night

embracing the quiet within

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Imagine the scene of sitting out watching clouds and the world on that park bench during a beautiful summer day.  The shade of the tree keeping you nice and cool.  The day is lively, coming and going with life busying itself around you.  How long do you think you can hold that moment?  How long can you just take in the world around you before you have to stop?  It’s been bothering me lately, that I can’t seem to find that peace enough to stop long enough to matter.

I’ve never been one to be able to stay still for long, taking in what I can and busying myself with the goings on in the world.  I might only get a few spare moments that my mind allows me to stop and say that I should just take it all in.  I don’t know if my attention span needs a little work, but I feel like I am not at rest, not letting myself relax. It’s a perpetual movement that drives me to go from task to task for the sake of doing so. I will take the time to capture a moment like a picture, but then I am gone on to the next onto the next one without skipping a beat.

What bothers me most, is that silence seems in some way to be the enemy.  It’s most telling when you are left alone with someone, someone you know, and there is a lull or natural stopping point within the conversation.  I can’t stand that silence, it’s unsettling to me so I fall back to words and conversation breaking what could be a real moment.

I’ve been trying to find that silence, that rest during my day, and yet the time I spend doing it, though only a moment, feels like an eternity.  I think it may be that I am not comfortable sitting with myself.  Not comfortable with allowing myself to stop and to catch my breath.  I try to sit and meditate but the task isn’t one that you can just check off a list, it’s something that requires waiting and patience.  To actually sift through a moment.

Personally, I find my solace in the loud, discordant undertone of life, the constant reminder that the world keeps turning and life keeps moving.  I want to work at embracing the small moments that I have of quiet in my life.  To just sit and ponder without speaking.  To listen without interruption. I think then I might find that I have matured in a way that I embrace life in all of its forms, loud and quiet alike.

So if you could, take a moment and wherever you are and just sit without anything else going on, and see how quiet can be.

Genuine

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I don’t know how to express it properly, this feeling about the world.  I find that out there, there are so many ways that people act, ways that are only a shadow of something else, someone else’s purpose and rational.  An act that a merely a motion in a machine of how people believe the world should be or just is.  The process we go to for learning how the world works keep us confined in the way we might have learned to be right.  It keeps us on in a perpetual motion towards and an end goal that we do not understand.  These actions we participate in, do we truly believe in their message or is it just a lesson we are not to question.  This basis for how we act is in direct relation to how to feel within.  So if there is something we do that is so incongruent to what we believe we create a resonance within ourselves, a detachment from our action and have to rationalize behavior we might not even truly understand ourselves.

We subtract the resources of our personality and use it the brick and mortar to build a wall around our hearts.  The problem with a wall is that it is a fixed thing, a settling down in space for the long night ahead.  It becomes hardened, a separate piece from ourselves as we hope to cultivate the fertile land of the being within.  A wall works both ways, though, it might keep the danger out, but it also keeps us in.  The higher the wall that we build, the more labyrinthian we create our protection, the more we isolate ourselves from the outside world.  There then is a sense of irony as we build the wall to keep others out but inside is a quiet hope for people to come in.

We can’t assume that someone will come to break down those barriers, find their way through the labyrinth and finally be able to share in harvest in your heart that you so meticulously sowed.  We have to act, spend time leaving the confines these castle walls and explore the world in a way we feel is right.  We must have the courage to act as at times we feel we must, not worried about how it might look or seem.  To ask the important questions about why these walls are there in the first place.  Our spirit asked not to be confined, so keep those doors open and keep our curiosity strong. One day I hope for the vine and weeds overtake the wall, return it to the earth, allow to see this rich land all around.  A land that we freely wander in our own way, and see with eyes unclouded, it’s beautiful out there, and wall only stands in the way of that.  It’s then we must realize that the only way we can truly be free is to believe in what we do and do what we belive.

Untitled

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I was walking through the night air

Puffing steam with every breath

The only sound around me were my shoes

as they would clap at every step

I needed someone to talk to

but no one was around

so I called out to the moon

and what I found made me frown

She just ignored me

As I missed her gaze

She just ignored me

and I didn’t know who to blame

She so bright and so beautiful

And yet I got no reply

So I called out to the stars

And be it a surprise

No one up there would answer

me or any of my cries

There are so many of you up there

How could this be

So many of you up there

How can’t it be just me

As I walked through the earth and pondered what may have been my mistake

only to come to the realization

My plan was half baked

That is when to a degree,

I knew what ultimately must be

It is I who stood and talked to the sky

But here on earth is where I must try.

