05/13/2013– 06/16/2013

1. No Theology! It ought to be a bumper sticker. No Doctrine! This is called the doctrine of no doctrine.
   
   Bad religion looks for something beyond the experience of life to justify the experience of life—and to look forward to once “this vale of tears” is left behind through death.
   
   The experience of life is more accurately a “veil of tears,” concealing the wonder, beauty, goodness and joy of life just as it is—which can be seen only by those with eyes to see, ears to hear, and a heart to understand.
   
   The experience of life is an optical illusion, now you see it, now you don’t and sometimes you never see it—with the “it” being the foundational truth of meaning and purpose lying beyond the apparent truth of meaninglessness and absurdity.
   
   The experience of life is an ink blot—reflecting the interior orientation of those who look at life and declare it to be as they see it.
   
   For example: Synchronicity is an encounter with more than meets the eye—which cannot be denied. A chance conversation changes our life. We have a brief exchange with a person in line with us at a checkout counter, whom we never see again and cannot forget.
   
   Synchronous experiences buoy us up and carry us along, and are available to all who are available to them. It takes a certain perspective, outlook, orientation, receptivity, to be able to see what is before us—and what is also before us—in each situation as it arises.
   
   That which transforms the life of one person is invisible to another. Look for yourself and see what you look at.
2. Duckie 07 — Bog Garden, Greensboro, NC, May 13, 2013 — The stream flows both ways. The disciples pull the master forth as much as the master pulls the disciples forth. Who is the master? Who is the disciple?
   
   The disciples become like the master in following no master and in seeing everyone as their master. The master who thinks she, he, is the master is no master.
   
   A true master takes instruction from every experience, each encounter. Is always learning. Is embarrassed to talk to others as an authority on any subject. Walks through her, through his, life in the spirit of play. Is at home with children. Delights in the gifts of the day. Laughs in her, in his, sleep.
3. Great Blue Heron May 07 — Bog Garden, Greensboro, NC, May 13, 2013 — Blue Herons come into the world knowing how to be a Blue Heron. Baby ducks come into the world knowing how to be a duck. You can imprint a baby duck with a cat, say, or a tarantula, but, put it in the water and it will swim like a duck.
   
   Elephants don’t try to be giraffes. You can’t trick a parakeet into thinking it’s an orangutan. A pine tree doesn’t imitate a Barrel Cactus. I could go on.
   
   Human beings like to cast about because they don’t know who they are. That’s ridiculous.
   
   All human beings with vital signs intact knows what they like and don’t like, love or hate, what fits or doesn’t fit, what their business is and isn’t. And none of them would let me sweeten their coffee or their tea.
   
   They could pick themselves out of a line-up.
   
   We know who we are. We just wish we were someone else. Until we get to know them.
4. Owl Flies Two — Bog Garden, Greensboro, NC, May 11, 2013 — Do it because you love doing it and not to become rich and famous. Do it because there is nothing you had rather do. Don’t do it to exploit it. Do it to do it.
5. Coming At You One — Bog Garden, Greensboro, NC, May 14, 2013 — Don’t try to make something happen. See what is happening and what needs to happen, and do that.
   
   The art of life is waiting for the time to be right—for the right moment to act—and being ready to walk through the door when it opens.
   
   Be there when the owl flies, ready.
6. Coming At You Two — Bog Garden, Greensboro, NC, May 14, 2013 — You have to live with singleness of purpose to live on the beam, aligned with that which is deepest, best and truest about you—in synch with the life that is your life to live.
   
   Singleness of purpose cannot coexist with multitasking. You see the problem.
   
   We have to know what our business is and do our business. The closer we can come to that, the closer we are to True Human Beinghood.
   
   We all suffer from Attention Deficit Disorder. We have too much to think about, too much to do, too many responsibilities, obligations and duties—too much clutter in our life.
   
   To do photography, I have to be, pardon the pun, focused on photography. Nothing is quite as distracting for me as photography with a group of photographers. If I am with a group, I am not with the scene.
   
   I see from solitude, out of solitude, with solitude, through solitude—the kind of solitude that fosters singleness of purpose and oneness with the scene—oneness with my life, the life that is my life to live.
   
   In long-ago Japan, spiritual deepening and self-realization and expression were reserved for the second-half of life when one had made one’s way in the world and the children were grown and settled into lives of their own. When one could be focused on the one’s on business, and do the work that was theirs to do.
7. Coming At You Three — Bog Garden, Greensboro, NC, May 14, 2013 — Singleness of purpose is knowing what your business is and what it isn’t and doing what is your business to do.
   
   ”Stay Out Of My Business!” “Mind Your Own Business!” These are two watchwords of the way, with the second being something we say to ourselves as well as to others.
   
   We cannot be casual with our business, flip, nonchalant, indifferent. Our business is our heart and soul—apart from our business our soul dies and we lose heart because there is nothing to serve us as “the still point of the turning world.” Without that, we fly off in a thousand directions, with no center to ground us, identify us, stabilize us, orient and direct us.
   
   What’s your business? Where does your soul come to life and your heart start beating? Where are you when you cannot think of a better place to be? What are you doing when you had rather be doing that than anything you can think of? How often do you go there? Do that?
   
   Are you picking up what I’m laying down here?
8. Over the Boardwalk 06 — Bog Garden, Greensboro, NC, May 15, 2013, Too close to focus, but you get the idea. — Five ducks are coming in, you pick a duck. How do you know which duck to choose? You pick a duck.
   
   We are overwhelmed with choices and don’t know which choice to choose. How do we decide?
   
   The worst decision is to be immobilized by the number of choices. You could stand before the orange juice section of your grocery store for a long time. Too many choices. So make one and go on to the next one.
   
   Get out of the way and let the Chooser choose. The Chooser cuts through all of the pros and cons, advantages and disadvantages, reason why and reasons why not, and picks a duck.
   
   If it turns out to be a poor choice, what of it? Three ducks are coming in now. Your odds just got better.
9. Heron Silhouette 04 — Bog Garden, Greensboro, NC, May 15, 2013 — The path opens before those who start walking. Who walk with awareness. Who collaborate with the inner guide in determining direction and pace. Who trust themselves to the journey without maps or guidebooks. Who have no need of timetables or schedules. Who have no destination in mind.
10. Watch out Squirrel! — Bog Garden, Greensboro, NC, May 15, 2013 — How hard would you play, or work, with everything on the line? How hard would you play, or work, with nothing on the line?
    
    Why the difference? Why allow what’s on the line determine the quality of your playing, or working, or living?
    
    Live to be passionately involved in your life with nothing at stake in the outcome.
11. Osprey Goes Fishing 01 — Bog Garden, Greensboro, NC, May 14, 2013 — What do you enjoy about your life?
    
    Enjoy the things you enjoy about your life with greater frequency and longer duration.
12. Catch of the Day 01 — Bog Garden, Greensboro, NC, May 15, 2013 — I think nothing would help us with our life quite like having a sounding board—quite like being able to talk things out, talk things through.
    
    The problem with writing in a journal is the problem with talking to ourselves. If we do that, we have to develop the art of seeing things from the other side—from the side opposite our own. Otherwise, we just express our point of view over and over, and never come to see things differently from the way we see things.
    
    A sounding board offers a different perspective, sees things from a different point of view, and can ask questions of us that we cannot ask of ourselves—because it never occurs to us.
    
    It is possible to develop an inner sounding board that does call us into question but, we have to be open to what we hear. Practice by making a statement about how you feel about your life—about how things are going with you—and listen to what occurs to you. It may not be words. It may be a picture or an image. An object may come to mind.
    
    Practice listening this way to the things you tell yourself, the things you say to yourself about what is happening in your life. You’ll be helping yourself get to the bottom of you, to the heart of the matter, and figuring out what response you need to make.
    
    In this way, you can create your own sounding board and carry it with you wherever you go.
13. Spring Panorama — Blue Ridge Parkway near Boone, NC, May 9, 2013 — All of the values that life proves valuable come together to form one perspective, orientation, outlook, attitude toward life.
    
    Patience is compassion. You cannot be patient if you are not compassionate. You cannot be compassionate if you are not patient.
    
    You cannot be compassionate if you are not vulnerable and capable of intimacy, of trust.
    
    It goes on. It’s a circle of oneness—of one thing being necessary for all the others—of one value being the foundation of every other value.
    
    And they also conflict. A values conflict is the best kind of conflict. How do we choose between equally important values when they are mutually exclusive?
    
    We die in working it out. That’s the nature of crucifixion. Giving up this to get that, making the necessary trade-offs required by life (Life eats life, you know), grows us up and makes us humble, heartbroken, and of real help to one another along the way.
14. Green Heron in a Cypress Tree — Bog Garden, Greensboro, NC, May 16, 2013 — Things can change without anything being different.
    
    You can divorce one spouse and marry another. You can leave one job and take another. You can move from one part of the country to another. Somehow, your life stays the same.
    
    Churches regularly change ministers and regularly remain the same. Restaurants change their menus. The food remains the same. You can put the entire contents of your refrigerator and pantry on the pizza. It’s still pizza.
    
    What makes things different? What is the key to transformation? How can we change our life from the ground up, inside out?
    
    How different can you be? How alterable are you at the core? If you were going to be different, how would you be then that you aren’t now?
    
    What remains the same no matter what you do?
15. Owl Flies Through The Tangle—Bog Garden, Greensboro, NC, May 16, 2013 — We need those who would be the right kind of community for us to serve as a sounding board and a balancing agent. Alone, we are off, over the edge, out of sight in no time at all.
    
    The craziest people you know are loners. The next craziest people you know are leading some mob off some cliff. We have to find the middle ground.
    
    The healthiest community does not act as one. Does not think the same way, believe the same things, does not live according to the same idea of how to live except the idea of surrounding ourselves with those who can hear us out, pull us forth, and provide the balancing ballast to keep us stable and centered in the path to maturation, awareness, enlightenment, insight, realization, peace and good citizenship.
    
    (Good citizenship is providing what we need to those who also need it—offering compassionate presence and good company to one another around the table, across the board, with no stipulations or requirements beyond, “Can you use what I have to offer?”)
    
    The healthiest community is the source of honest conversation straight from the hear about things that matter.
    
    Honest conversation is balancing, stretching, expanding, deepening conversation. It is not debate or argument There is no room for “the dialectic” in honest conversation, with it’s pros and cons, good and bad, right and wrong, logical and rational approach to truth.
    
    Honest conversation is exploratory, experimental, imaginative. No one tries to convert anyone through honest conversation. Everyone tries to see better what is to be seen, what may be seen, and to share what she, or he, sees with those who are looking.
    
    The right kind of community is good for this kind of thing, and it doesn’t come ready-made for us when we step into our life. We spend our life creating the right kind of community in order to live our life. It’s one of those wonderful ironies of existence, where nothing can happen until something else does. So, we wait for it even as we work to make it happen!
16. Trumpet Vine 01 — Bog Garden, Greensboro, NC, May 5, 2013 — I can be at-one with the owl and the ducks, or not. There is a perceptible shift—a felt shift—that happens when I move from one way of perceiving the world to another way of perceiving the world. It’s the move from the world of appearances to the such-as-it-is-ness of that which is before me. It’s the move from seeing to, well, seeing. And it can be gone in a snap.
    
    It takes focus to enter into “seeing mode,” and it takes focus to regain it when it is lost. I cannot be in two worlds at the same time.
    
    Being in the world such-as-it-is is a communion, a being-with, that has no preferences, no agenda, no timetable. It is being open to and present with what is before me. It is prayer.
    
    Being in the world of appearances is yada yada yada. It is where we look without seeing, talk without hearing, live without being alive to and present in the moment of our living. Multitasking is not living. It is doing a lot without being present with any of it.
    
    The quality of a life is as much the quality of the awareness, of the consciousness, with which that life is lived as anything. If you want to improve the quality of your living, pay attention to time and place of your living. Beginning now.
17. Mates for Life — Bog Garden, Greensboro, NC, April 21, 2013 — Find the interface between you and your life. Live there with your eyes open.
    
    Without nerve endings to tell us when something is hot, we would stand too close to the fire and drink coffee that was too hot to handle. Our nerve endings are the interface between our body and our environment.
    
    We are similarly equipped to sense our emotional/psychic impact upon the outer world within which we live and its emotional/psychic impact upon us. We are generally unconscious of the emotional/psychic interface that exists between us and the context and circumstances of our living, and blunder about, crashing and thrashing our way around in our life, wondering why it is such a mess.
    
    Well. Wake up.
    
    The spiritual journey is the way of making ourselves conscious of all that is right here with us, unseen, unexperienced, unknown.
    
    We think life is something that happens to us, and we are unconscious of the part we play in the arrangement and production—the creation—of the things that happen in our life.
    
    This is not to say that we can design our own life—that we can have the life of our dreams—by being aware of the influence we have upon our life. It is to say we can have the life that is our life to live by participating in its development as full partners in its realization.
    
    We can move from a life that is not working on any level to a life that is purring along. We have to change the way we think about what our life should be. We have to be open to possibilities different from our idea of the perfect life. We have to allow ourselves to grow up in the way that only we can grow up. We have to stop interfering with who we need to become and creating all this mess which takes our mind further off our business and obstructs our way to the way that is our way.
    
    We have to wake up and find the interface between ourselves and our life, and live there with our eyes open.
18. Solitary Sandpiper Reflection — Bog Garden, Greensboro, NC, May 8, 2013 — There is what happens to us and there is how we respond to what happens to us, which, together, set us up for what happens next. In two ways.
    
    They set us up for what happens next by putting in motion a certain configuration of factors that create what happens next—that precipitate what happens next—that determine what happens next. We produce our own fate by the way we deal with what comes our way.
    
    This can be though of as karma if you think of karma as momentum, as the weight of the past swinging forward into the future—in the sense of what you have done being the best predictor of what you will do—in the sense of how things have been being the best predictor of how things will be.
    
    They also set us up for what happens next by fixing us in a pattern of response, where when this happens, we do that.
    
    If you want what is happening in your life to change, respond to it in completely different ways. Do not do anything in response to what is happening that you have ever done before. Things will change. Maybe not for the better, but, sometimes, any change is better.
    
    I recommend that you think through what is happening and how you typically respond, and how you might respond differently. Here’s the trick. When you respond differently, what is happening will happen with greater vigor in an effort to get you back into your typical response pattern (The law of inertia and of karma is that a body at rest will remain at rest and a body in motion will remain in motion. You are breaking the law and must break it completely if things are to be different). You must hold the line and continue to respond atypically, unpredictably. Surprise even yourself.
    
    You only have to come up with one more unique response than the thing that is happening can trump. Your life will change. Maybe for the better.
19. Owl Shakes It Out — Bog Garden, Greensboro, NC, May 11, 2013 — Let’s say you build a house and decide to landscape it yourself. You take into account the area of the country, the amount of shade and rainfall, the direction the house is facing, the amount of time you want to spend tending your landscape, and every other little detail, put your plants in and enjoy the fruit of your labors.
    
    You do not say, “I like barrel cactus, and am going to plant them all over the lot. My Maine neighbors will be sooo envious!”
    
    You consider the such-as-it-is-ness of your location and adapt yourself to the limitations and possibilities of the flora of your area—and live within the boundaries imposed by your context and circumstances—to create a yard that delights you through the years.
    
    The yard is your life. You don’t tell it what it is going to be. You create what it can be within the restrictions placed on you by the time, place, nature and conditions of your living to produce the wonder of you.
    
    You square yourself up with what you have to work with, work with what you have and see where you go. See?
20. Boone Fork Cascades 02 — Blue Ridge Parkway near Blowing Rock, NC, May 9, 2013 — The Hero’s Journey’s other name is Growing Up. We grow up into who we are, not into who we wish we were, or who we want to be. The proper answer to “Who do you want to be when you grow up?” is “Who I am.”
    
    We grow up into who we are by looking ourselves in the eye and not turning away from what we see because it doesn’t match up with our wishes, desires and expectations.
    
    We look at ourselves with eyes of compassion, accept what we see and welcome every aspect of ourselves into the good company of us—engaging the strengths and gifts that each part of us brings to the whole in living the life that is ours yet to live in the time left for living.
21. Northern Watersnakes — Bog Garden, Greensboro, NC, May 12, 2013 — I find myself talking to those who can hear what I have to say, which is always more than I think it will be—and less than I wish it were.
    
    Those who know, know one another, like alcoholics can pick out other alcoholics across a room.
    
    Those who know, know what we think isn’t as important as what we feel, and that what we believe is more on the order of what we know than intellectual assent to some statement or theory (which is sometimes called “doctrine”).
    
    Those who know, know it’s a matter of being on the beam or off it, in the flow or out of it, with the moment or against it, invested in, and in sync with, the life that is ours to live or lost and at loose ends in the wasteland.
    
    Those who know, know it takes a lot of living to be able to hear what needs to be heard, to be able to see what needs to be seen, to be able to understand what is there all along, waiting.
    
    Those who know, know we grow up consciously, not accidentally—that we have to embrace the process, assent to it, join in it as full participants in the work to wake up and become who we are.
    
    Those who know, know the truth when they hear it, when they see it, by the quality of its resonation with the tuning fork of realization within us that guides each of us to the path with our name on it, the life that is our life to live.
22. Maple Leaves — Bog Garden, Greensboro, NC, May 18, 2013 — Everyone thinks they are awake. It’s everyone else who is asleep. Everyone thinks, “If all you people would just wake up and get your act together, everything would be just fine!”
23. Mallard in Flight 108 — Bog Garden, Greensboro, NC, May 6, 2013 — We are the interface, the threshold, between worlds. We are the boundary between worlds. We integrate visible and invisible reality. Or not.
    
    We have to know what we are doing to do it. Otherwise, it’s a mess. As far from integration as a psychiatric ward is from a think tank—which is only a perspective shift away from being the other. We are always only a perspective shift away from being who we are needed to be, who we are born to be. We may as well be separated by years and miles, given that perspective shifts are the hardest things to manage.
    
    We can’t just order up a perspective shift because this is Monday and we haven’t had one in a while. They happen all the time, but not because we say, “I’m in the mood for a perspective shift today.”
    
    Anyway. We are the threshold between worlds, but it takes being awake to unlock the door and let the interchange begin, in us and through us, which transforms both worlds. And it takes ego strength to be egoless enough to swim in the currents between worlds.
    
    Schizophrenics were shamans in another time and place, but the clash of colliding worlds is/was too much for them, and they aren’t/weren’t the kind of explorers the rest of us need.
    
    We need those who have what it takes to be a threshold without being carried away. Carl Jung had it, and Joseph Campbell, and Marie-Louise von Franz, and James Joyce, and Alberts Schweitzer and Einstein … The list is long, but not long enough. And those on it were/are ignored by too many, and dismissed by too many others, to have the kind of impact this world needs to receive that one well. But, they kept the door open, and encourage us to do the same.
24. Crabtree Falls — Blue Ridge Parkway near Little Switzerland, NC, May 2007 — We need a sounding board. We need to be well received by compassionate presence that doesn’t let us get by with kidding ourselves about the way things are, but helps us square up to them, look them in the eye, and do what we can do about them.
    
    We need to be reminded that even though it may be hopeless, useless, pointless and coming to a bad end, how we live in the meantime makes all the difference—as evidenced by the good company of those who care about us and do not leave us desolate and alone.
    
    May we all have that kind of company when we need it most—and be it in the lives of others who need it—all our life long!
25. Owl Yoga 03 — Bog Garden, Greensboro, NC, May 11, 2013 — What does the invisible world need from us? My hunch is that it has been there a lot longer than we have been here. There was nothing but the invisible world for the longest of times. Then there was a shift, and here we are.
    
    That’s the short version, and it makes as much sense as anything else. I recommend that you save yourself some time and stick with it, but you’ll do what you want to—which is exactly as it should be. Where were we? Oh.
    
    What do we have that the invisible world could use? I’m guessing here, as if you couldn’t guess. I’m guessing we have conscious awareness and articulation going for us. Consciousness is a form of structure. It’s a path through the mess—and a means of arranging the mess, of draping the mess with meaning and purpose. We dance to the music of the invisible world so the invisible world might see it and sing.
    
    Well. Maybe not. But it’s a nice way to think about our place in the invisible world.
26. Crabtree Falls, May 2013 — Blue Ridge Parkway near Little Switzerland, NC, May 21, 2013 — You don’t have to think up your life. You only have to live it. You don’t have to know what you are doing. You only have to do it.
    
    Everybody wants to make a splash, have an impact, make a difference. YOU are the difference. You can’t help but make a difference when you are being you—the you only you can be.
    
    You, right now, without doing anything other than what you normally do, have contacts, niches, routines that no one else has. Nobody can do you but you.
    
    Now, if you do you the way only you can do you—sharing the gifts that only you have in the way that only you can—bingo, as they say at the Moose Lodge, we gotta winna here.
    
    Ah but, you say, how do you do that? You don’t have a thing to worry about. You only have to get out of the way. You only have to take instruction, follow directions, listen to your dreams and to your intuition and to your sense of what needs to happen in each situation as it arises, and let yourself fly, or dance, or walk on water. You can do all of those things, you know, if you just trust your inner partner and let yourself show you what you are capable of.
27. Crabtree Falls Detail 01 — Blue Ridge Parkway near Little Switzerland, NC, May 21, 2013 — Dear God, For What? The question hammered into the wall of an abandoned New England subway station opens the door to a room full of responses.
    
    From one point of view, it is encouraging. Someone has taken the time to bang it out and into smooth granite. The work was fueled with emotion, with passion. For what?
    
    The work was it’s own reason for being. The work called itself forth, demanding to be done. The work itself is the answer to the question that called forth the work.
    
    From another point of view, the question carries us to the heart of the matter. Do we need a reason for being here? For doing what we do? For doing what is OURS to do?
    
    Do we need to believe in someone who knows why, who knows the purpose, and is busy “working it out as year succeeds to year—and the time is drawing near” when we will all know the majestic glory of the answer that dispels the absurdity and makes all the agony so worthwhile?
    
    Do we need to believe in reasons? What is more valuable, important, beautiful: Believing in a reason for it all or believing in it—in the value of the experience of life, in the value of the work we are doing, the work that is OURS to do—beyond all reason, in the absence of reason, for no reason?
    
    Can’t we love it all—all of it, the absurdity and the emptiness along with the joy and the wonder—so much that we would do it for nothing—and do it again, and again, and again?
    
    Can’t we believe in the value of the such-as-it-is-ness of our life, of all of life, to such a depth and degree that nothing can keep us from giving our all to the expression of our belief in the value of what we are doing—living, being alive—past all objection, obstacles, opposition and the Cyclops standing in our way asking “For what? Why are you even trying?”
    
    Next time that happens, grin right back at him and ask, “Why do you do what you’re doing, Dumbass?”
28. Goshen Creek 03 — Blue Ridge Parkway near Boone, NC, May 21, 2013 — If we cannot agree about what is good and how to do it, or what is harmful and how to avoid it, where does that leave us?
    
    If there is not a good faith agreement among us to see what we are doing, are trying to do, want to do—and what it’s impact is for good or harm—where does that leave us?
    
    The world is in our hands. WE are the responsible agents in charge of its care and tending. We have no business acting out of some ideology, some theory, about how we should behave, and turn a blind eye and a deaf ear to the actual effects our actions have on the people and the world around us.
    
    But, how do we get those in the seats of power to understand this fundamental principle of power? How do we get those who do not care, to care?
    
    When the disconnect between the rulers and the ruled is complete, there is trouble enough for everyone.
29. Sunbathing Owl 01 — Bog Garden, Greensboro, NC, May 22, 2013 — We have all the help we need to do the work that is ours to do. The trouble is, we want to do the work that will land us in fame, fortune and glory while we are young enough to enjoy it.
    
    We have to grow up enough to hand over our idea for our life in a “thy will, not mine, be done” kind of way.
    
    Once we get out of the way—get out of our way—the fun begins.
    
    We get out of our way by taking up the work of taking the invisible world seriously—by consulting the guide within and cooperating with the invisible world in constructing a life—building a life—that is our life to live in the time left for living.
    
    Some of us have no time to waste, hem-hawing around, trying to make up our minds about throwing in with invisible and maybe imaginary cohorts when it is our real life on the line.
    
    So, we can’t do this until we are old enough to have seen what we can do on our own, and know we can’t do any worse with even an imaginary friend offering guidance along the way.
30. Sunbathing Owl, 02 — Bog Garden, Greensboro, NC, April 9, 2013 — If we are going to contact the other side, we have to be willing to do our part. The deal really is, “Thy will, not mine, be done.” We talk it over and work out the details together, and we find the help we need to do what needs us to do it in each situation as it arises. But we have to jump into the deep blue sea. We can’t splash in the shallows and think we are doing anything. We’re in or we are out. The deep blue sea, I mean.
31. Meditating Owl — Bog Garden, Greensboro, NC, May 22, 2013 — We all have to go somewhere else from time to time—to drift off, float away, into reverie and woolgathering. We all have to take a walk in the Dream World, visiting with the ghosts who live there, grounding ourselves again in the flow of life that is more than our life—that is past and future mingled together with possibilities for the present that would be unimagined without drifting off from time to time, walking about.
    
    The visible world of normal, apparent, reality can consume us—can eat us alive. We have to regularly, intentionally, step out of that world and into the other world to have a chance. We do this naturally. We are built to do it. We have to do it. It’s called “looking out the window” by Those Who Know Best And Must Be Pleased, in a disparaging tone, accompanied by body language of pure disgust. It is not encouraged but. It is essential for LIFE.
    
    We have to walk about, away from mass think, away from the culture’s values and ways of doing things, which is thinking about things, reasoning things through, living logically and intellectually, and knowing what we are doing at all times.
    
    To be alive, we have to not know what we are doing a lot of the time. We have to walk about. Reconnect with the spirit world, the invisible world of our ancestors and descendants, and take our instruction there for how to live in the normal world of apparent reality. The Dream World informs life in the visible world.
    
    Want to know what to do when you don’t know what to do? Look out the window. Take a walk.
32. Black Crowned Night Heron (Juvenile) With Duckling 01 — Bog Garden, Greensboro, NC, May 23, 2013 — When you are ready to jump into the deep blue sea, there are two books to start you on your path. I’ve recommended them before, and will recommend them again. You should read them each time I recommend them.
    
    The first is “Inner Work,” by Robert A. Johnson. Read it slowly, meditatively. Absorb it. Understand it. It is foundational.
    
    The second is “The Power of Focusing,” by Ann Weiser Cornell. This introduces the process by which we read the signs and signals of the inner world, the inner guide, in healing the breach between inner and outer, reconciling, integrating and living with integrity within the polarity of the two worlds. It is a worthy tool for your work.
    
    Do not go without the right kind of help into the adventure of your life!

In reply to comments regarding the preceding photograph, made by Diane Dollar Harris and Sandy Bundgarrd: I certainly agree with you and with Sandy Bundgaard, and all those for whom you speak. I’ll say three things in response.

1) This is not nearly as agonizing as watching the 3-inch long turtle, bite and pull under water a duckling, who struggled to keep its head above the surface for 30 minutes while its mother quacked in circles, finally, exhausted, was pulled under and drowned.

2) This Night Heron was followed by the mother of this duckling for a short distance, quacking in protest, who turned and returned to her remaining clutch. All of this was witnessed by another Mallard mother of 16 fresh from the egg ducklings feeding on a mud flat nearby.

This mother took off in hot pursuit after the Night Heron, abandoning her own brood to whatever might happen in her absence. She followed the Heron around the corner of the lake shore, out of sight quacking furiously. The Heron headed for the brush of the bank before disappearing from my view. The Mallard hen followed. I could hear the confrontation I could not see.

Presently, the heron, still with duckling in its beak, came out of the brush and flew over the lake with the enraged hen on his tail, engaging him in air-to-air combat, body slamming him in flight.

The heron dropped the duckling, which fell 30 feet or so into the water and moved enough for me to know it was still living at that point. Then the duck and the heron broke off contact with him landing on a second mud flat and the hen returning to her charge. The duckling continued to move about for a few minutes and then became still. End of story.

3) Our place is that of the mother Mallard, protesting the way things are, even though it is hopeless, pointless and coming to a very bad—and predictable—end. Our place is to exhibit and express values worthy of us all the way, who cares what the end is or what difference it makes! We will NOT resign ourselves to things because “that’s the way things are”! We will play the game under protest, and make what points we can make, even though we are going up against Wilt Chamberlain, Shaquille O’Neal, Michael Jordan, Larry Bird and LeBron James. Never mind the odds. We live to express the values that are at the heart of the matter, no matter what.

We take the attitude of the other mother duck, who put everything she had on the line to stop the natural process—“nature’s way”—“how things are.” We say NO! nonsensically, opposing that which ought to be opposed out of our sense of how things ought to be, the facts be damned. We live to transform the facts—to move things away from how they are to how they ought to be if only for one brief moment. We fly with the other mother duck in the service of our sense of how things ought to be, no matter what.

1. Crabtree Falls Panorama 01 — Blue Ridge Parkway near Little Switzerland, NC, May 21, 2013 — We have to do the good we know to be good, and change what we do as our understanding of the good changes.
   
   Values change over the course of our life. What once was bad becomes good, what once was good becomes bad. Our view of what is important is one thing at 15, another at 35 and another at 60. But. We live in the moment in light of what is important in that moment. We live to serve the good we understand to be good—and allow experience to impact our understanding of the good, deepening, enlarging, expending our idea of the good, so that the good we serve becomes better with time.
   
   We get to better by serving what we understand to be good here and now and allowing our idea of the good to be transformed by our experience with life.
   
   The worse thing is to read some ideological, some theological, some scholastic, some philosophic theory of the good and rigidly comply with that all our life long. The good is as alive as we are, else slavery would still be fashionable, and heretics would still be burned at the stake, and witches would still be drowned.
2. To the above post, Caroline Webb replied: Try telling this to the 57 countries which are members of the Organization of Islamic Countries (OIC). Millions of people do not have the luxury of this kind of thinking and indeed face horrible fates if they step out of line.
   
   To Caroline Webb’s reply, I replied: If those who are hearing me heard me the same thing would apply to me in my situation here and now. This is as subversive as it gets. Jung’s Individuation is a radical threat to the “right order of things.” When we travel consciously the road to who we are, the foundations crumble. It is not good for the economy to think for oneself, to live the life that is our individual life to live. You should not be here, reading this. You should be shopping or watching TV.
   
   While I’m on a roll… We are all the duckling in the Night Heron’s beak. We are all the Other Mother after the Night Heron. On the path to who we are, we are on a course that takes us into the heart of Gethsemane and across the face of Golgotha. We go up against the Powers and Principalities, or, as we prefer, “The Way Things Are.” Waking up is a threat to the status quo, to the systems and people who benefit from having things in place, “As They Are.” We cannot be an I without transforming every We we are apart of. We’s don’t cotton to transformation. Those who have ears to hear, let them hear.
3. Dwarf Crested Iris — Along the path to Crabtree Falls, Blue Ridge Parkway near Little Switzerland, NC, May 21, 2013 — Listen to your symptoms! Listen to your life! Do not try to force your idea of your life onto your life! Do not try to make happen what you want to happen—what you think ought to happen! Let happen what happens in response to your being true to your core, your center, your Self! Let the life that is your life to live emerge in the life you are living! Let yourself come forth, bloom, transform the life you are living and life as it is being lived! Surprise yourself! Shock yourself! Enthrall yourself! Be amazed!
4. The Other Mother — Bog Garden, Greensboro, NC, May 24, 2013 — The story of The Other Mother can be found in one of my replies to comments under the photo of the Black Crowned Night Heron With Duckling—The Revolution is being yourself—being the you you are built to be, doing the work that is yours to do, sharing the gifts that are yours to give, living the life that is yours to live. If you do that, you will transform the world. And all you have to do is get out of bed each morning and live the day as only you can live it. Viva la Revolucion!
5. Owl — Bog Garden, Greensboro, NC, May 24, 2013 — When Native Americans go on a vision quest, they go alone. They don’t take a congregation along with them. How alone can you be? How often do you go there?
   
   When Native Americans go on a vision quest, they don’t take their iPods and iPads and laptops with them. How long can you be without listening to music, checking your text messages and your email, phoning your friends, playing video games (including solitaire)?
   
   We have created a culture to insulate ourselves from the invisible world. We do everything as a WE, nothing as an I, and are cut off from ourselves, isolated, and alone. The congregation, the group, the community does not protect us from emptiness and loneliness. It is the company of ourselves we seek—but cannot find because we are encased in the castings of the culture.
   
   The old Zen hermits lived a solitary life most of the time, but gathered, when the time was right, in convents and monasteries, to enjoy the good-faith company of like-minded people, and share experiences and stories of their pilgrimages—to say what they had learned and articulate what it meant to be who they were. They swapped poems and sang songs, played their musical instruments, laughed and danced. And then returned to their hermitage.
   
   They could be together in a way we are rarely together because they could be a part in a way we are rarely a part.
6. Blue Ridge Morning—Blue Ridge Parkway near Blowing Rock, NC, May 21, 2013 — We get beyond being a rookie when we aren’t bothered by being a rookie. We are always making rookie mistakes. Don’t let it stop you. Do what you need to do about it and keep going.
   
   The pros play the game through their mistakes. The rookies let their mistakes take them out of the game. That’s the biggest difference between rookies and pros. Rookies try to be pros. Pros are what the moment needs them to be—and when they are not, they don’t lose their place in the moment and become what the moment needs them to be now.
7. Crabtree Falls HDR 02 — Blue Ridge Parkway near Little Switzerland, NC, May 21, 2013 — If you want to improve your photography, take more pictures. Take pictures more frequently. See pictures all the time. Think about how you would take them.
   
   Examine the scenes you walk through when you walk the dog, drive through on your way to work or to the grocery store, Imagine how they would look at different times of the day, different times of the year, different weather conditions.
   
   Where would you go on a foggy morning? To get a sunrise or sunset? When it’s snowing? Go there at those times. Get the photographs that are there.
   
   Don’t buy a camera and put it on a shelf. Let the camera show you the world you live in and what you can do with it. Photography is not learning the tricks of the trade. Photography is taking pictures. The tricks you discover that way will stay with you for life. And the pictures will be with you, too.
8. Zen Maple Leaves — Bog Garden, Greensboro, NC, May 2013 — We have to square up with the such-as-it-is-ness of each situation as it arises—which includes our reaction to the such-as-it-is-ness of each situation as it arises. We have to resist what must be resisted. Oppose what must be opposed. Assist what must be assisted. Defend what must be defended. Support and encourage what must be supported and encouraged. Etc. No. Matter. What.
   
   We don’t have to win. We have to fight the good fight. We don’t have to prevail. We have to be what the situation needs us to be. We have to do right by the situation, regardless of the odds, the chances, or the outcome.
   
   We have to square up with all of that and do what needs to be done, anyway, never the less, even so, no matter what.
   
   That’s the way to do it. Loving every minute of it. That’s what we are here for: Doing what needs to be done—what needs us to do it—no matter what, regardless of the outcome, all our life long. Wow, what a ride!
9. The Search for the Holy Grail — Blue Ridge Parkway near Boone, NC, Spring 2007 — It takes time. Lots of time. More time than you want to allow. More time than you think you have. It takes all your life—all that is left of your life.
   
   Waking up, I’m talking about. Coming to your senses. Literally. Feeling what you are feeling, what you are sensing, and knowing it, and deciding what to do about it.
   
   Deepening your relationship with your unconscious—with the part of yourself that you are unconscious of, that you know nothing of, that you don’t know. Knowing that part of you that you don’t know. Takes time. Takes the rest of your life. Better get cracking.
   
   Get cracking paying attention to your nighttime dreams and your daytime flights of fancy and the meandering, wandering, drift of your imagination. Where do some of these things come from? Why now? Why here? In this moment? What is happening here and now that brings that to mind? Get to the bottom of it.
   
   Get cracking getting to the bottom of these things. Waking up. Listening to your senses and to the symbols and images coming to you from the unconscious world, calling you to wake up, pay attention, and collaborate with the Guide Within who needs your cooperation and is there to cooperate with you in living the life that is yours to live in the time left for living.
   
   All of this takes time. Why waste a second of it in some other pursuit, in some other direction?
10. Duckie 08 — Bog Garden, Greensboro, NC, May 2013 — Sometimes, no matter what you do, the outcome is going to be the same and it isn’t going to be good. Don’t let that stop you. Do what needs to be done the way it needs to be done, the way only you can do it, and let that be that.
    
    It doesn’t make any sense, but it makes as much sense as anything else could make in an absurd, nonsensical, situation. Some things don’t make any sense. Don’t tangle yourself up trying to make sense of things that make no sense. Do what you feel is appropriate, what is right in the situation, and let the outcome be the outcome.
    
    What is right in some situations has to be felt, intuited, it cannot be reasoned out, thought up, known for sure to be the right thing to do. Five ducks come in to land, you have to pick your duck and focus on that one duck, holding down the shutter all the way to landed. You have no way of knowing which duck will be the best duck, will give you the best photograph of a duck landing. The right duck is the one you choose to be right in the moment of choosing. You would never reason it out and you don’t have time to think about it anyway. Pick your duck. Do right by it with your camera. No second-guessing, lamenting, bemoaning your choice. More ducks are on the way. You’ll get to choose again.
11. Cardinal Leaving — An oil painting filter applied, Bog Garden, Greensboro, NC, May 26, 2013 — I use the oil painting filter with photographs that are out of focus but cool and unrepeatable. — There is no hurry. There is only paying attention. We aren’t getting somewhere. We are waking up. When we wake up, all we wake up two is the moment we are living and what needs to happen there—to the gifts we have and how they are being called forth in this here and now to do what needs us to do it.
    
    We aren’t setting ourselves up to reap some great reward or be recognized as the greatest human being who ever has been or will be. There isn’t something we are going to get out of all this work to wake up beyond being awake.
    
    It isn’t a competition. We aren’t here to see who can wake up first, or be the most awake of anyone who has ever claimed to be awake. We are just here to wake up, look around, see what is happening and what needs to happen in response to it, what needs to be done about it, and do it, with the gifts we have been given, in each situation as it arises, all our life long.
    
    And there is no hurry. And no time to waste.
12. Great Blue Heron May 08 — Bog Garden, Greensboro, NC, May 13, 2013 — It helps to be of one mind—to know what is of the path and what is not, and to stay on the path. The Dali Lama would not follow me through my life, because that would not be on the Dali Lama’s path. I would not follow Beyonce through her life because that would not be on my path.
    
    It helps to know what your path is, and isn’t—what your business is and what it isn’t. Walk your path. Tend your business.
13. Blue Ridge Morning 02 — Blue Ridge Parkway near Boone, NC, May 21, 2013 — When we are living the life that is our life to live, invisible forces assist us along the way. We find what we need to do what needs us to do it. The other world works with us to do what needs to be done in this world. It’s magical. And real.
    
    And we cannot turn it to our advantage. We cannot exploit it, profit from it, use it to our everlasting benefit, gain anything from the principle at work in the experience, which is “We will have what we need to do what needs us to do it.”
    
    The only good it does us is the encouragement and assistance it provides us in doing what is good. When we depart from doing what is good to serving our own personal good, it leaves us to our own personal devices, schemes and scams. When we move away from doing what is good we move into playing politics or becoming warlords.
    
    Politics is the game where everyone is trying to get a larger piece of the pie at everyone else’s expense without looking like they are pulling a fast one. Warlords just run over everyone in their way to get what they want. Warlords are politicians who have no patience with the game.
    
    And then there are those who do what is good because it is good and not to gain anything from it. My recommendation is that you hang out with those people and endeavor to become one yourself. They know what’s what.
14. Goshen Creek 04 — Blue Ridge Parkway near Boone, NC, May 21, 2013 — When you do what you do and I do what I do, it gets done. I can’t do what you do. You can’t do what I do. We can’t do what Those Who Know Best And Must Be Pleased tell us to do. You have to do what you do, and I have to do what I do—not to please anyone, but to do what we do for no reason beyond it’s what we do. Individually.
15. Four Ferns — Bog Garden, Greensboro, NC, May 7, 2013 — You could do a lot worse than meandering through your life trying to see what you look at, trying to hear what you listen to, trying to understand what is before you. You can start with anything—a measuring cup, a house key—it doesn’t matter. Seeing it leads to something else. Whatever you hear carries you to something else waiting to be heard. Whatever you understand transports you to something you don’t yet understand. We are moved through our life to the life that is ours to live—to the things that are our thing—as we see, hear, and understand what is to be seen, heard and understood.
16. Fog in the Valley — Blue Ridge Parkway near Boone, NC, May 21, 2013 — Evil is easy. Good is hard. Good goes easily over into evil. Evil becomes good with much suffering.
    
    Evil cares only for its own good. Good cares for the good of all.
    
    Evil will do anything, say anything, promise anything, in the service of its own good—in the service of evil. Good draws lines and will not do some things no matter how much apparent good might be done.
    
    Evil’s good can become the pain, suffering, agony and death of innocents. Good’s good is not that flexible.
    
    Evil is opposed to good. Good is opposed to evil. They are polar opposites, inseparably at odds within every living thing.
    
    Suffer the conflict consciously. Bear the pain. Do not think you are better than you are, or be worse than you have to be. Live toward the center. Extreme good is easily confused with extreme evil. The old saw is on the mark: “It is easier to be a Saint than to live with one.” Evil is easy. Good is hard.
17. Mallard Hen Detail 02 — Bog Garden, Greensboro, NC, May 28, 2013 — Imagination is the critical factor in our response to life. If you are going to improve your chances of bringing your LIFE to life in the life you are living—and of living with balance, focus, insight and a sense of humor upon the heaving roll of “the wine dark sea”—improve the quality of your imagination.
    
    How to do that is the question. Imagination requires perception and inquiry—two things that are prohibited by the culture.
    
    The culture is fueled by the economy. Advertisers don’t want you thinking about what they are saying and questioning what you are hearing. Advertisers want you sitting stupidly and being dumb, and doing what you are told to do. Advertises want you reacting to the stimulus they provide, not responding thoughtfully and imaginatively to your experience of life.
    
    You begin to improve your imagination when you start thinking about your thinking, seeing the way you see things and wonder how else you might think and see. Play with the possibilities. Do things differently. Imagine new ways to wash the dishes and drive to the grocery store. Shake up your life with imagination. Imagine your LIFE and bring it to life in your life.
18. Sandpiper Reflection—Bog Garden, Greensboro, NC, May 2013 — We all look at the same world. Why do we see it so differently? It’s amazing. How can you not be amazed at Liberal Democrats and Tea Party Republicans? How can that be?
    
    How can people look at something like, say, the beginning of the physical universe, and see such different things? Amazing. Or homosexuality? The list is long that contains every single thing.
    
    I don’t care what you look at, there are different ways to see it. Dramatically different ways.
    
    So.
    
    How can any of us say, “This is the way things are!”?
19. Spring Panorama 05 — Blue Ridge Parkway near Blowing Rock, NC, May 9, 2013 — When you don’t know what to do: Get. Out. Of. The. Way.
    
    Not knowing what to do is having some want, some desire, some interest that is being blocked. You know what you want, you just don’t know how to get it. When you are being blocked, it is time to take stock.
    
    Taking stock means listening to the other side.
    
    The other side exists on at least two levels. The other side is the invisible world, the world we are unconscious of, the world we don’t know anything about. It is the other side—the foundation actually—of normal, apparent reality.
    
    To see things from the other side, from the standpoint of the invisible world, to get the invisible world’s take on things, we have to get out of the way.
    
    The other side is also the opposite of our typical take on things. We tend to look at the world the same way all the time. We see something once, size it up, box it, label it, tie it with a bow and put it on the shelf it belongs on with all the other things just like it in similar boxes and bows.
    
    The other side would have us see what else it is, how else it could be seen, sized up, boxed, labeled, bowed and shelved.
    
    We have to look at things from all sides, upside-downside, inside-outside, this side-that side… Nothing is only what it appears to be. See. What. You Look At.
    
    To do that, we have to get out of the way.
    
    When we get out of the way, our interests, wants, wishes and desires get out of the way with us. With nothing to interfere with the reception, what needs to be done stands plain before us, saying, “It’s about time, honey. Let’s get going!”
20. Boone Fork Cascades 03 — Blue Ridge Parkway near Blowing Rock, NC, May 9, 2013 — We know what we want and we live to make it happen. We know what we don’t want and we live to keep it from happening. We are not interested in what needs to happen—in what needs us to assist and serve its happening. We have bigger fish to fry.
    
    The truth is that we DO have bigger fish to fry, and they are not the fish we think are the big ones. The really big ones are the ones we aren’t interested in, the ones we don’t know anything about, the ones that need us and only us to fry them.
    
    We live a life that is too small for us. We live in the service of small little clothes, and small little shoes, and small little houses, and small little futures. We are stuck in a small little world that is the biggest thing we can imagine, want, wish for and desire.
    
    It’s time we let ourselves show us what we are capable of—by laying aside the quest for our next greatest desire, and listening, looking, instead for what desires us.
    
    We are all over what we need. What needs us is the question. All we can come up with are the people and pets who want us to tend and care for them all our life long. We’re thinking too small again. We have to think bigger.
    
    What needs us? Do not look outside, look inside. What is stirring in us that needs us to bring it to life? What would love for us to give it attention, listen to its needs, devote ourselves to its service? What are we ignoring about ourselves? What are we discounting, dismissing about ourselves? What are we aborting by refusing to give it a chance at life?
    
    (The people who would refuse a woman’s right to abortion are missing two crucial factors. 1) There are women who are pregnant who cannot carry their pregnancy to term for whatever reason. They. Cannot. Carry. Their. Pregnancy. To. Term. 2) They are aborting aspects of themselves that need to be birthed into being—which they ignore by focusing on bringing an end to literal, actual, external abortion by others. We see in others what we cannot see in ourselves. We are doing what we cannot tolerate in others or allow them to do. The mirror stands before us at all times. We only have to open our eyes to see ourselves when we look at others.)
21. Table Rock — Blue Ridge Parkway near Little Switzerland, NC, May 21, 2013 — We have to carry our own burden, bear our own pain. This is called growing up, facing up to how it is with us, picking ourselves up and stepping into our life just as it is in order to do what can be done about bringing forth the life that is ours to live within the life we are living in the time left for living.
    
    Pain not borne, burdens denied and laid aside, haunt us as symptoms, as self-sabotage, as fate—demanding that we wake up and give them their rightful place in our life. What we refuse to face consciously becomes an unconscious presence clouding our life.
    
    They do not make enough alcohol, illicit drugs, and prescription medication to erase the truth of what has happened to us, what we have done (or failed to do) about it, and how that continues to interfere with our life. Nothing is more burdensome than the burden of the burden—more painful than the pain—unborne.
    
    This is what happened. This is what I did, or failed to do, about it. This is how it has impacted my life to this day. Now, what I am going to do about all of that is: square up to it, face it, bear consciously the pain of its impact and the contradictions that may exist between then and now, and let it be because it is—and step into each day knowing the truth of how things are, living, nevertheless, in light of how things need to be as I take up the work that is mine to do and find ways of living the life that is mine to live within the terms and conditions, nature and circumstances, of life as it is for as long as life is possible, with kindness and compassion, mercy and tenderness for my self and all who come my way.
22. In response to a comment on Duckie 03, posted on May 10: We participate fully—and consciously—in that which we oppose completely—and consciously. This is the paradox, the polarity, at the heart of our existence. We have relaxed the tension to the loss of soul. Native Americans honored and gave thanks to the bison they killed. Their meals were sacrificial and sacramental offerings and gracious receptions of life to life. They did not kill and eat without recognizing their participation in the mystery of Life Eats Life, and were more alive than we are because of it,
23. Nesting Herons — Two juveniles and an adult, Audubon Swamp Garden, Magnolia Plantation, Charleston, SC, April 27, 2013 — The corner stone of all the religions (And Buddhism has prayer flags, a pantheon and a merit system—which means somebody is keeping score—and that’s a religion in my book) is “one God.” One source from which life, meaning, purpose and values spring. The fight breaks out over whose version of God is the real thing. Dumb religions.
    
    We could bring peace to the religious world with one simple rule: Don’t believe in God, BE God. BE the God you declare to be God—don’t argue for that God’s supremacy. Be one with the God you call God. Whatever is good about the God you call God, exhibit it, express it, exude it, BE it.
    
    If everyone were living to be at one with the God they say is The One, what a world it would be.
24. See You Later, Owligator! — Barred Owls in the Bog Garden, Greensboro, NC, April, 2013 — Being conscious of our conflicts without having to arrive at a mutually satisfying conclusion for all sides—just being completely aware of our conflicts and waiting to see what happens—would do as much to restore peace and harmony to our life as anything else we might imagine. It’s amazing what bearing the discomfort of conflict will do.
25. The Shape of Mallard — Bog Garden, Greensboro, NC, May 30, 2013 — Truth lies beyond the scope, outside the bounds, of the norms, standards, mores, conventions, preferences and good tastes of its day.
    
    Truth is scandalous, obscene, heretical, disgusting, immoral, unheard of. You cannot approach truth with the methods and means of traditional examination and inquiry.
    
    So much for passing truth down through the ages, handing it along from one generation to the next, enshrining the teachings of the Ancient Ones, immersing ourselves in the ways of the gurus…
    
    Truth, like the good (And where DOES that line lie?), is as alive as we are. You have to be alive to know the truth, to recognize it when it comes tearing through the times, taking corners on two wheels, turning over apple carts, making waves, rocking boats, stomping on egg shells, flattening everything in sight.
    
    Jacob Bronowski said, “If you want to know the truth, you have to live in certain ways.” You have to live truthfully. You have to be ready for truth when it comes along by being already there ahead of it, wondering why it’s taking so long.
    
    The more you see things like they are being seen around you, like they have always been seen, the less able you are going to be to recognize truth when it rings your doorbell and asks if you want to come out and play.
    
    If you’re going to say, “Yeah, Baby!” to truth, you have to be weird.
    
    And so, when Jesus said, “You have heard it said, but I say unto you…” They killed him. The Ancient Ones were anything but weird. They didn’t cotton to weird. So. Who was dead, and who was alive? Who rose from the dead? Who couldn’t be killed?
    
    Truth can’t die. That’s as weird as it gets.
26. Magnolia Plantation Bridges 01 — Magnolia Plantation, Charleston, SC, April 27, 2013 — We can’t do anything about our perspective. It’s like our fingerprints. It happened to us. We didn’t pick it out of a pile, and can’t sent it back where it come from. And when it changes, it won’t be because we made it happen.
    
    Try to get an alcoholic to change the way he/she looks at a drink. Even alcoholics who are 100% behind the idea can’t do anything to occasion the shift. Yet, the shift happens for a lot of alcoholics. But not for all of them.
    
    Smokers? Same story.
    
    I didn’t grow up thinking the way I think. The way I think has changed a number of times over the course of my life. Each time my thinking has changed, it happened to me. It changed on its own. Of its own accord. I didn’t arrange it.
    
    If you are an ocean person or a mountain person it’s because you are an ocean person or a mountain person, not because you said, “I think I’ll be an ocean person (or a mountain person).”
    
    The way you perceive things, think about things, value things is the most idiosyncratic thing about you and you don’t have anything to do with it. It changes without your instigation, or even, your permission.
    
    Now, we can resist the alteration of our perspective, and we can assist it—but even that, the resistance and assistance, is part of our perspective, and we can’t claim to be responsible for even that much. Which leaves us helpless and at the mercy of the way we see things.
    
    It can change, but it will change in its own time, if it changes at all.
    
    Which raises the question, “How different can we be?” And, “What is in charge of the process of transformation?”
    
    I speak to only those who can hear what I have to say because it’s a waste of our collective time for me to do anything else.
27. Red October — That’s his name. Fourteen feet long. Audubon Swamp Garden, Magnolia Plantation, Charleston, SC, April 27, 2013 — We would be different if we could be. More like we ought to be. More like we will be one day. In the meantime, we have to hold on to the idea, belief, conviction that change is coming. Slower than we would like, but faster than we think.
    
    We have to trust ourselves to the process and be conscious of everything we can be conscious of. And wait. For the magic to happen.
    
    We are already more like we are than we were. And we didn’t do anything to make it happen. It’s working. Give it time. Change is a-coming.
28. Goshen Creek 04 — Blue Ridge Parkway near Boone, NC, May 21, 2013 — A mob cannot change its mind. Mobs often come disguised as well-dressed masses. It is difficult, sometimes, to distinguish a mob from Those Who Know Best And Must Be Pleased.
    
    If you want to think clearly, you have to separate yourself from the noise of the crowd—or the congregation—or the convention—and sit for a while in some quiet corner of the natural world until you can hear “the still, small, voice” of your own heart, and be washed in the wonder of life from time immemorial.
29. Magnolia Plantation Bridges 02 — Magnolia Plantation, Charleston, SC, April 27, 2013 — When “the world is too much with (me),” I lose my place. I forget where I am. I forget what I’m doing.
    
    We think the external world of normal, apparent, reality is the only world. We think it is the source things of all things good and wonderful. We live to arrange things like we want them to be in the physical world.
    
    We think if we marry this person, have this job, pay these bills, etc., we will have it made. We live to have it made according to our current idea of what constitutes having it made. It is all out there, to be done out there, to be made right according to our idea of what is right out there. And we strive endlessly to get things in place out there so that we can, at last, enjoy the fruits of our labors, relax and be glad.
    
    Well. Things keep going against us and we have to work harder to be happy with how things are because they don’t stay that way long if we ever get them there. We are hamsters in a cage, spinning, spinning and going nowhere.
    
    There are three statements which, when understood and applied, will transform our life and the world in which we live. “Know thyself.” “To thine own self be true.” “Thy will, not mine, be done.”
    
    The thy’s and the thine in these three statements are the same. Throw away everything you have heard and thought about the “thy” in “Thy will, not mine, be done,” and explore the possibility that the “thy” there is the grounding center of your own heart and soul. Align yourself with your own center and you have it made.
    
    All the wisdom you need is found in the center of your own heart.
    
    What you need most to do intersects with what some situation needs most to have done. You only have to be awake to the intersection when it comes along.
30. Owl Playing Dead 02 — Bog Garden, Greensboro, NC, June 1, 2013 — An accurate assessment of ourselves and our place in life is difficult to come by. We over-inflate or under-inflate with ease. Inflation and deflation are the poles between which we plot a position for ourselves determining the quality of our life and how we are doing in it. Quickly shifting between the poles in extreme fashion is called bi-polar disorder.
    
    Our assessment of ourselves and our place in life is completely subjective and wholly arbitrary. We have no idea of what we are doing and shouldn’t be in the business. We think too much of ourselves, or too little. We would do well to get out of the way.
    
    Stop with the grading! Believe this: Everything that has happened in our life, for good or for ill, has uniquely positioned us to offer exactly what the rest of our life needs us to bring forth.
    
    I don’t care if you spend your time thinking you are great or worthless or somewhere in between. I’m asking you to stop thinking of yourself as great, worthless or somewhere in between. The instant you catch yourself feeling good or bad about yourself, feeling high or low, STOP IT! Get. Out. Of. Your. Way.
    
    You are uniquely positioned to provide exactly what the rest of your life needs you to bring forth. Get out of your way and trust that to be the case. The truth of my position will be borne out in your experience IF you trust it to be so and stop looking for evidence to refute it.
    
    You are perfectly, beautifully, wonderfully YOU! No one else could do it the way you can do it. No one else could live your life the way you can live it. No one else fills the niche you fill, has the opportunities to bring forth what you have to give where, and when, and how you do. You are unique and irreplaceable.
    
    Let that be so because it is so. Get out of your way. Get out of your head, with it’s judgments and evaluations, and start listening to your heart and its leadings and guidance. And trust that you have exactly what you need to offer what is needed in each situation as it arises throughout the time left for living. Because you do.
31. Wing Span 02 — Barred Owl, Bog Garden, Greensboro, NC, June 1, 2013 — All of us go to sleep. None of us can make ourselves go to sleep. We can assist sleep by not drinking alcohol, or caffeine, or eating chocolate (caffeine), or citrus fruit, etc. before going to bed, but we cannot force sleep before its time.
    
    If we get out of the way, sleep will come, though perhaps not on our schedule.
    
    How else can we interfere with our life, trying to force what cannot be forced?
    
    We are here to attend, assist and serve—our life. Not coerce it into contortions at odds with its spirit and direction.
    
    If you are going to listen to anything, listen to your life—and be what it needs you to be—in the time left for living.
32. Francis Beidler Palmettos — Francis Beidler Forest, Charleston, SC, April 26, 2013 — You have to decide what you are going to keep and what you are going to throw away. This is the choice that determines everything about you, what you keep and what you throw away.
33. Magnolia Plantation Bridges 03 — Magnolia Plantation, Charleston, SC, April 27, 2013 — Carl Jung said, “I have frequently seen people become neurotic when they content themselves with inadequate or wrong answers to the questions of life.”
    
    We don’t think in terms of neuroses these days but give neurotic symptoms their own names: depression, anxiety, obsessive/compulsive disorder, obesity, violence, drug abuse, addiction, etc. These symptoms are characteristic of the culture of the world! Of a world that has contented itself “with inadequate or wrong answers to the questions of life” for generations!
    
    Chunk your answers! Get busy digging into the questions of life! The valuable answers are the ones you have to dig out on your own. The cheap glass ones are handed out in tracts on street corners, and preached from the pulpits of the churches, and bound up in the volumes of books lining the shelves in the self-help section of bookstores, and lip-synched by gurus, therapists and counselors.
    
    The real jewels are guarded by dragons deep in the center of mountains hidden in regions long forgotten, waiting for those who have what it takes to dig them out.
    
    You don’t go there in tour buses or on spiritual retreats. It’s an individual journey you make alone with your mule. A spirit quest for those with the heart for soul searching and the resolve to find answers that are our own.
    
    That’s what you will do with the rest of your life, if you’re game.
34. Beacon Heights Panorama — Blue Ridge Parkway near Grandfather Mountain, NC, May 21, 2013 — What motivates you? Moves you? Enlivens you? Connects with you on the deepest level? Brings you together within yourself, focused on—and at one with—this one thing? Heals you, restores you, makes you whole?
    
    Maybe it’s a camera, or writing, or both. Maybe it’s reading and underlining passages. Maybe it’s horses, or drumming, or digging in the yard. The world is filled with possibilities. But do not think that any of them is the end of the line for you, that any of them is all the world of possibility has to offer you. Whatever it is, it is only your mule.
    
    You and your mule are on a journey to the heart of who you are. Ride your mule as far as it goes. When it plays out, look around for another mule. Our mules pass us from one to another because it’s a long trip, and we are carried along by the things we love—by the things that interest us, the things that catch our eye, that click with us, that are life itself for us. Life is carrying us to life by way of our interest in life, our love of life, our deep affinity for life itself.
35. Sunbathing Owl 03 — Barred Owl, Bog Garden, Greensboro, NC, June 1, 2013 — Our symptoms are indications of divisions within. We are divided against ourselves. We want what we know we have no business having. We are at war with ourselves over how we will live, what we will do—over what is important—over what deserves our highest allegiance.
    
    All of this is, of course, underground and quite unconscious. As far a we are concerned, we think things are just fine, and can’t understand where these symptoms come from. And, we have no intention of getting to the bottom of it. Of stirring things up. Of discovering what our conflicts are and doing the work of reconciling them consciously.
    
    Carl Jung said, “Nothing has a stronger influence psychologically on their environment, and especially on their children, than the unlived lives of the parents.” And, “The greatest tragedy of the family is the unlived lives of the parents.”
    
    Guess what is unconscious in the lives of the parents—and perhaps in the family as a whole. The unlived lives of the parents lives in the shadows, unknown, unacknowledged, unconscious—and cast a long shadow over the future lives of the children.
    
    We do our children and ourselves the biggest favor in the whole display case of favors by being aware of the things we don’t want to think about. Our work is to integrate the opposites, heal the divisions, expose the conflicts, and get to the bottom of how it is with us and what we need to do about it. Our symptoms are a good place to start. Our dreams and our fantasies are not far behind.
36. Still Life With Log — Haw River State Park, near Brown’s Summit, NC, May 31, 2013 — You know what you like and what you don’t like, what you love and what you detest, what is good for you and what is bad, what is right for you and what is wrong, what is life for you and what is death…
    
    With what do you spend your time? How much for one and how much for the other? And when there is a conflict between one and the other, which takes precedent? Which goes on the back burner until a more convenient time?
    
    It is at the point of conflict between what is life for you and what is death, etc. that you have to stand up and step into the fire—that you have to take the heat and work things out in a way that takes your benefit and your deficit into account each time there is a conflict. And, you have to begin siding with your benefit, or working your benefit into your life, and taking the heat for doing that.
    
    Everything about your life in this world would disappear everything about your LIFE in the other world. Everything about this world thinks this world is the only world and you have to forsake your connection with the other world to prove your allegiance to the things of this world.
    
    Well. Your allegiance lies with the other world. This world just keeps our body going in the service of soul. This world is not the Be All And End All it is reputed to be. This world is just a feeding station that nourishes our body for its work with the other world.
    
    But. This world has developed a degree of self-imposed importance that is out of proportion to its design. We are born into obligations, responsibilities and duties that obscure, or obliterate, our relationship with the other world. It is easy for us to think that our primary concern should be for this world. We have to work to reorder our priorities.
    
    We have to work the other world into our life in this world—often having to “choose this (moment) whom we will serve,” on a situation-by-situation basis, recognizing that we “cannot serve two masters.” And we constantly have to work it out, which world we serve with our life here and now.
    
    We have to make it conscious, our relationship between the worlds. We have to stand up and step into the fire and take the heat. Situation-by-situation. All our life long.
37. Free Falling Owl — Barred Owl in the Bog Garden, Greensboro, NC, June 2, 2013 — You have to work your way back into a living relationship with the other world, the invisible world, which is the source of life and being, meaning and value. Start with what you love.
    
    You have to work to love what you love because this world of normal, apparent, reality will do its best to separate you from it. This world stands like a Cyclops, blocking our way to the other world. Who do you love? The Cyclops or you?
    
    My current metaphor for what we love is a mule. Ride your mule! Stay on the mule! Your mule will take you to where you need to be! Your mule knows the way! Trust your mule! Trust yourself to your mule!
    
    This world would insert itself between you and your mule—would have you bury your mule, forget about your mule, become the mule for this world, working in its service, being good for the economy, not rocking any boats or making any waves, all your life long. You have to work it out—paying the bills and your dues in this world while maintaining a healthy relationship with your mule and with the other world.
    
    Now, your relationship with this world has corrupted your ability to evaluate what is truly good, truly important and what truly needs to happen in a situation. We come to our situations burdened with a lifetime of shoulds, oughts, musts, and have-tos, and cannot get outside of how we have been taught to appraise things in order to see things for what they are.
    
    Learning to live soulfully is the hardest thing you’ll ever do. And the most essential. The work requires us to maintain our relationship with our mule—to love what we love—AND pay our bills and our dues in the world of normal, apparent, reality. We do the work by bearing the conflicts between the worlds consciously, with full awareness of the pulls in opposite directions in each situation as it arises—and working it out, situation-by-situation, all our life long.
38. Crabtree Falls 04 — Blue Ridge Parkway near Little Switzerland, NC, May 21, 2013 — We are not born under the curse of Adam’s sin, having to be relieved of our burden by the death of God’s Only Son Jesus Christ Our Lord, The Second Adam. We ARE Adam. And Eve. And we are The Second Adam. And Eve. Here’s the deal:
    
    Our view of the good, of what is important, of what matters most, is skewed by our investment in what is good for us. What is good is what is good for us. What is good is what we can exploit to our advantage. What is good is what we can bend to serve us, improve our lot, deliver us from what we don’t want and land us on the happy shores of what we do want.
    
    Sound like the Garden of Eden to you—where we sacrifice everything for the sake of what is pleasing to us? It should. This world is the Garden of Eden. The work is to live in this world as those who belong, heart and soul, to the other world, the invisible world, the world of the spirit who is like the wind that blows where it will, with no regard for the implications its blowing has upon those who live under the banner of “Thy will, not mine, be done.”
    
    This world is also the Garden of Gethsemane, where we enter the struggle, again and again, in each situation as it arises, to be who we are, to see things as they are, to do what needs to be done as it needs to be done, no matter what the implications are for us personally, for no reason beyond it needs what we have to offer and there is no one to do it but us.
    
    Eden or Gethsemane. We stand with a foot in each garden and make a choice regarding the nature of the good we will serve in each here-and-now of our life.
    
    Here is the test Jesus faced in the wilderness and again in Gethsemane, and the test that is ours to face again and again throughout our life: We have to stay on the mule by being who we are and doing what we love—without trying to exploit it to our advantage in any way.
    
    We just do what we love. We just stay on the mule. And see where it goes. It will go through the heart of Gethsemane, and across the face of Golgotha, and to the Empty Tomb, again and again. We pay the fare and ride the ride. And what a ride it is!
39. Wing Span 03 — Barred Owl in the Bog Garden, Greensboro, NC, June 4, 2013 — We have to reflect on our life experience and draw our own conclusions about what is important and what we are going to do about it. No one can be coerced into embracing The Truth.
    
    I don’t care what it is, it isn’t true until it is true for us. It isn’t meaningful until it means something to us. It isn’t good unless it is good for us. And we have no business saying what is true, meaningful and good until we have experienced it first hand and know that about which we speak.
    
    Which means we have to open ourselves to our experience, reflect on it, and draw our own conclusions about what is important and what we are going to do about it. And do it.
    
    Nobody can do it for us.
40. Owl Playing Dead 03 — Barred Owl sunbathing in the Bog Garden, Greensboro, NC, June 1, 2013 — The owls are teaching me to photograph owls. That’s the kind of teacher you need. You don’t take a course in owls at the local university. You don’t sit at the feet of One Who Knows All There Is To Be Known About Owls. You don’t seek out Owl Gurus and wait for them to reveal the Great Secret About Owls Photography. You just find an owl and start taking pictures. You’ll learn all you need to know by doing what you want to know how to do.
    
    If you want to know how to be married, find a spouse. If you want to know how to be a parent, have a child or two.
    
    Do not think you know how to be married before you find a spouse. That will ruin your chances.
    
    Do not think you know about being a parent (after all, you had parents) before you have children. That will ruin their chances (like your parents ruined your chances).
    
    Do not think you know anything about anything until you do the thing over time.
    
    You know about milking cows by milking a herd of Jersey’s.
    
    You know about playing second base by suiting up and taking the field—and chalking up the errors.
    
    You know all those things you don’t do (dancing, for instance) because you don’t know how to do them? If you want to do them, start doing them. If you don’t want to do them, just start saying you would do them if you wanted to.
    
    Which gets us to your mule. I don’t care how poorly you are currently riding your mule (That is, doing the things you love to do). Do not give it up because it is hard to work mule riding into your life. Keep climbing back up on your mule. Aim to ride it longer each time you get on.
    
    Riding your mule is the only way to learn to ride your mule.
41. Boardwalk Panorama 02 — The Bog Garden, Greensboro, NC, June 4, 2013 — You do your thing AND pay the bills, AND change the diapers, AND do the laundry, AND go to work, AND mow the lawn, AND… You do your thing along with all the other things that comprise your life. But. You do your thing.
42. Cardinal in Flight — Bog Garden, Greensboro, NC, June 5, 2013 — We have to know what our thing is, and honor it. We have to do what we love to do. We have to be who we are.
    
    We cannot just live the life that was handed to us—the life we fell into—the life that was the course of least resistance—the easy life—the one we could live without effort because someone was telling us what to do and how to do it and by when to have it done.
    
    We cannot play the part we were told to play.
    
    What do they know who did, who are doing, the telling about who we are? Those Who Know Best And Must Be Pleased would have us live in ways that are convenient for them. What do they know of us? What do they care about us?
    
    That’s our place—knowing ourselves, caring about ourselves. If we don’t do it, it won’t be done.
    
    When you stand up in the life you are living and take a step toward the lift that is your life to live, there will be opposition. Resistance. Discouragement. They want you being who they want you to be. They are not on your side.
    
    Begin cultivating relationships with those who are on your side. Who let you—who encourage you—to be who you are. Who are good for your soul, your heart. Who you can be with without being on guard, defensive, anxious, fearful, careful.
    
    You’ll need some buds to keep you on your mule, to help you recover from the Cyclop’s mauling, regain your balance, stand back up and take another step toward the life that is your life to live, toward the you you are.
43. The Outing — Bog Garden, Greensboro, NC, May 28, 2013 — Living well is the lesson. Living poorly is the teacher.
    
    You miss the point, and remain where you are, when you take living poorly as evidence of your inability to live well.
    
    You look at these photographs and you think I do photography well. I do photography well because I do photography poorly, well.
    
    When you live your life poorly well, you sit with your poor performances and your poor outcomes and you mine them for the gold. You see what they have to show you. You take what they have to give you. And thank them for their kindnesses.
    
    Every dream you dream is about you. And, if you don’t dream, that is also about you. Mine them for what they are worth. See what they have to say to you about you. Receive it well.
    
    Every dream is saying, “Look! This is the way things are with you! This is how it is with you! What are you going to do about it?”
    
    If you dream of someone you know driving too fast and running off a cliff, reflect on how fast you are living your life and how many red lights and warning signs you are running through.
    
    Treat your life as though it were a dream. When you live poorly, listen! Look! See! Hear!
    
    Look into every aspect of your poor behavior, choices. See all that is to be seen, from every side.
    
    Two days ago, I missed the owl flying at me. Seven photos were out of focus because the camera settings were not what I thought/assumed they were. I’m still getting the good out of that disappointment, and will for some time yet. It is showing me me like a bad dream would.
    
    My actual daytime life and my nighttime dreams are mirrors reflecting me to me, asking me to adjust my ways so that I might live well in the time left for living. Beautiful help for one who can use all the help he can get. Perhaps you know someone like that, too.
44. Spring Panorama 04 — Blue Ridge Parkway near Boone, NC, May 21, 2013 — We are running out of time. We cannot be throwing time away, spending time on the things that take our mind off our business, that serve as escapes, distractions, diversions, from and compensations for, the life we are living. The life we are living gets too much of our time, while the life we are called to live—that is ours to live—that waits to be lived—languishes for lack of time and attention.
    
    We have to find our thing and do it. We have to attend our dreams and the life we are living—including the escapes and diversions—for hints and clues about the life that is ours to live.
    
    We have to be on the track of the life that is ours to live like hounds after a fox. We have to be single-mindedly devoted to task of being who we are, of doing what is ours to do while are still capable of functioning purposefully, and know what “clicks” with us when we see it.
    
    We have one thing to do in the time left for living: Find our life and live it. Anything that detracts from that is in our way.
45. Goshen Creek Cascade — Blue Ridge Parkway near Boone, NC, May 21, 2013 — I remarked about a photo of me a friend had taken, with my camera duds on and camera in hand, “I look like a man who has lost his mule, wondering what now.” The comment immediately flashed me back to the observation that “Searching for Zen is like a man sitting on his Ox, looking for his Ox.”

I’m holding my mule, looking for my mule.

I understand our mule to be that which carries us through life and gets us where we are going. It is what gives us life and provides us with the wherewithal to get up and get back in the game. It is our incentive, our motivation, our joy of life, living and being alive. Our mule is our heart’s true love.

Know what your mule is. Ride it.

1. Straight On 01 — Barred Owl in the Bog Garden, Greensboro, NC, June 3, 2013 — Don’t let that it’s useless, pointless, hopeless, futile and coming to a very bad end stop you, or even slow you down!
   
   Geese that start out with four goslings and end up with one keep going as hard as if they had all four. Ducks that start out with sixteen and end up with seven keep at it as though they still had sixteen.
   
   Do you think if you explained it to them, food chain, turtles, owls, hawks, chances, odds, and how it is to them they would all OD on bread and there would be no more geese and ducks?
   
   They have their business—their work—their thing—to do and they do it, no matter what their chances are.
   
   I believe in me and I believe in you and I believe in me-and-you-together. More than that, I believe in More To Me Than Meets The Eye Even Mine and I believe in More To You Than Meets The Eye Even Yours and I believe in More To Me-And-You Than Meets The Eye Even Ours.
   
   If I can get you to join me in believing this, nothing can stop us. Then, we aren’t doing it because it make sense—we are doing it because that’s what we do, it’s who we are. We don’t care about the chances.
   
   We are in league with each other and with More Than Meets The Eye—for what, we do not know and do not care. We are here, we know that, and we have business, work, a thing to do, we know that. And, we are here to help each other remember and do what is ours to do in the time left for living no matter what because there is More To It All Than Meets The Eye—and we have no business looking at any of it and deciding that’s all there is to it and it isn’t worth it so we’re quitting.
   
   So get on your mule. We’re going for a ride. Even if it rains.
2. Sunset at Reedy Fork — Lake Brandt Greenway, Bur-Mil Access, Greensboro, NC, December 8, 2012 — We do better with the right ratios of nutrition, hydration, exercise and rest. And nothing is easier to neglect and ignore. If you were to ask me to help you with your life, I would say, “Get your ratios right, and then we’ll talk.”
3. Hydrangea Blossoms — Bass Lake, Moses H. Cone Memorial Park, Blue Ridge Parkway near Blowing Rock, NC, October 11, 2012 — We are constantly working it out—the conflict, opposition, contraries within and without. We cannot eradicate dissent, though we try mightily, though it would be to our demise if we could.
   
   Vitality and life depend upon polarities which respect and honor the other. We sit down and talk. We expand, enlarge, deepen each other with ways of seeing that take into account what the other is missing, overlooking, ignoring. But. We do not convert, change, disappear the other. We have conversations. We do not win arguments.
   
   And rising, we do what we determine needs to be done, after we have said and heard all there is to say and hear. Over the course of a lifetime of conversations with our opposing sides, within and without, we grow, we change our minds about what is important, we become richer, deeper, increasingly open and compassionate with ourselves and each other—because we have talked with respect and honor for each other and the views we hold.
   
   We have not gone to war. We have not made dissent illegal. We have not converted or expelled the opposite views and those who hold them. And the world is blessed for it, as are we all.
4. Wing Span 01 — Barred Owl in the Bog Garden, Greensboro, NC, June 1, 2013 — We are always growing up, never grown up. We are capable of infinite expansion, enlargement, realization and depth. We have unlimited potential in the area of bigness of heart and mind, compassion, understanding, comprehension and understanding.
   
   Why die small and narrow, tight and constricted?
   
   Why not go to sleep bigger than you were when you woke up?
   
   Why take pride in thinking like your parents thought, or like people thought 2,000 years ago?
   
   Why say, “The Bible says,” as though that is all there is to say? All that needs to be said? Why not wonder what the Bible should have said, or would say if it were being written today?
   
   Why be bound to a worldview that requires us to not know, not look, not ask, not see, not hear, not wonder, not imagine, not care, not explore, not experience, not be more than those who have told us what to think and what not to think?
5. Pamlico Sound Sunset Panorama — Cape Hatteras National Seashore, Ocracoke Island, NC, October 2011 — Not one of us has been as old as we are. We are entering a new world. Do not think we can get by there on the strength of our experience in the world we are leaving as we step into the Unknown. We will need more help there than we can be to ourselves.
   
   We will do well to rely on the help ourselves can give us.
   
   We have to cultivate a living, vibrant, relationship with the unknown knower within as we enter the Unknown Regions of our life, and deal there with what waits for us, drooling.
   
   The unknown knower and her, his, aides, have seen it all, several times, before. They have access to the collective wisdom of the species—and beyond. And stand ready to assist us in finding our way through the encroaching realities.
   
   Do not think you have to do it alone. When The Panic seizes you, relax into the presence of those inner aspects of you residing in the unconscious-because-we-are-not-conscious-of-it-world. As we make them conscious—by working with our dreams, fantasies and the spontaneous images that appear in our imagination—we take comfort in their company, and find what we need to manage our life with the things we find waiting.
6. Owl Bathes II 01 — Barred Owl in the Bog Garden, Greensboro, NC, May 31, 2013 — What kind of help do you need with your life? Where do you go to get it?
   
   I need a sounding board. I talk things out with myself. I carry on an inner dialogue at all times. I’m constantly surprised at what I have to show myself.
   
   When I’m able, I carry on the same kind of conversation with those who are capable of hearing what I have to say in the external world of visible, physical, reality. There aren’t many who take the time to listen, to hear me out.
   
   There are many who would apply some culturally approved nostrum, some popular salve, to my wound or problem, to dispense with me and get the focus of the conversation back to them.
   
   I need to talk with people who have experienced their life and thought about it, reflected on it, and come to their own conclusions about how things are. I need to hear their insight and perspective. I need to know what they see and how they see it.
   
   I don’t need people who talk to me of what they have been told. I want to know what they have seen and what they think about it. I want them to tell me what they think, not what they have been told to think.
   
   The culture, and the church of the culture, needs people who don’t think, thinking what they are told to think and doing what they are told to do.
   
   We cannot live our own life until we are able to think about the life we are living and the life that needs to be lived, and find ways to live the live that needs to be lived within the life we are living. This is the revolution. It is carried out by those who see, hear, reflect, understand, and live in response to all of that, in light of all that.
   
   What kind of help do you need to do that? Where do you go to get it?
7. Owl Bathes III 01 — Barred Owl in the Bog Garden, Greensboro, NC, June 9, 2013 — There is a saying in the Deep South (and maybe everywhere else), “It is so loud I can’t hear myself think.” If you don’t want people to think about what you are saying, yell at them.
   
   Think of the places you go where it is too loud to hear yourself think. Where it is too loud to think.
   
   Rock concerts. Nobody is thinking at rock concerts. Everybody is into the spirit of the concert. Who needs to think?
   
   Political conventions. Nobody is thinking at political conventions. The speakers are amplified and saying what everyone expects to hear and no one has to think about anything.
   
   Revivals and some church services, particularly those built on the rock concert theme. Same as political conventions. They are telling us what we expect to hear so who needs to think about it?
   
   Where else do you encounter an environment where it is too loud to hear yourself think?
   
   It’s a tool of propaganda and a torture technique for prisoners of war.
   
   And it underscores the importance of silence in seeking the grounding center of ourselves. We find our life unfolding, emerging, in the silence of reflection and awareness. If we hope to be who we are, we have to have quiet places in our life where we can hear ourselves think. And go there often to listen.
8. Jennette’s Pier Panorama — Nags Head, NC, October 2011 — I think of the soul as the seat of meaning and value. It could the the threshold to meaning and value. The doorway, the portal, the channel, the… The precise relationship between the soul and meaning and value is not mine to determine. “Seat” suits me.
   
   Soul comes alive in the presence of meaning and value and dies when we live our life in the direction opposite, and opposed, to meaning and value. Soul thirsts for meaning and value, lives for meaning and value, lives on meaning and value. When meaning and value go, soul is not far behind.
   
   Soul loss is loss of meaning and value.
   
   How meaningful is the life you are living? How valuable is your life to you? Where is meaning and value lodged in your life? Where are they to be found? What do you do that has meaning and value for you?
   
   Soul is your built-in guide to meaning and value. It is a compass pointing to meaning and value. It is a barometer measuring the degree of meaning and value in your life.
   
   If you are empty, depleted, joyless, hopeless, too long devoid of meaning and value, it’s time to do some soul work.
   
   Sit facing an empty chair—as empty as your life is. Imagine your soul in that chair. Tell your soul you know the chair is not empty and that your life is capable of being filled to overflowing with meaning and value. Ask soul to help you restore meaning and value to your life by pointing you in the direction of that which is, or will be, meaningful and valuable, and by encouraging you in its service.
   
   Now you have to fully cooperate with soul to infuse your life with meaning and value—you have to be a willing partner with your soul in producing a life worth living, but you have exactly what you need, waiting for you to give it the go ahead. So. Go ahead.
9. Great Smoky Mountains Sunset Panorama — Clingman’s Dome Parking Lot, Great Smoky Mountains National Park, NC & TN, November, 2011 — We have to live aligned with—be true to—what we know to be good. NOT to what someone else tells us is good.
   
   Of course, there is a price to be paid for living this way but. There is a price to be paid for living any way. Who do you want to be able to live with is the question. The answer better be your Center-most Self.
   
   You live aligned with your Center and the entire world will be better off for it, never mind what They (The Ones Who Know Best And Must Be Pleased) say. Regardless of the price you have to pay.
   
   One of the prices you will have to pay is that you will have to change your idea of the good. What you know to be good will not be the same throughout your life. Your life will impact, form and shape your idea of the good.
   
   There are people who have a better idea of the good than we do. There are people who know a better good to be good than the good we know to be good. Our idea of the good, what we know to be good, shifts in the presence of a better good than the one we perceive to be good.
   
   Women, gay people and people of color continue to struggle toward—and call us to serve—a better good than the one most of us over 60 (and a lot of us under 60) thought was good in our childhood and youth.
   
   The good is as alive as we are. As we grow closer to our Center, we recognize a good to be good that is different, that is better, than the good we called good when we were arrogant enough to think we knew what we were talking about. We have to deep the door of our heart open to a better good than the good we call good, even as we serve that good with all our heart.
   
   Changing our mind about the good is one of the prices we pay in serving the good we call good. It is not the only one.
   
   Jesus, the Buddha, Gandhi, Martin Luther King, Jr., Rumi and a host of others lived out before us—modeled—what it means to live in the service of the good we know to be good. They didn’t kill anyone over whose idea of the good was the right idea. They lived out of their idea of the good with kindness, compassion, gentleness, reverence and good will for all, friends and enemies alike. And they were open to changing their idea of the good as their life opened their eyes to a better good than the good they once called good.
   
   May we all be like them in our own way.  Amen! May it be so!
10. Duckie 10 BW — Bog Garden, Greensboro, NC, May 2013 — I am interested in getting you together with your life, with the life that is your life to live, the life you are built to live, the life that only you can live—not the life someone has handed you and told you to live, but the life that fits you from the ground up, from the inside out.
    
    That’s all there is to it: Getting together with your life. Living your life—the life that fits you—the life that is exactly right for you.
    
    This is where you come in. Only you know what fits you, clicks with you, resonates with you, is exactly right for you. No body can look at you and tell you what shoe fits. You have to try the shoes on. My wife won’t let me order a pair of jeans for her online. She has to try them on. Only she knows what is right for her—jean-wise and every other-wise.
    
    So you have to say what is right for you, and you have to hold the line against all comers. They will try to talk you out of what fits and give you what does not fit. They will try to take your soul away from you. Those Who Know Best And Must Be Pleased are soul killers. You are your first line of defense. You have to say no to those who try to take your life from you and give you some other old life instead.
    
    You have to live your life. You have to be one with your life. You have to live from the center of you. There is nothing beyond the center. When you live from the center you are at one with God. When you live your life you are one with God. You stand with Jesus when he said, “The Father and I are one.”
    
    Of course. And you are fulfilling the commandment that didn’t make the top 10: You must be holy as I am holy. You must be at one with your self as I am at one with myself. Says the Lord, or words to that effect. That’s what you do when you find your life and live it over all objection and opposition.
    
    And only you know how to do that. Only you know when you are on the beam and when you are off the beam, when you are on your mule and when you are off your mule.
    
    Get on your mule and ride!
11. Groundhog Mountain Picnic Tables 01 — Blue Ridge Parkway near Meadows of Dan, VA, June 10, 2013 — We live at odds with ourselves, at war with ourselves. We are not on our side. And we have the symptoms to prove it.
    
    We prefer knee surgery to losing weight. We prefer eating ice cream to a walk around the block. We know what a healthy lifestyle is and live the way we are living.
    
    Our health problems would take a quick turn for the better if we just got our ratios right (Nutrition, hydration, exercise and rest).
    
    What?
    
    Why aren’t we on our side? Why do we live against ourselves? Against the flow of our life—the life that is our life to live?
12. Dugger’s Creek HDR 01 — Blue Ridge Parkway at Linville Falls, NC, June 11, 2013 — What thrills you these days? What do you enjoy about your life? What do you love about living?
    
    What are you doing with your life that you believe in? What are you doing that you don’t believe in?
    
    Usually, when we feel bad about our life, we think rearranging external factors would do the trick. Change our spouse or partner, say, or jobs, or neighborhoods, or areas of the country. It goes deeper than that.
    
    Our life is a reflection of our relationship with our life—of our involvement, engagement, investment. It isn’t a screen concealing us from the world through deceit and duplicity, presenting a pretend us for all to see—an us we wish we were, while we live on the admiration and envy we get for not being who we are.
    
    Our life is who we are. Who we are is our life. “What I do is me/for that I came”—Gerard Manley Hopkins.
    
    What are you doing that is you, that is what you came to do, that flows from the center as naturally as spring of cold water flows up from the earth?
13. Silhouette 01 Black & White — Blue Ridge Parkway near Meadows of Dan, VA, June 10, 2013 — The Wasteland can be anywhere, everywhere. It’s whereabouts is entirely determined—and easily predicted—by the presence of those who have eyes but don’t see, ears but don’t hear, hearts that don’t understand.
    
    The Wasteland is always a slight perspective shift away from the paradise of The Promised Land. All it takes is seeing to see that it is so.
    
    Jesus came from Nazareth. Nothing good comes from Nazareth. He was the stone the builders rejected that became the chief cornerstone. He lived from the center of his being and transformed, by his simple presence, the lives of all of those who could be transformed—who had eyes to see, ears to hear and hearts that understood.
    
    Seeing Jesus is being Jesus. Seeing the Buddha is being the Buddha. In an “Oh, NOW I see” kind of way.
    
    When we see, we see. We get it. We do it. We become it. We are it. We see that we are it all along.
    
    When we live from our center, we transform the world, without doing anything.
    
    This is the Taoist/Zen (Zen is what happened with Buddhism met Taoism) principle of Wu Wei—doing by doing nothing.
    
    It all comes together in the center. All is one there.
    
    All is many in The Wasteland, at odds, competing, striving against each other to be the best, to have the most, to be #1.
    
    In the Center, there is no #1. All is One. There is no conflict at the center—it is all complimentary there, with opposites reconciled and at peace with their polarity.
    
    Helping the other be who she, who he, is, helps us be who we are. We are all one in the work of becoming ourselves with no threat to anyone, at the expense of no one.
    
    Seeing is laughing, doing, being. Like that, Poof, The Wasteland becomes The Promised Land.
14. Mabry Mill in the Rain 02 Detail — Blue Ridge Parkway near Meadows of Dan, VA, June 10, 2013 — No book can tell you where to place your tripod or where to stand, squat, or lie with camera in hand.
    
    No book can tell you what the right exposure is for any scene (My Duck Landing and Wild Geese and Geese In Flight series’ are all woefully over-exposed and make me happy).
    
    No book can tell you what is pleasing to you.
    
    No book can tell you how to do it.
    
    You know how to do it by doing it, reflecting on and evaluating what you did, and doing it again until you get it right according to you.
    
    YOU are the one who must be pleased with your photographs and with your life.
    
    No book can tell you how to be YOU. And nobody can either. Except, of course, YOU.
15. Goshen Creek 10 — Blue Ridge Parkway near Boone, NC, June 10, 2013 — We have to set ourselves aside in order to consider what our life—the life that is our life to live, not the life we have fallen into—is asking of us, needs of us.
    
    We have to take seriously the world we know nothing about, the invisible world, the unconscious world—and we have to work to make it conscious. We have to align ourselves with it and enter into a partnership with it, collaborating on what we do, how we live.
    
    We belong to that world, and are alive in this world of conscious, physical, reality in service to that world. We have to establish a working relationship—consciously—with that world, with the unconscious world.
    
    We do this by feeling the connection, not by thinking about it.
    
    When we feel at peace, at ease, at-one with what is happening, at home with where we are, as though we are where we belong and everything is right with us and our life, we are in synch with the invisible world.
    
    When we feel as though something is missing, as though something is not quite right somehow, as though we are out of rhythm with our life, we are disconnected from the invisible world.
    
    We are looking for flow, harmony, resonance, congruity, accord… And how that feels in our body.
    
    Dreams and fantasies, symbols, metaphors and images that stir us emotionally are contact points with the unconscious world, inviting us to reflect on and examine what is trying to come to consciousness in these experiences. We make the connection between the experience and our life—the live we are living and/or the life that is ours to live.
    
    The unconscious world has an investment in us, has something at stake in us, needs something from us. When we cooperate with the unconscious world, we discover a sense of meaning and value and purpose that affirms the track we are on, the direction we are taking, and we know we are not alone in this experience we call life.
16. Summer Fence 01 — Blue Ridge Parkway near Boone, NC, June 11, 2013 — There are no external possessions, acquisitions, relationships, gains, or advantages that can provide us with more than an internal shift does.
    
    The shift from out to in is the turning point marking the time and place of our true birth. That is when life begins.
    
    When we take out and make it conscious, see it as it is, we bring it in and transform our relationship with it, which transforms it. Out is transformed when we bring it in. So is in. That is the process which makes all things new.
    
    Things mean one thing to us before we become conscious of them, and a host of other things to us as we make them conscious. Nothing is as it appears before we see it. Nothing means what we think it means before we become conscious of it.
    
    Consciousness changes the world. Both of them, visible and invisible.
    
    Living with awareness is the revolution that gives life and kills no one. Except, of course, those who die to what they once thought was important.
17. Belted Kingfisher 01 — Bog Garden, Greensboro, NC, June 13, 2013 — Our life will teach us everything we are capable of knowing—show us everything we are capable of seeing.
    
    Our life—the life we are living, the life we fell into—is an inkblot. We see “out there” things that need to be seen and made conscious within. We have to understand the “out there” as a mirror of sorts, showing us the “in here” if we take the time to see what we are looking at.
    
    If our life, the life we are living. the one were born into, the one we fell into, doesn’t wake us up, we cannot be awakened!
    
    We have to wake ourselves up. No one can do that for us. If we don’t do it, it will not be done—and we think we are wide awake just as we are.
    
    When we wake up, we wake up to the disparity between the life we are living and the life we are capable of living, that is our life to live.
    
    When we wake up, we wake up to the difference between our life as it is and our life as it should be.
    
    The life that is ours to live, that we are built to live, that only we can live, is the life we would live if we were awake.
    
    How awake can we be in the time left for living? We owe it to ourselves to find out!
18. Magnolia 2013 01 — Greensboro, NC, June 2013 — When you fall in love with someone, that person is a carrier of you, bringing you to you. You are falling in love with yourself. Wake up to that!
    
    Bring forth in yourself the qualities and characteristics and values and way with life that you find attractive about the other person. He/she is you in this regard. Become him/her.
    
    If you want to spend the rest of your life with him/her, that’s fine as long as you become what you attracts you and as long as he/she helps you with your life—the life that is your life to live—by helping you find your center and be who you are.
    
    If he/she tries to make you some kind of stupid love slave, forget it. You should wear a tee shirt: I Am Not Your Love Slave!
19. Dugger’s Creek Falls — Blue Ridge Parkway at Linville Falls, NC, June 11, 2013 — We reside in a culture that neither nourishes our body or our soul. We have to take those matters into our own hands.
    
    We are responsible for the care and tending of ourselves. We cannot fall in with the crowd and go where they take us, where they tell us to go, and find what we need.
    
    Who directs your life? To whom do you look for direction? With whom do you check before you do anything? How much do you do that doesn’t have someone else’s stamp of approval? Who is in charge of your life?
    
    The right of the people to self-determination shall not be infringed! The right to self-direction is the birthright of every human being! And we sell our birthright for a bowl of porridge—or, in today’s terms, a trip to the mall.
    
    We treat ourselves and our life lightly, frivolously, flippantly, without consideration—certainly without the consideration we deserve and require. We think we can go just anywhere, do just anything—that it doesn’t matter how we live.
    
    Make no waves, rock no boats, tip-toe on eggshells, go along to get along, whatever THEY say is fine with us…
    
    Our allegiance is to ourselves. We are here to nourish our body and our soul. It matters how we live.
20. Olena Puckett Cabin 03 — Blue Ridge Parkway near Meadows of Dan, VA, June 10, 2013 — We have the idea that the invisible world is ours to ransack and plunder to our benefit, advantage and everlasting satisfaction.
    
    We read our horoscopes to get a leg up on the day. Tea leaves, chicken bones and the stars, when interpreted correctly, will lead us to victory in war and love—and provide us with an abundance of wealth and happiness.
    
    Well…
    
    Go and learn what this means: “Thy will, not mine, be done.”
    
    The invisible world is not here for our profit and gain or our comfort and convenience. It does not serve us. We serve it.
    
    When we place ourselves in the service of the invisible world and get out of the way, strange and wonderful things happen through us and around us—which we cannot begin to predict, anticipate, explain or control.
    
    They are just there—to amaze and confound us, and to keep us wondering and alert to what may happen next.
    
    It is LIFE unfolding, emerging, coming forth, dancing before us, laughing.
    
    Our left hemisphere is dizzy and can’t keep up. Our right hemisphere is wiping away the tears, thinking, “At last! At last!”
21. Early Light — Blue Ridge Parkway near Boone, NC, June 11, 2013 — You get things in place and wait for the owl to fly. For the ducks to take off. For the door to open.
    
    There is a lot of waiting. Nothing seems to be happening. Nothing is moving. Wait. Watch.
    
    Things don’t happen in a timely fashion, according to our schedule and convenience. Want a homegrown (which is quite different from “vine ripe”) tomato? You have to wait for it. “Vine Ripe” tomatoes came in vogue because people don’t want to wait.
    
    Things don’t line up all neat and orderly with sequential steps to the goal. They unfold in strange ways, a little at a time, on all sides, at once, just doing what’s next until the thing is done, like a rose bush blooming or a homegrown tomato ripening.
    
    You can’t plant a row of tomato plants and know which one is going to have the first ripe tomato, or when. You have to get things in place and wait.
    
    Things happen in their own time, in their own way, and surprise us with their suddenness and their perfection. The owl flies and we forget what we are doing. The ducks rise and we forget where the shutter button is. We were waiting but we weren’t ready. We were thinking it would be some other way, different somehow. We were ready for that, for the way we thought it would be in our mind.
    
    Don’t think it will be a particular way at a particular time. Wait. Watch. Be ready. To walk through the door when it opens.
22. Summer Days Panorama 02 — Blue Ridge Parkway near Blowing Rock, NC, June 11, 2013 — My whole point can be summed up with: “See what is good and do it.” When you see what you are looking at, you see the good and do it.
    
    To see the good is to do it. It’s the height of dysfunction to know what is good and not do it. I don’t know anybody who is that out of line.
    
    All the dysfunctions I know of are an aberration of the good—they call what is not good, good. They serve a good that is not good.
    
    Hitler, for example, was wrong about what was good. It wasn’t that he saw what was good and was intentionally evil. He did not see.
    
    If you want to change the world, just see the world as it is. Seeing what you look at transforms everything. Seeing is the revolution.
    
    If you want to change the world, show it itself. Mirror the world to the world. But know that it will kill you to avoid seeing. Just saying…
23. Goshen Creek Cascade 02 — Blue Ridge Parkway near Boone, NC, June 11, 2013 — When we wake up we see reality. We see the way things are, which includes seeing the way things also are. We integrate the opposites—we do not dismiss, discount, ignore one polarity in favor if the opposite one.
    
    We see polarities—the way things are and the way things also are—and create within our bodies a synthesis that takes everything into account. This is the work of consciousness, of awareness, of seeing, of being awake.
    
    When we can see things as they are without having to have things be different than they are, we are seeing things as they are.
    
    The natural world helps us in the work to see things as they are by being just what it is.
    
    If you spend time with the natural world—enough time to see it as it is, beyond your desires for it—it will open you to yourself.
    
    When we see, we see things as they are, we see ourselves as we are, we see what is happening and what needs to be done about it.
    
    The moment carries us deeper into our life, into ourselves. We birth ourselves by responding to the moment’s need of what we have to offer. Seeing is the way of life—the way to life—the way of being alive in the life we are living.
24. Summer Days 04 — Blue Ridge Parkway near Boone, NC, June 11, 2013 — Our life is like a dream which wakes us up to the life we are called to live—if we look at it with eyes that see. We read our life—interpret our life, what is happening in our life, what we are doing about it—as though it were a dream, that it may show us what there is to see.
    
    We don’t have to do anything more than see what we are doing.
    
    Seeing what we are doing transforms what is done, and aligns us with the soul’s way of doing.
    
    All roads lead to the center, and we can start that journey anywhere, at any time, simply by being conscious of where we are and what we are doing.
    
    Practice being conscious by looking at something—anything—until you see it. Look at it from all sides. What associations come to mind?
    
    The object or image becomes your guide to awareness, to consciousness, to seeing into you as you look at the object or image.
    
    When we see anything for what it is, we see ourselves. Everything mirrors us to us when we have eyes to see.
    
    When we see ourselves, we adjust ourselves, we shift ourselves, we align ourselves with the soul’s way of being/doing.
25. Magnolia 02 — Greensboro, NC, June 2013 — How much time do we spend not being where we are?
    
    How much time do we spend being where we are?
    
    What is it about where we are that makes it necessary, and easy, to not be there?
    
    What is it about where we are that makes it necessary, and easy, to be there?
    
    What can we do to reduce the time spent in the places where we are not being where we are, and increase the amount of time spent in the places where we are being where we are?
26. The Bog Garden is at the corner of Hobbs Road and Starmount Drive — across Hobbs Road to the east from the Bicentennial Garden. Hobbs road is the western boundary of the Shops At Friendly. Proceeding west on Friendly Ave., you would pass the Shops at Friendly and turn right (north) onto Hobbs Road. Go straight through the traffic signal at the intersection of Hobbs and Northline Ave. and turn right at the next street which would be Starmount Drive. It’s about a 12 acre natural habitat park and about 6 acres of it is Benjamin Lake. A great place to hang out with a camera!

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03/22/2013 — 05/13/2013

1. Well. Here we are. What can we do with it? Sometimes, it takes waiting to see.
   
   I travel to a distant location to photograph a particular scene, but the light isn’t there when I arrive. Maybe it’s raining. Maybe it’s overcast. Maybe it’s snowing. You get the idea. Now what?
   
   In my photography and in all of our lives, we find ourselves asking more often than now, “Now what?”
   
   It is important that we ask it looking—and waiting—for the answer.
   
   We are a balled-up burst of creative vision hoping we will get out of the way, with our expectations and disappointments and insistent demands that things go like we want them to NOW, and our pouts our dismay—so that we might actually allow our creative vision to show us what it sees and come forth. In other words, we have to shut up and wait to see.
   
   It takes letting go of what we had in mind and allowing our creative self show us what we can do with what is before us. Our creative self is waiting as much on us to listen as we are waiting on it to speak.
   
   We only have to take the “Okay, it’s here, I only have to find it” attitude to see the treasure in the situation, the gold in the bog full of swamp gas and slime. But. We have to wait to see. We cannot hurry the time of realization. We wait. Looking. Wondering. Standing aside so the light can shine through.
   
   We look at our life and think, “No creative genius can do anything with this!” And believe it is so. Give your creative genius a chance. And don’t rule out any nudges. What we want often stands in the way of what we can have—really, of what is right for us, if we only had eyes to see, looking, as we do with eyes for what we wish we could have.
2. Carolina, Of Course, Wren — Bog Garden, Greensboro, NC, March 1, 2013 — What are you waiting for? The question is not a push to get you going. The question is see if you know what you are waiting for.
   
   As a photographer, I wait on 10,000 things: The light, the wind, the clouds, the sky, the reflection, the tourists to get out of the way… I wait for the time to be right.
   
   I wait for the right time to act. In the meantime, I have a sense of the action I need to take and a sense of what needs to happen first, when things start happening.
   
   In your life, what are you waiting for? What has to open up, fall into place, for you to act? What action will the right action when it is time to act? What do you need to do to be ready when the time for action comes?
3. Goose in Flight 07 — Bog Garden, Greensboro, NC, March 1, 2013 — Second-hand experience is killing the soul of us all. We do not live our life. We live someone else’s life. All those Paparazzi magazines on the racks at the grocery store are purchased by people who find other people’s lives more interesting than their own—who have to read about someone else’s life because they don’t have one worth reading about—worth talking about—worth thinking about. We live to escape the life we are living.
   
   Because we have never lived our own life. From the beginning we have been living the life we were told to live, or the life we felt like we had to live because we had no choice. We live as good, company, men and women—and the culture is the company. We live lives that are good for the economy. We buy what they tell us to buy (that would be the ad agencies).
   
   When George Bush told us to “Go shopping,” he spoke as voice of the culture. He didn’t say, “Pray.” He didn’t say, “Think of how you can change the way you are living to embrace the values that will stand the heat of any fire because in your heart you know they are right for you, and true, and good.” He said, “Go shopping.”
   
   ”Serve the economy!” “Serve the beast that got us to the point of not knowing where we are, or who we are, or what our business truly is.” “Just do what you are told. Live lives that are good for the economy, and let someone else worry about the rest of it.”
   
   We live second-hand lives and wonder what is wrong. We think our way through the day, and can explain, defend, justify and excuse everything we do. We can answer for our deeds like good company men and women. We haven’t done what we felt like doing, what felt right, what felt like the thing to do in the situation as it arose in forever.
   
   We watch Reality TV trying to feel something if only disgust and revulsion. What are we disgusted with? What revolts us? What is killing our soul?
   
   Look in your refrigerator and your pantry and where you keep your snack food (Comfort food we call it). Look in your liquor cabinet, in your drug drawer (Call it your medicine drawer if you want to) and ask yourself, “What is this stuff doing in my life?” And wonder what your life would be without it. And live to find out what your life would be if you lived it.
4. Barred Owl in Flight 01 — Bog Garden, Greensboro, NC, March 2, 2013 — Alcoholics Anonymous emphasizes the importance of “working the program.” You don’t have to be an alcoholic to have to work the program. We all have to do that.
   
   You have to work the program—work YOUR program—the one you have to work to be aligned and in tune with the core, the heart, the center of who you are, and express it, exhibit it, in the way you live your life.
   
   The particular elements in the program are unique to each person. Maybe playing the drums does it for you, or making biscuits, or fast dancing. What grounds you, centers you, brings you into focus, restores your soul? Make it part of your program. Do it regularly.
   
   My program includes the Bog Garden, photography, writing, sitting quietly, walking, woolgathering, cooking and reading.
   
   When Alan Watts asked Joseph Campbell, “Joe, what form does your yoga take?” Campbell replied, “I underline passages.”
   
   We find our own way to the way, and we have to be conscious of it and devoted to it—and we have to practice it regularly. You cannot underline passages once every two months and call that your practice.
   
   You have to work the program. The program is your practice. It connects you with the heart of who you are and enables you to express that in your life. Find what constitutes your practice and practice it. Daily.
5. The Hooded Merganser Gang — Bog Garden, Greensboro, NC, March 2, 2013 — How are you going to live your life in the time left for living? What is going to guide you?
   
   Forget what you want. What you want is just another barrier between you and the life that is yours to live. What you want is just another Cyclops standing in your way, coming between you and what is right for you.
   
   What you want is a creation, a fabrication, of the culture in service to the economy. Madison Avenue can make you want the damnedest things, all of which are good for the economy, very few of which have anything to do with the life that is yours to live.
   
   What does wanting know? You wanted your first marriage, remember? And your second.
   
   What is right for you is the question. How do you know?
   
   Here’s a hint for you: You will never know what is right for you by thinking about it.
   
   How are you going to live your life in the time left for living? What is going to guide you?
6. Owl with Dinner — Bog Garden, Greensboro, NC, March 3, 2013 — It doesn’t take much to rob me of my peace, and it doesn’t take much to restore it again. A walk around the block, a visit to the Bog Garden…
   
   The center is always there. The ground is underfoot. It only takes remembering. But it takes remembering.
7. Owl Dinning — Bog Garden, Greensboro, NC, March 3, 2013 — It’s living on a piece of roofing tin with someone shaking it like a rug. Life. There is no steady state. It’s a heaving roll.
   
   It’s just ridiculous. We need someone who knows what to say saying what we need to hear from the first. The very first, I mean.
   
   We need someone who knows what would be truly helpful offering help to us all along the way.
   
   What we get are people who are as dazed and shell-shocked as we are saying things and helping in ways that make things that have no impact or make things worse.
   
   By the time we figure out what’s what and try to tell someone how it is and what to expect, we are too old to be taken seriously, and they roll their eyes like the deck of the ship we’re all on.
   
   Here’s the plan: Leave it alone. Don’t try to smooth it out. Don’t change a thing. Enjoy the ride. It’s a doozy.
8. Missed It! — Bog Garden, Greensboro, NC, March 3, 2013 — You do your thing, and don’t let what happens stop you.
9. Owl Thinking About Dessert — Bog Garden, Greensboro, NC, March 3, 2013 — The owl leaves his roost generally between 4:15 and 5:15 each afternoon, sometimes later. He doesn’t have a watch. How does he know when to go? He feels it.
   
   The entire natural world feels its way through each day, each year. Instinct and intuition, kid. Instinct and intuition.
   
   Instinct and intuition flow as freely through our veins as through the owl’s or the pussycat’s, but we have lost the connection. The right time is when we want it to happen, not when it is time for it to happen. And if some things are so wrong for us that it will never be the right time, we don’t want to hear of it.
   
   Our fingers are in our ears. “Nah nah na NAH nah!”
   
   With us one time is as good as another. Ain’t so in the natural world. In the natural world there is the right time and the wrong time. If it isn’t right, it’s wrong. The natural world waits for the time to be right.
   
   The owl knows when to go, and doesn’t go one minute early or late. He carries an internal clock with him wherever he goes (And I’m confident it is a he we are talking here—female Barred Owls are larger than males, and this guy is big in his own way, but not the largest I’ve seen), and doesn’t need to wonder what time it is. He knows: If it isn’t the right time, it’s the wrong time.
   
   That’s the kind of time we need to be able to tell.
10. Duck Work — Bog Garden, Greensboro, NC, March 1, 2013 — We have to design and work our own program for being aligned with the ground and core of our being, with that which is deepest, best, and truest about us.
    
    That doesn’t just happen. We have to work the program daily. We have to live in alliance with our own heart and soul, and let everything else fall into place around that.
    
    We have to know what is important and be right about it—and live in ways which honor than, and exhibit it.
    
    ”Who’s your Daddy?” “Who’s your Momma?” Who or what is the chief aim, the number one priority, of your life?
    
    We have to know who or what that is and design and work a program to remind us their, of its, place in our life and to align ourselves with it. We have to make ourselves conscious of the invisible world, submit to its service, align ourselves with it.
    
    Here’s an exercise I recommend becoming a part of your practice: When you are in a situation where you don’t know what to do—either because you really don’t know what to do, or because you are damned if you do and damned if you don’t and can’t decide—get out of the way and listen.
    
    Stop trying to think of what to do and listen for what needs to be done. Listen for instructions. Listen for direction. Wait, listening, to know what is being asked of you.
    
    We do not live our life thinking what to do and doing it. We live our life in the service of what needs us to do it, of what needs to be done—and we don’t think what that is. We feel it.
    
    We feel our way into what is right for us, into what is right for us to do here and now, in each situation as it arises.
    
    We live awaiting instruction, direction, guidance—which comes to us as revelation, as an urge to act in this way or that because the time is right for it and our action is required. For what or why, we do not have to know.
11. Barred Owl in Flight 04 — Bog Garden, Greensboro, NC, March 3, 2013 — Planetary systems organized themselves by crashing into one another over a long period of time. It was a real mess in the early days.
    
    The idea of a Grand Design with everything humming smoothly along, a place for everything and everything in its place, is quite out of place.
    
    Reality is anything but organized and smoothly flowing. The Grand Design is simply one way of looking at chaos. Keep looking and you see chaos.
    
    Life is wild, uncivilized, reckless. There are no self-imposed limits to life. Life gets by with what it can get by with.
    
    Consciousness comes along and limits unconsciousness, invents rules, lays down the law, restricts the natural, the untamed, flow, imposes regulations, invents civilization, makes life liveable. But the conscious, rational, logical world isn’t the only world, and must honor the other world.
    
    Consciousness must consult, collaborate, confer, cooperate with unconsciousness. Negotiation and compromise, kid, negotiation and compromise.
    
