give back and make the world a better place and I was determined to do so. I figured I was on the right track.

The pleasant incline towards awesome I had hoped to be on actually turned out to be a steep water slide filled with pee which led into a large pool filled with poo. Perception is key to life and experiences, and I could only pretend that my excrement-laden slide was fun for so long before I gradually began to understand the reality of my situation. Things in my life have gotten progressively worse over the past six months and my former positive attitude has been beaten into submission. If like attracts like and if I was so positive for so long, then why has my life turned out so freaking terribly?

I’ve come to realize that the fabled “Law of Attraction” really does work...if you’re already rich or born with a staggering amount of luck on your side. Neither of these things apply to me, and because I have terrible, awful, shit luck, I get pissed off, jealous and slightly bitter when I see people succeeding effortlessly lately. However, those people who are advocating for the Law of Attraction and other fluffy, pleasant and warm ideas are simply trying to help the world by explaining what has worked for them. They tried and succeeded and that’s their experience. That’s all they can understand and it’s not their fault for encouraging others to do the same. However, not everyone’s path is fluffy, pleasant and warm. I’m sure many of the people who believe in the Law of Attraction have faced stark adversity, but at some point, something clicked and the Universe or luck or whatever switched to their side and good things started coming their way.

For the past decade or three, I constantly busted my balls off to make something of myself by setting up goals and plans which all followed the rules of society: I did really well in grammar and high school, took out loans and put myself through college, worked and gained experience through different jobs, made a new life plan when I realized I wasn’t happy where I was, went back to school convinced that more education would beget a good job, and when I graduated, I took a huge risk and moved to the city where I would have had the best chance at a career and economic success. I’ve paid my bills on time, I’m consistently kind and treat everyone with respect. I valued and believed in the ideals of hard work and education. Meanwhile, large multinational corporations, huge banks and monied interests, in collusion with our politicians and government, have drained our economy through illegal means and have simultaneously destroyed our planet. They broke all the rules and have rewarded themselves handsomely. I followed the rules all my life and I’m 28 single, unemployed, overeducated, broke, living with my parents and with no light at the end of the proverbial tunnel.

So I suppose my life and experiences prove to me that the Law of Attraction is mostly bullshit. However, one of the spiritual truths that I’m still questioning is that everything one wants will eventually manifest itself, it just might take time. So who knows, maybe all I wanted in this life will finally come true fourteen billion lifetimes from now, but if that’s the case, I’d rather just not want anything at all. I know patience is a virtue and whatnot, but I really don’t feel like coming back here for centuries just to fulfill some dumb desire from a long time ago. That is the general law of karma, isn’t it? Whatever one gives out will come back, and if one projects enough desire, said desire is bound to bring back results. It just might take some time. Will I have to be reincarnated again and again until I finally experience all that I desired in this and all my past lives due to karmic law? Possibly and if so, fuck that.

With all of this, I’m left asking what the hell should I do next? Truly, I have no idea. A very small part of me wants to try what I’ve always done: form a new plan, hunker down and stubbornly force myself forward to accomplish a new goal. This is all I’ve ever done and it’s the only thing I really know how to do. After trying it numerous fucking times, however, I’m starting to wonder if it’s ever going to work for me. This is all most people do and we’re all stuck in this endless cycle of trying to make our lives passable in an economy and society that seems to revel in the failure and misery of regular people.

THE ELIMINATION OF ATTACHMENT

What else is there to do besides try harder? Give up trying? I wouldn’t even know where to begin with that or what it would entail, but that’s what I’m drifting towards. Perhaps the whole reason why I’m back in Buffalo is to do two things that are inherently related: break down my ego and release myself from the endless loop of attachment and desire. Like I said, though, the problem is that I have absolutely no idea how to do this.

Part of my problem is that I’ve done all of this self-analyzation and partial ego destruction on my own and I’d say 95% of my spiritual journey has been solitary, so it’s hard for me to gauge where I am and what I’m doing. I hear of all these spiritual and religious communities where people can rely on each other, but I’m vehemently opposed to any organization when it comes to spirituality. Plus, I feel like my ideas are closest to various Pagan, New Age, Kabbalistic, and other similar schools and the people that are drawn to these kinds of groups are generally not my kind of people. I’m too grounded and pragmatic. I have a very dark sense of humor and I swear like a sailor, but I feel my style of language adds a splash of color and humanity to what would otherwise be a very boring topic. If something like this were written by a typical New Ager, I’d be furious over how many times they’d likely mention love, consciousness, being, spirit, and other similarly groundless and fluffy words. Frankly, I feel that most of these people would be shocked or turned off by me because I don’t speak in light-bringing platitudes.