It’s Okay To Be Grey

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I don’t remember what compelled to take a thread and tie it around my wrists four years ago, but I’ve had them ever since. For me, they are a constant reminder to remain balanced. Left and right hand, black and white band, left is black because it is is the hand that I write with, the one that knows my thoughts and does its deeds. My right is white, because its the one I take action with, that knows my feelings and offers a helping hand.
Ever year, when one of the breaks, I spend the time to consider how my life fairs on the grand scales.  This might seem strange from the outset, but there is a great solace in knowing that I am a mixture of both.

I realize anytime I look down at my wrists is that I am as equally capable of doing good as doing bad, but it is up to me to make a choice as to what I do. Left or right, black or white, wrong or right is the choice I know I must make. I am then the gray, the piece of the puzzle that can see the intricacies of the two decisions at hand. The one who must make a choice and has done the best we can with it.

I don’t think people are made innately for balance, there are some people are more sure-footed than others, but it takes an effort to get to a place where this balance can exist.  Each day we can decide to break with this structure, throw ourselves to one side and hope not to tip the scales too much out of our favor. It takes energy to continue to fight for it and the whole universe is conspiring to bring about the grand entropy of life, to break down the systems we put in place.  Life takes a sense of effort, a sense of work to be able to support it the way we do and yet we throw ourselves into situations that are lopsided, unbalanced because of how it makes us feel.

This world we live in is getting better and better at giving us weights that take away our balance, compelling us to keep weighing ourselves down to compensate.  Forces push us to let go, let our world return to disorder because it’s so much easier not to care and let ourselves lean to one side.  It does this quietly, easily, through the messages of pleasure and avoidance.   There can be too much of a good thing when it starts to take away from us being functional.  It’s a hard line to draw, having fun but also knowing when to sit down and work.

We are all capable of finding balance in our lives, and it’s almost essential if we want to be healthy. It’s a life long struggle, and at times I don’t even realize things are off kilter. I think it’s important to take a second and reevaluate where we are, realize that we are capable of both right and wrong and it’s okay to be somewhere in the middle.

A Dampened Expression

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This happens every time! Something good happens, and I should be jumping for joy and be screaming to the heavens, but nothing moves within me.  It were much colder and calculated wondering about the next step to take. It’s infuriating!
Not to mention the slight overhang of matters of emotion and the hearts that seems to overhang like an overcast day, why won’t you at least let the sun in for peak of how bright the future might be.

I find this whole emotional state to be incredibly bothersome and a bit of an annoyance. My body is tired along with my eyes and yet with the mere mention of what should make me happy I feel nothing. Maybe it will hit me later when I least expect it, but intuition is telling me to wait for the clouds to pass, for the wind to come and blow them out of my otherwise bright sky and then finally I will be happy with the ray touching my face.

Maybe a good nights sleep will do it, free me of this mood, free me from feeling as happy as everyone seems to think I should be.  Allow me to be excited.  My heart controls when I get excited, unfortunately, and it will only move when it wants to. So for now, I wait to see if it will move for me or perhaps someone else.  Either way, it doesn’t change the amount of work I need to do, I will keep at because I am finally starting to hear the winds of change.

The World In The Life Of A Guy: Part 3 – The Cost Of Connection

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Back at the end of high school, I remember how beautiful the day was when I asked a girl to be my girlfriend for the first time.  The rosy moment was dampened when I was informed that some of her friends had thought I was gay.  I laugh about it now, because of its ridiculousness but it highlights a whole can of issues about being a guy.

You have to understand, I grew up surrounded by women, let me tell you, it’s not all rainbows and unicorns.  I remember coming home from school on a regular basis to Pride and Prejudice playing on the tv.  It was my sister’s favorite movie at the time, and she played it every day.  Now whether she watched it or not is an entirely different story, but it was always playing.  She would get mad at me if I turned it off or changed the channel, so I ended up learning to enjoy it.  Though it makes for a great story, it doesn’t actually work toward my “man points” when I can name all the major characters from all the Jane Austin movies and quote some of the lines. I have stories and anecdotes all throughout my life like this, ones that without context make me sound very strange or somewhat effeminate.  I have struggled with that balance, at times hiding these things that I might be part of my past or who I am just because it doesn’t make me out to be a tough guy.