    The visible world is built upon and is an extension of the invisible world. Consciousness makes the world visible. There is much yet unseen! There is more that we don’t know than we do know!
    
    Consciousness works with unconsciousness to bring forth the unseen, unknown, and to make visible what is invisible. Physical reality is invisible until consciousness sees itself seeing and knows that it knows and names what is known.
    
    Unconscious reality is as real as conscious, physical, reality. It’s invisible because it is not conscious, but it exists.
    
    Our place is to treat it as though it is real, because it is, and assist its coming to life in us and through us. As a by-product, we come to life as we bring the invisible (unconscious) world to life. It’s the only path to having life and having it abundantly.
12. Carolina Of Course Wren 01 — Bog Garden, Greensboro, NC, March 1, 2013 — We will do anything to live as long as we can. To do what? Watch more TV? What are we living FOR? What will we DO with a long life?
    
    The people who worry about dying are the people who haven’t lived. Jesus said, “Get in their and do your thing. Everything else will fall into place around that.” Or, words to that effect.
    
    We are alive to the extent that we are living in light of the needs and interest of the invisible world, making conscious what is invisible/unconscious, and trusting ourselves to what we do not know.
    
    We live prophylacticly, being careful, staying safe, thinking everything through and having a good reason for everything we do. A sure recipe for being dead long before we die.
    
    In being alive, we feel our way from one thing to the next, not knowing what we are doing, unable to make sense of anything, having no idea of what lies ahead or what we will do about it when we come upon it, but trusting, trusting, trusting ourselves to the process of divining our life, of dowsing our way to the treasure, which is nothing short of our own heart and soul—who we are, brought forth for all to see and be graced by in the time left for living.
    
    Hallelujah! May it be so!
13. Mallard in Flight 16 — Bog Garden, Greensboro, NC, January 29, 2013 — Jesus said, “Get in there and do your thing and don’t worry about those who are with you or about those who are against you!” Or, words to that effect.
    
    Jesus said, “Get in there and do your thing and take your lumps and don’t let anything stop you.” Or, words to that effect.
    
    Jesus said, “Get in there and do your thing and don’t worry about the outcome!” Or, words to that effect.
    
    Jesus said, “Get in there and do your thing and don’t hide your light under a basket!” Or, words to that effect.
    
    Jesus said, “You have everything you need to find what you need to do what needs to be done. Now, go do it!” Or, words to that effect.
    
    Jesus said, “Look. It’s like this. They can kill you but they can’t touch you, if you know what I mean. Now, what’s the problem?” Or, words to that effect.
    
    Jesus said, “Find the self within worth being true to and be true to that self—to your own sense of what is right for you (not what is right for someone else) regardless of what you want or what the culture expects of you!” Or, words to that effect.”
    
    That Jesus knew what he was talking about!
14. The Shape of Time 11 — Antelope Canyon, Page, AZ, May 2010 — All we want is a world in which everyone is free to do his or her own thing without interfering with someone else doing his or her own thing. That’s simple enough. How are we going to work it out?
    
    When things conflict, what? When my good is your bad, what? Or your good, my bad? At what point does my thing have implications for your thing—or yours for mine? What’s to keep me from pursuing my thing at the expense of your thing, or vice versa? Who is going to enforce the Rule of Things? What penalties will they be allowed to enforce?
    
    Who is going to decide when an individual thing is a threat to the things of the whole? Is it right for people who do not smoke marijuana to tell people who do smoke marijuana that they can’t do that thing?
    
    How can we limit people to doing what is right for them without telling other people what is right for them—or forcing the second set of people to do what the first set of people think is right for them?
    
    If people would only do what is right for them without messing with the right of other people to do what is right for them, what a great world it would be.
    
    We could call it Fantasy Land.
    
    In this world, we are stuck with working out the conflicts among us regarding what is to be done and not done. In this world, we live in two worlds at the same time. The world in which we are free to do what is right for us and the world in which we are not free to do what is right for us.
    
    In my growing up years, I was free to do what was right for me in the woods, and on the lakes, and in the fields of the natural world. I was not free to do what was right for me in the world of my adult supervisors. There was my world and there was their world, and I escaped to my world at every opportunity.
    
    Time in my world enabled me to survive time in their world. Things haven’t changed over time. I’m still escaping in order to recover, readjust, and step back into the other world and do what needs to be done there to enable my retreat to my world. Being retired helps a lot.
15. There are four things you can do to improve your photography dramatically and instantaneously. 1) Use a camera that suits your purposes. Do not try to make it do what it cannot do. If you are happy with your camera phone, read no further and enjoy taking pictures.
    
    2) If you are not happy with camera phone photos, buy a camera that allows you to control focus, exposure, aperture, shutter speed, and ISO. If your current camera will “get out of the way” and allow you to do that, you probably have all you need in a camera.
    
    3) Read the camera manual and learn how to get it to do what you need it to do in each situation as it arises.
    
    4) Do not show up in a scene at a time that is convenient for you and expect the photographs to be there waiting on you. The first law of photography states: The moment does not last and rarely returns. You have to be where the photos are likely to be at a time that is not convenient for you, at a time that is too early or too late for your satisfaction, and you have to wait on the photograph—on the light, on the time to be right.
    
    If you get these four items down, everything else will fall into place and your skill will improve beyond all hope and expectation. You can tell them I said so.
16. Lake Millinocket — Millinocket, ME, October 2012 — Don’t change anything. Don’t force anything. Don’t make anything happen before its time. Wait for the shift. And walk through the open door.
    
    They should tell us these things while we are still in the womb.
17. South Pond 01 — Baxter State Park, Patten, ME, September 24, 2012 — It’s all practice. We are figuring things out here. All those people who are chiding us for being slow? They have slow places in their lives, things they haven’t figured out. They ridicule us so they don’t have to think about themselves.
    
    The owl flies at me and I forget what I’m doing. So I go back, hoping the owl will fly at me again. I have thought about throwing the camera in the pond and taking a blanket and my thumb to some warm corner and waiting it out, but so far, sanity has prevailed.
    
    I’m teaching myself to take photos of the owl. Coming at me.
    
    We are teaching ourselves to live our life—as it needs to be lived, not with our thumb and a blanket (or any of the addictive equivalents) in a corner.
    
    When you think you will never get it, get back out there and hope to find an owl. Coming at you.
18. Reedy Fork Sunset H Panorama 02 — Lake Brandt Greenway, Bur-Mil Park Access, Greensboro, NC, January 24, 2013 — The longer we look at something, the more likely we are to see it in different ways. Sit with something long enough and it becomes more than you ever imagined it could be.
    
    I’m thinking here of you. Look at you long enough and you will change your mind about you. Several times. “Will the real you please stand up?” They all rise. They all are really you.
    
    But the same thing applies to everyone. Your parents, your siblings, your friends, your enemies… The whole circus.
    
    The longer you look, the more you see. The more there is to take into account. The more there is to consider when weighing judgment and issuing edicts.
    
    The old rhyme applies: “There is so much good in the worst of us and so much bad in the best of us, it doesn’t behoove any of us to talk about the rest of us.”
    
    It’s another way of saying, “Give folks—including yourself—the benefit of the doubt and see where it goes.”
19. Barred Owl in Flight 07 — Bog Garden, Greensboro, NC, March 8, 2013 — We want it to all fall into place so we can quit worrying about it, and quit working with it, and quit trying to make it out, and just enjoy it before we die. We think we can’t enjoy it until we get everything taken care of and in its place.
    
    Here’s Jim’s Tip of the Day: ENJOY WHAT CAN BE ENJOYED ABOUT IT JUST AS IT IS!
    
    Start with your morning coffee, or whatever its equivalent is in your life. Spend some time enjoying your coffee.
    
    Next time you’re in the grocery store? Stroll through the fruit section. Something is in season that you enjoy. Buy it. Enjoy it.
    
    You have things you enjoy doing that you haven’t done since you-can’t-remember-when. Well?
    
    Unleash your joy dog! Let it run all over the place, sniffing, licking, rolling in the grass…
    
    What do you gain by being all stiff and withheld? If you are waiting on all of it to be just right before you like any of it, you should buy a soft chair and take a seat. May be a while.
20. Trout Lily 01 — Bog Garden, Greensboro, NC, March 9, 2013 — How are we going to live our life in the time left for living? How is your life calling you to live it? How is your life calling you?
    
    One way our life calls us is through what we enjoy doing, through what we love to do. We answer the call by giving ourselves to it and seeing where it goes, being led along by what “tickles our fancy” and pulls us along.
    
    Another way our life calls us is through the people we fall in love with. Our falling in love with someone has absolutely nothing to do with the person we fall in love with and everything to do with the person our life needs us to become.
    
    Think of the people you have fallen in love with. Let one stand out from the rest: “Your heart’s true love,” we’ll call him, her. What are the qualities you love about him, her? The characteristics you find to be overwhelmingly wonderful? Make a complete list.
    
    What would the person bring to life in his, her, relationship with you? What would you do, who would you be, with the person that you would not be on your own? Make a complete list.
    
    You have two lists now before you. Begin the long, slow, painstaking work of incorporating each item on the list into your life, into the way you live, becoming who you imagine the other person to be. Becoming what you love in the other person. Becoming what you find so attractive in the other person, whom you would do anything for, make any sacrifice in order to be with for the rest of your life.
    
    Do it now. Do anything. Make any sacrifice. In becoming who you imagine that person to be.
21. Barred Owl in Flight 06 — Bog Garden, Greensboro, NC, March 8, 2013 —  Nothing beats listening/hearing and looking/seeing for finding the path with our name on it.
    
    We waste a lot of time on paths that do not have our name on them. Those who make it to the path with their name on it learn to listen/hear, look/see along the way.
    
    I don’t know why some figure it out and all don’t. I call it the Luck Factor.
    
    ”There’s no such thing as luck.” I hear it all the time. “It’s God’s Providence and Grace that gets us through!” they say. When I say, “Aren’t we lucky that God is so providential and gracious?” there is a pause, and then, “Luck has nothing to do with it!” End of conversation.
    
    Well. At least four golfers and a business wizard are credited with saying, “The more I practice (Or, the harder I work), the luckier I get.” Just showing up has a lot to do with it. If you show up enough with a camera, you’ll get your photos.
    
    If you keep picking yourself up, saying, “I know I can do better than this!” You’ll be more apt to find the path with your name on it than if you just lie there, marinating in your misery.
    
    So, maybe luck has nothing to do with it. Maybe it’s the Tenacity Factor, or the Perseverance Factor, or the Determination Factor. Whatever it is, some have it and some don’t. And I don’t know of any way to give whatever it is to those who don’t have it. I don’t even know what it is.
    
    But, I do know that listening/hearing and looking/seeing are basic requirements for finding our path and walking it. If you are going to practice anything practice those things.
22. Trout Lily 08 — Bog Garden, Greensboro, NC, March 10, 2013 — Our interests will guide us along the way. Our interests ARE the way. We cannot become who we are—and who we have yet to be—without being interested in what interests us—without loving what we love, enjoying what we enjoy, and doing what is ours to do.
    
    What is ours to do is not some odious (I have to start using that word more. What a great word. I never work it into a conversation. How odious of me!) task that is imposed on us from the outside, as a punishment for past wrongs or a requirement for residence in the eternal habitations.
    
    What is ours to do is ours to do because we are built to do it—because we are incomplete and much less than whole until we do it. And when we do it, we do it with all our heart, not begrudgingly, looking at our watch, wondering how much longer, and why do we have to do this old thing.
    
    The saddest people I know are the people who have no interests—who have been separated from their interests for so long that their interests have dried up and disappeared—who have not allowed themselves ever to follow their interests or enjoy anything about their lives because they are always being graded and don’t want to appear to be having fun because that would be a mark against them for sure and they can’t risk any more marks against them because all the ones they have already accumulated are surely going to carry them straight to hell unless they manage to be miserable enough in the time left for living to pay off some of their debt and maybe get to live on the fringes of heaven in the afterlife. Or something like that.
    
    So. Find an interest and follow it. It will lead you straight to the Promised Land, I promise. Of course, it may lead you to other interests along the way that is the way for you to the Promised Land. Just keep following your interests. It will be so delightful you may forget all about the Promised Land, and then realize you’ve been living in the heart of the Promised Land all this time, and laugh at the whole idea of the Promised Land being somewhere far off when it is right here with us all our life long just waiting for us to open our eyes and see where we are and what is ours to do and enjoy.
23. Don’t “Yo Mama” My Mama! — Bog Garden, Greensboro, NC, March 10, 2013 — You are up to you. You are in your own hands. You make the calls that lead to life or death. If you fail to be alive in the time left for living, look no further than in the mirror.
    
    We know what is right for us and what is wrong—we only have to take the time and go to the trouble of knowing what we know. Too often, we prefer not to know.
    
    Knowing asks too much of us. When we know too much, it puts us crossways with Those Who Know Best And Must Be Pleased. Then comes the showdown and we lose either way. Better to sacrifice ourselves again than to risk the displeasure of the scornful others who wield power over us and hold the reins.
    
    This line of thinking sells ourselves short and, never knowing what we know, we fail to experience—to know—the power that resides within, that is the source of all creative imagination, courage, determination, vision, purpose, meaning, and life.
    
    Allowing the Scornful Others “take care of us,” we never know the power that is ours to take care of ourselves when we live in the service of what is right for us, never mind the outcome.
    
    So, here’s your homework: Know when you are overriding what is right for you in favor of what serves the status quo, maintains the peace, does not rock the boat, and keeps things exactly as they are forever and appeases the Scornful Ones. Know at least that much of what you know. And see where it goes.
24. Avalanche Lake — Glacier National Park, Apgar, MT — We help each other along the way, in two ways in particular. We provide encouragement and caring presence. That’s one way. We serve as a sounding board. That’s the other way.
    
    People hear what they are saying when they say it to us. Our role is to keep them talking.
    
    Notice how often in a conversation you start talking about yourself, your experience with a recent illness, or loss. And you don’t make three statements before the other person takes the focus away from you and your experience and starts talking about themselves and their experience. This is not being a sounding board. It is also not providing caring presence, and is not encouraging.
    
    Listening to what is being said, and past what is being said to the feelings that are being expressed through what is said, and receiving both well, in ways that communicate having heard what has been said on the face value level and on the feelings-beneath=the-surface level is perfect sounding board behavior.
    
    It isn’t easy. But it’s important. Important enough to be aware of its importance. To practice it. To be good at it.
    
    Listening saves the world one person at a time. Nothing is more grounding, centering, focusing, and integrating than being heard. Being heard all the way to the heart of who you are is transformative—and essential to our waking up.
25. Trout Lilies 09 — Bog Garden, Greensboro, NC, March 12, 2013 — Eyes that see. Ears that hear. A heart that understands. If you are going to wonk on anything work on these things.
    
    The way to work on them is looking until you see, listening until you hear, and asking until you understand. And do not assume you see, hear, or understand until you do.
    
    Carl Jung said that belief for him was a strange concept—either you know something or you don’t know something, and if you don’t know a thing, then you don’t know it.
    
    Religion these days is based on believing what someone else says is so, without going to the trouble of knowing ourselves if it is so. We take someone else’s word for it and go on with our life.
    
    Eyes that see, ears that hear and a heart that understands are the heart of religion which is grounded on direct experience with the invisible world. No doctrine can take us there. No theology can substitute for our own raw encounters with More Than Meets The Eye. But, who is up for that these days?
    
    We think we have a life to live and just want the basics in our religion. We don’t understand that life hinges on what we know to be so out of our own experience. So we believe what we are told to believe and go on with our life, which is no life because it is disconnected from its heart and soul.
    
    If we want to know, we have to look, listen, inquire and get to the bottom of every little thing. We wake up that way, and come alive to the world that is waiting on us to see, hear and understand.
26. Mesquite Dunes 01 — Death Valley National Park, CA — It’s our work, aligning ourselves with the invisible world, living out the life that is right for us. This is our business. We have no business pursuing anything else. It is our highest priority.
    
    Well. You know about that. A stupid Pomegranate (My personal choice for the Forbidden Fruit. What’s yours?) distracts/untracks us—which means anything can. It doesn’t take much. Our highest priority is whatever we fancy now.
    
    But. The prize waits for us to wise up, to wake up, to take up the business that is ours from the start. It does not tarnish, evaporate, or waste away. It is always ready for us to say, “Oh, THERE you are! I’ve been looking all over for you. Let’s see what we can do with the time left for living!”
27. Mallard in Flight 34 — Bog Garden, Greensboro, NC, March 13, 2013 — There is a downside to waking up, you know. You have to bear the pain of realization. Seeing shows you stuff you had rather not know about. Awareness requires action. You cannot grow up and enjoy the numbed-out bliss of ignorance.
    
    There is something to be said for not-seeing, not-hearing, not-understanding, not-knowing. It isn’t the most wildly popular state of being ever for no reason. It pays to be tuned-out. It costs to be present with all that is present with us.
    
    Do we have what it takes, is the question. Will we trust ourselves to the presence of the inner guides? Will we fulfill our role as point person in the encounter with the full wrath and power of physical reality—countering the dismay and disenchantment that comes with eyes to see and ears to hear—with the compassion and resiliency of a heart that understands more than can be seen and heard?
    
    The physical world is great for producing the hopeless, pointless, meaningless, useless illusion that “this is all there is.” Leaving us with nowhere to turn but the numbness of escape and denial. So. We have to remember what we also know: This is not all there is.
    
    We carry the banner of the invisible world and swear allegiance to the service of more than meets the eye. It is squarely up to us to have the strength of our own convictions in the encounter with that which purports to be “the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth.”
    
    All of the temptations, tests, and contests—whether the hero is Jesus, or the Buddha, or Ulysses, or any of the champions of myth and fairy-tale—come down to what is real. Come down to what we are going to believe—our eyes and ears, or our heart.
    
    What does our heart say is right, and true and good? The facts be damned! We have a cause to serve! A life to live! We bring what else is true—what all is true—to bear upon what claims to be the whole, hopeless, truth. And see what happens. And see where it goes. This is the Hero’s Journey. It’s yours if you are up for it.
28. Trout Lily 10 — Bog Garden, Greensboro, NC, March 13, 2013 — Measure yourself by where you’ve been and where you are—by where you started and how far you’ve come—by who you have been and who you will be. And stop trying to be somebody else.
    
    Be you. To the best of your ability. Become more like you every day. Until you get it down and are perfectly, wonderfully, delightfully you in every respect.
29. What A Hoot Looks Like (Or, a “Who Cooks For Yoouuuu”) — Bog Garden, Greensboro, NC, March 14, 2013 — The facts don’t mean what we think they mean. Thinking the facts mean it’s all useless, hopeless, pointless and coming to a very bad end leads us to depression, disenchantment, despair and dismay.
    
    Who is to say what the facts mean?
    
    ”You have no education, so you can’t be smart.” Who is to say that education equals intelligence and is required for brilliance?
    
    ”You are not rich, so you must be stupid or ignorant or bad or worthless. You are definitely worthless if you are not rich.” Who is to say money is an indicator of character?
    
    ”The suffering and misery in the world proves that life is not worth living.” Who is to say life is best when it is pain free? That suffering has no place in a well-lived life?
    
    The facts have no business determining feelings. Feelings have to be free to access the situation apart from exclusive reliance upon the facts. Feelings can lead us to choices and behaviors that transform the meaning the facts have had for generations. Feelings can show the facts a thing or two. Feelings can say to facts, “Who made you the Boss of me?” and go on with what needs to be done in spite of the fact that it will never work, that it can’t be done, that it is contrary to nature and God’s eternal, unchanging, immutable will.
    
    Don’t let the facts dictate your feelings. Let your feelings transform the facts.
30. Early March Morning — Bog Garden, Greensboro, NC, March 13, 2013 — Growing up means changing our mind about what’s important. It means waking up. But not “Finally waking up.” Or “Finally realizing what’s important.”
    
    There is no “Finally” to it, to anything. There is always waking up again and changing our mind about what’s important.
    
    What’s important is called “values.” We change our values over time. Or not. To not change our values over time is to be deader than dead.
    
    When we fall in love, what we are falling for is not the other person but the values that are reflected in, by, the other person. What is important to that person shines through and grabs us, because it is important to us, but we don’t know it, and have to see it in someone else to get a sense of what needs to come forth in us, but we think it’s about the other person when it is really about us, and think if we can’t have the other person forever we will die, when it is actually if we don’t exhibit what we see in the other person we will die—we will be deader than dead—because we aren’t espousing values that are actually important.
    
    Falling in love is a wake up call, which we miss, thinking only about him or her, but we have other chances to wake up, grow up and change our mind about what’s important. Conflict is a great chance.
    
    All conflict is a conflict of values. What we think is important comes up against something else that is important, and we have to work it out. If working it out includes changing our mind, great. If it only means going to war and winning, smashing the other side’s values to smithereens (How long has it been since you heard that word? It used to be all the rage. It used to be important, say, in 1950. Somebody or something was always being “blown to smithereens.”) so that what’s important remains just what we always said was important, we drift on into being deader than dead, in the Wasteland, where there is no hope and no chance for those there who know what’s important and aren’t about to change their mind for anything.
    
    So get to the bottom of all of it. When you fall in love, get to the bottom of what draws you to the other person—of the qualities you want to live with forever (which isn’t what we think it is—nothing is—but just the next stage of life, which we will leave when we change our mind again about what’s important, or not leave at all when we lock ourselves into what is important and never change our mind, living out what remains of our life deader than dead) and live to exhibit them in your own life.
    
    And when you have conflict, find the values that are at odds and work to integrate them, reconcile them, so that what is important meshes with what is also important and transforms perspectives on all sides of whatever the issue is before us, by waking us up, growing us up and changing our mind about what’s important. Again.
31. Trout Lily 08 — Bog Garden, Greensboro, NC, March 12, 2013 — I had to leave the Deep South to have a chance. In the Deep South I would have always been who I was.
    
    In the Deep South, I’m still Jimmy. I still like homemade vanilla ice cream, and peanut butter and jelly sandwiches, and hunting and fishing. In the Deep South I will always be who I was.
    
    In the Deep South the norms are firmly in place and no threat to contentment is tolerated. How it’s supposed to be is how it’s always been. No change allowed.
    
    Life is movement. Life is in flux. In transition. Unfolding. Emerging. Becoming. Who knows what?
    
    And “There is nothing but the dead and dying/Back in my little town.”
    
    So we escape or succumb. You can’t live with a foot in some worlds. You “move far away and visit seldom” to have a chance. And don’t try to explain it, justify it, excuse it, defend it, make sense of it, or make anyone happy with it. You couldn’t anyway.
    
    Who could say what all needs to be said to those who would be saying it themselves if they could hear it, and who don’t have the foggiest notion as to what you are talking about? You have to know what I mean in order to understand what I’m saying. If you know what I mean.
32. See The Owl? 03 — Bog Garden, Greensboro, NC, March 14, 2013 — The Owl comes at me and I forget what I’m doing. You have to do something, and do something, and do something, in order to be able to do it.
    
    It’s called practice. It’s where playing the piano comes from. Or doing anything worth doing.
    
    You can’t write without writing. A lot.
    
    You can’t play first base without playing first base. A lot.
    
    We want to—think we ought to—be good at things we never practice. “Oh, I can’t talk in front of people!” Or we play golf a couple of times a month and are disgusted with our game.
    
    I’m practicing with the camera, and having a wonderful time. I’m really playing with the camera. Playing the piano starts with playing with the piano. Playing first base starts the same way. Hopefully, with nobody yelling at you because you can’t do it yet.
33. The Real Decoy 01 — Bog Garden, Greensboro, NC, March 16, 2013 — You have only one question to answer: How are you going to live what remains of your life?
    
    What are you going to do with the time, in the time, left for living? How are you going to live your life? How aligned can you be with the life that is yours to live? How much of that life can you bring forth in the life you are living—within the context and circumstances of your life as it currently is?
    
    How much can you learn/know of the inner world and your place in it—your relationship with it—in the time left for living?
    
    Do not think time is short so you must hurry. Hurrying, rushing, running around trying to find your life and live what you can of it is exactly the wrong thing to do. The time to take your time is when time is short. Because you don’t have any time to waste, and must be careful with what you do with the time you have.
    
    The most important thing to do in answering the questions above is nothing. Be quiet. Be still. Get out of the way. Look. Listen. Be fully present with what is present with you.
    
    The answers you seek are all plain before you. All you need are eyes that see, ears that hear, and a heart that understands. You know all you need to know. You only have to know what you know. And you know that, too.
    
    So, what do you need me for? To tell you to sit down, shut up, get out of the way, and pay attention.
    
    The life that is yours to live is dying for you to live it. Literally. It is not playing with you. Hiding from you. It’s right there in your heart’s true joy. In your heart’s true love.
    
    It’s time you got together with your heart. What a team you will make!
34. Mallard in Flight 35 — Bog Garden, Greensboro, NC, March 17, 2013 — One aspect of our practice is remembering who we are and what we are about—remembering to live aligned with the intents and purposes of the invisible world.
    
    This does not come naturally with us. While lions and humming birds have to be who they are, we can put on airs and have aspirations. We can build great walls between ourselves and who we are. We never once have to be who we are. So, we have to remember to be.
    
    A remembering place, or ritual, or both, would help. Every time we stop what we are doing for a cup of coffee, we could remember to ask, “Okay, who am I? What am I about?” And sit with the questions and the cup of coffee.
    
    We recall ourselves to the task that way, regain our perspective and our focus, our center and our ground. And step back into the day.
    
    The day has its ways of stripping us of our intentions and our resolve. So, we have to remember them and get back on track.
    
    It’s hard work being who we are. All a lion has to do is wake up and he, or she, is who he, or she, is. Of course, that’s really all we have to do, too. It’s just that waking up on that level isn’t as easy as waking up on the lion’s level.
35. Two Down — Bog Garden, Greensboro, NC, March 17, 2013 — Ducks, geese, owls—all living things in the natural world—act in the moment in light of what needs to happen in the moment. They don’t make lists, maintain schedules, consult calendars and clocks, have motives and agendas.
    
    They all have their own business and are about it, and it is constantly being disrupted by the 10,000 things, but they don’t pout about it. The goose with the broken leg, the duck with a broken beak, the ducks and geese with only one foot, all manage to be about what business they can be about given their present state of affairs. But they don’t think about it. They “just do it.”
    
    They don’t get in their own way.
    
    We come along figuring things out. Scheming, planning, staying ahead of the game, exploiting our position, pursuing our advantage, manipulating our outcomes, seeking to maximize our profits and minimize our losses… None of which has any connection with our business, with what we are doing here, with the life that is our life to live.
    
    My idea for us is to use our feeling function—the way we know what is right for us and what is wrong for us—to find our business, and use our thinking function—the way we find the best way to do something given all of the impinging conflicts and contradictions, barriers and impediments—to do what is genuinely ours to do within the context and circumstances of our life.
    
    We think our way to doing what feels right for us without being distracted and untracked by interests and concerns that have nothing to do with our business.
    
    We stay out of our own way.
    
    That would be my gift to us, but I’m going to continue testing it out on me before I put the hard-sell on you.
36. Mud Wrasslin’ — Bog Garden, Greensboro, NC, March 14, 2013 — There is one problem, arrogance, which manifests itself as two problems, inflation and deflation. Solve those two problems and we would have no problems.
    
    Inflation is thinking too much of ourselves. Deflation is thinking too little. Inflation and deflation make themselves problematic in 10,000 ways. It’s all arrogance outdoing itself.
    
    What’s needed is a humble respect for what needs doing and for how things are to be done. No sooner do we touch humility than we begin to think how significant it is that we are so humble, off we go into a humility based inflation.
    
    I’m saying there is no fix for the problem of arrogance or the problems of inflation and deflation. There is only me being aware of how the problems creep into my life and you being aware of how the problems creep into your life, and all of us hoping that awareness of their presence is enough to bring us back to being respectful of what needs doing and of how things need to be done.
    
    May we all live out of this respectful orientation without being impressed with how well we are living. This is called not letting the right hand know what the left hand is doing. The closest we can come to this is catching the right hand in the act of showing off by being all meek and humble, call the foul and say, “I see what you are doing! Cut it out!”
37. Geese on the Wing 01 — Bog Garden, Greensboro, NC, March 9, 2013 — The degree to which we live the life that is ours to live depends to a large extent on the way we respond to the life we are living—to life as it comes at us like some wild, howling, owl from hell so that we forget what we are doing and everything we ever thought was good, and suitable, and right. What we do then tells the tale.
    
    You better write yourself a script and memorize the thing. You better rehearse the scene 10,000 times, until you can recite your lines like you mean them, until you can remember you have a camera in your hands, and you are here to take photographs of howling owls from hell and anything else that looks interesting—until you can do the thing that is yours to do no matter what life throws at you all your life long.
    
    When you can respond to your life without taking your eyes off your LIFE—without forgetting who you are and what you are about—without casting about all hopeless and forlorn, looking for meaning and purpose and hope, as though those things live somewhere outside of your own heart and soul—and can remember your business and be about it no matter what is going on in your other life, then your LIFE knows it has a keeper in you, and snuggles right up to you and says, “Lets me and you go show them what we’re made of,” and the fun really begins.
38. Geese on the Wing 02, B&W — Bog Garden, Greensboro, NC, March 9, 3013 — Learning to see is learning to see with the heart. It’s different, whether we see with our eyes or with our heart. The difference is that between life and death.
    
    The eyes see what is pleasing, and displeasing, to the eyes, The heart sees what is pleasing, and displeasing, to the heart.
    
    The eyes can be taken in. The heart is a hard sell.
    
    The eyes are caught by sheen and glamor, by how things look, by the shimmering beauty of glass beads and silver mirrors, the bright plastic and flashing lights of Gay Paree.
    
    The heart sees into the heart of the matter. The heart looks past appearances and promises, past hints and suggestive packaging to the unalterable truth of how things are.
    
    The eyes know what looks good. The heart knows what’s what.
    
    Learning to see is learning to see with the eyes of the heart.
39. Mallard in Flight 43 — Bog Garden, Greensboro, NC, March 2013 — Is it a side track or the right track? It takes going to know.
    
    Side tracks can lead us back to the right track if we receive them well and refuse to take wrong turns more seriously than necessary.
    
    It’s all grist for the mill, and we make of it what we can, using the experience of living to lead us in the way of life—by living with our eyes open and learning as we go.
    
    It’s amazing what we can know just by seeing what we look at.
    
    So, don’t be down on yourself for not knowing more than you know. Learning what the way is not will lead us eventually to the way. Side tracks are the right track for those who see them for what they are and don’t kid themselves about what they are doing.
40. Geese on the Wing 02 — Bog Garden, Greensboro, NC, March 9, 2013 — If you want to find God—the God who IS, I’m talking about, understanding full well that our idea of God is not God—find your life. God will be there tucked away in your life wondering what took you so long, and why you wasted so much time trying to make sense of someone else’s idea of God.
    
    Your life is as close to God as you will ever get. Your life and God are one. But. You have to be living your life to know what I’m talking about.
    
    God also can’t figure out why we spend so much of our time—live so much of our life—not living our life, our LIFE. Chalk it up to the Five Barriers to Authentic Living: Fear, Ambition, Greed, Stupidity and Arrogance.
    
    We have a lot to work through to get to the work that is ours to do. Better get started.
41. Northern Shoveler Hen — Bog Garden, Greensboro, NC, March 18 2013 — I have known a number of local singers who had big time talent and never made it to the big time and didn’t let that stop them from doing what was theirs to do—from doing what they loved to do.
    
    There is a local bluegrass group that is the best in the world, but only a few of us know it because they are doing their thing and their thing doesn’t require international recognition.
    
    Doing your thing does not call for celebrity status. Celebrity status has been the death knell for the thing of a lot of people.
    
    We put stipulations on our thing. Insist that it pay off. Demand that it be to our advantage. Require that it serve our ends. Make us happy.
    
    We can be happy, but we cannot make ourselves happy. We cannot be made to be happy. We find happiness like a coin on the street. We are happiest when we are living in the service of our gift, our genius, our art.
    
    We cannot squeeze our gift, our genius, our art for the gold. It is gold, but it does not produce gold. It IS the gold we seek. Those who know that know all they need to know.
42. Mallard in Flight 49 — Bog Garden, Greensboro, NC, March 20, 2013 — I’m amazed at how little it takes to break my concentration.
    
    I can be alone at the Bog Garden and fully present with it—aware of, and attuned to, what is happening and what is likely to happen. I’ve been there often enough to know the patterns of the ducks well enough to sense when one is likely to take flight, and I’m fully into the scene unfolding before me. And someone walks up.
    
    You’d think I could exchange pleasantries about the weather and water level without losing my place in the scene. Not! I cannot do two of some things at once, this being one of them.
    
    And it takes a few minutes after they leave for me to settle back into where I was.
    
    Now, this is a lesson in Business Maintenance. We can be About Our Business or we can be Not About Our Business, but we cannot be A Little Bit About Our Business and A Little Bit Not About Our Business.
    
    When it comes to our Business, we are all ADD’s. The least little thing can knock us off the path. Some things can make us forget everything about the path—can make us forget there was a path.
    
    There is a reason Buddhist monks all the way up to the Dali Lama maintain a strict schedule around their meditation times. They have to be about their Business on a regular and steady basis to remember they have a Business to be about.
    
    You see, I’m sure, how all of this pertains to you. You can’t be about your Business the way you would be about a Sunday stroll or making oatmeal cookies. You can’t just take it up and put it down and get back to it in a few days when the mood strikes.
    
    Our loyalty and allegiance have to be to our Business, our LIFE, our path. We cannot work the program when we feel like it. We have to WORK the program.
    
    We have to know when the work has been disrupted and what to do to pick it back up. We have to know when we lose our concentration and how to find where we were before the distraction came along.
    
    Our business is our BUSINESS. It is who we are, what we are about. If you think there is something more than that, something other than that, something besides that, think again.
    
    We belong to our business. Our business does not belong to us, to pick up and put on when it suits us. Savvy?
43. Geese on the Wing 03 — Bog Garden, Greensboro, NC, March 9, 2012 — If we are going to walk together, we cannot stipulate where we go. We have to allow each other the latitude to determine his or her own direction and trust our relationship to be flexible and fluid enough to grant each other the room that differences require—and not be so If You Loved Me You Would Like Brussels Sprouts with each other that we all tip-toe on eggshells to keep from rocking the boat or turning over the apple cart or making waves and have absolutely nothing but a box of smoke where a helping, loving, relationship could be.
    
    You have to admit I’m great for sentences that could be six or fifteen sentences. And you’re still walking with me. I’m grateful, too.
44. See The Owl 05 — Bog Garden, Greensboro, NC, March 16, 2013 — Is it your business or none of your business? Is it your work? Does it help with your work? Does it have anything to do with your work? What are you doing, doing something that has nothing to do with your work?
    
    How focused is the Dali Lama? Was the Buddha? Was Jesus? “If your eye causes you to walk off the path, pluck it out! (Or words to that effect)!”
    
    A bit extreme, perhaps, but precisely the point: Know Your Business, Your Work. Do Your Business, Your Work.
    
    Life is too short to be frittered away in pursuits and undertakings not worthy of our time and attention. Only our work and that which pertains to our work is worthy of our time and attention.
    
    We have to draw our lines around what we will do and what we will not do, around what our business is and around what is none of our business.
    
    We cannot live any way that suits us and be about our business. We have to be clear about what the journey requires and whether we have what it takes to take it. Do we have the heart for the journey of heart? If not, what are we thinking?
    
    Jesus had lots of stories about starting out and not completing the journey, and about not going at all. He was talking about doing our work and not doing what is not our work.
    
    He would be quick to say, “There is only one thing: Your work. Do it!” And he would be right.
45. Geese on the Wing 04 — Bog Garden, Greensboro, NC, March 9, 2013 — What do you love to do? Do it for the love of it. Do it for the joy of doing it. Don’t look for wealth from it. It is peace and well-being that we need.
    
    Steer your way to what you value most and live a life that expresses it, embrace a good that serves it.
    
    Carl Jung says that in today’s culture—and it’s the world culture he is talking about—we don’t need to hear the message, but need to hear the message explained. When we are so far removed from our sense of what has true value that we need to be told what is valuable, we are in a bad way.
    
    When someone else has to tell us what is valuable, we have lost connection with our own sense of value, which is our sense of direction to purpose and meaning.
    
    Jesus said, “Do your thing, and don’t worry about those who are with you or against you,” or words to that effect.
    
    Most of us are free to have a life that is free within the life that is not free. We can live in two worlds at the same time.
    
    I check out of this world all the time and retreat to my world. I close the door to my office, for instance, and write what I need to write. I can do what I know to be important, to have value to me, in that world.
    
    I drive to a scenic location and walk amid the photographs waiting to be taken, with on one telling me which ones to take or not take.
    
    I have no control over a lot of things in my life. I have to do a lot of things I don’t want to do, don’t enjoy doing. In the other world.
    
    But. In my world, I am free to do what needs to be done, when it needs to be done, as it needs to be done, as I determine those things.
    
    I am living my life in my world in ways that are completely right for me, and you can’t stop me. Nah na nah NAH nah.
    
    And you can do the same thing in your world. What’s stopping you?
46. Goose Coming In — Bog Garden, Greensboro, NC, March 2013 — Money cannot buy a world fit to live in. Only the heart can create that world. Money has cut us off from our heart. We sell our heart for money, thinking money is the answer to all of our problems with life.
    
    Living a life of true value is the answer of all of our problems with life. Only the heart knows what is valuable.
    
    Without heart leading the way, the world becomes a wasteland, where we work for money to be content, and are not content, so we work for more money to finally be content, and are not content…
    
    It’s like my idea of bad religion where we go to church to hear the preacher tell us we are going to hell if we don’t come back and hear the preacher tell us we are going to hell if we don’t come back and hear the preacher tell us we are going to hell if we don’t come back…
    
    A life without value is a life in search of value. Here’s a tip: We cannot use money to buy it. More money is not going to do it.
    
    The heart knows what is valuable. Let heart lead the way.
    
    We have to build a life of value within the wasteland or our other life. We have to live in two worlds. We have to create a world worth living in within a world that is not worth our time.
    
    The older ones of you have already done this and just need a little affirmation and encouragement. You’re on the right track—you are doing the right thing with your life. Do it consciously. Keep it up.
    
    The younger ones of you know already that your life isn’t working and you found your way hear by casting about, grasping at straws, hoping to find something to help you construct a life worth living. I hope you’ve found it. You have to build a world worth living in based on what your heart knows to be truly valuable. This is your work. Do it.
    
    No one can tell you what is valuable to you. You have to listen to your heart. Silence is valuable to me. Solitude. Writing. Listening. Seeing. Inquiring. Walking. Conversation that is more than News-Weather-Sports-Politics-Religion-Gossip (See how much you have to say that doesn’t fall into one of those categories—It’s all we know how to talk about!). My list is not long but I find the things on it to be intensely valuable to me. I would hate to have to live without them.
    
    See what’s on your list. Incorporate the items there into your other life. Create a new life for yourself—a new world. Live in two worlds, knowing clearly which one you belong to.
47. Geese on the Wing 05 — Bog Garden, Greensboro, NC, March 09, 2013 — At the level of the heart, we all speak the same language. If we cold get at that level and stay there, we would have it made—worldwide. Ah, but. There are Fear, Greed, Ambition, Arrogance and Stupidity blocking the way.
    
    Another name for the Big Five Barriers to the Promised Land (Enlightenment, Nirvana, the Kingdom of God, or wherever it is we think we are going) is the Cyclops. We get up and go a few rounds with some manifestation of the Cyclops every day—a regular routine on the Hero’s Journey.
48. See TWO Owls? — Bog Garden, Greensboro, NC, March 23, 2013 — Seeing what you look at will carry you a long way.
    
    To see what you look at, you have to get out of your way.
    
    You have to lay aside your assumptions, inferences, prejudices, arrogance, all you think you know, everything you have ever heard and approach each seeing moment with eyes so fresh they sparkle and shine with interest and wonder.
    
    Get that down and you have it made.
49. Star Flower — Bog Garden, Greensboro, NC, March 23, 2013 — Work with what you have. Don’t be saying you can’t do anything with this old life and these old resources. Stop making excuses.
    
    We can put off forever the work of living the life that is ours to live within the context and circumstances of the life we are living.
    
    The problem is that we want it to be profitable. If our work were guaranteed to bring us our heart’s desire (which has no connection whatsoever with our HEART!) instantaneously, we would do it without hesitation, no matter what the initial cost. Our work is not profitable the way the world reckons profit.
    
    We cannot take the gift we have been given and exploit it for our own good. We can only serve the gift—not exploit it. Our work is serving the gift, bringing forth the gift within the context and circumstances of our life—the time and place of our living—here and now, for the good it can do, the blessing it can be, in the lives of others.
    
    The gold we seek is found in our devotion to, our love for, the gift, the genius, which is ours to serve and to give away.
    
    The gift may pay for itself—helping us pay the bills that serve the gift—or not. It is a source of well-being, not wealth.
    
    We think wealth is the everlasting source of well-being, and throw everything into being wealthy, and well-being languishes, and dies.
    
    All it takes is seeing what we look at to know what needs to be done and do it. In order to see what we look at, we have to change our minds about what we think is important. We have to grow up. We have to live in light of values that are worthy of us—worth our life in their service.
    
    The length of the spiritual journey—the Hero’s Journey—is the distance from our head to our heart (our HEART).
50. Mallard in Flight 39 — Bog Garden, Greensboro, NC, March 18, 2013 — It is important that we help each other do what is important to the other, that we help one another find what is right for each—for all—of us.
    
    It is important to not say things like: “Why are you doing THAT?” Or, “Why do you care about THAT?” Or, “That’s crazy!
    
    It is important to not put a premature end to someone’s ruminations—wander around with them amid the possibilities. We imagine our way along the way. We need sounding boards to help us hear what we are saying. We can talk our way to clarity if those who listen to us will just keep us talking!
    
    We have to listen to each other to know what is important to the other and help them find their way to it.
    
    The path is always at our feet, waiting for us to discern it. Waiting for us to be open to it. Waiting for us to know what is important, what needs to be done. And do it.
    
    We need one another to help us see what is before our eyes—not by telling us what is there, but by listening to us say what is there.
    
    People are always telling us what they want us to know instead of listening to us to help us know what we know.
    
    How will we ever know what we know without people who listen lovingly to us? To whom do you listen lovingly?
    
    Being listened to lovingly is what we all need. Why do so few of us do it?
51. Mallard Mirror — Bog Garden, Greensboro, NC, March 23, 2013 — What stops us from doing what needs to be done? We need to lose weight. We need to exercise. We need to cut things out of our life (Empty calories and TV) and incorporate things into our life (Silence and reflection), and we don’t. What stops us?
    
    What cannot be stopped? Organized crime, drug cartels, the gun lobby, injustice against women and immigrants… The list is long. What stops what needs to be stopped from being stopped?
    
    What is going on? What can we do about it? Why can’t we stop what needs to be stopped and do what needs to be done?
    
    What needs to be stopped in your life? What needs to be done?
    
    What’s stopping you from answering the questions?
52. Carolina Of Course Wren 03 — Bog Garden, Greensboro, NC, March 1, 2013 — We are here to serve the gift. This is the heart of “Thy will, not mine, be done.” Serving the gift soon carries us into the realm of “not my will.”
    
    Nothing is more quickly inconvenient and in the way, aggravating, bothersome, grating, and, eventually, painful, than serving the gift—than making the gift and its delivery our highest priority—than being at the “beck and call” of the gift. Particularly, when there is—as there usually is—nothing in it for us beyond the experience of the gift and its offering.
    
    This is the province of God’s will. Are we going to serve the gift or not?
    
    Am I going to get up at 2:30 AM to write what needs to be written or not?
    
    How often do we dismiss something that catches our eye—and how often does something catch our eye that is not gift-related—and go on in the service of our agenda, with no awareness of the gift and the opportunity we missed to serve it?
    
    How often do we think, “What gift? I don’t have a gift!” ?
    
    We think God’s will is about morality, about obeying the Ten Commandments, living a “pure, righteous and sober life.” Not so. God’s will puts us at odds with the moral precepts of our day. Jesus is the perfect example of what God’s will requires.
    
    Healing on the Sabbath. Associating with the outcasts, with the untouchables. Rocking every ecclesiastical, doctrinal, theological boat he could get his hands on. Putting himself in the position of being called “A glutton and a wine bibber” and “a Son of Satan.” All required in the service of the gift, and the direct result of doing God’s will.
    
    But you will never hear that in a Sunday School class or in a sermon.
53. Oops — Bog Garden, Greensboro, NC, March 23, 2013 — We serve the gift, share the gift, bring forth the gift, produce the gift—ARE the gift, the work, the life that is ours to give, do, live.
    
    The gift we have to give, the work we have to do, the life that is ours to live takes precedent over every other concern.
    
    This is what it means to pray, “Thy will, not mine, be done.”
    
    From the standpoint of this understanding of this prayer, religion is a lived experience of those who are engaged in the work of unfolding the gift they are called to be within the life they are living—and it has nothing to do with, no connection with, believing what someone else has said is true about God. It is knowing what is true about God first-hand.
    
    When we are living our life—the one that is ours to live, giving our gift—the one that is ours to give, doing our work—the work that is ours to do, we know God the way Jesus knew God, and can say along with him, “The Father and I are One,” because, then, there is no space between who we are and who God would have us be.
    
    When we find our life and live it, there is God—beyond theology, beyond doctrine, beyond dogma, beyond faith and belief. A rock-solid presence that cannot be doubted or denied.
    
    And so, when Carl Jung was asked if he believed in God replied, “I do not believe—I know!”
54. Mallard In Flight 58 — Bog Garden, Greensboro, NC, March 25, 2013 — Bringing the Christian perspective into the present means understanding sin as being wrong about what is important—as wanting what we want and not what we ought to want because it is right for us to want it and wrong for us to not want it. Understanding repentance as changing our mind about what is important. Understanding salvation as being right about what is important and living aligned with it—wanting what we ought to want, not because it is forced on us from outside of us, but because it is genuinely, authentically, who we are and right for us in the truest sense of the word.
    
    Hell is being lost to ourselves, adrift in a world of our own making, a wasteland of emptiness, hopelessness, meaninglessness because nothing is as we thought it would be, and is not what we wanted—and we have no one to blame but ourselves, but we cannot face the truth of our responsibility for our plight and blame everything—everybody—but ourselves.
    
    Heaven is being restored to ourselves and living authentically aligned with what is deepest, best, and truest about us—being who we are, doing what is ours to do, being about bringing ourselves forth into the world.
    
    Our work is to get ourselves on the right track—the track that is right for us, the life that is our life to live in the time left for living. The afterlife will take care of itself.
55. Mallard in Flight 001 — Bog Garden, Greensboro, NC, March 2013 — Look for living symbols that are alive for you. Water and stones are ancient ones that have worked in every age to connect the age, the people, to purposes quite beyond them—but each age, and each person within each age, must re-work the symbol to make it relevant and meaningful to that age, to that person.
    
    The Tao is Valley Water and baptism represents the water of birth—the embryonic fluid of our new beginning.
    
    We have to work the symbol, and work ourselves into the symbol, and see ourselves reflected by/in the symbol, and be reminded of who we are and what we are about.
    
    We have to have grounding, stabilizing, centering, focusing symbols to reorient us to the way that is our way, the truth that is our truth, the life that is our life—because there is much at work in our other life to strip us of the vitality, meaning and purpose that our symbols represent.
    
    So. Find your symbols and make them real. They are your life and connect you with your life and bring you forth and make you real. In making your symbols real, you are making you real, which is our real work. Being real.
56. Wild Goose B&W — Bog Garden, Greensboro, NC, March 26, 2013 — We have to live in two different worlds, The world that feeds our body and the world that nourishes our soul.
    
    What feeds our body is not necessarily what nourishes our soul. What we do to feed our body can deplete and exhaust our soul.
    
    And yet, body and soul are one thing, not two. Physical and spiritual are one experience, not two. Soul is nourished physically, through touch and sound, taste and smell and sight. We cannot know soul except through body.
    
    And body can be soulless, empty, barren, dry, dead, deader than dead—and is, when it does not take soul into account.
    
    Our life in the physical world has to nurture our life in the spiritual world, and vice versa. It is one world.
    
    And yet, it is two. What we do to pay the bills that enable us to feed (and warm, and cool, and wash, and dry) our body can deny and dismiss our soul. We have to also pay the bills that replenish our soul.
    
    We have to honor the second world and consciously, deliberately, willfully reconcile it with the first world—with the apparent world, with the visible world, with the world that takes itself to be the only world.
    
    We begin by creating the second world and living in it—when and where and how we can. And once we have established for ourselves the validity of the invisible world, the world of soul, we integrate it with the visible world, the world of body—bringing soul intentionally to life through the way we live in the physical world.
    
    We cannot just talk about soul and live soulfully. We have to experience soul—to be soulful—in order to live soulfully. We do that by creating for ourselves a world apart, and then bringing the two worlds together. The two become one in the hands of those who know what they are doing.
    
    But they are not automatically, spontaneously, easily one. The work is to make them one over the course of our life in each. They become one through those who do the work of oneness—the work of reconciliation, integration, harmony, wholeness—consciously, painstakingly.
    
    Two worlds plus one life lived consciously equals one world.
57. Mountain Magnolia — Bog Garden, Greensboro, NC, March 2013 — There are two worlds: The world of normal, visible, physical, apparent reality and the world of abnormal, invisible, spiritual, ephemeral reality. By living consciously in both worlds, we bring the two together in our life and make the two worlds one world. This is our work.
    
    There is the world of that which meets the eye and there is the world of more than meets the eye. We have to live in this world as those who never loose sight of that world, of that invisible world. Do not lose sight of the invisible world!
    
    We have to find ways of living in this world which make that world apparent, and present, and real. We do that through our physical senses, tuned into the world beyond the physical world.
    
    Every physical act has a spiritual component. Every physical experience is a threshold into more than meets the eye. Some physical experiences are so packed with the spiritual, with the numinous, with the More Than Words Can Say, that we are stunned into silence and remember it always, though we cannot say what it was that we remember.
    
    We must not discount those experiences. They are the ground of our work to see that world in this world, through this world—and to make that world apparent by the way we live in this world.
    
    That world is REAL—is more real than this world. We sense it through the impact of our experience with this world. This world drains us, depletes us, exhausts us—enthralls us, enchants us, bewitches us, delights us. What happens in this world has an emotional component that we cannot put into words.
    
    We dismiss what cannot be said, explained, described, told, counted, quantified, locked-up, fenced-in, seen, weighed, measured, touched, tasted, smelled. Weird, isn’t it that what we taste—lemon ice box pie for example—can transport us to a world apart, and we are back in our childhood, in our grandmother’s lap, eating her lemon ice box pie, and are brought to tears? Now, you tell me which world is the REAL world.
58. Geese Coming In 01 — Bog Garden, Greensboro, NC, March 22, 2013 — When you don’t know what to do, don’t try to think your way forward. Feel your way there.
    
    Be quiet. Be still. Listen. Look for what is stirring within, Fear and desire get all the press and attention, but look beyond them, see past them to the deeper feelings capable of guiding your boat on its path through the sea.
    
    The owl drops out of his roost as evening comes and goes looking for dinner. Where will he go today? His feelings guide him. Not his thoughts. Maybe he feels like this, maybe he feels like that.
    
    It’s like you when you walk through the cafeteria line. What’s for dinner? Surely you don’t think your way there. What looks good? What are you in the mood for? You go in thinking about salmon, but the baked spaghetti catches your eye. Suddenly, you feel like spaghetti. That’s how it works.
    
    Feelings have directed us through thousands of years of living. Thinking is a Johnny Come Lately, taking over the operation, acting like it knows what its doing. When you don’t know what to do, thinking just starts shooting from the hip, try this, try that, no that.
    
    Geez. Sit down. Shut up. Stop. Look. Listen. Feel.
    
    We feel our way to what is right for us. We do not think our way there. And if we feel our way to what is wrong for us, keep feeling. Feeling got us in the mess, feeling will get us out.
    
    What say your feelings? Listen to them!
    
    And if you feel incensed that I would say such things, what does that say? Are you going to listen to your feelings or not?
59. The Chase Is On! 01 — Bog Garden, Greensboro, NC, March 26, 2012 — Everything that comes, goes (Joseph Campbell). If you are not coming, you’re going. The enlightened life is to let come what’s coming and to let go what’s going.
    
    And, some of us think, “Oh, boo-hoo, boo-hoo! Nothing lasts! Nothing is worth it! It’s all emptiness and sadness! It’s just a box of smoke wrapped in pretty paper! Why have anything to do with this life? I’m just going to pout and cast about until I die!”
    
    But not all of us. Some of us “get in their and do our thing, and don’t let the outcome stop us” (Joseph Campbell). Some of us live the life that is ours to live, “and when the birds of the air—or the way things are—plaster us with their droppings, don’t even pause to notice, or wipe it off” (Joseph Campbell). Some of us are too busy with the things that matter to us to bother with how long it lasts or why bother with something that is going away.
    
    How long does sex last? Or an ice cream cone? Or a glass of wine? Doesn’t stop us from enjoying the experience, relishing the memories, and signing up for another round.
    
    What’s with this hanging on to things? What’s with this saying, “If my babies are going to grow up and move away, I’m not going to have children!”?
    
    If we are going to be alive in the time that remains, we are going to have to jettison the sorry attitude that keeps us from living.
    
    Look. It’s like this. This is how things are, and this is what we can do about it, and that’s that. Are you coming or not? You’re burning daylight, pouting and casting about!
    
    The challenge for everyone is to jump right in there and do what is ours to do as well as we possibly can and let that be that.
    
    We are called to join in the dance of life as full participants in how things are—loving what is to be loved, enjoying what is to be enjoyed, delighting in what is delightful, mourning what is to be mourned, grieving what is to be grieved, saying hello to what’s coming and good-bye to what’s going—as though the whole thing is all our idea and the best one we have ever had!
    
    We are to join right in as though the joy is all ours, and we are going to climb onto the big, snorting, pawing, beast of a bull and tell them to open the chute—and enjoy what we can of the ride.
    
    Doing what needs to be done as though we want to do it—letting things be what they are and doing what we can do about it—is the transition point, the turning point, from immaturity toward maturity. Making the decision to play the game on the game’s terms is the most important decision of our life.
    
    You’re burning daylight here. Are you coming or not?
60. The Shape of Time 18 — Antelope Canyon, Page, AZ, May 18, 2010 — Where do you find your peace? What are the sources of encouragement for you? What do you do to regain your balance, find your center, reorient yourself to what is important? Where do you find your strength for dealing with what you have to deal with—for doing what is yours to do?
    
    Do not hurry past the questions. Sit with them. Answer them. The answers cradle your heart. If you take care of your heart, your heart will take care of you.
61. Mallard in Flight 59 — Bog Garden, Greensboro, NC, March 28, 2013 — We have to know what interests us and we have to be interested in what interests us—past all resistance and opposition from any source.
    
    Jesus said, “Who is my mother? Who are my brothers and sisters? Not those who are my blood relatives, but those who perceive the will of God calling to them through their interests, urges, gifts and abilities and do it—regardless of the price or who stands in their way!” Or, words to that effect.
    
    We have an interest and begin to pursue it, or perhaps just to entertain ideas of pursuing it, and people close to us say, “Why on earth are you interested in THAT of all things?” and we turn back to doing the things we are supposed to be interested in, even though our heart isn’t in any of them.
    
    We have to fight for what interests us.
    
    The relationship we have with our interests is that of the medieval knight with his Lady. We wear her colors and swear allegiance to her to the death. She is the epitome of our heart’s truest love—and we honor and revere her above all else, trusting ourselves to her service for life, not knowing why we do it or where the road will lead.
    
    The spiritual journey (Hero’s Journey) is this way to the core. It is a journey of our unfolding, of our emergence, of our evolution from who we were to who we have it within us to be. We have no map. We have only our interests to guide us. We have to trust ourselves to them and serve them faithfully as they lead us to who we are.
62. The Chase Is On 02 — Bog Garden, Greensboro, NC, March 26, 2013 — Joseph Campbell said, “If a person doesn’t listen to the demands of his own spiritual and heart life, and insists on a certain program, you’re going to have a schizophrenic crack-up. The person has put himself off-center. He has aligned himself with a programmatic life, and it’s not the one the body’s interested in at all. And the world’s full of people who have stopped listening to themselves, or have listened only to their neighbors to learn what they ought to do, how they ought to behave, and what they values are that they should be living for.”
    
    What holds us down, what holds us back, is our idea for our lives, our idea of how our lives, of Life, ought to be. We have to get out of our heads, so to speak, out of our idea of how things should be, in order to participate in—in order to engage—things as they are. We do that by allowing ourselves to love what we truly love instead of loving what we think we should love.
    
    The biggest risk you will ever take is the risk of loving what you love—of giving yourself to your heart—of allowing your heart to have the reins, trusting yourself to your heart, and seeing where takes you.
    
    If you are up for it, you have started on the Hero’s Journey. Hang on. It’s the best ride there is.
63. Caterpillar Hill — Overlooking Deer Isle and Penobscot Bay, ME, September 28, 2012 — What is the central focus of your life? If you are casting about, looking for something good, let me suggest living aligned with your heart, and through it, with the drift and direction of the invisible world.
    
    When you are grounded in your heart—and through it, in the invisible world—you are a rock. More than a rock. You are life itself, alive in you.
64. Compass Pond 02 — Golden Road at the lower end of the 100 Mile Wilderness near Millinocket, ME, September 25, 2012 — The quick stopper to my “live aligned with your heart” advice is, “But what about all the times I’ve followed my heart and lived to regret it—like my first marriage. And my second. My heart doesn’t know anything!”
    
    My reply is, “If you live aligned with your heart and it leads to trouble, keep following your heart—it will lead you out of trouble. And you will learn things about yourself in the trouble that you would never have known otherwise. Your heart isn’t as stupid as you think.”
    
    Joseph Campbell said, “Consciousness is transformed by trials and revelations. Trials and revelations are what it’s all about. The trials are designed to see to it that the intending hero should be really a hero. Is he really a match for this task? Can he overcome the dangers? Does he have the courage, the knowledge, the capacity, to enable him to serve? The adventure (evokes) a quality of his character that he (didn’t know) he possessed. It took the Cyclops to bring out the hero in Ulysses.”
    
    If you give yourself a bad marriage, fine. Work out for yourself what you are going to do about that. It will evoke qualities you didn’t know you had. And keep living to be aligned with your heart. It will carry you straight, in a round-a-bout way, to the heart of who you are.
65. Fog on Cadillac Mountain — Acadia National Park, Bar Harbor, ME, September 29, 2012 — Joseph Campbell said, “Where you stumble and fall, there is the treasure.”
    
    We think our failures, mistakes, screw-ups and flame-outs are shameful, tragic, burdens that we will forever kick ourselves about because we were so stupid and should have known better—and DID know better but ignored every warning sign we put in our way.
    
    Our failures have called us forth in ways our successes and triumphs could not touch.
    
    We have within the ability to rise to every occasion—but we don’t want to have to rise to any occasion. We want, as my friend Ogi Overman reminds me, “smooth and easy all the way.”
    
    Smooth and easy will not—cannot—bring us forth, grow us up, produce in us the qualities of character and spirit that we develop in dealing with and recovering from our bad choices and wrong turns.
    
    Here we discover the spiritual conundrum/paradox: Bad is good. Wrong is right.
    
    And the treasure is this discovery and all the others we make about ourselves in handling all of the things we would like to avoid.
66. Mallard in Flight 60 — Bog Garden, Greensboro, NC, March 29, 2013 — We do not impose the solution onto the big problems. The solution emerges from the big problems.
    
    Carl Jung said, “The greatest and most important problems of life are all fundamentally insoluble. They can never be solved but only outgrown.” Growing up solves all of our problems.
    
    We create problems solving problems. When the problem solves the problem, the problems diminish.
    
    One of the 10,000 laws of photography and problem solving states: Wait long enough and something will happen. If we sit with a problem long enough, a shift will occur. We don’t have to find a solution. We have to wait for the shift.
    
    When the door opens, walk through. Seize the moment. Act when the time for acting is upon you. Do when needs to be done when it needs to be done the way it needs to be done. Poof. No problem.
    
    A leaking roof is not a big problem. Call the roofer. A stopped up drain is not a big problem. Call the plumber. When we make a big problem out of a problem that is not a big problem, we have a big problem. That would be us. We have to sit down with us and allow the solution to emerge. We have to get out of our way and let the shift happen.
    
    How do you get in your own way? How do you make big problems out of small ones? How are you refusing to grow up? Hmmmm?
    
67. South Pond 01 — Baxter State Park near Patten, ME, September 24, 2012 — I have two pieces of advice that I consider to be all you need to do to be on the way. Everything else falls into place around these two things.
    
    1) See what you look at.
    
    2) Be interested in what interests you.
    
    That’s it. Spend your time in the service of these two things and you’ll be in the center of the way the rest of the way.
68. Grackle in Flight 01 — Bog Garden, Greensboro, NC, March 29, 2013 — We don’t have to change the way we are. We have to see the way we are—with compassionate eyes.
    
    Seeing with compassion changes everything.
69. The Mates Meet — Bog Garden, Greensboro, NC, March 31, 2013 — How many times in a week are you are where you can’t think of any place else you had rather be? Doing what you can’t think of anything else you had rather be doing? How long are you there?
    
    What can you do to increase the frequency and the duration?
70. Mallard in Flight 67 — Bog Garden, Greensboro, NC, March 31, 2013 — We are here to help each other with our life—to help each other find our life (the life that is truly ours to live) and live it.
    
    It does not help to exhort, berate, harangue, expound, proclaim, preach, condemn, chastise, ostracize, expel, evict… I’m sure you get the idea.
    
    It does help to listen with compassionate ears, see with compassionate eyes, understand with a compassionate heart. Compassion helps a lot. And interest. And authenticity. And playfulness.
    
    It helps to know we don’t know what we are doing trying to help someone else with her, with his, life when we aren’t exactly in the saddle of our own life—but to laugh at ourselves and do what we can imagine doing in each opportunity to be helpful as it comes along.
71. Mallard in Flight 66 — Bog Garden, Greensboro, NC, March 31, 2013 — We want to feel better RIGHT NOW!
    
    Getting better requires us to bear the pain of our past over time. Facing the truth of how it is with us. Doing what needs to be done about it. And letting that be that. Trusting that healing and recovery and genuine acceptance of our false starts, and wrong turns, and life’s Big Juicy Wet Ones Right On Our Kisser will come in its time. And we will grow up to be the kind of people people are glad to have in their company.
72. Mallard in Flight 64 — Bog Garden, Greensboro, NC, March 30, 2013 — There should be some effective way of neutralizing mass hysteria and prevent it from sweeping the country—or the entire civilized world—up in a frenzied rush into insanity. Individuals grounded in and remaining true to, themselves are the only defense against communal madness I know of.
    
    Listen to your heart. Center yourself in what you know to be valuable, important, worthy of your allegiance. Stay away from crowds—even virtual crowds—and maintain your grounding connections.
    
    Avoiding psychic infections is one of the tricks to master on the Hero’s Journey.
73. Pier in the Fog — Lake Brandt Watershed Park, Greensboro, NC, January 11, 2013 — As physical beings, we have mass, take up space and are capable of movement.
    
    As emotional beings we make a feeling response to our environment—and to more than our environment.
    
    As mental beings, we can think about—be conscious/aware of what we are experiencing and decide what to do about it.
    
    And as spiritual beings we can bring it all together—integrating physical, emotional and mental aspects of our experience in light of qualities and characteristics we find to be valuable, and connecting us with sense of meaning, purpose and direction beyond anything we could extrapolate from the world of space, time and matter.
    
    Sheldon Kopp said, “We can experience more than we can understand and we can understand more than we can explain.”
    
    There is more to us, and to all of it, than meets the eye. Live in ways that honor the realization that there is more to know than we do know—more to know than can be known—and don’t act like you know all you need to know and that if everyone thought like you did the world would be a wonderful place.
74. Songbird — Bog Garden, Greensboro, NC, April 1, 2013 — Everything at the Bog Garden has its business, knows what it is, and is about it. And everything else by and large stays out of its way. Nothing there is lost and without purpose. So much for the supposed inferior nature of the non-human world.
    
    We moan about our lack of purpose and direction, not because we lack purpose and direction, but because we lack those that will do. We want some kind of purpose and direction. The kind that will make the neighbors sit up and take note. Perhaps because we think that is what it will take to get our neighbors off our back.
    
    My current purpose is learning to take pictures of flying ducks. That is to say, learning to keep flying ducks in focus. It is nothing to take a picture of a flying duck. I take plenty of pictures of them. They are just out of focus.
    
    People would have me have a better focus than taking a better focused picture of a flying duck. They don’t think that’s much of a purpose.
    
    ”Do you spend every day at the Bog Garden?” they inquire, as though there is a better place to be.
    
    If I let them take my purpose from me, I would be lost and without purpose. But, as it is, I know my business, and am about it, along with everything else at the Bog Garden. Everything else, though, has the advantage of not having to justify their business to everyone who comes along.
75. Two Owls on a Limb — Bog Garden, Greensboro, NC, April 1, 2013 — What is suitable in a situation may not be what is desirable—may not be what you want. It is what the situation calls for. A coat and tie, for instance, and shoes that pinch a bit. Maturation is doing what the situation calls for—what is appropriate, suitable, for the situation—no matter how much you would prefer to be in the Bog Garden.
    
    Our priorities float in a sea of situations. The highest priority is what the situation calls for—to be set aside in favor of what the next situation calls for. We cannot always do anything and hope to be living in accord with what is appropriate and suitable in the here and now of our living.
    
    The situation determines what is appropriate and suitable, not your mother’s Book of Rules, or the Church’s Official Decrees. We cannot impose an ideology upon our situations and have a livable life. We have to live in each moment, alert to the moment, guided by the moment. The moment will show you what needs to happen in the moment. Listen to the moment!
    
    The scene will show you what photographs to take. Stop trying to impose your idea for the scene upon the scene! Stop trying to impose your idea for your life upon your life! Cooperate with what is trying to come forth—assist what needs to happen—do what is appropriate and suitable to the occasion, regardless of how much you had rather be somewhere else, doing something else.
    
    This is called growing up and understanding that what you want is not the highest good.
76. Creekside — Bog Garden, Greensboro, NC, April 2, 2013 — One of the 10,000 laws of photography states: If you want to be there when something happens, you have to be there.
    
    If you want to walk up and take a picture, that’s fine. Millions of people do it that way and are perfectly happy with the results. They have a camera. It’s different with photographers. The camera has them.
    
    But, there is a connection between this law of photography and your life (As it is with all of them). You can’t order up your life and have it ready for you at the drive-through window. You can’t expect it to unfold before you like a magic carpet ride. Your life will work you over, just like your camera will if you are a photographer.
    
    Your life is work, just like your camera is if you are a photographer. And you have to work it, just like you have to work at being a photographer. You belong to your life, your life does not belong to you, just like you belong to your camera if you are a photographer.
    
    You have to tend your life—that means you have to pay attention to your life and do what it needs you to do. What does it want from you? What do you have to do for your life to come alive? For you to live aligned with the life that is your life to live?
    
    Your life has a life of its own, and it’s your place to be open to that and let your life live you. If you are going to practice anything, practice that.
77. Through the Trees — Bog Garden, Greensboro, NC, April 2, 2013 — Joseph Campbell said, “The influence of a vital person vitalizes, there’s no doubt about it. The world is a wasteland. People have the notion of saving the world by shifting it around and changing the rules and so forth. No, any world is a living world if it’s alive, and the thing is to bring it to life. And the way to bring it to life is to find in your own case where your life is, and be alive yourself.”
    
    ”The influence of a vital person vitalizes.” The only influence worth having is toward LIFE. If you want to influence the world for the good, you are going to have to be alive to do it. You can’t give away something you don’t have. You can’t tell someone how to get something you don’t have.
    
    We all come with it. Puppies have it. Children have it before they run head-on into Those Who Know Best And Must Be Pleased and haven’t been alive once since they were five years old, and now live only to take life away from others and hand them some rule book which is really a manual for going to hell before you die.
    
    Your task is to take your life back. This isn’t a hard thing. Where is your joy found? Go there. Often. Do things you love to do. How long has it been? Don’t let another day pass without working in some things you love. Hot showers count. And music. But don’t let my list get in your way. Make your own list. It’s a path to life.
    
    There are paths to life all over the place, just waiting for you to walk them. One of the 10,000 laws of photography applies here: “You’ll never know what you’ll see if you don’t go looking.”
    
    Go looking for life. Let it surprise you in all the places it’s hiding.
78. Cherry Blossoms 03B — Bog Garden, Greensboro, NC, April 2, 2013 — A variant of one of the 10,000 Laws of Photography is, “You’ll never see anything if you don’t go looking.”
    
    The camera is for more than birthdays and trips to far away places. The camera is for seeing. For seeing what you look at. For looking.
    
    Take your camera along and be alert to what catches your eye. Over time, you’ll marvel at what is always there beyond your vision because you aren’t/weren’t looking.
    
    The camera is also an invitation to take your time with what you see. Shift your perspective. How is it begging to be seen, photographed, shown? Is there a better time to see it, better light in which to see it? Do you need to come back when it’s cloudy, or earlier, or later?
    
    Your life is changing here. Who is to say that your life doesn’t need to change? Doesn’t need to be directed to something else? Directed by something else? Who is to say you know all about living your life and everybody and everything needs to get out of your way because you know where you are going, what you are doing?
    
    Who’s to say that the camera can’t show you a thing or two about your life—about life—and living—and being alive?
79. Songbird 02 — Bog Garden, Greensboro, NC, April 2, 2013 — There is your work and there is that which distracts you from your work. It’s important to know which is which.
80. Narcissus Reflection — Bog Garden, Greensboro, NC, April 2, 2013 — Joseph Campbell says, “The real dragon is in you…it’s (you) holding you in…it’s what I want, what I believe, what I can do, what I think I love, and all that. What I regard as the aim of my life and so forth. It might be too small. It might be that which pins you down. And if it’s simply that of doing what the environment tells you to do, it is certainly pinning you down. And so the environment is your dragon, as it reflects within yourself…And we slay the dragon within us by following our bliss.”
    
    Our bliss is our joy—it is our heart’s true love. What we are born for. Where we belong. It is our thing.
    
    It takes courage to give ourselves to our thing. We have to have heart to follow our heart. There is much to overcome. Resistance within and without. Objections. Opposition. Barriers…
    
    This is where faith comes in. Faith in ourselves. In our own heart. We trust our heart to know what it’s doing, and throw in with it, and see what we can do together. Or not.
    
    There are plenty of people who don’t. You can see it in their eyes. They opted out of service to their heart. And paid the price. Loss of heart. Loss of soul. Empty eyes. Empty life.
    
    The wonder is that nothing is more forgiving than heart and soul, and it is never too late to start believing in our heart.
    
    It’s ready right now to carry us into the bout with the dragon. Why not? There is nothing much on TV. The real fun is found in living our own life, giving our heart the reins and saying, “Let’s see what we can do.”
81. Sans Songbird 01 — Bog Garden, Greensboro, NC, April 3, 2013 — The most important photographic equipment are your feet for getting you out of the house to where the photos are.
    
    The most important piece of photographic advice is: “Go! Go! Go!”
    
    You can’t photograph what you don’t see, and you can’t see what you aren’t looking at. So, Go! Look! See!
    
    See?
82. Mallard Landing 03 — Bog Garden, Greensboro, NC, March 30, 2013 — People with no life meddle in the lives of others. Tell other people how to live. Call it religion. Say God told them to do it. It’s a lie.
    
    The Bible—that would be, according to those who use it to their own ends and purposes, the Very Word of God—says, “Thou shalt not remove thy neighbor’s landmark.” And Jesus said, “Man, who made me a judge of you?” and “Don’t be judging one another now, you hear?” (Or words to that effect). God clearly means, “Keep your nose out of other people’s business.”
    
    If it were only so simple! There are people who think everybody ought to be like they are and will stop at nothing to force their way on everyone else. Which leaves everyone else with the problem of how to be safe in a world that is out to get them.
    
    The first rule of survival is Be Neither Offensive Nor Defensive. Just live your life. Just mind your own business. Just do what is yours to do. “When the birds of the air plaster you with their droppings, don’t pause even to wipe it off.”
    
    The second rule of survival is: Know Who Your Friends Are. There is nothing like mutual encouragement and the joy of shared compassion to keep us going. We create small circles of trust where people can be who they are and be honored and respected for it—communities of innocence that have no agenda beyond being a good place to be together for the simple joy of being together.
    
    The third rule of survival is: A Life Grounded In And Lived From The Heart Is Immune To The Turbulence And Heaving Turmoil On The Surface Of The Wine Dark Sea. Return to the source—to the center, the core, of who you are and what you are about—and live from there in responding to each situation as it arises in ways that are suitable and appropriate.
    
    The fourth rule of survival is: Remember To Breathe. Breathing slowly, deeply and consciously is an ever-present path to the core—a return to the truth of who you are, and the still point of the turning world.
83. Cherry Blossoms 07 — Bog Garden, Greensboro, NC, April 3, 2013 — Joseph Campbell said, “One thing that comes out in myths is that at the bottom of the abyss comes the voice of salvation. The black moment is the moment when the real message of transformation is going to come. At the darkest moment comes the light.”
    
    We have to lay everything we have thought to be true on the altar of truth. This is the essence of “Thy will, not mine, be done!” We give up our interpretation of how things are and live to see if they are as hopeless as we think. And then comes the shift, the transformation, the transcendent experience—which can be seen as a turning point or the next step in the work of growing up and realizing how things are is not how we have been told they are, or though, or expected, them to be—which has been called “Enlightenment.”
84. Cormorant Migration — Bog Garden, Greensboro, NC, April 3, 2013 — We have our work to do. It comes down to seeing things as they are and responding to them as only we can.
    
    We have to live soulfully to see and respond in that fashion. Living soulfully is living beyond the boundaries of conventional norms and standards. Seeing how things ARE and doing what needs to be done about them as only we are able, sets us apart from the way things are said to be and are supposed to be done.
    
    You have to be somewhat untamed and outlandish to live like that. That’s why it’s called soulful. Because the soul is like the spirit which is like the wind that blows where it will, when it will, moving through us, transforming the world.
85. Bamboo Leaves B&W — Bog Garden, Greensboro, NC, April 2, 2013 — You cannot be intimate if you will not be vulnerable. You cannot be present if you refuse to be open. Vulnerability is the key to life.
    
    And we think in terms of guns. Too many of us do. Guns are an extension of fortress. Of a castle. Guns keep threatening possibilities at bay. ICBM’s keep them far away.
    
    Give us guns and ICBM’s! Give us impregnable (As if!) fortifications! Give us protection! Arm us all!
    
    Well.
    
    We have to make a choice. Life is vulnerability. We want invincibility.
    
    What do we want?
86. Mallard in Flight 65 — Bog Garden, Greensboro, NC, March 2013 — Know what your work is—and know what it is not. I’m not talking about your job. Your job is what you are paid to do. Your work is what you love to do. Your work is what they couldn’t pay you enough to do if you didn’t love it. Know what that is, and do it.
    
    Your work will lead you to you—which is the destination of all the Heros’ Journeys. We are here to meet up with ourselves and be who we are. Our work is the way to The Way.
    
    Know what you love, and what interferes with what you love, what ridicules what you love, what trashes what you love and shames you for loving it. And, between what you love and what shames you for loving what you love, choose what you love.
    
    Trust what you love. This is the kind of faith that will get you to heaven. Loving what we love is all the heaven we can bear. See how much you can stand.
87. Common Grackle — Bog Garden, Greensboro, NC, March 30, 2013 — Rich people hang out in different places of the world and call that living. Poor people dream of hanging out in different places of the world and think of that as living. Living like rich people live is thought to be living. What is the difference between hanging out and being alive?
    
    I understand the part money has to play in being able to afford to hang out. What part does money play in being alive? Does money have any connection at all in being alive? How alive can we be with no money at all?
    
    What will we do with our life in the time left for living? How will we live what remains of our life? How will that be different from hanging out?
    
    What does it mean to you to be alive? How alive can you be in the time left for living? Upon what does your being alive depend?
88. Used in Short Talks on Contradiction, etc., Sparrow 01 — Bog Garden, Greensboro, NC, April 5, 2013 — Hell is where people try to make things work like they want them to work. Heaven is allowing things to work the way they work.
    
    We confuse what we want to happen with what needs to happen and cannot tell one from the other.
    
    There is no peaceful, contented, serene, happy, tranquil, harmonious steady state of being. There are ephemeral, transient, temporary, passing, short-term experiences which confirm the reality of the good, but the good itself is always coming and going.
    
    Let it come. Let it go. Do your work.
    
    Our work includes bearing the pain of the contradiction of our work, our life, within the context and circumstances of our other life—the life in which we bring forth our LIFE and do our WORK. The contrast can be staggering, overwhelming. Do not let it stop you from doing your work.
    
    We live with dichotomies, polarities, incompatibilities—some of which we can integrate, reconcile, resolve, and some of which we have to live with, bearing the pain of the tension of mutually exclusive truths, and letting it be because it is.
    
    Ah, but. What’s the point? What’s the use? Why try? What good does it do? What are we getting out of it?
    
    This is the truest test of faith. Will you trust yourself to your work? Will you do what needs to be done—what needs you to do it—in the stark absence of profit, payoff, benefit, success or difference? Will you do what is good when it does no good? Whether it does any good or not? Will you believe in your work and do it no matter what?
    
    Will you say to your work, “Thy will, not mine be done,” and do it?
89. April Reflections — Bog Garden, Greensboro, NC, April 1, 2013 — My first three rules for becoming a True Human Being are: 1. See what you look at. 2. Be interested in what interests you. 3. Know what you are talking about.
    
    People are always talking about things as if they know what they are talking about.
    
    What do you know about God that you didn’t get from some other source—including the Bible?
    
    Are you more apt to trust what you know about God out of your own lived experience or what someone tells you about God?
    
    Most of what we hear about God comes from those who heard it from someone else, who heard it from someone else… We have no idea how many times what we hear about God has been passed along by those who didn’t, or don’t, themselves know it to be true, but “took it on good authority.”
    
    It would help if people only passed along what they know to be so out of their own experience—and offered it to their hearers, not as something that should be believed, but as something that might guide them in their own experience.
    
    If you are going to believe anything as an article of faith, believe that your work is valid and worth doing—notwithstanding all apparent evidence to the contrary. If you find your work and stick with it, it will teach you everything you need to know out of your own experience. God things included.
90. Osprey 07 — Hovering at the Bog Garden pond, looking for lunch, Greensboro, NC, April 6, 2013 — Know what your business is, and be about it. We are as scattered—as fragmented—as disoriented as our understanding of our business, what it is and what it is not.
    
    When we are grounded, centered and focused, we are grounded in, centered and focused on, our business.
    
    A cat watching a mouse hole knows what its business is. An Osprey circling a pond or cruising a river knows what its business is. Where are you so concentrated—so at one with what you are about?
    
    We live in two worlds: The world of our business and the world of what we do in order to afford to do our business. The world of our work, our life, and the world where we earn what it takes to pay the bills.
    
    The idea is to live in only two worlds, Too often we live in 10,000 worlds—all of which are important, all of which demand our time and attention, none of which can we do without. And we medicate our children because of their ADD. Their parents are as scattered, fragmented and disoriented. It’s just normal where they live. They would be making failing grades if they weren’t that way.
    
    Who is grading us? Why do we think we have to live with a foot in 10,000 worlds? Who are we kidding?
    
    Two things matter, our business and what we do to pay the bills that allow us to do our business.
    
    In long-ago Japan, people put off their business until they got their children established in their lives and had stabilized their own life to the point where they could narrow their focus to the two important things. They were well past middle age before they could devote themselves to their business and paying the bills their business required. The last half of their life was when they came alive to their business. Part of the first half of their life was spent weeding out the possibilities until their business became clear and they knew what was theirs to do.
    
    It’s a model we would do well to adopt.
91. The Day! The Day! — Bog Garden, Greensboro, NC, April 7, 2013 — Be true to the route! Detours and side trips are always required, and the main road is always the main road. Know what it is, and return to it.
    
    Even when you are off the beam because circumstances require it, remember the beam—and let the new beam be getting back to the beam. And let nothing detract you from that, no matter how winding the trail may be.
92. Used in Short Talks on Contradiction, etc., Goose Landing 02 — Bog Garden, Greensboro, NC, April 7, 2013 — I have spent my entire life, and expect to spend the rest of it, trying to get away from my father—to escape He Who Must Be Yet Cannot Be Pleased. The closest I come to freedom is in the realization that I’m running. When I realize that I’m running, the best I can do is laugh and say, “Yeah, I am.” And keep running.
    
    I would be kidding myself if I stopped running. I have to get away from my father. That is what my life consists of. To stop running would be to, what? I must run with awareness, conscious of the conundrum, laughing at the contradiction that claims my way with life.
    
    Joseph Heller’s masterpiece, “Catch-22,” wonderfully captures the paradox at the heart of my life. Yossarian’s pal Orr, escaped by practicing crashing his plane into the sea—the very thing Yossarian feared the most. There were “Catch-22’s” on all sides throughout Heller’s book. Need I say it? We all find ourselves there. Can we all laugh, say “Yeah,” and go on with our life?
    
    I learned early on that there was no pleasing my father, and stopped trying, but I did not run out of people who had to be pleased yet could not be pleased. My father became a metaphor for all those no one can please, and, in a sense, my savior, because I could say, “Merde (forgive my French), these people can’t be pleased!” and do what I could with my life.
    
    But my life was blocked on every side (Just like Yossarian’s) by people who had to be pleased but could not be, so my life became an escape from my father—who cannot be escaped. It’s great, if you can see the humor in it. Paradox, contradiction, mutually exclusive incompatibilities, etc., form the foundation of our life. Our life is a koan!
    
    We solve the koan, to the extent that it can be solved, by laughing and going on with our life—with our LIFE. We live our LIFE in spite of the mess our other life is. Our art is our salvation.
    
    I escape my father and all of his surrogates when I am taking pictures. The only one I have to please there is me. I live there to please only me—And I can be pleased. With me. With my art. With my work. With my LIFE.
    
    When your life becomes unlivable, instead of opting for suicide, or the slower death of addiction, take up your LIFE and live it—in the midst of the mess your life is. It will amaze you, what a difference your LIFE will make in your life. But don’t take my word for it. Know what you are talking about when you say, “If it weren’t for my LIFE, I would be dead, no deader than dead!”—and come alive in the time left for living!
93. Owl in Flight (April) 01 — Bog Garden, Greensboro, NC, April 8, 2013 — There is you and your life, your LIFE. And there is you and the life you were born into, the life that was handed you at birth. You were born into such-and-such a culture, into such-and-such religion, into such-and-such family—all with standards and norms and ways of doing things, and thinking about things, and believing things. And all the while there is this LIFE that you were born to live, that is dying to be brought to life within the life that awaited you at birth.
    
    Now, as you age, you begin to experience the conflict between the LIFE that is dying to be lived and the life that you are expected to live—between the person you ARE and the person you are expected to be. How do you work it out? How do you live in ways that honor your LIFE, that express who you ARE within the life you were born into and expected to live? This is your problem.
    
    You have to approach it consciously, with awareness, by FEELING your way along. Don’t go blundering about, knocking down walls, desecrating the norms and standards that the world you were born into considers to be sacred and holy. Bear the pain. Be aware of the difference between who you ARE and who you are expected to be. See what occurs to you.
    
    You are the seed in the earth. The seed finds its own way. You don’t have to think it up. Listen to the seed. See what it needs from you. You are here to assist its birth, its emergence, its coming forth—not to just step out of some phone booth (You have to be a certain age, or to have been to the movies, to know what a phone booth is) as some fully developed YOU. You grow into who you are, slowly, over time, by nurturing and nourishing the seed that you ARE within the “earth,” that is the world you were born into.
    
    Bear the pain of living in two worlds at the same time. You grow into who you ARE by being aware of who you ARE and seeing how you can be true to that and bring it forth into the life you were handed at birth. This is the adventure of being alive—of coming to LIFE in the life we are living. Don’t miss it for the world!
94. Two Owls on a Limb 02 — Bog Garden, Greensboro, NC, April 8, 2013 — Being with the pond at the Bog Garden (Officially known as Starmount Farm—or Farms—Lake, but earlier called, I have reason to believe, Benjamin Lake) is like being with the Tao.
    
    Being with anything is like being with the Tao—if you understand “being with” the way I understand being with.
    
    Being with is seeing what you look at. Seeing the thing as it is, which always includes how it also is. Seeing into the way of the thing you are with. Understanding what is before you in the deepest sense, on every level.
    
    When I can be with the Bog pond that way, I am at-one with the pond and with the Tao. It lasts until I become aware of being at-one with the pond and with the Tao, and begin to think, “Isn’t this cool? I have achieved oneness with the Tao. I could do this any time I wanted. I have the power. Wow.” That does it.
    
    The light goes out with the realization that it is on. I am no longer at one with the pond when I begin to admire myself for being at one with the pond—when I begin to think highly of myself. Inflation and deflation—thinking too much of ourselves and thinking too little of ourselves—keep us from being with ourselves, or anything else.
    
    What to do? Nothing. Knowing when to do nothing and how to do it is essential knowing. When to sit with a thing and be with it.
    
    We sit with the inflation. Smile at it. Chuckle. Laugh. Call its game. “You got me again! You are so good at that! But I’m catching you catch me faster than I used to—and I’m even catching myself thinking I’m something special for catching you faster than I used to! You’re still catching me, but you aren’t carrying me off like you once did. So I’m just going to sit here and be with you and see what you have to show me about me…” And we sit with our propensity for inflation (or deflation), opening ourselves to it, becoming aware of it, seeing it, receiving it well, letting it be because it is, becoming one with it, and with the Tao.
95. Mallard in Flight 85 — Bog Garden, Greensboro, NC, April 8, 2013 — If we look even occasionally for a very brief period at our life, you will understand clearly our need for something to offset, counteract, neutralize, soften something else in our life. None of us can make it without a compensating presence to buffer the howling furies that destroy our peace and erode our stability and sanity.
    
    Compensation easily becomes addiction. Escape becomes soulless wandering with empty eyes and an empty life. We have to balance our ballast.
    
    We do it with awareness. We do it by being with our need for an oasis, for a time-out, for time away, for compensation and restitution.
    
    We sit down with how we are on a regular basis and listen. Take stock. Pay attention. To how it is with us.
    
    We put it all on the table. Everything. Again. And consider the table. Again. Listening. Looking. Hearing. Seeing. Knowing the full truth—feeling the full weight—of our life. And trusting our LIFE to come to our rescue.
    
    LIFE saves life. Restores life. Heals life. Nurtures and nourishes life. Brings life to LIFE. We run from our life into our LIFE. And LIVE our way to balance, stability and sanity.
    
    The people who help us offset our life are the people who help us find and live our LIFE. Those are the kind of people we need in our life—the ones who know about LIFE. To live well—to LIVE well—we have to associate with the right kind of people. We have to find the right kind of compensation.
    
    It’s hard. So. We have to do what’s hard.
    
    We do what’s hard or we do it the hard way. That’s the way of The Way that is LIFE.
    
    I’d make it soft and easy for you if I could.
96. Owl in Flight, April 04 — Bog Garden, Greensboro, NC, April 8, 2013 — Being at-one with Benjamin Lake is a matter of being present with it with no preferences, presumptions or opinions—with no ideas of how it should or should not be—interfering with the experience of how things are.
    
    Seeing the pond is being with the pond, and vice versa, without imposing our idea of “pond-ness” on the pond. The just-so-ness of the pond is apparent to those tho observe the pond with no bias, leaning, or penchant for how it ought to be. The such-as-it-is-ness of the pond is there to be seen in any moment by eyes that are not looking for something else.
    
    In tune with the pond, we read the signs that are apparent to anyone who is interested, who cares enough to look with eyes that see—and are able not only to be aware of what is happening, but, based on that, anticipate what is about to happen.
    
    In a group of eight Mallards quacking and swimming around which one, or ones, if any, are likely to fly in the next ten seconds? If you see, you know. If you know, you see.
    
    It takes a lot of looking to see like this—to know what is going to happen because you know what is happening, because you are present with it, and see it. And it takes a certain quality of relaxed concentration, which is easily disrupted by someone wanting to know how long your lens is, or where the Blue Heron is.
    
    It is this “disturbance of the flow,” this “interruption of the Tao,” that makes it impossible for me to go on a photographing safari with someone. Photography, as I practice it, is a solitary preoccupation. It is as much feeling—as much sensing—as seeing. it has nothing to do with imposing my will for the moment on the moment, but everything to do with listening to the moment to see what is trying to come forth there—or is there waiting to be seen and photographed.
    
    All of which is to say, the world is waiting to be seen by those who don’t have a preference or an idea of how it ought to be.
97. Mallard in Flight 48 — Bog Garden, Greensboro, NC, March 20, 2013 — Joseph Campbell said, “We must be willing to let go of the life we planned so as to have the life that is waiting for us to live it.”
    
    He says, “The ultimate backing of life is chance—the chance that your parents met, for example! Chance, or what might seem to be chance, is the means trough which life is realized.”
    
    We have plans and something interferes. We have an accident or an illness, or we meet with some tragedy or disaster, and are forced to lay our plans aside. How do we deal with that? How do we meet it? We might see it as an opportunity to find the life that is waiting for us to live it—the life we would have never imagined if our plans had all fallen into place.
    
    Campbell says, “The problem is not to blame, or explain, (or try to understand why), but to handle the life that arises…The best advice is to take it all as if it had been of your intention—with that, you invoke the participation of your will.”
    
    We become the active force seeking ground and direction for our new life that now is completely unplanned and in the control of pure chance. We seek to find the way through the chaos that is our way, that is calling us, that is whispering our name.
    
    Campbell says, “You learn to recognize the positive values in what appear to be the negative moments and aspects of your life. The big question is whether you are going to be able to say a hearty yes to your adventure—the adventure of being alive.”
    
    And, “You’ve got to say yes to this miracle of life as it is, not on the condition that it follow your rules. Otherwise, you’ll never get through to (the life that is yours to live).”
    
    He says, “Voluntary participation in the world is very different from just getting born into it.” Voluntary participation is stepping into the life that chance appears to deliver to us—the fact that we were born when and where we were born, to the parents we were born to, with the qualities that are ours from birth, and all that has happened to us—and live it as it needs to be lived, in ways that we determine to be suitable, in the active service of the gifts that are ours to give, seeking to take what we have and see what we can do with it, for the good of whomever can benefit from what we have to offer.
98. Owl Perched 01 — Bog Garden, Greensboro, NC, April 9, 2013 — We know more than we know we know. Part of our work is knowing what we know. This does not mean going back to school, listening to lectures, reading books. It means going to sleep. We wake up by going to sleep in the right kind of way.
    
    We put the left hemisphere of our brain to sleep in order to be awake to the right hemisphere. Certain types of meditation can do this. Taking a shower can do it. Long walks can do it.
    
    The Aborigines call the place of sleeping wakefulness “Dreamland.” It is the border between being awake in the sense of carrying out our business in the world of normal, apparent reality, and being sound asleep and snoring.
    
    Dreamland is the threshold between consciousness and unconsciousness. It is where the unconscious world can “breakthrough” to the conscious world—where we can know consciously what we know unconsciously—where we can hear what we have to say.
    
    It takes practice to be there—conscious, intentional, deliberate practice. We have to consciously make ourselves available to the world that is just beyond seeing and hearing, so that we might see and hear what “the other side” would have us know.
    
    This is not a way to exploit the other side to our personal advantage. This is the way of placing ourselves in the service of the other side in a “Thy will, not mine, be done” kind of way.
    
    We collaborate with the other side in producing the life—the LIFE—we are capable of living. Since we have no idea what that is, we have to open ourselves to what the other side knows, and do what the other side needs to be done.
    
    You see how this process could lead to the development of religion, with its theology and doctrine and incense and chants and prayers—but that’s another story. We have to know what we know, and to do that we have to be quiet and listen—we have to quieten the left hemisphere and listen to what the right hemisphere has to say. And then, do what we know needs to be done in order to assist the emergence of our LIFE within the life we are living. This is the adventure of LIFE and LIVING that constitutes the Hero’s Journey.
99. April Morning 01 — Bog Garden, Greensboro, NC, April 10, 2013 — We live in a culture, which has become the predominant culture of the world, that values thinking, reason, logic and cognition over instinct, intuition, sensing and feeling. The left hemisphere of our brain has triumphed over the right hemisphere, to the loss of all. We have to get the right side of our brain involved in our life.
    
    Here’s your homework assignment: Do an internet/Google search for information about the right side of our brain, particularly about how to activate the right hemisphere and utilize it in the day-to-day business of living. Think your way into feeling!
    
    It’s the critical key to bringing your LIFE to life in your life in the time left for living.
100. Goose Landing 03 — Bog Garden, Greensboro, NC, April 7, 2013 — It’s like dying—No, it IS dying—to hand over your idea for your life, your plans and dreams and happy fantasies, and take up instead, your LIFE’s idea for you. We can’t just do that because somebody tells us to. It has to be taken from us.
     
     We have to hit the wall, or several of them. We have to suffer losses. We have to amass defeats and be steamrolled by tragedy and despair. Here’s what Joseph Campbell has to say about this:
     
     ”Igjugarjuk was the shaman of a Caribou Eskimo tribe in northern Canada, the one who told European visitors that the only true wisdom ‘lives far from mankind, out in the great loneliness, and can be reached only through suffering. Privation and suffering alone open the mind to all that is hidden to others.’”
     
     Suffering strips us of our idea for our life so that we might be open to our LIFE and take up the adventure that is ours. Here’s what Campbell says about that:
     
     ”The big question is whether you are going to be able to say a hearty yes to your adventure—the adventure of being alive.” And, “The adventure that the hero is ready for is the one he gets. The adventure is really a manifestation of his character…The adventure (evokes) a quality of his character that he (didn’t know) he possessed.”
     
     We have to “voluntarily participate in”—say YES to—the way life is—NOT the way we wish life were. Yet, we cannot volunteer our participation in life on life’s terms until our back is against the wall and it is only us and the abyss. THEN we can take a chance on life, on our LIFE, if we have the heart for it.
     
     The greatest trial the hero faces on her, on his, journey is at the beginning—with the decision to take it up: “Thy will, not mine, be done.” It’s like dying—NO! It IS dying! Remember, Jesus didn’t say these words lightly, at the end of some prayer for a new pair of shoes, “If it be thy will.” He said it from the depths of agony, handing over his idea for his life and taking on his life’s idea for him. As it was with him, so it is with everyone who has the heart to trust themselves to the abyss—with their hand in the hand of their LIFE.
101. Floating in Air B&W — Bog Garden, Greensboro, NC, April 8, 2013 — The single most important step in the direction of the way that is your way for you is learning to feel your feelings. Your feelings express your instinct and intuition, and are your contact point with the other world. And your feelings are a squirming mass of crazy impulses and chaotic reactivity. It takes thinking about it to know what to do. And it takes feeling your feelings—knowing what you know—to know what to think about.
     
     Is there any wonder that people throughout the ages have opted for easy religion (even that brand of easy religion that required hard things of them, like the sacrifice of their first born sons), with priests and parsons telling them what to think and do, and saving them the trouble of figuring it out for themselves?
     
     The Hero’s Journey is in the hero’s hands. She doesn’t take orders from someone else. He doesn’t carefully obey the norms and standards of his day. The hero listens to her, to his, feelings and thinks about which are the white rabbits and which are the red herrings and which are the wild geese. Regular people don’t have time for this kind of nonsense. That’s why there are so few heroes.
     
     Are you going to learn to feel your feelings, or not?
102. Osprey Silhouette B&W — Bog Garden, Greensboro, NC, April 7, 2013 — Salvation is restoration, is being restored to ends worthy of us.
     
     We save ourselves by submitting to the work that is ours to do—to the work that must be done and only we can do it. It’s the work, of course, that saves us, but our role is to acquiesce, to participate, to join in as full collaborators in the production of who we are.
     
     We save ourselves when we stop trying to have it our way, and get out of the way, and affirm the rightness of the way that is our way but nothing like anything we would dream up on our own. We save ourselves when we allow ourselves to be saved by that which can restore us to the truth of who we are and what is ours to do.
     
     We save ourselves when we cooperate in the realization and actualization of the gifts that are ours to give and the work that is ours to do.
     
     We save ourselves when we square ourselves up with the way things are and do what we can do about it and let that be that.
     
     We save ourselves when we wake up, grow up, get up and do what needs to be done with the gifts, interests and abilities that are ours to bring forth—even as they bring us forth—as a blessing and grace upon all of life.
103. Geese on the Wing 06 — Bog Garden, Greensboro, NC, April 11, 2013 — The spiritual journey, quest, begins with the need to know more than the physical world can tell us. Where is meaning to be found? Who am I?
     
     The physical world can provide the wherewithal for life, but it cannot provide us with a zest and passion for life, purpose, direction and the will to live.
     
     The physical world can feed our bodies but not our souls. Soul is invisible, yet real. When we loose heart we have lost something that is more real than anything that has mass and takes up space, can be weighed, measured, counted and shown off.
     
     The ground of life is the invisible world! We need more than money can buy! There is no consolation for those who have lost connection with that which cannot be seen, touched, smelled, heard or tasted.
     
     What feeds our soul? What speaks to our heart? We need to increase our level of association with these things.
     
     We live to be who we are! How does what we are doing enable us to be who we are? Keep us from being who we are? Start doing more of what brings you to life and less of what prevents you from being alive.
104. DUCDB? SICDB! — Bog Garden, Greensboro, NC, April 11, 2013 — The physical world points to the invisible world. You cannot live in this world long, with your eyes open, and be unaware of the other world. You cannot see anything as it is and not know there is more to everything than meets the eye.
     
     In all of the primal societies, the invisible world was understood to be the foundation of the visible world. Then came “man come of age,” and it all went to hell. “Man come of age” is man obsessed with his own importance, so that even woman is relegated to the category of insignificance.
     
     You can’t think you are the foundation of anything and have any sense of the foundation of everything.
     
     Money, and the quest for money, is the great buffer, the great source of static, jamming the signals coming to us from the invisible world, interfering with our awareness of the More that is the basis of our life.
     
     Wealth and the aspiration for more wealth is the basis of our life. With enough money (Which is an article of faith with out any actual, quantifiable, reality. There is never Enough money), all our needs will be taken care of and our problems will be solved. We will buy whatever we want.
     
     We look at everything and wonder how much it costs, and don’t see anything more than its price tag. As the culture of prosperity, we have lost the ability to see beyond buying, spending, amassing and consuming. We have lost our soul.
     
     The way back to soul is the way of knowing our desolation and realizing our place in the right order of things. Of course, this is like dying—No! It IS dying to the world we have created in order to be alive to the world that created us—and it is easier by far to turn back to thinking about how happy we will be with our next major purchase, or the ones we will make when our ship comes in.
105. Mallard in Flight 91 — Bog Garden, Greensboro, NC, April 12, 2013 — It’s important to know where the lines are—the ones you can live outside of and the ones you can’t—the ones you draw and the ones that are drawn by the circumstances within which you live.
     
     It is important to know where the lines are and to say about them, “These are the constraints within which I live.”
     
     And live there as a voluntary participant in the unfolding, in the expression, of your life there, within the constraints which bind you and hem you in.
106. Tulip Magnolia 01 — Bog Garden, Greensboro, NC, April 12, 2013 — The problem with listening to ourselves is that we develop interior anti-us voices that encourage us to take chances and then condemn us for being reckless. There are inclinations within which are not on our side, but are impossible to distinguish from the guides who would lead us to being who we are.
     
     Here’s the work-a-round: All roads lead to the center, the core, “the still point of the turning world”—when followed in the spirit of taking what every experience has to offer and using it as grist for the mill that grinds the wheat that makes the flour that produces the loaf we are.
     
     There are no dead ends—nothing is wasted—for those who see everything as offering the very thing that is most needed at that particular point in our life. “Where you stumble and fall,” said Joseph Campbell, “there is the treasure.”
     
     Nothing can happen to us that cannot be used in the development and expression of who we are. So, get in there and do your thing to the best of your ability to discern and express it—and let every experience improve your ability to discern and express who you are until there is nothing but you as you are for all to delight in and enjoy.
107. Mr. Owl 01 — Bog Garden, Greensboro, NC, April 9, 2013 — There is an inner world that is as real, deep and varied as the outer world of normal, apparent reality. Soul, or psyche (the Greek word means “soul”), is the truest thing about us. It’s as true as it gets. We stray from that truth when we think we can create a better life, an easier life, a life that is more pleasurable and less work using the materials found in the outer world.
     
     We know what we are doing. We don’t have to listen to soul, or psyche. And so, we create the wasteland that has become the world we know as the only world. We escape the wasteland by entering the wilderness.
     
     The wilderness is alive with soul, but we do not know the way of soul, the way to soul, and so it seems like a jungle to us. We turn back in panic and terror to the wasteland, and live lives that are empty but safe, meaningless but manageable with enough of the things that entertain us for a while but do not satisfy—distracted from the need to find our way on our own to the heart of life and being.
     
     The first test is the test of faith. Will we trust ourselves to soul to lead us to soul? Will we take a chance—no, will we risk everything to find something of value, which, of course, would be ourselves, our own life, our own gift, our own genius and destiny?
     
     We are the gold we seek, the treasure the dragon guards, and it is our task to get what is ours and become who we are. That is the spiritual quest, the hero’s journey, through the wilderness to the Grail Castle, the Promised Land, our own doorstep, our own house.
108. Two Owls K-I-S-S-I-N-G!!! — Bog Garden, Greensboro, NC, April 13, 2013 — We come into the world knowing that we have an “inner personal life” (The quote marks enclose the words of Marie-Louise von Franz, though I am using them out of context, but in the spirit of what she actually said)–that we trust explicitly and entirely “rely on (our) personal inner psychological knowledge”—and on “anything (our) objective soul might tell (us).”
     
     We are separated from this innate knowing by the culture’s preference for facts and logical, rational, approaches to orientation and direction in the world of normal, apparent, reality—and it’s complete distrust of anything akin to instinct and intuition.
     
     We have to get back to “the face that was ours before we were born.”
     
     Begin to honor the inner world with kindness, compassion and attention. Consult the inner knower/guide and learn to read on bodily shifts (the part of your body that lets you know when something is right or wrong) as signals from your deep self. Attend your dreams over time and see how they may be complimenting or compensating for your tilts and drift in your waking life. Initiate an ongoing conversation with your inner partner, and allow your life to become a collaborative effort between you and the other you. And see where it goes.
109. Owl Perched 02 — Bog Garden, Greensboro, NC, April 13, 2013 — The Dali Lama is as awake as the Dali Lama can be. You have to be as awake as you can be. The Dali Lama does his own work. You have to do your own work. The single greatest impediment to our own development is our propensity to want someone else to do it for us.
     
     We want to read books about the way, listen to lectures about the way, watch movies about the way, copy someone else’s way. We do not want to find our own way through the jungle of the wilderness that is alive with the wonder of life and being—where even wrong turns turn out to be right. We just want to be there, now.
     
     We just want somebody to tell us what to do—and we do not want to hear “Blaze your own trail through the wild places!”
     
     Alan Watts asked Joseph Campbell, “Joe, what form does your yoga take?” Campbell replied, “I underline passages.”
     
     You can’t do it like Alan Watts did it and have a chance. You can’t do it like Joseph Campbell did it. You have to do it like you do it.
     
     The disciples must become like the master in following no master.
     
     You cannot go hang out with the Dali Lama and have anything transfer from him to you. You would be following someone else’s black footprints. You cannot reject the black footprints the culture hands you and accept the black footprints the Dali Lama hands you. “No Black Footprints!” has to be your mantra. “I’ll stumble around on my own and make my own way, thank-you!”
     
     Jesus did it the way Jesus would do it. You have to do it the way YOU would do it. The best authorities say nothing. The second best authorities say, “Here’s what I have to say but don’t listen to me past getting ideas for how to do it on your own.” The worst authorities tell you how to do it.
110. Mr. Owl 02 — Bog Garden, Greensboro, NC, April 13, 2013 — The push to get it right, do it right, be right is wrong. The idea is to be awake, not to be right.
     
     What’s right is always changing. Wine was out and butter was in with my grandmother. Little did she know how time would alter the in’s and the out’s.
     
     If you are awake and take a wrong turn you can find things that are right about it, in Campbell’s sense of “Where you stumble and fall, there is the treasure.”
     
     This isn’t to say that being awake is about turning everything to our advantage—exploiting whatever comes our way. It is to say that when we are awake, we fit into the situation as it develops for the good of the situation—which also includes our good, but not as the determining, limiting, factor.
     
     Our good flows with the good of the whole, and it can surprise us. We never see some good coming. We resist it, avoid it, run from it—and it is the very thing we need most.
     
     Waking up opens us to the good of the most outlandish possibilities. Things that were so wrong become right when seen with eyes that see.
     
     When we see things as they are, we are able to live with them in ways that are right because they come forth from the situation—not because we impose them on the situation in serving some artificial, disconnected, notion of how things should be.
111. Ms. Owl 01 — Bog Garden, Greensboro, NC, April 14, 2013 — We are playing to some crowd. We are always looking to please some of those who are looking at us. It is essential that we play to the right crowd—that we please the right crowd!
     
     A lot of times in my 40+ years of ordained ministry (Presbyterian Church U.S.A.) I was preaching to people who weren’t there. I was preaching to a different crowd. I was preaching to those who could hear what I was saying.
     
     Jesus did the same thing. And the prophets. And the Buddha. And Lao Tzu. And every poet worthy of the title.
     
     What’s the point of telling people what they expect to hear? They could do that well themselves. Say what’s worth saying, I say—what needs to be said. To do that, you have to talk to those who aren’t there. You have to play to a different crowd.
     
     Playing to the right crowd pulls the best out of us—requires us to speak of the truth of our experience. We can’t just parrot what someone else has said and get by with it if we are playing to the right crowd. We can’t just do what everyone agrees is the right thing to do if we are playing to the right crowd.
     
     The right crowd requires more than the fat center of the normal distribution curve. The right crowd is out there on the fringe, cheering you on. Play to them. They will call you forth and require you to be who you are.
112. Owl in Flight A 09 — Bog Garden, Greensboro, NC, April 13, 2013 — Don’t have to know what you are going to do about every detail of life. “If that, then this,” will consume you, and you are no better off for working out all the scenarios, because there is always some hidden factor that cannot be taken into account.
     
     Surprise yourself. Wait to see what you will do—wait until you find yourself doing something and say something on the order of, “Aha! So this is what I’ll do!”
     
     This tendency of ours to worry what we will do into being has its roots in our wanting to be right, get it right, do it right—AND to be free of it hanging over us, what to do. To disappear it, we think we have to decide what we are going to do. Here’s the solution to that: Decide that you will wait to see what you will do when the time comes for action. THAT’s what you are going to do about it.
     
     Spend the time you freed up not worrying about what you are going to do, looking and listening. Paying attention. Noticing what is happening and what happens in response to what is happening. Become an acute observer of life as it happens all around you. Walk through the world seeing the world.
     
     Seeing is the foundation of action. When we see what is happening and what needs to be done about it, we know what to do. When we see what is happening, we know what is likely to happen, and we know what to do about it—if there is anything to be done about it.
     
     In the Bog Garden, seeing what the ducks are doing tells me what the ducks are about to do. Seeing/hearing is knowing. Knowing is doing/responding. If you want to know what to do, learn to see/hear by looking/listening.
     
     If you want to know what to do about anything, observe everything. It is the sure path to enlightened living.
113. Mallard in Flight 95 — Bog Garden, Greensboro, NC, April 2013 — We bear the murder and maiming of innocents in Boston with sadness and grief—and ache for ways of being with one another that ensure safety and well-being for all. Would that it were so! May we do what we can imagine doing to make it so!
114. The Owl’s Bath 01 — Bog Garden, Greensboro, NC, April 16, 2013 — We live within the constraints that constrain us. We can erase those that can be erased (Like gay marriage, for instance), and shift those that can be shifted (Like Daylight Savings Time, for instance), but we have to find ways adjusting ourselves to, and living with, the rest.
     