A friend and I recently went to a medium in Lily Dale and she told me my energy is “sharp” and “very hard to read,” which I’ve heard from other friends who are into energy fields and auras. Obviously I’m different from the soft, plump and couch cushion-like old ladies who often frequent those spiritual streets. I’ve gone for two different readings by two different mediums and they both completely missed the ball, either because they suck at their jobs or because I’m too difficult to read. I joked with my friend that my energy broke the mediums we saw together because she always gets great readings when I don’t go with her, but when she follows me, the mediums give her subpar readings. Mine just all around suck. So what do I make of my difference and where do I fit in? I have no clue, but it’d be nice to find a place where people with similar thoughts are capable of keeping their heads out of the clouds and grounded in more tangible rhetoric and practices.

When it comes to ego destruction, I feel as if mine is especially tricky as I’m not emotional at all in most respects. Most things never get to me. Am I more in control of my ego because I’m not ruled by my feelings? At all? Whatsoever? Or has my left-brain succeeded in finally destroying my creative and emotional other half? I’ve spent the past 28 years of my life chasing career-based dreams, which is pretty ego-reinforcing, I suppose. I’ve remained “spiritual” on the side through lots of reading and thoughtful contemplation, but my spirituality and mind were always used as tools to get what my ego wanted out of life: an engaging, rewarding career in international development. Maybe the point of not getting the job I’ve wanted for so long was to force me to relinquish my ego because had I gotten a great job, the ego would have been constantly reinforced by the status of my career.

Because of all this, I find myself drifting closer to the basic tenets of Buddhism and Taoism. However, I’m not sure if this is me agreeing with the ideas of these thought-systems or if it’s because I’m just turning into a cranky, spiritual cynic. I desired a great job for so long, and really, when I get down to it, the actual problem isn’t that I didn’t land a job, the problem is that I was so attached to the idea of getting this great job that my entire self feels lost now that I don’t have it. I forewent everything because I figured if I could just get a career in international development, everything would come up Milhouse.. I mean Ed. But now the previous 8 years feel like a frustrating mess of chasing spirits and shadows.

I have a problem with eliminating desire, however. I can not desire all I want but at the end of the day, I’m simply desiring to not desire, and what the balls am I supposed to do with that? I remember first learning about Buddhism and nirvana when I was in middle and high school and I was completely dumbfounded by it. All of these Buddhist people are running around seeking their ultimate goal of nirvana, which is a state in which desire and the ego no longer exist. But how are you supposed to achieve nirvana if it means you can’t want it? How is one supposed to achieve a goal if you can’t desire to achieve it? Is one supposed to randomly trip over a nirvana stone one day and happily land face first on the cold hard ground of selflessness? I’ve never found an answer to this basic and kinda-really-fucking-important question besides the “follow these eight simple Buddhist rules” bullshit. If it were truly that simple, then I’m pretty sure more of the millions of Buddhists out there would be achieving this storied state, but instead, people are stuck wanting to not want and making no progress towards the destruction of the ego.

After thinking on this whole desire thing for a couple of days, I realized that desire isn’t the problem. We all have desires that manifest themselves every day, such as the desire to eat, make friends and have kids. Hopefully those three desires don’t manifest themselves as one single desire for you. That would be bad. The real problem and danger is attachment. Our attachment to the outcome of our desires is what gets us into trouble. The distinction is subtle and in the end, it doesn’t make a huge difference, but it allows us to desire all we want, which is logical. We just can’t get attached to the outcomes, but then this is where shit gets tricky. I have absolutely no clue how to engage in desiring a goal without getting attached to a certain outcome. Let’s take what I’m currently going through as an example. I desire a great career with a great husband in a wonderful city with financial security. However, at the same time, I should be perfectly okay with the possibility of being 30 and in the same situation I’m in now? Living at home, unemployed, broke and stuck in Buffalo? Fuck that, that’s ridiculous. It was my attachment to the first outcome that made me work so hard to avoid the second and current outcome. Without working so hard, how in the hell will my goals come to fruition?

A SPIRITUAL CRISIS

Taoism teaches one to live in harmony with the Tao, nature, the Middle Way, or the path with the least resistance. Be like water. Surrender and flow to where you’re needed. Release your attachment to your situation and you’ll find peace. Fine. I did that. That’s why I came back to Buffalo. I surrendered, gave up and followed what I thought were signs from the Universe and moved back home because I figured I’d give up on struggling so hard in DC, except I’m more miserable than I’ve ever been. And now, not only am I miserable, but I’m completely lost. At least in DC, I had direction and purpose.