With that, there is a lot of pressure to forgo things that are seen as girly, a lot of pressure to act tough and harden your skin.  As a guy, you’re supposed to take it, shoulder it, carry it, deal with it. That’s what you grow up with, pressure to stay strong and stern.  It shows in our relationships, girl talk about their feelings, how they’re doing, and confide in one another.  Guys, at least in my experience, don’t talk much about feelings and emotions, and there’s a struggle to finally divulge information to one another. There are many things are left unsaid, hell, my father and I don’t even end phone conversations with I love you (I know he does so that’s not a problem).  The point is there is a barrier to connecting with one another on that level. It permeates our activities and even if something crosses that line if both people aren’t willing the event will leave a hole in the friendship. It’s seen as strange to act that way and only when special times arise are you actually allowed to connect on that level.

I just remember watching the show Scrubs back in the day and relating a lot to the main character JD.  He was a bit more effeminate and was treated as such because he was in touch with his feeling and acted with some “girly” mannerisms. The thing I liked about him is that he was unabashed at showing that part of himself, unafraid of going in for a hug, talking to people about what they meant to him. Sure some of his likes weren’t really tough or strong, but that didn’t really matter, he was who was he was.  It was a very different type of strength that he showed, a strength of character.

The point being that we’re not all wood working, car fixing, super outdoorsman like Ron Swanson, nor should we be.  Just because I know how to cook and at somepoint want to be completely and incandecently happy with someone doesn’t make me strange or gay it just makes me different.  There are things I do like fix electronics,  and being handy around a house that would be considered much more manly but what I find is that these labeles we give things only get in the way of us being who we want to be and limiting outselves.

After many years being this way I’ve come to accept these differences in perception of who I should be and am okay with how I am.  I just hope that these labels and pressures don’t drive people to the edge and that that people know its okay like both westerns and flowers but what do I know, I’m “just a guy”.

Night Tour

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There is something night, the calm coalescing of the late hours that extend seemingly forever.  It’s in the stories of great thinkers and artists, in the modern fairy tales of entrepreneurs and innovators. It’s a symbol of both frustration and hard work. The image of a team sitting around a table tired and overworked, squeezing out ever last drop of thought in hope it brings some sort or revelation has a kind of romantic twinge to it. The lonely soul walking the empty byways illuminated with the amber streetlamps and neon signs searching for some sort of solace has a sweetness to it. Truth be told, passion is just not as dramatic at 8 am.

I find myself wandering the night more regularly now, be it in my mind or in my car.  The night allows me to wander in a sort of anonymity.  The constraints I would have around my thoughts weaken, the tasks I had to do are all but done. So it then falls to me to let my mind saunter into the imaginary, to blur the lines of what is acceptable. There is something about the state of mind, that is so tired that it decides to focus solely on the one thing before you.
The unfolding nature of night strips away these waking selves which we so carefully prune  ], it allows us to interact with these quiet mental forces that would normally never have a voice. All the thoughts unfolding and opening into a much larger scope and view. All the questions and discussions that happen after a certain time of night, without fear of reprocussions. In thought, we find purpose, we find motivated frustration, a swell of emotion, a connection and destruction of relationships, and a time for truth from within and without.   When driving down those dark roads, the world becomes tangable metaphore for life. Seeming endless roads with hundreds of avenues to travel down but can only happen one at a time, much like our choices.  There is an ease to it, no expectation of making the right choice, and when you find youself face to face with a dead end, you just turn around and start again.

When I find myself behind the wheel there is a sort of serenity to it.  Seeing the city lights pass me by, the neon signs lit up into the night even after the stores and buisnesses have all been closed. The people walking about, all trying to get somewhere but taking their own time to do it.  We can observe the autonomy that continues to exist in the night without anyone around.  The way the lights sometime change for no one. There are endless reason to escape into the night every once in a while to free yourself.
I am fortunate enough to live in a city driving is a way of life, so I learned to enjoy the countless hours I may have spent behind the wheel going somewhere I don’t know yet.

Sometimes we need these moments, these moments when all things deconstruct and we are left facing ourselves. The moments where we can let off the burdens and find a sense of peace. The moments where two people can really connect and go beyond the facade of our lives. The night isn’t a miracle cure but it’s something that ushers in the new dawn and another chance in the form of a new day.  Perhaps all you need to change is a night tour.