     We all have to accommodate ourselves to the disparity between how things are and how we want them to be. A relatively successful accommodation is called “growing up.” A relatively unsuccessful accommodation is called “neurosis,” and “addiction.”
     
     Everything is a compromise, a trade-off. We give up this for that. We can’t live in this world without paying a price. Jim’s rule here is: Pay the fare and ride the ride!
     
     We live with constraints. So, LIVE with constraints. Do not let the constraints keep you from living!
     
     Enjoy everything that is to be enjoyed in your life right now, just as it is. Relish everything that is to be relished. Love everything that is to be loved. LIVE. Your. Life. Right here. Right now.
     
     Do not hold it against life that things are not as you wish they were. So far as we know, this is your one chance at being alive—do not throw it away because it isn’t what you wanted. LIVE the life that can be lived within the constraints and limitations of the life you are living.
     
     Starting now.
     
     Do not put it off. Do not fail to do what you can do to be alive within the context and circumstances of the life you are living. See which constraints can be erased. See which ones can be shifted. See what you can do with life in the time and place of your living while time lasts.
115. Pink Dogwood 06 — Greensboro, NC, April 16, 2013 — Your life is an ink blot. Everything is projection. Your relationship with your sister-in-law is your relationship with you. Your relationship with your lover? It also is your relationship with you. Your horse, your skillet, your dust cloth? Your relationship with you.
     
     We see in others what we fear, hate, love, need in ourselves.
     
     Our relationship with ourselves is our primary relationship. The logical, reasoning, realizing, understanding, thinking-knowing, seeing, hearing, doing (the left hemisphere) side of us is here to tend, serve, guard, protect, defend, honor, respect and care for the sensing, intuiting, instinctive, feeling-knowing (the right hemisphere) side of ourselves.
     
     We forget what we are here for. We think we are here for our own joy and pleasure. We are here for our soul’s (the right hemisphere’s—whether the right hemisphere IS our soul or the threshold, the connector, to our soul is a mute point and doesn’t matter. It makes no difference since we cannot tell the two apart) joy and pleasure—and go off in pursuit of our own delight.
     
     But, soul will not be put off, and spends the time it could be doing its thing through us, trying to wake us up to its need of us and our responsibility to it. We owe our soul our allegiance and loyalty, and soul will die trying to get us back in right relationship with it.
     
     So, soul sends us messages in the form of nighttime dreams and daytime fears and passions—all about what we need to bring to life in our relationship with soul. True to form, we misinterpret the messages and think our sister-in-law is our sister-in-law and our lover is our lover, etc., and do not see what is at stake between our thinking self and our feeling self.
     
     You like your lover for his/her tenderness, attentiveness, authenticity? Because you can be safe, vulnerable, intimate and real? Your soul needs those things from you. You must become the lover of your soul.
     
     You hate your sister-in-law’s invasive, self-centered, obnoxious insistence that everything revolve around her? That’s how your soul feels about your relegation of soul to the back burner of your life.
     
     Begin to look at everything you feel strongly about as a doorway to your soul—as a message from your soul to you regarding your relationship with your soul. It will change the way you look at things. And restore essential harmonies. And put you on the right track to you.
116. Owl Drinks 01 — Bog Garden, Greensboro, NC, April 16, 2013 — We have to tend the side of ourselves we are unaware of, unconscious of, if we are going to be reconciled and at-one with ourselves. Part of the work of the Hero’s Journey is making the unconscious conscious—by paying attention to the things that bring the unconscious to life.
     
     Strong emotion suggests unconscious connections. Our place is to wake up to what those connections might be. To get to the bottom of things. When we get to the bottom of things, there we are.
     
     Whenever we feel stirred, moved, the unconscious is trying to get our attention. Sit with the situation and see what comes to light.
     
     Whenever there is a block—a place we are stuck—encounter something we cannot bring ourselves to do, sit with the situation and see what comes to light.
     
     Whenever we feel iffy, ambivalent, uncertain—or when we get the Uh-oh Feeling—sit with the situation and see what comes to light.
     
     As we attend our soul, we learn to read our soul, we know how things are with our soul and how we need to adjust our living to be in synch with soul. But don’t think that means we have it made. There is a Cyclops at every turn. And, on most of the straight ways.
117. Owl Sees Owl — Bog Garden, Greensboro, NC, April 16, 2013 — Carl Jung said, “The reason for evil in the world is that people are not able to tell their stories.”
     
     We have to tell our story. We cannot tell our story without hearing our story as we tell it—without saying what happened and what happened in response and what impact it had on us and how we felt and what we thought and what was important and who we became in response to what was happening in our life. Or not happening.
     
     We have to tell our story. We have to say what is ours to say—because we have to hear it. An untold story is a life that was lived but not experienced. We have to articulate our life to experience it. We have to say it to see it. Feeling the impact of our life without words to tell what happened and what we felt is like carrying a secret—a terrible, heavy, secret—which we cannot remember, but we carry its weight and the ache of its presence.
     
     When we tell our story, we interpret our experience. We say what happened and what it meant to us—what it means to us—that it happened. And we do not have to use words.
     
     We can act it out. Dance it out. Paint it out. Sculpt it out. Sing it out. Piano it out. Drum it out… We have to express our story. We have to tell it in some fashion. We have to bring it to life.
     
     In bringing our life to life in story, song, dance, drawing, etc., we save our life and our life saves us. It brings us to life as we bring it to life, and know what it is that we have lived.
     
     Tell your story. Express your story. Connect with your story. Know what it means that you have lived.
118. Used in Short Talks on Contradiction, etc., Rabbit’s View — Bog Garden, Greensboro, NC, April 17, 2013 — We are not one we are two. We are not two, we are many. We are legion. We are a mixed bag. A real mess. And, it is up to us to straighten us out—not in a dominating fashion, but in way that is characterized by compassion, mercy, grace and peace.
     
     We see, hear, understand, reconcile, integrate, make whole—as we uncover conflict, expose contradiction, reveal discrepancies, detect polarities, engage opposition, meet with resistance, and make all of it conscious.
     
     We bring the healing light of awareness to bear upon all that is discordant, chaotic, unsynchronized and out of alignment about us.
     
     Rumi’s poem “The Guesthouse,” epitomizes the work that is ours to do. The internet will bring it to you. Read it. Reflect on it. Incorporate it into your way with you.
     
     Our work is to live together with ourselves for the good of the whole and for the good on one another. Our idea of good is going to be transformed. And of evil.
     
     Forget everything you have heard about good and evil. Good is what needs to be done in light of what is suitable for the whole—within and without. Evil is what needs not to be done.
     
     Good people cannot be ignorant people, asleep people, unaware people. “Father forgive them, they know not what they do,” enables them to go on being blind, deaf and dumb. “They are good people—they just don’t know what they are doing,” is no excuse. Good people know what they are doing—and know more about what they are doing as time goes by.
     
     Good people wake up, see what they are doing, and do something else instead. Bad people have no interest in waking up. They are here to serve their own agenda no matter what. How good, and how bad, are the best of us?
     
     We sit with how things are, with us and without, until we see into the heart of the matter, all matters, and know how it is with us, and how it also is—and do the work of bringing peace and healing, and making whole.
119. Owl Bathing 03 — Bog Garden, Greensboro, NC, April 16, 2013 — My bud Chris and I are thinking our way through creating a Circle of Elders to counterbalance the drift of the culture, and provide a grounding connection with meaning, purpose and focus for those who are lost amid bewildering options.
     
     Our idea of a Circle of Elders would be composed of those who are immune to the culture’s fascination with wealth and privilege by virtue of a life experience which has awakened them to true value, disclosed to them what is important, and enabled them to live in light of what matters most through all the claims and promises of the religion of commerce, advertising and economic development.
     
     Two of our initial requirements for membership in the Circle would be the ability to answer three questions, “What do you know to be of value that you did not hear of from some other source? What experience(s) led you to understand the importance of what you know to be valuable?”
     
     And, “Can you provide the names of three people who can verify that you have a loving relationship with at least one living thing?” In other words, “What evidence can provide to establish that you care for something that is alive in ways that are loving?”
     
     The Circle of Elders would have a lived knowledge of heart and soul—would understand the necessity of living in ways that express one’s allegiance to heart and soul—and would know that heart and soul are not for sale, and could not be bribed to forsake heart and soul for anything that money can buy.
     
     The Circle would gather as small groups of three or four on a regular basis—though not necessarily the same three or four—to tell their stories and remind each other of what they all know to be so in a culture that would have them forget that, would distract them from it and have them dismiss it in 10,000 ways.
     
     In sustaining and encouraging each other to live in light of what they know to be important, the Circle would help to call us forth into the life that is truly our life to live—and call into question all of the false values the culture espouses as worthy of us—and serve, in some small way, as the conscience of the nation and the world.
     
     We would love for each of you to join what is not yet a movement by drawing together your own Circle of Elders and see where it goes.
120. Light, Limbs and Leaves 01 — Bog Garden, Greensboro, NC, April 18, 2013 — Life is lived on a level apart from what we can buy, spend, amass and consume. Life consists of seeing, hearing, understanding, knowing, doing, being.
     
     The world we live in requires us to not-see, not-hear, not-understand, not-know, not-do and not-be. We live in a world of denial and entertainment, of techno-gizmos, texting and video games—a world that keeps us from seeing by showing us exciting stuff.
     
     How do we grow up in a world that doesn’t recognize the need for life past adolescence? Where everybody is sixteen forever? Where nobody thinks anything that isn’t thought by everybody else?
     
     Where do we go to wake up?
121. Owl Sees Owl 02 — Bog Garden, Greensboro, NC, April 16, 2013 — The owl is a feathered Buddha. If the leaf blower comes along blowing pollen from the boardwalk, or a photographer’s flash becomes intrusive, the owl flies away without losing its composure or moaning, “Poor me! Poor me!”. If its current perch lends itself to no meal, it flies to another perch, without lamenting its plight or wondering “Why me? Why me?” No Eeyore here.
     
     Here is the situation. This is what I can do about it. And that’s that. No energy wasted on castigating itself for not being a better hunter, or a better mate, or a better owl.
     
     I’ve tried to apply the owl’s approach to my own life. If I wander away from the owl or the hope of flying ducks to photograph blooming things in the Bog Garden, I switch the settings on my camera to adjust for still, shady shots. More often than I like to admit, when I walk back to the owl or ducks, I forget to change the settings to accommodate owl and duck shots. I press the shutter and get one click and not a series of 4.5 clicks a second. It makes a difference.
     
     The owl would just change the settings and hope for another opportunity, with no remonstrations or protests about my shortcomings and failures as a photographer and a person. I pretend I’m the owl and The Mood doesn’t have an opening.
     
     You know The Mood I mean. The one that would fling the camera in to the mud at the bottom of the lake and sulk its way to an early grave. Humans do that kind of thing to themselves, not owls.
     
     The next time you go to the grocery store and forget the milk and eggs and have to go back? Just go back. Be the owl.
122. Lift Off — Bog Garden, Greensboro, NC, April 19, 2013 — Nothing is only what it is. Everything is more than we can imagine. There is more to all of it than meets the eye. The call, the challenge, to us from everything we see is: “Look deeper!”
     
     The deeper we look, the more of ourselves we see, looking back at us.
     
     When we explore the numinous, we meet ourselves. We are numinousity awaiting recognition. There is a depth to each of us that matches the depth of all things. There is a symbolic aspect of matter which carries the awakening traveler on a sacred journey to the heart of things. The physical world is a threshold to spiritual reality—which is beyond concepts and doctrine, and lives to smile and wink at us in a realm of more than words can say.
     
     The closest we come to saying what’s what is in music and poetry, dance and the arts. Mandalas do it as well as it can be done. Photographs are rectangular mandalas, probing a truth beyond words, beyond realization, yet thoroughly capable of being known. But then, everything does the same thing for eyes that see, that look beyond the obvious, beyond the surface, to what all is there, looking back. Smiling. Winking.
123. Red Shouldered Hawk 01 — Bog Garden, Greensboro, NC, April 19, 2013 — Taking stock, assessing our situation, is more about feeling than thinking. We have to feel the rightness or the wrongness of and act and the time for it to be done.
     
     One time is not as good as another. The most important skill is the ability to tell time. The most important thing to know is what time it is. Not in terms of clock and calendar, but in terms of what needs to happen in the present circumstances of our life.
     
     What is it time for? What fits? What does not belong? You know when it is time for cup of coffee, and you know when you have had enough coffee. What is the equivalent of a cup of coffee in each moment of your life? What is needed here, now? What is out of place?
     
     We do not think our way to the answers. We feel our way there.
     
     Practice becoming conscious of what you are feeling. Give your feelings the reins. See where they take you. How does it feel to think about trusting your feelings? If you are afraid to trust your feelings, you are trusting your feelings about not trusting your feelings. So, since you are going to trust your feelings either way, trust them with the reins.
     
     You know more than you know you know. Spend the rest of your life finding how much more you know than you know you know. I promise it will be a very interesting and meaningful way to spend the time left for living. Where are you going to go to beat interesting and meaningful?
124. Showy Orchid 01 — Forsyth County, NC, April 20, 2012 — We have everything we need to live the life that is ours to live—the life that needs us to live it. We waste our time and the resources available to us trying to live some other life instead.
     
     When we wake up, we wake up to the gap between what we are doing and what we need to be doing—and do the things necessary to close the gap.
     
     A life that is interesting, meaningful and fulfilling is only a perspective shift away.
     
     What are we waiting for?
125. Cooper’s Hawk 01 — Bog Garden, Greensboro, NC, April 21, 2013 — I think the term “prayer” means the same thing as the phrase “one with the Tao.” To pray is to be one with the Tao, to be one with the Tao is to “pray without ceasing”—it is a way of life, a way of being. If you are going to make anything your practice, make it this.
     
     Ah, but. It will change your life. Not what we have in mind.
     
     We would like a little spiritual flavoring in a life that runs like we want it to run. We do not want to know what it means to pray, “Thy will, not mine, be done” (It means to be one with the Tao). We want to ask for something and get it, instantly would be preferred—next day delivery would be acceptable. Anything else is out of the question.
     
     We want to pray to be healed when we get sick. We don’t want to alter the way we are living to avoid being sick.
     
     We want to pray for our knees to stop hurting. We don’t want to lose weight.
     
     We have no intention of being one with the Tao ever. We just want our life to run like we want it to run. None of this “Thy will, not mine, be done” for us!
     
     We are standing in our own way, blocking the way to The Way With Our Name On It, to the Life That Is Our Life To Live—to Meaning, Fulfillment, Wholeness and Oneness with the Heart of Life and Being.
     
     We think prayer is ordering up life like we want it to be. Prayer is transforming life into what it needs to be—whether we like it or not.
126. Cooper’s Hawk 02 — Bog Garden, Greensboro, NC, April 21, 2013 — Our life is our work, our art, our gift—the gift we bring forth and offer to the world. Our life exhibits and expresses—makes real, makes plain—who we are. “What we do is who we are,” said Carl Jung, “not what we say we will do.”
     
     It takes reflection, introspection, examination, attentive presence, to align our living with our values, so that how we live is who we intend to be.
     
     A well-lived life is no accident. We become who we are by meaning to be who we are—by being aware of who we are and aligning our life with what we know of who that is.
     
     We have to sit with ourselves, listen to ourselves, see ourselves, know ourselves, love ourselves in order to live aligned with ourselves and bring ourselves forth in the life we are living.
     
     Who we are is not ours to wish into being. It is ours to see, hear, understand, know, do, be. We do not get to write the script of our life. We do not choose to be who we are—except by choosing to be who we are with no say in the matter, in a “Thy will, not mine, be done,” kind of way.
     
     We have to have what it takes to step into the life that is waiting for us to live it—and live it with all our heart, and soul, and mind and strength. In that, there be miracles, and wonder, and magic beyond imagining. But, you have to chance it to know what I’m talking about.
127. Love Birds 01 — Bog Garden, Greensboro, NC, April 21, 2013 — I’ve watched owls and ducks closely and regularly for four months. I see them make decisions about where to fly when it’s time to fly. I know when they are going because I know the cues that tell me they are deciding where to go.
     
     They aren’t thinking, weighing advantages and disadvantages, adding up the pluses and minuses, the pros and cons. They are feeling: Yes? No? Right? Wrong? They are guided by feelings, not logic and reasoning.
     
     This doesn’t mean they are always right. When they feel wrong about what they felt was right, they make corrections all along their flight—guided by their sense of what is suitable.
     
     Feelings are a way of knowing things we cannot possibly know. So, when you come upon a problem you cannot possibly know how to resolve, feel your feelings. You could do worse. You’ve done worse. See what your feelings can do when your brain doesn’t have a thing to say.
128. Mallard In Flight 97 — Bog Garden, Greensboro, NC, April 18, 2013 — If it hadn’t been for me showing up regularly at the Bog Garden to photograph flying ducks, I would never have met the owl. This is the way of things. We stumble onto the treasure on the way to the treasure. The treasure that calls us forth from the normal routines of life is not the only treasure, and we are expanded, deepened, transformed by finding more than we were seeking.
     
     It all starts with some white rabbit winking at us and hopping round a corner or down a hole. Will we follow? The answer to that question tells the tale.
129. Cardinal A 01 — Bog Garden, Greensboro, NC, April 22, 2013 — It is important to believe in what you do. It is also important to know it if you do not believe in what you do.
     
     We may have to do what we do not believe in. I had to take Organic Chemistry and Algebra. I had to file new library books in a card catalog. I had to mow the lawn. The list is long.
     
     Knowing that we do not believe in what we do frees us to do what we have to do and look for the things we can do wholeheartedly. I got through Algebra thinking about fishing.
     
     We have to know where our heart is—what it is in and what it is not in. And we have to give our heart what it loves—as often as we can, for as long as we are able.
130. Great Blue Heron A 01 — Bog Garden, Greensboro, NC, April 22, 2013 — We are here to assist one another on the way from death to life. The trick with that trip is that we have to die to make it.
     
     Waking up is dying. Seeing is dying. Hearing is dying. Understanding is dying.
     
     Back when I was doing Easter sermons (And this one is in the collection of pod casts on my web page. It would have been Easter of 2010. You’ll have to look it up if you want to listen. Just remember: Hearing is dying), I used a large ceramic egg with a dragon breaking out as a metaphor for Easter.
     
     No more happy bouncy Easter Bunnies with their brightly colored hard-boiled Easter Eggs for the little children to find under leaves or laying about on the lawn. Easter is for dying. First death, then resurrection.
     
     The New Life In Christ (I prefer “As Christ” because that’s what is required—Christ didn’t do anything FOR us except show us the way that winds through Gethsemane and across the face of Golgotha, get it, to death, then life) will eat our old life alive. It’s a dragon in the Easter Egg. Don’t be hatching the thing if you don’t have what it takes to take what comes when it comes out of the shell, drooling, with its eyes on you.
     
     In order to assist one another on the way from death to life, we begin with death. We invite one another to die. To wake up and die.
     
     The way we have been told things are is not the way things are. Realizing this is the worst kind of dying. No. It gets worse. Handing over all we have been told is important, of value, is the worst kind of dying. No. It gets worse. Giving up our idea of how life is and should be is the worst kind of dying: “My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?” We have to know in our bones what that means. Our idea of God has to go.
     
     And then, out of the crumbling ruins of how we thought things were, we have to put together a new way of life. Call it “Living at one with the Tao.” With the Tao that cannot be said, told, explained, indoctrinated, conceived, understood, concocted. We have to live with the wind of the Spirit that blows where it will forever in our hair, not knowing where we are going or what we are doing on the road to life. And, that too, is like dying.
     
     And we are here to assist one another on the way from death to life, because none of us has what it takes to make the trip alone.
131. Heron Landing — Bog Garden, Greensboro, NC, April 22, 2013 — The best trick to master in the whole book of tricks is that of being present with what is present with you. There is a psychic-spiritual-soulful-field of which we are mostly unconscious that connects every living thing, maybe everything (What do I know? Or any of us?)–which we can sense, glimpse, intuit, divne, discern with the right frame of mind.
     
     The right frame of mind is called “being one with the Tao.” Master that and you see things that are invisible to the rest of the humans in the room. The cats are onto it, and the dogs.
132. Heron in Flight 03 — Bog Garden, Greensboro, NC, April 23, 2013 — When we see what is happening, we see what needs to happen in response to what is happening.
     
     An old psychological law states: It takes two people to have a fight, but one person can prevent a disagreement of opinion or perspective from degenerating into a really awful mess.
     
     That person is the one who sees what is happening and what needs to happen, and offers that to the situation.
     
     It takes emotional distance to take everything into account and see what is happening in each situation as it arises. Emotional distance equates to having little at stake in the situation—nothing to gain or lose—confident in our ability to be just fine no matter what happens.
     
     If you are going to believe in anything, believe in yourself—in your ability to rise to any occasion and deal successfully with whatever comes your way, by offering what is needed in each situation as it arises.
     
     This is the attitude that is the fulcrum that levers bad situations away from becoming total meltdowns. The work to achieve it transforms ourselves and the lives we touch with our living.
133. Used in Short Talks on Contradiction, etc., Goose with a Problem 12 — Bog Garden, Greensboro, NC, April 23, 2013 — The gift I would give you first, from the great pile of gifts that would help you along the way, would be an awareness of, and an appreciation for (that might be two gifts), the polarities which define our life and within which we live.
     
     It is not “Good or bad,” “Right or wrong.” It is “Good and bad.” “Right and wrong.”
     
     Our life is a trade-off, a compromise. We give up this to get that. Good and right come with bad and wrong attached. Somebody’s good is somebody else’s bad (and sometimes it is the same person’s bad).
     
     Darkness is also light (Rumi said, “Darkness is the cradle of the light”). Light is darkness (The “dark night of the soul” was occasioned, not by an absence of light, but by an over-abundance of light. Light can be blinding, which is its own form of darkness).
     
     There are polarities, contraries, contradictions, opposites, discordances, etc. everywhere. And we are oblivious to them. We emphasize one side of the equation and dismiss it’s “evil twin.” We do not have a realistic view of things. In our world, things are how we want them to be.
     
     Waking up, we realize that our world is part of another, larger, world where everything is counterbalanced and evened out, and where harmony is not the absence of opposing sides but the realization of the importance—even necessity—of opposition.
     
     William Blake, in “The Marriage of Heaven and Hell,” said “Without contrary is no progression.” Is no life. We are alive to the degree that we are aware of and appreciate—respect and honor—the polarities within which we live.
     
     We are alive to the degree that we live consciously within the polarities that define our living—and accommodate ourselves to them. This is the very essence of the way to peace, harmony, oneness, wholeness and bliss. One is two. Sometimes, more.
134. Green Heron in Flight 01 — Bog Garden, Greensboro, NC, April 23, 2013 — Eight ducks are in the air, soon to land. The Great Blue Heron is in great golden light and is about to make a catch. Two geese are having a territory dispute. And a Cooper’s Hawk is tangling with a crow. All within easy photoing distance. The photographer’s dilemma.
     
     All of our dilemmas are solved with a decision. Pick one and let the others go.
     
     Four ducks come in to land as a group. Pick one and let the others go.
     
     Maybe you pick the wrong one. Live with it. You’ll get another chance soon enough. Perhaps your luck will improve. Pick one and let the others go.
     
     How do you know which one to pick? How can you avoid being wrong, again? How can you finally get it right—and know you are getting it right?
     
     Your odds improve dramatically when you get yourself out of the way, with your ridiculous fear of being wrong, again, and your obnoxious obsession with being right at last. Just pick one and let the others go. For better or worse.
     
     Don’t have to be right. Give yourself the freedom of making a choice without the pressure of making the RIGHT choice. That’s the RIGHT choice—to choose without fear, without pressure, without having to please anyone with your choosing, even yourself.
     
     Pick one and let everything else go.
135. Green Heron in a Tree — Bog Garden, Greensboro, NC, April 23, 2013 — The Presence is always present with us—the work is to be present with The Presence. I think how we do that is individual and personal. I’m sure there are no recipes to follow, no black footprints to step in.
     
     How would you open yourself to more than meets the eye? How would you become receptive to communing with what you do not know? How would you become aware of what you sense on a feeling level?
     
     Take this as a practice regimen: Spend the next half hour not deciding but following. Following what? Your sense of what needs to be done. Your feeling of what to do and not do. No thinking. No deciding. Just feeling. Just sensing.
     
     This is the Star Wars scene with Luke Skywalker in the helmet and Obi wan Kenobi saying, “Feel the Force, Luke!” See how you do with it.
     
     Put yourself in the helmet from time to time. Practice feeling the presence of The Presence.
136. Great Blue Heron A 03 — Bog Garden, Greensboro, NC, April 24, 2013 — “Oh but!” comes the objection. “My Uncle Buddy thought he could feel the winner before the race and lost huge sums at horse and dog races before Aunt Caroline left him!”
     
     ”Gambling is sure-fire proof that we cannot trust our feelings to tell us what to do! So is marriage for a lot of people. We better stick with cost/benefit analyses and Consumer Reports for guidance about what to do.”
     
     There are two counters to proofs that feelings cannot be trusted. The first is that feelings can easily be influenced if we have a stake in the outcome. We tilt the table by wanting or not wanting something to happen. If we have something to gain or lose, our hand is on the scales. We have to have no interest in the matter. If we are trying to exploit the situation by positioning ourselves to reap the rewards, we interfere with the process and trick ourselves with counterfeit feelings.
     
     The second consideration is that feelings call for input from our logical/reasoning faculty. The right hemisphere and the left hemisphere collaborate in making choices and decisions—one does not rule the other.
     
     There are photographs I will not take. I don’t care how much I feel the need to stop to photograph the sunset, I refuse to pull over on the shoulder of an interstate highway to set up the tripod and click away. I will not put myself in harm’s way—or gamble away the family fortune (Airfare to Vegas would do that)–to satisfy the feeling that something is right and I need to do it.
     
     I sit with the feeling and think about the nature of the situation and whether there are circumstances which modify or negate the urge to act. We do not set thinking aside when we feel what needs to happen. We consider the allness of the moment and decide what to do.
     
     I didn’t take up photography until the daughters graduated from college and were set up in lives of their own. I had been in love with a camera since I was 18, but didn’t follow the feeling until circumstances allowed it at 48.
     
     We have to work it out. We sense. We feel. We think. We reason. We choose. We decide. We do. Throughout our life. With as much consciousness/awareness as we can bring into play all along the way.
137. Lost in Thought — Bog Garden, Greensboro, NC, April 24, 2013 — We all need to drift off from time to time. Walk-a-bouts keep us oriented even if it appears that we are aimlessly wandering. Being anchored requires us to drift about. Too much focus on what we are supposed to be doing drains our energy and depletes our soul. We have to fly away from time to time in order to be grounded in the things of true value. The world is in the mess it is in because it dismisses day dreaming and has no time to look out the window.
138. Owl Flies 05 — A rare appearance in an open space at Benjamin Lake, the Bog Garden, Greensboro, NC, April 25, 2013. Note the missing wing feather(s) due to molting or to battle with hawks or crows. — Walk around with a camera and you will see something worthy of being photographed. The unexpected propels itself upon you. Just go walking, looking, and you will see amazing things. At the very least, you will see, which is, itself, amazing.
     
     Why do we so often walk, not looking?
139. Duck’s Wake — Bog Garden, Greensboro, NC, April 25, 2013 — If we got off our backs and out of our way, we would fly. Or not. But it would be great having us on our side for a change.
     
     ”Get out of my way, off my back and on my side!” If our soul could talk, that’s what it would say. I’m sure of it. Well, I’m sure that’s what mine would say to me anyway.
     
     I take courage in that. Of all the suggested sins that are levied on us, these three are not to be found among them. We are taught to be against ourselves early on. Those Who Know Best And Must Be Pleased have a large volume of things we must do and must not do in order to be pleasing, and they hold all of it against us, and urge—Nay! Compel!–us to do better.
     
     The only thing our Self/Soul has against us is that we are against Her/Him/It. We should throw in with Her/Him/It just to see where it goes. Cohorts on the journey to the heart of who we are.
     
     Those Who Know Best And Must Be Pleased won’t be pleased. All the more reason to get out of our way, off our backs and on our side!
140. Owl Yawns A 01 — Bog Garden, Greensboro, NC, April 24, 2013 — What do you do with all your heart? Do more of it. Do it with more frequency and longer duration.
     
     How much would it take for your heart to have enough? To say, “Let’s don’t do this any longer”? When would your heart quit?
     
     Our heart is a three-year old on a swing saying, “Do it again, Daddy! Do it again, Mommy!”
     
     We shrivel our heart when we tell it to grow up, act its age, like only the things it is supposed to like. In moderation.
     
     We kill our soul when we withhold what it loves, or parcel it out like crumbs of bread to the birds, dribbling what it loves over the top of its cold porridge as a pretend reward for doing its duty.
     
     Our soul is no fool. Our heart knows when we are absent without leave from service to our heart—chasing after the glass beads and silver mirrors we are sure are the very thing.
     
     We are here for our soul’s own joy, said Rumi All he could do was tell us, and dance his own dance, while his soul laughed and his heart called out with delight, “Do it AGAIN!”
141. Yellow Trillium 01 — Bog Garden, Greensboro, NC, April 13, 2013 — I know people who think they are not to love the things of this world—who think that attachment to “worldly pleasures” is sinful and an affront to heaven, and they will be written up in the Book of Life, which, so far as I can tell, is actually the Book of Death, in that it records all of the things about us that are worthy of eternal damnation which will be read out for all to hear and hiss at the Last Day when the Roll Is Called Up Yonder and our name won’t be on it because we loved too much the sights and sounds, tastes and textures, thrills and odors and stuff the world has to offer.
     
     Stupid people.
     
     Turning up their noses at the wonders and beauty of their one chance at life in order to live forever when they die, not knowing they are already dead and buried and too far gone to ever be awakened and resurrected.
142. Windows — Charleston, SC, April 26, 2013 — Where do you block your way, refusing to allow yourself to do what you love because you think you should not love it? You are damming the flow of your own life energy. Which is another way of saying you’re killing yourself. And you have symptoms to prove it. Don’t you?
     
     Whose side are you on? Really, whose side are you on? It’s clear that you are against yourself, but who are you pleasing by being against yourself? That’s whose side you are on. What makes them more important than you?
143. The Meeting Tree — Francis Beidler Forest, Charleston, SC, April 26, 2013 — We have to explore the things that pique our interest. We have to be interested in the things that interest us. Not in the things that are supposed to interest us. Not in the things someone else is interested in—or the things someone else thinks we should be interested in. The things that interest us.
     
     Cut off from our interests, we are cut off from life. Our interests are our lifeline, connecting us with the Heart of Life and Being. When we shelve our interests—dismiss, discard, ignore our interests—because they are inconvenient, unpopular, or out of the question, we dig our own grave.
     
     In each moment, each situation as it arises, we stand at the threshold between death and life—and make a choice. Interests are life. Expediency, convenience, smooth and easy are death.
     
     We are in charge of our own life, of our own coming to life, of our own being alive. We have to be strong in our own cause, true to our own heart, inflamed with our devotion to our own purpose and direction. Our allegiance is to life—to what brings us to life. Our interests lead the way.
144. Zen Iris 01 — Magnolia Plantation, Charleston, SC, April 27, 2013 — A flower is just a flower. You are just you. I am just me. And. It is important that a flower be seen and appreciated for the flower it is. It is important that you are seen and appreciated for the you you are. It is important that I be seen and appreciated for the I I am.
     
     In our case, the seeing and appreciating begins with us, seeing, appreciating ourselves.
     
     Not good enough, right? Not smart enough. Not mature enough. Not good looking enough… The list is long.
     
     You wouldn’t tell a baby she, he, wasn’t good enough. At what point in that child’s life would you say, “I’m sorry. You’re just not working out. You aren’t—and you never will be—good enough to be seen and appreciated for who you are”?
     
     The flower-ness of the flower, and the baby-ness of the baby alone make them worthy of being seen and appreciated for what/who they are. The you-ness of you, the me-ness of me makes us worthy of being seen and appreciated for who we are.
     
     Don’t be trying to deserve it. Just be trying to get out of the way and let it shine through. Zen essence shining through you and me, dazzling the eyes of all who glance our way.
     
     Believe it. Embrace it. Be it. May it be so!
145. Live Oak 01 — Magnolia Plantation, Charleston, SC, April 27, 2013 — Abraham and Moses left home and walked until they found home. Jesus left home but stayed in place and they killed him for being different.
     
     We pay a price if we leave home without going anywhere. We can either go away or pay the price of staying. The price of staying is death in one form or another.
     
     They have a variety of ways of killing us if we leave home without going away. They say, we are “different,” as a way of excusing, discounting, dismissing, ignoring, patronizing who we are. They disappear us that way. We become invisible to them in our differentness, and they treat us as though we are who they want us to be.
     
     Jesus formed his own community who became his new family, his new home, to counter the move to disinherit him for being different. He refused to disappear. Would not become invisible. Did not do it the way they insisted it be done. They totally disappeared him for his insolence.
     
     If you are going to leave home, it will be easier on everyone if you also go away without trying to make them like you want them to be. “Leave the dead to bury the dead,” or they will kill you in one way or another.
146. Live Oak 02 — Magnolia Cemetery, Charleston, SC, April 28, 2013 — Nature has no preferences. Whatever needs to happen, happens. When the Yellowstone caldera has to blow, it blows—never mind what the repercussions might be worldwide. If a planet, or a moon, crosses the path of a speeding asteroid, there will be a nice little smack up, no matter what.
     
     Baby ducks are born and become turtle food or an owl’s fine breakfast. The early bird gets the early worm. Life lives on life.
     
     We have to bring ourselves into accord with the way of things—living wholeheartedly in the heartless midst of it all.
     
     This is the fundamental, foundational, dichotomy. We are nature’s heart—nature’s conscience—nature’s soul. We bear the anguish of nature’s way—and soften, with kindness, gentleness, compassion and grace, the horror of natural catastrophes.
     
     We are nature’s way of caring for the things nature doesn’t care about. Our place is to fulfill our role—caring, caring, caring. No. Matter. What.
     
     The best thing about us is compassion. We cannot put that on a shelf and refuse to bring it to bear upon the way things are. Compassion and grace, gentleness, kindness, mercy, peace, empathy and the capacity to suffer with another are what we bring to the party.
     
     It’s a much better party when we play our part. It’s our thing and we have to do it if it is to be done. To not do it deepens the madness, and what’s the good of that?
147. Shem Creek Panorama Line Drawing — Charleston, SC, April 28, 2013 — When we live to be aligned with—in allegiance with and service to—the Core (In a “thy will, not mine, be done kind of way), we are transformed, and we transform everything our life touches.
     
     When we do it the way it needs to be done, everything changes.
     
     No planning, no scheming, no contriving, no forcing, no pushing, no striving, no having to have anything, no having to avoid anything, no manipulating, no controlling, no arraigning, no meddling, no converting, no condemning, no preaching… Just living as our life needs us to live it in each situation as it arises.
     
     From the standpoint of this orientation, of this perspective, we rarely know what to do before we find ourselves doing it. We do not think our life out and then carefully follow the recipe, stepping in the black footprints, to some predetermined outcome. We follow our internal guidance system and find out where we are going when we get there.
     
     Living aligned with the Inner Guide is quite the trick. We have to set ourselves aside and trust ourselves to What We Do Not Know. We would prefer bull riding. We know what is going to happen there.
     
     We don’t know what is going to happen with the Core in charge. We know only what is happening and what needs to happen in response to what is happening, but where that goes, we have no idea.
     
     This doesn’t mean our life is unstructured. The structure is internal, organic—not imposed from without in a “how life is supposed to be lived” way. Diet and exercise and how we spend our time become important. We develop regimens, patterns, ways of being in the world, ways of being with each other. We are less crowd-centered and more Self-centered, Self-directed, Self-defined, Self-pleased-and-pleasing.
     
     And it doesn’t just happen. We grow into a new way of living by living consciously, with awareness, in light of our Core, in service to our Core—and see where it goes.
148. Frances Beidler Forest 02 — Charleston, SC, April 26, 2013 — We live with an external orientation as though what happens in the outer world is what matters. That is not what matters.
     
     As we align ourselves with the inner world, making conscious what is not conscious, becoming aware of what all is with us there, and understanding—and honoring—the right order of things there, we live in the outer world as extensions, expressions, of the inner world, and everything is transformed.
     
     It is a perspective shift that changes the way life is lived—and the greatest adventure we could imagine.
149. Great Egret 04 — Swamp Garden, Magnolia Plantation, Charleston, SC, April 27, 2013 — How would you connect with your Core? Attend your Core? Listen to your Core? Commune with your Core?
     
     Ask your Core for suggestions/directions. Your role is to be attentive and responsive.
150. Arthur Ravenel, Jr. Bridge — Charleston, SC, April 28, 2013 — You have to do your own work. This is bad news. We do not want to do our own work.
     
     We want to give God some fruit as a votive sacrifice and let that stand for the work that is ours to do. We want to pray some prayers, burn some incense, make an offering, believe some beliefs, keep a few—say 10, no more than 10, maybe fewer—commandments, and let that be that.
     
     We want to live like we want to, and get God’s help in achieving goals we set and acquiring the things we think would be nice to have, and not getting in our way. We think there is God up there and us down here. God over there and us over here. God there, us here. That’s wrong.
     
     Hold up an index finger. That’s God AND you. You and God are one thing. Now, who calls the shots? Who is in charge? This is what is at stake in the “thy will, not mine, be done” thing.
     
     If we and God are not aligned, we are in each other’s way. The work that is ours to do is the work of aligning ourselves with God. Cooperating with God. Collaborating with God. Being in cahoots with God. Being God’s cohort.
     
     When we listen to the Core, we listen to God. Turn your ears on, and pay attention.
151. Great Egret 06 — Swamp Garden, Magnolia Plantation, Charleston, SC, April 27, 2013 — All that can be known can be known. All it takes is eyes that see, ears that hear and a heart that understands. So what’s the problem? Why spend all your time knowing what you know and not poking around in what you don’t know?
     
152. Zen Azalea 01 — Swamp Garden, Magnolia Plantation, Charleston, SC, April 27, 2013 — I don’t know of anyone who doesn’t have to be sharp. Who doesn’t have to pay attention. Who doesn’t have to practice being aware, awake, conscious and present in each moment, in each situation as it arises.
     
     I don’t know of anyone who can tune out. Who can drift off. Who can go to sleep at the wheel. Who can coast. Who can slide by without being invested in the experience of the time of her, of his, living.
     
     This isn’t study hall. Or recess. Those who know, know you have to be awake even in study hall and at recess.
     
     Those who know, know you have to be awake when you are napping. You have to be awake when you are asleep.
153. Magnolia Cemetery 02 — Charleston, SC, April 28, 2013 — I don’t know how you connect to the Core but I have to be quiet. That may not mean what you think it means.
     
     I have a friend who tells me he can’t be quiet unless he’s playing the drums. And another who tells me he can’t be quiet unless he’s fast dancing. I don’t know what quietens you, but it may not be sitting in a lotus position going, “AUM.”
     
     And I have to distance myself from myself—aware of what’s going on but not directing any action, aware without thinking. I call that being receptive, open, waiting. Maybe a phrase will come to mind that has some energy attached to it. I pay attention to that and see where it goes.
     
     Or, maybe, an image comes to mind—a pecan in its shell, say, or a plastic bucket of sand on a beach. I work with the image, playing (This kind of play is work) with it, turning it over in my mind, seeing what it connects with, reminds me of.
     
     Now I have a phrase or an image and I spend time during the day reflecting on it, seeing what it turns up and what response I need to make.
     
     I call this attending the core. Somebody else may call it something else. They have their own core to tend, and I wouldn’t want them to think they have to do it like I do.
154. Anhinga Feeding Young 01 (Or: Pureed Fish The Hard Way) — Audubon Swamp Garden, Magnolia Plantation, Charleston, SC, April 27, 2013 — We spend our lives looking for people who can hear what we have to say. Don’t waste your time arguing your point, explaining yourself, or trying to make converts. You’re looking for conversation that deepens all participants, and that begins with people who know what you mean before you start talking.
     
     The flip side of this is: Evaluate everything you hear in light of your own experience. Does it click? Resonate? Connect? Make sense? Evoke a “Yes!”?
     
     Do not buy anything you have to be sold on. Walk away. You are looking for someone who can say what you can hear, what you can listen to without engaging your fight or flight response.
     
     Your experience is your teacher. You articulate the impact of your experience—saying what happened and what you make of it—and formulate a life around your understanding of the impact of life experience. Do not take anybody’s word for it. Think yourself forward in partnership with your core—sensing whether your conclusions are helpful and suitable in the work of adjusting you to your life and your life to you.
     
     And ask all the questions. Have nothing to do with answers that stem the flow of questions. An answer only opens the door to more questions. Follow the questions—they will lead you to the heart of the matter.
     
     And do not quit! It will be hard, make no sense, and hurt in ways unimaginable. Bear the pain! Ask the questions! Seek accommodation to and an affinity with how things are. It will open your eyes and grow you up. Enlightenment works that way.
155. Eye on the Prize! — Barred Owl Goes Fishing, Bog Garden, Greensboro, NC, April 30, 2013 — What we serve with our life has to be bigger than our appetites and desires, our interest in pleasure and entertainment. Of what does our LIFE consist? What is within that if we don’t pull it forth in the time allotted for living we will have wasted our life?
     
     In light of what do we live? What are we bringing forth? Expressing? Doing with our life? If you don’t know, dream on.
     
     Dream on on two levels—on the level of daydreams and fantasies and on the level of your nighttime dreams. What is at work on both levels? What are you saying to yourself through your dreaming?
     
     Your nighttime dreams may be compensation for your daydreams and fantasies—offsetting them in a grounding kind of way, calling you to wake up and get to work and stop the escapist ruminations about what you will do when you win the lottery. And, your nighttime dreams may be ratifying and validating the substance and direction of your daytime aspirations and reveries.
     
     Your work is to get to the bottom of what you are saying to yourself through your dreams, day and night—and to find there the thread to what is calling you beyond settling for too little, challenging you to be about what is yours to be about in the time left for living.
     
     There is more to all of us than meets the eye. We have to live so as to express as much of it as possible before our time on earth is done.
156. Great Blue Heron A 04 — Bog Garden, Greensboro, NC, April 30, 2013 — When we are in sync with our Core, we know it. And, we know when we are out of sync.
     
     Our life works when we are in sync, and doesn’t work when we are out of sync.
     
     What we have to be about is seeking sync-ness. How would you do that? Do it!
157. Going Fishing 02 — Bog Garden, Greensboro, NC, April 30, 2013 — Everything that can be said has been said. There have been people in every age who knew what was what, and said it. And there have been more people in every age who knew what wasn’t what and used it to their advantage in marginalizing or excommunicating or executing those who knew what was what.
     
     What isn’t what serves the economy. What’s what serves the soul. Therein lies the popularity of what isn’t what and the confusion over what is what.
     
     In order to know what’s what, you only have to separate from the crowd and pay attention. It’s the path everyone who has known what’s what has taken.
     
     The voice we need to hear cannot be heard with all the other voices shouting directions, issuing decrees, making proclamations, and announcing who is going to hell for failing to heed their directions, decrees, proclamations and announcements.
158. Mallard in Flight 103 — Bog Garden, Greensboro, NC, May 1, 2013 — All of us are the way we are. And all of us are not the way someone else wants us to be. That is the conflict that tells the tale.
     
     From birth we are commanded not to be who we are because someone wouldn’t like it. Parents, church, school, society and culture are sworn to task of getting us to be who we ought to be. But. Something within each of us knows it isn’t right. Call it the Core. The Core knows.
     
     You can get the periphery to wear pink tights and jump through hoops, but the Core knows.
     
     You can get the periphery to pretend to be who it isn’t, and to like what it doesn’t, but the Core knows.
     
     And the Core will not be mocked, dismissed, discounted, set aside. The Core will spend our life working to overturn the misdirection and redirect us to the experience and expression of who we are—against all that would have us be someone else.
     
     The Core sends us dreams, and feelings, and symptoms—calling us in a thousand ways to wake up and be alive in the life that is our life to live.
     
     This is the work of becoming the Christ. The Christ is the Anointed One of God. We are all anointed of God to be who we are—not who Jesus was, except to the extent that Jesus was who Jesus was, and we are to be who we are. The Christ is exactly who God has anointed him, anointed her, to be—to the everlasting chagrin of those who have a better idea for him, for her.
     
     The Core is the image of God within us, and knows what’s what. Our role is to know what the Core knows and to do what the Core knows needs to be done. So, when they come to you with the pink tights and the hoops, tell them you have your own thing—and do it.
159. Spotted Sandpiper Landing—Bog Garden, Greensboro, NC, May 1, 2013 — The hands know what the head doesn’t. Don’t sit thinking about it. Go do it. Then you’ll know.
160. Shem Creek Panorama, Black & White — Charleston, SC, April 28, 2013 — Every age needs prophets and seers (And where DOES that line lie?) to articulate for that age the symbols and grounding truths of previous ages—to translate for that age all that was meaningful to previous ages—to say in the idiom of that age the things of value that were said in the idiom of previous ages.
     
     Nothing worthy can be passed along “as is” (Which is “as was”). Everything worthy has to be said anew, as though for the first time, in every age.
     
     John A. Redhead, a past pastor at First Presbyterian Church in Greensboro, said, “God doesn’t have any grandchildren.” Meaning each generation has to find its own way to God. Nothing substantial can be passed along without being revised to suit the needs of the present generation in “The old has passed away, behold the new has come,” kind of way.
     
     Old wineskins are not fit for new wine. The old teachings are not suitable for new ears. We have to say again, and then again, what is at the heart of things—reinterpreting, re-translating, rethinking, reforming what once was “plain as day.”
     
     A living symbol always means more than it once meant. A living symbol does not mean what it once meant, what it “used to mean.” Nothing vibrant and alive can be locked into the conceptual framework of the past. Nothing vibrant and alive is literally what it is said from ages past to be. Everything vibrant and alive is changing, growing, unfolding, emerging, transforming itself before our eyes.
     
     Nothing is deader than a truth unaltered through the ages. Every age needs people who can breathe life into that age by saying what’s what in ways the people of that age can hear. A prophet is someone who says what has never been said in ways the prophet says it so that the people who an be awakened wake up and say, “Amen! Ain’t it so!”
161. Spotted Sandpiper Reflection—Bog Garden, Greensboro, NC, May 1, 2013 — Each age has to re-imagine God in light of its own experience—has to re-formulate its idea of God in light of how it knows things to be. Each age has to re-think God in order to accommodate the incompatibilities it knows to exist with other ages’ idea of God.
     
     The failure to do this is a failure of hermeneutics.
     
     Hermeneutics is derived from the Greek word hermes. Hermes was the Messenger of the Gods in the Greek pantheon. In the Roman pantheon, his name was Mercury. Mercury is quicksilver, changing form, slippery beyond belief, incapable of being nailed down, defined, frozen in place, passed on from generation to generation “as it was in the beginning, is now and ever shall be, world without end, Amen.”
     
     Hermes/Mercury has a message of God that is new and different in every age. But. The priests have to deliver the message.
     
     Hermeneutics is the art of preaching as it is taught in Christian seminaries. The failure to re-imagine God in each age is a failure of hermeneutics—a failure of preaching. Preachers tell the people what the people expect to hear. And God is nailed to the floor, or the cross, incapable of being anything God has not already been.
     
     We talk of “the freedom of God,” but God is not free. God has to be who God has been said to be through the ages. The failure to re-imagine God is a failure of preaching—a refusal to re-interpret God in light of all that has been experienced since God was spelled out and said to be at the time of the Reformation. There hasn’t been a new idea about God allowed into the Christian church in 500 years.
     
     We cannot find our way to the God Who Is, bearing the burden of how God was thought to be 500 years ago. Or 1,000. Or 2,000.
     
     We are back to Jesus’ question: “Who do you say that I am?” “Some say this, and some say that, but who do YOU say that I am out of your own experience and the experience of the species over time?” Each age has to answer the question out of its own experience—out of what it knows to be so based on all it knows—for its answer to have any meaning and life at all.
162. Black Crowned Night Heron (Immature) 01 — Bog Garden, Greensboro, NC, May 1, 2013 — Run everything by the Inner Advisor, the Guide Within. Everything. Practice bringing her/him in on your life. It is not all up to you. You have a source of help and collaboration at the ready. Ask for guiding dreams, for a felt-sense of Yes or No, for direction through the morass of choices, decisions, conflicts, obligations and duties. It may sound crazy, but what do you have to lose?
163. Black Crowned Night Heron (Adult) 02 — Audubon Swamp Garden, Magnolia Plantation, Charleston, SC, April 27, 2013 — Living is the lesson—our life is the teacher.
     
     As a follow-up on the last post about consulting the Inner Guide, if you ask and get nothing in response, or if you ask and get really bad guidance, you are asking the wrong question.
     
     The Inner Guide is a joker at heart. She/he will not hesitate to lead you down the wrong path if you are asking guidance to places you have no business being. It’s what you get for being out of touch with the heart of things. The lesson is wake up and ask better questions.
     
     Ask questions that have to do with the Guide’s interest in the life you are living—not questions that have to do with maximizing your gains and minimizing your losses.
     
     Your personal advantage and prosperity are not your Guide’s concern. You cannot exploit the guidance of the Guide to serve your own ambition and desire. You can take the Guide to Las Vegas, but your odds will not improve.
     
     Your life is not as much your life as it is the Guide’s life and the Guide is stuck with living it through you. You have to make yourself available to the Guide in order to bring forth your gifts and genius, which are more of a blessing to the world around you than to you, though you get to enjoy the process of being you in your life, but you don’t get to kick back and smoke cigars while somebody else does the work that is yours to do.
     
     You do your work. The Guide helps you figure out how.
     
     If your life isn’t working, it may be because you are trying to make it work for you. When it works, it works for the Guide. You get to enjoy the experience, but it may not be what you had in mind.
164. Northern Rough Winged Swallow 03 — Bog Garden, Greensboro, NC, May 2, 2013 — You have to be asking the questions for the answers to make any sense—and we live in a culture that discourages questions. You see the problem, I’m sure. But there is a solution: Ignore the culture! Ask the questions that beg to be asked! Now, you’re talking! That’s the way to do it! Don’t quit until you get to wherever it is we are going!
165. Northern Rough Winged Swallow 03 — Bog Garden, Greensboro, NC, May 2, 2013 — You have to be asking the questions for the answers to make any sense—and we live in a culture that discourages questions. You see the problem, I’m sure. But there is a solution: Ignore the culture! Ask the questions that beg to be asked! Now, you’re talking! That’s the way to do it! Don’t quit until you get to wherever it is we are going!
166. Goslings 01 — Bog Garden, Greensboro, NC, May 2, 2013 — Knowing what to do is one thing, doing it is practicing it. If I put the camera aside for two days, I’m a rookie again. The secret to any art is practicing the art. You cannot pick up your camera and go take a photograph unless you pick up your camera regularly and go take photographs.
     
     Know what to do and practice doing it. That’s the key to success anywhere.
167. Great Blue Heron M 04 — Bog Garden, Greensboro, NC, May 2, 2013 — There is the life that is yours to live—the work that is yours to do—the gifts that are yours to give—and the tools that are yours to use in the living, working, giving. within the terms and conditions, nature and circumstances, time and place of your living. That’s it.
     
     There is nothing here about entertaining, distracting, ignoring, denying, dismissing, escaping yourself to death. There is nothing here about hanging out until you die.
     
     There is only living your life, doing your work, giving your gifts with the tools that are necessary for the tasks to be completed.
     
     Hugh MacLeod, in his fine little book “Ignore Everybody,” says there are tools and there are props. Props are like stage props, facades, fabrications, costumes which help us pretend away our life.
     
     A computer can be a tool if we use it to do our work, or a prop if we use it to pretend to do our work.
     
     I have known of people who quit their day job and bought the best camera equipment available and a fine four-wheel drive vehicle to haul it around in in order to become a famous photographer, take wonderful photographs, make millions and smoke cigars. They didn’t realize the work involved and the time required to turn their happy fantasy into lived reality. They had a lot of fancy props and no tools. They wanted to be seen as a photographer without doing the work that being there when and where the photos are requires.
168. Great Egret 05 — Audubon Swamp Garden, Magnolia Plantation, Charleston, SC, April 27, 2013 — Do not waste your time believing in God. Do not spend your time talking about God, telling people about God. Put all your time into being God.
     
     Be God. Be who God Is. Now we’re talking. That’s the way to do it.
     
     Be as much as you know of God starting right now and don’t say a word about God.
     
     Bring the qualities you know to be Godly qualities forth in your life—in each situation as it arises—and let that be it.
169. Great Blue Heron M 06 — Bog Garden, Greensboro, NC, May 1, 2013 — When Jesus told the paralytic, “Rise, take up your pallet and get on with your life,” (or words to that effect), all we see is a healed paralytic. We have to look deeper.
     
     Jesus is saying to us all, “Stop using excuses! Stop letting whatever is stopping you stop you! Stop bellyaching! Stop moaning, complaining, whining! And get into your life—the life that is your life to live—and live it as fully as you are able to live it within the terms and conditions, nature and circumstances, time and place of your living!”
170. Magnolia Cemetery 04 Black and White — Charleston, SC, April 28, 2013 — It is important to be transparent to yourself—to have nothing hidden from yourself. Symptoms are an indication of something hidden within, of our playing tricks on ourselves, fooling ourselves, playing games with ourselves, lying to ourselves, not seeing ourselves.
     
     The minute we approach ourselves with our guard down, saying, “Okay, let’s talk,” from the heart, ready to hear everything we have to say to ourselves—everything our Self has to say to us—a shift happens and the world is transformed. Out world, anyway.
     
     Once we declare allegiance to ourselves—declare our loyalty, dedication, devotion, faithfulness and service to ourselves—and commit ourselves to being on our Self’s side, we join our Self in collaborating fully on the life we are living together.
     
     No more unilateral decisions. No more striking off on our own in the service of goals we say are valuable. No more independent decisions, choices, actions. No more commandeering the wheel and taking the ship off on a course of our own devising.
     
     Everything is mulled over, talked out, worked through. We become a WE in the fullest sense of the word. We consult our Self, we attend our Self, we intuit our Self, we seek the guidance and direction and input of our Self, we listen to our Self, and don’t do anything without our Self’s support and encouragement.
     
     If you think this won’t make your life instantly meaningful, interesting and filled with amazing wonders, you are in for a big shockeruskie.
171. Goslings 02 — Bog Garden, Greensboro, NC, May 2, 2013 — We spend our lives looking for vicarious life. We want to be alive, but we don’t want to do the work required to be alive, so we associate with those we think are life-giving others. We fall in love. We join clubs and churches. We hob-nob with those who seem to have what we want, hoping it will transfer like a beneficial contagion, infecting us with vitality, purpose, enthusiasm and delight. Well.
     
     We have to do our own work.
     
     The work is, all together now, Waking Up, Facing Up, Squaring Up, Growing Up, Standing Up, and Doing What Needs To Be Done In Each Situation As It Arises Exactly As It Needs To Be Done All Our Life Long.
     
     When we Wake Up, we wake up to the discrepancy, the discord, between how things are and how we want them to be—and to the conflicts, contraries, opposites and antagonisms that exist within ourselves and among us all with ourselves, each other and all of life.
     
     Facing and bearing the pain of irreconcilable and mutually exclusive conflicts is the essential and on-going task in growing up and being who we are (and also are), which we strive to avoid by associating with those who seem to have what we want/need or who can help us forget our lack of alignment for a while.
     
     We do not find what we seek by associating with those who seem to have it.
     
     We have to do the work ourselves.
     
     The work of alignment, of reconnecting with the Core, the Heart, the Center, and being at-one with the Source of Life by living the life that is our live to live, never mind the life we have in mind.
     
     Of course, we don’t want anything to do with that. So we seek vicarious satisfaction and wait to be saved from the work that will save us.
172. Entrance to Magnolia Plantation — Charleston, SC, April 27, 2013 — Our symptoms—we are overweight, we have headaches or backaches, we drink too much too often, we are over-medicated on prescription (or over the counter, or illicit) drugs, etc.—point to unconscious internal conflicts and/or denied external conflicts.
     
     We have to wake up to what we are not seeing—to what is readily apparent but invisible to us. We have to know what is there to be known, but is not known—is not known to us but is obvious to everyone but us.
     
     We have to sit down, shut up, open our eyes and see.
     
     Of course, we think we do see. We have to look at what we think we see until we can see all that is to be seen.
     
     Behold your symptoms.
     
     Behold your emotional reactions. You know the individuals, or the groups, or the nationalities that send you over the edge? You are projecting on them what you cannot admit and do not want to face in yourself.
     
     The same thing goes with the individuals, groups, or nationalities that you love and adore. You are projecting onto them qualities that are latent in yourself, which you wish were true about you, which you deny about you.
     
     We see ourselves when we see the people we react emotionally to. We project onto those people qualities we deny in ourselves. Let them become mirrors showing you to you.
     
     Of course, we have conflicts with that. Our conflicts heal us when we make them conscious and work with them in a straight-forward, honest and open way. On the one hand, this. On the other hand, that. And then, there is that over there.
     
     Don’t try to resolve anything. Simply be intensely aware of the polarities, then tension, the agony, and bear the pain. And wait for things to shift. The shift is growth, transformation, realization, awakening, enlightenment. But don’t think it’s one and done. This is the model for the rest of your life. Growth, conflict, pain, realization, growth… Forever. And you become increasingly alive with each step along the way to full humanbeinghood.
173. Mallard Landing, One — Bog Garden, Greensboro, NC, May 3, 2013 — When I say, “Do what needs to be done,” I don’t mean according to some rule book, some “Mama Said” book. More often than not, I mean, “Do what you find yourself doing.” Or, “Do what you do without thinking about doing anything.”
     
     Your body knows more than you do. Your body takes care of you on all levels. Digesting food, or directing you toward one dish on the menu and away from all the others, taking you to bed, or to a nap, when it’s time for that, waking you up when it’s time for that…
     
     When I’m leaving the house to meet the day, sometimes I find myself tarrying for no apparent reason at the door to my bedroom, or the kitchen. When I take the time to get to the bottom of it (because by now I know it means something), I remember something essential that I’ve forgotten, like my money clip or the checkbook or the letters to be mailed. My body stopped me until my mind could slow down enough to know what’s what.
     
     We are often doing what needs to be done without knowing what we are doing—without intending to do anything worthwhile—and discover some time later it was the very thing that was needed to fit into a greater design or picture.
     
     I’m saying, “Just get out of the way and stop trying to think of what to do, of what needs to be done, and let yourself do what it knows to do whether you know it or not.”
     
     This is hard. It is Jesus’ recommendation: “Don’t let your right hand know what your left hand is doing.” That certainly applies with playing the piano, or the alto sax. The more we think about what to do and how to do it, the bigger mess we make of things. Just play! That way, your left hand doesn’t care what your right hand is doing, but trusts it to be enjoying itself, having the time of its life, knowing nothing about anything.
     
     Now we’re talking! That’s the way to do it!
174. Mallard Landing, Two — Bog Garden, Greensboro, NC, May 3, 2013 — The work is to align the inner you with the outer you. This is called “making the unconscious conscious,” or, “knowing what we know.” This is the absolute foundation to peace and well-being.
     
     When I find myself tarrying on the way out of the house, I have to make the unconscious conscious in order to know what is known on a deeper level than my thinking, rational, logical level.
     
     When we have a symptom, we have to get to the bottom of it. Do not ignore your symptoms. A symptom unheeded is a symptom disrespected, dishonored, and it will call all of its friends and invite them to make their home with you.
     
     If you “treat the symptom” without getting to the bottom of it, you are not doing yourself any favors. If you hear what the symptom is saying, you will discover a buried, hidden, denied conflict of interest. If you open yourself to the conflict without trying to force a solution or resolution, but bear the agony consciously, something will shift somewhere in your life. The unconscious will be honored, and the outer you will be better aligned with the inner you, and peace and well-being will make THEIR home with you for as long as you attend your symptoms and know when there is something unknown nudging you to bring it to light.
     
     This is the path of awakening that we walk throughout our life, aligning outer with inner all along the way.
175. Live Oak 04 — Magnolia Plantation, Charleston, SC, April 28, 2013 — People sometimes ask me to tell them how to take better photographs. The question is too general. It invites an introductory course in photography—and that would be a waste of our collective time.
     
     If you want to take better photographs, read your camera manual—over and over—until you clearly understand what your camera will do and how to get it to do what it will do. Now you only need to know which scenes and situations require what settings on your camera. At that point, you are in an area where someone who knows photography can help you with your questions about scenes and settings.
     
     Until you can ask the questions, the answers are going to be senseless. For the answers to be worth anything to you, you have to be asking the questions. No one can give you answers to questions you aren’t asking.
     
     Sound a bit like life to you?
     
     It isn’t going to help to hear someone tell you how to find what you aren’t looking for. It’s a waste of your collective time.
     
     We will have a better chance of finding the answers we need if we are clear about the questions we are asking. What do you need to know to help you with your life? The clearer you can be, the greater your chance of finding what you are looking for.
176. Mallard Landing, Three — Bog Garden, Greensboro, NC, May 3, 2013 — There is the life you are living, and the life you wish you were living, and the life that is yours to live. Our problem is to set the life you wish you were living aside and bring forth the life that is yours to live within the life you are living (Unless the life you wish you were living IS the life that is yours to live!).
     
     We have to get your LIFE together with your life.
     
     This is not easy. It is not easy to sell you on the idea that you have a life apart from your life—that you have a life that is yours to live that is different from the life you are living.
     
     And, it is not easy to get you to do the things that are necessary to align your life with your LIFE. That would be difficult even if the life you wish you were living didn’t keep winking at you and transfixing you with glimmering possibilities.
     
     The odds are stacked against us. That’s why you have to be old to give it a second thought. You have to have been around the block a time or two, been up against it, seen through the false promises and sweet nothings of the world as we wish it were, and be ready to take a chance on the life that is yours to live because you are running out of time and what do you have to lose?
     
     So, what’s the first thing you do to get your life aligned with your LIFE? Nothing. Do nothing. Wait. Watch. Listen. Look. See what happens. I’m not kidding. That’s all it takes. You’ll know what to do next when the time for doing it comes along.
     
     (This is great, isn’t it? You have to be crazy to listen to me. And you have to be really crazy to not listen to me. What kind of crazy are you going to be?)
177. Magnolia Cemetery 01 — Charleston, SC, April 28, 2013 — We have to be fed up with our behavior in a situation for the situation to change. It’s easy enough to be fed up with someone else’s behavior—with everyone else’s behavior—and to declare, “If he/she/they would only change everything would be fine!” Not to be mentioning anyone’s name here, but somebody else could change…
     
     Nothing is going to change in a situation until somebody changes. Who is going to be first to be fed up with what he/she is doing? It takes being fed up to change enough to have an impact.
     
     Just saying…
178. Mallard in Flight 104 — Bog Garden, Greensboro, NC, May 3, 2013 — We make better choices when we live transparent to ourselves. We don’t have to know what we are doing if we know who is doing it and what is prompting the action.
     
     With nothing about us hidden from us and everything on the table, we are free to walk around the table, consider the table, know what’s what, and choose what to do about it.
     
     If you are ever going to know anything, know you. Make your peace with yourself, with where you have been and what has happened to you and what you have done in response and how you wound up where you are.
     
     Understand that your future is more important than your past, that where you are going is more significant than where you have been, that the life you have yet to live is more valuable than the life you have lived, and that beginning here and now, you have more of a chance to be yourself on the way to becoming yourself than you have ever had.
     
     So, what’s the problem?
179. Owl Flies Ma 02 — Bog Garden, Greensboro, NC, May 4, 2013 — How do you sell change? Don’t bother trying to get everyone on board. Gandhi said, “Be the change you want to see in the world.” Joseph Campbell said, “The influence of a vital person vitalizes.” Campbell also said, “Do your thing and don’t worry about the outcome.” That’s all we need to know about selling change.
180. Far Away — Bog Garden, Greensboro, NC, May 6, 2013 — The foliage has changed the way photographs are to be made in the Bog Garden. More portraits. Less action. It’s dark these days—a green cave. Makes for slower shutter speeds. But the owls fly as fast as they used to. You see the problem. We don’t get to do it the way we want to do it. We have to do it another way instead.
     
     Sound like life to you?
     
     Adjustment and accommodation, kid. Adjustment and accommodation.
     
     It’s what we do best—and what we like to do the least. We want it the way we want it, and do not like to change course to accommodate pesky obstacles. “Damn the shoreline! Full speed ahead!” has been an order we have issued more than once. We are slow to grant reality its place in our life.
     
     Adjustment and accommodation are what growing up is all about. We take a picture of the owl perched on a limb when she is only a blur flying about.
181. Used in Short Talks on Contradiction, etc., The Angel — Magnolia Cemetery, Charleston, SC, April 28, 2013 — It is important that we wrestle consciously with the polarities that define our existence without submitting to denial or despair.
     
     In the church of my experience, it was not permissible to say anything about God the people hadn’t already heard. As their minister, they paid me to talk about God but I had to say the things they expected to hear.
     
     This is an example of a polarity that binds our life. I could not do what I was paid to do because I really wasn’t being paid to do what everyone said I was paid to do—and no one will talk about it, make it conscious. So I lived between what I saw as needing to be said and what I was allowed to say.
     
     I worked it out by A) being conscious of the conflict and B) pushing the limits by seeing how much I could get by with.
     
     We are all constrained by polarities, conflicts, contradictions, ambivalences, and Catch-22’s. We have to make them conscious—I don’t care how painful and agonizing that is—and see how much we can get by with.
     
     We cannot sink into despair at the absurdity of how things are, or embrace denial and refuse to consider the absurdity of how things are. We have to bear the pain of the absurdity by being acutely aware/conscious of it, and understand that there is no way out of it, and that we cannot do what must be done because it must not be done. And say, “This is ridiculous.” And see how much we can get by with.
     
     The seeing how much we can get by with is the monkey wrench in the gear case, and things are changing that don’t look like they are changing because we are conscious of their need to change and we are changing them by refusing to pretend that they don’t need to be changed.
     
     Wade with awareness into your polarities. See what you can get by with.
182. Mallard in Flight 106 — Bog Garden, Greensboro, NC, May 4, 2013 — We think a fact is a fact, that reality is reality, that the way things are is the way things are. Well.
     
     Facts are transformed by our interpretation of the facts. Reality is rearranged by what we make of it, how we understand it to be. The way things are is subject to the way we translate it, the meaning we make of it. No matter how trapped we are, we are a perspective shift away from freedom.
     
     The impact of facts, reality, the way things are upon our life is strictly dependent upon what we say they mean. We are as limited, bound, oppressed and hopeless as our imagination requires us to be.
     
     What do we tell ourselves about our situation—and then say, “That’s the way it is!”? And then get all hopeless, despondent, woe-be-gone and suicidal because it is obviously pointless to go on? We talk ourselves into quitting every time. Why not talk ourselves into banging away—and see what happens?
     
     We owe it to ourselves to see if it is as hopeless as we know it is.
     
     What do we tell ourselves about our situation? Say it out loud. Write it down. Describe the way it is in no uncertain terms. Get it all out. Use a five subject spiral binder if necessary.
     
     Now imagine what else you could tell yourself if you were free to take a different take on things. See how many different ways you can say how things are. Why take one—generally the worst one—for the TRUTH?
     
     I knew a guy whose image of his situation was that he was hanging on to one small tree root on the side of a sheer cliff, descending into oblivion, worn out with the effort, losing his grip, giving up. He had not considered that letting go could mean flying as easily as it could mean dying. We all have wings we don’t know we have because we never give them a chance to show us what we can do.
     
     We limit ourselves by failing to see all there is to see in all the ways there are to see it. We need to know what else—what all—we know if we would only listen before we make decisions based on what we “know.”
183. Francis Biedler Forest 01 — Charleston, SC, April 27, 2013 — Trust yourself to your life—to the life you are living and to the life that is yours to live. Do not have to know where it’s going, or what you are going to get out of it, or whether it will be worth it.
     
     If you are going to believe in anything, believe in your life. Trust your life. Hand yourself over to your life.
     
     The life you are living is the very thing you need to find the life that is yours to live. The life you are living is the doorway, the threshold, to the life that is yours to live. There are elements of the life that is yours to live already at work in the life you are living. You are already living the life that is yours to live—the trick is to live it with increasing consciousness, moving away from the things that interfere with the life that is yours to live over time, as you are able, becoming increasingly aligned with, centered on, the life that is yours to live.
     
     The motto for what remains of the time left for living is: Know your business and do it!
     
     There are things you have no business doing. Know what they are and don’t do them. There are things that, and people who, are wet blankets. Avoid them. There are toxic situations and personalities. Have nothing to do with them. Find the people who, and the situations that, are good for you. Hang out with them. Live to become increasingly focused on, aligned with, who you are, living the life and doing the work that is yours to do.
     
     It’s a slow process, becoming who you are. It’s taken you this long to be where you are. There is no hurry from this point on. Walk slowly, with your eyes open, through each day, all along the way, and, like that, you’re there.
184. Owl Jam — Bog Garden, Greensboro, NC, May 7, 2013 — There are people—toxic personalities—in our life who we need to avoid. We are kin to some of them. And you know who I mean.
     
     You have to sit yourself down and think through what you are doing when you make yourself available to them only to pay a high price in terms of depleted energy and loss of peace and soul.
     
     You do yourself no favors living on a toxic waste dump and exposing yourself to toxic personalities. If you aren’t going to protect yourself, who is?
185. One Fern — Bog Garden, Greensboro, NC, May 7, 2013 — I delight in sports teams (and individuals) that (who) play beyond themselves. A good coach is someone who can get more from her, or his, players than they have.
     
     Bum Phillips, an NFL coach with the Houston Oilers said “A good coach is someone who can take his’n and beat your’n. And then take your’n and give you his’n and beat his’n with your’n.”
     
     We are all born with a coach like that within us. We are capable of more than we can imagine. We can rise to any occasion. It takes turning ourselves over to the “coach” within to do that within the day-to-day sameness of our life.
     
     We give up too easily. We quit too soon. “We can’t do this!”, we whine. “It’s too hard!” We are constantly swooning before the Soul Killer questions: “Why try? What good will it do? What difference will it make? Who cares? What’s the use? What chance do we have?”
     
     There are teams (and individuals) that (who) constantly play beyond themselves—who don’t care what their chances are—who think odds are just some fool’s way of feeling confident about throwing his, or her, money away—who throw themselves into what needs them to do it, and do it with everything they have, and get up tomorrow and do it again.
     
     Now you’re talking! That’s the way to do it! We’ll show that Cyclops a thing or two!
186. Owl Yoga 01 — Bog Garden, Greensboro, NC, May 8, 2013 — It is not easy. You can do what is hard or you can do it the hard way. It is hard however you do it.
     
     There is no such place as Easy Street and enlightenment is not the way to it.
     
     Here is what Marie-Louise von Franz said: “…the deeper and closer people get to the Self within themselves, the more confused and complicated the situation becomes. It does not become easier.”
     
     When we live to make the unconscious conscious—which is what enlightenment, awareness, realization and waking up do—we make conscious the conflicts, ambivalence, polarities and paradoxes that are at the heart of the way things are. “Life eats life!” What kind of sense does that make?
     
     The world of the unconscious is not a rational, logical, reasonable, sensible world. We can feel strongly in opposite ways about the same thing. Good is bad and bad is good. Right is wrong and wrong is right. What kind of sense does that make?
     
     If you are waiting for things to make sense, you are standing in the wrong line. Sense is not what enlightenment and waking up are about. When we wake up, we wake up to the contrariness at the center of truth. If you can be cool with that, you have what it takes to continue the journey.
187. Duckie 02 — Bog Garden, Greensboro, NC, May 8, 2013 — We have figured things out for ourselves and gotten this far over thousands of years. When we started, we didn’t know what a piano was. Now we have electronic pianos, of all things!
     
     We sell ourselves short. No one told us nothing. Okay. Anything. No one told us anything. We started with nothing on all fronts. Look around. Everything you see came from us. We brought it all out from within ourselves.
     
     If you are going to ever take off your hat to someone, take it off to us. Tell us to take a bow. Parade us around the room. No! Parade us down some main street behind a band (We made bands, too) and ahead of the floats (I don’t know where floats came from. Probably from the same person that thought up high fructose corn syrup. We’ve come up with some doozies to go along with everything else).
     
     We’ve done all this starting with nothing!
     
     So don’t be dismissing yourself and talking about what you can’t do and how you’ve never done anything and will never do anything so why try, or whatever you say to put yourself down and keep yourself from tackling anything like, say, for example, your life. You come from good stock. Your ancestors handled Wooly Mammoths and life without toilet paper. Don’t be thinking you can’t do anything.
     
     You are part of a species that has done everything you see when you look around, without an instruction manual or a tool box. That’s something. You are something. You should get out of your way and let you show yourself what you can do.
188. Two Sandpipers — Bog Garden, Greensboro, NC, May 8, 2013 — A Solitary Sandpiper and a Spotted Sandpiper is my best guess. — We aren’t stupid. We know what fits and what does not fit, where we belong and where we have no business being. We know what’s what.
     
     Ants find the picnic, flowers turn to the sun, and we know what works and what doesn’t. So what’s the problem?
     
     We have a better idea. We have big plans. We will not be saddled with what works, what fits, and where we belong. We have bigger fish to fry. It takes a long time to come down off of our high horse.
     
     We cannot wake up without growing up. Growing up IS waking up—realizing how things are regardless of how we wish they were or plan on them being, and squaring ourselves up with what works, what fits, and where we belong—aligning ourselves with the life that is ours to live and bringing it forth in the time left for living.
     
     We could get there quicker if we weren’t so sure we had it figured all out.
189. Goshen Creek 01 — Blue Ridge Parkway near Boone, NC, May 9, 2013 — We have to bring our conflicts forth. We have to open ourselves—and wade right in—to our conflicts. We have to make our conflicts conscious, and bear the weight of the agony of mutually exclusive wants, desires, obligations, responsibilities, duties. We have to embrace our polarities, and our paradoxes, and our conflicts of interest. We have to make our peace with them all.
     
     We do not make peace among them. We make our peace with the fact of them. We are torn, divided, at odds within and without. Yet, we spend our time and energy denying that it is so, pretending all is well, declaring unto all—and believing it ourselves—that we are “just fine.”
     
     We must bring our conflicts forth and work them out.
     
     Conflict made conscious will bring us forth. Will define us. Will show us, and others, who we are.
     
     Only the conscious struggle with conflict will expose our loyalties, will make known our allegiance, will disclose what is important, will reveal our heart and make known our identity.
     
     Apart from that struggle, we are all talk. We say this is important or that is, that this is who we are and that is who we are not, and yada-yada-yada… We don’t know nothing, okay anything. We don’t know anything about who we are until we make the unchooseable choice. Again and again.
     
     And we are back to the Jung quite about it getting harder as we get down to the heart of the matter and begin to know a thing or two about who we are. It is agony being whole. Being One. Being integrated—awake, aware, alive.
     
     Being dead is so painless, so smooth and easy. But. You’re dead.
190. Used in Short Talks on Contradiction, etc., Duckie 03 — Bog Garden, Greensboro, NC, May 10, 2013 — Nature is heartless. The concept of Justice is foreign to the natural world. Life eats life. Nature requires fecundity—more life than is needed—more than enough to go around—to keep life going.
     
     People are always taking a peek at nature and saying, “How can anyone look at all this beauty and not believe in God?” Well. The beautiful little duckling is turtle food. The little turtle is Great Blue Heron food. The helpless little worms have the last laugh, feasting on what is left of everything else. It is easy to look at nature and not believe in God at all.
     
     The God of Life and Being is quite beyond, and other than, the natural world. We, you might say, are God’s gift to nature. We are the conscience, the consciousness, and the source of values sorely lacking among the birdies and beasties.
     
     Our place in the natural order of things is to say Yes! to it, and No!
     
     This is the conflict at the heart of things. We have to say Yes! to it because this is the way things are—this is the world we are born into. To reject it would be the height of arrogance and presumption. We are of that world. When given a chance, we have done no better than the rest of nature. But, to our credit, we are justly appalled by our own behavior.
     
     We recognize a higher ought-to-be than the Law of the jungle. And so, we say Yes! to No!
     
     We say this is the way things are and they ought not be that way! And, if someone should object that we cannot oppose God, I would reply that is exactly what we are here for: To oppose God if God is as heartless as the natural world. To call God to wake up and do better!
     
     Of course, I think God is not as heartless as the natural world. I think God stands apart from the natural world, and calls us to oppose it ourselves—even as we participate in it!
     
     This is a grand contradiction that we are asked to embrace and live out—being sources of all that is lacking in nature: compassion and grace, justice, mercy, peace, kindness, generosity, etc., without cutting ourselves off from nature or holding ourselves aloof.
     
     We bear in our own bodies the tension of the polarity between the way things are and the way things ought to be, and do not relax the burden of that tension even though it bears down on us like a great cross that we carry throughout our days.
191. Two Ferns — Bog Garden, Greensboro, NC, May 7, 2013 — We think there is somewhere to go on this journey, somewhere to get to. We think we are moving from were we’ve been to where we are going to be when we finally get there.
     
     We are not going anywhere. We are waking up. When we wake up, we will be right here. Awake. Aware. Alive.
     
     And we will be who we are.
     
     There is a sense in which we are already who we are, we are just asleep and don’t realize it. Who we think we are is not who we are, but when we become who we are, we will say, “Oh sure. This is who I have always been.” And we will be right.
     
     Who we are is who we always have been—and who we will be when we wake up and consciously—and conscientiously—align the outer us with the inner us, and deliberately live the life that is ours to live within the life we are living.
     
     That will change things—in ways that will awaken everyone who can be awakened.
192. Trumpet Vine 02 — Bog Garden, Greensboro, NC, May 5, 2013 — There is always something else to be aware of—always the possibility of seeing what we see from a different point of view.
     
     I step into old scenes and see new ways of seeing them. I go through old photo files and see new ways of presenting them.
     
     You think you have something all wrapped up, maybe in butcher paper, and stored away, maybe in the freezer, where it will never change on you and always be what it was when you put it there. Well. The joke’s on you.
     
     We waste our time nailing things down. Hammering things out. Putting things to a vote. Unanimously agreeing that THIS is the way this thing is and it will never be anything but what we say it is. Thinking we’ve done something.
     
     We will never see everything, and we will never see anything all the ways it can be seen. All it takes is a little more looking to know this is so.
193. Roaring Fork Falls 01— Pisgah National Forest near Little Switzerland, NC, May 9, 2013 — Stepping stones along the way…
     
     1) Our idea of God is not God.
     
     2) It takes a lot of looking to be able to see.
     
     3) We can do what is hard or do it the hard way. It is not easy. Ever.
     
     4) We experience things we don’t understand. We understand things we cannot explain. The left hemisphere of our brain is not the seat of Real Knowledge. The task of the left hemisphere is to know what the right hemisphere knows.
     
     5) When you don’t know what to do, sit down, shut up, and listen to what you feel. Feel for what you know. When we know what we know, we know what we need to know. If you don’t know what to do, what do you know?
     
     6) Practice seeing what you look at, hearing what you listen to, knowing what you know.
     
     7) Who do you know that you admire the most? What do you admire about them? Practice being like them in those ways.
     
     8) We know what we like and we know what we don’t like. We know what fits and what does not fit. We know where we belong and where we have no business being. We know what we love to do and what we detest doing. We know what fills our hearts and what kills our soul. We know what is good for us and what is bad for us. We know what energizes us and what depletes us… So. What’s the problem?
     
     9) Ask the questions that beg to be asked. Ask the questions that beg you to ask them, not the questions someone else tells you to ask. You can ask your own questions—and must!
     
     10) Don’t think answers are going to do anything for you. An answer is just a step on the way to a better question. Question the answers.
     
     11) Probe. Poke. Play around. Wander. Wonder. Explore. Experiment.
     
     12) Everything worth knowing comes about by playing imaginatively, creatively, with what is known, or thought to be.
     
     13) Playfulness, imagination and creativity are the same thing. Do not think you can think your way into new ways of thinking. You have to play your way there, imaginatively, creatively. Generally, you have to do something and think about what you did to see things—to think—differently. Playfulness leads the way.
194. Owl Flies Panorama — Bog Garden, Greensboro, NC, May 10, 2013 — Think about the people you hang out with. How many of them are able to help you with your life—with the life you are living and with the life that is yours to live? How many of them distract you from your life—either or both of them? How many of them interfere with your life—are an obstacle to living your life? Think about the people you hang out with.
195. Floating Princess Tree Flower — Bog Garden, Greensboro, NC, May 10, 2013 — Your primary obligation is to the life that is yours to live. You have to find it and live it—within the context and circumstances of the life you are living. There is nothing easy about it. But it can be fun. And meaningful. And interesting. And it can save your life—physically and emotionally/spiritually.
     
     Being connected with—living aligned with—in service to—with loyalty and allegiance to—the life that is ours to live revitalizes our life—physically and emotionally/spiritually. It heals us. Makes us well. And turns out to be all that was ever missing in our life—the life we are living.
     
     We are at loose ends, adrift, aimlessly wandering, going through the motions, with our heart not in what we are doing because we are not on the beam, not on track, out of sync with ourselves and living a life that is not ours to live.
     
     All of that changes when we take up the work that is ours to do—which has nothing to do with the work we do to pay the bills. We come to life and are alive when we align ourselves with the life that is our life to live.
     
     Our primary obligation is to find that life and live it. How are you doing with that?
196. Three Ferns — Bog Garden, Greensboro, NC, May 7, 2013 — Authenticity is a function of transparency—not that we are transparent to others, but to ourselves. We cannot kid ourselves, play games with ourselves, be blind to ourselves, and have any chance of living an authentic, genuine, really us life.
     
     So, when you look at yourself in the mirror, see who is there. Not to condemn, berate, shame, despise! Just to see. Just to know.
     
     The rule is simple: No holding anything back from ourselves. No hiding anything from ourselves. No pretending that things are different than they are.
     
     To be who we are, we have to start with who we are—just as we are, right there, in the mirror.
197. Going — The Bog Garden, Greensboro, NC, May 11, 2013 — We think a high standard of living is a substitute for being alive. What are we doing with our life, is the question. What is a high standard of living for?
     
     We live to serve the economy. But what does the economy serve? What is the goal of the culture? What is the culture here to help us do?
     
     I was a minister for 40.5 years. In order to be paid, I had to not do my job, or one of them. Of course, I cheated where I could get by with it, but it was always a question of where I was going to cheat, here or there?
     
     As a minister, my primary job was to take care of the church. Serve the church. That would be the building and the grounds and the bank account of the church. The organization. The paraphernalia.
     
     My secondary job was to care for the people and help them get together with their life.
     
     What’s a church for? Well, practically speaking, a church is here to grow the church, develop the church, have more programs this year than last year. Have an increasingly large budget. Be opulent. Obese. Everlasting.
     
     The people who come to the church are there for the church. They have to be involved in the church, which means doing what the church needs them to do, wants to have done.
     
     Well. Where in that scheme are people helped with their life, with the life that is theirs to live? The church just tells them what to do. It doesn’t help them find what is truly theirs to do. It doesn’t invite them to stop giving their money to the church and start spending it on the things and the experiences that will bring them forth and serve them well in their individual lives. They have no individual lives. Their life is the church.
     
     The same principle is at work in the economy. We are here to serve the economy. “Go shopping,” was George Bush’s great line. That was the best he could do. All he knew. And we elected him twice. It’s where we are as a culture, as a country.
     
     It’s easier to just not worry about it, about our life, about what is ours to do, about our work, our genius, our talent, our gift. A high enough standard of living takes our mind off the emptiness of our life. And we can always go to church and hear them tell us it will all come together for us in heaven when we die. But we are already dead. Why don’t they do something about that?
     
     The church ought to be raising people from the dead—helping them transform the culture from a wasteland into a vibrant source of life for everyone.
198. Owl Flies, One—Bog Garden, Greensboro, NC, May 11, 2013 — We have to work it out. Working it out is living within the tension, within the conflicts, within the polarities, within the opposites, that define our life.
     
     How much for them, how much for me? Always the question. We have to work it out again and again in each situation as it arises. Sometimes, we decide for them. Sometimes we decide for ourselves.
     
     There are no global, eternal, everlasting, once and done for ever and ever amen decisions about how to do it. We always have to work it out.
     
     We can be overwhelmed with the business of living—changing diapers, getting the dog to the vet, mowing the lawn, unstopping drains, etc.—to the point where we have no time to consider the life that is ours to live.
     
     And we can drift so far into escapism, dreaming of the life we wish were ours to live that we neglect, abandon, and betray our responsibilities, duties and obligations to the here and now needs of the life we are living.
     
     We have to work it out.
     
     Working it out starts with waking up. When we wake up, we wake up to the allness of it all. We wake up to everything that has a claim on us. It’s too much. We want to hide. That’s why we were asleep in the first place. Being awake is agony. It starts with the anguish of realization, the suffocating fear that it’s too much for us and we cannot possibly work it out. The fear is part of the allness. Put it on the table with the rest of it. Something else to work out.
     
     The German word “weltanschauung” points to a world-view that takes it all into account. Asleep, we have a very narrow weltanschauung. Awake, it encompasses the whole banana. We have to see it all. And work it out.
199. Boone Fork Cascades 01 — Blue Ridge Parkway near Blowing Rock, NC, May 9, 2013 — The busy-ness of our life can interfere with our business. “Stay Out Of My Business” could be a bumper sticker or a tee-shirt slogan because life intrudes. The flow of our life is redirected by the tsunami of our other life.
     
     And we are back to the Odysseus quote from the Odyssey: “I will stay with it and endure through suffering hardship / and once the heaving sea has shaken my raft to pieces, then I will swim.”
     
     We can’t let the rolling waves of “the wine dark sea” of life deter us from “our business”— even though we might have to set it aside while we deal with the disruption, disarray and disorder of the way things are.
     
     We have to remember what our business is even when we cannot get to it for a while, like until the kids get out of college. There isn’t an expired by date on our business. Swimming through the heaving sea is doing our business, just in the very early stages.
200. Blue Ridge Spring 01 — Blue Ridge Parkway near Boone, NC, May 9, 2013 — Life is a mixed bag, blessing and curse, good and bad, bad and good, good going over into bad, bad going over into good. It’s complicated. It’s complex. It’s chaos. Don’t let it stop you!
     
     We get as far forcing ourselves to move—willing ourselves to get back up and see what we can do in “the winter of our discontent”—as we do dancing merrily through the lush meadows of spring.
     
     A friend talked with me about her experience with postpartum depression, saying she had to force herself to dust the end table in the morning and the coffee table after lunch. “Just one thing like that a day was insurmountable and all I could do for too many days.”
     
     For what? We do not know.
     
     We believe in more than meets the eye. We trust ourselves to a purpose beyond our power to conceive. We sense that we are here for more than ourselves—that we serve LIFE in ways we cannot imagine. And deal with death doing it.
     
     Death comes in all forms. We carry the banner of LIFE. The Cyclops is death standing in our way, grinning. We must not die before our time.
     
     Why? Why do I say that? What evidence do I have suggesting that it matters? What can I put forth in defense of my position? In asking the questions, we take the side of the Cyclops. We become the voice of the Soul Killer, the Life Eater, and take sides with them against us.
     
     Whose side are we on? The side of LIFE, or the side of DEATH? It’s the fundamental choice. Are we here to be alive or to die—to live while we are alive or to die before we are dead?
     
     I’m betting on life, on LIFE. I’m betting we carry, somehow, the hope of the species—the hope of more than the species, of that which is beyond the species—the hope of that which we do not know, but serve, with loyalty and allegiance and courage and determination for as long as we are alive.
     
     And I’m looking for the good company of those who are willing to be traveling companions, supporting one another in the belief that we are here to be alive and will be, by God, for as long as life is possible. You sign on for the journey by sauntering up to the Cyclops in his most recent manifestation and spitting in his ugly red eye.
201. The Bog Garden is at the corner of Hobbs Road and Starmount Drive — across Hobbs Road to the east from the Bicentennial Garden. Hobbs road is the western boundary of the Shops At Friendly. Proceeding west on Friendly Ave., you would pass the Shops at Friendly and turn right (north) on Hobbs Road, straight through the traffic signal at the intersection of Hobbs and Northline Ave. and turn right at the next street which would be Starmount Drive. It’s about a 12 acre natural habitat park and about 6 acres of it is Benjamin Lake. A great place to hang out with a camera!

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12/27/2012 — 03/22/2013

1. We are all Leaving Egypt—the land of bondage, the house of oppression, the place of enslavement to someone else’s idea of who we ought to be.
   
   Egypt is the Wasteland, where everyone does what they are told. Where no one thinks for herself, for himself, or lives a life that could be mistaken for their own.
   
   In the Wasteland, no one lives authentically. Everyone pretends, fakes it, follows orders or the crowd from the barn to the pasture and back to the barn, every day, all their life ling.
   
   The Wasteland is the dwelling place of those who have lost their soul, who have no heart, who are the walking dead, stumbling through their life without direction, or purpose, or interest, or vision.
   
   We have to leave Egypt to have a chance. We have to take a chance to have a chance. We have to turn our backs to the Wasteland and step into the Wilderness.
   
   The Wilderness is where we come alive. In the Wilderness, we find our own way by seeing what we see, and hearing what we hear, and thinking what we think, and smelling what we smell, and tasting what we taste, and liking what we like, and knowing what we know, and doing what we can do the way we can do it…
   
   In the Wilderness, we find ourselves, our soul, our heart, our vision, our interest, our enthusiasms, our life. In the Wilderness, as “in the desert, we can remember our name, ‘cause there ain’t none there for to give us no pain.”
   
   But, there is pain. The pain of awakening. The pain of birth. The pain of realization. The pain of contradictions and conflict and choice and decision. The pain of growing up.
   
   We grow up or we go to hell. And create hell for all of those about us when we refuse the task of growing up, which is also hell. The difference is that growing up is hell with hope and life at the other end—the Promised Land. And refusing to grow up is just hell and a return to Egypt.
   
   The Wilderness forces all of this upon us, and we discover who we are and what we are made of and whether we have what it takes to live the life that is our life to live and prepare the way of the Lord—the coming one who is hidden away in our own Self, struggling to come forth in our own life, there in the Wilderness between Egypt and the Land of Promise.
2. Reedy Fork Sunset Panorama B 01 — Lake Brandt Greenway, Bur-Mil Park Access, Greensboro, NC, December 14, 2012 — It takes time. We cannot hurry our arrival in the Land of Promise—The full realization/expression of who we are, of the Self we are asked to be. We grow into that Self, gradually, over the long course of our life and, perhaps, beyond.
   
   How long before I become a photographer. Of course, I already AM a photographer, just as I am, and you are, already who I will, who you will, be. But, how long before I become accomplished, complete? The—my-ideal photographer? The road is long.
   
   There are two words which describe equally well, one might say, “Precisely,” what I do when I go out with the camera looking for photos—looking for something to catch my eye. The words are: Play and Practice.
   
   I play with the camera. I practice with the camera. I learn as I play and practice. I forget what I learned and learn it some more as I continue to play and practice.
   
   Us with our life is like me with my camera. We step into our life to play and to practice. To play at living, at being alive, at being who we are within the context and circumstances of our life. We learn, forget, learn some more.
   
   There are no grade books, no grades, no hell in the wings for those who don’t make the grade, just more play, more practice, more seeing how things work, more understanding our gifts, our art, our business, where we belong, what we are about, how best to be about it. Play. Practice. But.
   
   It is not to be discounted, dismissed, taken for granted, ignored, treated lightly, with contempt and disdain. I honor the camera and my relationship with the camera. To me, it is a sacred thing. Same with my life. Same with you and your life.
   
   We honor our life by living it lovingly, caringly, with consciousness, awareness and consideration. We cannot live any old way. I cannot take a photo of something that hasn’t caught my eye. I cannot close my eyes and snap away and claim to be playing, practicing. It matters how we live. Nothing matters more.
3. I feel the need to explain. The 10,000 (eventually, if I live long enough) Reedy Fork sunsets.
   
   There is enough of a difference at the same location each time I go to stir my interest. And it is the same location because it is the best—actually, the only acceptable—sunset location I know of in Guilford County. And it is thirty minutes from my back door to taking a photo at Reedy Fork.
   
   I am not selling photographs for a living. I am learning to take photographs by playing, by practicing, with the camera—and Reedy Fork is a great place to play and practice.
   
   Frequent, steady, reliable, continuing and on-going camera play/practice is essential to developing photographic skills. You cannot not play a musical instrument and be a musician. Michael Jordan practiced basketball all the way to the end of his career. We can’t put the camera on a shelf between trips to exotic locations and scenic wonders. Yet, most of us do not live with a backyard that excites our eye. We can snap the shutter but we cannot take a photograph if we don’t feel it first.
   
   So, when we find a few places a short drive from home where we “feel it,” we have to go there a lot. To play and practice. To honor the muse, revere the art, to be becoming as good as we can imagine being at what we love to do.
4. Reedy Fork Sunset B 06 — Lake Brandt Greenway, Bur-Mil Park Access, Greensboro, NC, December 15, 2012 — “There is no competition in music (Or words to that effect),” saith Daniel Dareus (The Michael Myquist character) in the Swedish film, “As It Is In Heaven.” We don’t do music to be the best there’s ever been, or will be. We do music because we must, and we do it as well as we can imagine doing it because we must.
   
   What must YOU do is the question. What is YOUR art, your ART, is the question.
   
   An aside inserts itself: That’s two questions claiming to be THE question. If you have been with me for a while, you know that I am all over getting to the bottom of it, of all of it, of it all, and that questions are the beasts we ride to the core, where we will meet, of course, more questions.
   
   We ask all the questions that beg to be asked, and question the answers. Every question is THE question. So I say that a lot. This is THE question and that is THE question. Well, which is it? Which is THE question? That’s the question.
   
   Back to the question. What is your art? What must you do? You don’t decide, you know. Our art chooses us as surely as “the wand chooses the wizard.” And, our art is as magical as any wizard’s wand—transforming us and all those we touch with it’s wonder and grace.
   
   We are all graced by our art. The community is graced by the art of each member of the community, which is why we have no business asking each person to leave their art at the door if they would belong to the community, if they would be a part of the family.
   
   How many families or churches or fill-in-the-blank have excommunicated their members for being themselves? For being true to themselves? For practicing their art the way their art demanded to be practiced? Because it wasn’t kosher? Acceptable? The right kind of art done the way it is supposed to be done?
   
   Those Who Know Best And Must Be Pleased have abandoned their art, forsaken it, betrayed it and have become art critics, in the worst sense of the term. Don’t let them stop you from doing what you must do or die!
   
   “When you leave home to follow your heart, the birds of the air will plaster you with their poop. Don’t even pause to wipe it off.”—Native American wisdom from Joseph Campbell
5. Reedy Fork Sunset D 01 — Lake Brandt Greenway, Bur-Mil Park Access, Greensboro, NC, December 30, 2012 — It takes a lot of looking to be able to see. If you don’t look, how can you expect to see? If you want to see you have to look.
   
   What do you look at? What do you look for? How we look, as in what we look at and what we look for—not as in “Don’t I look sharp in this turtleneck?”—determines what we see. If we want to improve our seeing, we have to improve our looking.
   
   We have to look consciously, intentionally. We have to look in ways that take our looking into account. We have to look at our looking if we want to see.
   
   I’ve suggested this before—show of hands here, how many took me up on it? Google “uncritical inference test” and take a half-dozen or so as a way of opening up the way you look at things, particularly your inferences and assumptions.
   
   We have to look at our inferences and assumptions in order to see them. There isn’t much space between an inference and an assumption and a projection. It’s all cooked up between our ears and then “seen” as though it is “out there” in the world of objective—as in measurable, weigh-able, countable, smell-able, touchable, taste-able reality. It isn’t. It’s all in our head.
   
   In order to see what’s “out there” and what’s “in here,” we have to look at what we think we see. We have to inspect it, examine it, poke it, prod it, sniff it, bite it and see if it is as real as we think it is. We have to look at our looking. See?
6. Reedy Fork Sunset D 05 — Lake Brandt Greenway, Bur-Mil Park Access, Greensboro, NC, December 30, 2012 — There is nothing in it for us beyond the living of it, beyond the experience of it. If you can understand that, accept that, embrace that, you have it made, and are as enlightened as you need to be.
   
   What do you think Jesus got out of it? Or the Buddha? Or the Dali Lama? They are revolutionaries who transformed the world by the way they lived in the world without deriving any benefit from the revolution they led. They all lived with pain, suffering, injustice, stupidity and death.
   
   What do you think there is to get? What benefit would make it all worth your time and effort? What’s the payoff you think would be acceptable? What do you think being enlightened would do for you?
   
   It would enable you to make your peace with the pain of life, of your life, of living, of being alive. Period. It would enable you to live the life that is your life to live within the conditions and circumstances that define and limit your life, your choices, your options. I hope that’s what you have in mind because that’s all there is to it: Being alive in the time and place of our living.
   
   I know when the Blue Heron at the Bog Garden is about to fly. I’m learning to read the clouds and gauge the quality of the quality of the sunset. I know these things by going often to the Bog Garden and watching the Blue Heron, by going often to Reedy Fork and watching the sunset.
   
   The discipline of opening myself to the time and place of my living is bringing me to life there, enabling me to be alive there, providing me with the experience of life in the time left for living. I’m seeing things I would never have seen if I had not gone looking.
   
   We all have to look at the things that catch out eye. It wouldn’t do for all of you to gather at the Bog Garden, or at Reedy Fork. But you all have something that needs you to look at it, to see it, to appreciate it, revere it, honor it. In so doing, you bring life to life in your living. You become alive. And, seeing, you live in ways that transform the world—your world, all worlds.
7. Wood Duck 02 — The Bog Garden, Greensboro, NC, December 31, 2012 — A stream doesn’t know where it’s going but it doesn’t quit. It trusts itself to its guide—that would be gravity—and doesn’t let anything stop it, flowing over, under, around and through obstacles and obstructions on its way to wherever it will be when it gets there.
   
   So much for having a goal and a plan and a strategy for effecting the plan and achieving the goal. Trust yourself to your guide—that would be your instinct and intuition and feelings—and go!
   
   Trouble is is it instinct or addiction? Cocaine, alcohol, tobacco and sugar (the list is long) create competing urges within and we do not know what is directing our path or guiding our boat on its path through the sea. When we do not know whether to trust our feelings or where they are coming from, two things help us sort things out: Time and our dreams.
   
   Time will tell. All it takes is time. It all comes clear with time. If we don’t know if the voice is “of God” or “of the Devil,” we wait to see. We wait it out. We wait for a sign. We wait. And attend our dreams.
   
   Our dreams are the language of the Unconscious. Learning to listen to our dreams is the most direct way of attending the other world. Dreams are context and person centered. That is to say your dreams are YOUR dreams and the same dream dreamed at 20 and at 60 would mean different things. There is no blanket, one size fits all, method of dream interpretation.
   
   Start simply by paying attention to your dreams. Keep a Dream Journal. Write them down when you wake up. Pay attention to dream themes that recur over time (that word again). See what you make of them.
   
   A general rule for understanding dreams is to see them as compensation for our conscious attitudes and behavior. A dream that has you showing up for a test without being prepared, for example, may be telling you to loosen up, let some things go. You tend toward perfectionism, obsession and compulsion. If you dream you are driving in a car with breaks that don’t work, you may be living recklessly, ignoring “stop signs” in your relationships or at work.
   
   Taking your time and listening to your dreams are the best ways I know of evaluating your feelings and your sense of what needs to be done. Look for confirmation, affirmation, direction if you are not sure your feelings can be trusted. There is no hurry. You have the rest of your natural life, and perhaps eternity to work it all out.
8. The Landing — Bog Garden, Greensboro, NC, December 31, 2012 — We’ve got rhythm. Or, if we don’t, we know we don’t got rhythm. We know when we are in tune, in sync, in harmony, aligned and at one with our life—and when we are not.
   
   Why do we push ahead, keep doing, the things that are off key for us? The things we have no business doing? What is our business? What isn’t our business? Who knows better than us?
   
   There is being on track, on the beam, at-one with our life, and there is being off the track, off the beam, at-odds with our life—and we know which is which and where we are at any point in our life.
   
   How to get from off the beam to on the beam is the question. To do that we have to quit doing what we are doing and do something else instead. What do we quit doing? What do we start doing? What’s our best guess about the quitting and the starting?
   
   Most of the time we know what to do, we just don’t want to do it. We don’t want to do what is hard, what asks hard things of us. We want to do what is soft, easy, trouble-free.
   
   “We only want two things, Jim,” says my bud Ogie Overman, “soft and easy.” The Cyclops loves that about us. It makes his job soft and easy. He doesn’t have to show up for work most days. We do his work for him, keeping ourselves off the track, off the beam, at-odds with our life.
   
   The only thing standing between us and the Promised Land, where we live fulfilling our mission to apprehend, bring forth, express and experience who we are, is us. We are the Cyclops—“the marble and the chisel.” What are we going to do about us?
   
   It’s time to pull up the chairs, don’t you think? Sit down? Talk things through? Work it out? Here’s a hint for you: If we could will ourselves past the Cyclops within, we would have done it long ago.
   
   Negotiation and compromise, kid. Negotiation and compromise. And, ask for the help you need—if you are serious about taking the help that is offered. If you are not serious, what’s it going to take for you to be serious? About living the life that is yours to live? In the time left for living?
9. Reedy Fork Sunset B 07 — Lake Brandt Greenway, Bur-Mil Park Access, Greensboro, NC, December 15, 2012 — The freedom to have an opinion, a perspective, and express it without having to defend it, justify it, explain it or excuse it is one of the hallmarks of my idea of the right kind of community—the right kind of company.
   
   The questions we would be asked would be the right kind of questions, questions for clarification, exploration, rumination—questions with more of a walkabout in mind than probing for weaknesses or scoring points for the prosecution.
   
   The freedom of our own perspective is the hope of the world. It was the cornerstone of the American Revolution, the driving force behind colonization, and is solidly ensconced in the Bill of Rights. But it isn’t widely encouraged or practiced.
   
   People are told what to think and inhibited from thinking for themselves at every turn. Commercial advertisement does not want us thinking for ourselves. It wants us buying what it is selling.
   
   I see the arts as the last holdout for individual expression. The culture would make mass consumers of us all. The arts are counter-cultural to the core. Of course there is a merry dance. Artists have to market their work. Franklin W. Dixon, the creator of the Hardy Boys mysteries hated what he did for a living, writing what he thought of as “pulp fiction,” instead of the masterpieces of literature he thought he had in him.
   
   We have to work it out, that word again, individually, in our own way, knowing that the individual expression of one’s own perspective is the hope of the world in every age.
10. Two Mallards — The Bog Garden, Greensboro, NC, December 30, 2012 — It’s a mess, and we find the way through—a way through. THE way may exist. THE right way. THE optimal way. THE way with the best outcome for everyone concerned. But. Trying to be sure the way we find is THE way expands the mess to completely unmanageable proportions and we collapse in total surrender, which is just another way of dealing with the mess. But. Not THE way for sure.
    
    We are digressing here, and digression is just another way of dealing with the mess. Wander around in a digression and a way appears in the wilderness. Things open before those who walkabout among the options and possibilities, and they find a door where they would never have thought there would be a door, and things shift, and they feel better, and are strengthened for the journey and are able to go on. I already feel better, and I’ve only digressed twice in two paragraphs.
    
    Back to the first digression. Finding THE way is like finding THE college major or THE career choice or THE job or THE spouse or partner for life. Just find one that will do and see where it goes. You will never make a decision that you couldn’t have made better with more time and more information. But. We do what we do and then deal with having done it, and it’s a mess. And we are back where we started.
    
    It’s a mess. And we find a way through by stepping into it and looking around, wading around, slogging around, swimming around, sometimes round and round. But. After a while or two in the mess things begin to come into focus. Begin to click into place. Begin to make sense in a messy sort of way. But. That is better than nonsense any day, and we begin to find a way out of the mess just by being immersed in it for a while or two.
    
    Jim’s rule of thumb here is “Just go live it and don’t try to figure it out. Don’t try to think up what to do to avoid that and make that happen. It will all become clear with time. Step into it and see what you can do with it. Every mess becomes somehow manageable with time. Sometimes it’s a long time, but no mess lasts forever. There is always another one waiting to take this one’s place. And we’ll do just fine there, too. Dive in and see if I’m not right about this.”
11. Barred Owl 01 — Bog Garden, Greensboro, NC, January 02, 2013 — I dreamed I was setting a snapping free from a tight box. I think I am the turtle and my task is to set me free. To get out of the box.
    
    I dreamed I was eating a chocolate cake what wasn’t tasty. I thought as I dreamed it, “Why am I doing this?” I see a connection with the turtle here.
    
    Based on these two dreams, I would say my goal is to be free by allowing myself to do what is needed in the here and now of my living.
    
    No boxes. No eating things, no doing things, that don’t taste right, that don’t suit my taste, that aren’t me.
    
    Dreams are great this way. Dreams come in tandem, or in groups, flocks, herds until we see what they are saying, until we get it. Then it’s something else.
    
    How can we set ourselves free from our fear in order to live in ways that are right for us?
    
    Sit with the question. Meditate on it. Commune with it. Ask for guiding dreams to help you explore it. Do not hurry an answer.
    
    Live with the question. “How can we set ourselves free from our fear in order to live in ways that are right for us?” Become friends with the question. See where it leads, what it stirs up, what occurs to you as you ask it, wonder about it, play around with it.
    
    Or, better, dream your own dreams—and play with them.
12. Bur-Mil Moon 02 — Bur-Mil Park, Greensboro, NC, December 14, 2012 — The contrast, or contradiction, between who we are and what is being asked of us can become so great as to be noxious and intolerable. There is some pain we cannot stand. It might appear to be as nothing to other people, with different perspectives, points of view, ways of accessing reality—but it is our world and only we live in it.
    
    My wife can take things I cannot bear. Enjoys things I detest. We are different that way. And it works in reverse. I can handle 6 AM with delight. She sees it as punishment and drudgery.
    
    The rule is simple: Stay away from where you do not belong. I have to stay away from cigarette smoke. My father was a smoker and I had enough of that early on.
    
    Know what you cannot handle and do not handle it. You have boundaries, borders, landmarks. “Thou shalt not remove thy neighbor’s landmarks,” is a bit of Old Testament wisdom not found in Proverbs. It can also be read as, “Honor your own landmarks and keep them from being overrun or overgrown.”
    
    Know what you cannot do, and don’t do it. Know what you can do for only three days at a time, with a long time between times, and never do it for more than three days at a time.
    
    Seeing clearly begins with seeing yourself clearly. The more visible you become to you, the more visible you become to everyone else. It’s a step in bringing yourself forth in the time and place of your living. It is not easy and you may not be well received but. You may be pleasantly surprised to discover the full wonder of you, wondering why it took so long.
13. Banks Presbyterian Church B&W — Marvin, NC, December 24, 2012 — I’m making bread. After a long hiatus. Bread of any kind hasn’t been on my diet for nearly a year, and homemade bread has been off for twenty years. Carbs. Cholesterol. Calories, calories, calories. There’s a small loaf in the oven along with 8 large cinnamon rolls.
    
    Two reasons. I love cinnamon rolls. I can make a better cinnamon roll than I can buy.
    
    The advantage of buying them is that I can buy them one at a time with a long time between times. So. It will be a long time between this bartch and the next one.
    
    The rule here is: Sin boldly and do penance equally boldly. And don’t kid the kidder, which would be ourselves.
14. Reedy Fork Sunset C 03 — Lake Brandt Greenway, Bur-Mil Park Access, Greensboro, NC, December 28, 2012 — I dreamed a Russian General was naming the three most influential men in Russian history and Dwight Eisenhower was one of them. I wondered “Why Dwight Eisenhower?” but didn’t ask the question because I was interested in the flow of the General’s remarks. All I can remember about the dream is that I did not ask the question.
    