I guess all I can do right now is sit back and wait for what’s next in my life as opposed to struggling to force it to happen as usual. I’ve heard that the definition of insanity is doing the same thing over and over again while expecting different results. At least I can say I’m not insane. Here’s the thing, though. I really fucking want and need a job. Soon. I’m broke and I’m nearly thirty with nothing to show for it, and the Universe seems content with throwing me broken bits of bone. I’m not even getting full bones lately! Just the shitty ones already torn to bits by other people.

So at the lowest point in my life in a long time, I’m supposed to shrug my shoulders, say it’s okay and have faith that it’ll all work out in the end? I don’t see that happening. I used to think that everything happened for a reason and it was all well and good when I had that one last thing to try, whether it was grad school or moving to a new city, but now that I’m all out of options, I’m also inconveniently all out of faith, hope and optimism. Previously, if I started to feel bad about my life or any aspect of it, I could just have faith that things would improve but things have only gotten massively shittier. Without faith, life feels pointless. So is it better to realize that reality is a bitter cold asshole who really doesn’t have my back or pretend that a Flying Spaghetti Monster is secretly watching over me and has my best interest at heart? I’m not so sure anymore.

I don’t see how it’s possible to put my trust in the Universe and yet somehow remain unattached to the idea of improving my current situation. Right now, all I see in my future are crap jobs that pay nothing because once again, I have shit for luck and I graduated at the wrong time in history. Because all I will be able to land are crap jobs, my financial future is looking pretty shaky. Thankfully, I’ve already eliminated my consumerist urges, but that was due to necessity, not a haughty sense of purpose. Since I’ve never made more than $24,000 in a year and I’m $90,000 in debt, it has gotten pretty easy to say, “I don’t need that insanely fun looking new piece of technology.” But that doesn’t mean that I don’t want my own place and have a future in a decent career that doesn’t make me want to kill myself when I wake up in the morning. You’d think that such a desire would be pretty basic and obtainable, but the Universe can’t even seem to send that my way. Meanwhile, douchebags who have wrecked lives and destroyed the planet get their every want and need met. And they’re the ones who are dictating how the rest of us are living! Their selfish desires and the economic and spiritual lies they’ve fed us are the reason we’re all screwed while they succeed. Seems pretty backwards to me.

So here we are again. I’ve written thousands of words about where I currently am spiritually and now more than ever, I’m really not sure what comes next. My answer before was always, “I just need to do this,” or “that certain type of break just needs to happen for me and I’ll be okay.” Everyone I know always tells me similar stuff, “just hang in there, something will turn around for you,” and whatnot, but it’s been a year and a half of constant struggle and disappointment. And even if something great were to come up, it wouldn’t last because that’s just the nature of reality. Not only that, if something were to change for me, what about all the other people who face similar or worse economic situations? Are they supposed to simply sit back and patiently wait their turn while the Universe figures out how to provide basic necessities and a slightly-better-than-awful quality of life for seven billion people? It doesn’t seem fair and so many of the New Agey, Law of Attraction folks seem to ignore this with rose-colored glasses. Apparently if the starving kids in Africa only wanted food a little bit more, they’d get it. BAM, I pretty much destroyed that whole argument in one sentence. So the New Agers and those that spout constant love and positivity can talk about “abundance” all they want, but until our society completely restructures itself, they will forever remain dangerously naive. Actually, I’d go one more step further and say that the continued encouragement of the Law of Attraction promotes materialism and thus reinforces our current capitalist economic model, which only ensures further exploitation of the world’s poor. So, this dangerous belief is not only naive, but implicit in keeping others from being able to create decent lives for themselves. Here’s to using my grad school vocabulary, language structure and critical thinking skills to deconstruct phony spiritual beliefs while simultaneously offering economic criticisms! Shit, I’m far too aware of the current state of things for my own damned good, and it’s making me cynical. It sucks being so brilliant sometimes. And sadly, coupling economic cynicism with my new-found spiritual cynicism leaves me feeling pretty hollow.