A Sound Dissonance

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There I was, sitting in my car parked in the mud, fog all around and the thick beams of light dashing by as the road was illuminated for only a moment then dark again.  I had hoped to come to some sort of resolution sitting there, away from it all but I couldn’t concentrate.  I tried writing, but everything I wrote sounded like a shallow drop into the bottomless bucket. I felt so off inside, and I didn’t know if anything I did would make me feel any different. I was desperate, and I continually thought “I can’t live like this, this can’t be my life, I have to change.” It was then that the tears began to flow, and I could finally hear my heart once again.

I’ve spent much time on the edge, the brink of my personal existence and for a while, there was a disconnect, a dissonance, between where to be logically and where my heart and soul wanted me to be. This dissonance, which I can only describe as what it would feel like to be a 3D movie without the special glasses.  It just feels wrong, nothing is in the right place but so close to where things should be that it’s hard to tell where things should actually be.  It was brought about but the lack of self that I have so neglectfully not infused into my action. I have only done, but never acted on my own accord.

This began because I have spent so much time trying to learn how to follow the right path that I have ignored the path I was meant for. It’s only now that I realize that the ways of other people only go so far. My desire for a good life obscured my true self behind the good intentions of others. This is not to say life will not be easier if we follow the solid advice of others, but there is a type of medicinal quality to making decisions for yourself. A genius is least likely to understand the steps and process it takes to get to an answer.  The answer simply makes sense to them, then as to people who have come across the answer and have lost connection to what it took to arrive at this solution, the answer just is.  So in following the solid but seemingly unsubstantiated advice, it ends with action that is has a sense of emptiness behind it.  A life that is lived solely on the suggestion and path of others will allow you to avoid troubles, but it also removes you from what it is to be a person.
This is in no way to say that advice should not be heeded, it’s merely to remark that in every piece of advice that we take, we must infuse a sense of our own essence into action. Do this or it will feel as if you are are not actually living life, and you will lose the passion and the path.
Now for me, it is to find learning through listening but also doing for myself. I am the only one who can live my life, and if I am emulating other people then how will I really get anything done.  It’s the conscious effort towards what our hearts want and our minds dream of that we can in some way feel fulfilled as ourselves.  It’s that friction of living a life untrue to ourselves that weighs and bears upon our soul.  We find that sometimes we cage ourselves in the institution that will ultimately lead us to success in a material sense but ultimately starves the soul.  If we live a life that doesn’t belong to us, we are in some way doing a disservice to ourselves.  I know if I were to walk through a life that had no passion or no promise of future would feel like dying continuously until all that would be left is hollow.
At this point, I have no more excuses, I have expended them all. All they are now is a way to avoid life and be okay with it.  I have to stop and listen to myself and with the aid and advice of others step forward into a new dawn.

That night I spoke to my heart, we had it out, I began yelling at it, and it started screaming back. It was all to keen to expose what I had pushed away, what I had been ignoring. It told me about all my worries and my fears. We argued my excuses, wounds, and shortfalls.  As time went on, and the conversation deepened, I felt like I was finally letting go.  Letting go of the reins that I had held on to for so long up to this point. Letting go of all the troubles I had been dragging along with me. My heart could not be with me because I had filled myself with debris.  I finally to broke the fast that I had unknowingly put my heart through.
When my tears dried, I felt one with my heart, as if it was right there back within my chest. I felt like I was where I was supposed to belong. Like how a small child out exploring hardly ever feels lost, instead a feels a sense adventure, the world once again felt like the grand adventure I knew it to be.

We can’t avoid making mistakes, and traversing familiar lessons but thats part of being alive, we just do the best we can out there. I understand the a great fortune to be talking about the ability to choose and the pusuit of dreams.  At the end of the day, I can only speak to what my heart tells me “Follow your dreams or die”. It really is just as unreasonable as I am and I wouldn’t have it any other way.

To: Love

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Dear Love,

I haven’t heard from you in a while, and trust me, I knew after our last encounter we needed some space.

It’s just been strange without you around. I remember you, and I having been inseparable since I first met you around 6 or 7.  You used to play with me whenever I felt lonely or down.  All through school, you accompanied me through my awkward phases and social situations, nagging me in the middle of class, diverting my attention.  I didn’t mind, I always enjoyed myself when you were around even if things didn’t work out as planned. I remember how charismatic you were, telling me stories and tales about others people who knew you and dreams of the future you had with me.  You were always there, pulling at my heartstrings, making me feel the true immensity of being crushed by the unrequited feelings I had in my chest.