    Ask the question that begs to be asked! I don’t care how it disrupts the flow of the conversation or or life! Belong to the questions! Ask the questions! All of them! Every one you can imagine asking! Be impertinent enough to ask the pertinent questions—the one you think are pertinent, that seem important—every time.
    
    Parsifal, in the story of The Search for the Holy Grail, did not ask “What ails thee?” “What’s the trouble?” “What’s the problem here?” And missed his chance to heal the Grail King (by enabling him to talk about his plight, explore his problem, find his own solution?), and spent the rest of the story in the search for redemption.
    
    Questions are redemptive, transformative, and, of course, disruptive. Questions are thresholds opening the way to the future, to the Land of Promise, to Life. Refusing to ask the questions that need to be asked is death. Sealing us into a life of the living dead. Keeping things as they are: stifling, rigid, frozen in place.
    
    What questions need to be asked that you aren’t asking?
    What questions are you afraid to ask? In what other ways is your fear of living keeping you from being alive? Who holds the key to life? You do. Well?
15. Barred Owl 04 — The Bog Garden, Greensboro, NC, January 4, 2012 — It’s the sidetracks that get us there. All those mistakes you have made? Critical steps in your development. Every one. Even that one. You know the one I mean. That one. Crucial to your being here, now. Where would you be without having made it, all of them? You wouldn’t be here, now—and we are glad to have you with us. And I am glad to be with you all.
    
    We are here because of where we have been and what has happened to us and how that impacted us—and one thing leads to another, and here we are. And we wouldn’t be here without the sidetracks, the missed signs, the wrong turns that turned out to be exactly right in a strange, inexplicable, kind of way.
    
    So ask all the questions—the ones that don’t seem to fit, but are begging to be asked, even though you know know why and it doesn’t make sense. And all those asides I throw at you—they are not without their own sense of direction, and they usually wind their way back to the point, after making other points, maybe related, maybe not, to the main point, but important all the same.
    
    Don’t mind being sidetracked, distracted, drawn off, away, for a while. Go! Go! See what gifts lie down those roads off the beaten path! See what gold might be found there! it’s all apart of the trail, of the journey.
    
    Yogi Berra said, “When you come to a fork in the road, take it!” See where it goes. It may make all the difference.
16. January Blossoms — Bog Garden, Greensboro, NC, January 4, 2012 — We adjust our stride to accommodate the terrain. We don’t get to dial up the terrain. “Make mine firm and flat, would you—and straight, with nice places to eat along the way, and no surprises I’m not ready for.”
    
    I particularly dislike the surprises I’m not ready for—not in the mood for. Surprises out of the corral, running wild, trampling down hopes, dreams, plans and wrecking lives at will.
    
    If your phone is like mine, it rings with a bad to good news ratio of about 4 to 1. Maybe higher. And we adjust our stride to accommodate the terrain.
    
    Adjusting our attitude is another thing. It helps if people don’t try to hurry us along. It takes time, getting ourselves adjusted to a day, a world, a life different from the one we had our eye on.
    
    ”Okay, now what?” When we get to the place of being able to ask the question, we know we are on the way. But. It cannot be rushed. We have to square ourselves up with how things are in order to step into the gap between how they are and how we wish they were—how we want them to be—and do there the work that has to be done, the way it needs to be done, the way it needs us to do it.
    
    We don’t just snap back in place and pick back up where we were before the terrain changed. We sometimes drop a stitch or two. We sometimes have to lie there a while before we can come to terms with letting come what’s come and letting go what’s gone.
    
    We should give ourselves time. “A period of adjustment,” call it. “I’m adjusting myself to a terrain change.” “I’m getting used to a new world, Golda.”
    
    In the meantime, we give ourselves to the things that calm our core, and restore our souls, and recover our peace. It helps to make a list of those things to help us remember what they are when the terrain changes radically and the ground drops out from under us.
17. Northern Shovelers 01 — The Bog Garden, Greensboro, NC, January 5, 2012 — I feel better just driving down the driveway with the camera in the car going to look for photos. Fortifies my soul. Restores my peace. Grounds me in that which is good, at least for me.
    
    You have to know what does these things for you, and do it often. If it’s playing the drums, play the drums. Loudly. If it’s riding a horse, ride a horse. If it is sitting with a book and your favorite music…
    
    You are in charge of the care and tending of you. The world is a tough gig. If you’re looking for someone to take care of you and treat you right, look in the mirror. And get with the program. Taking care of you the way you need to be taken care of.
    
    I walk and write every morning and make lunch for me and my wife and take a nap after lunch and go to the bog garden and to Reedy Fork in the afternoon when it isn’t raining, and have coffee with a bud when it is. Those things are my gift to me. I’ll make exceptions for the doctor and dentist, but otherwise, you take a number and wait for me to get around to you.
    
    I can get by with this because I’m retired and the kids are on their own. But, I’ve known what needed to be done for years, and I made timely gestures all along the way, caring for me, tending me, driving out of the driveway, even then, with the camera in the car looking for photos.
18. Used in Short Talks On Contradiction, etc., Two Geese Flying 01 — Lake Brandt Greenway, Bur-Mil Park Access, Greensboro, NC, December 18, 2012 — All we are doing here is waking up. Seeing. Making connections. Allowing the contradictions to work their magic on us and bring us to our senses, enabling us to live amid them as those who know the wonder of living amid the contradictions as sources of life, and light and peace anyway, nevertheless, even so.
    
    It isn’t going to all fall into place. We aren’t going to one day see why things happen as they do and be thrilled. Stop wondering why this, why that, why things like this or that are always happening to me. Why something happens isn’t nearly as important as what we are going to do with it, about it, now that it has happened.
    
    “Everything happens for a reason” isn’t nearly as helpful as “Nothing is wasted by those who are looking for how they can use what they have to do what can be done to make things more like they ought to be than they are for themselves and the entire commonwealth.”
    
    We step into the mess and make things better than they would be without us. We redeem, atone, transform, heal, restore, replenish, make whole. We interpret, spin, clarify, illuminate, perceive, center, reconcile, integrate, make peace—in each situation as it arises, for as long as there are situations. We order chaos to the extent that it can be ordered.
    
    We do it by bearing the pain of seeing, hearing, understanding and bringing what we have to offer to bear on how things are—no matter what they are. And, when we get tired of it, worn down by it, we put the camera in the car and go look for photos, taking pictures which themselves are healing for those who have eyes to see—which need be only the person taking the pictures.
19. January Shoreline 02 — Lake Brandt, Bur-Mil Park Access, Greensboro, NC, January 6, 2013 — What, exactly, do you have to lose? What, exactly, do you have to gain? Your answer to these two questions tells the tale.
    
    Our answer to these two questions says what we are willing to put up with and what we are willing to put up with to do something about what we are not willing to put up with. When what is to be gained overshadows what is to be lost, we move—we act—we do what needs to be done, no matter what.
    
    Knowing what we are willing to put up with, and what we are not willing to put up with, and what we are willing to do to do something about what we are not willing to put up with is the matrix within which we live.
    
    What do we have to gain? What do we have to lose? What do I think the answers should be?
    
    Why should you care what I think about what YOU have to gain or lose? Who am I to do your thinking for you? What do YOU think, is the question, and what do you think about your thinking?
    
    “Oh, we don’t want to think! Don’t ask us to think? We aren’t going to think! Just tell us what to think!” Well. If that’s what you think, what do you think about what you think?
    
    Thinking about what we think and going where that leads us is taking up the Quest, and we don’t have to physically go anywhere to do it. But. It can be agonizing just sitting in our recliner, or laying in our be.
    
    There is no growing up without sacrifice, without the right kind of pain, suffered in the right kind of way.
20. Pied Bill Grebes at Sunset 04 — Reedy Fork, Lake Brandt Greenway, Bur-Mil Park Access, Greensboro, NC, January 06, 1013 — When we give ourselves up—hand ourselves over to—the way that is right for us, that is life for us, things happen that serve the way. Joseph Campbell says there will be doors where we thought there were no doors, and hands to help us when we thought we were all alone. But. Don’t think this is easy.
    
    Things also tend to happen which test our resolve, our resiliency, our loyalty, our allegiance, and our faithfulness to the way that is right for us, to the life that is life for us. The Cyclops meets us at every turn.
    
    So we cannot be too quick to declare ourselves to be on the right track when things go our way, and we cannot be too quick to declare ourselves to be off track and lost in the wasteland when things don’t go our way. It’s tricky knowing whether to keep going and ride it out, play it out, see it through, or quit, turn around and try a different course.
    
    We have to persevere for a while. Time will tell, so take it, our time, that is. Look for the signs. Listen to our dreams. Trusting ourselves to intuit, divine, what is good for us, what is right for us, and what is not, in the time left for living.
21. January Shoreline 01 — Lake Brandt, Bur-Mil Park Access, Greensboro, NC, January 6, 2013 — There is no competition in art. We all are artists in our own way, doing what we do for the joy of our soul.
    
    Rumi said, “The soul is here for its own joy.” And, we are here to serve our soul. When we are doing our thing—the thing that we do, that only we can do the way we can do it—our soul comes to life and is alive.
    
    Mostly, our soul is dormant, dying, dead waiting for us to bring forth the gift that is ours to give and serve it upon the earth. Our gift is of soul and is soul, and exists to be expressed and exhibited and waved about.
    
    Mostly, what we express and exhibit and wave about is our own excess and lack of respect for limits of any kind. We call it “having fun,” or “having a good time.” We like to party as compensation for being mostly dead throughout our life—for having no life—for being alive only when we are drunk, high, and acting out. Our soul is rolling its eyes, wondering what is it going to take to wake us up.
    
    Waking up is growing up is squaring up to the difference between how things are and how they ought to be is standing up and doing what needs to be done about it (that difference) in each situation as it arises with the gifts that are ours to give is bringing forth our art in the service of soul, never minding what the critics have to say.
    
    We cannot bring soul to life without playing, laughing and having the time of our life—a time that is good in the best sense of the word, and more fun than we ever thought was possible. We are artists living for the joy of our soul. And, if we are not, we ought to be.
22. Barred Owl 05 B&W — The Bog Garden, Greensboro, NC, January 4, 2013 — We have to help people help us. The helping hands that are there when we thought we were alone can only be helpful if we receive the help offered. No one can help us against our will, against our willingness to be helped.
    
    People are bad to say (That might be a deep south phrase, “bad to do this or that.” It means they do it well and often. A person who is “bad to drink” is drunk a lot) they want help and that they will do anything to change their situation for the better—except, of course, the one thing that is required. For the alcoholic to stop drinking, for instance, or the obese person to stop eating and start exercising, etc.
    
    To help people help us means being willing to change—to stop doing what is not helpful and to start doing what is helpful. I knew a woman once who wanted a job “in the worst way,” but she wasn’t about to wear hose to the bank job offer or put up with kids who didn’t do their home work with the school job offer. Makes me wonder what “in the worst way” meant to her. Not what it means to me.
    
    All of which begs us to ask the question, “What are the characteristics of good help-ee candidates?” Sit with the question and see what comes to mind for you—and work those attributes into your way with life as you take up the way that you will not walk without being able to receive the help you need all along the way.
23. Earth Shadow Panorama 01 — Lake Brandt, Bur-Mil Access, Greensboro, NC, January 7, 2013 — We are not awake to the things we don’t want to face. Another way to say this is, “We see (or hate) in other people the things we (take your pick of ways to finish the phrase: fear, deny, can’t accept, would be appalled at, etc.) in ourselves.”
    
    When we wake up to how things are, we wake up to how things are in ourselves, to how things are with us.
    
    We can come at it in reverse. We can use other people as mirrors to our own soul. The things we love in others are things we value in ourselves but don’t believe are there, or things that actually aren’t there as often or as much as they need to be. The things we hate/fear/don’t like in others are things that are present in ourselves but which we deny, dismiss, discount (As in, “I am a bit over-weight, you are somewhat bulging at the waist, and he/she/it is obnoxiously obese.”)
    
    So. We read how we are seeing others—how we are reacting to others—and allow that to show us what is true about ourselves. Then we can become acute observers of our behavior and catch ourselves in the act of being more loveable than we might hope and more detestable than we imagine or believe.
    
    And then begins the process of transformation. When we wake up, we reclaim our positives and we rehabilitate our negatives—turning the things we are ashamed of into strengths and servants of soul.
    
    It’s important to not try to get rid of our negative capacities, but to wake up to them, be aware of them. On one level, they make us one with all people in a Thou Art That kind of way, disappearing our judgmental distance and the Superior/Inferior game instantly. On another level, they have their rightful place in our repertoire of responses to the situation as it develops. “Everything in its own time.” There will be a time and place for our Jerk Side to shine. We wouldn’t want to be bereft of the very qualities that are needed to serve the common good, no matter how bad we think of them as being.
    
    Be awake to your capabilities, and draw on them as necessary for the good of soul and of the whole.
24. Used in Short Talks On Contradiction, etc., Reedy Fork Sunset F 02 — Lake Brandt Greenway, Bur-Mil Park Access, Greensboro, NC, January 8, 2012 — Sometimes, what is good for us is bad for us. This is called a conflict of interest. We have to work it out. Conflicts of interest, within and without, are unavoidable. We have to work them out.
    
    We like a simple yes or not, good or bad, right or wrong, and think there is something wrong with us for our oppositional take on things. I’m here to sell you on the importance of contradiction in our life.
    
    “Without contraries is no progression,” said William Blake (In The Marriage of Heaven and Hell). Conflict, discord, discrepancy, disharmony, ambivalence, etc. are essential to our growing up, to our waking up, to our standing up and doing what needs to be done about seeing value in all sides. We have to choose, to decide—and therein lies the agony that is at the heart of life.
    
    Jesus in Gethsemane is every one of us in the critical moments, at the turning points, of our life. In bearing the pain—the agony—of decision, we grow up, wake up, and act.
    
    Opposition exists on all levels of life. Opposition to the experience and expression of the unfolding of the Self in our life runs deeply, runs to the core, perhaps of the Self itself and certainly within the psyche. And it is the place of consciousness to bring the conflicts to light, and bear the agony of our own depths.
    
    I have used the word agony three times, not counting this one, now. Paul uses it in his letter to Timothy: “I have fought the good fight, I have finished the race…” The word translated “race” is the Greek word agonae, agony. “I have run with perseverance the race that was set before me.” Again, “race” is “agonae,” agony.
    
    Agony is the path to the Promised Land, called “the Kingdom of God” in the New Testament. It is the price we pay for bringing ourselves forth—and for bringing the life we are called to live, built to live, forth—in the life we are living. It is nothing we cannot do. It’s just a matter of working it out.
25. Mallard in Flight 01 — The Bog Garden, Greensboro, NC, January 8, 2013 — Practice being alive today. Move toward life. Live toward life. Make a gesture—a symbolic act—toward life. Today.
    
    No one knows how much time is left for living, so no one has any business wasting a minute of what we have, a second of it. It is the most precious of all that could claim the title. How can we live with having failed to be alive in the time left for living?
    
    All of which begs the question: What to do?
    
    Don’t do anything in panic mode. Being alive is being consciously alive—not being frantically, unknowingly, reactively alive. Being consciously alive is being conscious of our unconscious leanings and lovings. It is knowing what we know. It is being aware of—and consciously, deliberately, willfully trusting ourselves to—the drift of our soul. Here’s the catch: This takes time.
    
    We move toward life by not doing anything.
    
    We move toward life by simply sitting and being open to what needs to come to life within us and through us in the life we are living.
    
    We move toward life by opening ourselves to the stirring of soul.
    
    We move toward life by noticing what catches our eye and looking closer—and seeing what happens.
    
    We are not in charge of our living. We are not “the captain of our ship, the master of our fate.” We are just along for the ride. We are the roadie, packing the luggage and carrying the equipment and waiting for directions to the next gig.
    
    We begin to live by sitting quietly and listening—and moving slowly in the direction of what calls our name. And seeing where it goes.
26. Reedy Fork Sunset F 01 — Lake Brandt Greenway, Bur-Mil Park Access, Greensboro, NC, January 8, 2013 — Self-confidence can easily go over into inflation, and arrogance and contempt for the opposition, or just those with whom we are living. It’s hard to keep the ratios just right.
    
    I’m practicing taking flying duck photos. I could practice taking flying Kingfisher photos, but that would be ridiculous. The Kingfisher is to little, too fast, too up and down and too far away. Ducks are easier to manage. I have a chance with ducks.
    
    To take a flying duck photo, I have to have one point of focus active in the center of the frame, and keep the duck in the center of the frame, and I have a beautifully focused flying duck photo every time. Except but only.
    
    There is a stick in the water at the Bog Garden about 50 yards from where I stand. The stick does not move. I cannot keep it in the center of the frame. I move. My heart beats and the camera moves. My arms tire of holding the camera and the camera moves.
    
    A beautifully focused flying duck photo is an accident of grace at work in my life. The duck flew itself into focus at precisely the right time.
    
    This is what it is like trying to balance the ratios at work in our life. Enough self-confidence to step us forth into our life without going over into inflation, arrogance and contempt.
    
    Lay out any value you aspire to on the table. Compassion, empathy, kindness, joy… Fill the table. Every one of those admirable qualities has an equally appalling extreme. How to be just enough the right way without being any of the wrong way is like trying to keep a flying duck in the center of the frame.
    
    in order to have a chance, we have to take it not seriously. We have to laugh, and shake our heads, and try again. And hope that sometimes the duck flies into focus at the right time.
27. Clouds at Sunset — Reedy Fork, Lake Brandt Greenway, Bur-Mil Park Access, Greensboro, NC, December 16, 2012 — When the Buddha named desire as the root of suffering, he was saying we wouldn’t suffer if we didn’t care about what is important to us.
    
    An inscription upon a New England tombstone says the same thing: “It is a terrible thing to love what death can touch.”
    
    I’ll take caring with suffering over being immune to, and untouched by, the impact of life upon love.
    
    Caring about—loving—that which is important to us is life. Take that away from us and we may as well be dead, and are dead—just waiting for the coroner to make it official.
    
    Suffering is the price we pay for being alive. If the Journey weren’t important, didn’t matter, the Cyclops would be nothing. That which stands between us and what matters most would be unable to find where he belonged—but it would be an empty victory.
    
    Artists suffer their art—they pay a price to serve their art, working at it to get it right long past where any normal human being would have quit and gone to bed. Edward Hicks painted “Peaceable Kingdom” over fifty times trying to get it right. Think that didn’t matter to him? Think he didn’t suffer his art? Think he didn’t care? Think he and the Cyclops didn’t go round and round every day? Think he would have given it up for a nice job with good pay that was free of pain?
    
    The life that needs us to live it is not free of suffering. The life that needs us to live it will take us into the depths of Gethsemane and across the face of Golgotha. And, believe it or not, we will be glad to go—because it is LIFE, and we will be dead long enough.
28. Wetlands Geese 01 Panorama — Guilford County near Summerfield, NC, January 11, 2013 — Trust yourself to the drift of your soul. Do what you can imagine doing to align yourself with—to live—the life that is right for you.
    
    You are in good hands. Those hands would be your own. You know what is good for you and what is not. What is life and what is death.
    
    What do you enjoy? What do you do for the sake of doing it? How often do you do it? How much time do you spend doing what you enjoy?
    
    Your deep joy and your soul’s deep joy are likely to be the same joy. You and your soul should share the experience of joy more often, and see where it goes.
29. Lake Jeanette Fog 02 B&W — Greensboro, NC, January 11, 2013 — Do not try to think your way to the life that is yours to live—to the life that needs you to live it—to the life that only you can life. Live your way there!
    
    Your life is an experiment in living, in being alive. You will know all you need to know about living your life by living your life. You will know what works and what does not work but. This is where thinking comes in. You will have to think about what isn’t working about what does not work.
    
    Does it not work because it isn’t right for you or because it isn’t right for someone else? Is it that you better not do that again because you hated every minute of it or because it made someone else really unhappy? Think about why it didn’t work and adjust your living accordingly.
    
    Maybe you don’t ever do that again. Maybe you do it again differently. Maybe you move far away from the person who is trying to direct your life. You have to think these things through. You have to work them out.
    
    Working it out is a thinking thing. Finding your life and living it is a living thing. You live your way to your life and then you think out the details in enabling you to live it.
    
    Knowing what your life is and getting things in place that will allow you to live it require two different skill sets: Feeling and Thinking. You have to develop your abilities in both areas to have a chance at having a life you enjoy living. Oh, and courage. We don’t get far from Those Who Know Best And Must Be Pleased without courage.
30. Wetlands Geese 01 Detail — Guilford County near Summerfield, NC, January 11, 2013 — Help comes from strange places sometimes, from unexpected origins. We cannot predict who, or what, will be helpful and who or what will not be. Some of the best trained and most educated can be the least helpful. So, be looking for help at all times, from all directions, in all weather conditions.
    
    Be particularly alert when things are at their darkest, hope is lost, and you are sure that you are beyond any chance of being helped. Of course, the help you get may not be the help you have in mind—so it helps to have nothing in mind.
    
    Be open to help in all forms from all sources. And be ready to receive what comes imaginatively and apply it creatively instead of measuring it by conventional standards of what is helpful and what is not.
    
    Help is often what we make of it, of what is offered—how we take it, and what we turn it into. Which means we are not as helpless as we think, and have a part to play in our own recovery.
31. Grebes at Sunset/Reedy Fork Sunset G — Lake Brandt Greenway, Bur-Mil Park Access, Greensboro, NC, January 12, 2013 — The owl has his/her (It’s hard to tell about owls unless you are an owl) flow, the geese have their flow, the rabbits and the coyotes have their flow, you and I have our flow. Of all the things that experience flow, who is most likely to be out of sync with theirs?
    
    It is part of the owl’s flow to disrupt the flow of the mouse. It is part of the coyote’s flow to disrupt the flow of the rabbit.This is part of the larger flow of the natural world, which has evolved in a way that supports both the flow of the parts and the flow of the whole. When the flow is disrupted, there is upheaval for a time while the flow waits to resume again—and does so, on a different stage, but in ways similar enough to be recognizable.
    
    Every living thing has its flow and lives best in synch with it. Of all living things, which disrupts their flow intentionally, deliberately, with their eyes on better things? Or which gives up theirs completely, irrevocably, hoping to avoid worse things? Which neglects or abandons what is right for them in pursuit of what they think they must have?
    
    Our flow may be disrupted but it cannot be denounced, betrayed. No one lives long—certainly, no one lives well—cut off from their flow, regardless of the glory and glamor of their life style.
32. Wood Duck 05 — The Bog Garden, Greensboro, NC, December 31, 2012 — Live as much in the flow of your life as you can manage, given the nature and circumstances of your living. And let that be that.
33. Used in Short Talks On Contradiction, etc., Trees in the Fog B&W — Laurel Bluff Trail, Reedy Fork Access, Greensboro, NC, January 11, 2013 — Conflict is a wonderful thing. Where would we be without it? In a world where everything always went our way, we would never grow up, confront opposition, or be aware of anything contrary to the prevailing idea of how things should be. “Our way” would just be the commonly accepted way of doing things.
    
    It is hard for me to imagine individual Amish having their own, personal, unique way of doing anything. “The Amish Way” is the way things are done. Tribal thinking is incapable of expanding to think things the tribe has never thought. Innovation, invention, alteration, improvement, transformation, change are all out of the question. One cow follows another from the barn, to the pasture, back to barn forever.
    
    Carl Jung said, “There is no coming to consciousness without pain.” We grapple with contradiction, opposition, conflict. We live in the “field of action” between the way things are and the way things ought to be (or just the way we want things to be)–and bring ourselves forth in the process, being birthed by the process of being alive—becoming who we would have never been apart from the process of the Hero’s Journey (the Spiritual Quest, the Search for the Promised Land and the Holy Grail) and the hope of “laying down our burden down by the riverside.”
    
    Our burden is our glory, our hope and our life. Without the burden, we are as good as dead—no better than dead, deader than dead! So, Jesus could say, “If you want to be my disciple, pick up your cross daily and follow me.”
    
    The bread of life is the bread of affliction. The cup of salvation is the cup of suffering. So, step consciously into the field of action and do your thing—and see what happens. You will participate in the making of a miracle, which will be you!
34. Picnic Table 01 B&W — Lake Brandt Watershed Park, Greensboro, NC, January 11, 2013 — If you are going to do anything, do YOUR thing and see where it takes you and what it has to teach you along the way.
35. Bur-Mil Park Pier B&W — Lake Brandt, Greensboro, NC, January 11, 2013 — Try making someone, yourself, say, care about something they don’t care about. Your best best is trying to make them pretend they care about what they don’t care about—to fake it, to act the part as though they, or you, were playing a role in a movie that had Oscar potential for you if you played your role really well. That’s as close as we can come to caring about things we don’t naturally, spontaneously, straight from the heart care about. We’re kidding ourselves if we think otherwise.
    
    We may come to care about something we don’t care about if we act as though we do over time. I didn’t care about tennis the first few times I picked up a racket. My wife didn’t think much of me after the first date. Some things take a while. And, some things don’t have a chance. But, we can rise to any occasion for the short term. But, we can’t make happen what isn’t going to happen long term.
    
    Knowing what we can ask for from ourselves and others—and what we have no business asking for—sets us up for a better relationship over time than we would have if we gave ourselves, or others, down the river for not liking whatever it is we don’t like no matter how many times it comes our way.
    
    After a while, we have to say, “Okay. You don’t have to eat your green beans.” And let things be what they are.
36. Fog Silhouette B&W — Piedmont Trail, Lake Brandt, Greensboro, NC, January 11, 2012 — Carl Jung says, “Get out of the sheep and shepherd game. The shepherds are sheep looking for a shepherd—which means there are no shepherds. There are only sheep, gradually waking up over the course of their lives, helping one another with the process of seeing, hearing, understanding, knowing, doing, being.” Or words to that effect.
    
    The upshot is that we are all in this together. There are no authorities. No Know It All’s. The early Zen practitioners nailed it with, “If you meet the Buddha on the road, kill him!” Because the Buddha out there keeps us from finding and being the Buddha in here, and that ruins everything.
    
    You are the one who knows what is right for you and what is wrong, what is good for you and what is bad, what is life for you and what is death. Sure, there are compromises and trade-offs, but you are smart enough to know when to make them and when to walk away.
    
    So stop traipsing off in search of the latest guru with the shortest cut to the Promised Land. Sit with yourself until you get an inkling of what you need to do and do it, and see where it goes.
37. Wetlands Geese 01 Detail B — Guilford County near Summerfield, NC, January 11, 2013 — You have to pay the bills and you have to feed your soul. What you do to pay the bills probably won’t feed your soul but. Some of the bills you incur could feed your soul if you incur the right bills. Make sure you incur the right bills. Working in the service of the wrong bills is no way to live—no way to be alive anyway.
38. Fog-Bound Grebe — Reedy Fork, Lake Brandt Greenway, Bur-Mil Park Access, Greensboro, NC, January 11, 2013 — You know what is right for you and what is wrong, what is good for you and what is bad. What is right for you now, good for you now, within your present context and circumstances? Well?
39. January Shoreline 03 — Lake Brandt, Bur-Mill Park Access, Greensboro, NC, January 8, 2013 — Don’t think in terms of achieving, accomplishing, acquiring, amassing, having, owning, going, doing—think in terms of reconciling, integrating, accepting, receiving, understanding, seeing, hearing, communing, being with, healing, making whole.
40. January Shoreline 07 — Lake Brandt from the Piedmont Trail, Greensboro, NC, January 11, 2013 — How much of your life are you enjoying? There are legitimate restrictions which inhibit our being able to enjoy our life, and there are illegitimate restrictions which inhibit our being able to enjoy our life. “If I can’t eat as much ice cream and chocolate syrup as I want to, why bother with eating any? It would just be torturing myself!” Do you see how a legitimate restriction can easily go over into an illegitimate restriction?
    
    Your have to be strong in your own service, in your own cause. You have to take care of yourself, look out for yourself, treat yourself with tender, loving, care. Treat yourself.
    
    Or, maybe, you think the world is going to come by your house today and invite you to come outside and enjoy your life.
    
    Every day that you fail to deeply enjoy some aspect of your life is a day that is wasted on you. A day your soul shrivels like a grape on its way to becoming a raisin.
    
    Don’t give me the innocent, helpless, victim of circumstances defense. If you are not working overtime to enjoy what can be enjoyed about your life, you are a wimp in your own service, a wienie in your own cause, and your soul is a raisin wasting its time hoping for rehydration.
41. Fence Row — Guildford County near Summerfield, NC, January 11, 2-13 — There is nothing wrong with us that growing up won’t fix.
    
    Face it! Face it! Face it! Face it! That’s all the mantra we’ll ever need.
    
    The ache of living has its source in our resistance to the experience of life.
    
    We are what we love and we are what we hate. When we integrate what we love and what we hate with who we are we are ready for the next step, which is understanding that we are not one, we are two.
    
    Inflation is thinking we are the Big One. Deflation is thinking we are the Little One. We are not either one. We are both.
    
    Living in the world as it is—as we are—makes True Human Beings out of all of us.
42. Flight 01 — Barred Owl, Bog Garden, Greensboro, NC, January 16, 2013 — The wisdom of the natural world—that would be instinct and intuition—is integrated with the light of human consciousness in True Human Beings, who bring forth the reconciliation of these opposites as a blessing and a grace for the common good.
    
    Neither the wisdom of the natural world nor the light of human consciousness is ours to exploit for our own, personal, advantage. We do not live for ourselves. We live best when we live in the service of that which is greater than we are—which would collaborate with us for the good of the whole of which we are a part.
    
    Each of us brings forth our gift, our art, our life as an addition to the “primal soup” which is the matrix from which we spring and to which we return—which is made richer by the contribution we make to it during the time we are alive.
43. Wetlands Geese 06 — Guilford County near Summerfield, NC, January 11, 2013 — Step consciously into your life each day. Allow it to bring forth what you have to offer in rising to every occasion and doing what needs to be done as only you can do it. Mix it up with your life. See what you can do with it. Make it show you what you got. Do your thing without having a stake in the outcome or anything to lose (Because what’s to lose except your chance to show your stuff and do your thing in the time left for living?). See where it goes. I’d bet you $20 if I still did that kind of thing that you’ll be amazed.
44. Mallard in Flight 09 — The Bog Garden, Greensboro, NC, January 15, 2013 — We need each other to connect with ourselves. The quality of our relationships with other human beings improves the quality of our relationship with ourselves. Alone we just get crazy.
    
    Together, we prop up one another, encourage one another, goad one another into giving it our best, why not, come on now, you can do better than that, show me what you can do, that’s the spirit, I knew you could do it.
    
    And when we get old and lose ourselves reminiscing about the sorrows we have lived through and seen others living through and it takes our breath and we have to sit down under the weight of life remembered, it’s good to have someone sit with us and say, come on now, you can do it, I’ll help, and some hot chocolate and a cinnamon roll will help us both.
    
    And we make another day, sorrows and all. That’s what I call being good for one another. May we all know what I’m talking about and practice being the right kind of presence in each others’ life!
45. Flight 02, Barred Owl — The Bog Garden, Greensboro, NC, January 16, 2013 — Live your life. Not the life someone else tells you to live. Not the life that is most likely to smooth your way and ease your living. Not the life that requires the least amount of effort, the least amount of trouble, the least amount of rocking the boat, making waves, turning over apple carts, and stomping on eggshells. Your life. The life in which you come alive. The life you relish, enjoy, love, delight in. The life in which you are you all the way to the core. You know the one I mean. Live it.
    
    And when there are conflicts between it and all the other lives you could be living instead, work them out.
46. Bur-Mil Pier 02 — Lake Brandt, Bur-Mil Park, Greensboro, NC, January 11, 2013 — You are what you seek. Everything we seek “out there,” in the world of external, actual, tangible, apparent reality is a projection of what is “in here,” in the world of psychic, unconscious, apparently-not reality, and is striving to come forth through us in our life.
    
    This is to say, if you are seeking love, become more loving. If you are seeking acceptance, become more accepting. If you are seeking justice, become more equitable and fair-minded. If you are seeking security and stability, become a secure, stable, emotional shelter for those who come your way. Get it?
    
    Become aware of what your hunger is and feed the world.
47. Greenway Bridge at Reedy Fork — Piedmont Trail, Greensboro, NC, January 11, 2013 — Being who we are in response to how things are—in light of how things need to be—is the act that transforms the world. Joseph Campbell said, “The influence of a vital person vitalizes.” The life of an alive person enlivens—and all the alive person does is live in relation to what is happening and what needs to happen in the time and place of her, of his, living.
    
    When we live with integrity—in ways that are integral with who we are, what is happening and what needs to happen—our life resonates with the souls of others, and the spark of one ignites another and LIFE comes alive in the land.
    
    It all starts with individuals being awake to how their life feels, to how it feels to be living the life they are living—and moving toward what feels right and away from what feels wrong—from what doesn’t fit to what does fit.
    
    There is no instruction manual for this shift from where we are to where we need to be. No one can tell you when your shoes fit, or when your hat fits. Some things you have to trust yourself to know, and, if you don’t know, trust yourself to learn by living and seeing what happens, and living differently and seeing what happens, and deciding for yourself what works best in what situations.
    
    We feel our way into who we are. We live our way there. We do not think or way there, or follow the black footprints laid out by our parents, or our religion or some ideology to who we are and how we need to be in each situation as it arises.
    
    We “trust the force” arising within us, carrying us to who and how and where we need to be. We trust ourselves to the drift of our soul. We trust ourselves to know what is right for us and what is wrong—to know what needs to happen and what does not need to happen.
    
    Just as leaves and flowers find the sunlight and ants find the picnic, we find our life and live it, and bless the world.
48. Wetlands Geese 12 Panorama — Guilford County near Summerfield, NC, January 11, 2013 — A friend said, “Jim, I’m on track on one level and the conditions under which I live are not the right conditions.” My life is right on one level and wrong on another.
    
    This is called walking two paths at the same time. It is also called living with a foot in different worlds. It is also called working out the contradictions.
    
    What we do to pay the bills is not good for us. The bills we incur enable us to do things that are good for us. We do what is good for us allows us to keep doing what is not good for us in order to do what is good for us. Sounds crazy until we try to do only what is good for us. Doing only what is good for us is bad for us. Try it. See how long you last.
49. Two Trees — Guilford County near Summerfield, NC, January 14, 2013 — What is your pain? What do you live to avoid facing? What is the agony that you will not bear? The ache you will not carry? And cannot escape?
    
    We have to come to terms with our pain and make room for it in our life. We cannot grow up without facing what must be faced and doing what can be done about it and bearing the pain of what cannot be done.
    
    Facing what must be faced is the rite of initiation for all who would grow up and live their own life within the terms and conditions of living. Gethsemane and Golgotha bar the way to life. Life waits for us to understand that—and accept it as how things are. Shouldering the crosses that are ours to bear is the price we pay for being alive.
    
    Squaring ourselves up with this fundamental reality is one of the crosses that is ours to bear.
50. Reedy Fork Sunset G Panorama — Lake Brandt Greenway, Bur-Mil Park Access, Greensboro, NC, January 12, 2013 — Living aligned with our center, our core, heart, soul, Self keeps us grounded and whole in the press and craziness of our life. Our focus has to be on maintaining the connection with the inner guides—with the essential values which declare who we are and what we are about—and letting nature take its course.
    
    We are not here to accomplish our goals or achieve our ends or make happen what we want to happen. We are here to exhibit, to express, the truth at the center of who we are by living in ways that are integral with that which is deepest, best and truest about us—and let the outcome be the outcome.
    
    We have to practice finding the center, learning to read the inner signals, trusting ourselves to our sense of what is being asked of us, and learning how to be who we are over time.
51. January Shoreline 06 B&W — Piedmont Trail at Lake Brandt, Greensboro, NC, January 11, 2013 — Be aware of your conflicts. There is nothing like conflict for creating symptoms. People who are awash in symptoms are awash in unacknowledged conflict.
    
    Conflict is always a conflict of interest and values. It’s going home for Thanksgiving, perhaps, or having our parents, or our partner’s parents, visit us for Thanksgiving. It’s a Situation, either chronic or acute, which you have to endure and cannot avoid. It’s a good that is not good for you. It is wanting what you have no business having. It’s being damned if you do and damned if you don’t. It isn’t something we can do something about.
    
    We can’t disappear our conflicts. Conflict is pain that has to be borne consciously. They are angels/demons we wrestle with for the blessing (that would be growing up), or dismiss, discount, deny, ignore for the blessing (that would be symptoms).
    
    The only way to transform a conflict is to face it, square up to it, bear it consciously over time. We cannot be rid of them without growing beyond them. Remember, there is nothing wrong with our lives, or with us, that growing up won’t fix. The only thing that grows us up is facing diligently the pain we have to outgrow.
    
    Make your conflicts conscious. Do not hide from the pain. Things will shift in time. But. You cannot hurry the time of your deliverance—you can only be conscious of your need to be delivered. You can delay deliverance indefinitely by refusing to be aware of your need to be delivered. It’s your choice. A conflict about what to do with conflict.
52. Barred Owl 08 — Bog Garden, Greensboro, NC, January 13, 2013 — The measure of every doctrine or belief is the impact for good it has on our life—the degree to which it enables us to live a life we would be proud to live—to live the life that is OUR life to live. NOT someone else’s idea of our life, but OUR heartfelt certainty that we are one with the life that is our life to live.
    
    If a belief or a doctrine doesn’t impact our life for the good in this way, it needs to be on the next stage out of town. Living aligned with the life that is our life to live is hard enough without the distraction of beliefs and doctrines that don’t help with the work that is ours to do.
    
    Find what you need to help you live your life, and live it—and let that be enough, because it is.
53. A Natural Still Life — Bog Garden, Greensboro, NC, January 11, 2013 — We follow our own heart to the path that is ours to walk. We are our own guide to the good. But it isn’t what we want that leads the way. It’s what we know needs to be done.
    
    We are at odds with ourselves. The guide is at the mercy of followers with minds of their own. Whose side are we on? There is that which needs to be done, which needs us to do it, which we are perfectly suited for and equipped to handle, and we don’t want to do it. We have bigger ideas. Better ideas. Fancier ideas for ourselves. We have a finer life in mind.
    
    Our heart is not the seat of guiding desire, that would be our eyes. We have eyes for other things. The fruit in the garden was a delight to the eyes. The lights and action of Gay Paree thrill and enchant all those who see them. Seeing is believing and our eyes lead us spellbound to Glory. Only not really.
    
    Lost sheep wake up at nightfall. And follow, not their eyes, back home, but their hearts—their inner sense of direction—listening, finally, to The One Who Knows within, past all the turns their eyes are sure are IT to where they belong, which they knew all along, but dismissed as not worthy of them, beneath them, not their style, with their eyes focused on other things.
54. Black-capped Chickadee — Bog Garden, Greensboro, NC, January 5, 2013 — Know what your business is and what it is not. Ask yourself, “What’s it to you?” at the right places during your day. Jesus said, “Don’t judge.” Same as asking, “What’s it to you?”
55. January Blooms 03 — Bog Garden, Greensboro, NC, January 22, 2013 — If I could get all of you together in a room, and remove from you your insecurities, and uncertainties, and your need for the rest of them to like you, and have you tell me in front of all the rest of them what you know to be true that you haven’t heard from some other source, and have the rest of them receive that with compassion and appreciation, without thinking they have to refute it or improve it, I’m thinking that would make a difference for the good in the lives of all of us.
    
    Just in case we ever get that opportunity, start practicing by thinking about the things you know to be true that you haven’t heard from some other source, and by listening to what others have to say with compassion and appreciation. I’m thinking that will make a difference for the good in the lives of all of us.
56. January Shoreline 07 — Piedmont Trail, Lake Brandt, Greensboro, NC, January 11, 2013 — Who has your best interests at heart? The answer better be you. It would be nice to have a buddy, or a partner, or a spouse you could count on to be on your side, watching your sheep, guarding your coffers, protecting your borders, but. No one has quite the investment in you that you have.
    
    You cannot be casual with you. “Whatever” will not do. You have to rank at least as high as everyone else in you life. You get every bit as much of your kindness and consideration as anyone else does. Do not neglect what is important to you in favor of what is important to someone else all of the time, or even most of the time.
    
    Who is going to take care of you, and your interests, and your life if you don’t? Your life needs YOU to live it—with out waiting for the rest of them to grant you permission or to ask how they can help.
    
    What can you do in the interest of you today?
57. Wetlands Geese 15 — Guilford County near Summerfield, NC, January 11, 2013 — We spend our lives growing up to be who we are. These are not two things. These are one thing. When we grow up, we are who we are. We cannot be who we are without growing up. When we are who we are, we are grown up.
    
    But, because there is always more to us than meets the eye, we are always becoming who we are—we are always growing up. There is no end to it. There is no steady state of being. We are always becoming, always a work in process, in progress.
    
    And the work is done in the form of developmental tasks. We crawl, we walk, we cut our teeth and talk—and every stage of life has its tasks that are unique to that stage. We cannot skip a stage or fail to work through the tasks that are imposed by that stage. We cannot grow up without completing the tasks required for maturation.
    
    The tasks produce maturation. The most immature among us are stuck in a stage (16 – 18 seems to be a favorite time to not grow beyond), and act as though they still are there.
    
    As we age the work becomes making our peace with the life we lived, saying our good-byes (Not literally, but letting go of the things that have meant so much to us—consciously, intentionally, releasing our hold on what was life, giving away favorite items, perhaps, relinquishing our place—letting the daughters and sons-in-law prepare Thanksgiving and Christmas dinners, etc.) and preparing to die. And, of course, no one relishes doing any of these things, so we resist the tasks and do not grow through the final stage of life.
    
    But the work is to grow up to be who we are, and we cannot quit the work prematurely, just because we don’t like the tasks of a particular stage of development. We do the work until it is done, like it or not.
58. Grebe Moon — Lake Brandt, Bur-Mil Park Access, Greensboro, NC, January 23, 2013 — We each have to work out our own life. We each have to make it work. We each have to become who we are within the time and place—context and circumstances—of our living.
    
    Some of us are luckier than others. None of us has it easy. The truth of our life is the bed we sleep in at night and the world we wake up to each morning and what we do with it between the waking and the sleeping.
    
    Being awake is the hard part. Part of being awake is waking up to how soundly we are sleeping as we go through the day.
    
    The work of working out our own life begins with paying attention. Seeing what we look at. Hearing what we listen to. Knowing what we know. If you think that’s easy, take your seat and tell them to open the chute.
59. Mallard In Flight 13 — Bog Garden, Greensboro, NC, January 13, 2013 — Do not reject, dismiss, disregard, disrespect, your current life. Your life will lead to your LIFE when lived with compassion, acceptance and awareness.
    
    The path to the Promised Land begins under your feet, right here, right now. You are standing on it. Start where you are and open your eyes.
    
    Aligned with the Center, with the Inner Self, we are aligned also with nature. Dancing with nature, we are often in the right place at the right time.
    
    Aligned with the Center, the power of the realm—the Force—is with us in the work that is to be done. The Force is not with us for any work, but for the work that is ours to do whether we want to or not.
    
    We cannot trick or manipulate the Force into being with us in work that is off-center, out of sync with the Core of Being and Life, about what we want, and wish for, and dream of, and adore.
    
    The idea that the Universe will throw open it’s arms to welcome and assist you if you think certain magical thoughts has no basis in reality. You will find what you need to deal with the stuff that comes at you when you take up the task of doing what needs you to do it whether you want to or not—but that’s as much as you can expect.
    
    An act that is good, that is exactly what the situation requires, what the moment needs, doesn’t do anything for us, doesn’t return anything to us. What we send out does not come back to us. It goes out beyond us, on and on, indefinitely, creating ripples of good past all reckoning. But to expect anything for ourselves is to miss the point entirely.
    
    We are called to live our life, to apply our gifts, to exercise our art, in the service of the Center and Source of Life and Being. It is a great adventure and we get to experience the full wonder of it when we give ourselves to the work that needs us to do it. It’s called being alive. You can’t beat it with anything, anywhere. It’s waiting for you to say, “Okay. Here I am. I’m all yours. How can I help? Let’s go!” and mean it.
60. Hitting the Ice — “ICE? Nobody said anything about ICE!” The Bog Garden, Greensboro, NC, January 23, 2013 — We are here to do what we can with it. To see what we can do with it. To be as good for it as we can imagine being.
    
    If you wanted something different, something better, something more it isn’t surprising. Everyone does.
    
    Getting over what we thought it was about and being about what it is about takes most of our life.
    
    You’d think things would be more efficiently run—that we wouldn’t spend our life figuring out what we are to do with our life. That’s baseball for you.
61. Reedy Fork Sunset H Panorama 03 — Lake Brandt Greenway, Bur-Mil Park Access, Greensboro, NC, January 24, 2013 — There is no straight path to the Promised Land, or the Grail Castle, or the Kingdom of God, or Nirvana, or the Elysian Fields, or Paradise, or the Tao, or wherever it is we think we are going. And no shortcuts.
    
    My best advice is to stay far away from those offering a map and a guidebook and a ready list of Do’s and Don’t’s and a fat promise to get you there quickly if you will just sit down, shut up, ask no questions, believe what you are told to believe, and do what you are told.
    
    You gotcha inner sense of what is good for you and what is bad, what is right for you and what is wrong, where you belong and where you have no business being. You got an inner way of resonating with the outer world, or not. You got the “Uh-Oh Feeling.” And you got your looks. That’s all it takes to find the way that is The Way for you.
    
    You may stumble around some, make some messes, have to figure your way out of some blind canyons, and spend a fair amount of time not-knowing what to do next but. You have all the ingredients to live aligned with the Center, the Core, the Ground of Life and Being.
    
    What do birds know about flying, or kids know about riding bicycles, that can be learned from some guidebook, or lecture, or explanation? You learn to live by LIVING! So, stop worrying about making mistakes and get in there and mix it up. Do your thing until you figure out what your thing is and then give yourself to it whole-hog all the way to wherever it is you will be when you get there.
62. Reedy Fork Sunset H Panorama 01 — Lake Brandt Greenway, Bur-Mill Park Access, Greensboro, NC, January 24, 2013 — This isn’t hard. Would you trust me to sweeten your coffee for you? How many of you don’t drink coffee? Show of hands. YOU certainly wouldn’t trust me to sweeten your coffee for you! What if I brought you a cup of coffee sweetened just the way you ought to like it? How many of you would drink that and smile, and thank me, and ask for a second cup?
    
    People you wouldn’t trust to sweeten your coffee for you are telling you how to live your life. If you are going to take charge of your own coffee sweetening—your own coffee drinking or not drinking—what do you mean handing your LIFE over to the spiritual masters, wizards, whizzes and gurus? If they don’t know, or care, about your coffee, what are they doing with your LIFE?
    
    You trust yourself to be in charge of your coffee drinking, or not drinking—to be responsible for making your own menu selections and clothing choices. What do you mean giving your LIFE over to someone else? If you are going to give something away, give away your sock preference. Give away something that doesn’t have implications for your LIFE. Ask the gurus and the whizzes what color socks you should wear. Do your own living.
    
    Make your own mistakes. Figure things out for yourself. Decide for yourself what to do and what to leave undone. And, if you decide you just have to have some authority to tell you how to live your life, look theirs over really carefully before you hand yourself over to them. Make sure they are living a life you would be proud to call your own, right down to the color of their socks.
63. Reedy Fork Sunset H Panorama 02 — Lake Brandt Greenway, Bur-Mill Park Access, Greensboro, NC, January 24, 2013 — Cooking is a simple matter of getting the ratios right, and who is to determine what “right” is? That would be the cook.
    
    You are cooking up your own life. A recipe is only good for offering suggestions of ingredients and proportions. Each cook has to modify or transform the recipe to suit the cook’s tastes and interests.
    
    You have to get the ratios right for yourself over time. This means life is an experiment in living, or living is an experiment with life. Get in there and stir something up. See what you think. Try it again with different ratios and ingredients. You will get it right—as you determine right—over time.
    
    And then it will be on to another dish, or aspect of life and living. May you die with cookies in the oven and crumbs on your plate.
64. Reedy Fork Sunset H Panorama 04 — Lake Brandt Greenway, Bur-Mill Park Access, Greensboro, NC, January 24, 2013 — The Way is the way it is and not some other way instead. Now, my deep hunch is that The Way is different for each of us, idiosyncratic for each of us—The Way is Our Own Way, perfectly suited for us but. It requires us to be true to ourselves.
    
    This is a significant limitation for those of us who think there are no boundaries and we can do anything we want to. We can want what we have no business having. And to traipse off after some wants is to leave The Way that is our way, abandon the calling that is our calling, neglect the responsibilities and duties that are our responsibilities and duties and wander without bearings or landmarks in a wilderness of our own making. Insisting on having OUR way, we depart from the way that was ours before we were born and deny the truth of our own soul and inner guide.
    
    This is a problem. And it takes us to the heart of the matter. That would be heart. We have to have the heart to remain true to our heart in spite of delightful enticements and promises of fortune and glory unequaled in the annals of time or anywhere else.
    
    We have to be faithful, loyal and true to the truth of our own heart. We cannot be discarding The Way in favor of some more enchanting way, or following The Way as long as the going is easy and we are in the mood for a stroll.
    
    This is our life’s work that we are engaged in. The Way for us is The Way for us and we can’t whistle up some alternative way, some surrogate way that we would prefer or wish were ours. That isn’t how it works.
    
    When some interesting invitation comes along, we have to evaluate it in light of The Way that is Our Way and what it requires and allows. If The Way is not clear, that’s that. “I’d love to, but The Way is not clear,” is as much as we need to say. If they say, “But wouldn’t it be nice if the way WERE clear? Why don’t you see what you can do to move things out of the way?” You have to respond, “Whose way would that be?” Clearly not yours. Your Way is not clear, and to clear it would be to betray your Way in favor of their way for you, which you cannot do and be on Your Way.
    
    Whose way is Your Way? The answer better be Your Way is Your Way. Be true to it no matter what. Being true to Your Way is being true to yourself, to your own heart. It’s the only Way to be.
65. This is great, isn’t it? It is for me anyway. I’m iced in, so I eat cinnamon rolls and drink hot chocolate which I made with 100% cacao (to feel righteous) and laced with a tsp of bourbon (to compliment the bourbon-brown-sugar glaze on the cinnamon rolls) instead of vanilla, and write. I call that making the most of the opportunity afforded by being closed off from taking photos.
    
    The subject is sunsets. There are now four Reedy Fork Sunset Panoramas posted, which are actually three. Numbers 02 and 03 are really the same shot, just taken in two different ways. So, 01, 02/03, and 04 represent the range of sunsets available in yesterday’s sunset. I could have started before the sun went down and added several more sunsets to the one sunset on January 24.
    
    In every phenomenal sunset there are a dozen sunsets. The word “phenomenal” is the key. What makes a phenomenal sunset are clouds. The sun goes down every day, but without clouds, it just drops out of sight. I call these “naked sunsets” because there is nothing to “deck it out,” “dress it up,” make it memorable.
    
    Clouds are the key. They have to be high enough, heavy enough, and interesting enough to reflect the sun’s light as the earth turns. A sunset is nothing without clouds, so watch the clouds. Learn to tell when they are right and when they are wrong. And when they are right stay with them until the light goes out—generally about 30 minutes after the sun sets.
    
    Yesterday, the sunset was at 5:36. The show was over about 6:05. And the sky changed significantly and beautifully three or four times during that “going down” of the sun. And the water reflecting the sky changed as the wind shifted and died. Things were different over time. So, don’t think you’ve seen a sunset when the sun disappears under the horizon. Stay with it. Dance with it, as our ancestors have done for tens of thousands of years.
66. Cardinal 01 Detail — Bog Garden, Greensboro, NC, January 23, 2013 — To say, “Everything is grist for the mill,” is not to say, “There is a reason for everything.” The things that happen to us do not happen for a reason, as a part of the unfolding of some plan that is gradually falling into place, piece by piece, immutable, invariable, indisputable, click…click…click… over the full course of time.
    
    The things that happen to us are the matrix, the medium, the “cosmic soup,” out of which the future comes, where more things happen and more futures are formed and shaped.
    
    We form and shape our future by the way we respond to what happens in our present. The future we had is transformed by the impact of the things that happen to us, and we shape that transformation by the nature and quality of our response. What happens to us is “grist for the mill,” which we take and use in making the “flour” which makes the “bread” that becomes our life in the aftermath of the life-altering event.
    
    Nothing has to be what it is. Anything can happen at any time. What we do about it shapes what becomes of it, and us, over the course of our life. What happens is not nearly as important as what happens next.
67. Mallard Reflections — Lake Brandt, Bur-Mil Park, Greensboro, NC, January 23, 2013 — Do what you have to do with such a willing spirit that it—and anyone watching—cannot tell whether you want to do it or not. This is called squaring up to your life.
    
    It is quite different from being compelled to mow the grass because your father commanded it. It is mowing your own grass when you don’t want to because it needs mowing and it is your grass. It is feeding the baby at 2 AM, or changing the baby 25 times a day. We stand up and do the thing that needs us to do it exactly as it should be done
    
    You can even tell the baby exactly how you feel about changing all those diapers if you do it in a sweet baby-talk tone of voice. The baby knows tones, not vocabulary. You can get by a lot with the baby if you use the right tone. Same thing goes with your dog. Your cat might catch on.
68. Used in Short Talks On Contradictions, etc., Sassafras Leaves — Guilford Courthouse National Military Park, Greensboro, NC, October 27, 2012 — Robert Pirsig, in “Zen and the art of Motorcycle Maintenance,” said, “The only Zen you find on tops of mountains is the Zen you bring there.” He could have said the same thing about enlightenment. Or religion. Or The Way.
    
    Pirsig also said, “Truth comes knocking at your door and you say, ‘Go away! I’m looking for truth!’” Whatever you are looking for is standing right before you and goes with you wherever you go.
    
    My recommendation is that you sit with your life—with all of them. There is the life you are living. The life you are expected to live by Those Who Know Best. The life you wish you were living. The life you truly ought to live—the life that is yours to live—that no one but you can live. The life you think you have to live to pay the bills. I don’t know how many other lives there may be, but this is a reasonable start.
    
    Sit with all of these lives. Listen to them all. Converse with them all. Explore them. Investigate them. Walk among them. Get to know them in depth. See all there is to see about them. Do not allow them to hide anything from you. This may take a while.
    
    My idea is that we spend our life running from our life. Our life comes knocking on our door and we say, “Go away! I’m looking for my life!”
    
    Religion is a favorite way of hiding from our life. Religion as it is generally practiced consists of listening to someone else, or perhaps The Bible—but it is always the Bible as someone else interprets it, as someone else tells us what the Bible says and what the Bible means—listening to someone else tell us what to do with our life and expecting to like the life they tell us to live, or thinking we ought to like the life they tell us to live, and thinking there is something wrong with us when we don’t.
    
    Stop hiding from your life! From any of them! Square up to them all. Look at them all and see what you are looking at! Listen to them all. Get to know all of them very well.
    
    This will bring your conflicts to life. Your contraries. Your contradictions and oppositions. You get to wherever it is you think you are going (Paradise, etc) by squaring up to your conflicts—to the truth of your life in all its forms.
    
    No one can do this for you. Some of us can help you bear the pain. Therapists are supposed to be good at this, for instance. But. You have to do the work. The work consists of seeing, hearing, understanding, knowing, doing (What needs to be done about what you see, hear, understand and know), and being (Who you are within the context and circumstances, terms and conditions, of your life. All of them).
69. Used in Short Talks On Contradiction, etc., Reedy Fork Sunset H 03 — Lake Brandt Greenway, Bur-Mil Park Access, Greensboro, NC, January 24, 2013 — We need to take a life inventory every two weeks, which is a completely arbitrary time frame, but it has to be often and it has to be carefully considered. We cannot run through it or check it off in an absent-minded kind of way.
    
    At least two questions need to be asked, and followed up with all the ones they generate: How do you feel about your life? And, Everything is just fine except for what?
    
    In exploring the questions, Three things need to be borne in mind: 1) We are here to grow up and become who we are. 2) We do that by facing, reconciling and integrating our conflicts and contradictions. 3) We avoid that by focusing on what They are doing that makes our life difficult and how They need to change—for example, “My life is fine except for the people in it who will not grow up!”
70. Sunrise — Cape Hatteras National Seashore, Ocracoke Island, NC, October 20, 2012 — The test is to live in the outer world aligned with the inner world. Our ideas for ourselves have to be in line with our Self’s ideas for us. Inner alignment is the heart of a well-lived life.
    
    Working to be aligned with ourselves is a life-long task. The more aligned within we are, the more grown-up we are, the more integrated we are, the more whole, complete and at peace we are.
    
    There is much that would distract us from the work of living aligned with our inner Self, so we have to make the work conscious, and check in with ourselves from time to time by attending our body and looking for the “clues and cues” that might suggest we are out of sync and need to get back on track.
71. Sunset — Pamlico Sound, Cape Hatteras National Seashore, Ocracoke Island, NC, October 19, 2012 — It isn’t what you know, or what you believe, or what you think, or how well you can articulate it, argue the point, win the debate and the day. It’s how you live your life. The life you are living and the life that is yours to live within the life you are living.
    
    Living your life, both of them, will grow you up. Wake you up. Wise you up. And enable you to be good company.
    
    If you are going to be anything, be good company. Be a good place to be. Be the kind of person people are glad to see coming and sorry to see going.
    
    The only value of a belief is the degree to which it enables you to live your life—both of them—the way it needs to be lived in the time and place of your living. That does not mean keeping the rules. It means reading the situation and offering what is needed in the situation—what is appropriate to the situation—even though it might give your mother palpitations and your grandmother would never understand.
    
    Live your life—both of them—the way it needs to be lived in the time and place of your living. And if you don’t know how it needs to be lived, bet it all on what resonates with you, on what brings joy to your soul, never mind what your mother or grandmother might think.
72. Yellow Leaves 02 — Bog Garden, Greensboro, NC, November 02, 2012 — We are spiritual to the extent that we are who we are. We cannot be who we are without being spiritual—without being aligned with the Core of Life and Being—without being at one with and intensely, and intently, loyal to the life that is our life to live and the invisible guide to that life and guardian of that life.
    
    So, rather than give us the lingo, the religions of the world would do better by enabling us to find and live the life that is at the heart of each of us, waiting to come forth in the world of space and time.
    
    We each have a life that is unique to us, so what are we doing living bland little cookie-cutter lives that look exactly like everyone else’s? “The spirit is like the wind that blows where it will,” remember. And those who are of the Spirit, that is, spiritual, will be like chips off the old block, following their own course to outlandish adventures and wild arrivals that are peculiar to each.
    
    If you want to be spiritual, be you. To. The. Core.
73. Mallard In Flight 14 — Bog Garden, Greensboro, NC, January 27, 2013 — There are two questions you need to answer: 1) What do you need to be who you are? 2) What do you need to buy to be who you are?
    
    We need to buy the things that will enable us to come forth into our life, practicing our art, serving our gift, applying our genius to benefit the common good. I need a camera, for instance, and a computer. Not the most expensive, but costly enough to do what I need to do.
    
    I need food, clothing and shelter. I need transportation. And after a while I get to the end of the list of the things I need to buy to be who I am.
    
    The other question is trickier to answer and satisfy. I need the right kind of company. You don’t just whisk that up. I need encouragement. I need to listen, to look, to hear, to see. I need to ask, seek, knock. I need to believe in myself, in the validity of my gift, in what I do that is me. I need to be strong in my own cause, loyal to my colors, faithful to the inner core that bets everything on all of us.
    
    This list is long, and I keep thinking of things to add to it when I begin to think I’m about to wrap it up. And were do we go to find the items listed? It’s up to us to find what we need, but where? How?
    
    It helps to know what we are looking for without being too particular about what we want to find. Help comes from the strangest, most unpredictable, places. We have to be open and receptive with few restrictions regarding the type of help that is acceptable. We have to help them help us.
    
    Helping them help us begins with our thinking through what we need to be who we are, and actively seeking the things that are crucial to our development as a True Human Being.
74. Mallards In Flight 15 — Bog Garden, Greensboro, NC, January 27, 2013 — There is a story that I will attribute to Joseph Campbell to the effect that at one period of Japan’s history, spiritual development—that is, the work to become a True Human Being—was postponed until the second half of life, because the first half consisted of too many competing responsibilities: Making a living, raising a family, tending your position in family and society, etc.
    
    When we retire we struggle to find things to fill our time. Then we go to the Home, they play Bingo with us. Giving ourselves to the adventure of True Human Beinghood would be the salvation—in more ways than one—of our later years.
75. Bog Gull — Bog Garden, Greensboro, NC, January 27, 2013 — Carl Jung said, “Get out of the sheep-shepherd game!” The shepherds are sheep and the sheep are shepherds. Stop thinking of yourself as someone else’s disciple and start thinking of yourself as a collaborator with all those who are engaged in the work of growing up and becoming who they are.
    
    We help each other along the way that is our own unique and particular way. We do not talk anyone else into doing it like we are doing it, except to say that when we do it like Jesus did it, for example, we are doing it like WE would do it.
    
    Jesus did not come laying down black footprints for us to step into. He said, “Who made me judge over you?”—or words to that effect. We have to grow up ourselves. We have to decide for ourselves what is to be done with our life, and do it.
    
    And it helps to talk things over with those who know how to listen—who know how to listen us to the truth of our own life, to the Core of our own being. We speak in order to hear what we have to say, and it helps to have those who know how to listen so we can hear.
    
    It helps to have the right kind of company, the right kind of companions, who collaborate with us in the task that belongs equally to all of us: Seeing, hearing, understanding—knowing how things are and how things ought to be—doing what needs to be done to make things more like they ought to be in each situation as it arises, and being who we are within the terms and conditions, nature and circumstances of the time and place of our living.
    
    We have to work all of this out, and it helps to have the companionship of those who are working it out in their own way along with us—respecting each other’s work and honoring each other for doing it.
76. Sunset Mirror 01 — Reedy Fork, Lake Brandt Greenway, Bur-Mil Park Access, Greensboro, NC, January 24, 2013 — The most radically counter-cultural realization we can make, embrace and live out in the world is: There is nothing in it for us beyond the experience of being alive.
    
    Every New Agey strategy to come along comes down to “How to get yours without doing much for it.” We think the right thoughts and attract prosperity. We pray the right prayer and revel in fortune and glory. The Secret is really The Trick for Getting What You Want By Manipulating the Universe into Paying Off Big Time. “We give to get.” “What you send out comes back to you a hundred-fold.”
    
    When the early settlers moved to North Dakota, they knew they were going into a barren wilderness, but were told by preachers preaching the gospel of the culture, “Rain will follow the plow.” It didn’t but the railroads did, and the economy won even though the farmers lost.
    
    When someone tells you what you want to hear, look for what’s in it for them.
    
    We are here to serve ends that are not our ends. We fulfill our destiny when we live aligned with the drift of our soul, trusting it to be all that we need to do the work that is ours to do. Learning to be so aligned is learning to feel, to sense, what is right for us and what is wrong, what is good for us and what is bad. It is learning to live by instinct and intuition—bringing the rational, thinking, aspect of our intellect into play to solve the problems of working out the details of giving concrete existence to soul’s drift within the world of facts, social norms and codes, and repercussions.
    
    It is not a simple matter to be who we are in a world with it’s own ideas of who we ought to be. Our conscious mind is what we count on to work it out. Our unconscious mind is what we count on to guide us in the work that is ours to do. And, what we get out of it is doing it, having done it, and the experience of being alive, of becoming who we are.
    
    It’s heroic stuff. The Hero’s Journey. Me becoming me. You becoming you. In the time and place of our living.
77. Ducks In Flight 01 — Bog Garden, Greensboro, NC, January 27, 2013 — Make the Hero’s Journey the entire focus of the second half of life. You don’t have to read Carl Jung and Joseph Campbell—you only have to do what you have always wanted to do, what you have always loved to do, and couldn’t do it, or couldn’t do it enough, because all those obligations, responsibilities, commitments and duties that abound in the first half of life kept getting in the way.
    
    Now your life can be YOUR life. You can live it the way you know it needs to be lived. And, if you are not yet in the second half of life, you can work it in as you are able right now, and plan your Escape From Egypt once you are able to make the stirring, bold, soulful proclamation: “Free at Last! Free at last! Thank God Almighty I’m Free at last!”
    
    The life that is ours to live, that needs us to live it, is the life we need to live—and it is adaptable to all climates, income levels and conditions of life. The most unexpected people are capable of the most astounding things. “The stone the builders reject,” remember, “becomes the chief cornerstone.”
    
    So, none of your whining, moaning, poor mouthing and complaining about not having what you need to do what needs to be done. Take the first step toward what needs to be done, toward what needs you to do it, and see what happens.
    
    You have to believe in your life, swear your loyalty and fidelity and devotion to your life, and imagine what you need to do to live it as fully as possible in the time left for living—and do it.
78. Hay Rake — Mountain Glory Farm, Patten, ME, September 24, 2012 — Here’s an easy way to practice restoring your connection to, what? Your Inner Guide? The One Who Knows Within? The Source of Life and Being? The Core, Heart, Center of our Soul/Self? Our Invisible Friend?
    
    Jung said, “There is within each of us another whom we do not know.” But we must know. We cannot live the rest of our life as unconscious of this very present Presence For Good in Our Life as fish are of the ocean in which they swim!
    
    We can practice restoring our connection with this Presence by simply asking “Yes? Or no?” before every choice we make and listen for the drift or pull to one or the other.
    
    We open the cabinet for a mug for our coffee and see which one pulls us today, or the clothes we select to wear in meeting the day. Practice sensing, feeling, an attraction to this, an aversion to that—and go with the feeling, without trying to understand, explain, justify, excuse or defend the practice.
    
    We are opening ourselves to the “other whom we do not know.” We are placing ourselves in the service of more than meets the eye. We are taking seriously the invisible ground of existence. And seeing where it goes.
79. Big Creek 02 — Great Smoky Mountains National Park, NC/TN, November 7, 2007 — Living is not a matter of doing it the way we see it being done around us. It’s a matter of listening to our own Core and doing it the way it needs us to do it.
    
    It is strange that we are not taught to do that early on—that we are cut off from the Core early on and told to do what we are told to do—never mind how it feels to do it. And we spend the rest of our lives finding our way back to living in sync with the Inner Guide.
    
    How does it feel to live the life you are living? How do you feel about your life? More on the beam than off? More off the beam than on?
    
    We aren’t likely to live the life that is our life to live by living as we see it being done around us. It’s like learning to walk all over again. We have to trust ourselves to know when we are in sync and well balanced and when we are not, no matter what those around us might think.
80. Linville Falls 01 — Blue Ridge Parkway, NC, July 13, 2012 — Just being open to the possibility of an invisible other within whom we do not know—just being curious about the possibility—just being willing to play with the idea that there may be something to it—just being receptive to the notion that our way may not be the best way for us and that there is another’s way that might be better suited to serve our destiny and bring forth our life… helps with the shift from running things with flow charts and five year plans and an inviolable reason for everything we do to placing our intellect, our reason, our rational mind in the service of making the unconscious conscious and collaborating in a thinking/feeling way to create a life that is more whole, integrated and alive than one that either might produce alone. That’s a great sentence isn’t it?
81. Big Creek 07 Panorama — Great Smoky Mountains National Park, NC/TN, November 7, 2007 — Brain Andreas says, “Everything changed the day I figured out there was exactly enough time for the important things in my life.”
    
    Of course, those are the things we think are important and not the things other people think are important.
    
    We cannot wait for everybody else to grow up before we do. We have to serve what we understand to be important over their resistance, opposition, objection. That will grow us up. Whether they ever do is up to them.
82. Reedy Fork Sunset H 04 — Lake Brandt Greenway, Bur-Mil Park Access, Greensboro, NC, January 24, 2013 — Marie-Louise von Franz said, “We have to solve our own problems and find out for ourselves what is right for us.”
    
    Part of the work of growing up is trusting ourselves to our own sense of what is right, of what needs to be done in the situation as it arises, and taking what comes as the price we pay for learning to find our own way through our life.
    
    We can hand ourselves over to our family or our spouse or partner or Those Who Know Best And Must Be Pleased, and never have to make another decision. Or. We can pick up our own cross every day and go where we think the path is taking us—and, of course, pay the price of our stubborn independence.
    
    This is as difficult a call as there is to make. It is hell being self-determined and self-reliant. And we are afraid to take the chance of finding out if we can do it and survive. Those of us who go that route must have compassion and understanding for those of us who do not, and be a soft presence in our life, for it may be that we may even yet take our chances with the life yet to be lived.
83. 
    The Sound — Pamlico Sound, Cape Hatteras National Seashore, Ocracoke Island, NC, October 21, 2012 — Take Marie-Louise von Franz’ statement: “We have to solve our own problems and find out for ourselves what is right for us,” and make it your mantra.
    
    This is the work of maturation. We don’t grow up without doing this. Without becoming skilled at this. Without “solving our own problems and finding out for ourselves what is right for us.” And living in its service all our life long.
84. Big Creek 06 Panorama — Great Smoky Mountains National Park, NC/TN, November 7, 2001 — In each moment, we have to work out the proper ratios between what is us and what is not us. Jerks and SOBs are about 100% toward the what is in their favor end of the spectrum, wimps and wusses are about 100% toward the what is to their detriment end of the spectrum. The rest of us fall out somewhere in between.
    
    It’s a trick being true to ourselves without the sensitive limits of what some situations call for. My recommendation is that you play the role—you play the part the situation requires you to play, and you play it with aplomb, kindness, compassion and grace, and end it when it’s over and exit when you can.
    
    You can play the part the situation calls you to play without violating your integrity or selling yourself out. Hollywood actors are constantly playing parts, assuming roles, that are not who they are. They do not lose themselves doing it. They don’t sell themselves out doing it. They don’t prostitute themselves doing it. They are actors acting a part.
    
    Life calls for the actor in all of us from time to time. We are handed a part by the situation as it arises—a role which calls us to do that which we would never wish for ourselves with a million wishes and 10 left over that we couldn’t imagine what to do with. We hand ourselves over to the actor within and go do the part with aplomb, kindness, compassion and grace. And end it when it is over, and exit when we can.
85. False Kiva — Canyonlands National Park near Moab, UT, May 14, 2010 — Our current approach to situations as they develop is two-fold. To exploit them to our personal advantage is our first priority and to prevent others from exploiting us to their advantage is our second priority. How can we hold on to what we have and get more is the question that fuels our way through the world.
    
    That is a question that can come to life in the absence of any grounding, guiding, sense of purpose. When our mission is to have and get instead of bringing forth out gift and serving our art, we have narrow little lives that gauge their value by the size of their house and their bank accounts.
    
    I have a landscaping crew doing some stone work on a patio and a low wall coming up our driveway. These three guys are artists with stone but they work for people who don’t appreciate their artistry—who want “something nice” for the lowest possible price. We should want their best and pay for it.
    
    Instead of trying to exploit the other, or seeing the other as a utilitarian functionary in the production of the grandest life we can manage, we have to think in terms of doing right by the other and the other doing right by us. Even if it does not produce a fundamental cultural shift in how things are done.
86. Hooded Merganser in Flight 05 — Bog Garden, Greensboro, NC, January 28, 2013 — We cannot will ourselves to grow up. We grow up against our will. Against ourselves. We see what is right and accede to it. We yield. Stand aside. Say “YES!” to that which is the way it must be, like it or not.
    
    Every time we do that in our life, we pass a test, turn a corner, take one giant step toward the Promised Land, which doesn’t get any closer, and if we studied that for a while, we would realize that arrival doesn’t bring us anything that the Way doesn’t provide.
    
    Growing up is a process without end, but with gifts and wonders unceasing.
    
    We think it would be easier if someone would give us the map and tell us what to do, and so the popularity of Orthodox Religions worldwide. No one can give us what we want and have it work. We have to not want it. But no one can give us what we don’t want. And so, we have to live our ways into dead-ends and stone walls and sudden drop offs from high cliffs.
    
    “Boom!”, as John Madden would say, what we don’t want blindsides us and steamrolls us and slams us to the mat with a Choke Hold, a Torture Rack, a Back-Breaker Horizontal and a Belly-to-Belly Piledriver—finishing off with a Rude Awakening. Leaving us with no where to turn but in.
    
    So we turn ourselves in. We hand ourselves over. We say, “This is all my fault. I’m so sorry. I will not do that again ever.” And we don’t, but that doesn’t save us from all the other arrogant assumptions we don’t catch until it’s too late and uh-oh here we go again.
    
    We grow up one missed sign at a time. Can’t do it any other way. Can’t read a book. Listen to a lecture or a testimony. See a movie. Believe all the doctrines of organized religion, or have weekly sessions with people who know everything. We live our way there. One missed sign at a time.
    
    We will get to “I’m sorry,” quicker though, and that will help.
87. Big Creek 04 — Great Smoky Mountains National Park, NC/TN, November 7, 2007 — We wouldn’t write it up like this. Our circumstances, which keep coming at us in ways that require us to grow up and be who we are, bear no similarity to the things we would write into the script.
    
    In living our life, we become a different person from who we would be if we lived life according to our idea of how life ought to be lived.
    
    We cannot grow up apart from encounters that grow us up. We couldn’t write up The Truth, any more than we can “handle it.” We cannot imagine reality as it comes to us right out of the blue, blindsiding us with things we couldn’t possibly think up and prepare for.
    
    We have to make up what we do with it on the spot, as well as we know how, learning how to be be better prepared for that if it ever comes again, which sometimes it does, or close enough. Then we can smile and say, “I’ve seen you before, or maybe it was your Daddy. Tell him hi for me when you see him next. He might remember me, but he might not recognize me now.”
88. Green River Canyon — Canyonlands National Park near Moab, UT, September 23, 2007 — Freedom is way too much responsibility. We want freedom FROM responsibility, which amounts to bondage. It’s all in how you spin it.
    
    We don’t seem to be able to be any more mature than we are but. And here’s where the hope of the unknown enters the picture. There is more to us than meets the eye. And we are capable of rising to meet any circumstance that comes along. Where does that come from? How is it that some of us can take to hiding the Jews? Or constructing the Underground Railroad?
    
    Joseph Campbell said, “It took the Cyclops to bring forth the Hero in Ulysses.” Circumstance grows us up—against our will—by calling us to stand up and do what must be done. “Face it! Deal with it!” And some do. It is absolutely, beautifully, unaccountable and yet dependable. We cannot predict who will do what needs to be done and who will look away, but some will do the right thing.
    
    I find that to be ground for trusting ourselves to That Which We Do Not Know, which is what we are unconscious of, which, for all I know is The Unconscious that is just on the other side of Consciousness.
    
    Anyway, I feel encouraged to think we are not alone, and that we are being called beyond ourselves—to grow beyond ourselves—to grow up and do what needs us to do it. I wish the way were clearer to being clear about what is being asked of us.
    
    Which leaves it up to us to clear the way between us and The Way, to learn the language of the unconscious, to see what we look at, to notice what catches our eye, and to be receptive to signs and wonders of the most insignificant variety. We’re back to responsibility.
89. Silver Lake 01 — Cape Hatteras National Seashore, Ocracoke Island, NC, November 1, 2009 — Look. It’s like this. We cannot be prepared for the next situation as it arises. We cannot practice for it. We cannot rehearse. We cannot memorize our lines and step into it with confidence knowing what we must to do be exactly what it needs. AND we can rise to any occasion.
    
    What we need is the equivalent of the helmet Luke Skywalker put on to practice feeling his response to a developing situation he could not see. “Trust the Force, Luke!” We need to practice trusting the Force, the nudge, the sense of what needs to be done here, now—and not thinking, but doing it.
    
    Luke made a lot of mistakes. Mistakes are the price we pay to know what we need to know. No one ever found their way to The Way, or stayed on it, without screwing up. You have to be okay with missing signs. We learn to see them that way. And you have to hold out for the possibility that your read was the exactly correct one and that the mistake belongs to those who are laughing at you.
    
    Happened that way with Jesus. Who knows? It could happen again.
90. Used in Short Talks On Contradiction, etc., Ocean Isle Sunrise — Ocean Isle, NC, May 2, 2008 — We are here to grow up and be who we are. The only thing that can grow us up is the impact of life experience. How we respond to the experience of being alive grows us up or shuts us down, arrests our development, and keeps us running from diversion to distraction, losing ourselves in a life of escape and denial forever.
    
    Here is the truth we cannot handle: What we want keeps us from having what we want. Or, to put it another way: We can have what we want but we have to give up what we want to have it.
    
    We grow up when we face up to the truth of this basic contradiction, and wade right into it, and give it a big juicy wet one right on the kisser, and have what we want, and give up what we want in order to have it, and let that be the way it is because that is the way it is, and we get no choice about some matters.
    
    How we deal with being stuck with the choices that are ours—We don’t get to choose our choices—tells the tale.
91. The Shape of Time 01 — Antelope Canyon near Page, AZ, May 18, 2010 — There is what we have to do, like homework or going to work, and there is what we want to do like sleeping in or going for a stroll, and there is what we ought to do, like clean the shower, and there is what must do, like whatever it is we know needs to be done in the here and now of our living and we are right there so we say, “I’ll do it!” before we know what we are doing.
    
    Pay attention to the Musts when they come along, to the things that you must do and you get no say in the matter. The things we do in the grip of some force greater than we are—not guilt, or shame, or fear, but benevolent goodwill out of the blue—are the things that know our name. They show us who we are.
    
    Listen closely to these things. There may be a theme to be found among them. It may tell you something about the way that is your way, and give you a clue or two about what to do with your life, at least for the short term.
92. Mesa Arch 02 — Canyonlands National Park near Moab, UT, May 11, 2010 — We keep it all in solution, waiting for the solution to emerge. We make all the conflicts conscious. Yes, that is true, and that is true, and that is true as well. And they are all mutually exclusive truths. That’s true, too.
    
    Stand—live—in the tension of competing, contradictory truths, and wait. Do not think you have to make it work—negotiate all the agreements—get the signatures on the newest treaty—make everybody happy… You only have to be aware of the problem, bearing the pain of the conflict, holding it to the light of consciousness, and waiting to see what happens.
    
    A shift will occur. Something you could never predict or imagine. Make a conflict conscious and it will drift toward solution on it’s own. Maybe not in your time frame. Oh well.
93. Horseshoe Bend Panorama 03 — Page, AZ, May 18, 2010 — Some people can need to be loved so much that no one is capable of loving them to their complete and everlasting satisfaction. “I just want to be loved!” or “I only want someone to love me!” can mean, “I want somebody to do my bidding 24/7/12/FOREVER!” Well, yeah. Take a number and get in line.
    
    I have never in all of my years of listening to people tell me what they want have heard anyone say, “I just want to grow up!” They want someone else to grow up. Their kids, their spouse, their parents, their… The list is long that doesn’t have their name on it.
    
    We are here to grow up and be who we are and we just want to be coddled, and cuddled and taken care of the way we want to be taken care of. And if anyone has a chance of ever waking anyone else up and turning them onto the way of becoming an independent, self-reliant, self-determined, responsible for themselves and their own life human being, he or she is going to have to look them in the eye and say, “We all have to solve our own problems and find out for ourselves what is right for us. We have to see what needs to happen in each situation as it arises and get up and do what needs to be done about it, whether we want to or not, every day for the rest of our life. That’s all there is to it. Now, go do it.”
94. Used in Short Talks On Contradiction, etc., Bryce Afternoon — Bryce Canyon National Park, Bryce Canyon, UT, May 15, 2012 — We throw ourselves into the breech between what life in the world of normal, apparent, reality requires of us and what living in synch with the Source of Life and Being requires of us. This is called living with a foot in different worlds, or walking two paths at the same time.
    
    We negotiate and integrate, make compromises and concessions and find ways of working things out, of making it work.
    
    You can lose your temper, become frustrated or/and depressed, moan, pine, and think it’s hopeless but it all rides on your doing the work of making it work. So, sit with the conflicts, contradictions, opposition and resistance and see what can be done. Ask for a guiding dream. Ask for help from the inner world. Tell them it is not so easy making things fit out here and to see what they can do about sending some instinct, insight and intuition your way.
    
    We can help ourselves simply by being conscious of the clash between worlds. The external world is in constant motion where multitasking is a way of life. The internal world requires meditative stillness for perception to become clear and still, small, voices to be heard.
    
    We blend the opposites, soften the harsh reactions, and see what we can do to make peace and ease relations between the worlds.
95. The Shape of Time 02 — Antelope Canyon, Page, AZ, May 18, 2010 —  As we grow up, we grow in wisdom and grace. We grow in compassion, kindness and understanding. We grow in drawing lines the way they need to be drawn, and doing what is appropriate in the time and place of our living, like it or not.
    
    We grow in saying “No,” when “No” should be said, and “Yes,” when “Yes” should be said. In being what the occasion calls for. In seeing into the heart of things, and knowing what’s what, and what to do about it.
    
    As we grow up, we develop eyes the see things as they are, ears that hear what is being said and what is not being said, hearts that respond to the all-ness of each moment in both worlds, inner and outer, in ways that respect and honor the needs of each, and integrate/reconcile both, without violating the integrity of either.
    
    Nobody can do any of these things straight from the womb. It takes a lot of living to be alive. I hope you aren’t in a hurry to get wherever it is you think you’re going. Nothing slows us down like trying to hurry things up.
96. Dome Sunset — Clingman’s Dome Parking Lot, Great Smoky Mountains National Park, NC/TN, November 2006 — We were praying for millions of years before prayer became rational, logical, vocal. There were the prayers of labor and delivery. The soft prayers of sexual pleasure. The prayers of the dance and the hunt. The prayers of preparation for war and the prayers of battle. The prayers of mourning and grief. The prayers of thanksgiving and gratitude.
    
    They were all prayers of the heart, not the head. Then the head got involved, took over, and no one remembered how to pray. We wrote prayer books to help us out, and developed doctrines and theology to make sense of it. To make sense of it.
    
    Once prayer became sensible it became sterile. What kind of prayer would make sense? Prayer speaks of experience at the edge of life and death. Make sense of that if you dare, then explain it to us as we laugh and walk away, leaving you to make sense of that.
97. The Shape of Time 03 — Antelope Canyon, Page, AZ, May 18, 2010 — Who is behind The Pose is the question. The Pose being the way we present ourselves to the world. Our Public Face.
    
    Who are we when no one is looking? Who would we be if no one were looking? What’s it to us who is looking?
    
    What do we think we are getting by with? What do we think we are arranging for ourselves by keeping them fooled? Who are we kidding?
    
    Do we think our fortunes ride on hoodwinking the world? That if they found out about us it would be all over, but if we keep up the pretense, and bamboozle them all, we’ll have nothing but “cottages and columbines and room to do handstands when we feel like it” forever?
    
    We are so funny. The ones who care enough about us to see what they are looking at know who we are, and care about us anyway. The others are just trying to get us to dance to the tune they whistle, and have no interest in our fortunes at all.
    
    We want it to be easier than being who we are and working out the rubs. We want to pretend to be someone else and have it pay off. Big time. It isn’t about the pay off.
    
    It’s about, all together now, growing up and being who we are. Focus on that. Let your life take shape around that. Let what you do serve who you are, express and exhibit who you are, reveal and reflect who you are—to the extent that’s possible within the context and circumstances, terms and conditions, of the time and place of your living.
    
    Work you into your life over time. That’s a Life Plan for you worth having.
98. Goose Wars 01 — Bog Garden, Greensboro, NC, February 6, 2013 — I’d bet you $20 if I still did that kind of thing that you think the way to the good is the way of being rational, logical and reasonable. That finding the good is as simple as making a list of pros and cons, deciding where you want to be in five years and creating a flow-chart with carefully plotted sequential steps to that destination.
    
    If I’m right about you, you don’t have a chance. The left side of your brain is choking out the right side. You are taking heavy doses of prescription medication in order to tolerate what you are supposed to be loving. You’re telling yourself things like, “My life is so perfect, why do I hate it?” And you hope a promotion with a few more perks and one or two major purchases will do the trick.
    
    You are waiting for your life to start working for you like you know it will, and you are standing in the wrong line.
    
    You do not do your life. Your life does you. Go sit quietly with this until you see what I’m saying. Then get up and see what your life needs from you—what your life has in mind for you—where your life will take you in the time left for living. If you can make the transition, it will be well worth the work.
99. I should say something about the Geese in the Wetlands series—because it wants to be said. It wants to be articulated, interpreted, understood, by me. I talk to you so I can hear what I have to say. You could take offense, being used this way, or you could be honored that I take you into my confidence. Your call to make.
    
    The Geese in the Wetlands series of photographs goes back to my six-to-twelve-year-old-period. I am sure, though I have no distinct recollection, that I saw a picture in an outdoor magazine—Outdoor Life, Sports Afield, Progressive Farmer and Ladies (yes) Home Journal are the only magazines that I remember from my childhood. Says a lot about the people who lived with me, and that’s the shadowy background of all of the stories of my youth.
    
    I’m sure I saw a picture in one of the magazines of a scene of Canada Geese rising from the water of a wetlands, and I was taken by it. Captured. Held captive all these years.
    
    The picture spoke to me then of things words cannot say, and in taking similar photographs in this here and now of my living, I am recapturing being captured and held captive, because it was not, is not, a tortuous experience, but one we long for, live for.
    
    Healing photographs are mandalas, healing circles in rectangular form, speaking to us on levels beyond words, bringing comfort, harmony, peace, unity, wholeness, integration, reconciliation, and oneness of body and soul. Art does this kind of thing for us.
    
    Photographs of wildlife and natural landscapes do it for me, speak to me on the deepest levels, restoring me to my soul and my soul to me. And I take this particular photograph of Canada Geese rising from the waters of a wetlands in the rain and fog, reconnecting with the child who found what he needed there all those years ago, and still finds it there, and always will.
    
    I take the photographs, and look at them, because I feel better when I do.
    
    I recommend that you notice when and where you feel better, and give yourself often the gift of those times and places. Without having to know, or understand, or explain what is going on there, then. If it is a good place to be, go there.
    
    Cow pens also do it for me, but that’s another story.
100. The Shape of Time 04 — Antelope Canyon, Page, AZ, May 18, 2010 — We all are fragmented, fractured, shattered, dis-integrated on our way back together, to wholeness, harmony, integration, peace. The path is the way of consciousness, awareness, realization, maturation and bearing the pain of our own rebirth—as those who are “both the chisel and the sculptor.”
     
     And, of course, we don’t have to do any of it. Long lines of human beings have opted out of the process since its beginnings. We don’t have to ask the first question, spot the first contradiction, make the first connection, withdraw the first projection… It can be all Their Fault. If we can just get rid of enough of Them, WE will all be fine.
     
     My recommendation is that we stop thinking about Them and Their shortcomings, failings and deficiencies—and simply start doing our thing. It will teach us all we need to know. If we do it with our eyes open, being awake, paying attention. Seeing, hearing, understanding. Knowing, doing, being.
     
     What do we need to be awake? Where do we have to go to wake up? What do we have to be shown in order to see? To be told in order to hear? What needs to be explained in order to understand? What is preventing our progress in the process of being awake, aware, alive? What is the problem?
     
     Doing our own thing with our eyes open will answer all these questions and take us speedily to wherever it is we think we are going.
101. Hooded Merganser 12 — Bog Garden, Greensboro, NC, February 7, 2013 — There ought to be a law: Everyone has to spend a minimum of 1 hour a day attending, serving, in communion with his or her creative spirit, and giving expression to that spirit in a manner that is appropriate to his or her heart and soul.
     
     That would make as much difference for good in the world as I can imagine making.
102. Wetlands Geese 15 — Guilford County near Summerfield, NC, February 7, 2013 — There is not a more counter-cultural (in any culture, across all cultures) act of defiance than the act of being oneself—than the act of seeing what you see, feeling what you feel, thinking what you think, knowing what you know, sensing what you sense and deciding for yourself what needs to be done about it, and doing it in each situation as it arises.
     
     People who do that are called Free Thinkers, Individuals, Rebels, Renegades, Revolutionaries by other people, but, to themselves, they are just being themselves.
     
     Nothing is more of a threat to the status quo than individuals being themselves.
103. Goose Wars 02 —  Bog Garden, Greensboro, NC, February 6, 2013 — The natural world has its own rhythms and flow, and we have ours. Aligning ourselves with our inner rhythms and with the flow of our life are two of the tasks of the journey, the path, the way to maturation, wisdom and grace.
     
     The tasks require us to pay attention, to listen within, to notice what is stirring, to trust ourselves to it and to work it into our life—the life required by the context and circumstances of our external world.
     
     We walk two paths at the same time, and must tend the affairs of two worlds, external and internal. How do you honor the rhythms and flow of the internal world? How often do you sit quietly, listening? Follow whims that you do not understand and cannot explain? Live a day without imposing a structure or a schedule? Allow the Inner Guide to determine what to eat, when and where?
     
     Establishing and deepening our relationship with the Inner World is a matter of making the unconscious conscious—of becoming aware of the ways and rhythms, the direction and flow of our own nature, and serving our own instinct and intuition within the field of space and time. Integrating reason with instinct and logic with intuition expands the possibilities of life in the physical world, and opens us to wonders unimagined along the way to who we are.
     
     We are here with the tools at hand—why pass up the central feature of the experience of being alive?
104. Lake Brandt Dusk Panorama —  Bur-Mil Park, Greensboro, NC, January 23, 2013 —  How much money do we need to be who we are? How much money does it take to compensate for the emptiness that comes from refusing to be who we are?
105. January Shoreline 09 —  Lake Brandt, Piedmont Trail, Greensboro, NC, January 14, 2013 —  We just live the moment as the moment needs us to live it, the situation as the situation begs to be lived. What’s hard about that?
     
     Of course, it requires us to live without a script, to ad-lib every scene, to never do similar moments the same way, to have no stock replies, no standard responses, no formula rejoinders, no predictable reactions. No one knows what we will do when, where or how, not even us.
     
     But, we will develop a style. We will characteristically be ourselves, acting “just like” ourselves. No one would take us for someone else. We don’t confuse Groucho Marx with Jimmy Cagney, or take Hillary Clinton for Oprah Winfrey.
     
     We cannot impose our will for the moment on the moment, our idea of what the situation needs to be on the situation. What needs to be done will tell us what to do. What needs to be written will tell us what to write. We just show up, pay attention, see things as they are, stay out of the way, and the way will open before us.
     
     As we learn to trust ourselves to it, things begin to fall into place.
106. The Shape of Time 05 —  Antelope Canyon, Page, AZ, May 18, 2010 —  The treasure is within. What we seek has been with us from the beginning. We are the stone the builders reject. We are the builders.
     
     We bring forth from an inexhaustible storehouse, an infinite well, exactly what is needed to rise to every occasion and grace and bless the times and places of our living. It only takes waking up to know that it is so.
     
     You hear it and laugh, or roll your eyes, because it is outrageous, or you change the channel because it is not what you want to hear, but why discount your own gifts or sleep through the times that are calling you to see what you can do?
     
     There is, tucked away in each of us, the very thing that is most needed and most precious, and we do not believe it. We do not believe in our own gift, or treasure our own treasure. We are not strong in our own cause. Are not loyal to our own colors. Are not allies of our own heart’s purpose.
     
     We are only waking up away from being what we need—from finding what we have to be more than we need to grace and bless the times and places of our living. Yet, we dream we are awake, snoring.
107. Fisherman —  Cape Hatteras National Seashore, Ocracoke Island, NC, October 23, 2012 —  There is tolerable and there is intolerable, and there are good reasons for tolerating the intolerable up to a point. That point might be death. The intolerable can become deadly. Death can be physical, and it can be emotional/spiritual (Where DOES that line lie?).
     
     Why die tolerating the intolerable? Why not die making a run for it? Fighting for life? Doing what we can think to do in the service of life?
     
     Tolerate the intolerable just long enough to make a plan, lay the groundwork, pack your bags, dig the tunnel. It’s amazing how the intolerable becomes tolerable once we start digging the tunnel.
     
     The tunnel to freedom and self-determination, self-development, self-reliance, self-expression, self-hood. Freedom isn’t freedom unless it is the freedom to be who we are.
     
     We cannot just be living to escape the tyranny of our oppressor. We have to be living to embrace the glory of who we are—to bring ourselves forth—to experience the shape of unencumbered emergence. We have to be living to serve the Self within.
     
     We live in someone’s service, that of the tyrant without or of the, well, tyrant within. The Self as Tyrant Within. Now, there’s one for you.
     
     We have to accommodate ourselves to a will that is not our will. We cannot think life is ours to do with as we please. Life is ours to do with as we must. “I have no say in it, Gibbs. It’s the pirate’s life for me.”
     
     We have to square ourselves with the reality that we do not call the shots. We collaborate with the One Who Knows Within in the unfolding of who we are in our life, but we do not get to live the life of our choosing.
     
     Anybody can dig a tunnel. Do we have what it takes to step out of it at the other end? To step into the life waiting for us to live it? To solve our own problems and find what is right for us and do it every day through-out the time left for living?
     
     It is not enough to want to leave Egypt. We have to have what it takes to live in the Land of Promise. We have to have what it takes to be who we are.
108. Big Creek 05 —  Great Smoky Mountains National Park, NC/TN, November 7, 2007 —  We waste a lot of time talking about free will. We are not free to will what we want or to choose our choices. How free is that? We want what we want and not what we want to want. And our choices are our choices. Give us better choices and we’ll give you better decisions.
     
     Enlightened as we can be, we still have the choices we have. Our life is still our life and we still have to live it—“solving our own problems and finding out for ourselves what is right for us.” Most of us are not deliberately, willfully, mean, evil or stupid, and those of us who are were mean, evil or stupid before we deliberately willed it.
     
     We did not deal the hand we are playing, and we are doing what we can think to do with the world we woke up in, with the terms and conditions, context and circumstances, we found waiting for us when we stepped forth from the womb.
     
     There is very little free about the entire enterprise. And we could use more help than we get. A friend to listen us to the truth of ourselves would be a great assist. A friend to listen without advising, directing, condoning, condemning, converting, saving, shaming, etc—a sounding board to help us work things out for ourselves—and just by listening enable us to say what we need to hear. What a wonder that would be, and we are lucky if we have something that even comes close!
     
     So we need to get off our back about all of this being our fault because of “free will,” and just see it as a mess that can be helped to become as good as it can be with a touch of compassion and grace, kindness and generosity, and giving people the benefit of the doubt and an encouraging word. We are all dealing with more than we know what to do with.
109. Heron at Sunset Panorama —  Reedy Fork, Lake Brandt Greenway, Bur-Mil Park Access, Greensboro, NC, January 25, 2013 —  We reform the culture and the world by reforming ourselves. We reform ourselves by seeing ourselves, hearing ourselves—by growing up and being who we are.
     
     The culture doesn’t want independent, self-reliant, self-defined, self-determined, true human beings as members of the culture. The culture doesn’t want anyone thinking for herself, himself. The culture distracts us from the tasks of seeing, hearing, and understanding with entertaining pastimes.
     
     The Roman strategy of “Give them bread and circuses” (That would be gladiators fighting lions, tigers and each other to the death in the Colosseum) prevails today. The culture hands us the internet and iEverything and tells us to go play. Go do anything but see how things are, and what needs to be done about it, and do it.
     
     We transform the culture when we see things as they are. And that is not good for the economy. The culture has a lot at stake in keeping us mindlessly unaware of the emptiness of our life.
     
     When we stare into the face of meaninglessness, we begin to look for meaning. Where did we last see it? Where did we put it? What did we do with it?
     
     The culture flashes us with mesmerizing quick-takes of glass beads and silver mirrors—It worked with the Purchase of Manhattan, and has been working ever since—to get us back in tow. But. Once we marry meaning, we are immune to the culture’s tricks of diversion and distraction.
     
     What has meaning for you? Where is your meaning to be found? Go there! Find it! Follow it throughout what remains of your life. It will lead you to the heart of truth and value, and change the world.
110. False Kiva Panorama —  Canyonlands National Park, Moab, UT, May 14, 2010 —  We have to work it all out. It’s just a bit ridiculous. No super hero ever had as much on her or his plate.
     
     The invisible world has a stake in our life, and we have to align ourselves with its ideas for us—getting “on the beam,” so to speak, and staying there.
     
     The visible world has a stake in our life. We are supposed to be good company people, not rocking the boat, maintaining the status quo, thinking what we are supposed to think and doing what we are told to do—and we have to keep things reasonably stable there to keep the wrath of Those Who Know Best at bay and give ourselves a chance to bring forth who we are within the context and circumstances of our life for the true good of the visible world.
     
     And we make it work, integrating, harmonizing, reconciling, mediating the conflicts, making peace. We are paving the way here, making a way in the wilderness, if you will, for the one who is coming, that is, for who we are to come into being in the life we are living.
     
     We are bringing forth who we are within the world of space and time. We are envoys of the invisible world within the visible world. So stop thinking of yourself as the child your parents, the partner or spouse of your partner or spouse, the parent of your child or children, the owner of your dog and cat, the employee or owner of your place of employment, etc. You have bigger fish to fry.
     
     You stand between worlds and make it work.
111. January Shoreline 08 —  Piedmont Trail, Lake Brandt, Bur-Mill Park Access, Greensboro, NC, January 13, 2013 — Meaning is a white rabbit, catching our eye, winking at us, calling our name, leading us a merry chase, passing us off, in time, to other white rabbits the way “one book opens another,” showing us a bit more of who we are with each exchange, until, by the end of a life filled with meaning found by following what caught our eye, struck a cord, clicked, resonated, rang true, we realize the wonder of being who we are.
112. The Shape of Time 06 —  Antelope Canyon, Page, AZ, May 18, 2010 —  It’s going to be just fine. Why not believe that? Why believe it’s hopeless, pointless, useless and coming to a very bad end? Even if it IS hopeless, pointless, useless and coming to a very bad end, how we live in the meantime makes all the difference. Why not live like it is going to be just fine?
     
     And look for the help we need? And look for how we can make use of what we have until we get the help we need?
     
     What form does your creativity take? You’re not sitting on it are you? Your creativity? You didn’t put it on some shelf in some closet did you? Not in the attic! It will dry up for sure in the attic! When is the last time you used it? Pull it out of storage! Dust it off! Shake it out! Put it on and get to work!
     
     Here you are whining about how hopeless, pointless, useless it is and what a bad end its coming to and you haven’t given your creativity a chance at it! Turn your creativity loose on it! Let your creativity show you what its got to offer! Give it an opportunity to demonstrate what all you can actually do in the meantime if you put your game face on and say, “Give me the ball!”
     
113. Reedy Fork Sunset H 02 —  Lake Brandt Greenway, Bur-Mil Park Access, Greensboro, NC, January 24, 2013 —  Our work is to find the grounding center—the heart—of our life, and live out of that heart. Scratch what we think. Think about what we feel.
     
     What feels right, good, true, real? What clicks with us? Resonates with us? Works for us? Calls our name? Where do we belong? How often do we go there? How long do we stay?
     
     Is it clear to you that you need to reduce the time spent not doing what is life for you and increase the time doing what is life for you? That you need to live in sync with the grounding center—the heart—of what is life for you? And if there is a problem with your other life, you have to work it out?
     
     Pull your creativity out of storage and tell it to work it out. And tell it you are not going to return it to storage because you are going to need it a lot from here on out. And tell it you are going to show it a really good time. And keep your word.
114. Schoodic Point, Acadia National Park, near Bar Harbor, ME —  You know what is good for you and what is bad. What is right for you and what is wrong. What works and what doesn’t work. Where you fit and where you don’t belong.
     
     Think of this kind of knowing as an emotional/spiritual (Where DOES that line lie?) vital sign. It’s all the guidance and direction you need to find your way. So what’s the problem?
     
     You are afraid. You are afraid to stir things up. You are afraid to upset the balance. You are afraid to tamper with your life.
     
     What if, in trying to make things better, you make things worse? What if you incur the wrath of Those Who Know Best And Must Be Pleased? What if your lose your marriage or your relationship, your job, your kids, everything you ever loved and wind up lost and alone in the world? Better just be smart and play it safe and pray for a miracle.
     
     A miracle would be things getting better with nothing much changing.
     
     What I’m saying is the problem is you. You are the only thing standing between you and what is good for you. We have to get you on your side. If we ever get the two of you together, you will be an unstoppable team. Until then, you’re just immoveable.
     
     Who are you going to trust if not yourself? Where are you going to look for a creative genius to straighten out your life and put it on the right track without it exploding all over the place if not in the mirror?
     
     Do me a favor. Just tinker with your creative imagination. Just play around with it. DON’T DO ANYTHING! Just wonder. Just pretend. Just imagine. Different scenarios, different approaches, sly but significant ways to move from what’s bad for you to what’s good for you—from what’s wrong for you to what’s right for you. Small gestures toward life.
     
     Then, when you’re ready, do something very slight but symbolic and see what happens. You are teaching yourself to be courageous—learning to trust yourself to be creative and self-reliant, alive and who you are.
115. Wetlands Morning Fog —  Guilford County near Summerfield, NC, January 12, 2013 —  What do we need to be who we are? Well. We need to get out of the way, for one thing. And off our back, for another.
     
     We have our ideas, you know. We know who we want to be. And we want to hurry up and be there. It takes growing up to get past what we want, and when we want it, and into who we are, and we cannot grow up before our time.
     
     We need time to be who we are. And a good bit of luck. And a sense of humor won’t hurt a bit.
116. Goose Wars 03 —  Bog Garden, Greensboro, NC, February 14, 2013 —  I sit and watch the stream. The stream has its own direction and flow. The days come and go, and bring what’s coming and take what’s going.
     
     And our role in the play of time with place seems to be that of compassionate witnesses. We are not unmarked by the passing of time, by the impact of event and circumstance. It matters to us what happens. We care about what comes and what goes.
     
     It’s what I like best about us. We have a stake in it. An investment. We are here to tilt things toward the good—to make things better by our having been here.
     
     We feed the birds, and house them, and give them water to bathe in and drink. Say what you will about us, we wash out bird baths and fill them with fresh water—and there is more to us than that. We all should be proud to be one of us, and a part of the stream in its comings and goings.
117. The Shape of Time 07 —  Antelope Canyon, Page, AZ, May 18, 2010 — We are here to do the work, not to get the work done, not to lay it by, not to finish anything. We are polishing silver here. When has silver ever stayed polished?
     
     We’re cleaning out a cavernous warehouse with a concrete floor and dust and gunk and crud everywhere, and lights that don’t work properly, and tools that would be better fitted to some other job, and when we clean the warehouse, we have to do something with it, sell it or give it away, and who is going to want to buy it or take it off our hands? But it’s ours to clean and manage.
     
     Responsibility without control is one of those demonic schemes haunting humankind, hanging over us, laughing. Sisyphus rolls his stone, we play it out. PLAY it out. Make a game of it. Get the last laugh. “The situation is hopeless but not serious” (Walzlawick).
     
     What lasts? What matters? Compassion is high on my list. And humor. Kindness, tenderness, gentleness, mercy, peace, art, music, dance, beauty, seeing, hearing, understanding, a smile on your face and a twinkle in your eye… Make your own list of the things that have mattered, that do matter, to you, in your life. Practice those things as you do the work, smiling and twinkling, winking and laughing, transforming your world and ours, through the quality of your living in it.
118. January Shoreline 04 — Lake Brandt, Bur-Mil Park, Greensboro, NC, January 14, 2013 — The work is growing up and being who we are. We have to be doing the work. We have to be doing our own work.
     
     Psychotherapy is a great idea for helping people do the work but. Too many psychotherapists are not doing the work themselves. Organized religion is a great idea for helping people do the work but. Too many paid clergy are not doing the work themselves.
     
     You can’t help someone with their work if you aren’t doing your work.
     
     There is a problem with doing the work of growing up and being who we are. We don’t want to grow up. We don’t want to be who we are.
     
     We have a better idea. Hanging out with our friends drinking beer, popping pills, having sex, letting the good times roll, really living. You know. Like that.
     
     Who do you know that is working on growing up and being who they are? Who do you know that is working on NOT growing up and being who they are?
     
     How do you get people to want what they don’t want? To do what they don’t want to do? What other people want or don’t want is not our problem. We have our hands full with ourselves, with getting ourselves to do our own work, growing up, being who we are.
119. Mallard in Flight 17 —  Bog Garden, Greensboro, NC, January 29, 2013 —  Thinking does not replace instinct and intuition. Thinking serves—implements—instinct and intuition. Thinking collaborates with instinct and intuition, takes its direction from instinct and intuition.
     
     Life gets complicated. Increasing complexity is the way of evolution. In the beginning, instinct and intuition could carry the day, as long as tomorrow could be counted on as being a simple extension of yesterday. When we began to create possibilities we had never encountered, we had to devise something more elaborate than instinct and intuition to help us along. We came up with thinking.
     
     Thinking stole the show. Thinking thought it WAS the show. Director, producer, actor, audience. Thinking is great at figuring out how to get things done. it isn’t so great at figuring out what to do—and when to do it. Instinct and intuition are great at knowing what to do when, but need help in how to get it done.
     
     We have to coordinate the effort. Thinking has its place. Instinct and intuition have their place. We have to see to it that they work together for the good of the whole. We begin by paying attention to instinct and intuition. We have to learn to feel what we feel, to sense what we sense, to know what we know—and to trust ourselves to More Than Meets The Eye.
     
     This is not easy. But. It is essential. Start with the small stuff. What are you “in the mood for” for lunch? Go with it. Practice your “in the mood for” sense of direction. Think about how to carry it out. See where it goes.
120. Bryce Morning 03 —  Bryce Canyon National Park, Bryce Canyon, UT, May 16, 2010 —  Those of you who have been with me for a while have heard me say, “Fooling ourselves is what we do best. No! Kidding ourselves is what we do best. No! Telling ourselves what we want to hear is what we do best. No! Shooting ourselves in the foot is what we do best!”
     
     We could save ourselves a lot of grief if we would only stop lying to ourselves. Self-deception is the root of all of our recurring problems. We cannot grow up without looking ourselves in the eye—without seeing what we look at. The terminally immature will not square up with who they are.
     
     I’m after honest, objective, self-evaluation. Inflation is the result of weighing what we see toward the good. Deflation is the result of weighing what we see toward the bad. Stop spinning you for good or ill. Just know who you are and who you also are. Stop pretending that you are better or worse than you are.
     
     Sit with you. All of you. This is the biggest test. What of you is not welcome? What of you is compensation for the unwelcome part? What of you is hiding, concealing, denying the unwelcome part? You aren’t going anywhere until you all can go together, on good terms. Your relationships with other people will be no better, no more honest, no more intimate, no more vulnerable than your relationship with yourself.
     
     It all starts with, and hinges upon, your sitting with you until all of you is welcome, listened to, heard, understood, received with compassion, reconciled to, and integrated with, the rest of you. We have to work out our differences with ourselves before we can work them out with one another.
121. Used in Short Talks On Contradiction, etc., Bridge Over Glen Canyon —  Page, AZ, May 18, 2010 —  There is where we belong and where we have no business being. Sometimes where we belong is where we have no business being. Life is great that way. We have to work it out.
     
     We work it out by being intently aware of our conflicts. On one hand this, on another hand that, and on another hand, that over there. Ambivalence, discord, conflict, opposition, disharmony, contrariness… It’s a wonder we ever keep anything down, living as we do on the rolling waves of the heaving “wine dark sea.”
     
     Placid waters are out of the question. We work with what we have. It helps to have the mindset of Odysseus: “I will stay with it and endure through suffering hardship / and once the heaving sea has shaken my raft to pieces, then I will swim.”
     
     ”The heaving sea” is the turmoil of our life amid the conflicts and contradictions of living. It is the nature of things to be torn, fragmented, at odds, feeling very strongly both ways, or all possible ways, at the same time.
     
     The worst thing to do is to take a pill or have a drink (or a six pack or two) to numb the pain of dis-integration. We have to do the work of integration, I don’t care how awful it is.
     