All I have left to try is the elimination of my ego, which is still just another desire in a long list of physical and spiritual desires that all leave me feeling more and more empty the more I chase them. I feel that I needed to write all this down, though. Otherwise, my hikes would have been plagued by the same ideas until I turned it into a blog of ginormous proportion. Maybe now, my hikes will be filled with my next pointless spiritual pursuit involving how the Universe likes to abandon those that want to serve it while rewarding those that wish to destroy it. Perhaps these four thousand words were written to lead me to the realization that our planet and the Universe are simply psychotic and suicidal. Maybe all they want is to be destroyed but they're not capable of doing it unless their little microbits kill themselves off first. I’ve aways been interested in the bigger picture, so maybe the reason why vulture capitalists and evildoers thrive while the rest of us suffer is so that this plane of existence can be put out of its misery even faster.

I started this blog off only slightly cynical and was hoping to find solace through writing it. When I thought I was 95% of the way finished, I wrote an ending few sentences that were supposed to close it all out, but wound up turning into this huge and depressing last section. Now I feel more cynical than ever! Wonderful. Stupid fingers and brain, that’s the exact opposite of what I wanted. Oh wait, maybe if I were less attached to trying to feel better about the Universe and my purpose in it, I’d feel better about myself. Because that’s totally logical. Damned sarcasm! Wait, no. Damned Universe! Yes, damned Universe, indeed.

Double Feature!

I've been in DC for almost.. sweet merciful crap! 4 months!? How did that happen? It's been a struggle and that's putting it lightly. In fact, that word in its various forms is used pretty often in these two bits of a blog. I'm trying to re-focus myself because my mind was been bogged down pretty severely with worry and stress because I'm in probably one of the most trying circumstances I've ever put myself in. So I've been determined to reverse that, and these two mini blogs are part of it. The first is a piece on what I currently have to be thankful for and the second is merely a letter written from myself to myself. Not the most complicated or thought-provoking stuff, certainly, but helpful nevertheless.

I HAVE AND AM THANKFUL FOR

So my thoughts these past couple of months and past couple of weeks especially have been plagued with constant thoughts and feelings of lack. I'm lacking this, I should've done this so I could have had that, and so on and so forth. To try to reverse this trend, I'm going to write a quick couple of things down that I actually HAVE and that I am thankful for.

First off, and I forget this often, but I'm in mother effing Washington, D.C. and this has been a pretty big goal of mine for years. The fact that I'm here hasn't had a chance to really sink in because I'm so constantly stressed out and worried, but this is a huge accomplishment in itself. Not only am I in DC, I moved here with nothing. The Ed of even three years ago would never EVER have just packed up and moved without some concrete plan set up. I suppose I have courage and for that I am grateful.

I don't own much really and even though this is a huge stress sometimes, I could be happy about it. My thoughts often stray to the fact that people my age are buying houses and investing and are able to buy big things like furniture and TVs, though at the moment, I can barely afford food. I suppose this is what it's like to be poor and it sucks. The big thing to keep in mind, though, is that I'm NOT poor. I have a laptop and a nice camera and other things, and I'm certainly not living in abject poverty so things could be considerably worse. I'm thankful that I'm NOT out on the street or starving.

One of the things I'm struggling with the most is having my master's degree. It was a huge goal for a long time and now that I have the fancy paper, it feels like it's done me absolutely no favors. I'm now $60,000 in debt and it's hard to be grateful for something that just makes me bitter when I think about it. I'm so frustrated with it that my mind seems to have forgotten how incredible the experience actually was and how I lived a dream for a year. Granted, I never thought it would be this difficult when I finally had the degree, but what I did was amazing. I need to keep that in mind and be grateful for the experience instead of feeling bitter about having gotten a master's degree that doesn't seem to do much good right now.

I'm definitely thankful for the support of my friends and family. Without them, I don't know where I'd be. It's only because I'm lucky enough to be surrounded by great supportive people that I've been able to live the life of a nomad and see so many places these past couple of years.

I'm thankful for inspiration, wherever it comes from. I'm thankful for my constant hunger for knowledge, which has allowed me to completely transform my way of thinking and to see how to change my attitudes. The past few weeks have been difficult for me, there's no doubt about that. I've been forced to confront my worst fears about money, pride, ego and more and I'm still truckin' along. I'm grateful that I'm able to understand that, for as sucktacular as my current situation may be, it's only temporary. I'm crafty and I'll figure something out, I have faith in that.

The fact that I've accomplished so many goals these past few years is pretty crazy. Many people aren't that lucky. I'm also determined as hell, which is both a good and bad thing. Nothing stands in my way from accomplishing what I want but I think I might be at the point where I'm willing to let go of that. It's gotten me far, but struggling this much isn't a fun process. I really would like to figure out what it is that the Universe needs me to do. Why was I created? Why did I bring myself to this point in time and space? I've been forcing creation to bend to my will for a while and I feel like I finally just can't bend it anymore without a massive fight.