Years went by with this persistent feeling, as I got older, our relationship deepened. I came to better understand you.  I took some time in high school to grow on my own without you around, knowing that we would reconnect as old friends when I got back. That period I learned not to lean on you, that I needed to learn to stand on my own two feet without you around. I couldn’t expect you to carry me in the future, especially if I didn’t have anything to give you in return.

Through heartbreak, I found you, through experience and a desire to not make the same mistakes I sought you. I thought you would leave me disappointed again, but this time you came back in spades. It marked a new depth to things, you really got to know me, and I really got to know you.

We were around each other for a while, taking a break every now and again. My college years were full of experiences with you, learning and growing.  It started to feel like this was what growing up and maturing felt like. We hit a groove, a rhythm, an understanding that maybe this would be something that continued without pause.

Then it happened, you and I got into a bit of a disagreement.  It wasn’t something unusual, and normally I would bounce right back, but this last one didn’t sit right with me. I knew we needed some time to figure things out.  I had taken you for granted, and you hit me where it hurt. It became heavy when you were around, and I just couldn’t handle the strain, there was too much memory, too much complication, and too many unresolved feelings.

I realized we couldn’t just keep going on like we used to, that I needed some time away from you. There is no blame to be cast, it just one of those things that happen.  Without you around, I could figure out myself and grow. Part of me knows that if you were around, I would get comfortable and complacent. Part of me believes this is the best for both of us, that one-day things will work out okay. Part of me is afraid you might do the same thing to me again, so I don’t know how much to trust you.

Time will mend these wounds, the experience will overwrite the pain. In the end, I know sometimes you treated me like crap, pushed me into situations where I would be let down, but I don’t regret any of my moments with you because you gave me memories I will cherish forever.

One day we will find each other again when the time is right, we meet like old friends who bump into each other at the supermarket, and without skipping a beat, we will reconnect. Until then I wish you well and hope you are okay. Know that I’m not gone for good, I will figure things out.

I miss you love, and I love you. I promise I’ll come for you again soon.

Sincerely,
Me

 

Writing and Intimacy

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I don’t know why I picked up that magazine, or why I had the time but as I sat there, I was entranced by the photographs that the magazine. I flipped slowly and carefully through each one of the pages, never looking at any page too deeply.  My fingers flipped through the pages as I double took on some of the more enticing ads and articles that they had, but one, in particular, caught my eye.  I was surprised to see it, there laid out before me, I stopped leafing through that book and took it in. What it was for escapes me but there before I was a woman, loosely clad, faced partially obscured by the limitations of the frame, leaning in and grabbing her chest.
The pores of her smooth skin were apparent as the camera’s clarity brought about every detail. Small folds of her breast shown through minute shadows radiating away from the hand that was holding firm.  There was a coy smile that painted itself on her face as it knew something much more than me. She seemed to have all the control and grace, as her hair was pushed off the way as not to obfuscate her body.
The image felt larger than the page and emanated a sense of both lust, and intimacy. A playfulness that jumped out reminded me of time long past and impressed the feeling of a sense of love and closeness.  It might seem strange, this photo might give all those things but its the expression through the body that say there was no worry, no fear, just a bit of fun because I trust you.  There were dark shades of color, as the backdrop of the bedroom came into view.  It makes you wonder what she was thinking about when that picture was taken, or if she was thinking at all.
The illusion of closeness and affection cast its spell on me, throwing back into my mind as I searched through buried memories of times when this feeling was more apparent. First came a sweet remembrance of love and touch but soon turned sour as my heart came to realize its absence. I began to miss intimacy, the bond of confidence and simple singular purpose that combines and intertwines the sense of body and spirit.  Being on that same stage with another human being, feeling the world vanishing as two beings remove themselves from the fold to enter a universe all their own.  I began to miss that feeling of no really caring about what about what was on the other side of that door because whatever it was, it didn’t matter anymore. I began to miss the quiet moments where hearts would if only for a moment connect.
Taken on a trip, my skin felt like it wanted to cry out for touch, to cross that physical barrier of the page to reclaim this lost feeling in a remiss heart. I was filled, just as blood coursed through my veins, with a desire in each of my limbs to reach out and grab whatever I could to bring me some sense of relief.  My heart called out “Come closer and listen to me, you have neglected me for too long and I want this”.  My eyes scanned the page to find some sense of truth that seemed to be lost to them and my brain remained silent, instructing my hands to turn the page and forget all of which I saw.