     The work consists of being conscious of our conflicts and feeling the disorientation and upheaval all the way to the heart of our anguish. This is called keeping your feet in the fire. It is knowing—bearing the weight of—the full reality of contradictory truths, and reconciling yourself to the fact of that is the way it is with you. You. Are. Torn. So be torn without tearing. Bear the pain. Consciously.
     
     As you sit with the pain, something will shift. This is called healing the breach (Or bridging the canyon). Bearing the pain consciously changes things. This is the work—the magical work—of integration, reconciliation. It is coming to terms with how things are and what can be done about it.
     
     What can be done about it does not necessarily mean disappearing the conflict, as in deciding for one side against all others. It may mean accommodating yourself to the fact of conflict and making it work. Living in two or more worlds at once, for example. Accepting that that’s the way it is. Swimming through the heaving sea.
     
     Maybe you just make your peace with the heaving and swim on, maybe even enjoying the crashing of the waves, relishing the delight of being alive to the complexity and joy of life as it is. You work it out in a way that works for you, there on the rolling wonder of the wine dark sea.
122. Green River Canyon —  Canyonlands National Park, Moab, UT, May 13, 2010 —  The unconscious world is simply the world we are not conscious of. It is everywhere and we don’t see it. We walk through it on our way to check the mail but our receptors don’t pick it up. We are awash in the unconscious world, and no more aware of it than a Blue Fin Tuna is aware of the sea.
     
     But. We know something is wrong. Something is out of kilter. Something is just not right somehow.
     
     What’s right about your life? What is not right? Don’t answer these questions with your head. Answer them with your body. Your body knows. Your body will tell you what is right and what is not right, what is good for you and what is bad.
     
     Our body is our link to the unconscious world, not our head. Our head is largely unconscious of our body. If we are going to become increasingly conscious, we begin with becoming conscious of our body, its signals, what it knows, what it can tell us if we listen.
     
     Even when we fool our body and addict it to sugar or to cocaine or alcohol, there is a “deeper body” that knows the craving is a lie. The “deeper body” knows. Our task is to know what the Deeper Body knows and to align our living with its knowledge of good and bad.
     
     What is good for us and what is bad? What is right for us and what is wrong? Takes listening to know. Deep listening. We cannot hurry here. We have to foster a cooperative spirit in league with, aligned with, loyal to what the Deeper Body knows.
     
     We feel what we know. We do not think it. The knowing that is the heart of knowing, the Heart of Life and Being, is felt knowing. We feel it in our body.
     
     So. Here’s your homework. Feel what your body feels. Listen to your body. Feel what “No!” feels like and what “Yes!” feels like. Let your body be your guide the rest of tonight and all day tomorrow. Check everything with your body. Your body leads the way. You follow.
123. Goose in the Mirror —  Bog Garden, Greensboro, NC, February 15, 2013 —  See what you can get by with. Take small steps in the direction of who you are. If they catch you at it, feign ignorance and innocence.
     
     They may accuse you of not being yourself when you begin to live toward who you are. Promise to do a better job of being you.
124. Used in Short Talks On Contradictions, etc., Daffodils —  Bicentennial Garden, Greensboro, NC, February 15, 2013 —  We don’t need a Guru to tell us the truth of our own heart’s leanings, our own soul’s deep joy. No one else can tell us when we are centered in the life that is right for us, that is where we belong. Only we know that.
     
     We only need the courage to align ourselves with the life we know is right for us, to do the things we know are ours to do.
     
     It is not all or nothing. There are trade-offs and compromises all along the way. We do things that are ours to do mixed in with things that are not ours to do. The dance is to pay the bills while doing the fewest things that are not ours to do and mostly the things that are ours to do.
     
     There is no plan for your life. There is only your life and not your life. You have to make that choice in each situation as it arises. We make up the form and shape we take as we go. The Plan is to be who we are. The particulars will take care of themselves.
     
     There is that which is right for you and that which is wrong for you. Sometimes that which is right for you is wrong for you, and vice-versa. Taking everything into account, all of the conflicts and contradictions, interests and influences, what will you do?
     
     You have to make the call about what you do in response to what is happening in the present moment of your life. Our life comes into focus, or drifts out of focus, takes shape and form, in the choices we make about what to do in response to what is happening here and now in each situation as it arises.
     
     It isn’t about believing true beliefs about the afterlife and how to get there, it’s about living aligned with a life that is right for us. If we live aligned with the life that is right for us in each situation as it arises, the afterlife will take care of itself.
125. Leaves 01 —  Bicentennial Garden, Greensboro, NC, February 15, 2013 —  The head does not know what the body knows. The body does not know what the head knows, but the body is quite willing for the head to take the lead in the areas of its expertise.
     
     The head, on the other hand, in its profound arrogance, is unwilling to grant the body any area of expertise. The head thinks it knows, and does not know what it doesn’t know, and is not interested in knowing.
     
     Our role is to mediate the relationship between body and head, to ask the body what it knows and hope the head is listening.
126. Used in Short Talks On Contradictions, etc., The Shape of Time 08 —  Antelope Canyon, Page, AZ, May 18, 2010 —  What would help us with our life? This is one of the essential questions. Answer it, and you have it made. On my list are:
     
     Squaring ourselves up—making our peace—with our contradictions and conflicts. This is also called facing up to the truth of how things are and also are. This does not mean getting rid of contradictions and conflicts. In means letting them be. This is true, and this is true and this is also true—and if this is true, then that cannot be also true, and that, too, is true. We bear consciously the pain of mutually exclusive contradictions—and in bearing the pain, we wait for the shift to occur and something to change. It could be us that changes.
     
     A place apart where we can collect ourselves, sort things out, regain our perspective, find our peace, remember what is important, return to the grounding center of our life and reorient ourselves toward who we are and what is life for us in order to step back into the fray and do what needs to be done there.
     
     A listening room where we can hear what is going on in our life, see what is happening and what needs to be done about it.
     
     A vibrant connection with The One Who Knows, the Invisible Other Within, the Heart of Life and Being, the Source of Gifts and Calling that are ours to give and to do. We are not alone. There is more to us than meets the eye. We have an inner colleague ready to collaborate with us in doing the work that is ours to do within the time and place of our living. We foster that relationship by treating it as though it is real and entering into dialogue with our Inner Guide—a dialogue which will remain constant throughout our life.
     
     The right kind of company. A small community—which may never know each other—we depend on for balance, stability, and caring presence. The right kind of friends who can listen us to the truth of who we are without advising, directing, controlling, preaching, criticizing, meddling, interfering and getting in the way. It takes work to build and maintain this kind of group, but it is work that makes it possible for us to do our other work, the work of growing up and being who we are—doing what is needed in, and offering what we have to give to, each situation as it arises.
     
     Create your own list. Add to it as things occur to you that would be helpful to you in living the life that is yours to live. The more conscious you an make that life—and the more conscious you can be of the help you need to live it—the more likely you are to live it and the more likely the world will be blessed by your presence in it.
127. Wetlands in the Rain Panorama — Guilford County near Summerfield, NC, February 7, 2013 — We live as though it is “out there” for us to achieve, do, acquire, amass, accomplish, see, master, manipulate, manage… It is “in here” for us to bring forth, serve, assist, know, love, become.
     
     The meaning we seek “out there” in our buying, spending, amassing and consuming is found “in here” when we align ourselves with what seeks us—with what seeks to be realized, actualized, made real in us.
     
     Listen! What calls your name? Look! What catches your eye? Why are you overlooking the important things in your quest for what is important? Why are you trying to be Somebody when the task is to be who you are?
128. Bass Lake — Blue Ridge Parkway, Blowing Rock, NC, October 5, 2012 — We wonder what we should do with our life. We should love what we love and see where it goes.
     
     We should find ways of paying the bills which allow us to love what we love. We should not worry about getting ahead. Staying even is good.
     
     We stay even with the bills that allow us to love what we love. If you can do better than that, have at it!
     
     What do you love? How often do you do it? How often do you love what you love in tangible, concrete, present and accounted for ways?
     
     We spend all our time paying the bills and none of our time loving what we love, doing what we love. We mean to, but.
     
     Whatever we think we are buying with the bills we pay is money wasted if it keeps us from loving what we love and doing it.
     
     As Linda Cohn would say, “Are you picking up what I’m laying down here?”
129. Used in Short Talks On Contradictions, etc., Mallard in Fight 23 — Bog Garden, Greensboro, NC, February 15, 2013 — Take care of the babies! The babies would be the inhabitants of the invisible world. We are the caretakers of psyche/soul, and bring it forth in our life like a babe born in a manger, tending and caring for it, aligning ourselves with it, merging with it, so that, at the end no one can tell where it starts and we stop.
     
     Do not think of the unconscious world—that would be the world we are not conscious of—as all together and wise and good and perfect. It’s a mess in there, as the old Romans well knew.
     
     We bring consciousness to bear upon the inner world—growing it up and growing up ourselves in reconciling opposites, integrating conflicts and contradictions, and working out the differences between spiritual and physical reality.
     
     We are all changed by the engagement with the other. The incarnation of transcendence impacts both worlds, which is exactly what we do when we bring forth invisible reality (that would be the life that is ours to live) in the world of space and time.
     
     And people are bored with their life to the point of watching Reality TV. That is not taking care of the babies!
130. Cloud Bank — Lake Brandt, Bur-Mil Park, Greensboro, NC, January 23, 2013 — Love what you love. Do your thing. This is not hard. It gets hard when it gets tangled up with ambition, competition, success, who and how we are supposed to be.
     
     You successfully eat an ice cream cone when you eat an ice cream cone. It doesn’t matter who finishes first or who eats the most.
     
     What do you enjoy about your life? Enjoy it. What do you like to do? Do it.
     
     When people intrude, interfere, and get in your way, be kind to them and, as soon as it is appropriate, get back to doing what you like to do, enjoying what you enjoy—with awareness.
     
     When you do what you like to do and enjoy what you enjoy with awareness, you will find yourself being passed along from what you like to do to what you also like to do, from enjoying what you enjoy to enjoying what you also enjoy.
     
     An entire life will develop from following two basic strategies. And you will be a lot more pleasant to be around than if you had diligently pursued being who you were supposed to be and never loved what you love or did your thing.
131. Owl Goes Fishing 05 — Bog Garden, Greensboro, NC, February 20, 2013 — Talk about synchronicity (We WERE talking about synchronicity, weren’t we?)! My life has been uniquely suited to me. It probably wouldn’t have done at all for you. Or yours for me. Funny how it works out that way, don’t you think?
     
     My life has been exactly what I needed it to be exactly when I needed it to be that. If it had been much different, I wouldn’t be here, now. If we change anything, we change everything.
     
     What we have to deal with is what we have to deal with. How we deal with it tells the tale. It is not too late to start dealing differently with things. If you wish things were different in your life, start dealing with them differently. That will change things up right smartly. It’s pretty much the only thing that will.
132. Owl Goes Fishing 06 — Bog Garden, Greensboro, NC, February 20, 2013 — It all has to work together for the good of the whole. WE all have to work together for the good of the whole that WE are. The WE here is both personal and individual AND corporate and communal. We cannot be a part of a community until we can be the individual we are. We have to work together on all levels for the good of the whole on all levels.
     
     You have to be centered, focused, grounded on—aligned, allied, in sync with—that which is deepest and best and truest about you—integrated with who you are and what you are about on the level of heart and soul. You have to live with complete integrity of being, that is, in ways that are integral to the truth of who you are.
     
     If you put your hand over your heart in the Pledge of Allegiance posture, and then close your hand into a fist so that your knuckles are against your chest and at the center of your chest just above your sternum, that is a gesture of connection with the center of your life and being. When we live out of that center, we are at-one with who we are.
     
     The gesture wakes you up to your need to be aware of who you are and what you are about on the deepest level—and of what you are doing in the present moment of your life—and whether the former is aligned with the latter. It is a grounding, centering, focusing, self-adjusting, course-correcting gesture. A way of taking stock and re-orienting ourselves in light of what is truly important and serves the good of the whole, on all levels.
133. Owl Goes Fishing 04 — Bog Garden, Greensboro, NC, February 20, 2013 — I have known people who are constitutionally inhibited from being able to express kindness, tenderness, compassion, consideration or even interest in others. They can’t help it. They just don’t get it. It has never occurred to them that they are not kind. They never think about it.
     
     We cannot worry about THEM. We have our own work to do. A portion of that work entails developing our own ability to be kind, tender, compassionate, considerate toward, and interested in, other people and the world around us. That includes compassion, etc., toward those who are not compassionate—loving our enemies, so to speak. At least, loving those who are working the other side of the street.
     
     Working our side of the street means caring for those who work the other side—without giving them more of ourselves than would be appropriate for us to share. We aren’t their servants, and will need to draw a line, but. We can draw it with kindness and compassion along with firmness and finality.
     
     The work is on ourselves—seeing, hearing, understanding how things are, within and without, and what to do about it in each situation as it arises, and doing it. If we get this down in the time left for living, then we can work on those who don’t have a clue about any of it.
134. Owl Goes Fishing 03 — Bog Garden, Greensboro, NC, February 20, 2013 — A parishioner in one of the churches I served, speaking for a lot of parishioners in all of the churches I served, asked me, “Jim, why don’t you talk to us about things we can understand?” I replied, “I don’t know, Marlene. I wish I could.”
     
     I understood her question to mean, “Why don’t you tell us what we have always heard? What we expect to hear?” Maybe she was asking, “Why are you so totally incomprehensible?”
     
     My reply applies to either possibility. But. Somebody has to hold the door open to things that haven’t been said enough. We can’t just settle for what we have been told or what we are capable of understanding. We have to be pushed, pulled, beyond where we are if we ever hope to be anywhere else—and if we don’t hope to ever be anywhere else, well, why not?
     
     There is more that we don’t know than we do know. We don’t know half of all there is to know. We have to be thinking things that haven’t been thought. Asking questions that haven’t been asked. What kind of adventure is it that keeps everything as it is forever? We wouldn’t go to a movie or a play or read a book like that. Why would we want to live a live we wouldn’t want to read about?
135. Owl Goes Fishing 02 — Bog Garden, Greensboro, NC, February 20, 2013 — We have to dance with our fear. We have to see if we have as much to be afraid of as we are afraid we do. We have to see if it is as bad as we think it will be. We cannot take our word for it.
     
     We would tell ourselves, “Keep your head down and your nose to the grindstone, do what you are told and don’t ask any questions, and you’ll be just fine.” Our ancestors handled Saber Tooth Tigers and Hairy Mastodons. Their genes are dying for an opportunity to step forth into our life and show us what we can do. We cannot keep them in a dark corner with us, under a blanket, hoping that nothing bad happens—that nothing happens—ever in our life.
     
     We have to go looking for trouble. We cannot be running from trouble. We are made for trouble. We are evolution’s crown jewel when it comes to handling trouble.
     
     We are afraid, though, it isn’t so. We owe it to ourselves to find out if it is—if we can rise to any occasion—if we do have what it takes to live our life, the life that is our life to live, the life that only we can live, in the time left for living.
     
     We spend our living time being afraid of life. Being afraid of taking a chance. Being afraid of the unknown. The horse that is our life, that is our life to live, grows sway-backed and feeble out in the pasture while we cower in the bunk house, afraid to come outside because there might be dragons or something worse.
     
     It’s like this, see? We have a life and we have one chance to live it. We have to take the chance. We have to live toward the life that is ours to live and see what happens. How will we ever explain to our life that we didn’t have the courage to let it show us what we could do?
     
     Do something, some small thing, today to live toward your life. See what happens.
136. Owl Goes Fishing 01 — Bog Garden, Greensboro, NC, February 20, 2013 — We are here to love what we love and to offer what we have to give to the situation as it arises.
     
     The situation as it arises calls forth what we have to give and shows us what we are made of. We wake up to who we are by being confronted with situations we would never write into the script.
     
     The life we are living calls for the life that is ours to live. And we think we cannot live the life we are suited for in this old context and these old circumstances. We think we have to have a bigger, better, finer, different life in order to be who we are.
     
     We are waiting for the engraved invitation to the life of our dreams and our life is waiting for us to give it a chance in the here and now of our living.
     
     We each have a life that is our life to live—that only we can live—that needs us to live it. Well?
137. Owl Goes Fishing 00 — Bog Garden, Greensboro, NC, February 20, 2013 — “How am I going to live my life?” “How am I going to be alive in the life I am living—in the time left for living?” These questions are waiting for us to ask, and answer.
138. Owl Goes Fishing 07 — Bog Garden, Greensboro, NC, February 20, 2013 — Finding our way to the life that is our life to live is a matter of listening to our body for direction, not to our head. Our head can figure out how to get there, but our body knows where to go, and what to stay away from.
     
     We come equipped with an internal guidance system that got the species from where we started to where we are, but it cannot work if we ignore it, wishing we knew what to do.
139. Green River Canyon A — Canyonlands National Park, Moab, UT, May 11, 2010 — All we need is a Clearness Committee. A Clearness Committee is all we need.
     
     A Clearness Committee is a creation of the Quakers whose purpose is to help individuals find their way through the difficult decisions (What job to take, whether to marry, etc.) of their life. I would modify it to helping individuals find their way through their life.
     
     We all need a group of trustworthy people—the right kind of listeners—to help us find our way through our life by enabling us to hear ourselves. It takes an external person to help us hear—to connect us with—internal reality. We are that disconnected. We can only hear ourselves through someone else. So we need a Clearness Committee.
     
     If we all lived in the same town, we could divide ourselves up and be what each other needed. That not being the case, each of us is going to have to collect our own Listening Team.
     
     Parker Palmer lays an excellent foundation for the process in his book, “A Hidden Wholeness.” You don’t need as much structure as he suggests, just a group of 3 to 5 people who know how to listen and ask you “How are you going to live your life?” and wait to hear what you have to say.
     
     We have to explore the question of how to live our life, of how to be alive in the time left for living, from all angles. What is inhibiting us? What is the opposition, the resistance, within and without? What are our resources, our aids? What is calling us? What do we need to do what we need to do?
     
     We explore the questions. We experiment with the possibilities. We experience all that is to be experienced and make it conscious by talking about it, articulating it, giving voice to it. And to do that, we need someone, some group of people, who know how to listen.
     
     Listening is an art that few people have mastered. If you can find 3 to 5 who have it down, you have it made.
140. The Shape of Time 10 — Antelope Canyon, Page, AZ, May 18, 2010 — Our body senses what (Instinct and intuition), our head figures out how (Logic and reason). Head cannot do body stuff. Body cannot do head stuff. When body and head work together, we hum right along. When they are at odds, or when head attempts to take charge, we jump the rails and plunge into the deep darkness.
     
     Ann Weiser Cornell’s book, “The Power of Focusing,” is an excellent guide for learning to listen to our body and feel our way to the way that is our way.
     
     Now, this is work. We are having to learn to navigate your life and the world in a way that is quite different from the way we have been doing it. We are looking for what is right for us, not for what we want to do, or what sounds exciting, or what looks like fun, or what promises to be a good time.
     
     Our body knows what is right for us. Our eyes can be fooled into chasing after anything that looks (or sounds) good. Our head sits around weighing the pros and cons, the advantages and disadvantages and sends us into Organic Chemistry in our freshman year because that would satisfy any science requirement once we decide on a major. Stupid head. I had no business in Organic Chemistry, and my body knew it instantly, but my adviser had all these reasons and what was I going to say, “But it doesn’t feel right”? To date, the Organic Chemistry “F” is the only one on my undergraduate and graduate record. I wasn’t about to retake the course.
     
     Just saying. Our. Body. Knows.
     
     Our place is to know what our body knows and let our head figure out what to do about it.
141. Mallard in Flight 25 — Bog Garden, Greensboro, NC, February 19, 2013 — How do we decide how we are going to live our life? At any point, multiple futures are possible. What guides our choices?
     
     In light of what do we live? What influences us toward one possible future over all the others? What determines what becomes of us?
     
     Who do we consult in the matter of choosing a future, of choosing a path to a particular future? We have to choose our consultants carefully.
     
     Choosing our consultants is choosing our future. Who are the people we listen to? Who are the people who listen to us, who hear us to the truth of who we are?
     
     I had a bevy of poor consultants growing up. They were not the kind of guides I needed to the future I was designed for, cut out for.
     
     I found the helpful guides in the books I read. “One book opened another,” and I was led to myself by those who were transparent to themselves.
     
     To be “transparent to ourselves,” we have to see ourselves, hear ourselves, understand ourselves. To do that we have to love and accept ourselves, on every level, all the way to the heart of who we are.
     
     We cannot think that we are a good self and a bad self and that it is the role of the good self to get rid of, or convert (same thing as getting rid of), the bad self.
     
     We cannot be who we are until we can be who we are. To do that, we need people around us who can allow us to be who we are.
     
     We need mirrors of the soul that we can stand before and see into the depths of our own possibilities and know which future to live toward.
     
     The kind of mirror we need are human beings who care enough about us to see us when they look at us and help us to see ourselves.
     
     Who sits with us, sees us, listens to us, knows us and helps us know ourselves buy helping us be conscious of who we are?
     
     Carl Jung said, “We are who we always have been, and who we will be.” We are the future we seek. To find our future we have to see ourselves, know ourselves, listen to ourselves, love ourselves, be ourselves—in the company of those who can do that with us.
142. Midnight Hole — Big Creek, Great Smoky Mountains National Park, NC/TN, November 7, 2007 — I have four stones in my office that I selected from the pile of stones being used to build the knee-high retaining wall by our driveway.
     
     The four stones represent the foundation of the world, no, the universe—and all that is beyond the universe. Everything!
     
     You can take four stones—or anything—and see everything in them if you look at them in the right way. The stones remind us to look beyond the stones, past the stones, to what the stones MEAN.
     
     This is the place of symbols in our life. Symbols don’t mean anything in themselves (a stone is just a stone)—they remind us to look beyond them to what they stand for, represent. There is their meaning.
     
     We are the architects of meaning in our own life. We make the meaningful connections. We find the threads of meaning—that have meaning to us—and follow them.
     
     No one can tell us what is meaningful, just like no one can tell us whether the water in the pool, lake, ocean or stream is warm or cold.
     
     “Come on in—the water is fine,” doesn’t mean the same thing to you as it means to me. We will decide for ourselves if it is fine or not.
     
     Just so, we will decide for ourselves if something is meaningful or not. It is meaningful if we say it is, if we find it to be meaningful.
     
     It is meaningful if it means something to us. Otherwise, it is just a stone, or a chalice, or a stream, or a series of words.
     
     We find our own meaning. We have to find what is meaningful to us. We have to look at our life with eyes that see meaning there.
     
     We give our life meaning by the way we interpret our life, by the things we say about it, by what we tell ourselves about living.
     
     What life means is what we say it means. The meaning of life is the meaning we say it has. We make it up.
     
     Our life is as meaningful as we imagine it to be. When I say the four stones in my office are the foundation of everything, I’m making it up.
     
     I am imagining the four stones to be meaningful, to symbolize the actual foundation of everything, but there is no ACTUAL, literal, foundation.
     
     Just to talk about “the actual foundation of everything” is to ascribe a meaning to things that does not exist in actuality. It is imaginary.
     
     Nevertheless, the four stones in my office ARE the actual foundation of everything, and “the still point of the turning world.”
143. Mallard in Flight 28 — Bog Garden, Greensboro, NC, February 24, 2013 — We cannot just fall into any old life. We cannot just live the life that is handed to us, or the life we are told to live, or the one that is easy.
     
     We have to find the life that is seeking us, the life that only we can live, the life that was ours to live before we were born.
     
     I have to listen, and see. I have to have a life that calls for, that calls forth, listening and seeing. I cannot have a life that forbids listening and seeing, probing, inquiring, exploring, looking, poking around, investigating, going beyond what is said and exhibited to what else there is, what all there is. I cannot live the life that is generally required of us all. Can you?
     
     We are cut out for some futures but not for others. The things we could not be are legion.
     
     When we are stuck with having to be who we cannot be, something has to give.
     
     Suicide or addiction sometimes seem to be the only way out. I recommend that we die to something else—not to life.
     
     Die to wanting it to be easier than it is. Die to wanting life delivered to you, wrapped in a bow. Die to what you are told you cannot do.
     
     Die to believing you cannot do what you know you are born to do. You owe it to yourself to find out if you cannot do it. Find out. Be sure.
     
     Homer was a blind poet. Beethoven was a deaf composer. The work finds a way when we devote ourselves to being who we are anyway. Any way.
144. Mallard in Flight 21 — Bog Garden, Greensboro, NC, February 17, 2013 — How are you going to live what remains of your life? How are you going to become alive in the time left for living?
     
     I recommend asking for a guiding dream. Seriously. Before you go to sleep tonight, ask your Inner Guide for a dream pointing you in the direction of how to live your life, of how to be alive.
     
     You will have to interpret the dream. Dreams come from the right side of our brain and are dreamed by the left side of our brain. It’s FM talking to AM.
     
     You ask for direction in how to live your life and you get a dream about a polar bear taking a hot shower. What sense does THAT make? The problem is compounded by the fact that no one can make sense of it but YOU. That’s YOUR polar bear and YOUR hot shower. YOU have to understand your own dream.
     
     You may have to work with it over a period of days, or weeks, or the rest of your life. You honor the dream by working with it. By asking for additional dreams to help you find the interpretive thread. By letting it simmer while you wait to find the connection between what you asked for and what you got.
     
     When you get it you will know it. Your body will resonate with your awareness. It will be like remembering the forgotten item at the grocery store. Not cheese, not toilet paper, not salt, COFFEE!
     
     So, ask for a dream and do not throw away what you are given. Receive it well. Turn it over. Walk around with it. Work with it. See what becomes of it. It is the threshold to a new world of possibilities—for the rest of your life.
145. Cone Manor Porch 02 — Blue Ridge Parkway, Blowing Rock, NC, October 5, 2012 — It’s all practice. Why aren’t you practicing? Rehearsing your scenes? Trying on different roles? Crafting your art?
     
     What is your art, by the way? Carl Jung said, “Art is a kind of innate drive that seizes a human being and makes him its instrument.” Our art will not leave us alone until we have done the thing and done it well. We practice our art. Our art perfects us.
     
     Art chooses the artist the way the wand chooses the wizard. We cannot say, “Oh, I’m going to be a poet,” when our art is cutting down trees, or making pancakes, or receiving people well.
     
     It is all practice. It is all art. We practice our roles, our scenes, in order to excel at the art of life, to master the art of living well.
     
     The scene is visiting your mother in the nursing home. How many different ways can you play that scene? Practice, practice, practice. Rehearse, rehearse, rehearse. Then play it and see how you do. How can you improve your performance? How can you play it differently next time?
     
     All those scenes that repeat, repeat, repeat themselves forever unchanging, always, always, always the same? Play them differently. Stop reading from the script. Ad lib your lines. Practice being a different character in the same scene.
     
     The scene keeps recycling, keeps coming around. The sister-in-law is coming again. You get to practice as many different ways to play the scene as you can imagine. You don’t have to do anything the same way.
     
     Art makes the artist. Jung said, “It is not Goethe who creates Faust, but Faust which creates Goethe.” You have an art. You become an artist by practicing your art. As one devoted.
146. January Shoreline 05 — Lake Brandt, Bur-Mil Park Access, Greensboro, NC, January 14, 2013 — I go looking with a camera. Sometimes, I see something. More often than not, what I see is something I did not expect to see.
     
     You have to go looking if you want to see.
     
     You cannot wait until you are in the mood. You have to go looking whether you are in the mood or not.
     
     It takes self-discipline to be an artist. If you are an artist of looking, you have to go looking. It’s the looking that makes an artist of you. It’s the practice that pulls you forth.
     
     Your have to practice looking if you want to see.
     
     Do not have much to do with people who tell you how to see. Who tell you how things are. Who tell you what’s what. Who spell it all out for you. Who give you the answers. All of them. About everything.
     
     Go look for yourself. Decide for yourself what is right for you. Pursue it. With your whole heart. All your life long. If you can find better advice, take it.
147. Duck on Ice — Bog Garden, Greensboro, NC, January 23, 2013 — May you see what you look at. May you hear what you listen to. May you understand what is happening in each situation as it arises and know what to do about it, and do it. And, in so doing, may you always weigh the best interest of yourself along with the best interest of others and the best interest of the situation, and act in light of all things considered. That should do it quite nicely, don’t you think?
148. Lake Jeanette — Greensboro, NC, January 11, 2013 — Our life—the life that is ours to live, that is—the life we were born to live—is always waiting to be lived.
     
     It is never too late to start being who we are. We generally settle for depression, despair or rage for having not been who we are—and continue to fail to do the work of being who we are.
     
     To begin moving toward who we are at any point in our life, we start loving what we love and doing the things that bring us to life.
     
     What do you enjoy about your life? What do you do that you love? How long has it been since you enjoyed it? Did it?
     
     Be who you are. That’s the most important thing. And, if you cannot do that, be who you say you are. That’s the second most important thing.
     
     Being who you are means loving what you love, not what you are supposed to love. Thinking what you think, not what you are supposed to think. Believing what you believe, not what you are supposed to believe. Feeling what you feel, not what you are supposed to feel. Seeing what you see, not what you are supposed to see—or supposed to not see.
     
     Being who you are means asking the questions that beg to be asked, even if you are not supposed to ask questions. And doing the things that need to be done, even if you are not supposed to do anything.
     
     Being who you are frees you to live your life the way you would live it. You’ll do a lot better with it than Those Who Know Best And Must Be Pleased. Or my name isn’t Rocky.
149. Used in Short Talks On Contradiction, etc., Katahdin 17 — From the Abol Bridge on Golden Road overlooking the west branch of the Penobscot River at the lower end of the 100 Mile Wilderness near Millinocket, ME, September 25, 2012 —
     
     The Buddha spent most of his life in a deep funk, suffering over the suffering he had witnessed in the world, and finally grew up enough to say, “Well, isn’t that just the way it is, though?” He called it enlightenment and stepped back into his life to free people from suffering about having to suffer.
     
     Suffering got him to the place of being free from suffering and he tried to give people a short-cut to freedom from suffering by telling them how to think about it. It is a wonderful inconsistency, contradiction.
     
     His experience was the path to his own release, but he figured he could save people the pain of that path by telling them about his experience. If you had pointed out the discrepancy between experiencing something and hearing someone talk about experiencing something, he would have said, “Yes! That’s right! I’m trying to save people the pain of waking up by telling them to wake up!”
     
     ”Growing up” is another term for “waking up.” No one can grow anyone up by talking to them about growing up. And no one can stop trying to do that.
     
     We think if we just tell people to grow up, to wake up, enough, they will.
     
     My wife wishes I would remember things, like where I put the checkbook. She thinks telling me to remember things is going to flip some switch and I’ll remember them. Last night I dreamed she told me to remember the church’s new address and I told her in the dream, “Telling me to remember something is like telling me to turn green.”
     
     There are no shortcuts to turning green. Or to growing up. Or to waking up. Or to seeing, hearing, understanding. If we get there at all, we live our way there. But. That doesn’t stop us from telling people how to do it. From trying to give them a short-cut. To save them the pain of finding out for themselves.
     
     There are no short-cuts to the realization that there are no short-cuts. We all have to live our way to wherever it is we are going.
150. Lake Jeanette Fog 02 Detail, B & W — Greensboro, NC, January 11, 2013 — We have to have the audacity to live toward the life that is ours to live, not wait for it to be delivered.
     
     We numb ourselves to the painful reality of this life by day-dreaming of THAT life—the one we would have if we won the lottery, or the one we could have had if it hadn’t been for whatever it was that forced this life on us.
     
     We are not to waste our time dreaming of some Neverland Life. We have to live the life that is ours to live, beginning right here, right now, with these resources, in this context and these circumstances.
     
     We cannot put things off waiting to be delivered from this life by winning the lottery, or stumbling upon a fairy godmother, or a Prince (or Princess) Charming, or a genie in a jar to whisk up for us a life worth living. That isn’t how it works.
     
     We can’t wait to be delivered! Odysseus didn’t wait for deliverance from the Cyclops. Jacob didn’t wait for deliverance from the angel.
     
     Step into your life and live it—live toward the life that is yours to live beginning now. You may take your lumps but you will get better at it. Better at living your life and at taking your lumps.
     
     That’s a lot better than dreaming forlornly about Neverland.

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10/05/2012 — 12/27/2012

1. Bass Lake 05, Moses H. Cone Memorial Park, Blue Ridge Parkway near Blowing Rock, NC — October 5, 2012 — We only have to take the first step, the rest of the way will open before us as we start walking. We do not have to have the journey plotted and planned. There are no guidebooks or schedules or maps. We don’t know where we are going or how we will get there. We only have to take the first step with our ears and eyes open to what meets us along the way—and to our body’s response to the meetings.
   
   We know Psyche through Soma. Body and Soul are One. Our body’s reaction is soul reacting. Our body is the receptor of soul’s leanings. Our body knows soul, and is soul. Every time we fail to consult soul in favor of our own idea of how our life should be, our body keeps score. We only have to decipher our body’s messages to know what soul has to say.
   
   So, we take the first step and listen to our body, allowing our body to guide us toward one thing and away from others. This works like choosing what you are going to wear, or what shoes you are going to buy. What fits is not enough. What do you feel like wearing? What style do you feel suits you? What do you feel when you feel these things? That’s reading your body.
   
   What do you feel when you feel “Yes!”? What do you feel when you feel “No way!”? What do you feel when you feel, “Uh oh!”? That’s reading your body. Take the first step with your ears and eyes open to what meets you, and read your body’s signals as to what the next step needs to be. And see where it goes.
2. Beech Trees, Acadia National Park near Bar Harbor, ME — September 28, 2012 — The natural world spends most of its time doing nothing. Sleeping, preening, waiting for the next thing to come along, waiting for the time to be right for something. In the natural world there is often a long time between times. The earth lies fallow all winter.
   
   We, on the other hand, think constant activity is a sign of mental health and that if we are not “involved” something is wrong with us. We might slip into a depression if we slow down. We are not allowed to withdraw from the active life. “Idle hands are the devil’s workshop.” Quietude invites imbalances of the worst variety. If you are going to sit, you have to watch TV. You cannot look out the window.
   
   There are natural rhythms that know nothing of clocks and calendars, schedules and timetables. Things are happening when nothing is happening. The seed in the earth, the yeast in the dough, are doing their thing, in their own time, in their own way. Why should human beings be different?
   
   We have our own rhythms. We move from activity to dormancy to activity dependably, reliably. But, without periods of inactivity, we have no time to process our experience, to reflect on it, to gain insight and prepare for the next round of action. Makes us crazy. Separates us from meaning and purpose. Cuts us off from ourselves.
   
   We cannot be whole, integrated, at peace without being quiet on a regular basis.
3. Hues of Dawn, Thunder Hill Overlook, Blue Ridge Parkway near Boone, NC — October 11, 2012 —
   
   How do you regain your balance? Your symmetry?
   
   How do you find again the center?
   
   How do you ground yourself again in you?
   
   In the things that are valuable to you? In the things that are true because you know them to be true whether anybody says they are or not?
   
   How do you come back to what is important to you?
   
   Once you have been, you know, pummeled. Whacked. Garroted. Run through. Done in. A time or two. Separated from all you ever knew was meaningful, and dear, and worthwhile, and beautiful. How do you come back from being treated the way we can be treated from time to time through no fault of our own, like the spoon slipping into the disposal again?
   
   Here’s what I’ll bet. I’ll bet you can’t do it alone.
   
   And here’s something else I’ll bet. I’ll bet too many of us are too alone for too long.
   
   We have to work on that. On finding ourselves the right kind of friend. How come there aren’t enough of the right kind of friend to go around?
   
   Who is hogging them? Come on, now. Fess up. Send us their names. We have things to say stored up for decades. Damn, we need to talk to the right kind of listener.
   
   What would you say, do you think, if you could?
4. Treetops, Just down the street, Greensboro, NC — October 10, 2012 — If I could give you anything—and I so wish I could—I would give you listening to yourself, listening to your life.
   
   YOU are the book! Read it! YOU are the song! Sing it! YOU are the treasure! Share it!
   
   We’ve been ignored, dismissed, discounted, disregarded, banished, expelled, excommunicated and shunned so much we’ve gotten in on the act ourselves. We’ve “gone over to the Dark Side” and joined the ranks of our abusers! We don’t give ourselves credit for anything good. We don’t think we have a thing to say worth hearing. So we watch television when we aren’t numbing out on something else.
   
   When we wake up, we wake up to us. To ourselves. To who we are and who we are being asked to be in the time left for living. We have one day less than we had yesterday. What exactly are we waiting for?
5. Two Swans, Bass Lake, Moses H. Cone Memorial Park, Blue Ridge Parkway near Blowing Rock, NC — October 11, 2012 — There are two things for you to do right by. You and your life. You get those two things down and everything else will fall into place.
   
   You betray yourself and your life and you’ll never get the rest of it in place. You cannot sell out and have anything to show for it.
   
   Now we must pause for a clarifying statement. It does not matter what you have done—how may times you have ignored your Self/Soul or how many times you have betrayed you and your life. The past is nowhere close to being as important as your future is. It does not matter where you have been. Everything rides on where you are going. The journey is fueled by your doing right by you and by your life.
   
   The two are one. You and your life are one thing. Who you are is what you do—is how you live. When you do right by you, you do right by your life. When you do right by your life, you do right by you. And the book is never closed. You get to write a new page in the next moment.
   
   So this isn’t like an alcoholic who has been sober for six years drinking a beer and saying, “Well, it’s all over now. I may as well have a couple of six packs.” We have a beer and we start over again being sober right now. Doing right by ourselves and by our life right now. See how it works?
   
   Our focus is doing right by ourselves and by our life no matter what just happened. What just happened isn’t close to being as important as what is just about to happen. No matter what just happened, your call to make is what is just about to happen. Make that call with doing right by you and your life in mind.
   
   And if you don’t know what it means to do right by you and your life, listen to you and your life. They are dying for an opportunity to address the matter with you. Tell them you are here to do right by them (If you mean it) and are looking for them to guide you in doing that all along the way. And then listen. Look. Watch. Wait. Tuned in to the inner signals and outer signs. Be alert, aware, awake, and attentive. See where it goes.
6. Bass Lake Fall 09, Moses H. Cone Memorial Park, Blue Ridge Parkway near Blowing Rock, NC — October 11, 2012 — Life is not for pickling, placing in a jar and kept forever in the back of the refrigerator next to the grape jelly that has been forgotten about and unused for years.
   
   We are not here to get things in place and keep them there, immobilized in a state of lasting perfection.
   
   Life is for living. Everything seeks to be itself. And there is more to everything than anything can ever be. It is as though we are all—every living thing is—here to explore being here. To explore being. To explore here. Not to wall ourselves in, seal ourselves off, keep things as they are supposed to be forever.
   
   Things are supposed to be expanding, deepening, enlarging us and our way with things. WE are supposed to be expanding, deepening, enlarging ourselves in our relationship with each other and all things. Following our interests and seeing where they take us.
   
   Ah, but. Fear and duty. Desire and laziness. Greed, arrogance and stupidity. Stand in the way. Keep us from being alive in the time left for living. We close ourselves off. Take no chances. Thankful it isn’t worse yet. Dead before we die.
   
   Where are you stuck? You’ll die there if you don’t get moving. Where are you refusing to change? Refusing to think differently? Refusing to be different? Refusing to expand, explore, ask, seek, knock, grow? Where are you holding back, saying, “Not me! Take Aaron!”? You’re blocking wonder. Trust yourself to your life and let it show you what you are capable of. Stop telling it you are afraid of falling, and fly!
7. Maple Leaf Medley, model from the Bog Garden, Greensboro, NC — October 12, 2012 — Here’s some homework for you. No kidding. You think listening to yourself and your life is easy? Used to be easy. Back when there was nothing else to do. Track down a Wooly Mammoth once every month or so. That was about it. Lots of time to listen to yourself and your life. Nowadays, we can’t catch our breath for people with ideas about what we should do. Listening to ourselves and our life is not on the back burner, they are on the back forty. To get to them, we have to mean it. That means homework.
   
   Find a comfortable place to sit and look around. See what catches your eye. Anything will do as long as it catches your eye. Stands out from everything else. You become interested in it, in this particular thing, for no particular reason.
   
   Now say all you can think of to say about this thing. Write it down if that would help keep you focused. After you can’t think of one more thing to say about the thing, think of one more thing.
   
   Now, become the thing. Say things about yourself from the thing’s point of view. Use first person. “I am…” “I did…” “I wish…” Etc.
   
   Now identify all the ways the thing is like you in your actual human form, and how you are like it. What are the things you have in common? How could looking at your life as an actual human being from the standpoint of the thing alter the way you see your life? How would the thing approach living your life? How would the thing live your life differently from the way you live it?
   
   How can thinking about the thing help you live your life? What does the thing have to offer you and your life? What would the thing say to you about your life? About how you are living your life? What advice would the thing have to offer? Ask it for its advice. See what it says.
   
   You are bringing your imagination into play here. How do you think the spiritual life works—how do you think the invisible world communes with you—if not through your imagination? If you want to be spiritual, you have to be imaginative. If you want to be wake up, you have to consciously enter Dreamtime. That’s how it works. I wouldn’t kid you about this.
8. Maine Moon, Deer Isle, ME — September 27, 2012 — You don’t get to you directly. You have to take an oblique approach. The shortest way to the center is the long way around. We circumambulate ourselves as we might walk around a holy object, slowly spiraling inward, over the long course of time.
   
   Why so long? Because at the center we are not a fact like a fireplace or a toad. We are an idea, a proposal, a suggestion of sorts, hoping to become concrete and actual in “the field of action.” We discover who we are as we bring ourselves forth to meet the day.
   
   But who is it we bring forth? Takes hearing to know. And seeing. And understanding. And loving. And trusting.
   
   Our relationship with ourselves is like any good therapeutic relationship. A therapist or mentor doesn’t have a plan for our life, a recipe, a shortcut to being us and living successfully. She, or he, doesn’t hand us a print out or lay out some Arthur Murray black footprints for us to step carefully into all the way to success and glory. We become who we are in a relationship that allows us to be who we are in ways that are appropriate to the occasion.
   
   Carl Jung said, remember, “We are who we have always been, and who we will be.” We only need relationships which enable us to see/know who we are and assist us in aligning ourselves with ourselves, consciously, with compassion aforethought.
   
   We love ourselves into being. And allow ourselves to show us who we are. We provide an accepting, nurturing, protective environment and trust ourselves to lead us to ourselves over time.
9. Sieur de Monts 07, Acadia National Park near Bar Harbor, ME — September 28, 2012 — We court ourselves, flirt with ourselves, fall in love with ourselves—yet, too often we cannot bear to be in the same room with ourselves. This is a problem.
   
   Every experience of being in love is about the need to be in love with ourselves. The lover is a projection, a mirror, in which we see—and are attracted to—aspects and qualities that lie latent within us and need to be brought to life. The other is not the point. WE are the point. The other is a handy reference to inner attributes that are trying to come forth in our life as lived characteristics. We see ourselves in the other and become what we love about him or her.
   
   Well, fine. But what about the other? It all depends on the other. Is the other capable of joining us in the work to bring each other forth in our individual life and in our joint life together? Can the other help us create an environment in which each is safe, respected, honored, seen, heard, well received, and encouraged to experience and explore his/her interests and become who he/she is? If so, make a pact and live a long and happy life together. If not, thank him/her for waking you up to you and look for the kind of partner you need to be the person you are.
   
   Regardless of how it goes with the other, your work is to bring forth what you admire about the other in  yourself. To love in you that which you love about him/her, and to serve those qualities with the same kind of courtly love that bound knights and their ladies in medieval Europe.
10. Bass Lake Fall 10, Moses H. Cone Memorial Park, Blue Ridge Parkway near Blowing Rock, NC — October 11, 2012 — We unfold like a rose, like a lotus flower, blooming, and follow the light all our life long. Nothing to it, except, of course, the bit about arranging our own cooperation with the process.
    
    We have our ideas, you know, about how things should be. We stand in the way of our own becoming.
    
    Whoever heard of a stream refusing to flow to the sea? Of a Giant Sequoia who decided, instead, to be a mountain range? Natural things are glad to be what they are. Only human beings—so far as we know—aspire to more than they have any business being.
    
    The Garden of Eden story would have never been told by a rabbit that wasn’t making fun of people. “If they had really wanted to be wise,” the rabbit would say, winding up the story for her children,” they would have embraced who they are and reveled upon waking each day that they were themselves!”
    
    We are our primary obstacle to happiness—refusing, as we do, to take what is ours to do and do it—wanting something better, something easier, something with a greater payoff attached, something with fame and glory strutting in its wake. Our problem with our life is that it isn’t good enough as it is. We want something finer.
    
    The rabbits are holding their sides, tears streaming out of their eyes, laughing.
11. West Branch of the Penobscot River, Lower end of the 100 mile wilderness, Golden Road near Millinocket, ME — September 23, 2012 — There is much to hinder our development—and much to assist it. The future turns on how we respond to what meets us along the way, on the degree to which we look to be hindered (“I KNEW this wasn’t going to work!”) or assisted, (“I KNEW I would find the help I needed if I kept looking!”).
    
    We can look at the things that would stop us as tests of our mettle, imagination and creativity. Or, we can see them as good excuses to quit.
    
    The future turns on the way we are turned and fulfills our expectations just like we knew it would. We always get the adventure we are ready for—and are looking for. We set ourselves up for what comes our way through what we say about what we have.
    
    So attend the attitude that is expressed in your comments about your present life situation—in how you feel about your life. This is the attitude you have to work with in forming your future. Nothing is going to happen to change your attitude. You have to change your attitude in order for something to happen. You have to shift from being hindered to being assisted. And see where it goes.
12. Linville River Fall, Blue Ridge Parkway near Linville, NC — October 11, 2012 — Who is the most alive person you know? The answer better be YOU. Our work is to be alive in the time left for living—by doing the work that is ours to do, bringing forth the gifts we have to offer in service to what needs to happen in each situation as it arises.
    
    We can’t do that without being alive to the situation, to the time and place of our living—looking, listening, seeing, hearing, knowing, doing, being. We cannot be lost in some fog of disappointed expectations, numbed out in some cloud of drug-induced euphoria, just getting by, given up and hopeless like a limp piece of seaweed being carried by the tides of fate waiting to be washed ashore.
    
    There is more to us than that. We don’t even know ourselves what we are capable of. It’s time we found out. We find out by handing ourselves over to the inner guides and saying, “Okay. Let’s see what you can do.” But there is a catch. We have to mean it. And we have to do our part.
    
    We have to develop our gifts. We have to practice our art. We have to work at seeing, hearing, and understanding how things are in each situation as it arises. Knowing and doing what needs to be done about it. And being who we are, offering what we have to give for the good of those who can benefit from our presence in their life.
    
    We can’t be holding back, tentative, afraid, looking for what’s in it for us. We get to be alive in the time left for living. You can’t buy that off the shelf at Wal Mart or Macy’s.
13. The Falls, West Branch of the Penobscot River, Lower end of the 100 Mile Wilderness, Golden Road near Millinocket, ME — September 23, 2012 — Our instinct and intuition guide us to the gold when reason and logic live in their service. When reason and logic take over the journey, it goes all to hell. Our place is to get out of our heads and into our hearts—to know what heart knows and give head the task of living with what heart knows at heart.
    
    I wanted a typewriter when I was 15 and fell in love with a camera when I was 18. Head had to work out the details, but I knew early on what loved. Here I am, taking photographs and writing—and four of my five books on Kindle include photos—but not coming close to paying even one bill, much less making a house payment. Head has to work that out—paying the bills AND doing what my heart knows has to be done.
    
    My head has no idea of what has to be done. My head reads the signs and the maps that point the way to the views my heart wants to photograph. My heart has no use for signs and maps, and would never remember to fill the gas tank, or stop to eat, or carry water for the trip. Head has it’s part. It gets us there and pays the bills. Heart says where to put the tripod and when to move on to the next scene, or when to stop the car and turn around to photo something we just drove past.
    
    We cannot think up what needs to be done. “What do you want to be?” is not even the question (What does wanting know?). “Who are you?” is the question. “What is your art? Your gift?” are the questions. “How are you going to work who you are into your life?” is the question.
    
    Heart (Instinct and intuition) gives us who we are, gives us our art, our gifts. Head figures out how to work that into our life. The two become one in the seeing/knowing and the doing. Our place is to give each its due in bringing ourselves forth in our life as a blessing and a grace upon all of life.
14. The Window, Stonington, ME — September 26, 2012 — If it isn’t helping you with your life—that is, with the life that is your life to live, not the life you are living (unless you are living the life that is your life to live), it’s wasting your time. If it isn’t helping you with your life it’s helping you avoid your life. It’s providing you with a surrogate life, a stand-in life, a replacement life—which, of course, is a lie. You are either living your life or you are living a lie. The Hero’s Journey is the transition from lie to life—and we need help with that work.
    
    Most of what passes for religion is no help with the transition from lie to life. Religion attempts to give us its idea of our life—to tell us how we are supposed to be living. Religion tells us what our life is to be—as though it knows.
    
    The Jewish authorities tried to tell Jesus what his life was to be. Jesus said, “You have heard it said but I—I—say unto you.” We have to tell the people who would tell us what our life is to be, we have to tell them what our life is to be: “I say unto you!”
    
    Where do we get that strength, that confidence? It comes from the core. From the heart. We live from the core, from the heart, if we live at all.
    
    I grew up in the deep south, a child of parents who grew up in the deep south, children of parents who had grown up in the deep south. That can’t be good.
    
    “You listen to me, boy! I’ll tell you who you are supposed to be!” That was the way boys were reared in the deep south. And girls. No one had a mind of his, of her, own. Their life was taken away from them at birth and they were handed the life they were supposed to live.
    
    Of course, it didn’t work, and we were all afflicted with symptoms of dissociation, of disconnection, of fragmentation and disintegration—which makes ours the work of integration, integrity, authenticity and genuineness. We need all the help we can get. We get precious little.
    
    Where are the models of integration, integrity, authenticity and genuineness? Where are the sources of wholeness and completion? We are thrown back onto ourselves, to our core, our heart. We find the way that is our way by listening to ourselves.
    
    And we have to listen carefully because there are a lot of voices within, pretending to be the One Who Knows. So, we take tentative steps in the direction we take to be the Right Way, and see how it goes. It’s a slow process, and it helps to be patient and to trust ourselves to figure out the path to ourselves over time. With enough time, even our mistakes will show us the way.
15. Bass Lake Fall 12, Moses H. Cone Memorial Park, Blue Ridge Parkway near Blowing Rock, NC — October 11, 2012 — There is nothing like ideology—the idea of how things are supposed to be—for screwing things up. All of the fanatical religious outlooks are sure their way is the Right Way For Everyone And No One Can Do It Differently Or Everyone Goes To Hell.
    
    The fact that there are so many different ideas of The Right Way For Everyone should tell them something.
    
    The Real Truth is that we all have a way that suits us—a way that is different from everyone else’s way—and that is what we have to find: Our Own Way. The beam with our name on it. When we find it, all we have to do is STAY ON THE BEAM!
16. Compass Pond Panorama, Lower end of the 100 Mile Wilderness, along the Golden Road near Millinocket, ME — September 23, 2012 — What do you need money to help you do? If you won the lottery and could suddenly pay your way out of debt, what would having money free you to do? I don’t want “travel” here. Travel in order to DO what? What is it that is yours to DO? As Linda Conn would say, “Are you picking up what I’m laying down here?”
    
    We live to DO, to ACT. We do not live to BE, as in happy. We ARE what we DO. Back to the Gerard Manley Hopkins quote: “What I do is me, for that I came.” What did you come to do?
    
    What is your gift to bring forth, to serve? What is your art to perform? What is your magic to bestow?
    
    The world you live in has let you down by not asking these questions regularly and often throughout your life, so that you have had to think about them forever. Well. You have the time left for living to think about them.
    
    If you don’t know how to answer them, it’s not a problem. Make some guesses. Experiment. Explore. Tell people you are looking for what is yours to do. Tell them they will just have to excuse you as you find your way—and search for your way.
    
    Maybe you know exactly how to answer them. Hoist the anchor, raise the sails and be gone with you in the service of what is yours to do. You have delayed long enough. Off you go!
    
    Maybe you’ve been doing what is yours to do for years. Take a bow. Commendations and high fives from all of us to you! We wish we had had you for a mentor from the start. All our best to you as you play things out and bless the world. But we have some catching up to do, and have to get started.
17. Cone Manor Porch, Moses H. Cone Memorial Park, Blue Ridge Parkway near Blowing Rock, NC — October 5, 2012 — I don’t care what you believe. I care what you do. Believe anything you want to believe but DO justice, exhibit mercy, show kindness, tenderness, generosity while you are bringing forth the gifts, the art, the magic, the work that are yours to DO in the time left for living.     
    
    Believe whatever it takes for you to do what is yours to do—for you to do what needs to be done in each situation as it arises as only you can do it, with the gifts, art, magic that are yours to bestow upon the rest of us and all sentient beings.
    
    Do your work. That’s all I care about.
18. Used in Short Talks On Contradiction, etc., Bass Lake Fall 07, Moses H. Cone Memorial Park, Blue Ridge Parkway near Blowing Rock, NC — October 11, 2012 — The Forty plus years I spent in the ministry were an ordeal for me as I worked to reconcile, integrate the contradictions and contraries between how I saw things and how I was supposed to see things—between who I was/am and who I was supposed to be (Which I air out to some extent in my book of poetry, “I Call this Poetry,” in the Kindle Store on Amazon.com). And it was exactly what I needed to bring myself forth. Our ordeals birth us and kill us all at once.
    
    Marriage does that to us. Parenthood does that to us. Paying the bills while being who we are does that to us. Life is an ordeal and to be alive, we have to bear the pain.
    
    We have to face what must be faced (How things are and how things also are), and square up with what is being ask of us and what we need to do about it—and do it—in each situation as it arises. We do not live long enough to live past our ordeals.
    
    Now I’m taking up the work of dying consciously and making my exit as graciously as that can be done with awareness aforethought. I don’t have a terminal illness (as far as I know), and may well live into my nineties (An age my mother is approaching). But it doesn’t matter how long I live, the work is the same: To die well, to die consciously, to die with awareness—squaring up to all that goes into living until we die, knowing we are going to die. It is, perhaps, the final ordeal. We cannot be sure about even that.
    
    The point is that our ordeals birth us, enliven us, awaken us, deepens us, expands us, enlarges us and enables us to be who we are. Don’t be trying to avoid them or get rid of them. Embrace them and take them on in the spirit of those who are determined to receive what they have to offer, the blessing of curse, and work out who we are amid the resistance and opposition that makes us whole.
19. Pamlico Sound Clouds Panorama, Cape Hatteras National Seashore near Ocracoke Island, NC — October 19, 2012 — The experience of Ordeal is a necessary aspect of our work of bringing ourselves forth and doing what is ours to do in the time left for living because we grow up against our will. WE grow up. No one can do that for us. No one can be us but us. It is ours to do alone.
    
    This is the meaning of Jesus’ “Thy will not mine be done.” We hand ourselves over to the will of—who? What? There are a lot of theories. The truth is—from my perspective—it doesn’t matter.
    
    It doesn’t matter who/what we consult, confer with, collaborate with in guiding our boat on its path through the sea. What matters is that we hand ourselves over to That Which Knows More Than We Do. We trust ourselves to, well, ourselves—our core, our heart—to that part of us that is connected with every self that has ever been or will be.
    
    We grow up by growing into the More from which we spring and to which we return and which we serve with our life in the time left for living. And all of this is purest agony and deepest joy.
    
    In the New Testament, Paul says, “I have run with perseverance the agone—the race—that was set before me.” And, “I have fought the good fight, I have finished the agone—the race.” The agone, the agony, the race is our life, the life that we live and the life we bring to life through the way we live.
    
    We bring it forth by way of ordeal and agony. We grow up against our will—doing what needs to be done, what needs us to do it, when we would prefer to sit by the sea and read the afternoon away. We become who we are in spite of ourselves. Happens every time.
20. Quokes Point Creek, Cape Hatteras National Seashore, Ocracoke Island, NC — October 20, 2012 — We do what we can imagine doing with each situation as it arises, and then do it again in the next situation—without trying to force our way or compel something to happen that has no business happening. That is, without having inflexible ideas about how things are supposed to be.
    
    I’m writing this from North Carolina’s Outer Banks, which are barrier islands of sand which Atlantic currents, wind and waves have been shifting/moving along the coast for as long as there has been a coast. But, people with technology and money in their pockets entered the scene with ideas of how things were supposed to be and spend enormous amounts of money in the service of the latest technology keeping things in place, restoring beaches and dunes that are then removed by the next hurricane—building bridges, rebuilding roads—working against the natural order of things in order to make things the way the people want them to be.
    
    Native Americans would have done it differently. As would the early practitioners of Zen. A Zen craftsman would have asked: “What does the shape of this tree lend itself to becoming?” We take our technology and turn the tree into whatever WE want it to become.
    
    Technology is our way of remaking the world in our image, in the image of how we think things ought to be. Why listen to what needs to happen when we have the power to transform everything into what we want it to be?
    
    The old magic was seeing/hearing/doing what needed to be done in accord with the wisdom of the moment and the drift of the time at hand. The new magic is bulldozers and dump trucks rearranging the face of the earth to some developer’s sense of where the greatest profit lies.
    
    We cannot live our life in light of the greatest profit. We live in an exploitive age. If a profit can be made, a profit will be made. Profit at any price is the motto of the Movers and Shakers. But our profits cannot buy what we forsake in our pursuit of prosperity.
    
    We have to find our way back to the old magic. Seeing, hearing, understanding, knowing, doing, being—all in light of what is happening and what needs to happen according to the wisdom of the moment and the drift of the time at hand—as servants of the drift and direction of life in the time and place of our living.
21. Sunrise 01, Cape Hatteras National Seashore, Ocracoke Island, NC — October 21, 2012 — The magic still works but it doesn’t work like we want it to work. What good is that? In order to see the good in it, we have to change our idea of the good. That’s what growing up will do for you.
    
    Maturation is changing our idea of the good. It takes a lot of living to understand that there is a good beyond that which we call good—and to align ourselves with it, and live in light of it.
    
    We want the magic to work our will upon the earth, or, at least, within our lives. But the magic works only as we align our will with the will of our core, our heart, which is at one with the core, the heart, of all who have been or will be. At the level of the heart, we are all one—and the magic works when our will disappears in the work to do what needs to be done in the situation as it arises, regardless of the implication that has for us personally.
    
    The problem is that we do not read the situation, or look there for what is needed, for what is being asked of us. We look to exploit everything to our own advantage—and the magic disappears.
    
    To get the magic back, we have to grow up, hand ourselves over to our life—to the life that is our life to live—and see where it goes, trusting the magic all the way.
    
    I have a friend who says: “Being lucky has a lot to do with reading the signs, whatever presents itself as cues and clues. Luck is a close kin to wise.” To be lucky and wise is to follow the cues and clues, even when they lead us away from where we want to go. When we live like that, the magic stirs to life and life is transformed.
22. Seafarer, Pamlico Sound, Cape Hatteras National Seashore approaching Ocracoke Island, NC — October 20, 2012 — You have everything you need to bring yourself forth—to bring forth your life—within the life you are living except confidence and courage. You’ll have to fake it there.
    
    ”Fake it until you make it” is an AA motto. It means we almost have everything we need. I think we are born with the confidence and courage we need, but they are stripped from us shortly after birth by the environment we are born into.
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    Abusive, toxic, environments separate us from ourselves, from our instinctive, intuitive, selves, and force us into walking a cultural or familial tightrope—thinking our way through life, which becomes a mine field of sorts because in an abusive situation one never knows when a line is going to be stepped over and hell comes calling. So we begin to live rationally, logically, trying to figure out and avoid all of the potential pitfalls instead of relying on our instinctive, intuitive take on things, and become increasingly separated from the seeing/knowing side of ourselves.
    
    Getting back to that is the real work of growing up. And we have to “fake it until we make it”—fake the confidence and courage required to act on what we think we know, but can’t be sure until after the fact.
    
    Even though our environment is no longer the abusive, toxic, one of our early years, the wounds are still open and we walk with a limp, unsure when things might change back, with hell coming for regular visits. It takes confidence and courage to fake confidence and courage.
    
    But, that is all that stands between us and living instinctively, intuitively, toward the life that is ours to live, bringing it forth—and ourselves with it—in the life we are living. It’s our work and it will wait until we are ready for it. After all, it’s been waiting all these years already!
23. Sea Oats 07, Pamlico Sound, Cape Hatteras National Seashore, Ocracoke Island, NC — October 22, 2012 — Our instinct, intuition and interests lead the way. Our place is to pay attention and to know what’s calling our name.
    
    When I walk into a scene with a camera, I cannot begin to think my way to a photograph. Where I place the tripod has nothing to do with where I think the tripod goes. If you ever sign on for a photo class, ask the instructor how she, how he, knows where to put the tripod. The most important things cannot be taught.
    
    You—YOU—have to feel it. YOU have to know this is it, and that is it, and that over there is it—but not there, there, or there. Same thing goes for your life.
    
    No body can tell you how to live your life any more than they can tell you how to know where to place the tripod. You are the one. Your task is to know what you know—and to trust yourself to your instinct, intuition and interests, and see where it goes.
24. Cape Hatteras Sunrise Day One, Cape Hatteras National Seashore, Ocracoke Island, NC — October 21, 2012 — Pay attention to what you are aware of. That’s my best advice. We are aware of all we need to know to respond appropriately to our circumstances in each situation as it arises—which is all that can be asked of anyone ever. But. We dismiss, discount, ignore and override without noticing what we are doing, all that we are aware of that doesn’t serve our agenda. If it is not important to our purpose, it doesn’t register with us, and we live as though it does not exist.
    
    One of the 10,000 spiritual laws is: Be Present With What Is Present With You. Or, Pay Attention To What You Are Aware Of. Or, See What You Look At… You see why there are easily 10,000 of these things. They are all different ways of saying the one thing that is the foundation of all of them: Wake Up!
    
    When we wake up, we see how things are and what needs to be done about it—which includes doing nothing about it for the time being.
    
    ”For the time being” is a wonderful deep south expression which means, “This is how it is for now, but things might change at any moment.” When our oldest granddaughter was four or five, if she was asked to do something she didn’t want to do, she would say, “Maybe later,” or “Maybe tomorrow.” I love the gentleness and softness of all these phrases, which draw lines without kindling resentment or a harsh response in return.
    
    Waking up does not mean doing what is expected. It means recognizing what is expected—what is supposed to be done—and placing that on the table with all the other possible responses, and seeing what needs to be done here and now. “Maybe tomorrow,” is a quite appropriate to a number of occasions.
    
    Pay attention to what you are aware of and see where it goes.
25. Used in Short Talks On Conflict, etc., Sunset Day 1 04, Pamlico Sound, Cape Hatteras National Seashore, Ocracoke Island, NC — October 21, 2012 — If we do not allow challenges to our preferred way of doing things to come to us from the inside, they will come to us from the outside.
    
    As a nation, and as the Culture of the West, and as the First World Country that we are, we have experienced failures of internal cooperation. When the FBI and the CIA and local law enforcement agencies do not share important information, it plays into the hands of the bad guys. Same thing with the Armed Forces. Same thing with the departments of large companies. Same thing with the various aspects and facets of our own makeup.
    
    We have to talk. We have to share information. We have to be receptive to information that is being shared. We have to be attentive to what we are aware of. We have to know what we know.
    
    We have to listen to everything on every level. What are we saying to ourselves? What are we missing?
    
    Right seeing, right hearing, right understand hinge on right interpretation. We can look at the facts but if we are misinterpreting them, dismissing them, discounting them, we are not seeing them. We have to SEE the facts in order to respond to them appropriately, and we have to arrange honest, transparent, conversation among the contraries within—the contradictions and ambivalences, the conflicts of interest and values, the competing points of view—in order to work out what we are going to do and who we are going to be in each situation as it arises.
    
    It’s a lot to be aware of, and we pay a high price for refusing to take the time and make the effort to be attentive to all of the voices within and without.
26. Sunset Day 3 05, Pamlico Sound, Cape Hatteras National Seashore, Ocracoke Island, NC — October 23, 2012 — It cannot be difficult to live in sync with ourselves. We make it harder than it needs to be. It is not far away that we should make long pilgrimages to the shores of our soul. It is not hidden away on some mountain crag that we should spend years searching for the right mountain and then for the right way up the mountain and then for the right sequence of chants and prayers and for the right votive offerings to be made in strict compliance with the prescribed methods of presentation in order to win an audience with our soul.
    
    We do not need all the hoops and hoopla to connect with the core, the heart, of who we are and what we are to be about. We only need to pay attention and do what we know needs to be done—never mind what is supposed to be done or what Those Who Know Best And Must Be Pleased tell us to do.
    
    We know. We only need to listen and to trust ourselves to what we think we hear. And trust ourselves to find our way out of any mistakes we might make on our way back to the center of ourselves, to the heart of who we are.
27. Sunset Day 4 01, Pamlico Sound, Cape Hatteras National Seashore, Ocracoke Island, NC — October 24, 2012 — We are what suits us. Another of the 10,000 spiritual laws. We are what we practice doing. We are what we do.
    
    But. We like to whine: “I can’t HELP it! This is just the way I am!” But. In the middle of a fight with our spouse, the phone rings with an important call from our boss. Do you think we talk to her in the same tone of voice we were using with our spouse? We cut it off. We cut it on. We are more in charge of “the way we are” than we like to think.
    
    We are what suits us. The truth is, we are just fine with “the way we are.” We see no reason to make any alterations. We would like for things to be different without anything changing. The Hero’s Journey is about transformation. The fundamental transformation is in the nature of that which suits us.
    
    As I age, sugar is not as acceptable to me as it once was. “Mr. Dollar,” said the Health Fair Nurse. “Cancer cells like sugar more than you do.” Sugar and fried food and salt and cheese, etc. once suited me “to a T” (whatever that means), but no longer, and so I am not the way I used to be.
    
    We do not have to be the way we are. We can be any of a large number of ways. We are what suits us. We are what we practice being.
    
    Practice compassion. Practice drawing compassionate lines. Kind lines. Firm lines. Practice tenderness, kindness. Without becoming submissive, compliant, passive.
    
    Practice seeing, hearing, understanding. Practice interpreting events and circumstances in different ways—seeing things from different points of view.
    
    Practice all of the qualities that characterize a true human being. Here’s a hint: ALL of the qualities characterize a true human being. A true human being possesses all of the qualities available to any human being. The true human being applies them appropriately, as they are needed, in each situation as it arises.
    
    Sometimes it is this way and sometimes it is that way. Sometimes it is like this and sometimes it is like that. The situation calls forth who we are in response to what is appropriate to—what is needed by—the situation. We are what is called for. We do what is needed. We are what we do.
    
    If you are going to practice anything, practice that.
28. Used in Short Talks On Contradiction, etc., Sunset Day 1 03, Pamlico Sound, Cape Hatteras National Seashore, Ocracoke Island, NC — October 20, 2012 — There is contradiction at the core. Yin and yang at the very heart of things.
    
    There is the way things are and the way things also are, and that is the way things are. This is true and that is true—and they do not cancel each other out, neutralize or negate each other, but deepen, enlarge, expand each other. So that each benefits from the opposition of the other.
    
    The center of things is not one big blissful YES, but Yes and No cooperating in the creation of a developing, evolving, choreography of being—that is harmonious and whole in its integration and integrity, in its respect, reverence, and high regard for the opposite aspects of its own nature.
    
    We are not one way only. Static. Frozen. Dead. Perfection. We are dynamic. Fluid. Flowing. Alive.
    
    There is conversation at the core of life. Dialogue. Movement. Dance. One way of seeing, saying, doing, being is embellished by different, by opposite, ways of seeing, saying, doing, being. We achieve clarity by seeing things from different sides, from all angles. We are One because we are Many. Because we are different. Within and without.
    
    Long live the opposition! By virtue of which we become who we are for the good of the whole!
29. Sunset Day 5 02, Pamlico Sound, Cape Hatteras National Seashore, Ocracoke Island, NC — October 25, 2012 — It isn’t so much what we don’t know that steamrolls us but what we dismiss, discount, deny, ignore. We know enough. We need the courage, the maturity and the grace to act on what we know. The only thing standing between us and where we need to be is us.
30. Silver Lake 03, Ocracoke Island, NC — October 25, 2012 — Depression is a number of factors coming together to ruin your day, week, year, life. One of those factors is the distance between how things are and how you want them to be. Things aren’t going your way, and you see no way for things to begin going your way any time soon, or ever. That’s one element.
    
    Another element is all-or-nothing-thinking. If it isn’t good it’s bad. It’s awful. It’s intolerable. And no one should have to put up with it.
    
    Another element is a lack of grace and compassion—a judgmental disposition that dispenses rulings and sentences with no grounds for appeal. There are never extenuating circumstances. Things are what they are. Citations should be written, fines levied, punishment administered, the guilty brought to justice.
    
    Another element is the absence of a sense of humor. “This isn’t funny!” “Don’t be making jokes about this!” If you laugh, it gives the powers in charge of dispensing misery all the excuse they need to double up on your portion. Besides that, it makes light of a completely serious situation, and we must take serious things seriously!
    
    Another element is the propensity to think there are serious things.
    
    This doesn’t begin to deplete the list. You know first-hand of additional elements that form the point of view we call depression, because you have experienced them in yourself or a friend or family member. Expand the list to include all of the elements you know contribute to the depressive point of view. And be acutely aware of when those ways of seeing crop up in your own orientation to life. And take counter measures immediately, talking yourself out of the drift you’re taking and into one that is good for your soul.
31. Sunset Day 5 09, Pamlico Sound, Cape Hatteras National Seashore, Ocracoke Island, NC — October 25, 2012 — We help each other along the way and stay out of each other’s way. That doesn’t sound too difficult, but it must be because how many of us do it?
    
    What are you trying to do? How are you trying to do it? How well is it working? — Who asks us those questions? They tell us what to do. They tell us how to do it. They tell us it is going to work, don’t worry about it.
    
    This is our life—as far as we know it is our only shot at life—and they are telling us how to live it. They are telling us they know more about living our life than we do. And so the old prayer: “Save us, O Lord, from those who would save us!”
    
    What is happening? What needs to be done about it? What are the barriers, the opposition, to that? What are the aids, the assistance, to that? What do you need to do what needs to be done about what is happening?
    
    We have to think through the questions—and the questions raised by the answers—regularly and routinely. It helps to have someone to talk to who knows how to listen. The road to hell is jammed with people who do not know how to listen. Not being heard is hell itself.
    
    Our role is clear. We have to learn to listen and hope it catches on.
32. Migration, Pamlico Sound, Cape Hatteras National Seashore, Ocracoke Island, NC — October 22, 2012 — We are so intent on forcing our way onto our life that we do not listen to what our life has in mind for us, is saying to us. We have to dance with our life, align ourselves with our life, live in sync with our life, swear allegiance to our life, be loyal to our life, allow our life to take the lead.
    
    Our place is to figure out how best to do what our life needs to have done. We find the tools and the resources, and do the work, but our life knows more than we do about what it is to be. We have to learn to read the signs and follow “the cues and the clues” in order to find the treasure that is the work we came to do, the gift that is ours to give.
    
    Ours is the stuff of all the great adventures, bringing ourselves forth in the service of our life for the good of the whole. It is a tale of epic proportions that we are writing, or would write if we would pick up the pen and get to work.
33. Sunset Day 5 14, Pamlico Sound, Cape Hatteras National Seashore, Ocracoke Island, NC — October 25, 2012 — The deal with depression is that it stops you. Sits you down. Sends you to bed. Anger is much to be preferred.
    
    Be angry even if you can’t do anything about the blockades and barriers in your life. Seethe. Rage. Show them a thing or two, the blockades and barriers. Show them what you CAN do—anyway, nevertheless, even so (Here’s one for you. Why can I get by with “anyway” and “nevertheless” with my spell checker and cannot get by with “evenso”? Life is funny that way. What it allows. What it forbids. We have to work with it. Acquiesce. We will never understand some things or be happy to have them in our life).
    
    If it’s raining and you want to take photographs of fall, you have to take photographs of fall in the rain or find something else to do. Of course, the rain and wind are knocking leaves off the trees and bringing an end to fall even as you wait for a better day. Are you going to be depressed or angry?
    
    I recommend anger. Verbalized anger. Speak it out. Do not hold it in. Let the rain know you are angry, and let your anger lead you to action. Take close-ups of wet leaves. On the ground. Or clean up the basement. Turn the anger-energy into something helpful.
    
    And let those around you know you are not angry at them. You are angry at the rain. You can be very focused in your anger. It does not have to spill over into all of your life.
    
    Anger’s energy is a gift that leads to action. Depression’s depletion is a curse that leads to lifelessness and gloom. Riding an angry horse is much better than trying to talk a dead horse back to life.
34. Hanging Out on Hanging Rock, Hanging Rock State Park near Danbury, NC — October 28, 2012 — We have to consult ourselves—our Deeper Self—on a regular basis and learn the language of soul. Soul speaks in metaphor, and has been known to say the exact opposite of what it means just to test us, to see if we are paying attention, to see if we get it, to see if we can be trusted to be in genuine dialogue—as opposed to being a yes-person and not really having our heart in what we say.
    
    Soul demands authentic conversation. We are full partners with soul in the bringing forth of our life. We work it out together, what soul wants and what we can give ourselves to in a fully committed kind of way. This is like Jesus wrestling in Gethsemane. We are that involved with soul in conversation. And soul is going to test us to see if we have what it takes before soul invests time and energy in our reclamation.
    
    Soul is a right brain kind of communicator. Maybe that’s because the right brain was all we used for the first ten million years (I’m making that number up—it was a long time) of history (Including pre-human history). So, soul is a right brain communication expert, but doesn’t do well with logical, rational, verbal, left brain stuff. So we have to learn to talk with our right brain.
    
    Metaphor. Symbols. Strong emotions. Images. Physical sensations. Symptoms. Dreams. Day dreams. Flights of fantasy. Automatic writing. Imagination. These are all aspects of the realm of soul, and soul speaks to us in these ways. We have to listen and interpret and intuit. We have to make sense of what we are hearing and seeing.
    
    There is no hurry, and there is no time to waste. See what you dream tonight, and see what you can do with it.
35. Sunset Day 5 13, Pamlico Sound, Cape Hatteras National Seashore, Ocracoke Island, NC — October 25, 2012 — God is an inkblot. Everything is. What we know of anything is what we project onto the “thing,” and then confuse with the “thing itself.”
    
    Everything—including God—is a projective device, which tells us much more about ourselves than about the world outside of ourselves. Our needs are nicely laid out in all of the things we say about who God is. Our idea of God is a mirror reflecting us back to us.
    
    Not that we are almighty, invincible, absolute and error-free, but that we aspire to be. That would be our idea of having it made. When we talk about God, it is as though we are telling someone what we see in an inkblot. Our description reveals us to someone with ears to hear.
    
    We have to develop those ears—and listen to ourselves talking—in order to know what we have to say and who we also are on a level much deeper than who we pretend to be.
    
    Reconciliation begins with recognition and acceptance—compassion and understanding. We cannot love our enemies without loving the enemy within—the side of ourselves we cannot acknowledge or permit ourselves to be—even though she/he may be the best part of us.
36. Swan Quarter Mooring B&W, Swan Quarter, NC — October 19, 2012 — The people I admire the most were all engaged in working their lives—not just working their jobs, but working their lives. They were not looking for smooth and easy. They were looking for what needed them to do it—not in the workaholic sense but in the “where might my gifts be best applied” sense.
    
    They were not interested in short-cuts, in wealth and prosperity, in kicking back and having it made. They were interested in bringing life to life about them—in engaging life—in embracing life in “the field of action.”
    
    One of the women who stands out for me was a teacher in the county Jr. High and helped her husband run a truck farm in her, as if, spare time. And she did it all exactly as it should be done, challenging her students to think beyond doing what their parents had done, beyond living as they had always seen life being lived around them, and extend themselves to their full capabilities.
    
    She modeled for them the kind of life she wished for them, and was revered by all who knew her as a source of goodness and grace in their lives. She gave life to those who came her way by calling their life forth and inspiring them to respond to her life by living lives of their own.
    
    She was a wonderful example of Joseph Campbell’s observation, “The influence of a vital person vitalizes.”
    
    As we live the life that is our life to live, we bring life to life in ourselves and in those about us—and our influence lives on in those we influence for good beyond our powers of calculation. May it be said so of us all!
37. Oak Leaf Medley, From my walk around the block, Greensboro, NC — October 29, 2012 — Adjustment, adaptation, accommodation, acquiescence, acceptance… Our work requires all this of us. Knowing when to stand our ground and when to stand aside is crucial knowing. Our most important battles can be those we lose.
    
    The most important battle of my life was lost with our then two-year-old daughter over eating her green beans. I said, at the critical moment. “Okay. You don’t have to eat your green beans.” That will redeem every negative item on my personal record.
    
    ”You have to know when to hold ‘um/know when to folk ‘um/know when to walk away/know when to run…”
    
    Instinct and intuition lead the way. We cannot think our way into the knowledge that is essential to our development as a true human being. We have to listen within, and trust what we hear, and stand our ground, or stand aside, in the critical moments upon which the future turns.
38. Sunset Day 5 10, Pamlico Sound, Cape Hatteras National Seashore, Ocracoke Island, NC — October 25, 2012 — We influence what we can influence, and that’s that. Don’t put everything you have on having an impact, making a difference. Maybe yes, maybe no. Put your marbles on living your life—on bringing you forth—no matter how that might be received in the world around you.
    
    Letting life determine the quality of your life is giving the Cyclops the victory lap. We have to live well no matter what! We have to bring our best to bear on each situation as it arises regardless of the impact and outcome.
    
    I don’t care how well you live, you cannot keep your 5 year old daughter from getting leukemia, your 10 year old son from being killed in a drive-by shooting. All of the important things are out of our control. What we do control is how we live with being out of control.
    
    It’s just another test the Cyclops throws at us to stop us in our work to see what is happening and do what needs to be done about it with the gifts that are ours to give in each situation as it arises no matter what all our life long.
    
    Picking ourselves up and stepping back into the work of living the life that is ours to live, bringing ourselves forth by the way we respond to what comes at us in a day, each day, is the work of being human in an inhumane world. We humanize life with the unique qualities of humanity—love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, tenderness, goodness, faithfulness, loyalty, generosity, grace, compassion and all the rest—because that’s what humans do. And what sense would it make for us to NOT do that?
    
    If we are not contributing to the humanization of the world we are contributing to its brutality, and its cruelty and its godforsakenness. In bringing ourselves to life, we bring God to life. Look me in the eye and tell me that is not worth doing.
39. Ocracoke Lighthouse 05, Cape Hatteras National Seashore, Ocracoke Island, NC — October 24, 2012 — The Native American saying, “It’s a good day to die,” means, for me, “Live like there is no tomorrow.” “Live like this is the last day of your life.”
    
    This doesn’t mean quit your job and go sit on the beach all day. It means give your best to the day. Be acutely attuned to every little thing. Be alive to—be alive in—every single moment. Miss nothing. Enter each situation fully “present and accounted for.” Be alert to what is happening and to what needs to be done about it—and offer what you have out of the gifts that are yours to give toward that end.
    
    If we lived each day like that, we could all die at peace—having done what was ours to do at the time it needed to be done. We can practice this approach for tomorrow in what is left of today!
40. Molasses Creek, Cape Hatteras National Seashore, Ocracoke Island, NC — October 23, 2012 — When we step into our fear in doing what needs to be done, we may not receive a reward commensurate with our risk. What we get out of it may be only having done it and survived. We serve purposes other than our own.
    
    We carry an entire psychic world with us wherever we go, and live not only for ourselves and what we might consider to be ours, but also for past generations. This is a category of immortality that doesn’t get any press. Each generation lives to redeem the lives of previous generations. We carry each other along long after death.
    
    We have dreams that are not our dreams. Moods that are not our moods. Motives that are not our motives. And undertake actions that are called for by interests and needs that are not our interests or needs. Putting things right somehow on levels we cannot imagine.
    
    Or not. This scenario is the best I can do with dreams and experiences I have had and inquiries I have made. Maybe we are all individual cells, coming and going with none but ourselves to consider. I take comfort in knowing I am not alone in my living and dying, but carry the hope of the species with me into each day, and my actions have the potential for impact for good far beyond anything I could arrange on my on in the daily routines of my life.
41. Path Through Fall, Forest Lawn Cemetery, Greensboro, NC — October 28, 2012 — We walk on two paths at the same time. We manage our life in the “real world” or normal, apparent reality, and we bring forth our life—the life that is ours to live—and the gifts that are ours to give from the invisible world of psychic reality.
    
    Primal peoples always understood the visible world to be grounded upon and sustained by the invisible world. Symbols were ways of implying things that could not be stated directly or explained fully, and their world was a symbolic world with foundations sunk deep in mystery.
    
    Then came Galileo with his telescope and Christopher Columbus sailing off the edge of the world—and back. And it was gone, like that, in a flash of reason. The Age of Reason and the Enlightenment laid waste to the gods and goddesses and the myths and legends. And brought with them nihilism and emptiness.
    
    Life was far from meaningless before reason came along, but now we have to have a reason for living, and we’re fried. If we don’t find our way back to the invisible world, our eyes will look like Little Orphan Annie’s in no time.
    
    We have to learn to walk two paths at the same time—to live with one foot in the world of reason and the other in the world of instinct and intuition, wild hunches and abounding creativity. We have to live out of the left and right sides of our brain.
    
    Living left-brained is easy. That is what education is all about. Living right-brained is where the work comes in. We have to teach ourselves to see the world in a right-brained kind of way.
    
    We could take art classes and music lessons. We could read poetry and write it. We could meditate and take photographs. We could experience the world and stop trying to understand it, predict it, manage and control it.
    
    We could think and play like children before we taught them to think.
    
    Gotta do something to find our way to the other path and live linked up with the invisible world.
42. Maine Skyline, near Millinocket, ME — September 23, 2012 — As we increase the distance between our way of living and the way of the natural world, it will increasingly seem as though nature is out to get us.
    
    We build homes on floodplains and then wonder where all the water comes from, or on the Outer Banks and complain about hurricanes, or on high cliffs overlooking the ocean and ponder why all the mud slides.
    
    When we try to live where we have no business living—where we don’t belong—there will be repercussions. We will pay a price.
    
    The Mississippi River built the Mississippi and Louisiana deltas. And we built a levee system to keep the river away from the deltas we now call home. The river is not a drainage canal living with our convenience in mind, and now it has global warming (That Which Is Not Happening) on its side, and those 100 year floods are going to come much more frequently.
    
    Walking on two paths at the same time means being aware of everything on both paths at once. Quite the trick, but one we need to be mastering. Knowing what is happening and what needs to happen is taking everything into account. Listening to all the voices on both paths. And deciding what to do based on everything we can know, sense, intuit, feel, hunch in every situation as it arises.
    
    Such is the nature of The Revolution. We all must become shamans, living in two worlds at once.
43. View from Hanging Rock 03, Hanging Rock State Park near Danbury, NC — October 28, 2012 — The Way is the way to the center of our Self/soul, to the heart of who we are. We are all cooking up ways to the Way, borrowing from and modifying the ways others have found to the Way and adjusting them to suit ourselves—our own unique style, shape, rhythm, character and form.
    
    If I gave you all my recipe for White Bean and Chicken Chili, or Baked Cheese Spaghetti, you would alter it to suit your taste, or never make either. None of you would make either precisely as I wrote it down because I can’t write it down precisely. I can tell you the ingredients I use, but I don’t use them all every time. Sometimes, I use something new. My recipe is a general direction. You have to decide all the important specifics on your own.
    
    The same principle applies to everything I say here. You have to mold it to fit you. You look for what catches your eye, for what clicks, and you adjust it to make it a better fit, a louder, more distinct, click.
    
    There are no Masters. There are only Disciples sharing their ideas and experience of the journey with other Disciples—providing encouragement and good company along the way to the Way, which is the heart and center of each unique individual seeking the deep truth of who she, who he, is and what she, what he, is to be about.
44. Cosmos 02, Mountain Glory Farm, Patten, ME — September 24, 2012 — Reasonable people can, and do, disagree about what the facts are, what the facts mean and what to do about the facts. This should give us pause but. Reasonable people cannot even agree about that. You see were that leaves us.
    
    We have to work things out. Or go to war. We seem to have a reliable preference for the latter.
    
    How do we work things out that go to the heart of what is important and we all, or a lot of us, have different ideas about what that is?
    
    Put Ann Colter and Hillary Clinton in a room. How long before they work things out? Rush Limbaugh and Keith Olbermann? Democrats and Republicans? Israelis and Palestinians? The list goes forever.
    
    There have to be fundamental agreements. Al Qaeda would never come to the table. North Korea? Never. And they might not meet the requirement of “reasonable people.” How would we determine that? Enforce that?
    
    It’s out of hand. Working things out is beyond us. We can’t work things out with our partners or our children or our parents. Or ourselves.
    
    When you come to a block, be as conscious as you can be of the block and see where it goes. This calls for personal meditation. Sit with the impasse. Open yourself to it. Regard it with compassionate awareness. See what happens, what stirs, what moves, what occurs to you. See what you see.
    
    Work with the block, with the impasse, over time. This is you working it out with you, with yourself. You do the same thing with dreams that catch your attention. Talk to the dream. Talk to the impasse, the block. Invite it to talk back.
    
    You cannot hurry the process but you can be with it, invested in it. Do not rush it and do not quit the work because nothing appears to be happening. Wait it out. There is nothing more important to do with your time. The future is here, aborning.
45. Sunset Day 5 08, Pamlico Sound, Cape Hatteras National Seashore, Ocracoke Island, NC — October 25, 2012 — Money gets in the way. Of the Way. Money is the Cyclops’ favorite weapon. He buys us. He pulls out a wad and asks, “How much for your life?” and starts handing over the big bills.
    
    It’s a fine line between enough money and too much, and we don’t know when we cross it. We know that we crossed it when we look around and think “This is ridiculous.” We know that we crossed it when we have no time to call our own because we are too engrossed in making and spending money. To what end? The question has no meaning. Making and spending money is its own end.
    
    How much do we need to do what is ours to do? What IS ours to do? Money makes it easy to ignore not knowing.
    
    Money provides compensation for not knowing what is ours to do—and for not doing it. Money is distraction, diversion, denial—a wedge separating us from our Self/soul, rewarding us for not asking, not seeking, not knowing who we are and what is ours to do.
    
    We buy our life back by giving money away. Start tipping well. Provide cash encouragement to those who are living in the service of their gift and struggling to pay the bills. Send a kid to college. Or technical school. Underwrite an art teacher in a local elementary school. Or middle school. Or high school. Or all three. Fund a spiritual center with different leaders in residence throughout the year. Listen to your heart/soul/Self for guidance and see where it goes.
46. Layers, Pamlico Sound near Cape Hatteras National Seashore, Ocracoke Island, NC — October 19, 2012 — Our ambition gets in the way of The Way. We have our ideas, plans, dreams, objectives and agendas. Big ones. Compensation, perhaps, for living less of a life than we are cut out for, but the danger is that we will want a life that is larger than the one we are asked to live.
    
    The trick is to trust ourselves to our life—and to let it be enough. The life that is ours to live, I’m talking about, the life that calls us to live it.
    
    Two professors stood out for me in my college career. One drank himself to death because he was teaching English Literature in a small school in the deep south where no one cared much for Shakespeare. The other brought Plato and Aristotle to life in philosophy courses taken by students who couldn’t spell “philosophy.” One wanted to be more than he was and the other was quite pleased to be who he was. They both were positioned to make all the difference in the lives of those who passed through their classes. Only one did.
    
    We cannot be dissing our life. It holds blessing and grace for us in the form of meaning and purpose—not wealth, fame and glory—and waits for us to give it a chance to make us glad to be alive.
47. Leaves of Fall, Bog Garden, Greensboro, NC — November 2, 2012 — When people ask me what I write about I tell them “Spirituality from a Jungian perspective”—seeing the unconscious as the origin of our spiritual sense. It isn’t Christianity as you have ever thought about it, but goes to the heart of who Jesus was, who we all are and are asked to be.
    
    All of the old themes (From bondage to freedom, death and resurrection, guilt and redemption, lost and found, etc.) and many of the old metaphors (The promised land, the water of life, the cup of suffering/salvation, the bread of affliction/life, etc.) still ring true from the slant of a different interpretation/perspective. But. It certainly isn’t for everyone. Only those who can no longer think along familiar paths have any business blazing new trails—and they can’t help it!
    
    What I have to say cannot be heard by all ears, and no one has any business leaving a path that nurtures and nourishes them, and no one has any business staying on a path that does not nurture and nourish them—but must blaze their own way to The Way, finding what help they can for the work of reformulating, and exhibiting, their understanding of who they are and what they are to be about.
    
    I see myself as offering tools for that task. I cannot do anyone’s work for her, for him, but can offer new ways of conceptualizing that work, and suggestions for what might be helpful. Jesus said, “You have heard it said but I say unto you…” That is the place of all those whose specialty is the gift of Hermes/Mercury, the Greek and Roman Messenger of the Gods, the God of Meaning and Interpretation—which change like quicksilver depending upon perspective, time and circumstance, so we are always saying: “You have heard it said but I say unto you…” Sometimes it comes out, “You heard me say that, then, but now I’m saying this!”
    
    What I have to say has no place in the lives of those who cannot make sense of it, but it may be “the water of life” for those who are no longer able to find meaning in the old formulations. May that be the way it is with you!
48. Sunset Day 5 05, Pamlico Sound, Cape Hatteras National Seashore, Ocracoke Island, NC — October 25, 2012 — What’s your specialty? Your knack? Your abiding interest? Your gifts are directly connected. Sit with the things you like to do and do often and well until the gifts they bring forth in you are clear before you.
    
    Your work is to live increasingly in the service of your gifts, so that they become obvious to everyone. The irony is that they may already be obvious to everyone and hidden from you.
    
    As you bring forth your gifts, consciously, intentionally, you bring forth you. You were born that you might become visible, individual, unique and valued in the world of normal, apparent reality. The irony here is that the pearl of great price is easily mistaken for glass and the chief cornerstone is easily rejected by the builders. Don’t let that slow you down!
    
    Do your thing. Your work. Do not hide your light as though it is nothing. Bring forth your gifts. Live the life that only you can live the way only you can live it in the time left for living. And trust that to be enough.
49. Sea Oats 9, Pamlico Sound, Cape Hatteras National Seashore, Ocracoke Island, NC — October 23, 2012 — You cannot hope to know who you are and what you are to be about—the life that is yours to live—without reflecting about it and being open and receptive to all that occurs to you when you do. You don’t get to choose who you are or what you are to be about. You get to be receptive to it, realize it, serve it.
    
    Our place is to live aligned with, as allies of, and loyal to who we are and what we are to be about. To know what that is, we have to listen and we have to interpret correctly what we hear, what we perceive.
    
    We tend to hear what we want to hear, so we have to become “transparent to ourselves,” knowing ourselves in order to know ourselves—listening again to what we think we have heard in order to see how else we might hear it.
    
    Awareness, awareness, awareness means listening, listening, listening and looking, looking, looking. We do not rush quickly to embrace what we take to be our work. We walk around it. Sit with it. See how it feels. Ask for a guiding dream. And wait for assuring, or objecting, signs.
    
    This is our life we are talking about. No point in being flip, casual or careless here. Look closely. Listen deeply. And then move carefully, attentively, into your best guess about the direction to take, being sensitive to the need for adjustment and alteration all along the way.
50. Fog on Cadillac Mountain 04, Acadia National Park near Bar Harbor, ME — September 30, 2012 — We have no time for reflection because we make no time for reflection. Used to be, that’s all we had, time for reflection. Taking Walkabouts and exploring the Dreamworld were all that were left to do after finding food and eating it. So we designed a culture to entertain us, distract us, disengage us from the Other World so that it would leave us alone with its barrage of directions and morning memos. And we lost the ground of our being.
    
    Reflection is the path to the heart of soul. We cannot find our way back to the source of who we are without doing the work of doing nothing but being open to the presence of the invisible world.
    
    It’s boring. It’s uncomfortable. It doesn’t serve our purpose. It’s a waste of time. It asks hard things of us. We had rather watch movies about someone else’s life than to go to the trouble of being alive in our own. If we had what it takes to be present and engaged with the Other World, we wouldn’t have created this wonderful culture as a diversion to all things spiritual.
    
    It isn’t easy, going home—back to who we are—to “the face that was ours before we were born.” We have to sit quietly to get there. And be open to what meets us in the silence, and calls us to the adventure at the center of all the legends of lore.
51. Reflections 02, Bog Garden, Greensboro, NC — November 02, 2012 — Becoming who we are is becoming the individual we are. We are as unique and unrepeatable as our thumb print. So why the rush to erase our distinctiveness and be like the crowd? Why become invisible?
    
    I understand the need to disappear. To disappear is to get away. To escape. To avoid the gang, and the noise that goes with it. We all need to disappear from time to time in order to reconnect with ourselves, find the center, be grounded in what important, in order to reappear as those who are clear about who we are and focused on what is ours to do.
    
    To be invisible is to blend in, to live unseen by being part of the scenery, camouflaged, concealed, out of sight. Individuals are not invisible. We stand out and are known for who we are—without shutting people out or cutting them off because they are not like us. The idea is to be not like us.
    
    ”Define ourselves while staying in touch” is the family systems motto. Tricky. Just try going back home “defining yourself and staying in touch.” What would your mother say, or your father, or your siblings, or your dear Aunt Jane? You have to be like they expect you to be or pay the price.
    
    Can you pay the price with grace and compassion and continue to define yourself without losing touch? Without withdrawing, slamming doors, driving off, disappearing?
    
    We have to time our disappearances. I disappeared this afternoon with the camera. It was great. But I can’t just walk away any time. I have to pay the price, face the music, just like you do, for being who I am in situations where it would be a lot easier to be like they are—like they expect me to be. We can’t do it the easy way and be who we are. We should know that by now.
52. Ledge Falls, Nesowadnehunk Stream, Baxter State Park near Patten, ME — September 26, 2012 — We set our expectations too high or too low. We think too much of ourselves or too little. We give ourselves too much credit or too much blame. We never simply allow things to be what they are without evaluation, judgment, appraisals and ratings. The pendulum swings between inflation and deflation, between exuberance and the blues.
    
    This puts us in perfect position to dismiss the life that is ours to live as either being beyond us (“Oh, I could never do that!”) or beneath us (“Is THAT it?”). No judgment. No evaluation. Just doing what needs to be done. Just living the life that is to be lived.
    
    We all have a niche where we shine (The grandchildren think you are the best grand-parent ever), a specialty that is exactly what is needed in more situations than we can imagine (Your perspective opens the way for kindness and mercy where, otherwise, they would never be). We cannot refuse to share our gifts because they don’t lead to fortune and glory.
    
    We ground ourselves in the center of who we are, live out of the heart of the life that is ours to live, and allow the path to unfold before us each day, bringing us situations and circumstances that need what we have to offer—and see where it goes.
53. Around the Block 07, Greensboro, NC — November 6, 2012 — We can take this happiness thing too far. “Whatever makes you happy” is no way to choose your life. “Whatever makes you happy” will not grow you up, or make you good company, or provide you with what you need to do what needs to be done in each situation as it arises whether you want to or not.
    
    If happiness comes, fine. If it does not come, fine. What we are looking for is a life we can be proud of having lived. A life that we can hang on the wall with Odysseus’/Ulysses’ life, with the Buddha’s life, with Jesus’ life, with Tevya’s life, with Atticus Finch’s life, with Eleanor Roosevelt’s life, with Rosa Park’s life, with Helen Keller’s life, with Amelia Earhart’s life, with Hester Prynne’s life…you get the idea…and know it belongs there. What we are looking for is the life that is our life to live whether it makes us happy, whether it is the one we would wish for, or not.
    
    We would not be likely to pick out life—the one that is our life to live—out of a pile and say, “This is the one I want! This is the life for me!” Our life chooses us as surely as the wand chooses the wizard. And we learn to adjust to it, accommodate to it, like it, over time. It grows on us, until, at the end, we wouldn’t trade it for anything. You might say we grow to be happy. We don’t necessarily start out that way.
    
    So, lay the happiness requirement aside, and look at the givens. This is what is happening, and this is what needs to be done about it, and these are the gifts you have to work with. See what you can do within that framework, without worrying about being happy, and see where it goes. Prepare to be surprised. Actually, prepare to be tickled pink. It’ll be great. You have to trust me in this.
54. Where The Orcs Live, Blue Ridge Parkway near Cumberland Knob, NC — November 5, 2012 — We take inventories and make assessments all along the way. Where are we pushing, forcing, our way? Where are we resisting, opposing our way? When do we move forward, when do we hold back? When do we stand our ground, when do we step aside?
    
    There are no rules, recipes or general principles to guide us. We feel our way into each situation as it arises. We live by instinct and intuition, not by commandments, directives, laws, decrees or edicts. What we do now, in this situation, may be the opposite of what we do then, in that situation—even though they may seem to be the same to a casual observer.
    
    We cannot be casual observers. What is happening? What needs to be done about it? What gifts do we have to used in the service of what needs us to do it? We take inventories and make assessments all along the way.
    
    Our life needs us. Our life is not something we create, produce, on our own—as though it is our call to make, how we live. We live to serve our life, to bring forth what needs to come forth in the here and now of our living. What is called for in each situation as it arises? What needs us to do it? In what ways might we rise to this occasion and offer what we have to give?
    
    We live in the service of transcendence and transformation—transcending all we have ever been by becoming what we are capable of being, transforming ourselves, our circumstances and the lives of all those impacted by our living by the way we live our life. And. If you think this is grandiose and ridiculous, take the Dollar challenge: Get out of your way. Get on your side. And give yourself a chance to show you what you can do.
55. Sumac, Blue Ridge Parkway near Cumberland Knob, NC — November 5, 2012 — It took a long time for me to gain enough experience to be reasonably ready for what came my way. I spent the first 30 years of my life being in a steady state of unreadiness. I was unready to learn to swim long after my father was ready for me to learn to swim. And ride a bicycle. I was unready for Algebra. I was unready to date when the time for dating arrived according to every other boy my age. Yet, I muddled through.
    
    I made just enough in the way of adjustment and accommodation to get to my thirties—and I learned along the way, not so much how to be ready, but how to deal with being unready. I developed skills at recovery and regrouping that have served me well over the years and bought me time.
    
    There are some things we just have to be old enough to do or to understand or to master, and no lecture is going to help us, only time and experience. Carl Jung said there are no solutions to the big problems of life—we just have to out-grow them.
    
    Growing up changes things. And growing up cannot occur before its time. We cannot be lectured, or punished, or shamed, into growing up. But we can assist the process by being quietly aware of ourselves awash in our life. Quiet awareness of—and acceptance of—the way of things, of how things are, spurs growing up like nothing else does. And we don’t do anything but see with compassion and refrain from helping the butterfly (that would be us) from the chrysalis.
    
    We become what is needed—what we need—over time. In the meantime, bear the pain! And trust that you are in the smack dab middle of the path even though there doesn’t appear to be a path, only inky black hopelessness everywhere you look. Hang on, hang on, muddle through!
56. Creek in the Woods, River Park, Rock Hill, SC — November 3, 2012 — What guides our boat on its path through the sea? Is it better to make no mistakes or to not worry about making mistakes? Is it better to “throw caution to the winds” or to “look before we leap”? No matter what rules we live by, there will be situations and circumstances in which the rules we live by do not apply. Then what?
    
    You’ve heard me say, “Fooling ourselves is what we do best; No! Shooting ourselves in the foot is what we do best. No! Telling ourselves what we want to hear is what we do best. No! Letting ourselves off the hook is what we do best. No!…” When we are the one we have to rely on for knowing what to do, we’re in trouble. Yet, who else is there? Our mother? Father? Best friend? Who would we trust ourselves to? Who would be more reliable than ourselves in finding the way that is truly our way through the choices and options that spring up, that lay themselves before us, along the way?
    
    Our life is our call to make but. What determines what we say yes to, and no to? What guides our boat on its path through the sea?
    
    How did we get here, now? By knowing what we were doing? Or by being lucky? By following instinct and intuition, or by always doing the smart thing? By mixing it up, sometimes instinct and intuition and sometimes the smart thing? How do we know when to do what? None of us has it down.
    
    You wouldn’t consult any of us about what you should do with it all on the line and come out any better than rolling dice or flipping a coin. We don’t know what you should do. We don’t know what we should do. There are no completely reliable guides.
    
    We are on our own with the life we are living. We consider our options, consult our experience, listen to our feelings, gather as much information as possible, put everything there is to be aware of on the table and consider the table, bring as much intelligence and wisdom as we have to bear upon the choice we have to make, pray to be lucky, hold our breath, cross our fingers, determine to make the best of the outcome and leap into the unknown. And, yes, that’s the best I can do.
57. Blue Ridge Farm Fall, near Rocky Knob, VA — October 15, 2012 — Can you imagine Jesus or the Buddha saying, “You people are in my way! I have big things to do! I have plans! Dreams! I have to save the world! Enlighten humankind! I can’t be wasting my time with the lame, the halt, the blind, the poor, the hungry, the hopeless! Begone! All of you! I have work to do!”?
    
    That would be ridiculous, wouldn’t it? You can’t separate saving the world and enlightening humankind from seeing, hearing, understanding and being with whomever is before us in the time and place of our living. People are not in the way. They ARE the way.
    
    How we treat one another—how compassionate, kind, generous, gracious, tender, merciful, just and fair we are—tells the tale. The quality of our presence and our attention is more salvific and enlightening than anything we can say, any advice we might give.
    
    If you are going to practice anything, practice being the kind of person who saves the world and enlightens humankind without saying a word.
58. Long View BW, Blue Ridge Parkway near Cumberland Gap, NC — November 5, 2012 — You have to work you into your life. We spend most of our life removing ourselves from our life. Not doing it our way. Doing it someone else’s way instead. We do it the way our parents want it done, the way our teachers want it done, the way our preachers want it done, the way our bosses want it done until we have no idea of how we want it done, or feel guilty for wanting it done differently from the way all our Life Directors want it done.
    
    It is no accident that the Gurus and Masters of Lore were solitary individuals. It is hard to be an individual any other way. But. You cannot hope to be a true community until you can become a true individual.
    
    Only an individual can listen another person into her or his own individuality, perspective, way of seeing/doing/being. Communities that erase individuality—and churches are particularly bad about this—create a tribal mentality that rules out any chance of individual development, maturity, growth. No one there can think, see, do, or be different from anyone else there, and the way WE do it is the way it is to be done.
    
    No one can move beyond the community without being expelled from the community, and the community cannot grow past the limitations of its founders—which makes Amish of all of us on one level or another.
    
    What do YOU think, see, feel, intuit, sense, believe? How would YOU do it—live your life—if you had the freedom to do it like you feel it needs to be done? Our life is an experiment in how to live it, in how it needs to be lived, from birth to death. Different circumstances require different responses—heretical responses, perhaps, blasphemous responses. Each new world requires new ways of living. Can you dance with your life? Will you? Do you dare? To the music only you can hear?
59. November Afternoon 01, Wright Dairy, Rockingham County, NC — November 8, 2012 — Our life is an experiment in finding the things that stir us to life, and doing them. We are lethargic, depressed, dying and dead to the extent that we are living someone else’s life—the life someone else demands that we live.
    
    Joseph Campbell said the Wasteland is where people are living inauthentic lives—lives that are not their own life—where people do more of what they do not like to do than what they like to do—where our life is determined for us by the culture, or the church, or the organization, or the job, or the role, and not by our own heart and soul.
    
    By mid-life, we all should have had enough of this kind of existence. We all should be ready to see what we can do with the last half of our life, whether Those Who Know Best And Must Be Pleased like it or not.
    
    What is the life you have not been allowed to live, or that you have not allowed yourself to live? If you can’t begin living it now all at once, how can you begin to live toward that life, one step at a time?
60. Around the Block 02, Greensboro, NC — November 6, 2012 — We labor under the illusion of optimal and dream of the best of all worlds—and are disappointed and despondent when our life doesn’t match our dreams for our life. It never will.
    
    We can always imagine a better world than the one we go to sleep in each night and wake up to each morning. We cannot allow our dreams for our life to get in the way of our living.
    
    A dream is only good for getting us going. After that, we have to forget the dream and see what we can do with our life. We cannot be comparing our reality with our dream of reality. We will come out on the short end of that stick every time.
    
    I dreamed of moose and moon rises in Maine. The dream got me to Maine. There I found rain and overcast skies. Dreams are always crashing into the rock face of Reality Mountain. We have to make the best of it. I took photos of fog on Cadillac Mountain, the ferns and trees of Sieur de Monts, and the heavy seas of the North Atlantic—in the rain, under overcast skies.
    
    We stand before our options, unable to choose because we don’t know which choice will be the best for us. We do not know where we will be better off. Get used to it. Go with your best bet, with the choice that feels and looks like a good one, and work with it toward the best it can be.
    
    Someone else will have it better, and someone will have it worse. You can’t expect ideal. Don’t hold out for it. If it comes your way, fine. I have some ideal—for me—photographs, but I didn’t camp out, waiting for them. I turned a corner, and there they were, a surprise, lagniappe for showing up. I turned the corner looking for the dream that got me there, and there was the ideal photo I never imagined.
    
    Let your dreams get you going, and live to be surprised.
61. Used in Short Talks On Contradiction, etc., Around the Block 05, Greensboro, NC — November 6, 2012 — How do we understand this—whatever it might be that destroys what we have told ourselves about reality, crumbles our foundations, fragments our structure, our constructs, our schematics, our blueprints, our design, our doctrine, all the things that hold life together for us? How do we make sense of this? How do we explain this?
    
    The people who have a way of reconfiguring their configurations when the unthinkable happens, when the contradictions and discordances, and dichotomies, and cacophonies roll through the land leaving nothing but chaos where there had been order—the people who can take the complete loss of everything in stride, saying, in effect, “Wow, that was a surprise, but not a problem. What else you got?” are the people who have it made.
    
    Everybody else is in trouble.
    
    The work is to make sense of existence in a way that allows for the work of reworking when the complete opposite of everything we have told ourselves about how things are knocks down our door and says, “You forgot about me, didn’t you?”
    
    The facts are always coming around to call into question what we have done with the facts. And we have to take up again the task of explaining—interpreting—what the new facts mean in a way that allows us to make a life for ourselves in a new world, in light of new facts.
    
    We have to develop a fluid explanatory system that takes contraries in stride and enlarges our hypotheses in light of realities we never imagined. We have to be able to live amid the crumbled structures of the Old World in ways that accommodate the strange ways of the New World.
    
    We start by being aware of how we make sense of our world and playing the game of handing all of it over, living as though we are explorers on a new planet, observing, wondering, imagining how things work there and seeing how we need to adjust ourselves to new ways of living in order to thrive there in that environment, because the old is always passing away and the new is always coming over the hill to disrupt what has been our life.
62. Shadows 03 B&W, Wright Dairy, Rockingham County, NC — November 6, 2012 — We are here to be who we are and to help each other be who she or he is—to assist each other with our life without interfering with our life. To see how things are, and what is happening and what is trying to happen, and what needs to happen, and what needs to be done about it, and do what we can about what needs to be done with the gifts that are ours to give—in each situation as it arises.
    
    Now there is nothing about any of this that is too hard for us. So, what’s the problem?
63. Katahdin 07, West Branch of the Penobscot River at the lower end of the 100 Mile Wilderness, off the Golden Road near Millinocket, ME — September 25, 2012 — We each must bring forth who we are as a blessing and a grace upon our life and those who share our life with us in the time left for living. They will not all view it as a blessing and a grace. We cannot allow their opinion of us, reaction to us, freeze us in place, making us as they think we ought to be.
    
    And, we cannot be any way at all—who we wish we were, for instance, who we think we would like to be. Carl Jung said, “We are who we always have been, and who we will be.” I enjoy crafting ideas and images. Always have. Always will. I cannot lay that about me aside and take up shoeing horses or repairing automobiles or building pianos.
    