What I'd like to do, and I'm grateful for having come to this realization lately, is surrender to the will of the Universe. I feel like I need to read some Islamic stuff as Islam means "to submit" and maybe reacquaint myself with some things relating to Taoism, which is about finding the path of least resistance and letting nature work through me. Now this all sounds well and good but I have no idea how to discover what it is the Universe would like me to do. I dunno why, but I feel like I need to check out astrology or mediums or something. Some other ideas I wouldn't have considered before are popping up, too. I've tried asking the Universe to point me in a general direction but I haven't been able to hear a damned thing from it lately, most likely because my mind, heart and soul are drowning in worry and stress. If anyone has any recommendations about direction, that would be fantastic!

I've been using my time here in DC to do a lot (and I do mean A LOT) of reading on various aspects of spirituality and I feel like that's going to be a common thread during my stay here. I just need a bit of guidance and reassurance sometimes!

WRITE A LETTER TO MYSELF

Okay Ed, this is what's really going on...

You're stressed out. That's obvious. You're frustrated and you have reason to be. But you're still you underneath all of the external bullshit that you're trudging through right now and YOU KNOW you're strong. You'll get through this and as usual, everyone you know will be amazed at your strength. You demand a lot out of life because you know you're capable of a lot but because of that, you're bound to run into a few brick walls here and there or encounter a few situations that aren't the easiest. But you will survive. Not only that, you will thrive.

You chose a long time ago to not follow the typical path of most people your age. You feel behind, you feel like you're not successful or like everyone else is so much further ahead than you are. You feel like that your life at 27 is what most people you know experienced at 22. But you know that you've affected lives and changed people for the better. You've traveled the world and you're educated. You feel like that doesn't count for much now, but it will and you know that deep down. Your education and your chosen major helped show you a lot about the world and how every day people can make a difference. You are one of those people.

Love troubles you easily. Give it up. How much time have you wasted searching and searching for him? How much heartache, shame and disappointment have you endured in a search that hasn't brought you much? You spend hours a day looking through the guys, hoping to find one you really click with. Yet it doesn't happen and the guys you really want never end up wanting you back. You struggle with it and it hurts every single day. So why bother? You hate being controlled by your lesser impulses and this is something you've known for a while, so why do you always come back to it? You won't find him online. You know that. Give it up.

The spirituality thing is key. It is what will get you through this and it is what will give you a lot of your strength.

Smiles help. Helping strangers helps. Giving helps. Focus on your breathing. Don't get caught up in your thoughts. When you feel the worry an stress coming, breathe through it and try to laugh because you will laugh about this and feel joy in it in thirty years. Why shouldn't you laugh and feel joy about it now?

Learning to Love This World.

Oh, man. This post is a rambler, and it's fairly.. deep, for lack of a better word. Musings on Christmas, fear, spirituality, the Self, time, death, capitalism, Wikileaks, the circle of life and even more, are all found within. This is from my journal that I've been adding to all day. If you're reading this, I apologize for the conflicting styles. It's basically a stream-of-consciousness exercise, so it repeats in places and may run on a bit. It's also large, because I wanted to work through my thought process as much as I could. Normally, I don't post my journal here 'cause I like to keep that stuff to myself, but I had a good time working through all this and I like to share the more interesting thoughts that grace my buzzing mind. This is a bit of a vain thing to do, though, as I contradict the idea that my words and thoughts can teach anyone anything later on in this post, but hey, that's fine! It may get preachy in places, but keep in mind that I'm guilty of every sin that I call out.

This whole thing has been primarily inspired by two books. The first is Siddhartha by Hermann Hesse and it's a fictional novel about the life of Buddha. I loved it. The second book that helped to inspire this post is The Way of the Wizard by Deepak Chopra, awesomely given to me by a constant source of inspiration, my friend Grace. So, without further adieu, I'm just going to jump into this:

Siddhartha ends up sympathetic to the trials and tribulations of man.
I don’t think I’m there yet.
I get aggravated with people,
Even with myself,
When they get preoccupied in their lives,
When they feel that the rest of the world doesn’t exist.
I suppose I hold that in contempt a bit
Because we all get too wrapped up in all of our petty problems.
But these problems are all they know.
Even with my momentary serenity,
I have problems with my bleeding heart liberal.
I want everyone to know how tragic life can be for everyone else
But then again,
Maybe it’s not tragic.
I suppose people who were born into developing countries
Or in really awful conditions
Chose to do that because they needed to learn whatever lessons they needed to in that particular situation.
Those of us outside it,
Me especially,
Are simply passing judgment.
I want to put these people up on a pedestal in an attempt to shake the people in the West from their complacency
And their consumerism
Which is making everyones’ lives worse.
The people in the developing world are slaves to our needs
As they’re stuck making our products and destroying their land for pennies
While we’re slaves to our desires and our marketing and our lifestyles.
No one’s really happy.
Really poor people just want food, water and shelter
And for their kids to have a better life than what they were born into.
People in the middle class are miserable because they want more.
We aspire to be rich,
Or to have this thing and that thing,
Or this experience and that experience.
And not that I know,
But I’m sure the rich aren’t happy, either.
Bernie Madoff’s son just killed himself yesterday
And the only reason I bring that up is because his family was massively rich.
They got that way from essentially fucking people over out of greed.
Everyone aspires to have the lifestyle of the super-rich
To have enough money to live carefree,
But money never really allows us to live carefree.
We’re left wanting more of it
Or we’re left scared that we’re going to lose it.
I’ve known for a while that the pursuit of riches and money, aka greed,
Is just another form of fear,
And anyone who lives their life dominated by a fear never ends up happy.
Thus,
Anyone who tries to amass unnecessary amounts of wealth most likely isn’t happy.
I don’t think this means I should embrace being an ascetic,
But I do believe that pursing money for the wrong reasons will only end up in disaster.
I really would like to have enough money so that I could give bunches of it away on kiva.
But then again,
My stupid inner bleeding heart liberal judgements come out again.
Who's to say that those people need my help?
Though I suppose if they're signed up to that site, they certainly want it!
Like I said, though,
I put these people up on a pedestal,
When many of them would just want to have a lifestyle similar to mine
And here I am bitching about how bad it is.
But I suppose that’s just the thing,
No one is happy where they are and we all want more
Or at least some massive change.

Do those in power have an interest in keeping all of us unhappy and unfulfilled?
I think so.
It’s not like I’m talking about anything new or novel here.
Hell,
I’m pretty sure this exactly what Jesus was talking about
And yet here in America,
We celebrate his birth by buying shit!
How ridiculous.
Some guy in a beard ran around talking about how the poor are closer to god than the rich
And yet his birth represents the biggest rush of capitalism throughout the year.
Man, that’s gotta be the most ridiculous piece of irony in the history of irony.
The key to our salvation,
At least according to Jesus,
Involves us renouncing our greed and fear
And yet we spend his supposed birthday indulging in our greed and fear by keeping this gear that exploits the poor turning.
Those in power tend to be the ones who exploit fear the most.
Just look at what’s going on with Wikieaks right now;
A mass of previously classified information gets released and it sends the powerful of the world into a fear-crazed tizzy about even more protection and security
Simply because the words they wrote are being read by everyone.
I do believe that those in power,
And not just governments,
I’m primarily speaking of the lords of capitalism,
Want us to remain unfulfilled.
How else could they convince us to buy so much crap?
So much of our marketing presents our products to us as the answer to further fulfillment or happiness,
Or the answer to a problem,
And after living with the product for a year,
How much of that fulfillment remains
And how much of that problem is left unsolved?

Ok, so back to Siddhartha.
Here are some quotes that I thought were especially poignant in the last chapter:

“[the world] is perfect at every moment; every sin already carries grace within it, all small children are potential old men, all sucklings have death within them, all dying people -- eternal life (116).”

I like this one because it essentially means that everything that’s currently occurring, no matter how awful it is, has purpose and positivity and goodness in it. This was something that I wrestled with when reading Conversations with God, and I’d rather not revisit the ridiculously long thought process that occurred after, but I’m glad that I still understand it and agree with it. It’s just so damned difficult to keep in mind when going through something that sucks so bad!

“I learned that through my body and soul that it was necessary for me to sin, that I needed lust, that I had to strive for property and experience nausea and the depths of despair in order to learn not to resist them, in order to love learn to love the world, and no longer compare it with some kind of desired imaginary world, some imaginary vision of perfection, but to leave it as it is, to love it and be glad to belong to it (116).”

Ugh, ain’t this one a bitch? To truly love all the heartache, the pain, the shittiness of life and the bad stuff that always happens feels like it requires the patience and mindset of a saint. I know from my experience that I always think to remember this lesson during bad times, but it’s so difficult. However, thinking it and doing it are two different things. I think I just need more practice. HOWEVER, UNIVERSE.. that does not mean that I want life to get even worse than it is right now to test this hypothesis! Balls! Balls..