    Carl Jung also said, “There is within each of us another, whom we do not know.” This other is our Best Self, our Core Self, who we are called to be increasingly like, who we are called to become over the course of our life. Our work is to know and be who we are and who we also are.
    
    Joseph Campbell said, “We know when we are on the beam and when we are off it.” We have a gyroscope of sorts inside. We know when we are in balance and when we are out of balance, when we are centered and when we are off center, when we are in and out of sync with our Self. We only have to pay close attention to what we know—to know what we know—and live in light of it. This is not hard, but. It takes a while to get it.
    
    We have big ideas. Or little ones. And work hard to be more, or less, than we are. We have the rest of our life to get the ratio right. Time spent with our Self is time well spent.

Fall Flood Plane, Blue Ridge Parkway near Blowing Rock, NC — October 5, 2012 — Our life is not ours to live alone. It is all up to us but. Just try sitting in a corner manufacturing encouragement. Talk yourself into being encouraged. Or, here’s a better idea. Talk yourself into a different perspective—a different point of view—a different way of looking at things. And write down the dialogue. And send it out to the rest of us. Because we’ve given that a spin a time or two, and we woke up the next morning with the same old ideas in place.

We need one another to have a chance. Make that the right kind of others. If I had remained under the influence of my family of origin—or certainly under the influence of my mother’s family of origin—you wouldn’t recognize me. We have to have the right kind of others in our life, who offer the right kind of help, delivered in the right kind of way. And we have to help them help us.

We help them help us by receiving what they have to offer in a way that makes full use of the gift. The people who have been the most help to me had no idea they were helping me. They were talking about themselves and I applied what they said about them to me. Or I overheard conversations they were having with someone else and took what they said and applied it to my own situation at the time.

When you are open to being helped without officially being the helpee, everything and everyone becomes a potential source of assistance. It’s amazing. Help is everywhere for those who can be helped. And nowhere for those who can’t be.

To be helped, it helps to know what you need help with. What are you working on? What isn’t working? Where are you stuck? What are you seeking that you aren’t finding? What form does your help need to take?

What’s so hard? About living your life? About working you into your life? What would help? What do you need? Where might you find it?

Clarity is always a good place to start.

Go sit in a corner and ask yourself what you need help with, and keep asking questions until you are perfectly clear about the help you need. Then get out of the corner and into your life and see how long it takes you to find it. I’m betting less than a week.

Ps. As I have turned this post over in my mind, it has occurred to me that we are helped most often by honest conversation from the heart about things that are important to us. Who talks with you in this way? Speak with them often!

• Around the Block 04, Greensboro, NC — November 6, 2012 — We wake up with the same ideas we went to sleep with. This is not called growing up. We are imprisoned in our view of things, with complete freedom to move about the country, traverse the world, looking out through windows without bars, living behind doors with no locks, free to think the way we have always thought for life.
  
  And so the need for revolution.
  
  It takes a shock to the system to transform the system. The bread of life is the bread of affliction. The cup of salvation is the cup of suffering. This is true not only in the life of Jesus and the lives of his disciples. It is true in your life and mine, in the lives of all of us, across the board, around the world, through all of the ages and epochs of time.
  
  The Greek poet Aeschylus is credited with having written: “He who learns must suffer/And even in our sleep pain that cannot forget/Falls drop by drop upon the heart,/And in our own despair, against our will,/Comes wisdom to us by the awful grace of God.”
  
  “Those who seek to save their life will lose it, but those who lose their life (for the sake of the truth of their own wisdom—for the sake of that which is greater than they are—) will find it.”
  
  We grow up against our will. That which opposes us, blocks us, inhibits us, challenges us transforms us and brings us forth. Joseph Campbell said, “It took the Cyclops to bring out the hero in Ulysses.” The bread of affliction is the bread of life. The cup of suffering is the cup of salvation. Savvy?
• Sieur de Monts 03, Acadia National Park near Bar Harbor, ME — October 2, 2012 — Enlightenment doesn’t mean you can’t be stupid. It is said the Buddha died from eating bad pork. How enlightened is that? The Dali Lama doesn’t know anything about hitting a curve ball. Or backing an 18-wheeler.
  
  This enlightenment stuff is way over-rated. Getting something on one level doesn’t mean you get everything on every level. Sometimes, you may find yourself in the basement, or in the attic, and not know what you’re doing there. So what? You can still find your way back to the kitchen. Once you get there, you’ll probably remember why you were in the basement, or the attic.
  
  When you wake up, you wake up to how things are (and also are—which is how things are), and what needs to be done about them, and what skills and gifts you have that might be useful in doing it. My shorthand version of the enlightenment process is knowing this is how things are, and this is what can be done about it, and that’s that.
  
  Do what you can and see where it goes. Wherever it goes, the same formula applies. Do what you can there and see where it goes. If you get this, you are enlightened. Doesn’t mean you can hit a curve ball.
• Farm in the Valley, Blue Ridge Parkway near Air Bellows Gap, NC — November 6, 2012 — There is a thread of purpose meandering through your life, through all of life. And that is a statement of faith if ever there was one. A thread of purpose meandering through our life can be experienced but it cannot be proven, or explained, or understood. And it can be dismissed, discounted, denied and ignored.
  
  If you are going to believe anything, believe there is a thread of purpose meandering through your life. And do not waste one precious second of living formulating a body of doctrine to enhance your belief, defining what’s behind the purpose, for example, and why it’s like this and not like that, and what we have to do make that which is behind the purpose happy so we can exploit it and get what we want from it.
  
  Lay your purposes aside and align yourself with the purpose beyond our purposes meandering through your life.
  
  Why? you say. What’s in it for you? you say. This is the hard part. You have to be at the end of your rope before you have what it takes to hand yourself over to something as obscure as hidden purpose. You have to be out of options, with nowhere else to turn. That’s why you’ll never be able to sell this idea on street corners to the general public and create, say, The Church of Sacred Purpose.
  
  There is nothing in it for you. Except life, and hope and meaning and, well, purpose. But it is not your purpose, not something you can make up, like making a bundle and retiring before you are 40.
  
  The purpose you are seeking to align yourself with is mystery. You will not live to see it laid bare before your eyes. But it will bring you to life in your life, and you will sing songs of joy and gladness from your heart, and it won’t matter to you what it all means or where it is going because it is meaning itself that carries you along, laughing. Alive.
• Sunset Day 5 03, Pamlico Sound, Cape Hatteras National Seashore, Ocracoke Island, NC — October 25, 2012 — You have to pay the bills. That’s your first order of business. Put simply, you have to find a Day Job.
  
  ”Oh, but my ART! My ART!” If you don’t pay your bills, you can’t do your ART, your ART! “Oh, but how can I be true to myself and sell myself out for a job just to pay the bills?” Don’t let being true to yourself be the easy out in refusing to do the work required to pay the bills.
  
  Here’s what you do. Decide what you can do to pay the bills, then go down the list and decide which of the jobs you can do to pay the bills leave your integrity mostly intact. Then do the work to pay the bills. AND keep an eye on your ART, your Art.
  
  Work your ART, your ART into your life, into what is left over of your life after doing the work to pay the bills. First the bills, then your ART, your ART. Chances are, it’s first the bills (Maybe, if we are lucky—if you get what I’m saying here) and then it’s PARTY TIME!
  
  If someone asks us to go partying, we never say, “Oh, but my ART! My ART!” We say sure. Funny how your ART, your ART takes a backseat to everything but working to pay the bills. Don’t you think that’s funny? Aren’t you laughing? At yourself? For doing such a good job of fooling you?
  
  Suck. It. Up. Pay the bills. Then do your ART, your ART. Then, with whatever time is left over, do all the other things that crowd your ART, your ART out of your life.
  
  Chances are, only your parents are still reading this. I lost you at the end of the first paragraph. How’s an adviser going to advise with none to take his, or her, advice? So, I’ll just confirm your parents in their sense of things, and let them take it from here.
• Around the Block 14, Greensboro, NC — November 13, 2012 — We have to know what is important, and do it. Nothing is more important than knowing what is important and doing it. But. How do we know?
  
  All of Those Who Know Best And Must Be Pleased tell us what is important. We have to decide if they are right. We have to decide if what we are told is important—what we have always been told is important—is important.
  
  Here’s the catch. What is important changes with time and circumstance. What is important at a certain time in our life, or in a certain situation, is not important at a different time, in another situation. How do we know?
  
  We have to pay attention. We have to be aware. We have to notice the shift in time and circumstance. We have to live with our eyes open, seeing what we look at, and knowing what is going on. And we have to take a chance. We can be wrong about what is important.
  
  Here’s another catch. What is important to us at a particular time and in a particular situation, may not be important at all—and it may be essential. Sometimes we override what is important to us for the sake of what is important, and sometimes we ignore what everyone proclaims to be important for the sake of what is important to us. How do we know when to do what? Re-read the paragraph immediately preceding this one.
  
  Everything turns on our knowing and doing what is important, and we can be wrong in our appraisal of things. This is the human condition. Do not run from the responsibility, the duty, of standing your ground, evaluating the situation, and deciding for yourself what is important here and now—in each situation as it arises—and doing it. This will grow you up, wake you up, and carry you to the center of the path with your name on it faster and more surely than anything else, though it may take your whole life long.
• Sieur de Monts 22, Acadia National Park near Bar Harbor, ME — October 2, 2012 — Listen. See what you hear. See what else there is to hear. See what comes to you when you listen. See what comes from you. See where it takes you. See where it goes. Listen. See?
• The Orchard BW, Mountain Glory Farm, Patten, ME — September 27, 2012 — We think life consists of acquisition, attainment, achievement, accomplishment, awards and recognition—and we burn ourselves out in the pursuit of these things. Life does not consist of burning ourselves out.
  
  Life consists of living, of being alive to the time and place of our living, to the here and now of living, in each moment of life.
  
  We look without seeing, talk without listening, eat without tasting, touch without feeling, medicate our bodies without noticing what they are saying to us, dead to our senses—how alive is that?
  
  We experience without experiencing—without reflecting, examining, exploring, imagining, wondering—dead to our experience. How alive is that?
  
  We are waiting for something good to come along to transform this old life that nobody would think of living. Waiting for Godot. To gift us with life in all its splendor and glory. Ignoring the splendor and glory of dust motes in sun beams and yellow leaves dropping from Maple trees in the fall.
• November Afternoon 02, Wright Dairy, Rockingham County, NC — November 8, 2012 — We have to walk two paths at the same time, live in two worlds at once. We belong to the world of normal, apparent reality and have to pay the bills. And, we belong to the invisible world of unconscious, spiritual, reality and have to find and stay on the beam.
  
  Joseph Campbell said, “We know when we are on the beam and when we are off it.” We know when we are living the life that is our life to live, and when we are not. We know what brings us to life, and what is death in disguise. The problem is that the beam rarely pays the bills.
  
  We have to live in this world in ways that honor the requirements of life in this world even though our heart and soul are of the other world. The place of conscious awareness is that of working it out.
  
  Working it out means making the polarity real and consciously integrating the opposites in ways that allow us to live as responsible citizens of each world. We know what that means for the world of physical reality. Our life is structured  by that world and we tend its needs daily.
  
  We have to learn what it means to be a responsible citizen of the other world. It means sitting quietly on a regular basis, listening, reflecting, open to what comes to us in the silence. It means listening to our dreams and our physical symptoms—talk to your back pain and invite it to talk back. Assume you are overweight for a reason. Explore what that reason might be. Engage in a dialogue with yourself and listen with acceptance to all that comes.
  
  We begin building a relationship with the world of invisible, spiritual reality by listening to what it has to say to us, and adjusting our life to better take it into account. Robert Johnson’s book “Inner Work,” and Parker Palmer’s book “A Hidden Wholeness” are two guides I’ve found helpful for finding ways of approaching the invisible world.
  
  We are the contact point between the two worlds, and we have to live there consciously in order for the connection to happen. We’ve waited long enough.
• Sunset Silhouette 01, near Stonington, Deer Isle, ME — September 28, 2012 — You don’t have an unlimited supply of Life Energy. How do you plan on spending it? I recommend that you find out what your life needs from you and spend it in the service of your life. Not in the service of your wants/desires. Want what your life wants you to want. That’s my best advice.
  
  I get blank expressions whenever I advise it. People know what they want, and their life is the horse they ride to glory—to the glorious realization of their wants and desires.
  
  Everybody knows what they want. Nobody knows what they ought to want. They think they know. They think they ought to want what their mother wanted them to want. Or their preacher. Or their best friend…
  
  Nobody has an idea of a life that is separate from their idea of their life. Ask them to tell you about their life and they will tell you what happened to them, or what they have done. You may get a long list of medical problems, ailments, afflictions and conditions. You won’t get anything about the life that is there waiting for them to live it, with the gifts that are still theirs to give in the time left for living.
  
  Life is something that happens to us or something we do with our time on the earth. It is not something that calls us away from our idea of it into its service, against our will, wants, desires and better judgment.
  
  So, waking up is always the first order of business. The question is not, “What must I do to get what I want out of life?” The question is, “How do I find my way to the life that is my life to live past all of the attractive alternatives and exciting offers that keep coming my way?” The question is, “How do I wake up?”
• Around the Block 13, Greensboro, NC — November 13, 2012 — Life is not what happens to us, it is what we do with what happens to us. It is what we bring to life in dealing with, in working with, what happens to us in light of what is trying to come to life within us and through us into our life.
  
  Life is two things. Life is 98.6 and breathing and all that goes into keeping us breathing. And. Life is what we breathe for, what we breathe to do and be and bring forth. It is the beam, the foundation, the ground, the source of the experience of being fully alive. It is the meaning and purpose that enable us to live with anything that happens to us, doing with it what can be done as we exhibit there, in the time and place of our living, what it means for US to be ALIVE in this world exactly as it is.
  
  All we know of life and being alive is buying some new technological toy, some new car, some new house, some new something to delight and entertain us for a while and take our minds off the emptiness of our life.
  
  The life that is waiting to come alive in us and through us and fill our living with meaning and purpose, waits for us to wake up and allow it to seize us with vitality and exuberance and purpose, and we go shopping.
  
  We wake up by realizing that our life is the stuff of myth. Of mythology and psychology. The two are the same ology. All of the old mythological stories are stories about us, about our psychological development, about our coming to life beyond being 98.6 and breathing.
  
  The stories of Jesus and of Ulysses are the stories of what happens to those who live to be awake and to align themselves with the life that is theirs to live. As we take up that work, we become who Jesus was, who Ulysses was, and as it was with them, so it will be with us, and we can make connections between the life we live and what happens to us and the life they lived and what happened to them. And we take courage, and go forth to embrace our destiny. May it be so with us all!
• Sieur de Monts 04, Acadia National Park near Bar Harbor, ME — October 2, 2012 — It’s about growing up. Waking up. Wising up. And that road never ends. We are never grown up. Awake. Wise. It’s always about growing up. Waking up. Wising up.
  
  It’s about seeing, hearing, understanding. It’s about having eyes that see, ears that hear and a heart that understands.
  
  And there is nothing in it for us. We don’t get anything out of it beyond growing up, waking up, wising up, seeing, hearing, understanding.
  
  There is nothing beyond being alive to have, or know, or do, or be. Being alive is about growing up, etc. As we engage in, embrace, the process of growing up, etc., we come to life. We cannot be alive without growing up, etc.
  
  What we get out of life is being alive. That’s what we are here for. Do not waste a second of the time left for living not being alive.
• Stone Mountain, Blue Ridge Parkway near Doughton Park, NC — November 6, 2012 — There are 10,000 (The Taoist number for infinity) ways of taking our mind off our business. Or of taking our mind off our search for our business.
  
  Our business is the beam, the center and ground of our life and being. It is what we are here for, what we are here to do, what we are here to be about. It is our calling, our work, our task.
  
  There are 10,000 ways of losing the way, of stepping aside from the path, of forgetting what we are to be doing, of losing focus, of taking our mind off our business or off the search for our business.
  
  Know what your business is and do it. Know what business you are in and be in it. How do you talk about your business? What business are you in, understood in the way of the second paragraph?
  
  I’m in the business of asking questions and questioning the answers. I’m in the business of asking, seeking, knocking. I’m in the business of poking around and probing into assumptions, inferences and convictions. I’m in the business of reframing, reinterpreting, transforming traditional ways of seeing and bringing new ways of thinking about things—understanding things—to life. I’m in the business of finding all of the tripod positions—that would be all of the ways of seeing something, anything, everything—and wondering which is the most appropriate for the here and now of our living.
  
  What business are  you in? What are your favorite ways of taking your mind off your business?
• Sunset, Day 3 02, Pamlico Sound, Cape Hatteras National Seashore, Ocracoke Island, NC — October 23, 2012 — There is how things are, and how things ought to be, and how we wish things were. How well we consciously integrate these three aspects of life tells the tale.
  
  Seeing how things are—into the heart of how things are (Not just that your mother is not standing up to your father, or did not, but that she could not because she had no ground to stand on)–and how things ought to be, need to be (Not how they should have been—wouldn’t it be nice if we all had the parents we needed, and they had, and their parents had? They didn’t. We didn’t. Here we are. Now what?)–and how we wish things were (That we all had our own ground to stand on and did things the way they need to be done everywhere, all the time)–brings forth what can be brought forth to heal what can be healed and redeem what can be redeemed and transform what can be transformed in each situation as it arises, and lets the rest be, because it is.
  
  We will never have the parents we didn’t have, or know how things would be if we had. But here we are. Now what? None of us ever out-grow having had parents. But here we are. Now what? And parents are just one facet of all of the influences and impacts that have helped shape our perspective. But here we are. Now what?
  
  Recognition, realization, reflection. Awareness, acceptance, authenticity. Seeing, hearing, understanding. Compassion. Grace. Kindness. Mercy. Tenderness. Vulnerability. Honesty. And, perhaps, in time, forgiveness. There is much to be acknowledged before forgiveness. Much to see and sit with. We have to name the demons before we forgive them. And some aren’t worth our time.
  
  ”As you go into the world to seek and live your life, the birds of the air will paste you with their droppings. Don’t even pause to wipe it off.”—Native American instruction to tribal youth, relayed by Joseph Campbell
• Bass Lake Fall 11, Blue Ridge Parkway near Blowing Rock, NC — October 14, 2012 — We wake up by examining, exploring, investigating what we assume to be so. What makes us think that the way we think is the way to think? The trick is to begin thinking about our thinking.
  
  One way to do that is play around with Uncritical Inference Tests. Do an internet search for the term and instead of playing Solitaire, work through a test or two each night. It’s a way of sharpening your thinking skills, and catching yourself in the act of confusing what we think about the way things are with the way things are.
  
  We wake up when we move out of a literal, concrete, right or wrong, good or bad, absolute way of thinking into a figurative, metaphorical, abstract, symbolic way of thinking. This is the shift from the left hemisphere to the right hemisphere. It is a shift that increases the number of ways we can see, interpret, understand a situation and the number of ways we can respond to it.
  
  How many ways can you think of to think about your situation? Your father? Your mother? Your family of origin? Your partner? Your children? Your job? Your life? Put what you always say about these things on the table (that would be an imaginary table), and see how many different things you can say about them, how many different ways you can see them. Stretch/expand your explanatory style.
  
  Step aside from The Facts for a moment and see how many different ways you can interpret, understand, perceive the facts. Sit with the facts and see what stirs, what shifts, what comes to mind. This is called playing with the possibilities. It is one way new life comes to life and cracks appear in “the cosmic egg,” which would be your representation of your life, world, universe.
  
  We don’t grow without seeing things differently. We don’t change without changing our outlook, perspective, point of view. This is not a walk in the park we are taking. It is the Hero’s Journey. It asks hard things of us, like thinking about our thinking.
• Long View, Blue Ridge Parkway near Air Bellows Gap, NC — November 6, 2012 — Our pattern of life IS our life. When the pattern is disrupted, say by our graduating from high school and moving off to college all in the blink of an eye, or losing our job, or encountering a major illness, or the death of a parent, child or partner, our life crumbles around us and we grope about in the darkness with none to guide, lost and without direction.
  
  No wonder there is such binge drinking, partying and drug abuse in college. We cannot face our lostness, our no idea of where to turnness, our what to do nextness. We don’t fare better with any of the other loss of life experiences. When our pattern of life is taken from us, we do not replace it smoothly and easily with a replacement pattern.
  
  We need a recovery room, a decompression chamber, a year or two with people bringing us meals and speaking softly to us. The emotional trauma is the equivalent of being hit by a steam locomotive on the physical level. At the very least, we have to be conscious of that and deliberately take up the work of putting the pieces back together.
  
  Dreams, which often serve to compensate for our conscious attitude, may be terribly threatening and chaotic if we are failing or afraid to consciously face up to the facts of our situation. Our dreams would be saying, “This is how it is with you! Wake up to it!”
  
  We wake up to it by feeling it to its foundation. We have to be as lost as we are in order to take up the work of integration, reconciliation, wholeness, harmony, oneness and peace—and creating a new pattern of life.
  
  Drawing, painting, coloring, creating mandalas may be particularly helpful. I’ve said before here that I see my photography (a quadrangular mandala instead of a round one as they usually are) as a way of harmonizing my own disparate parts and creating a ground, or foundation, of integrated wholeness—peace for my soul, and perhaps yours as you view them.
  
  However we do the work of recovery, consciousness is the key. Awareness—seeing what must be seen, knowing what must be known, feeling what must be felt. And out of the depths of that darkness, light, and life, and peace. Until the next disruption. Then we do it again, and become really good at it over time.
• Around the Block 09, Greensboro, NC — November 9, 2012 — To live aligned with the voice of the Inner Self is to live quietly attuned to the “cues and clues” that arise within. We know more than we know we know, and so we must attend the inner knowing.
  
  Reflection, examination, introspection, exploration and abounding curiosity are bents and leanings we must develop if we are to be Self-guided instruments of our own growth, being and becoming.
  
  In order to know what we know, we have to feel what we feel, sense what we sense and perceive what we intuit. We are saying something to ourselves in each situation as it arises, at each turn in the road, each place filled with opportunity and chances to be missed or recognized and taken.
  
  Let things settle, be still, become quiet—and see what stirs, occurs. We may find ourselves saying things we would never have thought to say, or doing things that surprise us. Who would have guessed it? It is the beauty of who we also are that even we can be surprised by the wonder of us, and led down paths we could not have predicted, and into the company of those who bless us with grace beyond imagining. All because we gave up control and got out of the way.
• Used in Short Talks on Contradictions, etc., Lincove Viaduct Fall 01, Blue Ridge Parkway near Blowing Rock, NC — October 5, 2012 — We are known by what we say yes to and what we say no to, by when we say yes and when we say no. We define ourselves by our choices. What we want, you might say, determines who we are.
  
  It would be a good and helpful thing, then, to think about what we want, about what guides our boat on its path through the sea.
  
  It is best to not fool ourselves, I think. We cannot fool ourselves and be transparent to ourselves, and we cannot make any distance along the path to who we are without being transparent to ourselves—without seeing, hearing and understanding how it is with us—without knowing who we also are and what we are about.
  
  So. We sit with ourselves and listen. And reflect. We observe ourselves in action. We catch ourselves in contradictions. We wonder with ourselves, “How can we say this and do that?”—Not in an accusative, judgmental, way, but inquisitive, curious, investigative way. We are trying to understand who we are (who we also are), uncovering our motives and agendas, getting to the bottom of who we are (and also are).
  
  The journey is an inward journey to the center of our soul. We are the path we walk, the gold we find. We know ourselves by exploring what we say yes to, and no to, all the way along the way.
• Lower Cascades Panorama, Hanging Rock State Park near Danbury, NC — November 12, 2012 — You have people in your life, or have had people in your life, who you like to see coming and hate to see going. They make things better. They have redemptive, healing, qualities, and we are renewed, restored, by spending time with them.
  
  You’ll have to make your own assessment about your people, but my people receive me well. No judgment, no condemnation, no correction, no unsolicited advice, no lectures or instruction. They listen to me with compassion and look at me with soft, kind, eyes. And they laugh a lot. They don’t set themselves up as the way it ought to be done. They aren’t prudish, holy and pure. They have their foibles and failings, and don’t pretend otherwise. And they are as accepting of mine as they are of their own.
  
  They make all the difference in my life and in the lives of a large number of people. And, they don’t make any difference at all in the way the world works. The headlines are as bad as ever. Wrong seems to get worse over time. Joblessness, the economy, poverty, war… And regardless of the headlines, no matter how bad it is, there are those who make all the difference in our life.
  
  And there aren’t enough of them. We need to make it our practice to become like them in the lives of others—as a way of honoring those who have brought us to life.
• Low Tide 02, Stonington, ME — September 26, 2012 — The tide goes out and the tide comes in. Waiting is the hard part. Between the tide being out and the tide being in can seem like forever. And between the tide being in and the tide being out can seem like no time at all.
  
  The trick is letting come what’s coming and letting go what’s going. “This, too. This, too.” Either coming or going, either in or out, our work is the same: Being awake to the time at hand, present with what is present with us, alert to what is happening and what needs to happen and what we can do about it.
  
  At times, waiting is all that can be done. We wait for the time to act. For the moment to be at hand. The propitious moment, the favorable moment, the moment that is ripe, the time that is right for what we have to offer, the gift that is ours to give.
  
  The farmer doesn’t sew seed on rocky soil, or thorny soil, or swampy soil, just anywhere, just any time. The farmer waits for the right time, the right place. Waiting is the hard part.
  
  Everything is easier when we are conscious of it. When we are waiting, it helps to know we are waiting, and to wait consciously—for what, perhaps, we do not know. An opening. An opportunity. A chance. A space. A shift. A shift in the times.
  
  With every illness I have had, I have known when the corner was turned, when I started coming out of illness into life. The shift can be subtle, but can be seen, felt, by those who are looking, waiting, for some sign, some indication, some food for hope, some reason to be encouraged.
  
  In the darkness, we wait for the first hint of light. Biding our time, trusting ourselves to the coming of the shift, preparing ourselves—readying ourselves—to do what is to be done when the time is right and the moment is at hand.
• Wetlands Sunrise Panorama, Four Mile Creek Greenway, Charlotte, NC — November 23, 2012 — We each pick up the thread that runs through out life and follow it out in our own way. Or not at all. Some of us live as bulldozers all our lives, forcing our way to goals we deem worthy, plowing through stop signs and dead ends, with no regard for what needs to happen, in the service of wants that we will into being, regardless of the impact, in spite of the results. Or as puppets, robots, dancing to someone else’s tune, marching to someone else’s orders.
  
  But. There is a thread running through the life of each one of us, a thread of truth, arising from and leading to the core, the source and goal of life and being—ours to find and follow through life and to life—past more attractive alternatives, or safer options, all along the way.
  
  The path lies beneath the feet—and unfolds before those—who trust themselves to the thread and start walking.
• Wetlands Cattails 04, Four Mile Creek Greenway, Charlotte, NC — November 23, 2012 — We pass through time looking to make our mark, but it is not through achievement, accomplishment, attainment and acquisition that we do so. It is done in being who we are.
  
  Our mark is our signature. It is our Self shining through—seen in how we do what we do, in who we show ourselves to be through the process of living our life.
  
  The wisdom of Delphi advised “Know thyself,” and “To Thine Own Self Be True.” Living aligned with the truth of our own being is to live with integrity. It is to bring forth who we are to meet what we find in each situation as it arises. This is the ethical principle, “the categorical imperative” running through every moment, in all conditions of life.
  
  Be who you are at the core, at the center, of that which is deepest, truest and best about you. And, how do you know what that is? Wake up.
  
  ”We are who we have always been,” said Carl Jung, “and who we will be.” It only takes waking up to know who that is, and be who we are, consciously, intentionally, in the time and place of our living. As we do so, we discover that we are exactly what the situation needs us to be, a boon beyond reckoning, which we receive in the act of giving it away.
• Enjoying the Wetlands, Four Mile Creek Greenway, Charlotte, NC — November 23, 2012 — There is distraction and there is focus. To know the difference between the two is to be focused. To forget the difference between the two is to be distracted.
  
  Where is your focus? Where does your focus need to be? What is distracting you from where your focus needs to be?
  
  What is your business, here and now? What are you about? What do you need to be about?
  
  When we “return to the center,” or “find the center,” we refocus on the business at hand. What are we doing? What needs to be done? What needs us to do it?
  
  What are the sources of distraction at work in the time and place of our living? If I am looking for a photograph in a scene where the mosquitoes are swarming, I can forget the photograph. The mosquitoes are going to win the day.
  
  If I’m trying to write—or read—in a room with a TV blaring away, I can forget writing, or reading. I have to deal with the distraction before I can get back to the business at hand.
  
  Removing the distractions is essential to recovering our focus, to remembering who we are and what we are to be about. We move from disintegration to integration by bringing ourselves into focus, remembering our business, and being true to ourselves within the conditions and circumstances of our life in the time and place of our living.
• Ginkgo biloba 01, Charlotte, NC — November 23, 2012 — Waking up is growing up. We cannot be awake and immature. Maturity is a function of consciousness, of awareness, of awakening—seeing, hearing, understanding. Enlightenment.
  
  Immaturity is unconscious. Maturity is conscious. The spiritual journey—the Hero’s Journey—is maturation. Growing up. Waking up.
  
  Immaturity is taking someone else’s word for it. Maturity is seeing for yourself.
  
  Immaturity is doing what they tell you to do. Maturity is deciding for yourself what is called for in the situation as it arises.
  
  Immaturity is believing what they tell you to believe. Maturity is believing what you believe is suitable, fit, proper, appropriate, right, good, and worthy.
  
  Immaturity is thinking what they tell you to think. Maturity is thinking what you think, feeling what you feel, seeing what you see, hearing what you hear, knowing what you know—and choosing what to do about it out of your own sense of what needs to be done.
  
  Immaturity is doing what the rules say do. Maturity is rising to the occasion and doing what is called for never mind the rules.
  
  We grow up by taking chances on ourselves and learning to be true to ourselves over time. Which means mistakes are the teacher and seeing is the lesson.
• Reeds 02, Four Mile Creek Greenway, Charlotte, NC — November 23, 2012 — It’s illegal if it breaks a law of the State. It’s immoral if it runs counter to the officially sanctioned codes of the day—the Thou Shalts and the Thou Shalt Nots of popular or orthodox religion, for example. It’s unethical if it is contrary to our own sense of how our life ought to be lived—if it is out of sync with the truth of our soul.
  
  To be ethical in the deepest sense may require us to be immoral and illegal. My soul says “Get the picture!” The sign says “No Trespassing!” If the fence isn’t electric and there are no dogs barking, the picture is mine, to my wife’s everlasting chagrin.
  
  The same thing applied to all of those Jim Crow laws, and to all of those laws infringing on the civil and human rights of gay people, and to all of those laws dehumanizing immigrants desperate for work and help without their papers. We are called beyond where we are supposed to go.
  
  The clash of oughts and shoulds and musts and must nots are at the heart of the Hero’s Journey. Each of us has to make up our own mind about what we are going to do and who we are going to be in the time and place of our living. We do ourselves no favors when we live in the solid center of who our friends and family expect us to be. The more like them we are, the less like us we are.
  
  Who guides our boat on its path through the sea?
• Beech Trees, Guilford College Woods, Greensboro, NC — Spring 2008 — We have to bear the pain. Growing up is developing a tolerance for disappointment, anxiety, insecurity, uncertainty, and their relations (In the deep south a “relation” is someone who may be kin to you but no one remembers exactly how, like your grandfather’s second cousin on his mother’s side. Maybe).
  
  We just deal with it. It will not be made right—or made up to us. There is too little in the way compensation and consolation to my liking—but what are we going to do? We pick ourselves up and go on. Cussin’ helps as much as anything. Seriously. Studies have shown we can bear pain longer (as in a hand immersed in ice water) if we give the experience a good cursing than if we “grin and bear it.”
  
  So dust off some expletives and have at it. Then, pick yourself up and go on. If you spend too much time thinking about what just happened, you won’t get out of the way of the next thing coming along, and before you know it, you have become the Cyclops’ all day succor.
  
  I’ve been looking for a way to use that line for years.
• Used in Short Talks on Contradictions, etc., Wetlands Cattails 08, Four Mile Creek Greenway, Charlotte, NC — November 23, 2012 — The pain we bear is the pain of contradictions. We want this and we want that, but this and that are mutually exclusive options, so we have to choose. Or choice is forced on us, or taken from us, and what we get is NOT what we want.
  
  Life runs contrary to our wishes, and we are left with doing what we can with something we don’t want anything to do with.
  
  We bear the pain of reconciling contradictions, of integrating opposites, of making peace.
  
  We make peace not only between warring children but also between ourselves and the way things are, between our wishes for the world and the way the world works.
  
  The trick is transcendence. We transcend the either/or stalemate by imagining, envisioning, a third way as a marriage of the two opposites.
  
  But, there is a catch. The solution is apparent only from the perspective of the struggle. We cannot solve a problem we are not engaged in, that we are not pained by. Transcendence is a function of immanence. To be a part of the solution, we have to be a part of the problem. We have to bear the burden in order to transform it, transcend it—and we are changed by the process of effecting change.
  
  We want a magic wand and WE are the magic wand! The magic happens through us, and to us. We work with the contradictions and things change—and we are one of the things that change.
  
  If you can live with that catch, you have it made.
• Mile Post 244, Blue Ridge Parkway, Doughton Park, NC — November 5, 2012 — The dumbest piece of advice in the Bible is “Resist the Devil and he will flee from you!” The Evil One—however you understand that metaphor—loves defiance. In Jungian psychology, the Shadow just deepens—becomes increasingly dark and devious—when we put on the pure and righteous act and “have nothing to do with evil.” It isn’t that easy. It isn’t easy at all.
  
  In the first place, we have to recognize that the Devil, the Evil One, the Shadow is not a thing apart from us. The Pogo Cartoon revelation is on the mark: “We have met the Enemy and he is us!” What to do about it is the question.
  
  We work it out is the answer. We wade right in. We play it out. We see it through. Darkness and Light, Good and Evil, Right and Wrong, Good Guys and Bad Guys—this is who we are to the core, and we have to make it work.
  
  Other Biblical injunctions are much more to the point: “Make friends with your accuser on your way to court!” “Love your enemies!” “Do unto others as you would have them do unto you!”
  
  William Blake, in “The Marriage of Heaven and Hell,” said, “Without contraries is no progression.” Is no transformation. Is no movement, no life.
  
  Rumi’s poem, “The Guesthouse,” lays the blueprint for peace and cooperation before us. “We”—all of “us” within—need the perspective and the strengths of each other. Just as the eye can’t say to the ear, “Who needs you?,” or the foot to the elbow, so the Light cannot say to the Darkness, “Begone, Thou pit of wickedness and filth!”
  
  In another poem, Rumi points out that “Darkness is the cradle of Light,” and if there is only light, all are blind—and deep and endless is that darkness. It behooves us to initiate a parlay. Have a talk. An ongoing talk. A conversation.
  
  Invite the Devil to the table. Listen to him to the very heart of all he has to say. See what you have to say in response. See where the conversation goes. The rule for both of you is to be honest, authentic, genuine, real. Don’t strike a pose. Don’t play a part, a role. Don’t say what you think the preacher, or your Sunday school teacher, would have you say. Say what is yours to say. We seek the truth by being truthful all the way to the core—and seeing where it goes.
• Fall Lane, Anne Springs Close Greenway, Dairy Barn Access, Fort Mill, SC — November 24, 2012 — We find the thread of truth running through our life—the truth of who we are—and follow it out in the time left for living. In so doing, we become who we are. We do more of what is us and less of what is not us. We spend time with the things that bring us forth, that bring us into focus, that clarify us, identify us and make us real.
  
  The watchwords for those on the trail of truth—the truth of who they are—are authenticity, genuineness, integrity (as in doing that which is integral to who we are—living in ways which reflect and express what is deepest, truest, and best about us).
  
  The truth of who we are is a magical transformation wherein we remove our stiff, lifeless, manikin-like exterior and exhibit the living being at the heart of our life and is who we are called to be, and capable of becoming.
  
  This doesn’t mean we abandon all of our roles and cease doing everything that isn’t us. It means we work it out. We bring ourselves forth within the conditions and circumstances of our life. And when those conditions and circumstances will not permit our metamorphosis, working it out may mean finding ways to leave those behind and move into new ones which will assist our birth in ways that are truly helpful—like being open, accepting and understanding.
  
  The rest of our life is where we work out being who we are within the givens, within the facts, of life. This is the Hero’s Journey. It waits for each of us to take it up and see where it goes.
• November Afternoon 04 B&W, Wright Dairy, Rockingham County, NC — November 9, 2012 — We have to work it out over the course of our life. This is the Hero’s Journey, working it out.
  
  We have to work out who we are, over against who we wish we were and who we think we ought to be and who we are told to be and who we are invited to become. We have to find the thread of truth—the truth of who we are—running through our life and align ourselves with it, at the cost of all other claims upon us.
  
  We have to work out who we are within the framework of all other claims upon us—within the terms, context and conditions, time and place, of life as it is.
  
  We take the fact of who we are in one hand, and the facts of life we find waiting for us when we come forth from the womb in the other hand, and we spend our life working to get the two sets of facts together—to integrate who we are with how things are.
  
  This is the Hero’s Journey, becoming who we are in the time left for living, while taking all the claims upon us into account.
• Used in Short Talks On Contradiction, etc., Grazing 02, Anne Springs Close Greenway, Dairy Barn Access, Fort Mill, SC — November 27, 2012 — I don’t know what you will find that helps you work it out—who you are and how to be who you are within the terms and conditions, the time and place, of your living—but sitting helps me, and walking slowly, and silence, and solitude, pondering, reflecting, writing, listening, looking, hearing, seeing…
  
  The more you see and hear the more aware you become. The more aware you become, the more aware of contradictions you become. How we integrate, reconcile, the contradictions tells the tale.
  
  Even if I live for long years to come, I’ll die working the camera into my other life. The camera is a harsh taskmaster, caring nothing for the schedules and convenience of other people, even close family members who think Christmas Dinner (etc.) takes precedent over every other thing.
  
  So I have to work it out, belonging to both worlds, reconciling the contradictions, finding the thread of truth (of who I am and what is asked of me) in each situation and following it into the next situation.
  
  Do not be disheartened at the difficulties involved in making it work. You have to be your own advocate, your own champion, flying your own colors, swearing allegiance to and keeping troth with your own true life—with the thread of truth running through your life. And you have to do that taking claims upon you into account. How much for you? How much for them? How much for the rest of your other life? You decide in each situation. You work out the ratios. You make it work as well as it can work—the nature and scope of the Hero’s Journey.
• The Swinging Tree, Guilford College woods, Greensboro, NC — April 2008 — My friend Ogi Overman said in a comment below that, for him, “the Hero’s Journey is a quest for true humility.” He’s right again.
  
  True humility is complete integrity of being. True humility does not pretend to be more than it is, and true humility does not pretend to be less than it is. True humility is content to be just what it is in each situation as it arises. And that is the essence of a true human being.
  
  A true human being is truly humble, and truly proud to be who she, who he, is in the time and place of her, of his, living, regardless of the conditions and circumstances and context and nature of her, of his, life. Our goal, the Hero’s Journey, the Spiritual Quest, is to be who we are, where we are, when we are, how we are. As we do that, in each situation as it arises, we exhibit why we are, and grace the world with our presence.
  
  Of course, this is the best trick in the Big Book of Tricks, so we join Ogi in the quest for true humility, and see where it goes!
• Hemlock Islands 02, Penobscot Bay, Deer Isle near Stonington, ME — October 1, 2012 — As I get older, I need less imposition and more leeway. It may be compensation for having a job—I was a minister for 40.5 years—that required complete availability/imposition and very little leeway. But, I like nothing between me and the end of the day.
  
  You hear that phrase “at the end of the day” a lot. For me it means bedtime. When I cut out the lights and go to bed, that’s the end of the day. And I like a clear path from getting up to going to bed. Guess how often that happens.
  
  Our life is spent making adjustments to our preferences and priorities to take reality into account. Reality. The facts of life. How things are. House guests. Dentist appointments. HVAC repair. The list is long of things that come belching and sneezing into our life, knowing we have no choice but to move over and make room.
  
  Imposition is reality. And it doesn’t matter what job you have. It is the Chief Fact of all of the facts of life. We are imposed upon from start to finish. And have very little—not nearly enough—leeway.
  
  Which makes people who take you into account, understanding your tics and proclivities and allowing you the privilege of being who you are, how you are, no matter what, a joy and a delight to be around.
  
  There are waitresses who sound genuinely happy to bring me  Chicken Nachos without the nachos. Friends who honor need for quiet mornings and suggest coffee or tea after 2 PM. Dear ones who know I’m “just that way” where distance and availability are concerned or when the light is right and I have to disappear with the camera. It is wonderful to find people who grant leeway when I’m being an imposition. May I be more like them when the situation calls for it than I am naturally inclined to be!
• Beech 03, Guilford College Woods, Greensboro, NC — October 2008 — Carl Jung said, “Every relationship has its optimal distance, which, of course, has to be found through observation and experimentation”—in other words, through experience. We learn by experience what is too close and what is too far, and it’s different with different people, and it’s different in different settings and situations. It takes an awake brain to figure this out. And this is just the distance portion of the equation!
  
  It’s no wonder relationships are such tricky things to tend. We have to pay attention. Be awake. And talk, talk, talk. And guys can’t do any of those things. Unless it comes to hunting, fishing, baseball, football or NASCAR.
  
  So guys have their work cut out for them. Caring about relationships as much as they care about hunting, fishing, etc. Wow. That would be better than Viagra for a lot of the women I know. Caring attentiveness. How come there isn’t a pill for that?
  
  But let me get off the sexist wagon. I don’t know of anyone, male or female, who isn’t a sucker for tender, kind, attentive presence. If you are going to give me anything, give me your undivided attention. I may as well ask for the moon and all stars.
  
  Take this horse for a ride. See how long you can remain attentive to another person—how carefully you can hear what she or he is saying—how “with” the other you can be without taking the topic away from her or him and turning it into your own.
  
  Practice listening. Attentive listening. Listening with your full, directed, focused attention. Notice when you drift off, or when you get defensive, or when you become uncomfortable and change the subject or take over the subject.
  
  Reflect on what happened. And practice extending the focus.
  
  We will save the world by attending our relationships, finding and maintaining the optimal distance, and listening each other to the truth of who we are.
• Wetlands Cattails, Four Mile Creek Greenway, Charlotte, NC — November 24, 2012 — I don’t remember if Obi-wan Kenobi ever actually said, “Trust your feelings, Luke,” or “Trust yourself to the Force, Luke,” but he could have, even should have. It’s the key to finding and following the thread of truth that runs through our life.
  
  Trusting our feelings IS trusting ourselves to the Force—IS trusting the Force—whatever the Force is behind it all, conscious, unconscious, mystery, being, life… It goes by a lot of names, and it is known through our feelings. Our sense of its presence and its preferences, its leanings and its direction.
  
  And, we can feel like another beer or another evening with cocaine. Our feelings can trick us. Remember your first marriage? But, our feelings lead us out of all of the dead ends they lead us into. We are left with trusting our feelings to know when something isn’t working and to get ourselves walked out of wherever it is that we don’t need to be. And it may turn out, in the long run, that our wrong turns were the rightest things we ever did, because without them, where would we be? Even our bad choices can lead us, in a round-a-bout way, to the Way with our name on it. IF we trust our feelings.
  
  There is that within us which knows more than we do, and it is our place to know what we know, by sitting quietly, regularly, and listening. We have to get ourselves out of the way to know what we are feeling—and to be able to discriminate between feelings, so that we can tell an ill wind from a good one, and say what needs to be said, and refrain from saying what does not need to be said—instead of just saying anything that comes to mind (And the same goes for doing).
  
  We have to sit and listen in order to hear. We have to sit and look in order to see. Sitting quietly, listening, looking, feeling is the path to the path with our name on it.
• Low Tide 07, Edgar M. Tennis Preserve, Deer Isle near Stonington, ME — October 2, 2012 — I say the same thing over and over because I only have one thing to say: Wake up! Do your thing! Get out of the way so your thing can come to life through you!
  
  The same thing needs to be said because people keep not hearing what I’m saying, saying, “We’ve heard that before! Why do you keep saying the same thing?” When does hearing happen is the question. As long as we can keep from hearing what we have heard, we don’t have to do anything about our thing.
  
  We let anything, everything, keep us from doing our thing. Any excuse will do. “We don’t know what our thing is!” “Our life is too hard!” “We can’t do anything with this sorry old life!” “We could do our thing if we had a better life!” We keep ourselves safe that way.
  
  The things that keep us from doing our thing are: Fear, Desire, Duty, Greed, Arrogance, Laziness and Stupidity. We have to live beyond these things in order to do our thing—we have to risk everything. We put ourselves on the line. We stop imposing our ideas of our thing on our thing.
  
  Our thing is not necessarily what we think our thing is or what we want our thing to be or what we are told is our thing. We have to sit before, stand before, all the things—waiting, watching, looking, listening in order to see, hear, and understand what ours is.
  
  Just like “the wand chooses the wizard,” our thing chooses us—we don’t choose our thing. We have to get out of the way and allow our thing to come forth in the manner of an immaculate conception, a virgin birth.
  
  Finding our thing is finding the thread of truth that runs through our life. Our thing is what our thing always has been, and will be. We have to sit, stand, before ourselves, and see ourselves with fresh eyes in order to see the thing that has always been ours.
  
  When we begin to do our thing consciously, with intention, with loyalty and devotion and allegiance, we develop an identity, a foundation. Then, we become who we are, and are centered, focused, grounded, whole, complete, integrated, at peace, clear and unmovable.
• Used in Short Talks On Contradiction, etc., Foothills of Katahdin, Baxter State Park near Patten, ME — September 24, 2012 — Here comes something else I’ve said before and keep saying because it is the central issue in the whole process—the process of waking up, growing up, standing up, squaring up to the truth of how things are and how things need to be and doing what must be done about it in each situation as it arises whether we want to or not, whether we feel like it or not, whether we are in the mood for it or not, at any time during the day or night, in all weather conditions.
  
  We have to face up to our own conflicts, ambivalence, contradictions, inconsistency, hesitancy and uncertainty. We have to bear the pain of living in the tension of wanting mutually exclusive things, of being on both sides of the fence, of being torn between what we want and what we also want and what we have been told we ought to want.
  
  We have to live the contradictions—knowingly, consciously, with full awareness—and be the redeemer, the mediator, the reconciling agent/influence between and among the opposites at war within, transcending animosities, integrating incompatibilities, healing deep wounds, bringing peace, becoming whole in the time left for living.
  
  Which begs the question: Just how do we do this? You aren’t going to like the answer: You play with it. You get in their with it and stir things up. See what comes to mind. Fiddle around. Monkey around. Experiment. Explore. Probe. Wonder. Imagine. Create. Stop taking the serious things seriously. See what you can do. See what happens. See where it goes.
  
  There is no recipe, no formula, no plan, no procedure for doing what must be done. Each of us has a way that is ours alone, a way that has only our name on it, a way that is as individual and unique as we are. And our way to the way is just as individual and unique as the way is.
  
  Wade into the mess! Into the rolling boil of discordance and discrepancy and dissonance—with eyes that see, ears that hear and a compassionate heart that understands and accepts—and see what you can do.
• Greenway Boardwalk, Four Mile Creek Greenway, Charlotte, NC — November 24, 2012 — It IS all about you—each one of you. It is about the life you are living and the life you are asked to live. It is about who you are and who you are asked to be. It is about you becoming the you you are built to be.
  
  At this point in your life there are three true things: The life you have lived. The life you are living. And the life you have yet to live.
  
  It is the place of the conscious, aware part of you to enter into an alliance with the unconscious, knowing part of you—a collaborative partnership in which you bring into being the future that needs you to live it—that no one but you can live, and co-create by living in such a way as to bring it forth.
  
  This is the meaning and purpose of your life: To live the life that is your life to live—to bring yourself forth in the life you are living, however difficult that may be. If you are going to opt out of something, opt out of sugar or high fructose corn syrup. Do not opt out of bringing forth the life that is yours to live within the context and circumstances of the life you are living. That’s the Hero’s Journey! Why would you want to miss that—no matter how hard it is?
• Ginkgo biloba 02, Charlotte, NC — November 24, 2012 — Most of our experience with community is being swallowed up in one. The communities of our experience have existed to disappear us into the community—to make us like everyone else. That’s more of a commune than a community.
  
  A community is a loose confederation of individuals who exist together for the sake of each other. The Judges of the Old Testament is a good example of this, calling the people together to deal collectively with a threat to their joint welfare and then disbanding and returning to their individual ways of life once the threat was no longer a problem.
  
  Community exists for the sake of the individuals within the community, not the other way around. We need help with our life. We need help coming forth. We need help knowing and remembering that we have what we need if we will only get out of the way and trust ourselves to the Knower/Guide within. We need a nourishing, nurturing environment in which to experiment and explore and discover our interests and proclivities and gifts and abilities—in which to discover who we are and bring ourselves forth into our life.
  
  Not exactly what any community we know of has in mind. So, we have to create our own. The church as it ought to be. A listening post. A place where people are listened to the heart of who they are—and helped to find the thread of the truth of who they are running through their life.
  
  We’re back to Eugene Gendlin (“Focusing”) and Parker Palmer (“A Hidden Wholeness”) as guides to what is helpful and what works to create it with a small group of people who have what it takes to be what each person needs.
  
  Speaking of small groups, Jesus said “Wherever two or three are gathered…” I think three is necessary to keep two from becoming a couple, and much more than that is too big to work for the good of each—it gets to be political early on, with people siding with people against other people, and people “hiding out,” not coming forth… Keep it small, keep it honest, with no group secrets and everything said to everybody, and you’ll wonder how you made it this far without it.
• Old Saddle Mountain Baptist Church B&W, Blue Ridge Parkway near Cumberland Gap, NC — November 6, 2012 — We can trust ourselves to know what to do about not knowing what to do. We can trust ourselves. If we trust ourselves and get into a fix, we can trust ourselves to get out of the fix. And the experience of the fix may be just what we need to avoid some future fix.
  
  I’m saying, cut yourself some slack. Ease up. Your Self, your unconscious Knower, is the most reliable helpmate you could wish for. It takes trust, though, to find out that I’m right.
  
  Trust is another word for faith. Faith in ourselves is equivalent to faith in God. God acts in us and through us, right? There is no way to find the line separating where God stops and Self starts. God is our better half. When Paul says, “It is no longer I who live, but Christ Jesus living in me,” he is talking about the Knower within. We’ll never find the line where Christ Jesus stops and the Knowing Self starts. The difference isn’t enough to butter a piece of bread with, as they say in the deep south.
  
  I’m saying your Self can be counted on for guidance and direction in all matters pertaining to LIFE. We are not alone. But. It takes trusting this is so to know that it is. It takes faith in the reality of our Self. And allegiance and loyalty to the service of our Self. And alignment and affinity with the drift of the Self. To bask in the wonder of Selfhood.
  
  It will not be confirmed intellectually, rationally, logically. Only experientially. We have to trust ourselves to know our Self is trustworthy. To trust ourselves is to give ourselves over to our Self, knowing that what our Self has in mind for us may not be anything like what we have in mind for us.
  
  So. Who are you going to trust to know what’s in your best interest? You, or your Self? The answer to this question tells the tale.
• Ledge Falls 02, Nesowadnehunk Stream, Baxter State Park near Patten, ME — September 26, 2012 — There are two basic avenues to meditation. One is the Hindu/Yoga/“Transcendental Meditation” approach, which is to empty our mind of everything. We are told to ignore all of the voices (“Monkey Mind”) clamoring for our attention and focus on our breathing and our mantra, driving all other thoughts away.
  
  When we find ourselves straying into grocery lists and happy fantasies about winning the lottery, we bring ourselves back to the moment at hand by focusing on our breathing and our mantra. Completely focused. Completely at peace. Completely present.
  
  The other way of meditating is to become interested in all of the voices we hear, paying close attention to them, being fully aware of them. In this approach, we listen to what we hear, reflect on it, evaluate it, assess it, weigh it and determine whether to follow or not.
  
  My recommendation is to understand meditation as listening/hearing, looking/seeing, attending/realizing—and pay attention to the voices without thinking that means do what they tell us to do, listen to the voices without thinking that means to obey them.
  
  Like an investigative reporter, we get to the bottom of what we hear. We ask the voices to tell us more. We receive with acceptance what they say but ask probing questions about what they mean. We make inquiries. If they are harsh, judgmental, belittling, we ask them what is their point and what do they want and why aren’t they being more helpful in heading off the things they attack us for.
  
  We hear what we have to say—ALL of what we have to say, and ask if any voice has anything else to say, and take it all under consideration, turning it over, exploring what we have heard, inspecting, reflecting, imagining, wondering, thinking, etc. And see where it goes.
• Steele Creek Trestle, Anne Springs Close Greenway, Old Mill Access, Fort Mill SC — November 24, 2012 — Doing what needs to be done in each situation as it arises places all other values at risk. The Ten Commandments are the first things to go. We cannot keep God happy and do whatever the situation calls for—unless we understand that God is happy with us doing whatever the situation calls for—that God does whatever the situation calls for!
  
  The parables of the vineyard owner, the good Samaritan, the Prodigal Son, the unjust steward, the wise and foolish bridesmaids say God is free. Even Jesus gets into the act, forgiving a guilty woman (the one “taken in adultery”) and cursing an innocent fig tree—the one that had no figs because “it wasn’t the season for figs.”
  
  God, and Jesus, and we are all free to do what needs to be done in the situation as it arises, never mind what ought to be done, what is supposed to be done, what has always been done—or what ought not be done, ever, for any reason, no matter what. Everything is on the table. We are free to act as we deem it necessary to the situation as it arises.
  
  The idea that we have dishonored God and God is scandalized at us and is going to punish us all unless we repent and toe the line itself misses the mark. We have dishonored God by refusing to draw our own lines and live out of our own sense of what needs to be done, when, where and how.
  
  The failure to live open and alert to the time and place of our living, so that we know what is happening and what needs to happen and use our gifts to assist the coming into being of what needs to be results in a deadening that is deader than dead. So that we become like cows following the worn path from the pasture to the barn and back to the pasture—never getting out of line or out of order, and calling that being alive.
  
  “Leave the dead to bury the dead,” said Jesus. “There’s nothing but the dead and dying in my little town,” said Simon & Garfunkel. We are dead when we are afraid to be alive, afraid to risk being wrong in the service of what we think needs to be done because of what might happen if we do.
  
  We have to take a chance on God. This is having faith in God—taking a chance on God—trusting God to be on our side when we take a chance and do what we think needs to be done (Healing on the Sabbath, for instance). We have to take a chance on God to be on our side when we act on our own authority in doing what needs to be done in each situation as it arises.
  
  None of this, “God said do it this way,” and “God wants it done like this or else!” God wants us to do it like we think it needs to be done! God wants us to live, not like God wants us to live, but like WE think life needs to be lived in the moment of our living! No timid, hesitant, fearful, frightened followers! Leaders! Disciples who are not afraid to be like the Master in following no Master!
  
  We lead the way in making our own way, and we have no followers because they get the idea and make their own way. LIFE requires freedom to act, to be, to do, to see, to feel, to know, to ask, to wonder, to imagine, to create…To find our own way to LIFE, living, and being alive!
• Neighborhood Lights 01, Ridgeway Drive, Greensboro, NC — December 4, 2012 — No one can tell someone else how to do it, how it’s done. We make our own connections, come to our own realizations, find our own way to what works and does not work for us.
  
  Everything I write here, I write for me, to remind me of what I have found to be true. I need reminding because I’m forever forgetting. I have to remind myself of what I know because there is no one to remind me, because there is no one who knows what I know.
  
  I know a lot about photography, but it is information that is pertinent only to me in my particular situation, with my particular interests and my particular equipment. I could talk to you a lot about photography, but it wouldn’t mean much to you if you aren’t taking the photos I’m taking, and what would the point of that be?
  
  We have to get in there and do our thing and figure it out as we go—learning, learning, learning to be open and alert, awake and alive to each situation as it arises. Seeing with fresh eyes every moment. Finding new ways to respond to what is being asked of us. Asking, seeking, wondering, experimenting, exploring, probing, poking around in all of it and being surprised again and again by the expansion and transformation of what we thought we knew.
• Oak Leaf Hydrangea, Greensboro, NC — December 4, 2012 — Our plans too often run counter to our soul’s design. We can want more than we have any business having. What is the life that needs us to live it, is the question. Not what do we want to do.
  
  Our life needs us to do the things that we are uniquely equipped to do. What do we need to do what we are needed to do?
  
  We need to wake up, grow up, wise up, square up to the truth of how things are and who we are and what is ours to do about how things are, and suck it up and do it.
  
  Never mind the big ideas, and the high ideals, and the dreams of hitting the big time. Settle into who you are and what needs you to do it with the gifts that are yours to give, and have at it. There will be enough good in that, enough meaning in that, enough enjoyment in that to see you through your days—to put a smile on your face and a light in your eyes. Things hitting the big time forsakes in the service of The Pose.
• Neighborhood Lights 02, Ridgeway Drive, Greensboro, NC — December 5, 2012 — Being happy is way over-hyped. Satisfaction and peace lie on a level beyond happiness. Happiness is empty calories, a diversion—not transformation. We can be happy with how things are and nothing changes.
  
  It isn’t about happiness. It isn’t a question of being happy. It’s a matter of knowing how it is and doing what must be done about it with the gifts that are ours to give—in each situation as it arises.
  
  We serve and share the gifts—the qualities and proclivities—that are ours to give in the time and place of our living. We can not do that and be happy, but we cannot fail to do that and be at peace in our soul, with our soul.
• Bass and Violin Shop 01, 523 North Cedar St., Greensboro, NC — December 5, 2012 — We can trust ourselves to figure it out over time. If you live with a mess long enough it becomes apparent what needs to be done. Get in there and do your thing and make adjustments when it becomes apparent that adjustments need to be made. Why aren’t we told that?
  
  Why are we given all those lectures and all that sarcasm and that “Here, get out of the way, I’ll do it for you, you’ll never figure it out!”?
  
  Here’s what I know: I know we have what it takes to find what to do about anything that blocks our path. I know there is a creative well of imagination, insight, understanding, guidance and direction within—and we only have to ease back on the anxiety and trust the inner wizard or wizette to work it out through us.
  
  We have to be attentive, alert and aware—fully present and accounted for, listening and attuned to the Source, but the Source can be counted on. We will get it over time.
  
  We can trust ourselves to what, we do not know, in finding ways to deal with whatever comes our way. We have an Invisible Friend who knows good stuff, waiting for us to ask for a little help from our friend.
• Boardwalk at the Bog Garden, Greensboro, NC — December 04, 2012 — When we live aligned with the thread of truth running through our life several words describe or experience. We live with integrity—in ways that are integral to what is deepest, best and truest about us.
  
  We live with authenticity—there is nothing fake about us. We are genuinely who we are, where we are, when we are, how we are. No “putting on a happy face.” No pretending to be who we aren’t. No posturing. No positioning.
  
  We are awake/aware. We are conscious of how what we are doing, or being asked to do, reflects or obscures who we are and what is deepest, truest and best about us.
  
  We are at one with our life. The truth of who we are and the truth of what we do is one truth. Our life resonates with us. We belong where we are, doing what we are doing. We are at peace with ourselves, in accord with our own sense of who we are, and how we are, and what we need to be doing.
  
  All of which begs the question: “How do we get there?” Eyes that see, ears that hear, a heart that understands. We get there by looking until we see, listening until we hear, asking until we understand. We pay attention. We become aware of how things are and what needs to be done about them. We take chances. We experiment. We play.
  
  We notice when something catches our eye, and we notice when we dismiss something that has caught our eye. We look closer at the things that catch our eye. And see where it goes.
  
  We live with an ear tuned to the pulse of our life, with an eye on what’s what. And do what needs to be done with the information at hand.
• Brass and Violin Shop 05, 523 North Cedar Street, Greensboro, NC — December 5, 2012 — Our life is a life-long experiment in how to do it, in how to live our life. We figure it out along the way. We figure out what works and what does not work—under what conditions and contingencies.
  
  It’s all in flux. Life is movement. Movement is change. Ebb and flow. Rhythm and vibes. Feel and sense and timing. We can’t spell it out. Write it down. Orchestrate it. Choreograph it. Say, “In this situation do that, in that situation do this.”
  
  Live it! Dance it! Sing it! Play it! Play with it. Break the rules. Redraw the lines. Ignore the lines. See how it goes. Maybe it works, maybe it doesn’t work. Just don’t try to freeze it in place. Stop the action. Keep it exactly like it is forever. Let it go.
  
  Let come what’s coming and let go what’s going. Everything that comes, goes. That tells me we shouldn’t be taking things so seriously. It’s all on the way out—it’s all becoming something else. What we take so seriously today, we won’t be able to remember tomorrow.
  
  Lighten up. Laugh more. Play more. Walk in the rain more. What exactly do you have to lose in loosening up?
• Used in Short Talks On Contradiction, etc., Ginkgo biloba 03, B&W — Green Hill Cemetery, Greensboro, NC, December 5, 2012 — The writer writes what needs to be written, the singer sings what needs to be sung, the poet poets what needs to be poeted, the doer does what needs to be done.
  
  Walking through graveyards carries us past the tombs of unknown soldiers, clowns, CEO’s, genuine human beings, social butterflies, drunks, believers, sinners, saints and reprobates… Representatives of all of humankind walks above and lies below the world’s burial grounds. They were who we are.
  
  And if some of them figured it out, it doesn’t mean much to us. We are left with having to figure it out, again, on our own. Even if they left writings which spell out what they got when they got it and how they managed to do it, reading it makes no sense until we get it somewhere else and know what they mean, and so can understand what they are saying, and respond with, ‘Yes! Amen! That’s IT!”
  
  If we are lucky, we live, we see, we hear, we understand. We know how things are and what needs to be done about it. We do it. And we become as fully human—as completely, wholly, one with the truth of our life—as possible in the time we have for living, and we die.
  
  Immortality is achieved when we become who we are. Loving what is to be loved. Relishing what is to be relished. Celebrating what is to be celebrated. Mourning what is to be mourned. Bearing what is to be borne. Doing what is to be done. Being who we are, where we are, when we are, how we are—bringing ourselves forth in response to each situation as it arises and offering there the gifts that are ours to give in the service of what needs what we have to give.
  
  We live our life and die. We are as alive as we can be when we are as awake, as aware, as conscious of living as possible. The contradictions bring us to life. The struggles wake us up. The resistance and opposition enlarges us, deepens us, expands us.
  
  Don’t throw any of it away. See what you can make of all of it. You are making a life of your own. Your life. When it is over, that is what you have done. You are your work. Live so that you are forever proud of how you did it.
• Reedy Fork Sunset 06 — Lake Brandt Greenway, Greensboro, NC, December 8, 2012 — Find your own voice! Sing your own song! Dance your own dance! Do your own thing! If you dare.
  
  It’s amazing how much opposition and resistance to individual expression there is. Break-a-way musicians and painters have a hard time of it. That isn’t the way music or art is supposed to be!
  
  Don’t even THINK about living your own life!
  
  And so the need of a community of support and encouragement. Two or three buds who cheer you along. Mid-wives of the spirit, bringing you forth, birthing you into the life that is your life to live.
  
  You’d think it would be easier. You’d think everybody would be into who she, who he, is. Not! Everybody is into who everybody is supposed to be. Into doing it right. Like it is supposed to be done. According to the failproof standard of public opinion.
  
  The norms! The norms! The norms have to remain in place! Without the norms, where would we be? Civilization would crumble! We would be back to the Dark Ages, or the caves, in no time!
  
  Just try to talk them out of the absurdity of that position!
  
  All of which is to say, you have  your work cut out for you on a number of levels when you take up the path that leads to the heart of you. Hostility, disapproval, and obstruction will come at you from all sides. All because you want to be who you are. It’s insane, but real. So get your determined face on, and “when the birds of the air plop you with their poop, don’t even pause to wipe it off!”
• Reedy Fork Sunset 01 — Lake Brandt Greenway, Greensboro, NC, December 8, 2012 — If you can think, you can pray—and you don’t have to have any of it figured out. You don’t have to know if it works or not (It doesn’t work on cavities or stopped toilets or lost checkbooks. Nothing seems to work on lost checkbooks), or what the magic number of people praying has to be before it works on whatever it might work on.
  
  You don’t have to know who you are praying to (Okay, to whom you are praying). People of every possible religion pray, and have claimed to have benefited from the experience. Prayer isn’t limited to the purview of a particular religion or outlook. We can pray without knowing who is listening.
  
  We know we are listening. That’s enough. It is enough to say what needs to be said straight from the heart about the things that matter deeply to us. It helps just to know what we need to say, and to say it, and to hear ourselves say it.
  
  The catch is that the prayer has to say all we have to say—all we can imagine to say—about what we have to say. We have to put all of it on the table, out in the open. We have to speak the truth, straight from the heart, of what is important to us. We cannot hurry when we pray, or recite the worn phrases of some church’s prayer book, and call that praying. We express ourselves when we pray. We bring ourselves forth—and meet us anew each time.
  
  There are five automatic, spontaneous, prayers from the heart that every human being has prayed across all ages, epochs, religious orientations, and points of origin. They are: Help! Thank You! I’m Sorry! Wow! I Love You!
  
  When we pray these prayers, we know where we stand. We know what’s what. We know how it is with us. And there is nothing like this kind of clarity for making our peace with how things are and with providing us with orientation and direction for what needs to be done about it with the gifts that are ours to give and the resources available to us.
  
  Prayer has always been therapeutic—a source of healing and guidance for people throughout their lives. It’s the perfect accompaniment to the Hero’s Journey, and we would be wise to rely on it for what it has always provided its practitioners—an accord with their circumstances that transforms what can be transformed and accepts what must be accepted and rejoices in what joy and gladness, peace and wonder, there may be at every point in our life.
• Bass and Violin Shop 07— 523 North Cedar St., Greensboro, NC, December 5, 2012 — It is very difficult for a child to become more mature than her or his parents without leaving home on some level, usually physically. I had to escape the entire culture of the region (the deep south, US) to have a chance. Too much of “the way it’s supposed to be” is death.
  
  Another term for the Hero’s Journey, the Spiritual Quest, the Search for the Holy Grail, and Enlightenment is Maturity. Waking Up is Growing Up.
  
  The world is awash in immature guru’s and masters, but they all are an embarrassment to the title. They claimed the title without doing the work. They wear the hat and the spurs but they never saddled a horse or roped and branded a steer.
  
  The work is in the service of maturity. As we grow in maturity, we grow in wisdom, insight, grace, mercy and peace, and our spirituality deepens. But. It’s hard to be more mature than our environment—our context and our culture—allow.
  
  Those Who Know Best And Must Be Pleased don’t want any challenges to the way they declare to be the way. A child is blessed if her, or his, parents are consciously working to develop their own maturity, individuality, personhood, humanity.
  
  The greatest gift you can give someone else is the conscious, and conscientious, pursuit of your own maturation, awareness. You cannot be aware without being aware of the impact of your living upon others. To know what needs to be done is to do it.
  
  We hide from what needs to be done in 10,000 ways, which is the essence of immaturity—refusing to see, hear, and understand. We maintain the protective shield of immaturity by reciting the hypnotic spells of our culture: This is the way to see, hear, understand!
  
  All of that is challenged when one person has the courage to wake up and see things as they are. The child who said, “Look, Mommy! He’s not wearing any clothes!” changed the culture the Emperor strutted through in one short second.
• Winter’s Leaf — Bog Garden, Greensboro, NC, December 9, 2012 — John A. Redhead, a longtime minister at First Presbyterian Church in Greensboro, is credited with saying, “God doesn’t have any grandchildren.” Every generation has to find its own way to God—to the God of that generation—to the God that generation is capable of understanding to be God. The God of the ancestors will not do.
  
  My frustration with the church throughout my ministry was its failure to understand this basic truth. The church keeps throwing at its people the God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob, as though there is no 4,000 year disconnect between here and there and no 2,000 year gap between here and the time of the Roman Empire.
  
  We train new ministers each year who could be taught to reinterpret the ancient symbols in light of today’s understanding of how things are, but they are taught to teach what the symbols meant 2,000 or 4,000 years ago. it won’t work, and hasn’t worked for generations.
  
  If the people don’t hear what they are hungry for from the church, they will find it somewhere, or wander lost, looking for that which is not to be found.
  
  The first thing the people need to hear is that they are free to question everything they have heard from the church, and required to rethink all that they have been told to think of things religious. We put everything on the table and walk around the table, reevaluating and reinterpreting all of it.
  
  This is the parable of the net of fishes where the fishermen sort the catch into categories of useful and useless and keeping only that which will be helpful in finding and living aligned with the heart of the thread of truth which runs through our life.
  
  This is where we are, and this is what we need help with, and what we get are people telling us what is not helpful and what we do not need to hear.
• Neighborhood Lights 03 — Ridgeway Drive, Greensboro, NC, December 7, 2012 — We are all crazy in our own unique, idiosyncratic, ways—and need the grounding influence of caring presence to reassure us that, crazy as we are, we are nevertheless just fine and a very welcome addition to the human community. The problem with this in my experience is the pronounced lack of caring presence. I don’t know what to do about that.
  
  Be aware of it, I suppose. Call attention to it. Invite others to join you in doing something about it by practicing the art of caring presence.
  
  Caring presence is seeing, hearing, understanding and accepting one another as each is. No condemning, no converting, no chastising, no criticizing, no suggestions for improvement, etc. Just seeing, hearing, understanding and accepting one another as each is.
  
  Practice being sources of that in your daily interchanges. Become really good at it. Invite others to join you in the practice. You will have a hard time having a more significant impact in the lives of the people you meet than paying attention to them in caring ways.
• A Leaf Among Leaves — The Bog Garden, Greensboro, NC, December 10, 2012 — When you stop looking, you stop seeing. When you stop seeing, it’s all over. You may be 98.6 and breathing, and your blood pressure and pulse rate may be normal, but. You’re deader than dead. Because you stopped looking.
  
  How many places have you been where people had stopped looking? Where people let someone else do their looking for them, telling them what to see and how to see it? Telling them how things are and what to do about it? How long did it take you to escape?
  
  Some of us are still escaping. Still trying to remember how to look for ourselves—how to see what we see, think what we think, feel what we feel, sense what we sense, know what we know, and trust our knowing to be such that it does not discount or dismiss what it does not know, but looks it over to see what it might see even there.
  
  Learning to look until we see and then, to look at what we see until we see what we don’t see, and then, to look at that… Well, you can see how this approach to living would change the way life is lived around us, or would, if we looked at it.
• Reedy Fork Sunset 04 — Lake Brandt Greenway, Greensboro, NC, December 8, 2012 — We have to do the work of finding and bringing forth our life—the life that is ours to live, that only we can live—within the life we are living. Everything, in terms of meaning, purpose, peace, harmony, wholeness and satisfaction, rides on our doing the work of finding and doing our work.
  
  We get very little guidance and direction toward this end. No one seems to know anything about it. The cultural norm is solidly in place where our life’s goals are concerned. We are to get a good job and “go shopping,” enjoying the things money can buy, and playing golf or bridge long into our happy retirement. That’s all anyone knows about being alive.
  
  We have to figure out all of the important stuff on our own. It starts with asking questions and questioning the answers. There has to be more to it than beer and football, trips to the mall and vacations at the beach. What are we going to do with ourselves in the time left for living?
  
  Our Self has some ideas if we will only stop long enough to listen. Our life is a collaboration between our conscious, thinking, rational self and our unconscious knowing, feeling, sensing self. We take up the process of making the unconscious conscious by recognizing and treating the unconscious as our full partner in the creation of the life we produce together.
  
  We all have an invisible friend—the Self at the center of our soul. And we would do well to learn the language of the unconscious (“Inner Work” by Robert Johnson is one place to start), and take up the practice of feeling, sensing, intuiting, the drift of instinct toward what resonates with us and away from what repels us.
  
  The more interested we become in the work of finding and bringing forth our life—and working with our inner Self toward that end—the more meaningful coincidence will guide us toward the help we need to become who we are. It only takes believing this is so to discover that it is.
• On Being A Mallard 01 — The Bog Garden, Greensboro, NC, December 9, 2012 — Some of us are luckier than others. We all have something to deal with. Some hand to play. The Kenny Rogers song by Lorenz Hart and Richard Rodgers takes us to the heart of the matter:
  
  ”You got to know when to hold ‘em, know when to fold ‘em,
  Know when to walk away and know when to run.”
  
  How do you know is the question. You have to play a lot of poker is the answer.
  
  No book can tell you what you need to know. No sermon. No lecture. No advice column. No carefully prepared list of do’s and don’t’s. You have to live it to know it.
  
  If you want to know about being a cowboy, get on a horse that’s never been ridden, round up some cows and brand them. Do cowboy stuff.
  
  And exactly when in that process, in that long line of doing cowboy stuff, do you become a cowboy? There is no exact point. You can’t say. It seems like you’ve always been a cowboy. Life’s that way.
  
  If you want to be alive, live it. Your life. Exactly as it is. Beginning right now. Live open to everything about it. Don’t shut yourself off from anything. The pain and boredom? Embrace it. The uncertainty and fear? Invite it in. Live the whole thing with your eyes open to it all.
  
  Don’t leave any aspect of your life unexperienced, unlived, unknown. Your life is waiting on you and you have to go through the Cyclops to get it. Well?
• Hooded Mergansers 03 — The Bog Garden, Greensboro, NC, December 12, 2012 — It isn’t about making and spending money. It’s about being comfortable enough not to have to worry about where our next meal is coming from so we can devote our attention to developing and bringing forth the gifts that are ours to give in service to the common good.
  
  We have to tend our gifts, do our work. And our work is not making money. That’s our job, which may, or may not, use our gifts. Our work uses our gifts, gives our gifts, is our gift, our art.
  
  Our work is finding and doing our work. Forging the alliance with our unconscious. Collaborating with our invisible partners in the creation of the life that is ours and theirs to live. Trusting ourselves to the source of instinct and intuition in finding our way to the center of the thread of truth running through our life, and following it to the heart of ourselves and the life we are capable of living.
  
  This is not easy stuff. It’s the Hero’s Journey, the Spiritual Quest, the Search for the Promised Land and the Holy Grail. It is what legends are made of. Our life is a legend waiting to be lived.
  
  You aren’t going to laugh at that, are you? Spit on it? Dismiss it? Turn and walk away? Back to making and spending money?
• Grazing — Anne Springs Close Greenway, Dairy Barn Access, Charlotte, NC, November 24, 2012 — We are just along for the ride. We stew over it like it is all ours. We puff up and strut when it goes our way. We shuffle through depression when it doesn’t. Like what we think matters. Like our way or not our way is the whole ball of yarn. Here’s one for you: If it coincides with our way, fine! If it runs completely contrary to our way, fine!
  
  We just do the driving and carry the equipment. Someone else tells us where to go and where to place the tripod. If it is raining, what do we care? We let someone else worry about it. We just do what we’re told.
  
  All we have to do is listen. See what catches our eye. Read the signs. Pay attention to our dreams and the least likely of all the possible messengers of the gods. Follow the drift of our soul and see where it goes.
  
  The only difficult thing is getting out of the way. Stop trying to direct the action. Get our hands off our hips and the pout off our faces. And do what we are told.
  
  The trick here, of course, is the conflict of interest. Who says what we are told? We do. How can be sure we are hearing what our unconscious knower is saying or if we are putting words in her, in his, mouth? How do we know when we are out of the way and when we are calling the shots?
  
  We have to be honest. Genuine. Authentic. Real. Vulnerable. Open. Present. Attentive. Awake. Aware. Alive to what’s going on—to what’s what. We have to look in the mirror regularly and see what we look at.
  
  Besides. we hold the cards. We can say, “This is what I think I’m to do, and I’m going to do it unless you stop me.” Or, “I have no idea of what to do so I’m going to sit here and read this book until you make the next step clear and urgent.”
  
  It’s important not to go beyond the next step. We never get the plan. It’s never mapped out. We are on a need to know basis and the next step is all we ever need to know.
• View from Hanging Rock 04 — Hanging Rock State Park near Danbury, NC, November 7, 2012 — We are what we do. Cowboys do cowboy stuff. Sailors do sailor stuff. Poets and artists do poet and artist stuff. What we do is who we are.
  
  If we spend most of your time watching TV, we’re a TV Watcher. If we spend most of your time shopping, we’re a Shopper.
  
  I know people who have cameras who never take photos. They are not photographers. I know people who have pianos and never play them.
  
  When you have time that is all yours, what do you do? There you are.
• Hooded Merganser 08 — The Bog Garden, Greensboro, NC, December 13, 2012 — We have to be clear and correct about, well, about everything. What’s happening and what needs to happen and what can happen and what we need to do about it.
  
  Being clear and correct about what we need to do, and don’t have any business doing, is essential. People will have us doing everything in a flash. People are that way. We are not here to do for them what they need to do for themselves. Where do they stop and we start is the question.
  
  I was a minister for 40.5 years. During that time, I observed people in action, and non-action. Every church I served could be neatly divided into two groups, those who over-functioned and those who under-functioned. Those who were responsible for every little thing and those who were responsible for nothing. The church, in this way at least, is a reflection of all organizations everywhere.
  
  Your family is like that. Someone tells everyone what to do and someone doesn’t do any of it. Here is the all-weather rule for getting someone else to be responsible for her or his responsibilities: If you want someone to function better in relation to you, function worse in relation to her or him.
  
  Fail people in critical ways. Forget to wake them up for an appointment that they value. if you want people to begin functioning, you have to stop over-functioning. Become helpless, forgetful, absent-minded. Excuse yourself in a thousand ways. Apologize profusely. Promise to do better and don’t do anything.
  
  It was said about me throughout my ministry that no one accomplished more by doing less.
  
  You have to fail/refuse to do what is not yours to do. You have to know what is yours to do and what is not yours to do, and you have to not do what is not yours to do. And you have to be willing to pay the price of it not being done. You are going to pay some price, it may as well be that one.
  
  Be clear and correct about what your responsibilities are and take care of them. Only them. I can hear the objections already: “But SOMEBODY has to __(fill in the blank)__!” We call this co-dependency. The over-functioning person needs to be surrounded by under-functioning people in order to feel needed, loved, cared-for, important. One thing leads to another, and before you know it, everyone is growing up. Against their will. Which is how it happens every time.
• Reedy Fork Sunset B 01 — Lake Brandt Greenway, Greensboro, NC, December 14, 2012 — The massacre of innocents in Connecticut is a wound exposing a wound demanding treatment and bringing to mind the prophetic lament, “They have healed the wound of my people lightly, saying ‘Peace, peace,’ when there is no peace.”
  
  The wound of “my people,” our people, our culture, is deep. We are bereft of meaning, purpose, hope, heart, soul, foundation—adrift on “the wine dark sea,” with nothing but the ideal of a higher standard of living to guide our living.
  
  We live for more money and more things to buy, and live with a hole inside that money and things cannot fill. And some of us cannot hide from the hole as well as others of us, or have too little money to make a pretense of all being well, and cease caring about anything but making somebody pay for our misery.
  
  Make the innocents pay. They are easier targets. Trusting. Believing. Loving. Hoping. Kill them. Show them what’s what. Why make them wait to find emptiness on the end of the line?
  
  Ironic, that it is about at their age that we would have had to have gotten to their killer to counter the culture’s shallow song—if we could have—and given him something he didn’t get from those who were healing the wound of their people lightly, saying, “Peace, peace,” when there is no peace. And “Here’s something to believe in and here’s hope for your soul and your life,” when there is neither.
  
  So. What to do? Make guns hard to get, and ammo. Really hard to get. Give kids the arts early on and make the arts a constant presence in their life through high school and college, and beyond. The arts and foreign languages. Teach children poetry in foreign languages.
  
  Honor the children. Let the deaths of the innocents be the beginning of our understanding of how essential it is that we honor the children, all children, and stop using them, seeing them, thinking of them, as slaves for the next economy, or for the current one. Stop training them to buy, spend, amass and consume from the womb—as though having money and spending it is IT, it isn’t.
  
  Wake up to the importance of living our life in the sense of bringing it forth, not in the sense of collecting experiences, or being “somebody”—as in celebrity status, fame and fortune—but in the sense of being alive to our own gift, our own self, and the value of our own being.
• Reedy Fork Sunset B 04 — Lake Brandt Greenway, Bur-Mil Park, Greensboro, NC, December 14, 2012 — We are all standing in some line. Some are more terrible than others, but in each one we get to the end of the line, and that’s that.
  
  Religion makes the line, the terribleness of the line, and the end of the line its marketing point. Buddhism talks about the line being suffering and offers the release from suffering to its adherents. Christianity talks about the end of the line really being a threshold to either a much worse experience or to the joys and delights of eternal rapture. Every religion makes much of the line, the terribleness of the line, and the end of the line.
  
  I say we are all standing in some line and it is how we live there that makes all the difference.
  
  We mediate the awfulness of the line by the way we receive it and respond to it. We transform, redeem, the line by transcending the line and bringing to life there the wonder of grace, mercy and peace to heal, restore and make well.
  
  Some would say that it is an abomination to even think of healing, restoration and wellness within the agony and anguish of desolating realities. Why heal, restore and make well what is only going to die?
  
  It is how we live in the meantime that makes the difference. The human thing is to engage in the practice of life as long as we are alive—to live as fully as possible until we die—to be alive and engaged in the work of life in the face of death and devastation, and to live toward the good that is good no matter how bad it gets.
• December Shoreline 01 Detail — Lake Brandt from the Lake Brandt Greenway, Bur-Mil Park, Greensboro, NC, December 14, 2012 — We have to square up to the discrepancy between how things are and how things truly ought to be (Determined by a show of hands by everyone through the ages of time). We have to work our way through it. We have to make our peace with it. We have to do our own work. We have to bear our own pain. No one can do this for us.
  
  When we don’t bear the pain that is legitimately ours to bear, or do the work that is ours to do, it’s hell for everybody to deal with. I was talking this over with a Bud of mine, who replied:
  
  ”And the “hell for everybody” is unbearable pain through which we once again find our own way to peace, but.  It goes back to everyone needs a place or two where he or she is listened to the truth of his or her own life.  Birthing rooms, healing rooms.  Every person needs someone who loves them enough to listen them to the truth of their life.  There is a quote on my desk at work that says something like “every child needs someone who is absolutely crazy about them.”  We each need someone who loves us enough to listen us to the truth of our own life.  Instead we want to all fix the problem, or give directives, or put our hands over our ears and not offer a place of attentive listening.”
  
  The work that is not done in making our peace with the discrepancy between how things are and how things ought to be, and the pain that is not borne, set up a negative feedback loop making things chaotically crazy and completely out of hand. We simply have to do the work that is ours to do and bear the pain that is ours to bear.
• December Shoreline 01 — Lake Brandt from the Lake Brandt Greenway, Bur-Mill Park access, Greensboro, NC, December 14, 2012 — We all have to bear the pain of the discrepancy between how things are and how things ought to be, and we all have to do the work of making our peace with the pain and the discrepancy. Here is one approach to that work.
  
  Sit before an imaginary table and place on the table how things are—as fully and completely as possible. Now place on the table how things ought to be. Observe the table and how you react to the things on it.
  
  Now place your reaction to the things on the table on the table, so that you have how things are, how things ought to be, and how you react to the discrepancy between how things are and how they ought to be all on the table.
  
  How do you react to your reaction? Engage in an imaginary conversation between your initial reaction that is on the table and your observation of that reaction and the way that reaction is impacting how things are and how things ought to be.
  
  Does your reaction improve how things are? Narrow the discrepancy? Offer any thing in the way of compensation or consolation? Help the situation in any way? Does your reaction inflame the situation? Make things worse?
  
  How does your reaction need to be modified to offer what needs to be offered, to do what needs to be done, in response to the discrepancy between how things are and how things ought to be?
  
  Joseph Campbell describes the discrepancy—the space—between how things are and how things ought to be as “the field of action,” and says that “the field of action” is where we are born to live—that that is where our life has whatever impact it is going to have, for better or worse. He challenges us to step into “the field of action” and live there as those who would bring to life there the gifts we have to give to heal what can be healed, and redeem what can be redeemed, and soften what can be softened, and make better what can be made better—doing what needs to be done in response to how things are to make things more like they ought to be than they are, here and now, in the field of action.
  
  The burden right seeing, right hearing, right understanding, right knowing, right doing and right being is always ours to bear in bringing grace, mercy, compassion and peace to bear upon the terrible realities in the field of action.
• Bur-Mil Pier — Bur-Mil Park, Lake Brandt, Greensboro, NC, December 15, 2012 — Nothing heals like compassionately attentive listening. Have you been heard—compassionately, attentively—lately? How long has it been?
  
  We want so badly for someone to care enough about us to see us, hear us, know us—and in knowing us, to help us know ourselves.
  
  We see ourselves in, through, the eyes of others. How they see us becomes, in time, how we see ourselves. If we are never seen with compassion, with caring attention, we will not see ourselves that way.
  
  If you want to change the world, see it with compassion, with caring attention, one person at a time. Start with the next person you see.
• Bur-Mill Moon 01 — Bur-Mil Park, Greensboro, NC, December 15, 2012 — If you place me in an anxiety-producing situation, I will become anxious. Acton-Adventure-Thriller movies? Out of the question! Sporting events where the outcome matters to me? Instant tension. Family situations in which everyone is holding her or his breath and tiptoeing on eggshells? I’ll have to go for a walk.
  
  Joseph Campbell was on the track team at Columbia and returned to watch a track meet later in life, reporting that he couldn’t witness the event without being stirred uncomfortably and did not place himself in that kind of environment again.
  
  The Holy Master-Gurus are above and beyond it all because they stay away from it all. Someone else worries about parking and shopping, preparing the meals and making everything come out on time.
  
  There is no immunity from stress-provoking situations. We have to avoid them to be calm and serene. Little blue pills or a long drag of whiskey straight from the bottle are ways of avoiding stress-provoking situations. Just avoiding them works for me.
  
  But I can do that. I’m retired. Except, of course, family dynamics follow one even into retirement—so I take the camera and go looking for photos. We cannot expose ourselves to situations that stir us uncomfortably without being stirred uncomfortably. There are no magical mental or emotional shields. We do not outgrow the impact of our mother’s angry outbursts. The Buddha ran away from home. So did Jesus.
  
  So, cut yourself some slack and don’t ask of yourself more than you are capable of doing. Recognize your limits. Draw your lines. Maintain an emotionally comfortable distance between you and the turmoil-producing life experiences whenever that is possible, and give yourself to them in short bursts when you cannot stay entirely removed.
  
  Peace and sanity mean distance from chaotic and insane situations. And, while physical distance does not always equate to emotional distance, it helps to avoid track meets if the outcome matters.
• Lake Brandt Reflection — Lake Brandt Greenway, Bur-Mil Park Access, Greensboro, NC, December 14, 2012 — We live to express the truth of ourselves in each situation as it arises, but. There is a catch. The catch is it can be not so good for us or for the situation as it arises to express the truth of ourselves.
  
  I am an abused child. I tend to say “somewhat abused” because I was never burned with cigarettes, or beaten to bleeding or unconsciousness, or locked in a closet with nothing to eat for days…etc. But, abused is abused, and one of the things you learn early on as an abused child is to disappear—to not show them anything of who you are—to hide, deny, and never ever express the truth of yourself in any situation, no matter what.
  
  It can be not good for you or for the situation to express the truth of yourself in the situation, but. We live to express who we are in the situation as it arises. We cannot be alive without expressing ourselves, and to live our life is the whole purpose of our life. To live OUR life—not some other life, not somebody’s idea of our life, not some life someone hands us off the rack and tells us to live, not some life the culture tells us we are cut out for because we are black, or gay, or female, or an immigrant, or poor…etc., but OUR life.
  
  So, we have to learn to read situations and know what is appropriate to individual situations—and know when and where and how and how much it is appropriate to reveal who we are in the then and there of our living, but. Abused children grown up to be adults don’t trust themselves to know how to read a situation. It backfired too often on us as children. Intuition and instinct told us one thing, but we missed a sign, or didn’t know our father was in the next room, listening, and that was that.
  
  We have to trust ourselves to know what’s what, but we don’t trust ourselves to know what’s what. This is a problem. We live to express who we are but we are afraid to express who we are. There is no fix here. We can only keep living with our eyes open and trust ourselves in small ways in situations where we are as safe as we can be except for flashbacks. And we have to have the right kind of people in our life.
  
  Everything depends on the company we keep. The right kind of company makes all the difference. We increase our chances of finding the right kind of company by practicing being the right kind of company ourselves, for others, and seeing where it goes.
  
  It is slow going. There are no shortcuts to the Promised Land, to the Grail Castle. It takes as long as it takes. Are you coming or not is the question. You’ll never get there if you don’t start walking. The rest of us are going slowly, too, so there is no chance of your being left behind. Come on! Come on!
• December Shoreline 03 — Lake Brandt, Bur-Mill Park, Greensboro, NC, December 15, 2012 — You wouldn’t bring a dog to a cat party. You can trust yourself to know what’s what more than you might think. You know where the lines are most of the time—what is, and is not, cool. So what’s the problem? Perfection? Always wanting to be right? Never wanting to fall in public?
  
  Trivante Bloodman, a Mississippi State freshman point guard on 3 losses in the Maui Invitational Tournament, said “Sometimes you have to fall to get back up.” A wonderful example of exactly what he was talking about. And an invitation to us all: When you get a chance, take it! And, if you fall, what of it?
  
  Learning to read situations and offer what is needed out of what you have to give, in response to what appears to be happening, is a matter of doing what we think is called for and making adjustments over time.
  
  We have the rest of our life to learn to ride a bicycle. What’s with being afraid we’ll lose our balance? Or our way?
  
  Learning to read situations as they arise and respond appropriately to them is like learning to drive a stick shift. Screw up a thousand times if that’s what it takes to get it down. Once you have it, it’s yours.
  
  So throw the grade book away, and get in there and do your thing, and see where it goes. Don’t stop until you get to the Grail Castle in the Promised Land!
• Flight of Geese — Lake Brandt, Bur-Mill Park Access, Greensboro, NC, December 15, 2012 — It is easy for us to be crowded out of our own life. Maintaining our boundaries is constant work that gets old quickly, and there is no one here but us to do it.
  
  Too many people think we are here for their everlasting convenience and are miffed when we have a different idea. Miffing people is what we have to learn to do best.
  
  We cannot be an “I” without drawing lines, marking borders, building fences and saying what “I” will do and will not do. This is the work of soul as much as finding our own path and walking it at our own pace, or finding our own song and singing it.
  
  There is an Old Testament commandment that didn’t make the top ten, but should have: “Thou shalt not remove thy neighbor’s landmark.” The corollary, of course, would be, “When they come to take away your landmark, do not allow it.”
  
  Being clear and correct about where we start and our neighbors stop is essential for a long and happy life together. An assortment of “I’s” make a “we,” when we honor the boundaries, borders, landmarks, lines which set us apart and define who each is. In order for that to happen, each of us has to do the work of knowing what our business is, and what it is not—and honoring our own limits in kind and compassionate, firm and relentless, ways.
• Coming In Collage — The Bog Garden, Greensboro, NC, December 14, 2012 — “Live your own life” doesn’t mean “Do what you want to do.” What does wanting know?  “Live your own life” means “Do what is yours to do, whether you want to or not.” But that doesn’t mean “Do what you know you ought to do.” It means “Do the particular configuration of things which no one can do better than you.”
  
  ”Live your own life” means “Live the life with your name on it.” It means “Live the life that is waiting for you to live it.” It means “Live the life that no one but you can live.”
  
  Of course, you don’t have a clue about what that is. And so, the Hero’s Journey, the Spiritual Quest, the Search for the Holy Grail and the Land of Promise (A.K.A “The Promised Land”) is about finding and doing what is yours to do, living the life with your name on it, living your own life.
  
  You think you’re too old. Your life has passed you by. How old was Sarah? How old was Abraham? Age has its advantages. They expect you to do crazy stuff when you are old. You can get by with things when you are old. Grab your life by the mane and jump on. It will be the ride of your, well, life.
  
  Give your life a chance. Your life understands the saying, “When you get a chance, take it!” Your life is just waiting for you to say, “Okay, show me what you got.” But you have to mean it. You have to cooperate. You have to get with the program. You have to be willing to be about your business, the business that is uniquely, especially, yours.
  
  You have to be willing to live your own life when you tell it, “Okay. I’m ready. Let’s go!” Why die without living?
• Pied Billed Grebe at Sunset 01 —  Reedy Fork from the Lake Brandt Greenway, Bur-Mil Park access, Greensboro, NC, December 19, 2012 — Live the Revolution! It’s the only way to pull it off, living it, in each situation as it arises.
  
  When we Live the Revolution, we do what needs to be done in response to what is happening and/or what needs to happen in each situation as it arises, and not what would be good for the economy, or what the culture and its representatives (That would be our parents, the church, most of our teachers and friends, our employer, etc.) tell us what ought to be done.
  
  Which means, of course, we will probably never eat another potato chip or high fructose corn syrup or 10,000 other things which have no point beyond making us feel better about having lost the point—and we will begin living in light of what WE determine to be the point: Bringing forth who we are for the good of the situation and beyond.
  
  When we Live the Revolution, we see what we look at and do what is called for from the heart of the truth of what is happening and what needs to happen in the here and now of our living.
  
  When we Live the Revolution, we live the life that needs us to live it—the life that no one but us, with our particular configuration of experience, insight, intuition, instinct, understanding, gifts, talents and abilities, can live. We are who we are, who only we can be, for the good of the whole—even though that might appear to be bad for the whole and is unappreciated, or even condemned, by enough of the whole to make it appear to be the whole of the whole.
  
  To Live the Revolution, we have to trust ourselves a lot, and to trust ourselves a lot, we have to have—and trust ourselves to—the attentive, loving support of a community of those who are also Living the Revolution and can provide the right kind of company in the right kind of way.
  
  The Revolution is Lived by revolutionaries who see, hear, and understand—who know what is called for and serve it in each situation as it arises for the good of the whole in spite of what the whole may think its good is. This doesn’t mean imposing, through violence and coercion, our idea of the good upon the whole. It just means living in light of our understanding of the good, and seeing where it goes. Live the Revolution!
• December Shoreline 05 —  Lake Brandt, Bur-Mil Park access, Greensboro, NC, December 19, 2012 —  Play with the possibilities. You don’t know what is possible until you begin to play around with what’s what. Play connects your imagination with what’s what and you’re off. To no one knows where.
  
  It’s the adventure of life being lived through your imagination. It’s the Revolution. Imagine that.
• Used in Short Talks On Contradiction, etc., Hooded Merganser 09 —  The Bog Garden, Greensboro, NC, December 14, 2012 —  It takes our wounds to wake us up. Nobody wakes up with everything going her, going his, way. Of course, wounds can send us over the edge as easily as they can wake us up. They can cause us to quit as easily as put us to work, working things out, making things work, doing the work required to make things more like they ought to be than they are…
  
  Wounds aren’t magical. They are thresholds. To what or where depends entirely upon the heart and mind of those who step over them going somewhere, doing something.
  
  What do we mean to do about our woundedness? How we bear our pain tells the tale.
  
  We have to wrestle with the contradictions, with the questions that must be asked and cannot be answered. And, if someone (who doesn’t understand) answers a question for us, we have to question the answers!
  
  For a wound to work, we have to work the wound! We have to get the good out of it! The good of it calling into question all of our pet assumptions and reassurances and convictions that if we do our part as it is supposed to be done nothing bad will happen to us or those we love.
  
  The good of a wound is to strip us of all of our false assurances and wrong-headed constructions about the nature of spiritual reality. That’s waking us up. And calling us to take up the work of working things out and making our peace with the discrepancy between how things are and how things ought to be—stepping into “the field of action” to do our thing in the service of the common good, no matter what the circumstances.
• Earth Shadow —  Lake Brandt, Bur-Mil access, Greensboro, NC, December 18, 2012 —  We’re here to get to the bottom of it, of us, of ourselves. To see what’s what and what needs to be done about it and do it. If we do it correctly, that will keep us occupied, invested, interested, engaged, etc. for a lifetime or longer.
  
  It starts with making inquiries. What matters? You can start anywhere. What is important? Who says so? What makes you think they know what they are talking about? Why does it matter to you what they say?
  
  Questions have a life of their own, particularly when you question the questions and question the answers. They will lead you a merry chase and help you clarify things along the way, like what matters, what’s important, how do you know, what makes you think so, and what are you going to do about it.
  
  A ready candidate to the inquiry method of making a meaningful life is the Inner Critic. You know the one I mean. “Why listen to Jim Dollar? What does he know? Why try anything? Nothing you ever do is going to help you or anybody else in any way. You’re wasting your time. Nothing is ever going to come of you or anything. Nothing ever does any good. Why try? Who cares? What difference does it make? What’s the use?”
  
  Interview her/him. “Where did you come by your beautiful disposition? What experiences led you to discount, to dismiss, everything, including experience? What did being negative ever do for you? Etc.
  
  Interviewing the Critic separated you from her/him, so that it is no longer you against you, but you against the Inner Idiot determined to keep you chained to her/his ideas of you and your future. A play thing for one who has never played in her or his life, except with you and your future. Ask all the questions and question all the answers and stop giving her/him the attention she/he never deserved.
  
  Then take the skills you’ve learned in turning her/his questions into your own internal investigation of the Pest Within, and ask the questions which beg to be asked everywhere (remembering to ask the questions that beg to be asked of the answers). See where it goes.
  
  See how close to the bottom of it you can get in the time left for living. See what you can make of it, of what’s what and what needs to be done about it, and how much you can do. It’s an exercise worthy of you, and you become increasingly worthy in its pursuit.
• Great Blue Heron 01 —  The Bog Garden, Greensboro, NC, December 16, 2012 —  A sure sign of your closing in on maturity is the degree to which you can let come what’s coming, and let go what’s going, and be with what is. Being with what is—without having to have it stay or go—is a milestone.
  
  So much depends on our knowing how to be with what is with us at any point in our life. “Everything that comes goes,” said Joseph Campbell and countless others before and after. And we can rarely prevent or hurry the process.
  
  The Carl Jung quote about “none of the important problems can be solved, they can only be out-grown,” points to the reality of timing, of things coming and going in their own time, at their own pace. “Shift happens,” according to flight attendants who tell us to be careful opening the overhead bins upon landing. It happens throughout our lives. When we can’t do anything else, we wait it out. The shift will happen. The opening will occur. Things will change. You can count on that. Be ready. It will not always be as it is, for better or worse—for better and worse.
  
  It is enough to be with things as they are in their coming and their going.
• Abstract Sunset —  Reedy Fork, Lake Brandt Greenway, Bur-Mil access, Greensboro, NC, December 19, 2012 —  It comes down to eyes that see, ears that hear, and a heart that understands. Seeing, hearing, understanding. That’s all there is to it. Taking the time to see, and hear, and understand.
  
  Sex is seeing, hearing and understanding. So is walking, reading and riding a bicycle. So is photography. We cannot do anything the way it needs to be done apart from seeing, hearing and understanding.
  
  When we see, hear and understand, we see, hear and understand how things are and how things ought to be and what needs to be done about it. This is called clarity.
  
  Once we have clarity, we lack only courage. If we see clearly enough long enough, we will eventually become courageous enough to do what needs us to do it in the field of action (Joseph Campbell’s term, and maybe James Joyce’s before him. I’m not clear about that). Clarity creates courage.
  
  Clarity creates the change it envisions. Clarity produces action. We can only fail to take up the Hero’s Journey by refusing to know what is being asked of us. That’s why we don’t often look, or listen, or inquire. We know what knowing means, and keep our head down, our eyes closed and our fingers in our ears.
• Parker Creek —  Pamlico Sound, Ocracoke Island, Cape Hatteras National Seashore, NC, October 28, 2012 —  The first thing to see, hear and understand is our body. What’s it doing? What’s it saying? What’s it trying to tell us? How is it trying to tell us? What is it asking of us?
  
  When head and body are out of synch, we are a collection of symptoms looking for relief. Our body knows. Head’s first order of business is to know what the body knows. When we attend our body, we find our most powerful guide.
  
  Our body understands rhythms and timing, routines and diet. Our body knows when it is time for what. Our head is clueless about these things.
  
  We cannot give our body US American for breakfast, Chinese for lunch and Italian for dinner without paying a price.
  
  “Eat when hungry, rest when tired,” is advice from someone who understood the principle of listening to the body, and allowing it to direct our way along the path of life, to life.
• Leaving Swan Quarter —  Hyde County, NC, October 21, 2012 —  We have to do our part and help others help us to stay on the path and follow the thread of truth which runs through our life to the heart of who we are.
  
  You would help me help you with your photography, for example, by reading your camera manual and knowing how to get it to do what you need it to do. You would help your physician keep you healthy by eating less and walking more.
  
  You could make eating less and walking more a New Year’s resolution. Eat less and walk more every month than you did the previous month. And stop eating entirely all the things you know you have no business eating. This is helping people help you.
  
  And stop having to see results! Stop having your behavior depend upon the impact of your behaving! Start doing what is good for you whether it does any good or not! Start being good for nothing! Particularly with your diet and exercise. Eat smart! Exercise regularly!
  
  And find your rhythm—your rhythms, and honor them. The tides ebb and flow like clockwork, like a metronome. Our body has its own rhythms, which we violate without thinking. Start thinking, sensing, feeling, knowing, honoring the rhythms which carry us through our life, or would, if we allowed them to.
  
  Pay attention to your tastes and interests and the things that catch your eye. You are being invited down all manner of roads which you ignore in favor of the structure you impose on your living. Examine that structure. How is it helping, hurting? Where does it get in the way of the life that needs you to live it?
  
  How do you think you need to help your helpers help you? How do you get in your own way and fail to live the life that needs you to live it? Well? Who can do what needs to be done about that?
• Silver Lake 04 —  Ocracoke Island, Cape Hatteras National Seashore, NC, October 25, 2012 —  At the center of ourselves, we are Everyone. Everyone who is, or was, or ever will be. We cannot be a Self alone. We are a Communal Self. We exist in relationship at the core. In Right Relationship.
  
  Right Relationship is our source and our goal. It is where we originate and where we end up. In between there is recognition, awareness, realization.
  
  No one achieves True Human Being-hood as an individual achievement of strength, will and wisdom. We are nurtured and nourished into that for which we were born and to which we are called by those who love us to the truth of who we are. It is grace and compassion all the way.
  
  Psyche/Soul is personal but it is not private—it is not individual. It is all of us participating in and creating the uniqueness of each of us—saying, in essence, “Come on! You can do it! You can make it! After all, you are one of US!”
  
  We all become an “I” in relation to a “You,” a “Thou”—to all of them, actually. One of them represents all of them. It takes two to make one. We birth each other, both as midwife and as Virgin Mother.
  
  We are all born of a Virgin. Psyche is Mary the Mother of God in the person of You and Me—all of us, actually. God become flesh, made real, actualized in True Human Beings. The Divine Essence of Life and Being dwelling in us, seen in us, visible and apparent in us as we become the Self we are in Right Relationship with other Selves.
  
  It is the Christmas story that we are living out when we find out way into the company of those who can receive us well and bring us forth into the Eternal We as the I we are born to be.
  
  If I still did that kind of thing, I’d put $20 on your not having the foggiest notion of what I’m talking about—and another $20 on it working out in your experience exactly as I’ve laid it out here when you view it from the Other Side.
• Hanging Rock —  Hanging Rock State Park near Danbury, NC, October 28, 2012 —  Our life is to live, explore, experience. Our life is our art. Art is not competitive. We do not live to win. We live to be awake, aware, alive—experiencing and exploring our life.
  
  Living to win misses the point. The biggest, the best, the fastest, the most whatever is a distraction unless it’s accidental, unless it’s a by-product, a side effect, of the central focus of experiencing and exploring our life—and we are not impressed, because so what?
  
  Buying, spending, amassing and consuming as though these things are important misses what is important, namely: seeing, hearing, understanding, knowing, doing, being. We see, hear, understand what is happening and what is called for. We know what to do about it. We do it. And we become who we are—who we are capable of being—thereby.
  
  This process can be applied to any context, any circumstance, any situation. Wherever, whenever, however you are, no matter what the terms and conditions of your life, you can see, hear, understand, know, do, be—living, experiencing, exploring your life as one who is awake, aware and alive. And that is all that can ever be asked of any of us.
• Two Geese Flying 02 —  Lake Brandt, Bur-Mil Park access, Greensboro, NC, December 18, 2012 —  Jesus took the gifts that were his to give and did what he could imagine doing with them. That’s all the rest of us are asked to do.
  
  Jesus lived out of his own integrity, so that the way he lived was integral with what was deepest, best and truest about him. His life was a mirror of his soul. What he did was who he was, who he was was how he lived. That’s all the rest of us are asked to do.
  
  Jesus lived aligned with his own sense of how things were and how things ought to be and what he could do about it in each situation as it arose. That’s all the rest of us are asked to do.
  
  Jesus identified himself with the thread of truth running through his life—in which he saw reflected the qualities and character of his own heart and soul being expressed in his acts and interests—and consciously brought forth those qualities and that character within the context and circumstances of his life. That’s all the rest of us are asked to do.
  
  Jesus bore the pain of his life in the time and place of his living, stepping into the “field of action” that exists between how things are and how things ought to be, healing what could be healed, redeeming what could be redeemed, bestowing justice where justice cried out to be experienced, and touching all who could be touched with kindness and compassion, grace and peace . That’s all the rest of us are asked to do.
  
  The spirit of Christmas lives forever in the lives of those who offer the gifts that are theirs to give in the time and place of their living. May we all so live forever!
• Pied Bill Grebe Sunset 02 —  Reedy Fork, Lake Brandt Greenway, Bur-Mil Park Access, Greensboro, NC, December 19, 2012 —  What robs you of your peace? What restores your peace? How often in a day, in a week, are you at peace? What can you do to be there more often? To stay there longer?
• December Shoreline 04 —  Lake Brandt, Bur-Mil Access, Greensboro, NC, December 16, 2012 —  We have to be clear about the differences between where we belong and where we have no business being. It’s a matter of knowing where we stop and other people start—where our world stops and other worlds start.
  
  I have no business playing card games. Or board games. Or any games where there are rules and a winner. I could get you to as much of the bottom of it as I have gotten, but you wouldn’t be much better off for it. I don’t think it matters why our boundaries are our boundaries and limits are our boundaries and limits, so much as it does recognizing that we have boundaries and limits and knowing what they are.
  
  This restricts us, confines us, walls us in, and off. We are not free to go just anywhere, do just anything. This realization and its acceptance—our acknowledgement of it and accommodation to it—is a turning point on the path to maturation. We are who WE are and not who someone else is, and not who we, or someone else, might wish we were.
  
  We have to work the differences out in ways that allow them to stand. In ways that do not erase the differences, but respect them, honor them, hold them in high esteem. It is as though we are all visitors in a foreign country as we walk among our friends, and family, and family of origin. We cannot expect of them, or they of us, that they would be as we are, or we, as them. So, what’s the problem?
  
  We forget that it is as though we are in a foreign country, and live as though differences are bad things and should not be allowed. “If you loved me you would be like I am,” is not as healthy an orientation to the other as “If you loved me, you would let me be as I am and let you be as you are.”
  
  Love works things out and lets differences stand, reveres differences as that which pulls us forth—against our will, perhaps—and grows us up, expanding us, deepening us, broadening us, and enabling us to be ourselves within a cacophony of selves becoming a symphony of selves, to the glory of self-hood and the wonder of being alive together for the good of all.
• Used in Short Talks On Contradictions, etc., Wetlands Flyover 01 —  Four Mile Creek Greenway, Charlotte, NC, December 26, 2012 —  You do it your way and I’ll do it mine, and we will all wake up at about the same time. So, what’s the advantage of one way over another? What’s the advantage of having the advantage? What’s having all the advantages ever done for anybody?
  