“...what is of value and wisdom to one man seems nonsense to another (117).”

“...teachings are of no use to me; they have no hardness, no softness, nor colors, no corners, no smell, no taste -- they have nothing but words. Perhaps that is what prevents ou from finding peace, perhaps there are too many words, for even salvation and virtue. Samsara and Nirvana [illusion and truth] are only words, Govinda. Nirvana is not a thing; there is only the word Nirvana (118).”

For all the reading I do on spirituality and the different traditions I’m interested in (Taoism, Kabbalah, Buddhism, Alchemy, crazy other stuff), it’s all semi-pointless. One of the thoughts I thought (or felt, I suppose), was that everyone finds happiness in their own way. We’re all here to experience life differently and it’s incredibly naive of me to believe that if I follow a certain teacher’s words exactly that I’ll find my answers. I’ll only find his (or hers, of course). Everyone needs to make their own path and learn the lessons they need to learn on their own.

The biggest point of Siddhartha seems to be about Unity and how important that is, and I believe that word nicely captures most of what I’ve already written about. We’re all in this together. We all have pieces of everything else in us and vice versa. My body is simply a collection of random atoms and molecules and so is everything else. We’re all just stardust. I remember hearing “ashes to ashes and dust to dust” a lot in Catholic school and I think most kids understand the meaning of it. When we die, we simply become dirt. Simple as that. But the simplicity of the phase denies the complexity of the process. We’re just renting the molecules we use to propel our bodies around this Earth and before we rented these specific molecules, something else rented them for the exact same purpose. For instance, the soup that I had for lunch today had lots of vegetables in it. Let’s take the green beans, for example. The plant rented its molecules to grow and thrive until it was put into my soup where I ate it and now my body will use those same atoms and molecules to keep going. The plant had to be fertilized in order to grow, so the cow that pooped out the fertilizer is part of this chain, too. And when I end up dying, something else is going to rent my molecules, too. I think that’s a really humbling idea and that’s why when I die, I want to be buried somewhere remote without any sort of crazy poisonous fluid in me so that my molecules can turn into a tree that will live for a hundred years and spread its leaves all over. How awesome is that? Yes, I got that idea from The Fountain, thank you very much.

Now, I’m sure anyone that can read this understands this process, but the question is do we feel it? I don’t think many of us do. The first time I did was a few years ago and because of this wonderful idea, my attitude (even though it’s straining lately) is incessantly optimistic and bouncy. Where do I get all of my energy from and why am I usually so damned happy when I hang out with people? Mostly because I really do understand and feel this concept.

So after finishing Siddhartha,
I’ve come to believe that my mission is to learn to love the world.
The way that it is structured,
Its rules,
Its mistakes,
Its follies
And all the potentially terrible things that are occurring every moment.
Just as it is now
Because god knows it’s not perfect.

After finishing the book,
I picked up my old journal from 2007
And I appear to still be struggling with the same concepts.
I understand lots of stuff,
But I have a hard time applying most of it
And ensuring that I follow what I think in these moments of inspiration.
How frustrating!

I then read some of The Way of the Wizard.
Apparently wizards like Merlin are thought to live life backwards through time
And Arthur asked why they do this and what benefits could possibly come from it.
So Merlin ordered Arthur to dig a huge ditch and then fill it all back in.
Merlin asked him what he thought of the task,
Arthur felt that it was “pointless.”
Merlin then said, “Exactly, and so is most human effort. But the pointlessness isn’t discovered until too late, after the work has been done. If you lived backward in time, you would have seen such ditch digging as pointless and not begun in the first place (42).”
Hello the past 4 months of my life!
Over 100 resumes sent out and an overwhelming feeling that the entire effort was incredibly pointless.

Everyone is too obsessed with the trappings of the body
And what occurs to us while we’re stuck in it;
Most people believe that we move into some kind of afterlife once we die
And yet we can’t seem to translate that idea into every day life,
Maybe because we don’t have much proof.
But as I was thinking in bed last night,
If we had tangible proof of the afterlife
And how great it supposedly is,
What’s to stop us all from committing mass suicide to move onto the next step because so many of us are so unhappy in this one?
I think we’re shielded from the afterlife so much just because of that reason.

Anyway,
As I was saying,
People are so obsessed with this life and their problems within it.
One thing I always tell people (and myself) is that the pain we’re experiencing today will be gone in 30 years,
So why stress over it now?
Think back even 10 years.
I’ll use me as an example.
I was 17 and in my senior year of high school
And my biggest concerns were getting into college and how awesome my fishnets and leather pants were.
Those worries seem so innocuous to me now
And I’m sure the worries that stress me out now
Will seem innocuous to 37 year old Ed.
Putting more focus on this thought,
I can see exactly how the path that I’ve followed my entire life has led me to this exact moment,
And how even the most dire of times simply led me to the most amazing experience of my life.
I’ve spoken about it a lot,
But the years before grad school were filled with constant disappointment and heartache.
Now, though,
I can see that if everything had worked out really easily right away,
And I had gotten into school for photography in Savannah,
I would’ve missed out on the best experience of my life.
So,
All that bad stuff held a purpose
And was just potential amazingness before it turned into amazingness.

We’ll all move past what we’re experiencing
And it’ll be replaced with new pains and new joys
And all of those will be replaced, too.
So why bother focusing on all the negative stuff that holds us back?
Why not just embrace all the good stuff and not worry about the rest?
It’s so hard because we’re stuck in this illusion of time,
And it seems to be that moving past this illusion
And understanding it constantly,
Every moment of every day,
Is the key to actual happiness.
So I suppose that is moving backwards in time.
Not focusing on the future necessarily,
But realizing that once we get so far into the future,
All of today,
Which will then be the long forgotten past,
Won’t matter too much to us then.
I just need to project my thoughts really far ahead in time again.
I’ve done this before,
It’s just stupidly difficult to keep focused.

“Cutting the timeless into little pieces creates time, and that is still our tendency (43).”

I did an exercise from Way of the Wizard that involved my writing down my fears in an endless stream for 5 minutes while trying to concentrate on my breathing.
I kept noticing that I was forgetting to breathe correctly,
But I think it was successful!
My writing started off small and focused
And by the end if it,
It was flowy, large and maddening.
I started off each line with “I am afraid of” and then followed it with whatever.
So here’s what I’m afraid of:

Zombies, Angels [I dunno why this came up second, but I thought it was interesting. Maybe ‘cause I don’t really understand them or what their existence could mean], demonic possession, losing control, becoming attached to possessions again, opening up, not succeeding, not finding love, losing my inner voice, not doing this right, being passed by, not completing what I’m meant to, this not working, dying and finding out that there’s nothing after, not being able to inspire again, getting too close to people, never hearing from Jason again, never forming meaningful connections with people, never moving past fear, not being able to finish this or do it right [I had to change pages and this was the first on the next sheet of paper, which interrupted my flow of consciousness a bit], not being able to read this after, not finding a job, getting stuck again, repeating my past mistakes, letting Jason back in.

And that’s it.
I don’t think it really got all that deep
Or maybe I just don’t have all that many fears.
After doing this and reading it through,
I’m at peace with a lot of them because with the idea that time can heal everything,
Most, if not all, of my fears are entirely irrational.

All of this was written throughout the day as I was experiencing it,
Which I think is both helpful to me in the moment
And useful later.
I’ve got a bad habit of forgetting these important thoughts when it comes time to write here at night.
But I think I do feel this whole Unity thing right now.
It’s calming.
My problem is taking this feeling and applying it outside of this moment.
I’ve been thinking about this lately
And my brain seems pretty focused and in the moment when I’m with people.
My thoughts only drift off to ridiculousness when I’m on my own,
Especially when driving.
Getting it to shut the fuck up has always been my biggest problem.
And now,
After all this deep wisdom crap,
I’ve given myself a headache!
Sweet.

Obviously, I’ve been doing a lot of introspection lately,
And I feel that if I can learn to love the world that I’m currently experiencing,
This bland, drab, colorless world currently stuck in the grip of winter,
My most hated of seasons,
I find happiness anywhere.
The picture at the beginning of the most isn’t beautiful,
It’s of nothing noteworthy.
It’s not the Great Wall of China,
It’s not a wonderful leaf
Or a hilarious memory from my travels.
It’s simply a view of my street from a window going upstairs
Taken before another storm is supposed to hit.
The true beauty of this picture, though,
Comes from all the thoughts, feelings and emotions inside each one of those houses.
All the smiles,
The great animals,
The memories
And the colorful interiors within
Bely the dreary exterior appearances.

So if I can learn to love this world
Exactly as it is
And not constantly compare it to some blissful world as I think it should be,
I will find some sort of inner peace that I feel is missing.

Phew, I’m exhausted and my head is spinning.
Time to give it a rest for a bit!