  Having the advantage, or all of the advantages, is over-hyped. It isn’t about the advantages. It is about being dead or alive.
  
  There is only one thing to avoid: Being Cookie Cutter People. Cookie Cutter People’s way is not their way. It is the way that has been handed to them. The way they have been told to live. The way of making money and spending it and having a good time. It is the way of the Wasteland.
  
  Joseph Campbell says the wasteland is where people—I would say Cookie Cutter People—are living inauthentically, doing what they are told to do, what they are supposed to do, never doing anything out of the ordinary, unexpected, unusual. Never doing anything that catches their eye, strikes their fancy, calls their name.
  
  What’s the advantage of not being like them? Of not being one of the Cookie Cutter People? Of not living in the Wasteland?
  
  What’s the advantage of being alive? Of being awake, aware? Of looking Life in the eye and saying, “Let’s see what you got!”? Of facing the contradictions, and bearing the pain, and doing what needs to be done as it needs to be done in each situation as it arises—never mind what is supposed to be done or what Those Who Know Best And Must Be Pleased think of us or react to us?
  
  If you have to sell being alive by talking about the advantages of life over death, you’re talking to the wrong people. They are already dead. Move on, move on. Look for someone who can hear what you have to say about the Way of Life and the Way of Death because they know what you mean, and need only to be affirmed and reminded of the importance of living their own life in the time left for living—whether it is to their advantage or not.
• Mother and Child B&W —  Founder’s Park, Trade Street, Charlotte, NC, December 26, 2012 —  I survived my childhood and youth by telling them what they wanted to hear. The Big People. My father was actually called “Big James,” not because he was all that large, but to distinguish him from the other James, my mother’s nephew, who was not all that little, but was a few years younger than my father.
  
  The Big People ruled my world, which is how it worked in all of the worlds of the people my size in my experience. We survived by telling them what they wanted to hear—by saying what we were supposed to say. By not having a mind, or a thought, or an opinion of our own.
  
  Try to get away from that when you step into adulthood. Finding my own voice, stating my own views, and getting my own feet under me were the tasks of learning to be a self among other selves. Here’s how it worked. I decided at some point during my colleges years just to go ahead and get it over with—to stop living in dread of what would happen if I said what I thought, but to say it and let the world end.
  
  The world didn’t end. And I developed the strategy of being, what might be called, utterly transparent about a lot of things in order to dispel the ghosts in my mind threatening me with resplendent doom if I said a word. Nothing much happened.
  
  Well, there were some protests and objections. A few people left some of the congregations I served. But. A new world opened.
  
  Speaking truthfully about what I thought, felt, believed, wondered, etc., led me to pursue what I thought, felt, etc. down strange trails, into the company of hundreds of books none of the Big People of my childhood and youth would have ever recommended—or read. It was an enlightening experience which continues to unfold before me, as I wonder my way along to wherever it is that I will be when I get there.
  
  We grow ourselves up by trusting ourselves to ourselves—to whatever oversees interest, enthusiasm, curiosity, wonder, joy, delight and the like—and being willing to see what happens, to see where it goes.
• Lake Brandt Greenway 01 —  Bur-Mil Park Access, Greensboro, NC, December 27, 2012 —  Our solutions to our problems create more problems when we do not listen to the original problem and see what it is asking of us. Listen and See need to be the First Responders to every problem, but they have been relieved of duty in favor of Push and Shove and Rush and Hurry.
  
  We can’t sleep so we take a pill. The pill becomes routine and we become lost in side effects. What would not sleeping say if we listened to it? We don’t have time for such foolishness. We are in a hurry to get to sleep.
  
  We fix depression without attending it. We don’t want to encourage it. We just want to get rid of it.
  
  We go to war to show our enemies a thing or two and teach them a lesson they will never forget. Right. War has lessons for the victor as well as for the vanquished, which neither ever learn.
  
  Guns? Solution? Guns were supposed to solve the problem of bows and arrows. They created the problem of intercontinental ballistic missiles and nuclear warheads. Guns are great for creating problems guns cannot solve.
  
  Listen and See! Listen and See! Listen and See! With, of course, everything on the table. The solution often requires of us things we are not willing to relinquish—leading to Carl Jung’s observation that “None of the important problems can be solved, they have to be out-grown.”
  
  When we have a problem that can’t be solved or fixed, we have to grow up. It’s the only way to take care of things, and the first thing to be dismissed. Life is so hard because we won’t do what is hard—grow up. And there is no fix for that for sure.
• Reedy Fork Sunset C 03 —  Lake Brandt Greenway, Bur-Mil Park Access, Greensboro, NC, December 27, 2012 —  What? You think your life is going to knock on your door and ask if you want to come out and play? You think if you keep sitting by the fire, drinking hot chocolate and eating cookies, your life will call you up and suggest a more pleasant way of spending your time, when you are in the mood for it and only for as long as you feel like it?
  
  Our LIFE requires a Hero’s Journey—and it doesn’t even make THAT easy! WE have to show some initiative! WE have to go in search of our life! We have to track it down, grab it by the shoulders, look it in the eye and say, “Here I am! What can I do for you? When can we get started?”—and give it a shake or two just to show that we mean business.
  
  The five magic words for the Journey are: Identity, Integrity,  Initiative, Clarity and Courage.
  
  We have to know what our business is and what it is not. We have to know where we belong and where we do not belong. We have to be clear and correct about what is happening, and what needs to happen (also called how things are and how things ought to be), and what we can do about it with the gifts that are ours to give—in each situation as it arises. We have to live there (in each situation) in ways that are integral with what is deepest, best and truest about us—whether it does any good or not. And we have to keep it up throughout the time left for living.
  
  Remember the process and apply yourself to it and you will be a Hero on a Journey in no time.

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07/14/2012–10/08/2012

1. Alone, Blue Ridge Parkway near Boone, NC — July 13, 2012 — 22 If we followed the Dali Lama around all day, we would be dead of boredom by breakfast. That’s because he arises for meditation at 4 AM and it doesn’t pick up from there. Compare his life with our idea of how life ought to be. We go for excitement, thrills, parties, fun, drama, entertainment, distraction, diversion. The Dali Lama has a different idea of how life ought to be. Do you think his life is ever going to fit us? That we can ever possibly come close to fitting into his? We’re talking apples and doorknobs here. We think, some of us do anyway, that the Dali Lama is IT for wisdom and enlightenment, but we could never step out of our life into one that was even a close approximation of his. We cannot be who he is. We are separated by the chiasm between cultures. Cultural differences are extreme and cannot be dismissed. We can’t be wigging out and wringing our hands because we cannot be who the Dali Lama is. We cannot be who the Dali Lima is! We have to be enlightened and wise in our own way. The Dali Lama has to be enlightened and wise in his way. He has his work to do and we have our work to do—and it is not the same work. The Dali Lama could not live our life. His life would not fit into our world. Most of us could not survive in his world. We have to recognize the differences and let them stand—and work to live as enlightened beings in our world as well as we are able, and let that be that. 07/14/2012
2. Black Eyed Bee, Blowing Rock, NC — July 6, 2012 — There is no Plan for our life. There is only the drift of the current of our life in each situation, a current that changes its direction and flow in response to what is happening then, there, calling us to trust ourselves to it and see where it goes. May we be so bold! Doing it this way in one situation and that way in the next, without pausing to explain, defend, justify or excuse our actions—living the contradictions and letting our light shine! 07/14/2012
3. Linville Falls 06, Blue Ridge Parkway, NC — July 13, 2012 — 21 We drift through our life like an unmoored boat on the sea. I don’t care how specific your career goals and your life plan are, you are adrift in the current of your life. When you are blind-sided and spun around a few times and whacked a good one and knocked off track and given a big juicy wet one right on the kisser by life at its worst and meanest, it’s just the current showing you its stuff, offering you the opportunity to wake up and trust yourself to it instead of fighting it until you’re exhausted and sink in a whirlpool of despair and despondency. These are great water metaphors. Don’t miss the connections that exist among water, life, and the unconscious. It’s all one thing. We are afloat on the sea of unconsciousness in our little boat of conscious awareness, looking for meaning and purpose and life, all the time surrounded by it, wondering where it is and how to find it, struggling to direct our boat to what we think may be it, when all we need to do is trust ourselves to it and allow the current of our life to carry us to life, into being alive to the experience of life with its spins and whacks and smooches opening our eyes even more, even more, to what all there is beyond words, beyond imagining, “This too! This too!” that is calling forth who we are—who we also are—in the encounter with each moment, with each situation as it arises, birthing us again, laughing, shouting, “Come on in! The water’s fine!” 07/15/2012
4. Manor Porch Panorama BW, Moses H. Cone Memorial Park, Blue Ridge Parkway near Blowing Rock, NC — July 13, 2012 — 20 We live with demands, not preferences—requirements, not inclinations. THIS! Not THAT! Or THAT! Not THIS! HERE! Not THERE! Or THERE! Not HERE! NOW! Not THEN! Or THEN! Not NOW! We think with a magic stick we would have it made. Conjuring up this, disappearing that. Or conjuring up that, disappearing this. We think we know what it takes, we just have to figure out how to get it. Well. Is it better to succeed or to fail? To be lost or to be found? To be out of work of gainfully employed? To be healthy or to be ill? To have needs or to have nothing we need? It has taken every step to be where we are. Which steps would we not take in the future? Avoiding what would be losing what? Gaining what would be losing what? Every asset has its liabilities. Every liability has its assets. We shout NO! too loudly and fail to receive the gift concealed in the delivery. We shout YES! too loudly and are blindsided by the “What were you thinking?” tucked away in the package. I’m recommending here preferences and inclinations, not demands and requirements. Trust your life. Work with it. See what you can make of it. See what it can make of you. Left to our own devices, we would never volunteer for the experiences that deepen, expand, enlarge us—that grow us up—that wise us up—that make us soft and compassionate, gracious and beautiful—against our will, perhaps, but with our best interest needing only our cooperation to redeem the challenge and bless the world. 07/16/2012
5. Magnolia 04, Greensboro, NC — June 2012 — 1 Our calling is not our call to make. Captain Jack Sparrow in “On Stranger Tides” said, “I have no say in it Gibbs—it’s the pirate’s life for me. Savvy?” What do you have no say in? Horses? Some of us have no say in horses. Cameras? Some of us have no say in cameras. I know a woman who knew she was going to be a teacher in the third grade. It’s not that clear for all of us, but. We all know what we love. What we cannot live without. Where we come to life and are alive. It is up to us to do what we love often, to nurture, nourish, our connection with what has heart for us. That is where our heart comes to life with the life that is life and guides us in the way of life—and we have to listen to what that is, to feel our way to the way of heart and life. We have to cherish and serve what is life for us. For our trouble, we get life in return, life not in the 98.6 and breathing sense, but life in the what life is all about sense. Being alive life. The camera restores me to life. Who can make sense of that? Why try? Just do what restores you to life. And see where it goes. This is the path to adventure and life. You’re wrong if you don’t walk it. Savvy? 07/15/2012
6. Dugger’s Creek Falls 02, Blue Ridge Parkway near Linville Falls, NC — July 13, 2012 — 19 Where are you most yourself? Who you are? At-one with you? Free to do what you feel needs to be done when and how you feel it needs to be done? Where is it just you and the moment you are living, with you reading the circumstances and choosing your response to them without advise and direction from Those Who Know Best And Must Be Pleased? Kayaking in white water can be that kind of place, where it’s just you and the kayak and the rocks and the rapids and you have to do what needs to be done the way it needs to be done at the time it needs to be done and nobody is shouting instructions about what and when and how. Where do you shoot the rapids in your life? Just you and the kayak? If you don’t have many places like that, my hunch is that you’re dying to get together with “just you,” and see what happens, see where it goes. We die with too many directors, too many over-seers, too many people who must be pleased. If I were a therapist dealing with mood disorders, my first question would be, “How many people do you have to please in a day?” My second question would be, “How much time do you have with ‘just you’ in a day?” We have to have something like a kayak and white water in our life where our responsibilities, duties and obligations to the larger world are peeled away, and it is just us and the moment we are living, and it’s up to us to live it as we determine it needs to be lived. So, my third question would be, “What are you going to do to reduce the amount of people in the first question and increase the amount of time in the second question?” That would be the end of the session. Your life would be in your hands. 09/17/2012
7. Blue Ridges, Blue Ridge Parkway, Thunder Hill Overlook, NC — July 13, 2012 — 18 We can see our life as an adventure, or as a trial, or as punishment. I vote for adventure. Once we say, “Adventure!”, we make it that by allowing ourselves to be charmed by the life that is our LIFE to live—we have to allow it to catch our eye and follow where it leads. We cannot be off limits to our life and have a chance. We have to believe that we have a LIFE, even yet, even now, and offer ourselves to it, swear to it our loyalty and allegiance, til’ death do us part, as in a heavenly marriage, and then align our life with its service. This is the adventure, making that work. Look at you. You have kids, a house note and a lawn to mow AND you have a LIFE to live amid all your duties and obligations. Work it out! This is hero stuff. Indiana Jones didn’t have a better script. We have to engage our life as full participants in the work of birthing ourselves in our life, in bringing forth our LIFE in our life. And we have to bear—endure—the pain of the birthing, the coming forth. This little shift in perspective, seeing you and your life and your LIFE and embracing the challenge of the adventure of merging it all together in one grand crescendo of being in the time left for living, will transform your world—will transform THE world. Go to it! You don’t know how much time that is—you have none to waste, thinking about it! 07/17/2012
8. Turk’s Cap Lily on Black, Blue Ridge Parkway near Linville Falls, NC — July 13, 2012 — 17 There is no hurry and there is no time to lose. We have all the time it takes and time is running out. If we go too fast, we will miss something for sure and if we don’t get there quickly it will be gone before we arrive. When to speed up? When to slow down? Master that and you have it made! This is the nature of the spiritual quest, the Hero’s Journey. It’s a judgment call all the way. It is the judgment that is the heart of the matter. Listening to ourselves. Deciding for ourselves. Making up our own mind about all of the important things, like when to speed up and when to slow down. No one can tell us what to do and everything hangs in the balance and it’s all up to us. Our life is in our hands. I’ll tell you how it works with me and photography. I’m always having to live to redeem what I screwed up in the past. Today is tomorrow’s past. I’ll live the day after tomorrow redeeming what I missed today. You miss a lot on the spiritual quest. You say, “Damn!” a lot on the Hero’s Journey. Can’t be helped. You don’t get good judgment in a bottle, or a book. Your only hope is to get better at it as you go along. That means taking the plunge today and living to redeem it in some tomorrow. The Linville Falls picture that I posted several days ago is redemption for the one I missed two years ago. The difference wouldn’t likely mean anything to any of you, but it was a burden to me, and I lived to redeem it. So, take your best shot is what I’m saying, and take it knowing that you can live to redeem it if it needs to be redeemed. You’re learning to see here, and hear, and understand, one step at a time—and there is no time to waste, so start making those judgment calls right now and let time make them better. 07/18/2012
9. Roan Mountain View, Roan Mountain Highlands, Cherokee National Forest, Carver’s Gap, TN — June 16, 2012 — 16 We could avoid a lot of suffering simply by enduring legitimate pain. Pain that is not endured is passed along to others and comes back to us as suffering. We cannot grow up without enduring the pain that comes with waking up to the truth of how things are, squaring ourselves up with that truth, and doing what we can with it, about it. We are terrified of what may be asked of us, of what may happen to us, of not having what it takes, of coming up short, of being a failure, a disappointment, a laughter and a blight on our ancestors’ record. And the way that is The Way asks us to step out on our own, follow our strongest sense of what needs to be done, endure what must be endured and take our lumps as people on a mission, with a LIFE to live, allowing nothing to stop us or even slow us down. That’s what I call a life plan. 07/18/2012
10. Cornfield Sunrise 04, Dinkins Bottom in Yadkin County, NC — July 06, 2012 — 15 We don’t want to wait for what is ours to do, for the gifts that are ours to give, for who we are to be revealed to us. We don’t want to wait for our life to show us what it needs from us. We can’t stand the suspense and want to know NOW what we are about so we can get on with it, KNOWING what we are doing and not have to wonder if this is it, if that is it! The pressure of waiting, uncertain, on edge, anxious, afraid—what if we miss it—is too much! We will do anything, believe anybody who sounds convincing, do what anyone who seems to know what they are talking about tells us to do—just to be rid of the uncertainty, just to be done with the waiting! Wait. Think of waiting as yeast working in the dough. Does the dough get impatient? Wondering what is going to become of it, thinking maybe nothing, that time is running out, and maybe it better settle for being flat bread and be done with it? Think of waiting as wine fermenting. Can it not stand, there in the dark, not knowing if it is Cabernet or Chardonnay, Merlot or Zinfandel? Waiting is a test of our mettle. If we can’t pass the waiting test, we have no chance when the Cyclops grabs us by the neck. Wait. Watch. For what? A white rabbit. Some slight movement of soul. A hint of interest or fascination floating through the air. For something to catch your eye, which you might miss or dismiss, looking, as you are, for the fireworks and flashing lights announcing The Way for all to see and applaud, ooou and ahhh about, be jealous of. 07/20/2012
11. Summer Green, Blue Ridge Parkway near Doughton Park, NC — June 29, 2012 — 14 Things are going to work out according to their own drift and timing. Wait. Watch. Assist what needs to be assisted in each situation as it arises—but do not get in the way! Let nature take its course and see where it goes. This doesn’t mean don’t water the garden, or the lawn, during a dry spell. “Letting nature take its course” means trusting yourself to the situation as it unfolds without interference, without trying to artificially force outcomes or force your will in the matter, but always ready to assist nature (as in watering the garden) with what needs to happen. This puts you in the position of determining what needs to happen—and you have a stake in the outcome, you have interests which you think need to be served. How do you separate yourself from the situation? It’s an issue with parents and children, determining what is helpful and what is intrusive. There are no rules here. We have to be sensitive to our tendency, one might say our “natural” tendency, to exploit the situation to our advantage, and to the need of the situation to flow “naturally” toward an outcome that is favorable to the situation. Our interests are not the only interests. When do we “stand our ground” and when do we stand aside? We decide, but we must decide. We cannot always do one or the other. What is called for here and now? That is our question to answer in each situation that unfolds before us all our life long. 07/20/2012
12. Used in Short Talks On Contradiction, etc., Around the Bend, Blue Ridge Parkway near Mt. Jefferson, NC — June 21, 2012 — 2 Jesus said, “Everyone has ears to hear. Why don’t they hear?” He said, “You people hear what you want to hear! You see what you want to see! You believe what you want to be true! You adore plastic and think money will make your life easier! Easy? Ha! I’ll talk to you about easy! Pick up your cross and follow me! How’s that for easy? There is nothing easy about doing what needs to be done, but it is life. The mother who changes her baby’s diaper when it needs to be changed, the way it needs to be changed, even in the middle of the night when she is dead tired and needs to sleep—who knows when to step aside from her needs in order to do what needs her—does not have it easy, but she is alive to the moment of her living and life comes to life through her way with life. Those of you who talk about The Way, The Way, are standing in the way of The Way! Get out of the way and there is The Way! There is nothing wrong with any of you that growing up won’t fix. You want to have life delivered to you made to order, as you like it, the way you want it to be—and your life needs you to be its host, treating it as an honored guest, going where it wants you to go, doing what it wants you to do, never mind your preferences for sleeping late and having someone else do your chores. You have to work out the contradictions, the discordances, the discrepancies between what you want from your life and what your life wants from you. That work is called growing up. It’s the only thing that stands between you and The Way.” — or words to that effect. 07/21/2012
13. Queen Anne’s Lace 02, Blue Ridge Parkway near Boone, NC — July 13, 2012 — 13 We think our value is linked directly to our achievements, accomplishments, acquisitions and success (which is always understood in terms of achievements, accomplishments and acquisitions), and are in a panic-driven rush to “make our mark.” The rest of the natural world spends its time waiting to see what needs to be done and then waiting for the right time to do it. Nature doesn’t get in a hurry and it doesn’t delay when the time to act comes up. Nature doesn’t try to force its way. No pushing and shoving. It bides its time until resistance becomes futile and the river bursts through the log jam, or the daffodil pushes through the asphalt. And nature doesn’t do it exactly the same way twice. You think spring is spring and fall is fall until you look closer. Dogwoods were a mess this spring. They were great last spring. Five years ago, the False Hellebore were superb in one location, now they are better just down the road. Don’t get locked into doing the same things in the same ways. Dance with the circumstances. See what is called for, when and how, and assist its coming forth as a partner in the process of being alive. Watch, wait, do what is needed when the time is right. Your life will be a work of art. A new definition of success! 07/22/2012
14. Boone Fork, Blue Ridge Parkway near Blowing Rock, NC — July 13, 2012 — 3 Our place is to put money in its place. The revolution is putting money in its place—granting it no more value in our life than it deserves. The culture makes money the highest value. “Wealth and privilege, kid, wealth and privilege.” We put everything into making more money, but what do we do with it? Fritter it away on entertaining pastimes and talking to our buds about how much money we have or what entertaining pastimes we would spend it on if we did have it. Money is good for only one thing: Paying bills. We have to incur the right bills. Bills fall into three categories: Maintaining and enhancing life—food, clothing and shelter kinds of things. Distracting and entertaining ourselves with things that promise life but do not, because they cannot, deliver. Bringing ourselves to life by serving that which is LIFE for us. LIFE is more than being 98.6 and breathing. You know where you come to life and you know where you are mostly dead and dying. The things that promise life to us but cannot deliver actually drain us of life, rob us of life, exhaust and deplete us. We need to be incurring the bills that restore and refresh, enliven, vitalize and energize us on the deepest level of soul/heart/being. So, look at your budget. How much of your money goes to soul/heart/being restoration and recovery? Spiritual growth requires us to put money in its place—using it in the service of that which is life itself. 07/22/2012
15. Dugger’s Creek Falls 03, Blue Ridge Parkway near Linville Falls, NC — July 13, 2012 — 4 It hangs by a thread and turns on a dime and we need each other—the right kind of others to have a chance, and that’s where it all goes to hell. Why are the right kind of others so hard to find? The person you married didn’t show any signs of alcohol abuse or cocaine addiction or abject worthlessness on your wedding day. How were you to know? Predators rarely come off as predators. People who take advantage of you, who exploit you, who violate your boundaries and kill your soul are the nicest people, or can appear to be. It’s hard enough when everything is what it seems, and how often is that the case, for how long? Which leaves us exactly where with exactly what to count on? Is it any wonder that we are hollow-eyed and haggard? We need a friend—friends—who are the right kind of friends, who know how to be a friend—the relational equivalent of a safe place, a panic room, in which to gather ourselves, ground ourselves, orient ourselves, stabilize and recover. And we are easy marks for those who say, “I’ll be your friend.” Finding the right kind of others becomes another life task that we have to work out for ourselves in order to do the work that is ours to do. The work is enhanced by taking up the practice of being the right kind of other, offering what is needed and being a source of compassion and grace in the lives the people we know. Providing what we need increases our chances of finding it. And, if it doesn’t, we’ve made someone’s world a better place by the way we carried ourselves in it. If you have to settle for something, settle for that! 07/23/2012
16. Goshen Creek, Blue Ridge Parkway near Boone, NC — July 2012 — 5 You have to believe in your LIFE—in the LIFE that transcends your life, that is bigger than you are, that is more than anything you are capable of imagining, that needs you to live it. And you have to trust yourself to it, step into it and say, “Okay, let’s go!” And see where it takes you. This is called the leap of faith. Nothing can happen until you take the risk and make the jump—with everything on the line and nothing held back. It isn’t like you have something to lose here. You only have something to lose by not jumping straight out into nothingness, trusting your wings to work. 07/23/2012
17. Boundary, Blue Ridge Parkway, Doughton Park, NC — June 2012 — 6 We bring forth who we are to meet the day, or not. Generally, we are more concerned with playing our cards right to get what we want—or avoid what we don’t want—than getting out of the way and allowing the qualities that are best suited for the situation unfolding before us to come forth as blessing and grace. As we walk through our day, we don’t encounter much in the way of blessing and grace—and we don’t think about standing aside so they might emerge in our own life. “Stand Your Ground” is more important to us than standing aside. Certainly more important than standing down. Standing down is for wimps and wienies. Never mind that Jesus said, “Put down your swords!” We say everybody should have a gun and use it, with a high capacity magazine attached! Show them they can’t push us around! And even if we don’t carry a gun or have one, we have an attitude and carry it: “Everybody Back Off! Here We Come!” With nothing in the way of blessing and grace to offer, extend and leave behind. 07/24/2012
18. Black Birch, Blue Ridge Parkway, Rocky Knob, VA — 7 We have to make peace with our helplessness and vulnerability. We cannot think/believe that we are, or ought to be, able to defend, protect, out-think, out-maneuver, ward off or out-run the things that could be the end of us, from a gun totting idiot over the edge to a rouge meteor on the prowl to a happy little cancer looking for a home in our body. A lot of things could go wrong. There is no immunity. Life is a fragile affair. Makes it all the more precious, don’t you see? Instead of spending our time cowering in some corner, afraid of all the possibilities, we have to gratefully receive the moment, this moment, of our living because of all the moments that have been or will be, how many have had, or will have, US in them so what do we mean wasting any of them, throwing any of them away, refusing to do right by even one of them because we are afraid of the end of them? LIVE NOW! is the lesson. What are you waiting for? Take your fear and helplessness by the hand and lead them gently into life, rejoicing in what joy you can find, celebrating what is to be celebrated, relishing what is to be relished, and living with all the vitality and enthusiasm your life deserves for as long as life is possible. Please don’t wish you had listened to me.  07/24/2012
19. Zen Moon, Price Lake, Julian Price Memorial Park, Blue Ridge Parkway near Blowing Rock, NC — April, 2009 — 8 Live like it matters! That’s my best advice. Live like your presence in the world has an impact on the world, carries weight, leaves a wake—because it does. The quality of your presence in the lives of others is something you can do something about—and has the potential of meaning more than anything else you can do. James Joyce said beauty consists of three qualities: Integration or wholeness, harmony, and radiance. Put yourself on the table and walk around the table. Become transparent to yourself so that you see, become aware of, all that you are and also are and are capable of being/becoming. Be aware of all that is Not You but people expect you to be, or you require it of yourself to be who you think you have to be to be a success, or to have friends and be liked. Separate who you are from who you are not and consider just the I, the No Longer I, the Also I, and the Not Yet I. See how these elements all relate to you, all contribute to your life in the world. Hold them together in the oneness that is you. You just integrated the whole. Keep it before you. Do not allow its disintegration. Hold you together, with all your disparate parts contributing to the truth and beauty of you. And live with harmony. Harmony is bringing forth each aspect of you as it is appropriate in the situation as it unfolds. You are an entire orchestra. All the sections contribute to the life, the composition, you produce. Let them come forth in their time in a beautiful expression of the harmony of being dancing with time and place. Radiance is your own personal wonder, awe, delight, amazement, pleasure and joy at the production of you in your life, in the world. You can’t give enough of you in the right way to the world, and you love the experience of the expression of you in the here and now of your living. Wholeness, Harmony, Radiance makes for Beauty. You grace the world with the blessing of your presence every moment of every day. Work to become the work of art you are in the time left for living. Not to exploit it, but to give it away—the gift of your life to the world. Beautiful presence, beautiful life. You. 07/25/2012
20. Sun on Black, Blue Ridge Parkway — September 2008 — 9 Don’t sell out! One of the myriad manifestations of the Cyclops is the Well-Paying Job That Eats Our Life Alive. How much for “them” (the signers of your paycheck) how much for you is always the question. How much time for them, how much for you? How much of your life for them, how much for you? No formula applies. It’s a judgment call—like all the important calls of life. Hold something back is my best recommendation. Don’t sell your soul. Easier said than done. Make your soul real—my soul comes in the form of a third grade girl with eyes of hope and confidence, believing in me to deliver the goods and give her what she needs to live the life that is hers to live. It’s a long story, but the child is real for me and is Psyche, the carrier of my soul. I don’t put Psyche off. I don’t tell Psyche, one day, later, I’ll get back to you, right now “I have married a wife, I have bought me a plow, I have fields and commitments that cost a pretty sum, please hold me excused, I cannot come,” but one day, “I don’t know when, but we’ll have a good time then.” Make your soul real and stand between your soul and your commitments, obligations, duties and requirements in the world of apparent reality, and choose in each moment whom you will serve. Keep a running count of the moments, and make sure your soul gets its fair share. It is the fundamental, foundational, agreement of a life well lived. 07/25/2012
21. The Pond, Robeson County, NC — November 2008 — 10 Silence is crucial. How often do you go there? How long can you stay there? What do you do there? Awareness is crucial. How extensive is your field of awareness? Outward and inward, around you and within you? What blocks your awareness? What shuts it off? What shuts you down? Awareness is fueled by interest and curiosity and inquiry. You develop it with practice. Practice wondering about things, poking around in things—internal and external things—so that all of life becomes transparent to us and we become transparent to ourselves, seeing things as they are and what to do in response throughout our life. So, see what’s what and what it leads to. Presence is crucial. “Be here, now,” you know. How present can you be in each moment of your life? You can’t be aware without being present, but you can be aware of not being present, and bring yourself back to here, now. I mentioned inquiry. Question everything. See how many questions you can ask in a day, to yourself if no one else is interested or available. Answers are only good for more questions. Questions carry you into awareness, into presence, into silence. Don’t go anywhere without your questions. They will serve you well even if, especially if, they create a little trouble along the way. 7/26/2012
22. Hydrangea Variations 09, Greensboro, NC — June 2012 — 11 One of the Buddha’s foundational principles was mutual interdependence. We need each other. We all face the same problem: Bringing ourselves forth within the context and circumstances of our life. This is the Hero’s Journey. We need each other to have a chance. How much help have you received in your life—the right kind of help offered in the right kind of way? And how much resistance, hindrance, opposition, obstruction? It’s hard enough with everything going our way. People ought to be doing their thing in a way that doesn’t interfere with other people doing their thing, but helps, assists, enables all things, everybody’s things. It’s starts with us, committing to living our own life and helping (the right kind of help in the right kind of way) everyone else live their own life, urging mutual support and encouragement all the way around. 07/26/2012
23. Bow Lake, Banff National Park, Alberta — September 2008 —  12 Let come what’s coming and let go what’s going. If you are going to practice anything, practice that. Practice standing still, letting come, letting go, without running to something, or away from something, or after something. This doesn’t mean you don’t have preferences or don’t do what you can to maintain life like you like it. It means when your circumstances take a turn, you take the turn, too. This is not easy in a culture whose root beliefs are contrary to the way things are. From the culture’s standpoint, if something is wrong in our life it’s because something is wrong with us. We aren’t doing something right if something is wrong. We can control our circumstances by dancing the right dance. Listen. To. Me. There is much that is beyond our control. If we are going to have a chance in the heaving waves of the wine dark sea, we are going to have to find the source of stability and calm within ourselves. We cannot be micromanaging our circumstances 24/7/12 in the effort to guarantee nothing goes wrong. Peace is a perspective, not a political achievement. James Joyce talked about “proper art” being that which stops us—“esthetic arrest,” he called it—in the experience and contemplation and enjoyment of beauty. “Improper art” sends us running to the thing or from it, in desire or fear. We are all artists. Our life is our art. We have to learn our craft. We have to learn the difference between “proper” and “improper” art. In the calm created by letting come what’s coming and letting go what’s going, we perceive the beauty and wonder of it all, all the coming and going, and are “arrested”—staggered, really—by the experience of being alive to witness the wonder of life, and, from that point, look at all things anew, barely breathing, continually amazed, lost in the art, making art, alive, in awe of the whole idea—in awe of the whole. 07/27/2012
24. 26 Multnomah Falls, OR—September 2009 — The things that would be most helpful are the things no one can help us with. Growing up would be helpful across the board, in all situations and circumstances. Wising up would be helpful. Waking up to how things are (and also are). Squaring up to the discordance between how things are and how we want them to be. Standing up and doing what needs to be done about it. If we could give the world those five things, we wouldn’t recognize the place tomorrow. But. The world is quite safe. That kind of radical transformation is quite out of the question. It takes a certain drift of spirit and soul to carry us into each of those areas. We have to be leaning in their direction to have a chance. No one can force us there against our will. And yet. Each of us goes there against our will. Interesting, don’t you think? We have to distance ourselves from our agenda, our desire, fear, laziness, greed and sense of duty in order to Grow Up, Wise Up, Wake Up, Square Up. And why would we want to do that? Why would we want to do what we don’t want to do? Some of us just can’t seem to help it. That’s the best I can do. Some of us are predisposed to what I think of as The Transcendent Orientation. Predisposed to transcend the normal, popular, cultural point of view and move toward, shall we say, Transcendence Itself? Move toward what we do not know. We can at least say that much. We are torn from our social, religious and political moorings and are adrift in currents carrying us to distant shores, or maybe just to an endless stream of currents, we don’t know. And what would be most helpful to us would be a Community of Innocence concerned only about assisting us in the development and maintenance of a healthy point of view, which is the foundation of a healthy way of life, which is the most any of us can hope for cut off, as we are, from the culturally approved standards of living. 07/28/2012
25. 62 Ocean Isle Sunrise, NC — September 2008 — In the company of the right kind of people you have it made, as much as you can have it made, because the right kind of people will grow you up, to the extent that you can grow up. The more grown up you are, the more you have it made. The right kind of people help you with that by forcing you to hear what you are saying, and asking you what makes you think that what you think is so, and raising questions you don’t want to ask—much less answer—and challenging you to face your demons, recognize your inferences and presumptions, your biases and prejudices and the perspective that protects you from seeing things as they are. The right kind of people will enlarge your point of view and open up new worlds for you to explore by the quality of their relationship with you. The wrong kind of people coddle you and cuddle you and keep you safe from the truth of your narrow way of life. The wrong kind of people keep things the same, unchanging, unexamined, unquestioned forever. The wrong kind of people maintain the world as it has always been, saying the same things, reading the same lines from the same script like a sit-com that becomes increasingly boringly bad over the seasons of its run. If you want to never see anything you haven’t already seen, think anything you haven’t already thought, hear anything you haven’t already heard, understand anything you haven’t already understood, spend your time with the wrong kind of people. 07/29/2012
26. 74 Ranger Creek, Great Smoky Mountains National Park, TN/NC—October 2008 — Drugs and alcohol are a safe haven for a lot of folks. Numbness is not distance. Our addictions, including shopping and religion, numb us, distract us, but do not distance us. Awareness is distance when we combine it with acceptance, trust, and giving ourselves over to our circumstances. We can retreat to awareness. Waking up is facing up is squaring up is doing what can be done and letting that be that. If we are not letting that be that, we wake up to that. Waking up is waking up to the Five Barriers to peace, harmony, wholeness, grace, and compassion: Desire, Fear, Duty, Greed and Laziness. When we need to numb ourselves it is generally because we are in the grip of one or more of the Big Five. Waking up wakes us up to the truth of how things are and what needs to be done about it. It gets us to the bottom of what we have to face up to, look in the eye, and have it out with—what we have to release our attachment to (Yes, Virginia, we clutch too closely that which is killing us)–in order to give ourselves over to our circumstances and trust ourselves to the resources and gifts that are ours and the drift of our LIFE to carry us on. We have to achieve Working Distance between ourselves and our circumstances in order to be the blessing we are by living the LIFE that is ours to live within the context of the life we are living. We cannot be caught up in the 10,000 things and be a source of peace, grace and compassion within them. Maintaining Working Distance is not an individual operation. We need the right kind of relationship with the right kind of people to remember who we are and what we are about—to find the center and live from it—to be stable, grounded and whole. We have to have the right kind of life support to have the right kind of life. Waking up gets us busy with the work required to do the work that is ours to do. 07/30/2012
27. Sunset at the Lighthouse, Peggy’s Cove, Nova Scotia — September 2009 — 59 We worked hard, giving ourselves an environment conducive to our development, only to sell out for glass beads and silver mirrors—and Carnival mirrors, at that. We carved out for ourselves a safe place and proclaimed “Freedom from oppression,” but. We forgot about greed and laziness. Where would you go to be free from those things? We know all we need to know to live the most whole, the most aware, the most fulfilled life in the history of the species. It isn’t a matter of not-knowing. It comes straight down to not-doing. We know about tobacco. How many of us smoke? We know about the dangers associated with obesity. How many of us can lie on our backs and see our toes without lifting our head? We know about the importance of exercise. How many of us walk farther than to the car or to pick up the morning paper? We know about the advantages of silence and meditation. Well? We know about the disadvantages, one might say the side effects, of prescription and other kinds of drugs. Well? We want a better life, a better body, we just don’t want to pay the price of having either. We talk about spiritual development, about the spiritual quest, about the Hero’s Journey, about becoming who we are, finding our work and doing it, living at-one with our LIFE, our soul. What are we doing about it? What would our soul say to us if it had the chance? Give it the chance. Sit down at your computer, or with a pen or pencil and a piece of paper and get out of the way. Let soul write you a letter. See what soul has to say. If you’re up for it. And if you’re not up for it, what does that say? 07/31/2012
28. Beech Trees, Guilford College Woods, Greensboro, NC — October 2008 — That which is necessary is beyond right and wrong. But. We have to be right about what is necessary. We have to do what needs to be done, regardless of what our parents, or the preacher, or society, or culture might think. Jesus is a wonderful example of what is going on here. Jesus lived with himself on the line—and it is a very fine line between seeing how things are and doing what needs to be done about them no matter what (Healing or picking and eating grain on the Sabbath, for example) and doing whatever we feel like doing and saying, “I just had to do it.” An apocryphal text highlights this. Appearing only in Codex Bezae, following the story about eating grain on the Sabbath in Luke 6:4, we read: “On that same day, seeing a man working on the Sabbath, Jesus said to him, “If you know what you are doing, you are blessed, but if you don’t know, you are cursed and a transgressor of the Law.” And if you think you’ll just play it safe and take no chances, and not trust yourself to know if you are right or wrong, there is that happy little parable about burying your talent. Hiding your gift. Refusing to be who you are because it might get you in trouble. We are here to make trouble! We cannot be afraid of it! We use our gift, our gifts, in the service of the best we can imagine—doing what we deem to be necessary in each situation as it arises for what we determine to be the good of the situation. We deem, We determine. We decide. We do. It is in light of this burden to be who we are no matter what, doing what is ours to do, serving what we perceive to be the good in each moment, regardless of the outcome that Jesus smiles and says, “Pick up your cross daily and follow me.” We take our chances and live with our life on the line. It’s the key to being alive. 08/01/2012
29. Crescent Beach, Ecola State Park, OR—September, 2008 — 6What are you interested in? That’s where it starts. The Hero’s Journey, the spiritual quest, the search for the Holy Grail and the Promised Land. It starts with what interests you. Without interests, we’re dead, just waiting for the undertaker to make it official. The best thing you can do for yourself is deepen, expand, enlarge your level of interest in life, living, being alive. Our interests bring us to life, engage us with life, carry us into life. But. Don’t limit yourself to your starting place. Don’t build high, thick walls around your interest and refuse to allow yourself to be interested in any other thing. Do not specialize. Let your interests have their way with you. Allow one interest to pass you off to another, to several others. But also be willing to dig in where the treasure lies. Become increasingly better at what pulls you in that direction. See where it goes. We live to see where it goes. There is no getting everything in place, all lined up, locked in place, there for you to enjoy forever. You don’t have forever. Nothing does. Something is always coming and something is always going. Life is not static. The only static thing is death. Life is fluid, vibrant, moving, changing, transforming, inviting you to dance with it all the way, sending you interests to awaken you to the dance. Don’t just sit there unmoving. Allow them to take you by the hand and lead you along the way, delighting in their company and relishing their gifts. And see where it goes. 08/02/2012
30. Atlantic Moonrise, Cape Hatteras National Seashore, Ocracoke Island, NC—October 2008 — It’s about your life. It’s about aligning yourself with your LIFE, not just any life, but the LIFE that is yours to live, utilizing and applying the gifts that are yours to give—your perspective, proclivities, knacks, tendencies, outlook, attitude, etc.—in serving the good of your context and circumstances in each situation as it arises throughout your days on the earth. It’s a problem because we are looking for the advantage, and seek to exploit each situation as it arises for our own personal good at the expense of the good of the situation. Whose good is the good we call good? Generally it is our own good. How much of what we want is needed to do what is ours to do? We don’t pause to consider the question. We strive to get as much of what we want as possible, thinking that’s the whole point of life. We have to rethink the whole point of life. The whole point of life is to live in the service of that which has need of us, doing what we can imagine doing with the gifts that are ours for the good of the whole. This is not a burden. It is a joy, in that aligned with what is ours to share and do, we are one with ourselves, which is the deepest good there is. At one with ourselves, we are at one with all selves and all that is beyond self. Purely sublime. It’s all the pieces of the orchestra playing together in the production of a masterpiece. For that to happen, we all have to be doing our part. For each of us to do our part, we have to realize we have a part, and live to identify with it and bring it forth in our life—bring our LIFE forth in our life. This is our life’s work, being alive in our LIFE in the time left for living—not by trying to orchestrate the parts of everyone else, but by listening to, looking for, and living out our own part, living our own LIFE, and letting that be that. 08/03/2012
31. Lake Brandt at Reedy Fork, Greensboro, NC—November, 2009 — 35 I’ve taken to asking people what they are interested in. “Money,” comes up often. “Money for what?” I ask. They have no idea. I press them. “If you had all the money you needed, what would you do?” “Travel,” is a frequent response. “How much would you need to begin travelling now?” They don’t know how much money they need to begin traveling now. Tells me they don’t want to travel—they just don’t know what else to say. We want to pile money up. We don’t want to spend it. We are afraid something will happen and we’ll need money. Money soothes fear. We don’t live because we are afraid of what might happen. Fear shuts down life. Our life is dying to be lived and we are afraid of living. We are only safe when we are dead. Forget being safe. Focus on being alive. Remember the scene from Star Wars, with Luke in the helmet learning to use his light sword? That’s you in the helmet learning to live your life. You can’t see. The left side of your brain is no use. You will never figure it out. You cannot think your way into living. “Listen to the Force, Luke.” “Trust the Force, Luke.” Call it the Life Force that needs your cooperation to live in and through you—and can direct your life if you live open to that possibility. Our work, our practice, is learning to align ourselves with—assist—the Life Force that lives within us and would live through us in our life. Gene Gendlin’s work on Focusing and Mihaly Czikszentmihalyi’s work on Flow both speak to the practice of aligning ourselves with our LIFE. The challenges we encounter as we attempt to shift into living aligned with the Life Force while wearing the helmet require us to develop certain skills. The skills include listening/hearing, looking/seeing, sensing/feeling, inquiring/searching/seeking, probing/wondering/imagining/creating… Right brain stuff bringing us to life in the LIFE waiting to be lived in us and through us in each situation as it arises. 08/04/2012
32. The crucifixion of Jesus received no notice. It was the hope of resurrection and the promise of a better life on the other side of death that got the attention of his fans. The Buddha made no impression by being enlightened. It was the hope of accumulating merit and escaping the eternal rounds of suffering that made him famous. The life Jesus and the Buddha lived was indistinguishable from 10,000 other lives of their day. “Love your neighbor as yourself.” “Be a light unto yourself.” Ho-hum. 08/05/2012
33. Cades Cove Methodist Church, Great Smoky Mountains National Park, TN/NC — October 2008 — Doing right by the situation as it arises is a lot less dramatic than you think. It is a life of complete invisibility. The work to sustain, maintain, enable, encourage is the real work of transformation that goes unnoticed like the seed in the earth, the yeast in the dough. Nothing appears to be happening. It’s all very boring. And, all the while, magic is going on. That is the impact of a life well-lived. Doing right by each situation as it arises is offering cups of cold water to those who are thirsty, a kind word to those who are discouraged, safe presence to those who need to restore their soul, innocent goodness (innocent in the sense that it is good for nothing, for no reason, without a gain in mind, seeking no advantage, no pay-back, no gory for itself) as a blessing upon all—things that are done without doing anything, without being noticed by anyone, yet benefiting everyone. Being what the situation calls for shifts the future and saves the world—and you get no credit for the impact you have. We have to believe in the value of life lived well without the drama, the attention, the lights and the headlines, the money and the raves. Very counter-cultural—and essential to the well-being of all. 08/05/2012
34. Sunset, Cape Hatteras National Seashore, Bodie Island, NC — The culture takes all that we know to be true, all we know to be valuable, away from us and hands us a box of smoke beautifully packaged as a replacement. This is the story of the Garden of Eden. What we see is not what we get. But, the culture is convincing, and we believe our eyes, not our heart. The Hero’s Journey, the Spiritual Quest, the Search for the Land of Promise and the Holy Grail is the work to find our way back to our heart. Our heart is the stone the builders reject, and it is the pearl of great price. It is the wellspring of living water and the threshold to the land flowing with milk and honey. All of these old metaphors are verbal descriptions of that which cannot be said. Being at one with the Tao. Enlightenment. Nirvana. The Still Point of the Turning World. These phrases attempt to capture the essence of the experience of living from our heart, seeing with our heart, hearing with our heart, understanding with our heart and doing what our heart needs us to do. And the culture—and the handmaiden of the culture, the Church, the Religion of the Culture dressed up in fine regalia to awe and entrance the masses, blowing smoke—does a quick heart transplant on each of us shortly after birth, replacing true seeing, hearing, understanding, knowing, doing, being with Blah-Blah. And we wake up somewhere in mid-life needing to get our heart back—needing to restore ourselves to our soul. We are here to help each other with that task, but a word of warning. The way back to the Garden of Eden winds through the Garden of Gethsemane and across the face of Golgotha. Just saying. 08/06/2012
35. The Relic, Down East, NC — We cannot hope to transform what we will not be intimately related with. We cannot be intimate if we will not be authentic. We cannot be authentic if we will not be vulnerable. You see where this is going. We want to be safe, protected, immune, off-limits to all that is ugly, mean and stupid—AND change the world. Kiss that happy fantasy good-bye. The world is changed, if it is to be changed, by the quality of our relationship with the world. We cannot build high, thick, walls, mount loud speakers along with the razor wire on the top and broadcast instructions for change 24/7/12, and think we are doing anything. We have to live in the world if we want to impact the world. We have to live in caring ways in the world if we want to impact the world. We have to care about what we would change, and it may not change, not in our lifetime, anyway. We may feel like we are wasting our time. We may be wasting our time. If you want to be productive, go to work for Apple—they are booming. Who don’t we love in a way that they would know we were loving them? People are always saying they don’t hate gays, but the gays can’t tell the difference. People are always saying they love their enemies, etc., but their enemies, etc., can’t tell that they are being loved. If you are going to love me, show me by the quality of your relationship with me, by the way you listen to me without advising, directing, correcting, chastising, converting, condemning… Become involved with me! Care about me! Be authentic, genuine and real with me! Be vulnerable with me! Let me see who you are! Let me change you as much as you want to change me! And live that way with everyone you know. Or stop talking about how much you want to make a difference. 08/07/2012
36. Still Life, My very own light fare table, Greensboro, NC — August 07, 2012 — A friend said recently, “We all need more of what we need and less of what is harmful and hurtful. Compassion and gentleness should be what we all strive for.” And, what would be keeping that from happening? We are here for each other, to help as we are able in the work of being a calming presence where people might come to hear themselves think, to find their center, to be balanced, righted and restored. That isn’t beyond any of us. But it takes being balanced, righted and restored ourselves to do it. We can’t be listing and be of help. Much less, sinking. Where do we find what we need to be who we need to be in the lives of one another? This is our task. Not to guilt ourselves to death over not being who we need to be, but to find what we need to be what is needed. What would be helpful, where is it to be found? Our questions to ask, and answer. 08/07/2012
37. Peyto Lake Photographer, Banff National Park, Alberta—We are always being torpedoed and sunk by what we don’t want to hear—by what we don’t want to know, face up to, square up with, deal with, come to terms with, do something about. It would be so nice if things were like we want them to be! There is no such thing as Global Warming, the very idea, how silly is that, in our little world. There are no Domestic Terrorists in our little world—let every American have all the guns they want. We have such a nice little fantasy world that takes no notice of That Other World until it’s too late and we are body slammed and steam rolled again by what we refused to see coming. What do you think waking up wakes up to? How. Things. Are. And. What. Needs. To. Be. Done. About. It. We think enlightenment, and realization, and self-actualization are about flipping a spiritual switch and making all our dreams come true. The Law of Attraction asks nothing of us whatsoever. Thinking the right kind of thoughts. How convenient. Life as we want it to be for the low, low price of thinking the right kind of thoughts. We don’t have to change the way we are living or do anything we don’t want to do—and we certainly do not have to take That Other World into account. All our talk about waking up just deepens our trance state and makes us all the more susceptible to the shock of body slams and steam rollers. So. What is it that you don’t want to hear? Face up to? Square up with? Deal with? Do? What you refuse to acknowledge in your little world slams into it as a Desolating Sacrilege from beyond, an Abomination of Desolation, a wake-up call from That Other World, winking at you, laughing. 08/08/2012
38. Dry Docked, Peggy’s Cove, Nova Scotia — We think if we could just get the disarray in order we could enjoy our life. However, our life does not exist apart from the disarray. The disarray is the “field of action” (Joseph Campbell’s term) that brings our life forth. We are who we show ourselves to be in facing up to, squaring up with, and doing what needs to be done about the disarray—not in reading a book and ordering drinks at the table by the side of the pool. The book, drinks, table and pool may well be necessary assists in our being able to deal with the disarray, but the disarray is where we show ourselves to be who we are. The quality of our life in the disarray tells the tale. Anybody can appear to be whole and charming at a table by the side of a pool. How do they come off in the field of action, is the question. Who are they, then? There? 08/09/2012
39. View from Left Field, Greensboro Grasshoppers NeBridge Bank Park, Greensboro, NC — August 8, 2012 — It would be one thing if we got to choose our choices. It’s another thing entirely, given that we don’t. Don’t come at me with all that guilt and shame and going to hell stuff! Not with the choices I’ve had to work with! Give me my choice of choices and THEN heap the mean, low and evil load on me, but not until then. Until I get to choose my choices, I’m going to hold that I’ve done better with the choices I’ve had than any had anyone right to expect me to do. I would have chosen different parents to start with, and a different point of origin—and would have picked up steam from there. I’ve had what I consider to be the bare minimum amount of support and encouragement along the way—and how many of us struggle along with way less than that? And they send us to hell? How dare they?! Now that we have them in their place, it’s time to put us in ours. Our place is dealing out kindness and compassion, grace and peace to one another and all others. It’s amazing that we are doing as well as we are. We all need a “Nice going—keep it up!” and we all need to give one to the people who need one, which would be everybody we know. Hold back on giving people a hard time and give them the benefit of the doubt instead. See where it goes. That’s my best advice. Today, anyway. 08/09/2012
40. Linville Falls, Blue Ridge Parkway near Linville, NC — July 13, 2012 — We look for meaning the way we looked for Easter Eggs, moving inside if the weather turned bad, and our minds on something else, and wonder why it’s so hard to find. Could be because nobody talks about the price we have to pay to live meaningfully, what we have to give up, what we have to accommodate—or how easily potential meaningfulness is set aside as having no value on the cultural scale of things. The cultural point of view is toxic to our system but it is pervasive and highly persuasive, and who can withstand its appeal? Even the Holy Scriptures, which purport to be the voice of soul, promise the same things the culture offers in making its case for God: safety, security, abundance and prosperity—just a different path to the same goal—and that with complete disregard for the life holy people have lead in all religions throughout the ages: “Foxes have holes but the Son of Man (read: the True Human being) has nowhere to lay his head”—a dismissal justified with it all being made up to them in the afterlife, which also reflects the cultural idea of what it means to have it made. Religion is of the culture, not of the soul, and exists to insulate us from God more than to introduce us to God. The spiritual path is to find our way back to the voice of our own soul, to recognize the conflicts between culture and soul and to work out the ratios, how much for one and how much for the other. A meaningful life hangs in the balance. 08/10/2012
41. Dune Walker, Mesquite Dunes, Death Valley National Park, CA — We have to find our own way—with the help of those who know how to be helpful to those who are finding their own way. We have to find our own way because no one knows what resonates with us but us. We cannot take anyone’s word for what is, or is not, our way is, because we are the only one who can recognize it when we see it. We have to discover it for ourselves. We have to find our own way. We cannot allow someone else to tell us how to live our life, what to believe, how to think. We have to find out for ourselves what to believe, how to think, what to do, what works under what conditions and what does not. We have to find out for ourselves what is important, what has value, what grips us with a passion that is the heart of life itself. No one can give us their way, or give us their way for us. We have to find our own way. If they can’t understand that, they are in the way—and we have to understand that. And find our way to the people who know how to be helpful to those who are finding their own way. 08/11/2012
42. Grazing, Blue Ridge Parkway near Meadows of Dan, VA — May 13, 2012 — Self-discipline and self-control are essential aspects of self-discovery and self-development. We live to be who we are within—to bring forth the gifts that are ours to offer to—each situation as it arises without exploiting any situation to our advantage. What we get is who we are. We get to enjoy the experience and expression of who we are within the time left for living. The context and circumstances of our life brings out the best in us—when we get out of the way, when we stop trying to force our way, and trust ourselves to the drift of our life and see where it goes. This is hardest to do, perhaps, when nothing seems to be happening—when there seems to be no flow at all to our life—when we seem to be in an eddy, circling, circling, far from the mainstream, going nowhere. This is a test of self-discipline and self-control, and a test of our faith in ourselves and in the life that is our life to live. Will we wait it out? Like seeds in the earth? Yeast in the dough? Trusting ourselves to the transitions of our life? Giving ourselves in good faith to the task of doing what needs to be done in the here and now of each moment, and seeing where it goes? 08/11/2012
43. Mount St. Helens National Volcanic Monument, WA — September, 2009 — Wake up to what is good and do it. Good for whom, is the question. Whose good is served by the good we call good? Takes being awake to know—to see, hear and understand—and to do what is good because it is good when there is nothing in it for us. How good are we when there is nothing in it for us, is the question. How good are we when it doesn’t matter if we are good or not, is the question. How good are we when no one is watching or keeping score, is the question. We walk through situations every day crying out for goodness. Do we keep walking, is the question. Or do we stop? See the situation as it is, recognize what is needed, and offer it? How many situations could we transform in a day—if we took to offering kind words, gentle presence, support and encouragement? I believe in cash encouragement. Tipping well, for example. Or if several of us got together in a Cash Mob kind of way and offered to provide a scholarship or two for music, or art, lessons with a local piano teacher or artist. Ways to be helpful are all around us. All it takes is looking to see. 08/12/2012
44. Available Seating, NewBridge Bank Park, home of the Greensboro Grasshoppers (Who were playing an away game with the Rome Braves when this photo was taken. These seats are filled when they are at home. It’s the baseball place to be) — August 8, 2012 — If Jesus had had access to the metaphor (another reason for not closing the canon), he would have used a smoothly functioning restaurant as a setting for a parable about the kingdom of heaven, which is another term for the spiritual realm, or the invisible world. When we are living in synch with the invisible world, we function in this world like a smoothly functioning restaurant. All elements in the restaurant understand their primary duties, but stand ready to assist as needed in all other areas. The wait staff have their individual sections, but offer help to each other, filling glasses or replacing dropped silverware. Each waiter carefully attends their dinners, offering what is needed in each moment as it unfolds, without weighing what is in it for them or whether a larger tip awaits this action but not that one—responding spontaneously and graciously, one might say compassionately, to the need of the moment in creating a welcoming atmosphere and an experience of pleasurable dining. We are the wait staff. The world is our dining room. 08/12/2012
45. Green River Canyon, Canyonlands National Park, UT — May 2010 — We are certain that wealth, prosperity and privilege are in our best interest. We cannot conceive of our best interest apart from being wealthy, prosperous and privileged. What else could life hold? Come with me for a moment. Imagine that we are all on a star ship escaping a meteor on course to destroy the earth. We have everything on the ship required to sustain life but we have no resources to waste and we have to share what is available. We are headed out of the solar system to explore the possibility of livable planets thousands of light years away. None of us will live to see the end of the journey—nor will our children or our grandchildren. How will we pass the time? Of what will our life (in the sense of what life is all about) consist? What becomes of wealth, prosperity, privilege there, where equality is essential for our life together? What will be in our best interest there? Here’s one for you. The earth is a star ship moving rapidly through space. None of us will live to see the end of the journey. How we manage our limited resources and how well we live together makes all the difference. What is the actual value of wealth, prosperity, privilege here, now? What do we need to be alive in the what life is all about sense? What is in our best interest? 08/13/2012
46. Polly Woods Ordinary, Blue Ridge Parkway,  Peaks of Otter, VA — May 28, 2012 — An Inn in the woods where Polly Woods met the Ordinary needs of travelers, food and a place to sleep.—Our life becomes meaningful as we find and develop our art, our gift, our life—the life that needs us to live it. It is too easy to live without having a life, without being had by the life that is our life to live—without being seized by a vision of mythic proportions and hurled into a life that we would never have imagined living. Ah, but. Those visions are few and far between. We keep it that way by dismissing everything that comes along as being “not us.” Of course, it’s “not us”! That’s the nature of mythic visions! “Where did that come from?” we are apt to wonder. “What am I thinking?” If our friends aren’t surprised by our behavior, it isn’t much of a vision. Noah built an arc. Jonah fought a big fish. That’s what their life did for them. What ours does for us is still to be seen. But. If we open ourselves to it, it won’t be like it was, and it won’t be like we thought it would be. That’s what an adventure is, you know. Hang on. Enjoy the ride. 08/13/2012
47. Hi Jo, Thanks for inviting me into this part of your world. I’m sorry you are passing through the ache for that which cannot be, the truth of grief and mourning. And I am glad your friend lived a life worthy of being grieved and mourned—may it be so of us all! My best advice is to be real with that which is real to you—and do not make anything less real than it is. Embrace the grief of your friend’s death as you would embrace her in life—and live to keep alive in your own life that which stands out most for you in her life. This way, we keep one another alive long past our own living, and continue the blessing and the grace throughout all eternity. I love you, Jo—and wish the wellness that comes with seeing, hearing, understanding, knowing, doing, and being your way through the long years of the far distant future. 08/14/2012
48. Borax Wagon, Death Valley National Park, CA — This will flash some of you back to “20 Mule Team Borax,” an early version of 18 wheelers delivering borax from the mines to households across the country. — We cannot allow ourselves to be led by our wants, by what we want to happen in each situation as it arises. We have to be able to see past what we want to what needs to happen regardless of what we want. The formula for the kind of life that will transform the world is: Right Seeing, Right Hearing, Right Understanding, Right Knowing, Right Doing, Right Being. Right Being is the product of the rest. Being follows seeing hearing, understanding, knowing and doing. We cannot just “be who we need to be” (which is who we are). We have to work our way into being sources of transformation against our will all the way—yet allowing ourselves to be led along the way by our allegiance to what needs to be done even though, like Jesus in Gethsemane, we want mightily to not do it. We become who we are through many dark nights of wrestling with the angel of death and getting up the next morning to do what needs to be done. This is the magic elixir of life that brings life forth in the Wasteland—the water of life for a parched and barren planet—from us to the world, one apparently insignificant situation at a time. 08/14/2012
49. Hwy 52 Falls, near Fancy Gap, VA — May 3, 2012 — How many points of view are there? How many ideas of the Good are there? How long does it take for an idea of the Good to be recognized as good by all parties? Longer than most of us have to wait. We can’t let that stop us from living in light of our idea of the Good while we wait for the rest of the world to catch up. Somebody has to give them the idea that there is more to the Good than they think. No one has the Good figured out, plotted, mapped out and in place. Back in the days of Women’s Lib, the Buddhists looked around and noticed that in their temples worldwide, the women were doing women’s work and the men were doing men’s work and the women were doing most of the work. Enlightenment doesn’t wake you up to everything. We are always needing to be enlightened, awakened, shown how things are and how they need to be. Of course, that’s what got Jesus crucified. Jesus had a radically new conception of the Good: “Treat everyone as your neighbor. As yourself.” Funny how some people don’t want to wake up, or have their idea of the Good challenged. Jesus didn’t have time to wait for his idea to be acceptable before presenting it. He lived it out and called for its ratification in the time and place of his living. That’s the way it goes with those on the cutting edge of new ideas of the Good. But without them, nothing changes. We can’t wait for everyone to get on board—for everyone to grant permission, nod approval. We have to get out there and call for them to catch up—knowing that by the time they do, we’ll have a newer idea of the Good and they will have to catch up again. Or, maybe, pass us—which would be even better! 08/14/2012
50. Boone Fork Cascade, Blue Ridge Parkway near Blowing Rock, NC — It is discouraging to come up against things we can’t do anything about. Give us Money! Give us Power! Give us Guns! Give us Bombs and Missiles! Give us Standing Armies! Give us Three Wishes! Give us Magic Wands! And, if you can’t give us any of the things that would really help us rearrange the world to our liking, Grant Us Immunity! All of it just puts off the inevitable. At some point—no matter how much stuff we have gathered about us to effect our will and keep us safe—we come up against it. There are things—bad things—we can’t do anything about. What will we do about being impotent, helpless, and at the mercy of a world full of really bad things? How well will we carry on? Toward what? What will we live toward when we cannot live like we want to? Here’s what I’m selling: We live toward who we are in every circumstance, every situation. We live to bring forth who we are in every here and now of our life. We live to meet the damn Cyclops on his terms in all of his myriad manifestations as our Best Self. Life cannot do anything to us that we cannot bring our Best Self forth to meet. For what? For the doing of it. Because that is what we are here to do—to become who we are, to bring ourselves forth within the circumstances that call us forth. We are not here to run from life and hide behind all of the things we hope will protect us. WE are the magic wand we wish we had! We step forth to meet the Cyclops vulnerable, exposed, with nothing but our Best Self on our side. And when the Cyclops laughs and says, “Is that the best you can do?”, we say, “Yeah.” And smile. 08/15/2012
51. View from Sharp Top, Blue Ridge Parkway, Peaks of Otter, VA — May 28, 2012 — Live until you die, that’s what I say. Die living. We are not here to be dead. We are here to be alive. Don’t put it off until you have all your bases covered and there is nothing to worry about. Live every chance you get. This doesn’t mean be stupid. People somehow equate being alive with being stupid, e.g., “Goin’ 90 miles an hour down a dead end road.” Being alive is being connected with the things that are life for you, that bring you to life, infuse you with life, and cause you to forget the passage of time. When something like that comes along, don’t dismiss it. Don’t put it off. Don’t say, “Maybe later, come back another time.” How many things like that do you think there are for you? How many chances do you think you’ll get to be alive, to be at-one with life itself? How long between chances? What do you mean, saying no to life? What are you thinking? Oh, don’t tell me. Let me guess. Responsibilities. Duties. Obligations. And all the things that could happen if you take a chance on life. Listen. To. Me. Work it out. If you stand between what you love, what is life itself, what is calling your name on one side and what everybody thinks you ought to do on the other. Work it out so you can go with your heart. If it blows up on you and everybody says “I told you so,” you can say you took a chance on life and you’ll do it again every chance you get. To not take a chance on life is to be stuck with death—with “nothing but the dead and dying back in my little town.” You’re going to be dead a long time. Live while you can—doing the things that are life, and bring you to life, and bless you with life. And you know what I’m talking about, or will, when it winks at you and asks you if you want to go for a ride—for the ride of your life. 08/15/2012
52. Sunrise: Crater Lake, Crater Lake National Park, OR — We have to do what it takes to do what needs to be done in each situation as it arises. We can’t do what it takes whenever we feel like it and think we are doing anything. We have to be up for every situation, ready for the challenges we find there. Ready for the Cyclops. He’s certainly ready for us! Here he comes again, ready or not—preferably, from his standpoint, not. He loves it when we’re not ready. We have to have what it takes to do what it takes. And where do we get that? I’m glad somebody asked. I was beginning to think I would have to do all this by myself. We get what it takes to do what it takes by getting out of the way of what it takes. We interfere with what it takes by having opinions and preferences and moods and inclinations and judgments—and by being lazy and having our mind on other things. We have to be with it to do what it takes. We have to be in the game. In the moment. Alive to what is happening and what needs to happen and what we need to do about it. Usually, we are off in some other world, wishing we lived somewhere else, with a better life and better choices. We don’t care about having what it takes to do what it takes. Whatever. Meh. We’ll bring our A Game to the game when the game matters to us. Meanwhile, we’ll let the kids fix their own breakfast. Again. Or, we’ll do it like we are not there. Because we wish we weren’t. Again. 08/16/2012
53. Yellow Poplar, Blue Ridge Parkway near Groundhog Mountain, VA — May 17, 2012 — We are generally so frustrated, so depressed and dejected, over our lot—things aren’t going our way—we aren’t where we want to be, or think we ought to be—we can’t get a break—we don’t know what we ought to be doing with our life—or worried because we are (or a child or a parent is) on the edge of being unable to pay our bills, and what are we going to do if this happens, or that does—that we hardly ever take a free breath. “The world is too much with us, late and soon.” William Wordsworth knew us well. It may be some comfort to know it’s been this way with everyone who wasn’t buffered, insulated, and secluded—or in denial—in every age. It is not easy being us, or those like us. Never has been. Never will be. And here we are. This is it. This is the context and circumstances of our life. If we are going to be alive, we are going to have to be alive right here, right now. Come with me. I have a plan. It’s called walking two paths at the same time. Living in three worlds at once. There is the world of the daily grind. You know the one I’m talking about. There is the world of our soul’s true joy. This is the one where the life we are built and called to live could blossom unrestrained. And there is the invisible world of magic, wonder, and incredible possibilities—the world that is the source and foundation of the normal world of apparent, tangible, reality. We have to learn the art of living as a resident of all three worlds. This world is not the only world—and we cannot live in it as though it is! Our place is to remember the other worlds and pay them homage—honoring them and finding ways to make them real in this world. How do we give our soul the opportunity to dance with its true joy? How do we, not only acknowledge, but also live as thresholds to, contact points with, the reality of the invisible world? Giving ourselves the task of working this out will enliven us and transform our relationship with the world that is “too much with us.” Magic still happens! 08/16/2012
54. Field Corn, Rockingham County, NC  — August 16, 2012  — Children comfort themselves with stuffed animals, dolls and blankets. What do you comfort yourself with? Where do you go to be comforted? We do not live well without comforting sources of peace and well-being. It starts out early in the day for me with the cup I use for coffee, and ends with a different cup I use for wine. I have a chairs that rock. I have walking shoes and hiking boots and a camera. Being out with my camera restores my soul. What restores your soul? How often do you go there, do that? We are up against it steadily. We need sources of strength and encouragement. And we cannot make something up. You can’t go to Wal Mart and buy any mug off the self and take much comfort in it. Learning to know what is comforting and what is not is an essential aspect of listening within, of knowing what works for you and what does not. Our comforting amulets are personal, individual. We are known by what we know to bring peace and joy to our souls. We have to attend our souls to know that. Eyes that see, ears that hear and a heart that understands see, hear, and understand soul first and foremost—how things are with soul and what needs to be done about it. If soul is going to be our guide, we have to put ourselves in position to be guided. We have to look, listen, inquire if we are to see, hear and understand. As you undertake this work, you are bringing yourself forth—seeing, hearing, understanding yourself. And living with yourself in ways that are good for you. If you cannot live lovingly with you, you can’t live lovingly with anyone. And the world is dying for those who know how to live lovingly with one another. 08/17/2012
55. NC Wetlands Panorama, Guilford County near Summerfield, NC  — August 16, 2012  — “I love you” means, when I say it, “I will treat you lovingly no matter what—no matter how you act or how I feel. I pledge to you loving treatment, which implies being well received, with kindness, tenderness, gentleness, honor and respect—listened to, heard, understood—not attacked, chastised, criticized, belittled and/or condemned. Loved. You know.” The world is dying to be treated lovingly, but it wants more from us than it can have—and so we have to draw loving lines and say firmly and finally, “No!” when no must be said. And the world will tell us, as it always does, “But if you loved me, you would take care of me the way I want to be taken care of!” To which we reply, “No I wouldn’t,” and leave it at that. 08/17/2012
56. Fall Pond, White Mountains near the Swift River and Kangamangus Highway, NH — The problem with good ideas is that people have different ideas about what is good. The people driving the tanks have an idea that is different from the idea the people have who are running from the tanks. The Tea Party Fringe has an idea that is different from that of the people the Tea Party would displace, oust, eject, remove from view. It’s a problem. How are we ever going to get people with such extreme differences in their idea of what is good to agree on what is good? How are we ever going to live together with such different ideas about what life together should be? “You like to sleep with the window open, I like it closed, so good-bye, good-bye, good-bye!” Hmm. The US was founded by people who wanted a place to do it like they thought it ought to be done. Now, we can’t agree about how it ought to be done. Throw into the mix the people who stand to lose big money (banks, for instance) if we change the way it is being done (more regulation and enforcement, for instance), and they will bankroll anybody who will see that it is done their way. How can we agree how it ought to be done when there are Large Forces at work making sure it is done like they want it to be done? In other words, a fair conversation and negotiation about how it ought to be done is off the table. Great. “Of the people, by the people, for the people” doesn’t mean what it is purported to mean. Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland can’t top this for absurdity. “Look, this is absurd!” How’s that for a start? “Mommy, he’s not wearing any clothes.” The enchanted ones have to perceive the fraud—and stop buying into the idea that their good is of concern to those who talk about being good for them—and begin to see one another as allies and not enemies. Those who talk about “Them” are Them! WE have to talk about WE, meaning all of us, because WE ALL are in the same boat and have to get along. 08/18/2012
57. An Inviting Scene, Blue Ridge Parkway near Doughton Park, NC — June 2012 — I don’t care about what you like or don’t like—tell me about your passion. Tell me what grips you, seizes you, and won’t let you go. Tell me what stirs you to action—what you cannot not do. I know guys who come alive in Lowes or any auto parts store in town. I have no business in either of those places, but they love being there and love what they do with what they find there. Rebuilding an engine is some guy’s truest love. My other wife is a camera, and my other wife is getting used to the idea. This is what I’m talking about when I ask about your passion. What rivals your obligations, duties and responsibilities? What interferes with your other life—the life you are expected to live by those who do only what is expected of them? And if you can’t come up with anything, what are you doing to keep your passions at bay? What are you doing to hold back the waters of life that are trying to flow? If you were to let yourself go, where would you go? If you don’t know where your life is to be found, where do you think it may have been found once when something interfered—pregnancy, perhaps, or the war? What of that can be reclaimed even now, even yet? It is ridiculous to think that we can be alive without being passionately alive—without loving life and being deeply in love with some aspect of life. If we are not so alive, it isn’t because we are deficient somehow, dispassionate, reasonable, logical, practical. It is because we are holding back, afraid, perhaps, of what might happen if we let ourselves love our life, the life that is ours to love. What would our parents think, or our children? How would we explain that our other wife, or husband, is a camera? 08/18/2012
58. Smoky Sunset, Clingman’s Dome (Parking Lot), Great Smoky Mountains National Park, NC/TN — The life that is waiting for us to live it—the life that IS life for us—isn’t likely to be glamorous, wealth-producing, or celebrity-status-establishing. People aren’t likely to be impressed. They may not even notice. But. It’s a life that transforms the world. It works like this: Everyone of us has a future that we impact for better or worse. We don’t get to have no impact on the future. We impact the future by virtue of our place in it. It may not be a difference that makes much of a difference but it makes a difference, and it has the potential of making a significance difference—for better or worse—in the lives of at least some of those who share it with us. As we wake up to how things are and how they also are, and what needs to be done about it with the gifts that are ours to give—living the life that is our life to live—we improve our chances of impacting our future in the right kind of way—in the way that is the right kind of better and the right kind of worse. Better, you understand, is also worse, and worse is also better. The impact of our life, whether it’s the life that is our life to live, or just the life that we find ourselves living, will be better or worse (better and worse, actually). Better for some will be worse for others. Our place is to live in ways that produce the right kind of better and the right kind of worse. The impact of a True Human Being—an Awakened, Enlightened, Human Being—produces and impact upon her or his future that is the right kind of better and the right kind of worse. That is what we are after—not to make everyone happy but to make everyone blessed, whether they know it or not, by virtue of the impact we have on their life, for good and for ill. 08/19/2012
59. Soy Bean Field Panorama, Guilford County, NC — August 16, 2012 — An introvert, that would be me, talking to extraverts, that would be most of you, is like AM talking to FM. When you find yourself saying, “What is he talking about?” don’t blame you or me. It is the nature of the interchange. Introverts can only talk to introverts. Extraverts can only talk to extraverts. When we try to crossover it falls flat. You have to know what I mean before you can understand what I’m saying, and in order to know what I mean, you have to look at the world through the eyes of an introvert—which is a real trick if you’re not one. What I say comes out of my experience with the worlds of my experience, the visible world of normal, apparent, physical reality, and the invisible world of misty, obscure, spiritual reality. I also speak more from a right hemisphere orientation than from a left hemisphere orientation. The left hemisphere favors rational. logical, practical, sequential, laws, rules and recipes. The right hemisphere is comfortable with “sometimes it’s like this and sometimes it’s like that.” And “feel the music and dance.” So, if you find yourself thinking I’m talking nonsense, I am, except to the people who think I’m dead on and it’s about time somebody said so. There are fundamental differences in the way we see, in the way we perceive, reality—both physical and spiritual. It is as though we are speaking in different languages and faulting ourselves or the other for our failure to understand. We understand the way we understand, and we don’t understand something presented to us in another way. So, giving me the benefit of the doubt, we could say that I know what I’m talking about, I just can’t talk about it in a way that makes sense to a lot of you. However, the photos should work around the table and across the board! 08/19/2012
60. Used in Short Talks On Contradiction, etc., Rangeley Lake Reflection, Rangeley, Maine — A healthy point of view is the foundation of a healthy way of life, and that starts with our being transparent to ourselves, aware of where we start and others stop, aware of and doing the work to reconcile our various contradictions—including the one that exists between what we can want and what we can have—and the work of recognizing and coming to terms with what our limits are, and doing what can be done with the context and circumstances of our life to bring forth who we are as a blessing and a grace unto all. The work comes down to seeing how things are and what needs to be done about it and doing it. The work is done on two levels at once. The work is individual and personal, and the work is political and international. It is not enough for black people (and by extension all persons of all races, ages, genders, and religious and sexual orientation) to be who they are, doing the work that is their individual work to do. They must also be on equal standing with all other people, enjoying the full rights and privileges of life in the world. We all work with each other to help with the work that belongs to all of us on individual and political levels. We cannot allow voting rights to be taken away from U.S. citizens—and “born in the U.S.A.” should be a basic guarantee of citizenship. We cannot vote for people who espouse the restriction of rights for other people. We have to join one another in the work to establish, maintain and safeguard the rights of all. We cannot allow those who talk about THEM to divide us. Those who talk about THEM are THEM—the rest of us are WE, and ours is the joint work of providing liberty and justice for all. 08/20/2012
61. Storm Cloud Panorama 02, NewBridge Bank Park, Greensboro Grasshoppers, Greensboro, NC — August 8, 2012 — Money is not the highest value. It is not even in the running. Love, Joy, Peace, Patience, Kindness, Compassion, Grace, Goodness, Gentleness, Self-Control, Loyalty, Honor, Respect, Authenticity, Transparency… The list is long of higher values. We sell out for money. It’s like selling our birthright for a bowl of oatmeal. The revolution is putting money in its place. The revolution is seeing to it that money has no more place in our life than it deserves. We don’t have to wait for some revolutionary leader to step forth. We each do the work of revolution in our own way. We can start with giving our gift away instead of trying to exploit it for our own personal gain. We can look for ways to be good for others for nothing—innocent goodness, with nothing in it for us. We can stop thinking of our value in terms of how much we earn, or are worth, and start thinking of it in terms of how much love we generate, express, exhibit in a day—how lovingly we live each day. It isn’t how little we can spend and how much we make that adds up to a life well-lived, but much of the values that are valuable we can bring forth in each situation as it arises, and in all of our relationships, throughout our lives. 08/20/2012
62. Used in Short Talks On Contradictions, etc., Sea Oats at Sunrise, Cape Hatteras National Seashore, Ocracoke Island, NC — We have an interior life that is more complex and interesting than anything we can generate or arrange in our external life of normal, apparent reality—but it takes attending it to know. Our interior life is home to the “still, small, voice” of pace and timing, direction and guidance. Who takes time to listen, or knows what to listen for, or trusts themselves to what is heard? Our interior life is home to all of the conflicts and contradictions that work their way into our external life in surprising and sometimes disconcerting ways. Why do we shoot ourselves in the foot or wind up in another dead-end relationship again? Carl Jung said, “We cannot hope to be whole without an engaging, vibrant Shadow,” or words to that effect. Our Shadow is part of the Inner World. We think it is something to bury, lock away, escape—not something to engage, appreciate and consult on a regular basis. We think conscious, rational, logical, intellectual reality is the only reality, but it is a small boat afloat upon a dark and heaving sea of unconscious reality that has been in existence long before consciousness came onto the scene. There is more to us than any of us know, but we act as though we know all there is to know—certainly about ourselves—as though the life we proclaim to be our life is our only life but. Heraclitus observed, “You would not find the boundaries of the soul no matter how many paths you traveled, so deep is its measure.” That is how deep WE are. You’d think we would at least be splashing in the shallows, wondering what lived beyond. 08/21/2012
63. NC Wetlands Panorama 02, Guilford County near Summerfield, NC  — I seek to be known, and I hunch we all do, but we have to understand that it is not the “being somebody” in a celebrity kind of way that gets the job done. The life that needs us to live it is the life that makes us known—to ourselves and to others—by bringing us forth and showing us who we are, which is not always who we think we are. We often do not think we have what it takes to live the life that is ours to live (“Not me, take Aaron!”). And are surprised to discover that we do have what it takes after all. All this time, we’ve had our eye on some other life, on some other prize, when the treasure we sought was tucked away inside our own hearts all the while. The life that needs us to live it is not far off, across the ocean, that we should drop everything and go looking for it. It is as close as our heart. We have to be who we are—that is fundamental—but we do not know who we are until we meet ourselves for the first time, so to speak, in living the life that is to be lived, that waits for us to live it. We have to live so as to bring out the beauty within us for all to see. We think, “What beauty?” We only have to get out of the way and there it is. We are as amazed as everyone else is. We didn’t know we had it in us. There is more to us all than meets the eye. 08/21/2012
64. Pines, Near Sunset Beach, NC — Human sacrifice was one of our earliest strategies for appeasing the gods and having things go our way. We were close, but missed the mark. We cheat the gods when we sacrifice someone else’s heart. Human sacrifice is about sacrificing our own heart in the service of the gods—which has always been understood to be in the service of ourselves. Whatever we did for the gods was payment for what we expected to receive from the gods. We gave in order to get. Dying in the service of the gods has to be understood as dying in the service of ourselves. Ours is the task of living the life that is to be lived—the life that needs us to live it. We sacrifice ourselves in that work, in a “Thy will, not mine, be done,” kind of way—and receive in turn life, “pressed down, pouring over, spilling out.” But, there’s a catch. It isn’t like anything we had in mind. “The gods must be crazy.” 08/22/2012
65. Soy Bean Green Panorama, Rockingham County, NC — August 16, 2012 — Cats know their business, Humpback Whales know their business, and we know ours—it just takes us a while to know what we know. It’s the scene in Star Wars with Luke learning to use the light sword. We are in the helmet learning to live the life that is to be lived. “Listen to the Force, Luke.” We don’t know of anyone who listens to the Force and therefore can help us listen to it. The would-be Obi-wans we know could only read to us from some light sword manual. We have to teach ourselves if we are going to learn. When you “listen to the Force,” what are you listening to? When you consult yourself, how do you hear what yourself says? How does your self communicate with you? When you get the “Uh-oh” feeling, what do you get? How do you get it? What’s sending us the “Uh-oh” signal? Who’s there? What’s going on? When we have an “intuition,” what do we have? How do we have it? Put the helmet on and go live your life, listening to the guidance that is trying to get through to us in each situation as it arises. 08/22/2012
66. Used in Short Talks On Contradiction, etc., Highway 163 from Mexican Hat to Monument Valley, Arizona — It is not just a matter of learning to listen to our self, it is also one of listening to—of being able to hear—what we have to say. Jesus said he came not to bring peace, but a sword. The peace that comes with reconciling ourselves to how things are is first the sword of division. William Alexander Percy wrote: “The peace of God it is no peace/but strife closed in the sod/yet children/pray for but one thing/the marvelous peace of God.” Justice at the expense of peace is resentment and hostility. Peace at the expense of justice is disgrace and pretense. We have to work it out. Working it out is dancing beautifully with our conflicts. Peace AND Justice! Peace AND NOT War! How do we make it work? Compromise and negotiation. Transparency and integration. We make it work by bearing the pain of the full truth of how things are—within and without. Division, conflict, contradiction, irreconcilable differences and the like make it seem like war or divorce is the only solution.  Integration is the only solution. We have to integrate the opposites. Our conflicts deepen us, enlarge us, expand us, bring us forth, enable us to engage—and love—ourselves—if we approach them in the right way. We have to square up to how things are and how things also are. On the one hand this, on the other hand that, and on the other hand that over there. If you are going to believe in anything, believe in the value of conflict beautifully danced—and learn to dance beautifully with your conflicts. 08/23/2012
67. Cornfield Sunrise 03, Dinkins Bottom, Yadkin County, NC — July 6, 2012 — Waking up is a matter of seeing what we don’t want to see and doing what we don’t want to do. We wake up against our will. Drawn by that which we cannot resist in a “Thy will, not mine, be done” kind of way. Of course, we do resist it, but we also seek it, hunger and thirst for it and refuse to let go of that which will not let go of us or give us any peace. None of which makes any sense, and leaves us exactly where we have always been: Sitting on our ox, looking for our ox—swimming in the sea wondering where the ocean is. The difference between seeing and not seeing, having and not having, is the difference between getting a joke and not getting it, the difference between observing the shift of an optical illusion and wondering what people are talking about happening when they look at it, the difference between being in love and not having a clue about what it means to be in love. It is not a matter of having anything explained to us. It’s just a matter of waking up to what is always there, and not there at the same time. Our life—the life that is our life to live, the life that is to be lived—is always at hand. Carl Jung said, “We are who we always have been, and who we will be.” The oak is in the acorn. The acorn was yearning to be what it is before it was born—and it was never anything else, even then. So. What do we do? There is nothing to do. What does an acorn do? Or a squealing pig? 08/23/2012
68. Desert Afternoon, Death Valley National Park, CA — Here’s my take (my spin) on the difference between fate and destiny: Fate is what you are born into and cannot do anything about. The time and place of your birth. Your parents. Your birth order. Your gender. Your sexual orientation. Your physical characteristics… The facts that define and limit your world constitute your fate. Your destiny is what you are called to do with your fate. Your destiny is your fate in the sense that you are gifted with these gifts and not those, that you are called to do this with them and not that. You don’t get to choose your destiny any more than you get to choose your fate. Your destiny chooses you. If you don’t choose it back, you are locked into your fate. If you choose it back, your life becomes an adventure wherein you take your fate and see what you can create with it with the gifts you have to work with. Perspective is the most important gift. All of your gifts are gifts to the world. Showing the world how to see is the best thing you can do for it. It begins with seeing, yourself—with your seeing and with your seeing you and everything that constitutes your fate. You change your fate into your destiny by the way you see both. Perspective is the magic wand we wish we had. The Philosopher’s Stone whereby base metal is turned into purest gold. We are not stuck with one perspective, point of view, way of seeing things. It shifts as we take up the work of asking, seeking, knocking, probing, pondering and poking around. Ask questions and ask questions of the answers to your questions. Do not allow people to shut you up! Ask the questions that must be asked, that beg to be asked, and see where it goes. This is the foundation of the spiritual quest, the Hero’s Journey, and the threshold to the unfolding of your destiny. Stick around. There is more to come. 08/24/2012
69. It’s Never Been This Dry, according to Billy Simms, Miller at the Glade Creek Mill, Babcock State Park near Fayetteville, WV — August 24, 2012 — If you are going to believe in anything, believe in your destiny—in the work that is yours to do, the life that is yours to live, the gifts that you are to bring forth as boon and blessing—and work to realize it in the time left for living. We have lost the sense of our individual value due to bad theology and worse preaching, and believe there is nothing for us to do but pray for forgiveness and hope to go to heaven when we die. WHEN WE DIE??? There is LIFE to be lived! Which we neglect—reject—with our belief that everything we touch turns to sin and nothing we do matters. Our life is of essential value to the transformation of the world, and it is waiting on us to live it—to be who we are for the good of the whole. When we are all doing our part, the whole world is blessed. But, we have to believe that we have a part, a destiny, a calling—and do it, live it out. Our destiny is doing our thing and seeing where it goes, where it takes us and what happens along the way. This is the Hero’s Journey—and it waits for us all. 08/24/2012
70. New River Trestle 02, near Fayetteville, WV — August 24, 2012 — We integrate who we are and who we also are and engage the world as one on the way to oneness with herself, with himself. Or not. Fragmentation and disintegration remain attractive options for a high percentage of the planet’s population. There are people past counting who willfully refuse to live on terms other than their own—and actually take their own life or turn to the wall in any number of ways and slowly pout themselves to death because things aren’t more to their liking. Making the best of it is not in their repertoire, and the rest of us have to do what we can without their help or cooperation. But. We have our own work to do, and like the story of the wise and foolish bridesmaids, we have to know where we stop and they start—what can be done, and cannot be done, and must be done—and turn our attention to the work that is ours to do—over the objections of those who think it is our obligation to try to save them by cottoning to their whims and wishes all our life long. Our work is integrating who we are and who we also are in sharing the gifts that are ours with a world dying for the very things we have to offer. To spurn the work, and reject the gifts, and refuse to be who we are for the good of the whole in each situation as it arises is to create a wasteland where life should be, and deepen the delusion that nothing we do matters. 08/25/2012
71. Glade Creek Panorama, Babcock State Park, near Fayetteville, WV — August 24, 2012 — The church of my experience was big on talking about grace and love and little on being gracious and loving. And when it was gracious and loving it was directed to “us” and not to “them.” “They” had to become like “us” if “they” wanted to enjoy the benefits “we” had to bestow. But, the closer you examined those benefits, the less beneficial they came to be. It was a fine line between “us” and “them.” You could become “them” just by asking questions. Certainly by developing a point of view different from the officially sanctioned point of view. And hell was always in the wings, to be hurled as a threat to keep everyone huddled together in the very center of “us.” And we repeated the adages of “usness” like trance-producing spells to keep us all centered in the certainty of “us” and immune to apostasy, heresy, blasphemy and idolatry—none of which could ever hope to be privy to grace and love. You had to deserve grace and love in order to be treated graciously and lovingly. Yet, grace, in my book, is unmerited benevolence, undeserved kindness and love. Funny how it gets redefined and redirected, with all the fun removed, in a place where no fun is allowed except under the most stringent restrictions—which are out of place in an atmosphere of grace and love. All of which is a long way of saying, show me what you have to say. I’m going to believe what I see of you, how I feel about you, years after what you said has been long forgotten. 08/26/2012
72. Sharp Top from the Blue Ridge Parkway, near Peaks of Otter, VA — 08/26/2012 — We would do better if we knew how. We don’t get enough of the right kind of help, and to top it off, they blame it on us, as though it is all our fault. We would do better with better instruction and encouragement. You should have seen my parents, and my grandparents—particularly on my mother’s side. You would never think of blaming me if you knew where I came from, and what I’ve had to deal with along the way, and how little in the way of helpful help I’ve had. I’m certain the same could be said for you. And if not, we need your name and address so we can send the blamers straight to your doorstep when they come along looking down their long noses at us, saying we are the ones. 08/27/2012
73. Still Life with Clouds and Silo 01, near Bedford, VA — August 27, 2012 — We have a life to live beyond, in addition to, to some extent instead of, the life we are living. This is the test, to see how much of our other life we can live in the time left for living. Carl Jung said, “There is within each of us another whom we do not know.” The other one has a life to live too, and we only have one body to share. It’s a problem. It’s our place to get to know as much of the other one of us as we are able—to invite the other one of us into our life, and make room, accommodating, integrating, reconciling our two lives, so that “the other and I are one.” This is the work of being a True Human Being. The Other within holds the key to our soul, knows the deep secrets we are dying to get to (like who we are/also are, what is important, where lies the path to the saving perceptions and the like) and is our Guide to All Things Good. It would be well with us to work out things with our Inner Other but. We have our own ideas about where we want to go, what we want to do, who and how we want to be. Take a look around. We are where we are, and things are as they are with us, as the result of doing what we wanted to do and living the way we thought our life ought to be lived. This is the best we could do. Maybe you are just fine as can be with how things are with you but I’m thinking I could have done better sharing the decision making with The Other Who Lives Within. If you are with me here, we have the rest of our life to form the alliance and figure out how to live together for the good of the whole—and the good of the world. This is the adventure we’ve been hoping for. The Hero’s Journey begins NOW.
74. Sandstone Falls Panorama B, New River Gorge National River, near Hinton, VA — August 26, 2012 — Taking everything into account, seeing everything as it is, putting everything on the table in each situation as it arises, walking around the table, considering the table—what would enable you to set everything you have ever heard aside and allow what is important to come to the surface and do what needs to be done the way it needs to be done including what would be best for you personally? We do not just automatically set ourselves aside for the sake of some other need. Other needs are not automatically more important than our own needs. Some needs are more important than others in different situations. Jesus never did the same thing twice. Would he raise the dead or leave the dead to bury the dead? Would he condemn an innocent fig tree and forgive a guilty woman? Each situation is unique and immune to the imposition of policies and standard operating procedures. We decide in each moment what to do here, now. What would you need to do what is needed? To assess, determine, decide, do? I would suggest airing it out. Talking it over with someone who has no interest in the outcome. Who is not there to sway you one way or another. Who simply listens with understanding, asking questions to clarify their understanding of your perception of the situation but having no stake in your choice. Do you have anyone like that in your life? Are you that kind of listening presence in anyone’s life? Everyone needs what no one has, Who is going to make the first move to be what all of us are dying for? 08/28/2012
75. View from Long Point, New River Gorge National River, near Fayetteville, WV — August 25, 2012 — We are doing everything we can think to do, everything we think needs doing. To do any better, we would have to see better. To see better, we would have to see past all that stands in our way, preventing us from seeing the situation as it arises, the moment as it unfolds, before us. Everything stands in our way. All that we have ever seen, and heard, and thought before. Our ideas stand in our way. Our ideas about good and bad, right and wrong. Our ideas about what should be done and should not be done. We think we are doing right when we do what we have always thought was right—when we do, again, what we have always been told is right. Sometimes, what is right goes against the grain, stands apart from the crowd chanting, “Do what we say! Do what we say!” Sometimes, we have to take the bold risk of doing what we sense is the right thing even though everyone we know is telling us it is the wrong thing. Our opinion about what is right can keep us from seeing, knowing, doing what is right. A prejudice is a pre-judgment, judging something as right or wrong before the time of action. Our prejudices and our inferences and our assumptions and our long-standing convictions and certitude have to go. We have to set them aside and step into each situation as an innocent servant of the good, looking, listening, seeing, hearing, sensing, feeling—open to what is happening and to what needs to happen—ready to do what needs us to do it with the gifts that are ours to bestow as a spontaneous act in the service of life and light and peace—ready to step aside and allow the good to shine through where we stood as blessing and grace upon us all. It’s hard work, but more than worth the effort.
76. Long Rural Highway 02, Virginia State Highway 40 near Smith Mountain Lake Dam (That’s Kudzu about to collapse on the highway and consume all hapless travelers, coming soon to a housing complex near you!) — August 26, 2012 — Believe whatever you want to believe, but don’t let your beliefs, or your principles, or your ideology keep you from seeing and doing what needs to be done. Ideology is no guide. We cannot allow our principles to depict what we do. We have to go where ideology and principles cannot follow: Into what needs to be done no matter what! Of course, we have to be right about what needs to be done. That’s where the problems arise. But, ideology and principles put bras on African and South Pacific native women. A beautiful example of people with eyes to see not seeing. What needs to be done in a situation cannot be imposed on the situation but must be allowed to come forth from the situation. What needs to be done is organic, not artificial. The situation calls for its own solution, apparent to those with ears to hear, eyes to see. What we want to happen in a situation may not be what needs to happen. We have to approach it with no agenda, no designs, but in a good faith commitment to discern the good and do it in a “Thy will, not mine be done,” kind of way. The trick is getting out of the way of the way of that which needs to be done when we are the ones who say what needs to be done. There could be a bit of conflict of interest at work here. Living truthfully means living in light of what we know to be true, transparent to ourselves, aware of how we are living, seeing things as they are and doing what needs to be done about it—in each situation as it arises. It’s all too much for us and so we find ourselves saying, “Just tell us what to believe, Preacher—and what to do!” Never mind that Jesus said, “Pick up your cross daily and follow me!” The Preacher will tell us what to believe, and do, about that. 08/29/2012
77. Cattails and Sharp Top, Peaks of Otter, Blue Ridge Parkway, VA — August 27, 2012 — How do we talk to someone who refuses to hear what we have to say? How do we guarantee good faith commitment to the good of the whole? The big things are out of our hands. We can do everything right and still be trumped by the stupid refusal to cooperate on the part of those whose cooperation is essential to the creation of an environment conducive to “life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness” of everyone else. We are up against it. Helpless. Vulnerable. At the mercy of the merciless hoards. Left only with “Father, Forgive them, they know not what they do.” That’s being generous to a fault, don’t you think? Giving them way too much the benefit of the doubt? “Know not what they do”??? They damn well ought to know what they are doing! Or, at least CARE about whether they know what they are doing or not! They cannot be careless with the lives of others in their hands! “Father, Wake them up to the impact of their living on the lives of others!” Now, that would be a prayer worth praying. “Father, Forgive them” leaves things nicely as they are forever, unchanged and unchanging through long generations of snatch and grab, power to the meanest, most vicious and ruthless among us, who have no business exercising power over anyone ever. A nice little religion of the status quo if there ever was one! Words of Jesus, or words of the church of the status quo? That’s the trouble with thinking the Bible speaks for God. The Bible says what someone says God said. Who stands to gain from what God has to say? Who benefits from a manifesto that keeps the people in their place? At the mercy of the merciless power wielders who “know not what they do” ho, ho, wink, wink, as if? How do we wake people up who have no interest in waking up? Who have nothing to gain from waking up? Who are quite content to exploit every situation for their good at the expense of the good of others? We see how things are and say how things are without mincing words. We play the game under protest, or we quit playing that game and find another way of supporting ourselves and those we love. Tough calls, hard choices. But. Playing along, hoping for a change of heart in those who have no heart is a “sickness unto death.” 08/30/2012
78. Sunflowers, Blue Ridge Parkway near Peaks of Otter, VA — August 26, 2012 — We do what can be done to limit the intrusion of ruthless invasion and tyranny in our life and recognize that ruthless invasion and tyranny form the backdrop of life and has since the beginning of life. The natural world is hell on earth. You don’t want to be a peaceful little earthworm with Robins about. Civilization sets some limits but laws only offer recourse, not immunity, and we have to make the best of it more often than not. I wonder if we could wield a weapon, defending ourselves against ruthless, invasive, violence—without becoming ruthless ourselves. Harry Potter broke the most powerful wand in the world. Frodo, with Gollum’s unintended help, dropped the ring of power into the fires of Mount Doom. Those who wield power become victims of power. Hope seems to reside in vulnerability and innocence. What are we do make of it? Do not trouble yourself with making anything of it! Joseph Campbell says the clear directive of life is: “Get in there and do your thing—and don’t keep score or worry about the outcome!” Or words to that effect. We like to think that we “do our thing” best if we are left alone by the ruthless invaders and tyrants of the world but. Again quoting Campbell: “It took the Cyclops to bring out the hero in Ulysses.” So, who’s to say? And it doesn’t matter anyway, what anyone says. The ruthless invaders and tyrants are part of the landscape in which we “do our thing,” that is, do the work that is ours to do—like it or not. We cannot think in terms of protection and immunity. We have to think only in terms of “doing our thing” in each situation as it arises for the good of the situation—and “not keeping score or worrying about the outcome.” The protection and immunity we need is against dismay and despair over having no protection against ruthless invasion and tyranny.  We need a cultural environment in which people have the freedom and the help they need to wake up and “do their thing,” that is, the work that is theirs to do, without discrimination and injustice. The Bill of Rights is a good beginning point for the right kind of environment. We have to elect the people who will defend these rights and expand them, not erode them in the service of an ideology that is little more than ruthlessness in thin disguise. 08/30/2012
79. Courthouse and Tavern, That would be the Appomattox Courthouse and the Clover Hill Tavern, Appomattox Court House National Historical Park, Appomattox, VA — August 27, 2012 — Just as “The wand chooses the wizard,” so our life chooses us. It is not so much a matter of finding our life as it is realizing what it has always been. We don’t make up something new—we give shape and form to the core characteristics that have shaped and formed us. The important things don’t change. I have always been one to look out windows, pondering, probing, wondering, imagining, curious. I have always been one to wonder where a road goes, and take it to find out—the map is consulted only to find my way back home. I still do that with actual roads, but now I also pick up a word or phrase that has some interest for me, some energy about it, and write it down, and see where it goes. Seeing where things go is more important to me than having things, achieving things, acquiring things, amassing things, owning things… My work is roaming around, looking, seeing, listening, hearing, inquiring, seeing what I can make of things—particularly contrary things, contradictory things. Holding things in creative tension, seeing where it goes. What good is that? That is an illegitimate question to ask of our work. Our work is justified by its value to us—not to anyone else. No one can judge the value of our work but us, and its value is its value to us, what it means to us. Our work is good for us. If it benefits others, fine. If not, fine. Gerard Manley Hopkins said it well: “What I do is me/for that I came.” 08/31/2012
80. Blue Ridge View 02, near Peaks of Otter, VA — August 26, 2012 — I’ve probably said here before that the Buddha recognized three things as the cause of suffering: Fear, Desire and Duty. I’ve added four more things to the list: Greed, Laziness, Arrogance and Stupidity. You could actually group the first six items on the list under Stupidity. In addition to being the root of suffering, Stupidity and its six manifestations prevent the coming forth of ourselves into our life—which plays right into suffering. This leads smoothly into one of the 10,000 Spiritual Laws: We can do what is hard or we can do it the hard way. When we stupidly refuse to do what is hard in bringing forth the life that is our life to live into the life we are living, we suffer. When we live to avoid legitimate suffering, we suffer. Stupidity sinks the ship, or beaches it. I can’t think of anything that wouldn’t be better if people were less stupid about it. But, there is no saving them, or ourselves, from the impact of our choices. Things have to play themselves out. Think you could have prevented the Civil War? World War II? Any war? Any exhibition of Stupidity? In the grip of the consequences, we have to do the work of waking up, squaring up, growing up, and doing what needs to be done in the situation we are in—always looking for the opening, for the shift in the circumstances, that will allow us to break free of the chaos and take up the work that is ours to do—bringing forth the life that is our life to live within the life we are living, which transforms that life and brings peace and hope to life in it. This is the work of the yeast in the dough, the seed in the earth—life coming to life within some stupid choice, transforming the choice and making it the ground of all things good, which does come out of Nazareth after all.
81. Virginia Countryside 03, near Bedford, VA — August 28, 2012 — Every one of us wakes up in a really bad situation from time to time. In every situation, we can live in ways that make things better and we can live in ways that make things worse. The problem is we have no way of knowing which effect what we do is going to have. Very few of us try to make things worse. A large percentage of us do. How to get better at reading the circumstances and mediating peace is a book we all need to read. This is a book we all write out of our own experience. Reading situations, seeing what is happening and what needs to happen and what we can do about it, spontaneously, off the cuff, on the fly, in the moment of our living—and doing it—and seeing where it goes, always ready to see and do again in the dance of life throughout our life is the art of life. This is what we are here to do: Develop and practice the art of life. The primary rule governing our proficiency in the art of living is: No Imposition Allowed! We bring forth, we do not impose! No principles, no policies, no ideology, no doctrine, no agenda (except the agenda of no agenda), no formula, no recipe, no map, no blueprint—just listening, looking, seeing, hearing, trusting, experimenting and learning over time how to read the external signs and signals and how to hear the internal voice of the intuitive guide and trusting what we think we see and hear in acting for what we think is the good of the situation and seeing where it goes. In this, there are no guarantees, no certainties, no assurances. This is the nature of adventure. The moment of our living is an adventure with life, with learning the art of living, with knowing better how to live in the strange and unfamiliar environment of relationships and divided loyalties and conflicts of interest and contradictory aims and values. We are thrown into it, are up against it, and have no idea of what to do about any of it. This is the script of every action-adventure—and it is our own life. We work it out. We learn from our experience. We experiment. We play. We practice, practice, practice. All there is is practice! Look until you see what you are looking at! Listen until you hear what you are listening to! Do what you think needs to be done until you get really good at knowing what needs to be done! Live the adventure! In each situation as it arises! 09/01/2012
82. Used in Short Talks On Contradiction, etc., Sandstone Falls Panorama C, New River Gorge National River, near Hinton, WV — August 25, 2012 — Where do we go to be centered, grounded, focused on how things are, and also are, and what needs to be done about it? Where do we go to speak truthfully about what we are up against and what we can imagine to do about it? What are you up against these days? What are the conflicts and contradictions you are struggling with? Where do you go to talk this out? We need a sounding board as much as we need anything. A sounding board is a compass, a dousing rod, a sextant, a lifeline, salvation. Of course, we have to be doing the work to benefit from a sounding board. The work is waking up, squaring up, growing up, getting up and doing what needs to be done. If we’re not doing the work, we’re just shooting the breeze, loafing around, hanging out. We don’t need a sounding board for that. Most of the people I know have no idea of the work that is theirs to do. They are praying for forgiveness and waiting for Jesus to take them home. Or, they are thinking, “What can we do to sock it away, retire early, have it made?” We should be seeking the work that is ours to do and doing it in the time left for living. That’s where a sounding board comes in. Nothing beats a sounding board for finding our life and living it—finding our work and doing it. But, we have to be looking for a sounding board to help us with the finding. 09/01/2012
83. Boardwalk, Blue Ridge Parkway, Peaks of Otter, VA — 08/27/2012 — No one grows up because they want to. No one thinks growing up is just dandy and they wish they had thought of it years ago. No one grows up because they think a little maturity would be good for them, or because they’ve tried everything else and that didn’t work, so let’s see what growing up will do for them. We grow up against our will. It is not our idea. We do not volunteer for it, or say something on the order of, “I think it’s time I grew up,” and begin, like that, to live a considered life. But we think we can be spiritual because we decide to be. So we pick up a book or two on spiritual growth, or maybe hire a spiritual director, and attend lectures with “soul” in the titles.  Hear this: We do not think our way grown up and we do not think our way spiritual. The two are one, and we get there by having no choice in the matter. By being shanghaied by our life and forced along routes we do not choose in the company of those we would not select to ports of call we cannot imagine. That’s the spiritual journey for you, the Hero’s Journey, the Quest for the Holy Grail, the Search for the Promised Land. You don’t do it in the comfort of your recliner, as you feel like it, when you are in the mood, in charge of your choices and know what you are doing. 09/02/2012
84. This Dogwood Can’t Wait!, Abbott Lake, Peaks of Otter, Blue Ridge Parkway, VA — August 27, 2012 — Our work—the work that is ours to do—which is our life—the life that is ours to live—brings us forth and is the source of our maturity and our spirituality. These are one thing. We are as mature as we are spiritual and we are as spiritual as we are mature. A Buddhist monk who throws tantrums and demands to have his, or her, way is far from being the Buddha. If we choose to pick something up, jogging, say, we can choose to put it down. The life that is ours to live is not ours to choose. “It’s the pirate’s life for me, Gibbs. I have no say in the matter” (Cap. Jack Sparrow). “The pirate’s life” has its equivalent for each of us. We “have no say in the matter.” We do not choose to say, “Thy will, not mine, be done.” We are compelled to say it. We must say it. We say it against our will. We have no choice. Waking up is recognizing how things are—seeing into the heart of things and knowing there is nothing to do but acquiesce to truth. We face up to how things are. We take the life we are living in one hand and the life that is ours to live in the other and work it out. The work to work it out and do the work that is ours to do will grow us up, bring us forth, and develop our spirituality. We don’t become spiritual by changing our vocabulary and attending lectures and reading the holy books, but by living the life that needs us to live it. We can burn incense and ring bells, pray, meditate, and sit Zazen but spirituality goes deeper than the things that are ostensibly spiritual. We can speak the lingo and wear the robes, but a hat and boots do not make us a rider. Riding does not make us a rider. The horse knows. Wanting to be spiritual by taking up spiritual practices is like wanting to be a Buddha by shaving your head. There are no shortcuts to spirituality and maturity. We get to the-two-that-are-one the long way around—by doing the work that is ours to do, living the life that is ours to live. And we cannot do that just because it’s raining and we are bored and think, “Why not?” 09/02/2012
85. Used in Short Talks On Contradiction, etc., Glade Creek Falls 01, Babcock State Park near Fayetteville, WV — August 24, 2012 — The Buddha did what was his to do. Jesus did what was his to do. There is a theme here. You and I have to do what is ours to do. We can’t just make something up: Snowboarding! I like snowboarding! I’ll do that! We have to do what needs us to do it with the gifts that are ours to give. We have to intuit what is ours to do, douse what is ours to do, open ourselves to what is ours to do, be seized by what is ours to do—and do it. Spirituality is the lived realization of the life that is our life to live, the grounding characteristic of a life doing the work that is its work to do. Spirituality is a by-product of living the life that needs us to live it, of doing the work that needs us to do it. Spirituality has nothing to do with doctrine, ideology, belief, or religious practices. Spirituality has everything to do with the alignment of being with doing, so that what we do is who we are: Integration. Wholeness. Harmony. Spirituality has everything to do with faith—understood as trusting ourselves to who we are and seeing where it goes—trusting ourselves to the life that is ours to live and seeing where it goes. It all comes down to doing the work that is ours to do. We have to do the work. There is no substitute for doing the work. This sounds like such a simple formula: Hand ourselves over to our True Life and enjoy the bliss of peace and harmony. Not so fast. Things are complicated by the choices that are forced on us by our circumstances. There is nothing like a forced choice to limit our freedom. One forced choice seems to lead to another and, like that, we are as much in bondage to the life we are living as the Israelites in Egypt were in bondage to theirs. Each of us is Moses to our Israel side. We set ourselves free from the life we are living in order to submit to the life that is ours to live by facing up to how things are and working out the conflicts, integrating the contradictions, reconciling ourselves to our life and our life to ourselves—and repeating the process anew in each situation as it arises all our life long. 09/03/2012
86. Peers House, Appomattox Court House National Historical Park, Appomattox, VA — August 27, 2012 — The plaque in front of this house reads: “From this spot was fired the last shot from the artillery of the Army of Northern Virginia on the morning of April 9^th, 1865” Lee surrendered to Grant on that date, effectively ending the Civil War, though occasional skirmishes continued into June of that year. — History is a downer. Truth is a full body slam. We need someone to help us put our experience of life in a perspective that allows us room to breathe—to help us spin it, if you will, in a way that enables us to remain relatively balanced and reasonably well-defined instead of decimated, devastated and disintegrated. All history has the potential of overwhelming us with hopelessness, despair and depression—personal, national, international, natural… It is a bleak picture that can be painted with the brush of truth. We need a perspective that enables us to look truth in the eye, recognizing it for what it is without needing to pretend otherwise—no denial, diversion, distraction allowed—and without surrendering to the apparent uselessness of standing against the currents of time. How we live in the face of all that is true matters. That it matters is also true. The wonderful old values matter even though it would appear that they don’t stand a chance. Love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, gentleness, generosity, goodness, self-discipline, grace, mercy, justice, loyalty… The list is long. These things stand against greed, corruption, injustice and their kin—and we must stand there with them. In the stories of darkness and death beyond imagining in World War II, there are lights shining brightly. England’s courage. Denmark’s providing escape for the country’s Jewish population to Sweden (and destroying its own naval vessels) prior to German occupation… That list is long as well. These things matter! WE matter! The way we live matters! WE are a light by virtue of the way we live our lives. We may well be the brightest light in somebody’s darkness. We cannot think that we have no impact for good, that we carry no weight, that we do not count. When our perspective begins to turn on us, we need to have a perspective adjustment, in order to pick ourselves up after another full body slam and step back into our life filled with Cyclops’ and do what we can with them all.  If you are going to believe anything, believe what you do matters! And live as though it does! Your whole life long! 09/03/2012
87. Virginia Countryside 02, Appomattox Court House National Historical Park, VA — August 27, 2012 — Each of us is capable of responding as needed to the situation as it arises—of doing what is needed, of being who we are needed to be. But, there is a catch. We have to grow up to do it. We have to be bigger than we are. More gracious than we are. More confident and self-assured and self-reliant than we are. More trusting of ourselves to know what is right when we see it—to know what is called for when we see it. And to care less about avoiding or arranging certain outcomes than we care about being what the situation needs us to be whatever that might me and wherever that might lead. As it currently stands, situations are useful only for levering other situations into position for our personal advancement and exploitation. We use this moment to get to that one, or to avoid that one. We arrange situations to our liking by doing what this situation requires to advance our purposes, goals and agenda in the world. This is called living with our best interest in mind—or, on a national level, serving our national interest at the expense of the interest of every other nation on earth, even of the earth’s interest, of all things. We live to sacrifice every interest but our own. The height of immaturity and self-centeredness. We have to grow up. Everything depends on it. 09/04/2012
88. Sandstone Falls Panorama A, New River Gorge National River near Hinton, WV — August 26, 2012 — We are up against the Facts of Life as a stream is up against its channel. We work our life out within the context and circumstances of our living. Our life shapes—as it is shaped by—the facts that restrict our choices and require things of us, like it or not. We work things out over time. We don’t have a plan that we impose on our lives. We live to see what we can get by with, what we can do, what happens and where it goes. We want things to be different than they are and get depressed and anguished and angry because they are not more like we want them to be. That’s like a stream getting depressed and anguished and angry because its banks are granite instead of sand or mud. The facts that constrain us are the facts that constrain us. How can we bring forth who we are where we are how we are? We have Ideas for our life, for the life we want to be our life—things we want to happen, how we want them to happen and by when. We would do better to have an idea of the life we are built to live—the life that needs us to live it—and to live to serve that idea no matter what. 09/04/2012
89. Roaring Fork Falls Panorama 01, near Mt. Mitchell State Park, NC — September 05, 2012 — We have to get in there and figure it out—taking our lumps, collecting our fair share of embarrassing oversights and dumb moves, and amassing an accumulation of experience to consult for guidance and direction over the course of our life. We just want to know what to do. We want to go straight to perfection. Forget laying the groundwork. Forget paying our dues. Bring on the bliss and glory! Time to wake up now. We have to become proficient in what remains of our life in figuring out what to do with the time left for living. We could start with learning to read the instruction manual. We all came with a manual, you know, on what we do best. Got shelved somewhere around kindergarten when Those Who Know Best And Must Be Pleased decided we should color inside the lines and trees should never be read “because that isn’t how trees are.” It went downhill fast from there. Overnight we learned not to trust ourselves. Well, who do you think is the Keeper of the Manual? That would be ourselves. So, we have to reestablish connections and learn to rely on our intuitive sense of what resonates with us—rebuilding the internal structure that guides the external life. This means we have to get in there and figure it out, and stop worrying about getting it right, now. Getting it right comes with time spent figuring it out. 09/05/2012
90. Crabtree Falls, Blue Ridge Parkway near Little Switzerland, NC — September 05, 2012 — The greatest adventure goes over into drudgery and boredom. Drudgery and boredom are the Cyclops’ two favorite weapons. Anything to get you off the path, out of your art—your life—and into fretting about your art—your life. When we start thinking about our art, our life, we stop doing art, living our life. We begin to pick it apart. Dismantle it. Search for what is wrong, for why it isn’t working, for the reason nothing is happening and we aren’t pumped, excited, thrilled to be doing our art, living our life. Sitting Zazen is the heart of Buddhist life. How boring is that? How long can you just sit there, breathing? How long do you need between sitting sessions to feel as though you’re accomplishing something, getting things done? We have to deal with time on our hands. We have to deal with time in which nothing is happening. There are long stretches between takes—between the action shots, between the times for acting. When the actors aren’t acting, what are they doing? When the artists aren’t arting and the livers aren’t living, what are they doing? What do we do between scenes? Between the times our life needs us to do our thing? We wait. And we do what needs to be done even there. We do what’s next. We ride it out being who we are even there, bringing ourselves forth even there, living even there—between the times—as life there needs to be lived. Kayaking is not all running the chutes and taking the falls and missing the boulders in churning water. The stream flattens out, slows down, bores us out of our minds. Use the time to recover from the past and store up for the future. Receive the moment as you would the thrilling ones. It is all our practice. We practice being who we are wherever we are, whenever we are, however we are. It’s all the same. This moment is the place of our coming forth as we need to come forth to bless and grace the moment. 09/06/2012
91. Sandstone Falls Panorama, New River Gorge National River near Hinton, WV — August 26, 2012 — We cannot approach our spiritual life as though it is an extension of the way we live in the physical world of normal, apparent, reality. We have to shift gears. Slow down. Breathe. The physical world runs on Chronos time, the time of day-timers, calendars, clocks, schedules, anniversaries and all that makes up a day. The spiritual world is Kairos all the way—the right time, the opportune time, the choice time, the time the tomato is ripe and the time the tomato is rotten, the time to act and the time to refrain from acting. We can say we are going to be spiritual by the end of the month, or the year, or the decade, but our spirituality and our maturation come in its own sweet time. There are no cram courses we can take to speed things along. We speed things up—to the extent that they can be sped up—by slowing things down. Walk slowly. Sit quietly. Notice everything. See what you are looking at. Look closer at what catches your eye. Ask. Seek. Knock. Inquire. Probe. Poke, Ponder. Stop. Look. Listen. Wonder. Wander. Stop pushing to know everything—to know what you don’t know. Know what you do know, and what you think you know. Knowing what you need to know will come in its own time, its own way. Our Unconscious—Psyche, or Soul—doles out what we need when we need it, much like Manna from heaven. Want to make Psyche laugh? Give her a schedule. A time limit. A due date. And tap your foot. She loves it when you tap your foot. And scowl, or pout. She’s rolling on the floor now, begging you to stop before she gets the hiccups. 09/06/2012
92. Food for the Journey, Blue Ridge Parkway near Little Switzerland, NC — September 05, 2012 — There’s a hot bumper sticker driving around these days: Socialism Works Until You Run Out Of Other People’s Money. I was a minister for over 40 years. I made my living on other people’s money. Every church and religious organization I know of does the same thing. Those CEO’s whose bonuses are more than the Gross National Product of most Third World Countries? They make the Big Bucks off other people’s money. Bankers. Hedge Fund managers. Insurance moguls. Financial Industry wizards and their entourage. Members of Congress. Members of the Armed Forces. Teachers. Lawyers. Firemen and Police. The list is long of those who make their living off of other people’s money. If we got rid of the Socialists in this country, we wouldn’t have a country. So. What’s the point of that bumper sticker? Poor people have no business getting their hands in the pockets of those WE have our hands in. We cannot talk spirituality without talking politics. How we live is who we are. What we do is who we are. We cannot be all holy and divine and gushing with the spiritual virtues as long as those who are the very least of our brothers and sisters are struggling for survival at the bottom of the financial barrel. The primary difference between those at the top of that barrel and those at the bottom is resources, connections, the right kind of help and good luck. Start the rest of us out where most of the poor and marginalized started out and most of us would be where most of them are. Everybody in this country deserves the freedom—and financial assistance is freedom—to see what they can do with the gifts they were born with. Hungry school children shouldn’t have to subsist on junk food. Their parents shouldn’t have to work two jobs at a minimum wage that cannot pay the rent. No one can be free to be who they are until everyone is free to be who they are—because who we are is dependent upon “liberty and justice for all.” We become who we are through helping one another be who they are. Our place is to give each other a hand—and that would be all others. Our place is to help each other to a place where we free to develop spiritually because our physical needs are being met. We have to create the political climate that supports and encourages spiritual development. Your vote is your hand and the least of your brothers and sisters need a hand, need our help. Being spiritual is being helpful. 09/07/2012
93. Crabtree Falls 02 Detail, Blue Ridge Parkway near Little Switzerland, NC — September 05, 2012 — Being who we are means doing what we do not want to do. It is not all peaches and cream, being who we are. It is hell. “Thy will, not mine, be done” means we become who we are against our will. Integrating ourselves is war with ourselves. To the death. And resurrection. The story of the Christ coming to life in Jesus is the story of the Christ coming to life in every person. Follows the same plot. Practically the same narrative. We save ourselves the trouble by saying it’s about Jesus—that Jesus was THE Christ, THE ONLY son of the Lord God Almighty. Gets it off our backs, sonship, daughterhood, but it is our cross to bear all the way. The story of Jesus becoming the Christ is the story of our becoming the Christ—the particular manifestation of the Christ that is unique to us. If the Cyclops has an infinite number of manifestations, preventing the emergence of the Christ, the Christ is capable of an infinite number of manifestations, coming to life again and again in each one of us on the Hero’s Journey that we are each called to take up and spend what remains of our life completing. All those Bible studies about THE Christ is another method the Cyclops uses to untrack us from our task, our Hero’s Journey, of becoming the Christ ourselves. We think we are doing what THE Christ would have us do when we are actually being faithless to the cause of the Christ we are capable of becoming, denying the Christ within by serving THE Christ without. Our work is to integrate ourselves with ourselves, to become who we are in partnership with who we also are. This was Ulysses work in the Odyssey (Homer’s work, actually, if we read the Odyssey as Homer’s autobiography), and it was Jesus’ work in the Gospels, and it was the Buddha’s work as well. So we can find in the Odyssey and the Gospels and the stories of the Buddha for clues and encouragement for our own work. But. We have to be clear about the work that is ours to do. We are becoming the Christ by being who we are in partnership with who we also are.
94. Mesquite Dunes, Death Valley National Park, CA — Making the Unconscious Conscious is aligning ourselves with the beat of our own drummer. It is discerning the cues and the clues of our Soul’s drift and synchronizing our life with its leanings. Soul speaks a symbolic language which we have to perceive and interpret in order to translate into the life we are living. Soul knowledge is not intellectual, logical, rational—it is not something to be thought and said. It is not information we seek in order to stun and impress with our grasp of the intricacies of the spiritual world. We are seeking to import the right ratio of being and doing into each moment of our life—into each situation as it arises throughout each day of the time left for living—so that the world might be blessed by our presence and awakened by our life and join us in the work of soulful living.
95. Grapes 01, Shelton Vineyards near Dobson, NC — September 09, 2012 — It’s all practice. Our life is our practice. Our practice is our life. It doesn’t matter how you feel about how it’s going, be aware of it, be conscious, be alert, be present, be awake to what is happening and to what needs to be done about it and do it. And don’t think that is going to do the trick for you, turning things around, changing your luck, getting your groove back. It’s just practice. You are practicing seeing what is happening and what needs to be done about it even when it is not going so well, and won’t no matter what you do. This is not about getting things to go well! This is about the practice of seeing what is happening and doing what needs to be done about it even though that is not going to do any good! Print this paragraph out and paste it onto your bathroom mirror, your bedroom mirror, and your refrigerator. The Dali Lama said, referring to the Chinese occupation of Tibet, “When that which is happening has the momentum it is likely to continue to happen no matter what you do in response,” or words to that effect. But this doesn’t mean your response is useless, pointless, futile. The Dali Lama got out of the way. It didn’t stop what was happening, but he avoided a worse outcome by taking flight. When you meet an elephant on the path, get off the path! Do what you can do, but don’t expect it to disappear the elephant! Do not limit yourself to doing only those things which disappear your problem! Maybe you cannot disappear your problem, but you still have choices, options. Pick your best one and take it for a ride! It’s all practice! Practice choosing! Practice riding!
96. Golden Canyon, Death Valley National Park, CA — Do what you would do and make the necessary adjustments to get it like you think it needs to be. You are your own guide to what is right as you deem it to be. So. Sit with your next choice to make until you are clear about what you would do, about what you think needs doing. Do it and make any adjustments that need to be made. If you want to call in those who can broaden your perspective, bringing up for your consideration things you might not see on your own, that’s fine but. When you get it all on the table (to your satisfaction, or to the extent that is possible), then YOU sit with the table until you are clear about what you would do. Listen within. How does your body feel as you consider the table? Let your body take the lead. Being comfortable in your body about a choice is a strong signal that you are clear about what needs to be done, about what you would do—that you are on board with yourself. At-one-ment with you is always a good place to start. This is not to say you won’t have to make adjustments. One thing leads to another. People have weird reactions to your not doing what they want  you to do. There are always things to deal with but. Getting you aligned with you is the first step to wholeness, harmony and transformation. Practice that until you get it down. You’ll amaze yourself. Why would I lie? 09/10/2012
97. The Vineyard, Chateau Morrisette Winery near Floyd, VA — September 10, 2012 — How’s it going? How do you know? Fooling ourselves is what we do best, you know. No—telling ourselves what we want to hear is what we do best. No—shooting ourselves in the foot is what we do best. No—Well, my point is that self-assessments are difficult to make. We can think it’s hopeless and why go on, or we can think we are the captain of our own ship sailing straight to glory, and be wrong on both counts. So. How do we know how it’s going? Listen to your body. Look in the mirror. Notice how you spend your money and how you spend your time—particularly what you spend your time thinking about, and ask yourself, “What does thinking about what I think about keep me from thinking about?” And listen for as long as it takes for the answer to become clear. It’s important that we do a life inventory, evaluation, from time to time. When you look at your life, how do you feel? Emotionally and physically? What physical sensations are you aware of in your body? Listen closely to what they have to say. Let the predominant physical sensation stand out. If it were an object or an image or a scene—so that in showing me the object, image or scene, I would know exactly what it feels like in your body? Sit with the object, image, or scene and ask it to speak, to say what it has to say. Listen deeply, completely. Receive well what is offered. Then ask it what it would like to happen, what it would like for you to do. Receive that well and thank it for its forthrightness and its trust in you. Tell it you need time to process the information, to live with what you have heard, and promise you will continue the conversation soon—and keep the promise. Learning to commune with your body, with your physical senses, is learning to commune with Soul. It is taking prayer to a deeper level. Creating a partnership with the Invisible World. Sharing a life for the good of the whole—the whole that you are and the whole the world is. Sharing the journey of a lifetime. Happy trails! 09/11/2012
98. Grapes 01, Chateau Morrisette Winery near Floyd, VA — September 10, 2012 — Carl Jung said, “Within each of us, there is another whom we do not know.” This Other within was, for Jung, the Self, the organizing center of the Unconscious, the Psyche, the Soul. He thought that it is our life task (the Hero’s Journey) to know this other and collaborate in living our life together—within the terms and conditions of the world in which we live. When we are being “true to ourselves,” we are being true to this invisible core of the Unconscious. We can be “untrue to ourselves.” We can have ends and agendas that do not belong to the Self within. We can live in ways that are at odds with the inner Center. Soullessness is the result of cutting ourselves off from our Soul, from our Center, in living a life of our own design. We begin the work of finding our way back to the Center, to the Self within, by waking up, coming to our senses, and opening ourselves in good faith to the direction and guidance of the invisible world. The bad news is this isn’t a strategy for getting what we want. We hand over what we want. Our place is to effect in the physical world the qualities and values of the spiritual world—to incarnate the heart of the Spirit of Life, giving flesh to Spirit in concrete acts of love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, faithfulness, gentleness, goodness, grace, mercy and all the values that reflect and express life at its best. This is our destiny—to incarnate, reflect and express the heart of life—with the gifts that are ours to give. You do this in your way, as only you can do it. I do it in my way, as only I can do it. We do not do it the same way. We do not live the same life. We live our own life but not serving our own agenda. We serve the agenda of the Self within, bringing forth the values that grace and bless the world. 09/11/2012
99. Roaring Fork Falls 01, Pisgah National Forest near Mt. Mitchell State Park, NC — September 05, 2012 — Listening is wondering, is paying attention, is being awake, attuned to the moment of our living, is sensing what is happening externally and internally, is knowing the impact events are having on our body, is feeling physically what is happening and what needs to be done about it. It’s like playing tennis. You don’t think what to do and do it. Your body responds to the events as they unfold on the court and does what needs to be done in response. A flock of birds in flight moves with the grace of a single organism—is even more graceful that a single bird could be removed from the flock. In the flock something besides thinking is directing the flight of the flock as it does what needs to be done in response to what is happening. You leave the house and know you’ve forgotten something, you can’t remember what. You can’t think your way to what it is but you can think down the checklist: Car keys? No. Glasses? No. Grocery list? No. Umbrella? No. CHECKBOOK! How your body feels between No and Yes is the signal your brain is waiting on. This is the feeling we follow to the Promised Land, overriding it only when circumstances require a detour or a change in direction, like if we turn back to get the checkbook and notice the house is on fire. On one hand, we are always looking for the advantages and thinking of how to exploit a situation for our personal benefit. On another hand, we are getting the Yes/No sense from our body. If we continually, habitually, override the Yes/No sense for the sake of what we take to be advantageous, we cut ourselves off from the guidance that is available to us and have nothing but what we take to be our self-interest to carry us along. It’s a balance we have to strike, when to override, when to follow—a call we have to make, knowing that we are making a call, being “wise as serpents” in one situation and “innocent as doves” in another. Tricky, but an art we must master over the course of our life, listening our way along. 09/12/2012
100. Yellow, Bog Garden, Greensboro, NC — September 12, 2012 — It can be terrifying to encounter the reality of the invisible world. It’s a test of your mettle—to see if you have what it takes to be a partner in the work to be done. Trust works both ways. Your Invisible Other has to trust you not to cut and run at the first sign of resistance to your doing what needs to be done in the visible world. You have to trust your Invisible Other to provide, or help you find, what you need to do the work that is to be done—the work that is your work to do. It starts with your Invisible Other going “BOO!” and seeing if you bail. It might come as a dream, or a nightmare. Terrifying figures of darkness. Here’s what you do. In your dream, or resetting the stage in your imagination after you wake up. Walk right up to the terrifying specter and demand to know what it wants. Ask it straight out: “What do you want from me?” Fold your arms, set your jaw, tap your foot. And receive well everything that comes. When it is your turn, be clear about what you want: Support, stability, safety, insight, courage, guidance…whatever you think will be helpful to you in the adventure you are about to embark on. You want to know you can rely on your Invisible Other to help you find what you need to do what needs to be done. It is not legitimate to ask for fame, fortune, glory, and easy living in high cotton. This is what the two of you are going to work together to do with what remains of your life in the time left for living. It’s as though your Invisible Other is Obi-wan Kenobi, or Yoda, and you are Luke Skywalker with the helmet on learning to live your life. You have to pay attention, open yourself to your feelings, and sense what needs to be done, and do it. You sense what needs to be done like you sense that you forgot something, and you know what to do the way you know it was the checkbook. And it takes practice, practice, practice to develop the art into full-fledged True Human Being-hood. 09/12/2012
101. Footbridge, Peaks of Otter, Blue Ridge Parkway, VA — August 28, 2012 — When it comes to working out our alliance with the invisible world, we are not helplessly at the mercy of forces quite beyond us, compelled to do their bidding as those possessed, entranced. We walk in to the negotiations as full partners in the unfolding of what remains of our life in the time left for living. We possess the power of NO! We aren’t doing anything we don’t agree to do—and no one can make us. This is a point often lost in Orthodox Christianity. God has the power to send us to hell but God cannot force us to do anything we don’t agree to do. The selling point of conventional Christianity is that if we don’t agree, it’s hell to pay. That’s extortion, pure and simple. It’s a shakedown. It’s the process of obtaining favors through fear and threats. A Mob tradition that a God worthy of the title would have no truck with. We need a better motive for throwing in with the invisible world than if we don’t we’ll be sorry. Fulfillment, wholeness, completion, peace of mind, and an interesting, meaningful life are the things I would offer you in return for your good faith commitment to the work of unfolding what remains of your life in the time left for living. And if you weren’t buying, I’d move on, looking for those who can see the inherent value and goodness in what I have to say. We are full partners in the work to bring to fruition—to life in the physical world of normal, apparent, reality—the gifts we have to give in the service of giving concrete existence to spiritual qualities and values—through the quality and value of the life we live. No one can force us to do anything we do not agree to. The invisible world needs our allegiance, our loyalty, our alliance—and it offers in return help along the way. There is a catch. The help we receive is help for the work that is our work to do. It is not help for our agenda, our plan, our idea for our life. It is not help to do what we want to do. It is help to do what truly needs to be done. But we are completely free to spend ourselves in the service of what doesn’t need to be done if we want to. We’ll just be on our own with nothing to guide us but our own sense of greed, or our own sense of fear or duty, or our own variety of laziness and stupidity. And if we decide to go our own way, we always have the option of waking up to the futility of having only our wants and wishes and fears to drive us—and can choose at any time to avail ourselves of the partnership that is always at hand, awaiting our participation. And if we agree to the deal, we still get to say NO! whenever we need to, without negating the partnership, all along the way. We’ll just have to work out the details regarding to what we are willing to do in the service of what needs to be done. 09/13/2012
102. Persimmons, Greensboro, NC — September 12, 2012 — We are full partners with the invisible world in the work of bringing life forth with the gifts we have to give in each situation as it arises in the time left for living. I’m good for sentences like that. It’s one of my gifts. I’m happy to share it with you. My Aunt Lois could Tat like crazy. Christmas ornaments. Baby booties. Gave it away. At the end of her life, she sold some of her work at craft fares and was amazed at what it brought in—and was more comfortable giving it away. Bringing life to life in the time left for living is what we do through the way we respond to the moments, the situations, of our life. It takes the right perspective to respond in the right way. Spirituality is a perspective. It is a point of view. It is a way of looking at things—a way of receiving things, receiving them well, as they need to be received. It is an art to receive people well, to receive situations well, to receive our own moods and shortcomings well—to receive our life well. We have these expectations, you know, these standards, these ideas of how things ought to be. When Jesus said, “Don’t judge,” he meant don’t know what to expect—be surprised—be gracious, gentle and kind—give everyone and every thing the benefit of the doubt, and see where it goes. It takes practice to pull that off. Start with yourself. See how gracious, gentle, kind and receptive you can be with yourself. it’s easier to treat others like that when you can treat yourself like that. Start with the voice you use in doing Self Talk. The tone of voice. How you say what you say. Work on sounding gracious, gentle and kind when you are talking to yourself about yourself. When you get that down work on your vocabulary. You’ll be a humane being in no time. That’s the idea, you know, for all times and places and circumstances. A humane being. All of us. Wow. That would be revolutionary. Which is the other idea. But, one thing at a time. 09/13/2012
103. Used in Short Talks On Contradiction, etc., Yellow Three, Bog Garden, Greensboro, NC — September 13, 2012 — Somebody has to be the grown up here. That would be you. And me. We have to be the grown up in this situation. In each situation as it arises. This is a problem because we are all still growing up. No one is ever Grown Up. It is a process without end. The Spiritual Quest, the Hero’s Journey, is the process of getting ourselves grown up, of maturation, of being able to consistently come forth with a response appropriate to the occasion—of being able to rise to the occasion, every occasion—of being able to take the Cyclops in stride and deal with whatever he throws our way, without missing a beat or losing our place or being out-done or overwhelmed, or falling all to pieces. Integration is putting all the pieces together into a harmonious whole. This is growing up. Maturity. The Heroic Achievement. Spiritual Development. It is the work of the Mandala, the sand paintings of the Buddhist Monks and the Native American tribes of the southwest U.S. Symmetry. Balance. Harmony. Wholeness. Completion. We engage our opposites, our conflicts, our contradictions and bring them together in the creative tension of life—of our own personal life. We grow ourselves up by being the Grown Up we are becoming. The process completes us, and we oversee it, direct it, produce it, act it out by consciously, deliberately, intentionally being what the process enables us to become. I don’t remember who said it but we are sculpting ourselves and are at once, at the same time, simultaneously, the sculptor, the chisel, and the marble. Tricky. And interesting. And the most meaningful way you could ever hope to spend the rest of your life. 09/14/2012
104. New River Gorge Bridge, New River Gorge Historic River near Fayetteville, WV — August 25, 2012 — We have to take care of business and we have to take care of the baby. Business is all that is required to hold life together—including our own rest and recovery. The baby is the Unconscious, vulnerable, easily dismissed and ignored, completely dependent on us for its care and tending—and its coming forth into the world of space and time. If we take care of our responsibilities in both of these areas, we will be due a “well done, good and faithful servant” or two, along with high fives, accolades and a ticker tape parade. It helps to know—and remember—what we are about: Business and the Baby. And to reflect, at various points in the day, on how we are doing with each, and what we might do deepen our awareness of what it means to tend both. 09/14/2012
105. Roaring Fork Falls 03, Pisgah National Forest near Little Switzerland, NC — September 05, 2012 — We work it all our in relation to what is happening in our life—to what has been happening all along the way from then to now. And, we will continue to do that, to work it out in relation to what will happen in our life from not until then.
     
     It is all quite accidental in the sense that anything could have happened—nothing had to be what it was/is—and yet, no matter what happened in our life, we all would be pretty much where we are in our work with coming to terms with the invisible world—with making our peace with how things are and also are—with aligning ourselves with the Unconscious and becoming an increasingly conscious partner in forming the alliance between Consciousness and Unconsciousness in working to do the work that is ours to do in the time left for living.
     
     We are all here, now—you are reading what I am writing in the virtual company of all the others who are reading what I am writing—as a natural extension of the work we all have been doing on our own up to this point. Me writing and you reading is just the next step on the way to wherever it is we will be when we get there—but wherever that is, it will be only a step on the way to somewhere else. There is no landing, no arriving, no settling into some status quo where nothing ever changes and we all think what we are supposed to think—what is the Right Thing To Think—finally having figured it out—until we die.
     
     It is all an unfolding, an emerging, a birthing, an awakening, an ever-deepening, expanding, enlarging realization of how things are and what our place in it, with it, is. And it is all something we realize, something we work out, in relation to what is happening in our life at any given point. Our seeing is the result of what we are grappling with in our life. We wake ourselves up by coming up against something or other all the time.
     
     We think we are awake now, but then, we come up against something else, and, in working through that encounter, we wake up to things we never considered back when we thought we were awake. Where we are going is a dance with where we are and where we have been—a dance of awakening, of realization, of awareness, of consciousness becoming Conscious of itself and Unconsciousness, and how it is all a Great Marriage of wonder unveiling itself before our eyes. I’m glad to be a part of that with you—and I look forward to the dance, and the Marriage, going on and on with us all. 09/15/2012
106. Yellow Two, Bog Garden, Greensboro, NC — September 12, 2012 — Here’s a morning prayer for you, and for all of us: May we see with right seeing. May we hear with right hearing. May we understand with right understanding. May we know with right knowing. May we do with right doing. May we be with right being—in each situation as it arises throughout the time left for living. In this way, may we transform our life, all of life and the cosmos we influence with our presence, one situation at a time, as a blessing and a grace upon all who come our way—all without a plan, a timetable, or an agenda—serving only what needs to be done with the resources and gifts at our disposal: Seeing, Hearing, Understanding, Knowing, Doing, Being. Transforming. Making well. Making whole. Making peace. Amen. May it be so. 09/16/2012
107. Virginia Foothills, near Stuart, VA — September 11, 2012 — Futility, uselessness, pointlessness, hopelessness and the like are the Cyclops Ace In The Hole. When he throws those at us, we stop. Fold it up. Drink heavily and pray for death to hurry. The questions, “So what? Who cares? Why try? What’s the use? What’s the point? What difference does it make? What good would it do?” are the Killer Questions. They take the life right out of us. When we take them up, the Journey ends.
     
     The antidote is to believe and reply, “Even though it’s useless, pointless, hopeless, futile and coming to a very bad end, how we live in the meantime makes all the difference!” Then we smile at the Cyclops and continue the Journey.
     
     We need one another to remind us that how we live makes a difference. By reminding one another, we make a difference and become evidence of the truth we espouse. We make a difference by the quality of our company, by the nature of our presence in each others life.
     
     Think of the people in your life who have made all the difference to you and then tell me that how we live doesn’t matter. How they lived mattered. How you live matters. If you are going to believe anything, believe that—and live as though it is the rock solid truth and ground of your life, because it is!
     
     How you live makes all the difference—the way differences need to be made. It won’t effect the outcome. You’ll still die, lose your teeth and your hearing and all the other stuff that goes. But it will redeem all those losses and render them much more insignificant than your life, because how you live will transform the meantime and make it a place of life and love, goodness and grace for all who come your way. 09/17/2012
108. Used in Short Talks On Contradiction, etc. Sharp Top Reflection, Abbot Lake, Peaks of Otter, Blue Ridge Parkway near Bedford, VA — August 28, 2012 — We are seeking ourselves—to be reunited with the heart of who we are. It is not a quick and easy trip. We assist it when we learn to distinguish between our impulses.
     
     We can be drawn to a lot of things, any of them could have the integration of our opposites—the reconciliation of our contradictions—or the realization and expression of a gift of soul at their core. Not all of them do.
     
     All of the addictions are eddies circling eternally far from the central flow of our life. We can want what we have no business having. The holes we fall into can wake us up but pushing people into holes was never the Buddha’s—or Jesus’—way.
     
     We assist the work of soul by listening to our impulses and discerning which are saying, “Sugar! Beer! Babes and Hunks!” and which are saying “Here is the way that is truly the Way for you here, now.”
     
     How do we know? Practice, practice, practice. And listening to our dreams. And being alert to the drift of our life over time—to the themes and the interests that are reflected in our choices and pattern of behavior. And being particularly sensitive to symbols that attract us in our dreams and waking life.
     
     For instance, for some time now, I have been fascinated for some time now by the idea of magic wands as a way of disappearing evil and entrenching good. Well. I’ve worked imaginatively with the symbol of a wand and have come to realizations I would never have managed otherwise. So notice your symbols and work with them. Play with them. See where they lead you.
     
     They will lead you to yourself. It’s where we’re going, you know. 09/17/2012
109. Crabtree Falls 03, Blue Ridge Parkway near Little Switzerland, NC — September 05, 2012 — Keep watching. Keep listening. Hoping to see what you are looking at. Hoping to hear what you are listening to. And watch everything. Listen to it all.
     
     There is no recipe, no formula, beyond see, hear, understand, know, do, be and stay out of the way. The path meanders. The Journey drags on. We want to hurry things up. “How much LONGER?” “When will we BE there?” This is always as there as it gets.
     
     The process of becoming ourselves, of being who we are, is far from systematic, with ordered, sequential steps from preschool to graduate degree. No one can tell you what to do when, what books to read in what arraignment, what to master and what to ignore.
     
     Watch. Listen. Over time, a pattern will develop, something will emerge, a shift will happen, you will begin to sense a drift of soul, an impulse toward this and away from that—none of which could be predicted but all of which is “right down your alley.” And you will find yourself being moved through your life in accordance with how things need to be in each moment, in each situation as it arises. And all you did was watch, listen, and stay out of the way. 09/18/2012
110. Roaring Fork Falls Detail 02, Pisgah National Forest near Little Switzerland, NC — September 05, 2012 — All we need is a sounding board—someone to hear us to the truth of who we are and how things are with us. By listening carefully to what we have to say, those who hear us deeply enable us to hear what we have to say—and therein lies the transformation.
     
     Seeing and hearing lead to understanding, understanding leads to knowing, knowing leads to action, to doing, and doing results in being—We are what we DO. This is quite different from believing and thinking and saying all the right things while our behavior gives lie to our fine words. We become who we are, not by believing and thinking and talking but by doing what needs to be done, the way it needs to be done, when it needs to be done.
     
     Action/doing/living transforms us—and our acting, doing, living is transformed when we see, hear, understand, know how things are with us and what needs to be done about it. Everything rides on having someone listen us to the truth of who we are and how things are with us.
     
     So, I propose that you look around and find two other people who are doing the work you are doing, or interested in doing the work you are doing. I think three is the minimum number for the kind of listening that is required. One person talks and two people listen. The roles are passed around until everyone has been heard and has heard themselves speak from the depth.
     
     Together you form a listening team that would meet once a month or so for a couple of hours. Parker Palmer’s book “A Hidden Wholeness,” in which he talks about “circles of trust,” would be a worthy guide. And I have posted “Ground Rules For A Community of Innocence” on my Blog (outlandspress.blogspot.com) which offers some guidelines.
     
     The trick is finding people you can trust, who respect one another’s boundaries, and who won’t pry or try to keep the conversation going beyond the time you meet together. If you form a group and would like to email me about process and procedures, I’ll be happy to write you back.
     
     A listening team is a logical next step in the work to see, hear, understand, know, do, be—and I hope you can find a couple of other folks who will join you in the work of transformation. 09/18/2012
111. Sweet Gum Leaf, Bog Garden, Greensboro, NC — September 18, 2012 — What we talk about to our listening team is how the work is going. We become who we are at the expense of who the others in our life want us to be, wish we were—at the expense of who WE want us to be, wish we were. We need the help of those who understand and offer the right kind of help in the right kind of way to have a chance.
     
     We talk about the obstacles without and within and what we are doing, what might be done, to deal with them. We talk about the Cyclops in all of his manifestations. We talk about the difficulties involved in walking two paths at the same time—the path our life in the visible world requires us to live and the path our life in the invisible world requires us to live.
     
     We talk about our dreams and what we understand them to mean, what they seem to be asking of us, saying to us. One reason for meeting once a month is to give ourselves time to collect dreams and work with them, think about them, ponder them before talking about them.
     
     We talk about the symbols that have become significant to us. Carl Jung says “A true symbol appears only when there is a need to express what thought cannot think or what is only divined or felt.” This means the symbol chooses us—we don’t choose the symbol. The symbol offers itself to us as a way of helping us explore the world of the path, the Journey, the world that is opening before us as we take up the work of exploring it.
     
     We might use Internet collections of quotes by Carl Jung as a starting point for what we have to say. Quotations that “click” with us would be a good place to start rummaging around in our exploration into who we have been and who we are becoming. You will find that as you begin talking you’ll have more to say than you think—because saying it brings it up in ways that thinking about what we have to say cannot. As we say it it comes forth. As we think about it, it just shakes its head, wondering when we are going to start talking.
     
     A listening team is a big step. It makes it official, our work to become who we are, against all odds—to see what’s there, what’s there to us, and what’s there to the invisible world. We are saying to ourselves, “Okay. Show me what you got.” So an early thing to talk about is the fear of finding out.
     
     It’ll be great. Let the Revolution begin! Let it begin with you! 09/19/2012
112. Glade Creek Mill Panorama, Babcock State Park near Fayetteville, WV — August 25, 2012 — The “Click Factor” is the organizing principle of life. We move toward what resonates with us on all levels of life. Flowers move toward sunlight. Amoebas move toward food and away from toxins. It is a principle that directs life across the spectrum.
     
     Human beings have developed to the point of being able to think what is good and not have to rely on feeling it. We have created ethical and moral principles, codes, rules and guides to supplant the Click Factor in guiding our behavior and directing our lives. We are paid high salaries to do things that would not Click with anybody under any circumstance. And, we lose our soul in the bargain.
     
     Soul doesn’t understand money. Soul understands Click. If it doesn’t resonate with Soul, Soul has nothing to do with it. We recover our connection with Soul—we find our way back to Soul—by rediscovering the Click Factor and moving toward the things that resonate with us and away from the things that do not.
     
     You might practice strengthening your Click sense by going to restaurants that serve food which Clicks with you in stead of going to the same restaurants you always go to. Go with what you are in the mood for—unless you are on a diet that rules out every good thing that can be eaten!
     
     Practice looking for the Clicks as guiding lights in your life, follow them and see where it goes. 09/19/2012
113. Narrow-Leafed Sunflower, Price Park, Greensboro, NC — September 15, 2012 — We have to know when to stand our ground and when to step aside. When you meet an elephant coming toward you on the path, get off the path. Make a new path. There are things we cannot do anything about. Give them a wide berth. Walk on.
     
     But, don’t take my word for it. Jesus said it first: “When you come upon those who have it in for you, get out of town!” Or words to that effect. Jesus got out of enough towns to know what the deal was there at the Garden of Gethsemane. He could surrender to the Romans, or surrender his integrity or take up arms and join the resistance movement, which would also be surrendering his integrity. His “put away your swords” was his choice that had only one possible outcome—but his integrity remained intact. Sometimes the elephant chases you down. But it’s a rare elephant that goes to that kind of trouble.
     
     Most of the time, standing aside, putting down our sword, letting things play out, is enough to keep the work going that needs to be done in spite of the opposition. We “go on to the next town” and hope to find receptivity there. Eventually, we run out of options and join our ancestors, hoping we left behind enough to provide light and encouragement for others on the way.
     
     We need light and encouragement because it is a judgment call all the way. When to press forward and when to ease up, when to turn around, when to get off the path. What to do when, where, how—maintaining our integrity AND doing the work that is ours to do with compassion and kindness, grace, mercy and peace… Hoping to find those who can receive what we have to offer in the time left for living, and pass it on. 09/20/2012
114. Rural Road BW, Near Smith Mountain Lake, VA — August 27, 2012 — We have to do the work, the work that is ours to do, that needs us to do it. AA is right about working the program. The program I’m talking about is our life, living our own life, the life that is ours to live.
     
     We think it’s automatic. With enough money, life just flows we think. There is nothing automatic about life, about being alive in the deepest sense, about living the life that is our life to live. It takes complete concentration, rapt attention, intentional awareness, deliberate focus. 
     
     Who are we? What are we about? Anybody can spend their life looking for a party and letting the good times roll. There is more to us than that. There is a life in here that is desperate to get out—into the life we are living. The life in here can’t wait to transform that life and bring it into alignment with who we are capable of being and what we are capable of doing for the good of the whole—for the good of every living thing.
     
     It’s our place to mediate the integration, the alignment, of the life we are living with the life that is our life to live. It is not automatic on any level. We have to learn—and use—all of the Right Brain tricks in order to assist the birth of what is coming to be, which would be us in our own life.
     
     Anything poetic, symbolic, imaginative, metaphorical and creative assists that work, and anything literal, logical, rational, factual, actual, tangible and concrete obstructs it. The problem is that we live in a logical, rational, factual world. We have to learn to live in this world as citizens of that world—of the invisible world of symbol and metaphor.
     
     I dreamed last night I was in a cafeteria line and the people around me kept dropping their food. I took that to mean my needs will be met but I’ll have to put up with a lot of absurdity along the way. I may have missed the point of the dream—if so, there will be another one, maybe tonight. My point here is to play with your dreams. Don’t take them literally. See where it goes. The same thing applies to all of the symbols that are meaningful to you. 09/20/2012
115. Bamboo, Bog Garden, Greensboro, NC — September 18, 2012 — “We only want two things, Jim,” says one of my AA buds. “Smooth and easy. That’s the initial attraction of alcohol. It smoothes things out and makes thing easy. At first. Apparently. Then it smashes you and everything you ever thought was good. Smooth is a washboard road in disguise. Easy is hardest thing you’ll ever do.”
     
     Spoken by one who knows.
     
     Forget smooth and easy! Do what’s hard! Bear the pain! Don’t run from the pain! Don’t hide from the pain! The upset! The agony! Discomfort is a natural, legitimate, part of life—especially of the life that devotes itself to seeing, hearing and understanding—to seeing what needs to be done and doing it in each situation as it arises.
     
     To live properly is to be and do what our life needs us to be and do in each moment. The only thing consistent about us is the good we are striving to do. In rising to the occasion, we morph into whatever the moment requires. We become in our response to the moment whatever we need to be in that moment—standing firm in one moment and standing aside in the next.
     
     The only thing that is always wrong is failing to be who the situation needs us to be. The only thing that is always right is offering what is needed out of what we have to give to the here and now of our living.
     
     Rigidity is dereliction of duty, and disastrous. Inflexibility has catastrophic consequences. We think we always have to be the same way in every moment, that we must be “in character” in every situation and never think of doing anything that is “out of character.” That is true only if our “character” is capable of an infinite degree of transfiguration.
     
     Forget smooth and easy! Life is another evening at the Improv! We do not recite lines, we read situations and bring ourselves forth to meet whatever we find there, for the good of all. 09/21/2012
116. Goldenrod, Price Park, Greensboro, NC — September 18, 2012 — We have to hand ourselves over to our circumstances and trust ourselves to have what it takes to find what we need to deal appropriately with whatever comes our way. We spend too much time dreading the awful possibilities, developing anxiety reactions anticipating the unknown, making elaborate plans to counter all imaginable contingencies. The truth is we’ll have to wing it.
     
     Winging it got us where we are, winging it will get us where we are going. We navigated all of the major turning points in our life not knowing what we were doing. We made it all up. Our screw-ups are all attributable to our attempts to apply some intelligently designed over-lay to situations that were developing before our eyes. We pulled out a rulebook with black footprints included like an Arthur Murry Dance Manual and tried to walk through our life following directions.
     
     Our best moves were completely uncalculated. They were driven by instinct and intuition, and caught everyone, ourselves included, totally by surprise. And here we are. Worried about tomorrow and ten years down the road, as though we won’t be able to figure it out. As though the well is dry. As though we are flat out of luck with zero chance of handling anything even slightly out of the ordinary. And have to sit home in the dark with our hands folded in our lap taking shallow breaths to keep everything as it is or it’s over.
     
     We are afraid of tipping the fragile balance we have somehow achieved with our life and losing it all in a single catastrophic stroke. We owe it to ourselves to find out if it is going to be as bad as we are afraid it will be. The Cyclops creates the fear within to stop us in our tracks and bring the Hero’s Journey to a halt. Into the fear! The Journey will make Heroes of us all! 09/22/2012
117. Persimmons 03, Greensboro, NC — September 22, 2012 — The hardest part of photography is waiting. You wait on everything. The light mostly. But then, there is waiting to find the scene, and waiting on the tourists to get out of the way, and waiting on someone to bring the coffee. I’m still waiting on that one.
     
     The people who can be photographers can wait. Even “The Eye” has to be waited on—or, better, “The Eye” has to wait on “the eyes” to hand over control and start seeing what “The Eye” would have them see.
     
     It’s wait, wait, wait and then take fast photos while the light lasts, which is never long enough. It’s amazing how quickly the earth turns, the clouds move, the light disappears. You have to be ready. You have to understand how things work. You have to be willing to forsake sleeping late and dining leisurely at an hour most convenient for you…
     
     In this way, photography is a macrocosm of life. Life is waiting. Waiting on the time to be right. Waiting for the right things to line up in the right way. Waiting for the opportune moment. Then, using the in-between time to reflect on how you did, what you could have done differently, how to do it better the next time, and practice, practice, practice—if only mentally rehearsing the situation you are anticipating.
     
     Rehearsal is a major component in a well-lived life. It doesn’t get nearly enough press or credit. Nobody can be expected to nail a scene—lived or photographed—without preparing for it beforehand. Improv is the result of 10,000 hours of practice on some scene. Improv draws from an expansive repertory of scenes mastered. Life is not accidental—certainly not a well-lived life. Practice. Practice. Practice. Wait. Wait. Wait. That’s the formula, waiting, yes, to be applied. 09/24/2012
118. Katahdin 01, near Millinocket, ME — September 23, 2012 — We spend our life looking for the Big Find, the Big Break, the Right One… It’s all “out there.” To be had. To make ours. And be fulfilled. Happy. Satisfied. Forever. And ever. Amen.
     
     Here’s one for you. It isn’t “out there.” It is “in here.” It is “who we are” that we translate into visible, tangible expression “out there.” We bring the “in here” forth into the “out there.” We articulate the wonder of us into a form that benefits, graces and blesses the “out there.”
     
     We do not become something “out there”—famous, say, or wealthy—that transforms something “in here” into loveable, acceptable, charming and cherished. We interpret the “in here” in a way that transforms the “out there” into more like it ought to be than it is.
     
     We think we are not who we ought to be. We are victims of a super sales job. It’s the “out there” that isn’t what it ought to be! We are here to straighten out the structures and format of the world at large, and the world tells us we are the ones who need to be straightened out—that it is all our fault that things are the way they are.
     
     Thinking we are to blame, we forsake our calling to come forth as we are to redeem and make right, and live out our life thinking there is nothing here to redeem anything or make anything right. All the Wizard within needs is a faithful disciple to make a few waves, turn over a few apple carts, stop tiptoeing on eggshells and wake the world up to the truth of its own misdirection. We are the One we are waiting on. So now, what are we waiting on? 09/24/2012
119. Katahdin 02, near Patten, ME — September 24, 2012 — Our life is not our life. Exploiting every situation to our advantage is not always in our best interest. Our life has a life of its own. Our situations are calling us to life, to live, in ways beyond what is reasonable and customary. We may have to cut against the grain of one world to drift in the current of the other world.
     
     When to do what, where and how is always a problem. We have to work it out. Our tools for the work are eyes that see, ears that hear, a heart that understands and the courage to get up and do what needs to be done in each situation as it arises.
     
     Experience does not provide us with prefabricated over-lays to apply to situations that may appear to be similar to previous situations. Experience teaches us to shut-up, sit down and pay attention to what is happening and what needs to happen in this situation—never mind what is supposed to happen according to the dictates of Those Who Know Best And Must Be Pleased.
     
     It is so hard to make it in this world without resources and support—yet, we ignore the primary resource and support, and spend our time looking for gold in “them thar hills,” carrying Fort Knox with us, within us, every step in in the search for wrong treasure.
     
     Jesus talked about living water and the bread of life and we still think it’s “out there” in heaven after we die. We have to “die” all right—to our idea of what has value and how to avail ourselves of it. Life, “sifted out, pressed down, pouring over” is a simple matter of seeing, hearing, understanding, knowing, doing, being—of attending the life that needs to be lived within us—of bringing forth the “gold” that is striving to come forth as blessing and grace within the situations of our living.
     
     This does not imply preaching any doctrine. It is solely about living the life that is our life to live within the life we are living for the true good of all. We write the book on how to do it by doing it. Nobody knows but us what clicks with us. Nobody but us can tell us when to do what where and how. We are our own baby to birth and bring forth, champion and serve throughout the time left for living. And it all starts now. 09/25/2012
120. Katahdin 03, West Branch of the Penobscot River, Lower end of the 100 Mile Wilderness, on the Golden Road near Millinocket, Maine — September 25, 2012 — The wilderness tends to separate us from all that is false and pretentious about us. The moose and the racoons don’t care who you are, so what’s with the posturing and the affectation? There is no one to be impressed in the wilderness, or to be pleased.
     
     When it’s just us to be pleased, how do we live in ways that are pleasing? How do we decide what to do when we don’t have to do anything? Left to our own devices, what do we devise?
     
     The wilderness gets us down to us. How long can we stand our own company before we need the distractions of civilization to save us from ourselves? What is it about us that we need to escape? How can we hope to be whole if we cannot embrace ourselves?
     
     The entire spiritual enterprise—all of it, I mean—comes down to our relationship with ourselves. There are a number of us. There is the I, the Not I, the Also I, the Not-Yet I, the No-Longer I, the I I Wish I Were, the I I’m Afraid I Am, and the I I’m Called To Be—just to mention the ones I’m most familiar with. It is our place to be on friendly terms with all of the I’s we are.
     
     Our work is to be okay with ourselves, to enjoy our own company, to work out the conflicts and share the joy—within ourselves and with all the other selves who are a part of the world with us. It’s easier to do that with them if we are doing that with us. 09/26/2012
121. Low Tide 04, Stonington, ME — September 26, 2012 — Play with your life! Have fun with what you’re doing. Why not? Does not having fun with what you’re doing make more sense?
     
     The title of one of Paul Watlzlawick’s books is “The Situation is Hopeless, But Not Serious.” We would do well to lessen the degree of seriousness with which we deal with hopeless matters.
     
     Aging, for example, is hopeless. If we live long enough, we’re gong to lose everything. But it isn’t serious. We can enjoy our food without being able to bite into it. Honey, yogurt and oatmeal can carry us a far piece. It’s all in how we look at it, in the weight we ascribe to it.
     
     So it is with a lot of things that weigh us down. Hopeless is not necessarily serious. It’s possible to be hopelessly playful, and have what fun we can with the things that come our way. See what you can do to make me right about this. 09/26/2012
122. Compass Pond, Lower end of the 100 Mile Wilderness, along the Golden Road, near Millinocket, ME — September 25, 2012 — We uphold, support, encourage one another in ways that bring the other forth, that bring out the gifts the other possesses—perhaps to the surprise of all of us!
     
     We are here, in part, to be good for one another, to be safe, caring places for each other to be. We are nurturing, nourishing sources of life bringing life to life. Or not.
     
     Mostly not, in my experience. I have my ideas of what I need to do and other people have their ideas of what I need to do, and there is a wide disparity between my ideas and theirs. I am me best when I am mostly alone, yet, none of us can do it on our own. We need the company of the right kind of people to have a chance. We are not doing a good job as a culture of producing the right kind of people.
     
     The bullies run the show. On all levels. Get a little power and force your way, seems to be the way the world turns. Nothing but power plays and struggles and wars as far as the eye can see. Tell everybody else what to do. Make them do it or be sorry. That is not what we need.
     
     So, we have our work cut out for us. It starts with finding the people who can help us find what we need to bring forth who we are. Those people are pearls of great price. May we all become them in the process of finding them! 09/27/2012
123. Peaceful Scene, Deer Isle, ME — September 27, 2012 — We are all apprentices of the Wizard within. The real magic trick is aligning our will with the will of the Wizard within. Boom! As John Madden would say. Transformation!
     
     The trick with aligning our will with that of the Wizard within is seeing with eyes of compassion. We think we understand when we see with arrogance and contempt, wielding our will with the fervor of fanaticism—laying waste to all countryside’s in the name of what we call good—waking up too late, if at all, to the wanton destruction we unleashed in the service of the wrong ends.
     
     And so it is that the power of transformation does not reside with the powerful, but with those who see into the heart of how things are with hearts that beat at-one with the heart of all creation—and act to bless the world with peace and grace, and whose kindness and tender presence is never forgotten.
124. Katahdin 05, At the Gorge, West Branch of the Penobscot River, lower end of the 100 Mile Wilderness, off the Golden Road near Millinocket, ME — September 25, 2012 — Receive the gifts. Gifts are always coming along. A piece of coconut cream pie that is well beyond the ordinary. Driving along a tree-covered lane. And, for me, a faint odor of cow pens on the wind (What IS it about cow pens? Something else we will never get to the bottom of—but evidence of something within I know not of enjoying things without with which I, personally, can make no connection. And, I’ll bet it is the same with you, though probably not with cow pens).
     
     Gifts are everywhere for those attuned to the shifting nature of the moment, awake to what is presenting itself to you now, looking for someone with eyes to see, to see and acknowledge and appreciate.
     
     Do not let a gift of time and place get by unseen, unacknowledged, unappreciated. Relish them all and hold them in your memory as one might cherish the grace of absolute goodness. 09/28/2012
125. Sieur de Monts 01, Acadia National Park near Bar Harbor, ME — September 28, 2012 — We cannot be conscious—and we cannot take up the work of making the unconscious conscious—without being transparent to ourselves. That means seeing ourselves in action. It means knowing when we are fooling ourselves, kidding ourselves, telling ourselves what we want to hear, and letting ourselves off the hook.
     
     Being transparent to ourselves is being aware of ourselves non-judgmentally. It means being interested in what we are doing, and why we are doing it and what it has to say about us at this particular point in our life. What do our actions say about us? We read our actions as the book on who we are and what we need in the present moment of our life.
     
     Seeing what we are doing is a way of listening to what we are saying with our life. Waking up to what we are doing is a way of waking up to what is going on with us on a deeper level, and opens the door to further inquiry and introspection—which may, or may not, lead us to change the way we are living, but it will certainly lead to knowing better how things are with us, and lead us to wonder what we can do about it beyond what we are already doing.
     
     It all starts with our being transparent to ourselves and seeing where that leads. Awareness is the foundation of transformation. And transformation is a long, okay, endless, series of shifts from who we are to who we need to be.
     
     It’s also called the Hero’s Journey. The first step is knowing. The second step is knowing what to do about what we know. The third step is doing it. Then we repeat the cycle. If you think that’s easy, take it for a walk around the block. 09/28/2012
126. Sunset Silhouette 04, Penobscot Bay, Deer Isle, ME — September 27, 2012 — It is not about thinking. It is about seeing, hearing, and understanding. It is about grasping. It is about getting it.
     
     We do not think our way into getting a joke. It comes as a flash of realization, of awareness, of comprehending. When we see, we say, “Now I see.” See?
     
     The only things that can bring about seeing, hearing and understanding are looking, listening, and inquiring. The people who don’t ask questions have a smaller chance and a longer way to go than the people who ask questions.
     
     Good questions lead to better questions. Bad questions lead to dead ends that are worshiped as The Answer. Answers are only good for more—and better—questions. An answer that doesn’t lead to more questions is no answer. It is death in disguise. Explanations are jokes on those who relish explanations. They think they see and those who see are laughing at the idea that anyone thinks they see.
     
     We are not after answers. We are after seeing, hearing and understanding. Movement into the heart of realization, awareness, comprehension, life. 09/29/2012
127. Heavy Seas 07, Otter Point, Acadia National Park near Bar Harbor, ME — September 29, 2012 — If you are going to pray for anything, pray for courageous curiosity. That’s my recommendation. Courageous curiosity asks the right question at the right time. That’s the critical component in the Hero’s Journey. We don’t know what we need to know, so we have to ask. Innocently. Unknowingly.
     
     We can’t ask what we think is the right question. We ask what we intuit, what we sense, to be the right question. We don’t know what the right question is. What do you want to know? Ask the question. See where it leads. The Journey turns on such instinctive acts of courage. 09/29/2012
128. Harbor Scene 02, Penobscot Bay, Deer Isle, Stonington, ME — September 27, 2012 — The path opens before those who start walking, but it isn’t the path they have in mind. The adventure we get is the one we are ready for, but it isn’t the one we want. When we ask for help, we have to mean it—we have to be ready to receive the help that comes, but it always comes from the most unlikely sources, with the most godawful strings attached. We have to give up our idea for our life and align ourselves with our life’s idea for us.
     
     These are the reason’s the Hero’s Journey is only for heroes. The rest of the people pass and wait for something more their style to come along, which never happens, but they get to comfort themselves with their dreams of how they wish things were, of how things might have been, with the right kind of magic at work in their life.
     
     Magic is everywhere all the time, but it doesn’t meet our standards, and we aren’t impressed. We want the Real Deal with our wishes, wants and dreams being served even as they change into bigger and better wishes, wants and dreams. A new genie every fifteen minutes, a different fairy godmother every night—that’s the kind of magic it would take to make us happy.
     
     Here’s one for you: It isn’t about our happiness. It’s about our living an interesting, meaningful life that asks hard things of us and pulls us forth against our will, birthing us before our eyes, leaving us astounded at the wonder of us. The catch is that we have to let go of our dreams of us to wake up to the wonder of who we are.
     
     Dreams are always smooth and easy. The road to wonder is often difficult and “long, with many a winding turn.” And is often not taken by those who prefer a less tortuous way. 09/30/2012
129. The Dingy, Stonington Harbor, Deer Isle, ME — September 27, 2012 — How do we know what’s helpful and what is not helpful? That’s the best trick in the book of tricks. Not only is it difficult to discern helpful from not helpful at the point of initial inspection, but the matter is further complicated by the fact that what is helpful on one level can often be unhelpful on another level. For example, not going to school or to the dentist can be helpful short term and unhelpful long term. So, what is helpful can be unhelpful and what is unhelpful can be helpful. As they say in the deep south, “It all depends, honey.” The “honey” is what makes that a deep south phrase.
     
     We render this massive complexity manageable with two life-essential strategies. 1) We don’t take it seriously, which enables 2) We approach our life with an orientation of experimentation and playfulness.
     
     We cannot experiment freely if we are not playful. What is helpful, what is unhelpful? What is good, what is bad? What is right, what is wrong? “It all depends, honey.” Sometimes it’s this way, and sometimes it’s that way. Sometimes it’s like this, and sometimes it’s like that.
     
     Sometimes, we have to go with what appears to be helpful and say, “Oops. Never mind. I’m so sorry,” when it becomes evident that we misread the signs and need to get ourselves backed out of there and turned around as soon as possible.
     
     We explore. We experiment. We play. And see where it goes, looking for what is helpful and what is not helpful all the way. 09/30/2012
130. Fog on Cadillac Mountain 03, Acadia National Park near Bar Harbor, ME — September 29, 2012 — We’re just playing around with our life, seeing what works and what doesn’t. Seeing what we need more of and what we need less of. Seeing what resonates with us, clicks with us, calls our name. Seeing where it goes. 09/30/2012
131. The Knife’s Edge, Katahdin Range, Baxter State Park near Millinocket, ME, taken from the Abol Bridge on Golden Road overlooking the west branch of the Penobscot River at the lower end of the 100 Mile Wilderness — September 26, 2012 — We are known by the company we keep, by the people who constitute our family, to whom we may, or may not be, related. Many of us have mothers and fathers we wouldn’t spend any time with if they weren’t our mothers and fathers—and feel as though something is wrong with US for feeling the way we do about them. Well. Chances are, they aren’t good for us on any level.
     
     Toxic personalities can be next of kin. Who are the people who encourage us? Support us? Sustain us? Listen to us and actually hear what we have to say? Without messing with our life? Without fixing us, lecturing to us, advising us, prying into our business and remaking us according to their idea of who we ought to be? Spend time with those people.
     
     Spend time with people who stretch you, deepen you, expand you, enlarge you—in an atmosphere of compassion, kindness, tenderness, respect and trust.
     
     You have your best chance of finding those people by becoming one of them. Like attracts like. When we become who we need, we increase our chances of finding what we need—not by searching for it but by having it just show up.
     
     Of course, the toxic personalities in our life will try to block our development in the direction of health and wellness. “Don’t even pause to wipe it off,” or bother to “shake the dust off your sandals” as you walk into the life that is your life to live, and into the company of those who can help you live it. 10/01/2012
132. Katahdin 11 BW, Baxter State Park near Millinocket, ME — September 25, 2012 — When it isn’t working, trying harder isn’t going to work either. You have to know when to put it down, walk away, give it a rest. Timely breaks make all the difference. And different approaches. Experiment. Play. You stop playing when you try to win.
     
     We call them “games” when there is a winner and a loser, but they are not games. They are contests. Games go easily over into contests, particularly in the hands of those who have to win. With games, the rules are vague, and perhaps nonexistent. With contests, the rules are clear and everyone has to play by them, only it isn’t playing that is going on.
     
     Contests are work, and everything is one the line. We have to win or be consigned forever to the ranks of Those Who Did Not Have What It Takes. Which is ridiculous. We all have what it takes to do what is important.
     
     The Super Bowl is not important. Nothing we win is important. Who we are is important. Being a True Human Being is important. Nobody can be more of a True Human Being than anybody else. True Human Beings are all the same. Completely equal in their Human Beinghood. One.
     
     Of course, this makes being a True Human Being play, not work, and certainly not a contest. Who can get there first? Fastest? With the most Style Points? Those on their way to True Human Beinghood shake their heads over these questions and those like them, and walk away, saddened that no one knows how to play and that everyone thinks keeping score matters. 10/01/2012
133. Walk Through, Inn on the Harbor, Stonington, ME — September 30, 2012 — The words are there in the hearts of the hearers before the speaker speaks them. No one can hear what they have never felt, sensed or thought before hearing it. Words, like seeds, have to fall on fertile ground. Bob Dylan said, “The songs are there. They exist all by themselves just waiting for someone to write them down.” But. The song writers and the speakers get all the credit.
     
     I can only say things that resonate with you. You can’t hear, and probably won’t have anything to do with, anything else. One of the 10,000 spiritual laws is: “You have to know what I mean before you can understand what I say.”
     
     My place in your life is to articulate what you already know to be so but have either never been conscious of it (Have not known what you know) or never had an environment in which it was safe to say—and think—what you have always sensed to be how it is. I simply assist you in the work of consciously forming ideas to create a philosophical foundation to support you in the production of the art of your life.
     
     YOU are the artist. I simply remind you of that and get out of your way. 10/02/2012
134. Maine Sunset 01, Deer Isle — September 27, 2012 — Our work is aligning ourselves with our Self—with the Heart of Who We Are. This Vibrant Core of Life and Being is the Buddha Nature, the Christ Within. We are all the Christ when we are At One with the Heart of Who We Are. Thus comes to realization Jesus’ prayer that “they may be One even as we are One.” At One with our Self we are At One with the Self of each one, of everyone.
     
     Religion, of course, gets in the way. Everyone is warring over whose idea is the Right Idea, whose way is the Only Way. When we stop having to be right and start listening within, we all hear the same thing. All of our hearts beat in tune with compassion and kindness, tenderness, gentleness, mercy, respect, justice and peace. We all appreciate a cup of cold water on a hot day, and are thankful for the hand that offers it to us regardless of the ideas the head the hand belongs to holds.
     
     Our work is to live beyond religion in alignment with the Heart of Who We Are. We have to listen to do that. And hear, and see, and understand—so that we know what is called for in each situation as it arises, and offer cups of cold water to all who are thirsty, and love our enemies, and our neighbors, and ourselves—regardless of race, or creed, or nationality, or gender, or sexual orientation—one Heart beating in tune, in sync, with all Hearts, returning to the Great Oneness from which we all come. 10/02/2012
135. Sieur de Monts 02, Acadia National Park near Bar Harbor, ME — September 27, 2012 — Our work is facing ourselves, listening to ourselves, accepting ourselves, coming to terms with ourselves, squaring up with ourselves, reconciling ourselves with ourselves, working things our with ourselves, finding the way forward with ourselves, living at-one with ourselves.
     
     Our tools in the work to be who we are are instinct and intuition. We live in the service of what resonates with us, clicks with us, winks at us, calls our name. We pay attention to dreams and inclinations and strong emotional responses.
     
     We are always saying something to ourselves, somehow, some way. It’s time we began to pay attention. Our Self has been wanting to get up with us from day one. All we have to do is welcome what is trying to reach us and make our peace with the fact that there are two of us sharing one life. It will be interesting all the way! 10/03/2012
136. Cascade on Cadillac Mountain, Acadia National Park near Bar Harbor, ME — September 28, 2012 — Much of the work of growing up is bringing our budding maturity to meet the rampant, indulgent, immaturity of the masses. This is ridiculous. And the greatest hindrance to our own continued awakening and development—the Cyclops secret weapon. Idiots everywhere.
     
     What good is being awake if you can’t wake up anyone else? We would be better off in a lot of ways if we could just take our place before the Telly and laugh on cue with the canned stuff in the sitcoms! Well. It isn’t an option.
     
     We don’t get to choose our choices, and we cannot unwake ourselves anymore than we can wake up the rest. We are left with bringing our budding maturity to meet the rampant immaturity of the masses, knowing how the awakened ones all have felt being awake in a land of sleepwalkers. Compassion and kindness, kid. Compassion and kindness. 10/03/2012
137. Low Tide 10, Deer Isle-Sedgwick Brdge over Eggemoggin Reach, Maine — September 25, 2012 — We are a bundle of vulnerabilities and need an atmosphere in which we are safe to be who we are while we experiment with becoming who we are built to be. You know what our chances are. Fat and slim. I don’t know what we do about that but. We start with being aware of what we need and how difficult it is to find—without despairing or sinking into gloom or giving up.
     
     We are the champion of our own soul. We can’t be groveling about because it’s difficult. Of course, it is difficult! It would be called the Slacker’s Stroll if it were easy. It’s called the Hero’s Journey for a reason.
     
     Our role is to find a way for our soul to do its thing. I drive the car and carry the equipment, but my soul knows where to place the tripod and how to frame the photograph. Every time I set up the tripod, I think, “This is weird. Why here and not a foot front or back, right or left?” It’s HERE. That’s all I know, or need to know. Someone else is in charge of HERE and NOT THERE.
     
     We are born into a hostile environment. I don’t know why. We will never get to the bottom of it but. Our role is to give our soul a chance. Not to flail about, whining and moaning because it is “so hard,” while our soul rolls its eyes, shakes its head, and wonders what it ever did to wind up with us.
     
     We bring soul to life in the life we are living. That’s our place in the grand scheme of things. It doesn’t matter what the odds are, or how much easier it would be in the right environment. Here we are, and we have work to do. 10/03/2012
138. The Beaver Dam Pond, Acadia National Park near Bar Harbor, ME — September 29, 2012 — We have to be interested in what interests us. Photography interests me, but that’s not the end of the matter. I have to take the photos that interest me. It is a betrayal of something deep within if I take a photograph that does not interest me. It is a lie of soul.
     
     Think of your own life and look around you at the lives of others in this culture—which is too fast becoming a world culture—and ask where are we not guilty of such lies of soul? We have to stop the betrayal of Self. We have to start becoming interested in what interests us.
     
     The entire religious establishment throughout time has been focused on separating us from ourselves. Thought crimes have led beyond excommunication and banishment and shunning—to inquisitions and burnings at the stake and drownings. There is nothing like a few public executions to restrict free thinking and have everyone singing sweetly out of the same hymnbook.
     
     There are no experts. No one can tell us what we are interested in. There are no formulas or recipes or doctrines for the work of soul. No one knows what she, what he, is doing but. We all have done something and we all know what happened when we did it, so we have experience/knowledge of some sort. We know something of what is the way and something of what is not the way. We know something of what works and something of what does not work. That is enough to find the way through the darkness in the company of our own vibrant heart and soul. 10/04/2012
139. Sunset Silhouette 08, Penobscot Bay, Deer Isle, near Stonington, ME — September 27, 2012 — Everybody and every situation are potentially helpful assists in our journey—even those that are evil or agony-producing. How we see what is before us—how we view what is happening to us—is the magic that transforms our experience and assists us along the path.
     
     We have to seek the help we need. What is helpful? Everything is helpful in its own way, but we have to see what we need to make use of it. Only the refusal to be helped, to receive the help that is being offered by whatever is before us, cuts us off from what we need on the path.
     
     Even the Cyclops is helpful. Joseph Campbell said, “It took the Cyclops to bring out the hero in Ulysses.” It all is exactly what we need—“everything is grist for the mill”—but it takes eyes to see to see how it all can be helpful to us on our way.
     
     In order for us to get this to work like it can work, we have to live meditatively, mindfully, open to all the possibilities—without an agenda or a plan, and with plenty of flexibility with regard to our schedule and our destination. Something is always coming along to upset our carefully plotted map for the rest of our life—but it shifts us toward the life that is our life to live, if we are alert to it, open to it, and agreeable.
     
     There is magic in the air, and if we have not worked to develop rational immunities, it will carry us to a life like none we could devise on our own.
140. Katahdin 13 Panorama, Abol Pond, Baxter State Park near Millinocket, ME — September 25, 2012 — Carl Jung coined the phrase “synchronicity” as a way of talking about “meaningful coincidences.” This happens at the exact moment that that happens, and the meaning of the two events coming together at this particular point in your life changes everything for you.
     
     I think of synchronicity as help coming from the strangest, most entirely unpredictable, location at the precise moment you need it most. It happens a lot to those who are attuned to, and enlisted in the service of, the needs of soul.
     
     We aren’t helped “magically” toward ends that we have determined to be valuable, that is, we are not given what we want. We are helped “magically,” I would say, “syncronistically,” toward ends that our soul/Self has determined to be valuable and which we have aligned ourselves with (in a “thy will not mine be done” kind of way).
     
     When we serve soul/Self, things happen that are beyond explanation. And so comes to pass Sheldon Knopp’s observation, “We can experience more than we can understand and we can understand more than we can explain,” or words to that effect. 10/04/2012
141. Bass Lake Fall 01, Moses H. Cone Memorial Park, Blue Ridge Parkway near Blowing Rock, NC — October 5, 2012 — We are as one in the work to be who we are. The shortest distance to the center is the long way around. The spiritual masters who have devoted their lives achieving harmony, awareness and balance have never changed a diaper, can’t drive, and don’t know the first thing about grocery shopping and cooking for a family of five. Give them your life and see how long holiness lasts.
     
     I’m saying we’re all at about the same stage of spiritual development. Those who appear to be more serene don’t have the responsibilities and duties the rest of us have to weigh them down—and the rest of us cannot gauge our degree of spiritual maturity in comparison with those who don’t have our life. Apples and doorknobs here, folks.
     
     We circle the center. Circumambulation is moving slowly around a sacred center. It’s how we live our life, circling closer to who we are over time, but not bagging the quarry with a weekend seminar or a sweat lodge experience. 
     
     We all are equidistant from ourselves. The work is to be who we are, not who someone else—our parents, the church, our partner, spouse, children, etc.—would have us be. Begin with what interests you, resonates with you, clicks with you, stirs something within—and see where it goes. 10/05/2012
142. Price Lake Fall 01, Julian Price Memorial Park, Blue Ridge Parkway near Blowing Rock, NC — October 5, 2012 — When we are alone, we can believe the strangest things about how things are and behave in the weirdest ways. When we are caught up in Mass Mind, we can believe the strangest things about how things are and behave in the weirdest ways. Hard questions are the only protection against encroaching idiocy.
     
     We have to know that we don’t know—that we don’t have a clue—and that certitude and conviction are the twin monsters carrying all thinkers to their untimely demise. Just because things look we say they look doesn’t mean they are what we think they are or mean what we say they mean. There are always other interpretations!
     
     Reasonable people can look at the facts in any situation and fail to agree about what meaning to ascribe to them, and what to do about them. Reasonable people can, and usually do, disagree. Whenever you have agreement in any group for any length of time, the group is either not thinking clearly or it is not free to question the conclusions of the group.
     
     We have to foster conflict and disagreement—that is the key to creativity and maturity. When anyone’s word is taken as the Last Word, it’s all over. The Dali Lama doesn’t have the last word on anything. Neither do any of the gurus who write and speak with such assurance about things nobody can know anything about. Jesus himself said he didn’t have the last word (“You’ll do greater things than I did”). No one is the Authority, the Expert, the One Who Knows. And those who claim to be create pain and suffering for everyone else.
     
     Question everything! Take everything with a “grain of salt.” Adopt Missouri’s “Show me” attitude. Probe, explore, inquire, experiment, examine, ask, seek, knock… The way opens before those who abandon all their solid convictions about what constitutes the way. 10/06/2012
143. Sieur de Monts, Acadia National Park near Bar Harbor, ME — September 27, 2012 — We throw our lives away in a lot of ways. Everything about the culture—any culture, every culture—is designed to take our minds off the emptiness of our lives. “Give them bread and circuses (that would be the gladiators killing one another in the coliseum) was the Roman solution to The Problem.
     
     We have a bevy of addictions to choose from: Television being high on a lot of lists. Shopping, sex, drugs, alcoholism, religion and work are also there. Prosperity is not the solution to all of our problems. Throwing money at emptiness is a laughter. Meaning is one thing money can’t buy.
     
     What we need is counter-cultural from the start. Reflection. Introspection. Self-examination. Asking what do we need instead of what do we want (What does wanting know?). Hearing, seeing, understanding how it is with our soul, what our soul is asking of us, how we need to change our life in order to live aligned with the heart of who we are.
     
     The answers to the questions of soul do not come in the form of a computer printout with a sequential list of things to do to be soulful. We work it out with our soul over time by learning its language and sitting with it in meditative contemplation—reading our dreams and our emotional reactivity, our moods, interests and inclinations.
     
     Soul is saying something to us all the time. We have to take the time to attend the inner dialogue that is waiting to happen—and see where it goes, which will be far more engrossing than anything we have been able to devise on our own. 10/06/2012
144. If I were going to sit down with a group of three of you, I’d ask you what brought you to the group and what would it take to bring you back. We would have to know what you are looking for, what you are seeking. We would have to name the hunger. So. What would bring you there? What would bring you back? 10/06/2012
145. Low Tide 05, Stonington Harbor, Deer Isle, ME — September 26, 2012 — Reasonable people can look at the facts and disagree about what the facts mean and about what to do about them. This means conflict and disharmony are integral aspects of the makeup of the way things are—and essential to our own development and the maturation of our perspective.
     
     The maturation of perspective IS the spiritual journey. The way we see “the facts”—that would be how things are and what needs to be done about them—changes over the course of our life. We do not see things the way we once did—or the way we will see them, if we keep seeing our seeing and thinking about our thinking and looking at things from different points of view.
     
     There is no one right way to see—to interpret what we see—to say what it means and what needs to be done about it. There is the way we see here and now, but that may well change by the time we get to then and there. But. We have to live now on the basis of how we perceive and interpret (really one thing—perception IS interpretation) what is happening in the current situation and what we think needs to be done about it. And. That means we can be more compassionate, receptive, kind and considerate about points of view that conflict with our own—and use the opportunity for conversation with the opposing points of view to enlarge and deepen our own.
     
     We do not have to kill our enemies. Loving our enemies means listening to them and allowing conversation with them to transform the way we perceive/interpret how things are and what needs to be done about them. But. We still have to protect ourselves against the intrusion of toxic personalities even as we wonder about the nature of our own vulnerabilities and what we might do to reduce them—and thereby reduce the toxicity of those who threaten our stability and our integrity. 10/07/2012
146. October Morning, Blue Ridge Parkway near Boone, NC — October 5, 2012 — Mandalas (A Hindu word meaning “magic circle”) are, as you might guess from the meaning of the term, generally circles, but they also come as rectangles, “quadrangular mandalas.” Mandalas, in whatever shape, are a means of putting ourselves back in harmony with the heart of who we are.
     
     As we create or contemplate mandalas as circles representing wholeness, or as quadrangles with their four corners—a number traditionally associated with wholeness and completion—we participate in the restoration of “a lost inner balance” (Marie Louise von Franz), and recover our “loss of soul” that primal peoples understood as the basis of illness and ennui.
     
     It may be that being born into the physical universe is enough of a shock to our interconnection with the invisible world to warrant the work of reestablishing contact with “the regulating center of (our) soul” (von Franz), but some birth environments can be so harsh as to guarantee that work will need to be done.
     
     If we are born into a culture and/or a family where respect for individual differences is non-existent, it will be as though our soul is surgically removed at birth, and we will spend a lifetime trying to restore the lifeline. For many of us, this becomes the essential task of life in the time left for living.
     
     I have come to recognize my photography as mandala work. Each photograph is my attempt to reestablish the lost harmony with the heart of who I am, to recover my alignment with and allegiance to the soul/Self within. von Franz writes, “The contemplation of a mandala is meant to bring an inner peace, a feeling that life again has found its meaning and order.” I couldn’t have said it better myself. 10/07/2012
147. Rough Ridge Bridge 02, Blue Ridge Parkway near Blowing Rock, NC — October 5, 2012 — Physical limitations are real limitations. We do not get help from the invisible world to Zot the Cyclops in any of his manifestations from our path. We have to work it out, living from the heart of who we are within the terms and conditions of life in this world.
     
     But this is good. It keeps our feet on the ground. It prevents us from drifting off—as a number of Gurus, spiritual leaders, and media ministers have done in our lifetime. Our spirituality is no free pass to glory. We have to deal daily with the aggravations and restrictions of normal life—and do it in a way that exhibits and expresses the values and qualities at the heart of who we are.
     
     This is the work of a true human being. We live with a foot in each world, visible and invisible. We walk two paths at the same time. I yearn to drift leisurely from one photo-worthy scene to the next and I tackle soap scum in the shower and debris in the gutters, shop for groceries and prepare meals, deal with dental issues and keep an eye on my cholesterol numbers.
     
     We have to work it out. We have to do the work. There is no escape from the regimen of getting up each day and finding ways to fit that world into this one. We want to be excused, to be delivered, to be free of the burden of this world, but it is this world which calls forth the specific expressions of grace and compassion that world is good for. That world needs this world to form and shape its blessings in discernible and wondrous ways.
     
     That world needs us in this world to bestow its gifts in ways that redeem and transform the experience of life in this world—and we want to escape the experience that calls for what we have to offer. We pray for the Cyclops to be Zotted, for our way to be swept clean. We don’t want to do the work of blessing and grace. And that world waits for us to wake up to the truth of how things are, so we might do what can be done about it in the time left for living. 10/08/2012
148. Sieur de Monts 05, Acadia National Park near Bar Harbor, ME — September 28, 2012 — Those who belong together find their way together IF they listen to their inner guides and trust their instinct and intuition. We find what we need to live out of the heart of who we are in our relationships with those who are looking for what they need to live out of the heart of who they are. The right kind of company forms the right kind of community that brings forth the individuals who comprise the community in their full integrity and uniqueness.
     
     There is no forsaking oneself for the sake of the whole in the right kind of community. The whole serves the individual selves who constitute the whole. The right kind of community understands each individual to be the savior of the world, and creates an environment in which the individuals are honored, respected, and enabled to be who they are and present their gifts for the good of all people everywhere.
     
     As we work to become ourselves, we find our way—one might say magically—into the company of those who are working to become themselves, and together form a community that assists us in that work and calls others to join us in it for the transformation of all of life. If this sounds grandiose to you, prove me wrong by giving it your best shot and seeing where it goes. 10/08/2012
149. Used in Short Talks On Contradiction, etc., Lobster Buoy, Goose Cove, Penobscot Bay, Deer Isle, ME — September 27, 2012 — The joke is on us when we fail/refuse to wake up and be fully present in the moment of our living—attuned to what is happening beyond what we think is happening or expect to be happening. Waking up is seeing beneath the surface, into the heart of how things are, knowing what is going on and what needs to be done about it.
     
     When we refuse/fail to live this way, it’s no wonder that things turn out like they do. “We do it to our own self,” as they say in the deep south. Or, as Jesus would say, “You all have eyes to see, ears to hear and a heart to understand—why don’t you use them!?!” Our only pertinent rejoinder is: “We could use a lot more help than we get.”
     
     We could be around people who are awake, for one thing, or, at least, who are working to be awake. Most of us have never seen an awake human being. Most of the people we have ever known are cows following a worn path from the barn to the pasture and back to the barn. We cannot be expected to be more awake than the people we spend our time with.
     
     Part of the work to wake up is finding people to help us in the work of waking up. Who can see things from more than one (the usual and customary) perspective. Who can live in the tension of contradictions and contraries. Who can imagine a number of alternative responses to events and circumstances. Who keep the door open to new ways of thinking. Who see possibilities and options wherever they look. Who ask, seek, knock, poke, probe, ponder, examine, explore, experiment and never tire of digging for gold in the most unlikely places.
     
     May we all have who we need to help us become who we have the capacity to be throughout the journey that never ends!
150. Used in Short Talks On Contradiction, etc., Fog in the Valley 02, Blue Ridge Parkway near Boone, NC — October 5, 2012 — We are at the same time completely vulnerable and capable of exercising inordinate influence upon the events and circumstances of our life—and upon the people whose lives intersect ours. To a considerable extent, we are the pivot upon which the future turns. And we cannot remember where we put the car keys, and worry ourselves awake all night about nonexistent termites gnawing away at the foundation of our house.
     
     One tendency does not rule out the other. We are a bundle of contradictions. Our place is to see to it that we do not cancel ourselves out—that we do not allow our vulnerabilities to keep us from offering the blessing and grace of our presence to the time and place of our living.
     
     Live the contradictions! You know what to say that completely diffuses an explosive situation and you don’t know where you put the car keys. We are vulnerable in some places and flirt with omnipotence in others.
     
      Knowing we have strong tendencies in both directions keeps our vulnerabilities from sinking us into despondency and prevents our near omnipotence from rising us to the heights of arrogance and egotism. Who we are in any moment is neatly balanced by who we also are, and we offer our gifts with the humility of those who know how easily we could have left them with wherever the keys are.
151. The Canoe at Fish Creek, Penobscot Bay, Deer Isle, ME — September 27, 2012 — We have a set of “every day” stainless steel flatware at our house that we have used for years. Eight pieces of everything. About half the spoons show signs of garbage disposal experience. One of those has been banged up so many times that its days of useful service is over. If I use it at all it is to stir my morning coffee. Why that one spoon?
     
     We used them all equally. They all had the same chance of falling into the disposal and having someone turn it on with the spoon inside. Why was that particular one singled out to receive damage far beyond what the odds would predict?
     
     We will never get to the bottom of it. That’s just the way it is.
     
     Your life is like that. Things happen you don’t deserve. You get more than your fair share of disposal experiences. Don’t sit trying to figure it out—trying to get the gods or the universe on your side. Sacrificing virgins. Giving your last penny to the church. Rubbing a rabbit’s foot (How can that possibly bring you luck? It didn’t do the rabbit one bit of good!). Thinking positively so as to attract prosperity.
     
     The things that happen to us are just the things that happen to us. They are not portioned out according to some fairness scale, some Who Deserves What Now schedule. Our place is to deal with it without losing our place—without getting untracked, off the beam, lost among all those wandering without hope, or purpose, or meaning in their life. “Don’t even pause to wipe it off or wonder about it!”
     
     It’s just something else the Cyclops puts in our way to keep us from living aligned with the heart of who we are, allied with our soul in the work to bring it forth within the terms and conditions of our life no matter what they are, being sources of blessing and grace in all circumstances, rising to every occasion, leading the revolution, transforming the world.

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05/03/2012 –07/12/2012

1. Dandelions, Blue Ridge Parkway, near Orchard Gap, VA—May 1, 2012 —If we saw the truth we would have to do something about it. Better not to look. The truth I’m talking about is the truth of how things are (which includes how things also are). The truth of our life. The truth is the bed we sleep in at night and the world we wake up to each morning. To see that truth exactly as it is is to have to do something about it. Better to not know. Better to just go through the daily routine. Nodding when we are supposed to nod. Smiling when we are supposed to smile. Reading our lines off the invisible script that everybody reads their lines from. Keeping things nicely in place. Never saying anything remotely similar to the child’s exclamation in The Emperor’s New Clothes, “But Mommy! He doesn’t have anything on!” Things change when we see them for what they are. Better not to look. 05/03/2012
2. Blue Ridge Pond, Blue Ridge Parkway near Rocky Knob, VA—May 1, 2012 —Too many of us are aimlessly wandering through our life, bouncing from one entertaining pastime to another, hanging out, looking for something fun to do. Too few of us are conscious of aligning ourselves with our life—the life that calls us to live it—following our life’s meandering through the events and circumstances of our living, unfolding our life, serving our life, doing the things that exhibit and express the heart and soul of our life, ourselves, in the time left for living. How to move from being adrift at sea to piloting our boat on its path through the waves is the work of waking up—seeing, hearing, understanding, knowing, doing, being—and becoming who we are. 05/04/2012
3. Storm Clouds, Blue Ridge farm north of Rocky Knob, VA—May 01, 2012 — It takes a while to adjust ourselves to what has to be done. We take an emotional hit when life hits us with a body slam, a choke hold and a doubleknee armbreaker all at once with no referee in sight. We have to lie there for a while, barely breathing. We cannot expect that we should act normal in the aftermath of jolts of roller-coaster variety to life as we have known it. We have to sit with it for a while and work at getting ourselves squared up with the idea of how things are NOW. How long? Longer than you want it to be but not as long as you are afraid it might be. Just sit. Just breathe. Let the magic of emotional accommodation to life’s wild gyrations do its work. We may walk with a limp, but for now, sitting, breathing. 05/04/2012
4. Pink Lady Slippers, Blue Ridge Parkway near Orchard Gap, VA—May 01, 2012 —Rumi said, “Let yourself be silently drawn by the stronger pull of what you really love.” If you can find better advice, take it! 05/04/2012
5. Storm Clouds, Blue Ridge Parkway farm near Rocky Knob, VA—May 01, 2012 —We have too much to tend to but we can’t let that stop us. We have a life to live in, around and through all the stuff life throws at us. The hollow-eyed, empty, soulless ones around us have lost the life-line, the connection with that which is deepest, best and truest about them, with that which needs them to bring it forth and give it form—exhibit it, express it and make it real—in the time of their living. We cannot allow that to happen to us. We cannot be so caught up in, threatened by, afraid of the things that come at us in life that we forget to be alive, that we fail to live in the time left for living. The important thing—the central thing—is to live the life that is ours to live within the swirling whirl of all that competes for our attention. This is called walking two paths at the same time. We can bring ourselves forth AND go for our chemo treatments AND get the dog to the vet AND babysit the grandchildren or get the children to their appointments and obligations AND … We can bring ourselves forth amid all the things that normally separate us from ourselves and keep us from getting to the life that is ours to live. Takes concentration and focus, but we can concentrate and be focused. Takes knowing who we are and what is ours to give, to do, but we can remember to find the center and live out of the core. This is not hard. It only requires us to maintain our relationship with the Point Of View that sees things as they are and what to do about it in each situation as it arises—even when several situations arise at once. 05/05/2012
6. Working the Vetch, Along the Path, Piedmont Land Conservancy trail, Greensboro, NC—April 2012 —How we respond to what happens sets the stage for what follows what happens but. We can’t just say, “I’m going to respond better to everything that happens.” Our response is governed by the level of our maturity, which is a measure of our awareness—which includes self-awareness so that we are aware of ourselves reacting, aware of situations which punch our buttons, aware of our history or reacting in situations similar to the situation we currently face, aware of as much as we can be aware of across the board, around the table. Awareness modifies our reactions which shifts our relationships and interchanges and changes our life, one would think for the better. Growing up is growing in awareness which is an ongoing process. Grown Up is not a steady state of being. We are always and forever Growing Up. Becoming Aware. Waking Up. Seeing. Hearing. Understanding. And changing the way we respond to our life by seeing things differently—by seeing things. 05/05/2012
7. Along the Parkway, Blue Ridge Parkway near Orchard Gap, VA—May 01, 2012 —Play it out. See where it goes. Express what is yours to express in each moment, in each situation as it arises. This doesn’t mean say what is on your mind. It means bring forth your gift, your genius, who you ARE, holding nothing back—Why hold anything back?—in the time left for living. It means live to exhibit the truth of you, of who YOU are, in the time that remains. And, if you don’t know who you are, what your gifts are, what your genius is, live to find out. Do not dismiss any of it—not you, not your gifts, not your genius, not the context and circumstances of your life. Believe in it all. You are the only you there is or ever has been or ever will be. Do not throw you away because you aren’t who you wish you were. Nothing good could come from Nazareth, you know. The pearl of great price is the stone the builders reject. Give yourself, your situation, the benefit of the doubt and live to see what you can do with what you have at your disposal before you die. Do not die before you are dead! Live to find out who you are, what you can do. Surprise yourself. 05/06/2012
8. Mesquite Dunes, Death Valley National Park, CA—Rumi said: “When you eventually see through the veils to how things really are, you will keep saying again and again, “This is certainly not like we thought it was!” (From The Essential Rumi, translated by Coleman Barks). 05/06/2012
9. Buttercups, Blue Ridge Parkway near Meadows of Dan, VA—May 01, 2012 —What keeps you going? That’s the mystery. One of them, anyway. We are still here. And, by now, we know that none of the things we live for lasts. Our continued existence is the most irrational thing about us. “It’s hopeless, pointless, useless, futile and coming to a very bad end,” yet, here we are. And I, for one, am certain that “how we live in the meantime makes all the difference.” How we live with one another makes all the difference. We matter to each other. We keep one another going. Because. It. Is. Important. Why? That’s the mystery, or one of them, anyway. It is important to our life that we live it. Do not think of your life as something you create, generate, oversee and direct. Think of you as something your life creates, generates, oversees and directs. Our life needs us to live it. We try to figure it out and run a cost/benefit analysis from time to time to make sure we are getting enough out of it when it is not something that can be logically deduced or rationally justified or scientifically explained. It is a spiritual affair entirely. We keep going because we must. We don’t know why. If we quit before it is over we betray ourselves, one another, all others and everything that matters. Something has a stake in us. Something is betting on us, counting on us, needing us. And that is as spiritual a statement—as in unsubstantiated and incapable of being proved beyond the experience of its validity and truth—as can be made. The value of life and living is self-validating, and if we spit on that and turn away pouting because it’s hard and is not going our way, we cut ourselves off from the one thing that matters which is living what is left of our life the way only we can live it—and seeing where it goes. 05/07/2012
10. Mill Flow, Glade Creek Mill, Babcock State Park, WV, near Fayetteville and the Cathedral Cafe which why would you miss? —We have to work out what can be worked out and come to terms with what can’t be. How things are is not often how we wish they were. We have to deal with the discrepancy. THIS is what we have to work with, like it or not. Not liking it is part of it, part of the THIS we have to work with. We have only THIS to work with whether we like it or not. If it is a really stinky job, we can quit when we are able. If it’s cancer, we have to come at it differently. Jung said that none of the really important problems can be solved. They must be out-grown, that is, we have to adjust to them, accommodate ourselves to them, come to terms with them. We have to develop adjustment strategies, steps to take to come to terms with what must be done—with what our choices are—and what to do about it—what choice to make. We hit walls. Then what? It isn’t the wall that tells the tale, but what happens next. What happens after we hit the wall? What do we do then? Life comes alive in the living of it, in the “What then?” The wall is the Cyclops, blocking our way. What then? What now? What next? 05/08/2012
11. Nodding Thistles, Along the Path, Piedmont Land Conservancy trail, Greensboro, NC—April 2012 —We want too much for everybody else to be like we are. We think too much that we should be like everybody else is. There is an Old Testament commandment that didn’t make the Top Ten but which serves as a beautiful summation of all of them: “Thou Shalt Not Remove Thy Neighbor’s Landmark!” We have to grant each other the right to our own life, to our own business, to our own way of doing things—and we cannot be so sensitive to what the other is doing that every little thing impacts us and interferes with our life: “MAMMA! HE’S LOOKING AT ME!!!” 05/08/2012
12. White Flame Azalea, Blue Ridge Parkway near Tuggle Gap, VA—April, 2012 — We have this idea of how everyone should be. Call it the Perfect Human Being. I have this idea that we should put it to a vote. Alan Watts, remember him? was a Bodhisattva in the eyes of, let’s say, the entire eastern world. That’s a lot of people. They get to vote, don’t they? They would vote for Alan Watts as being a Perfect Human Being, a savior, come to help the rest of us to eternal satisfaction. And he was also an alcoholic. We have a problem with that. Not the majority of those casting a vote. They are fine with it and have no problems with contrary things being true about us at the same time. There was a drunk in my childhood who was unwelcome in any of the churches in town, but who taught the town’s boys how to fish and how to throw baseballs and footballs and dig worms and do the things that needed boys to do them. Who would be right about Otis? The church people or the boys? My point is that our idea of the Perfect Human Being that we are supposed to be is out of plumb. We need to put it in the burning barrel. Let everyone be who and how they are. That’s close enough to perfect for anyone with eyes to see. 05/08/2012
13. Sunset Morton’s Overlook, Great Smoky Mountains National Park, TN—Sometimes what is needed in a situation is to get away from it. A burning building, for instance, or a relationship that has no respect for our sense of boundaries. Sizing up a situation and knowing when to leave is a critical life skill. We all know the “Uh-oh” feeling. Not all of us listen to it. Instinct and intuition are our initial guides. It is sometimes necessary to override them with intellect and reason but we have to put them aside consciously each time we do it and not ignore them completely always. We have to draw our own lines and be aware of the smooth talkers and domineering personalities who would move in, rearrange the furniture, take out walls and make a home for themselves in our life. 05/09/2012
14. Pink Lady Slippers B&W, Blue Ridge Parkway near Orchard Gap, VA—May 01, 2012 — It’s how we live, what we do with our life—with the moment of our living. It isn’t what we say we will do, or plan on doing. It isn’t what we believe or think. It isn’t even what happens as a result of what we do—but the results can shape and guide what we do in the next moment, can open our eyes to the impact of our doing and lead us to adjust what we do to better meet the needs of the situation as it arises. How does what we do reflect, exhibit, express the gifts that are ours to give? How does what we do serve what needs to happen in the situation of our living? How do we gauge what needs to happen? In any scene there are numerous tripod positions. Where we place the tripod (or the camera) is the single most important determinant in producing a worthy photograph. How do we know where to place the tripod? How do we know what needs to happen in the moment of our living. Our knowing in each situation is grounded in that mysterious openness, awareness, which sees, hears, perceives and understands what is happening and what needs to happen. We can’t say how we know what we know but we place the tripod here, we respond to the moment like this. Be open to knowing what needs to happen without having to know how you know or if you are right. You’ll find out when you look at the photograph. 05/-9/2012
15. Pineville Crossing, Pineville, NC—What’s the hurry? Where are you going? When you get it all done, then what? There is always more to do. Something is always waiting. The Zen standard, “Eat when hungry, rest when tired,” suggests that the moment has its own rhythm, purpose and direction and that our place is to be open to the stirrings of the time at hand. The Greeks understood time on two levels: Khronos is clock time, calendar time, time to get up, go to work, eat lunch, take your medicine… Kairos is the right time, the opportune time, the time to act, the time a tomato ripens or a peach falls to the ground… Eating when hungry has no need of a clock to tell you it is time to eat. What does a clock know? Learn to read the moment—to know what time it is now, to know what needs us to do it now—not because it is on our to-do list but because now is the time to do what needs to be done now. If you have to have a list to direct your life, make sure a time for listening is included which will allow what you hear to override everything else on it. 05/10/2012
16. Rhyolite Bank, NV—Rhyolite is a Ghost Town created by a mining boom and bust, near Death Valley National Park—In the Lord’s Prayer, the petition, “Deliver us from evil,” means deliver us from the evil we might do and deliver us from the evil that might be done to us. Do you think more evil is done in the name of evil or in the name of good? Deliver us from evil also means deliver us from doing evil that we think is good. 05/10/2012
17. Dugger’s Creek Falls, Blue Ridge Parkway near Linville Falls, NC—May 11, 2012 —Jesus healed on the Sabbath. Healing on the Sabbath was strictly forbidden by the scriptures of Jesus’ day. Jesus violated the Word of God of his day. Jesus said, “You have heard it said but I say unto you,” replacing the Holy Word with His Word. Jesus calls us to follow him. The question is, Are we going to heal on the Sabbath or not? 05/11/2012
18. Farm Road Fog 02, Jim Dollar, Yadkin River Valley, NC—May 11, 2012 —We are in it for what we can get out of it. Everything hangs on what we think we are getting. Don’t sell out for anything less than the total surrender to your soul! Rumi said “We are here for the soul’s joy.” What we are to get out of it is a happy little soul. If we are after anything else, we are on the wrong track. The right track is the service of soul. Anything else is a cop-out. I don’t blame us for copping out. Serving soul is the hardest work imaginable. Just thumb through the Who’s Who in Soul Work. The people in that book did not come to a Very Good End. Yet, they all came to The End that was the unavoidable conclusion of their work—and they wouldn’t forsake the work for a better end. Not one of them. When Jesus says, “Sit down and count the cost,” he is making fun of all those who want to be sure that serving soul is going to serve their advantage. He’s laughing at us. No one would ever serve soul if they think our good is more important than soul’s good. “Forget the cost!” is what he’s saying. “Do the work that is yours to do and take your pleasure in the pleasure of your soul!” The heart of the matter, presented to us by one who knows. And the people? Well, of course they say, “Give us Barabbas! He’s more our kind.” 05/12/2012
19. Hay Making, Blue Ridge Parkway near Blowing Rock, NC—May 11, 2012 —Who does your thinking for you? You wear what so you will fit in where? You vote how so you’ll be apart of which crowd? Your interests and tastes and spending habits reflect whose ideas of how those things ought to be? Whose opinion of you matters? You can’t be happy until who, okay, whom, is happy? Who are Those Who Know Best And Must Be Pleased in your life? Ain’t going nowhere on the spiritual/hero’s journey without going against those who call the shots in your life. Abraham had to leave home, you know. So did Jesus. We find our own way in the company of those who are finding their own way and no one tells anyone how to do it. To say hello to who you are, you may have to say good-bye to those who are standing between you and you. Just saying… 05/12/2012
20. Biking the Blue Ridge, Little Switzerland Tunnel, NC—May 11, 2012 —The difference between where we are and where we wish we were and where we need to be is one of the things we become aware of when we become aware. Our life comes down to how we live it. How we live it starts right here, right now. How we live this minute tells the tale. We can’t wait to start living our life the way it needs us to live it. Why wait? What are we waiting for? The Cyclops to go away? Our life needs us to live it here, now. And we are hating it? Blaming it? “I coulda had class. I coulda been a contender. I coulda been somebody, instead of a bum, which is what I am.” Excuses abound. There is always a reason not to live this moment the way it needs to be lived. How does it need to be lived? Probably not how we think it is supposed to be lived? Probably not how Those Who Know Best And Must Be Pleased think it is supposed to be lived. Living this moment as it truly needs to be lived is the first step in the Revolution. 05/13/2012
21. Wiseman’s View Panorama, Linville Falls Wilderness, Grandfather District, Pisgah National Forest near Linville Falls, NC—May 11, 2012 —The path opens before those who start walking. We can’t sit in our rocker waiting for some salesman hawking spiritual journeys to ring our doorbell with brochures, maps, itineraries and tour guides to lay out the plan before us and ask our permission to sign us up, all questions answered and satisfaction guaranteed. The Way is a leap of faith. We gather ourselves and start living toward a particular destination and change direction as necessary in response to what happens along the way. If we want to be a writer, we have to pick up the pen but. That may lead us to shoeing horses or teaching third graders. We start walking and see where we go. The initiative lies with us. We cannot wait until we know what to do. We don’t know what to do until we find ourselves doing it. There is no adventure in which people know what is going to happen next and what they are going to do when it does. They make it up all the way. It starts with them stepping into the unknown, trusting themselves to their life, looking forward to seeing what happens. 05/13/2012
22. Biking the Blue Ridge 02, Little Switzerland Tunnel, Blue Ridge Parkway, NC—September 2011 —The way it works is to stop trying to work it in your favor and to trust it to work like it needs to if you just assist it by doing what needs you to do it and see where it goes. My seventh grade English teacher would say that’s too many “it’s” in one sentence. She would be right. Sometimes it needs you to do too much of something. You can’t be telling it your English teacher told you not to. 05/13/2012
23. Goshen Creek Cascade, Blue Ridge Parkway near Boone, NC—May 11, 2012 —The spiritual journey is the trip to who you are. The trek to the center of yourself. The path is the meandering trail of your interests. You follow you to you. If you have no interests—as is the case with “nothing but the dead and dying back in my little town”—you have no hope. Our interests are our salvation, our life line. We find them by noticing what resonates with us, what catches our eye, what stirs our soul. It may not be what Those Who Know Best And Must Be Pleased think it should be. Your life is linked to your interests, not theirs. They are just another configuration of the Cyclops standing in your way, and you know what to do with the Cyclops when he looms, leering, drooling. It will become easier with practice. You’ll start looking forward to things to not let stand in your way. You’ll get better at knowing what is important, at doing what you love, at following your interests as one leads to another in an amazingly curiouser and curiouser adventure filled with wonder and delight, laughter and tears. All because you had the courage to do what calls your name. 05/14/2012
24. Used in Short Talks On Contradiction, etc., Trumpet Vine, Bog Garden, Greensboro, NC, Canon—May 2012 —The Buddha said, “Life is suffering.” I say life is incongruity, conflict, contradiction, discrepancy, discord, disharmony, polarity, opposition, nonsense. Life eats life (Joseph Campbell). How’s that for making sense. Something lives because something else dies. Even vegetarians depend upon the death of what they eat—and in eating grains they kill the future generation. It makes no sense. All of the old, time-honored values: Love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, generosity, gentleness, goodness, self-discipline, grace, mercy, peace, justice, etc. are espoused by those who have to kill to eat. You can’t make sense of it. You have to live with the disparity. You have to suffer the contradiction. Life is suffering. The work is to suffer consciously. Bear the pain of the contradiction consciously. Stand within the tension of the polarities. Be conscious of it—aware of it. With the anguish of awareness comes the recognition of the human predicament. We are damned if we do and damned if we don’t. The necessary response is not to run from this knowledge—not to hide from it, not to deny it, not to pretend it is not so—and not to denounce it, reject it, and refuse to accept the terms of the conditions of life—but to embrace it, affirm it, say YES! to it and voluntarily immerse ourselves in it as full participants in the experience of being alive. We cannot make sense of it, understand it, make it palatable. We can recognize it for what it it, see what is being asked of us and live within the contradictions as those who would bring compassion and peace and all the other values to bear upon the time and place of our living—the human gift to the human condition.
25. The Fence Post, Buttercups, Blue Ridge Parkway near Meadows of Dan, VA—May 01, 2012 —One thing leads to another and you have an interesting, meaningful, life just by following your interests. But. To have an interesting life, you have to have interests. You have to be interested in life, in living, in being alive. To be dead to life is to be dead before you die. Why would you want to do that? That is the height of arrogance: “If life won’t be lived on my terms, I’ll have nothing to do with it! I will swell up and pout and sit right here in my chair and GLARE at the world!” That’s stupid. A lot of people opt for it. You can be angry at the world or interested in it. Your call all the way. But. Angry is stupid. Dying before you are dead is stupid. You are here only once, so far as we know, (theories about 84,000 reincarnations don’t count for knowledge no matter how many people embrace and espouse them). Why not make the most of it? I say live while you can by being interested in the things that interest you about your life, and die with cookies in the oven and crumbs on your plate! 05/15/2012
26. Woods Lily, Bog Garden, Greensboro, NC—April, 2012 — I don’t know what the name of this flower is. “Woods Lily” will do until I look it up or you tell me what it is. — Doctrine is superfluous, as in extra baggage, unnecessary weight. All that counts is kindness and compassion. Believe whatever enables you to be kind and compassionate. That’s my best advice. 05/15/2012
27. Farm Road Fog 05, Yadkin County, NC—May 11, 2012 — Ingenuity, imagination, creativity, courage, persistence and faith in our life are the qualities that are required to move us past stuck places into the life that is waiting to be lived. If you are going to believe in anything, believe in your life—in what needs you to live it. Stop believing that you were born into a throw-a-way life, that you have a life that isn’t worth living, that nothing good can come from this old life… Nothing good could come from Nazareth, remember? The stone the builders reject becomes the chief cornerstone, remember? Give your life a chance. No! More than that—give your life YOU! Trust yourself to it. See where it goes. Start with this—begin noticing what you dismiss, discount, ignore, reject, refuse, ridicule—and all the reasons you use to not do what your life is inviting you to do. Start with seeing how you are blocking your way, then get out of your way. You are perfectly capable of taking over from there—IF you will just get out of your way. 05/16/2012
28. Yellow Flame Azalea, Blue Ridge Parkway near Orchard Gap, VA—May 01, 2012 — The Blue Ridge is home for many of us who have never lived there. We find what we are looking for in the connections the Parkway affords—with nature, the ancestral peoples, the cosmos, ourselves—and in time spent alone on the trails, at the overlooks, or driving along the way. Many of us are more who we are there than anywhere else in our lives. “In the desert you can remember your name, ‘cause there ain’t no one to for to give you no pain.” Maybe that’s it with the Blue Ridge. They can’t get to us there and we can find our way to what matters. And, maybe, it’s something else entirely. “Home” covers a lot of possibilities. Home—the way home ought to be—is where we belong. Where we can relax, rest easy, reflect on what is important, and find what we need to do what needs us to do it. May that be so with us all—a virtual family flung far and wide, but knowing home when we see it. 05/16/2012
29. Rhododendron at Mabry Mill, Blue Ridge Parkway near Meadows of Dan, VA—May 17, 2012 —As we grow older, or poorer, or sicker, or less fortunate our circumstances will increasingly restrict our choices. How we respond to that will make all the difference. The last choice to go is the choice of how to respond to the lack of choices. When that one goes, it’s pretty much all over. Until then it matters how we respond to the constriction of our life. I suggest sitting with the damn reality. Sit down with this manifestation of the Cyclops. Look it over. Look into its ugly red eye. See it clearly. Become fully aware of it and the circumstances that gave it birth, that brought it into being. Become fully aware of the impact of not enough good choices. Don’t do anything. Just be with the reality of your situation. Then look into what needs to happen. What is your situation asking of  you? Of all your possible responses which ones are the most appropriate, fitting, proper, necessary, needed? Continue to sit with the allness of the situation, waiting for a shift to happen within you. Waiting for a door to open to the part of you that is capable of rising to any occasion. Waiting for the right thing to do to become obvious. When it does, do it. 05/17/2012
30. Fog in the Valleys 03, Blue Ridge Parkway near Volunteer Gap, VA — May 17, 2012 — May you always see things as they are and do what needs to be done about them in each situation as it arises. Here’s a tip for you: We find the wherewithal to see and to do by talking things over with the right kind of people (Who are NOT Those Who Know Best And Must Be Pleased). The right kind of people form a community of innocence for us—innocent in the sense that it isn’t trying to get us to do or refrain from doing anything other than seeing, hearing, understanding how things are and what needs to be done about it. With the right kind of clarity and the right kind of courage and the right kind of company we have what it takes to do what needs us to do it. May we never lack for any of these things! 05/18/2012
31. Yellow Poplar Blossom, Blue Ridge Parkway near Groundhog Mountain, VA — May 17, 2012 — Enlightenment is a shift in perspective. Growing up is a shift in perspective. Growing up is a form of enlightenment. Enlightenment is a form of growing up. It is all contingent on how we see things. How we see things is related to how we look. But. We don’t get there by trying. Having your mother yell at you: “Why don’t you grow up!!??” didn’t help with your maturation process—and indicated a hitch in hers. All we can do is wait. We wait consciously, deliberately, intentionally, with awareness and attentiveness. We wait knowing that we are waiting for the shift in perspective that transforms our life, or at least turns it toward the good. The next time someone asks you what you are going, tell them you are waiting for your perspective to shift so you can live your life as it needs you to live it. When they ask you how long you think it will take, tell them longer than you want it to but not as long as you are afraid it will be. 05/18/2012
32. Appalachian Homestead, Blue Ridge Parkway near Doughton Park, VA—April 2012 — The tension of our polarities clarifies the position of each pole. Each pole needs the other to know better who, or what, it is and is not. We come forth in response to what is not us—and may be surprised to discover, as with yin and yang, there is a little of who we are not tucked away inside who we are (and vice versa). 05/18/2012
33. Rhododendron at Mabry Mill 02, Blue Ridge Parkway near Meadows of Dan, VA—May 17, 2012 — May you have enough of the right kind of time! The right kind of time is squaring up time, coming to terms with the way things are and what can be done about it—with what needs you to do it—with what your gifts are, your choices are, your work is, your art is and how you are going to work it all out. Working it out is the task of the left side of our brain. The right side presents us with who we are. The left side has to figure out what to do about it. The problem is, the left side is not content with its role and wants to run the entire operation. The right kind of time provides us with the kind of reflection, rumination, consideration needed to keep the left side of our brain in its place. As the arbitrator between the hemispheres, we have to regularly remind both: “You don’t get to choose your choices! Now, we (that would be the rest of us) need your help here in doing what is ours to do!” It takes enough of the right kind of time to keep ourselves on the path, in place, and going along on the Hero’s Journey. May we all have everything it takes to do what needs us to do it with the gifts we have to offer! 05/19/2012
34. Home in the Woods, Not really—this is the gift shop and visitor’s center of the Grandfather District of Pisgah National Forest at Linville Falls, NC—May 11, 2012 — Knowing what business we are in keeps us centered, focused, grounded, in sync and aligned with that which is deepest, best and truest about us (What is truest about us is what is true and what is also true about us—which is quite different than what is not true at all about us). Keeps us from going where we have no business being. Keeps us from doing what we have no business doing. If you are going to know anything, know what your business is, and isn’t. 05/19/2012
35. Dugger’s Creek Falls 03, Blue Ridge Parkway near Linville Falls, NC—May 11, 2012 — There is more to all of us than meets the eye—more to us than meets our own eye. See as much of you as you can see before you die. That’s my best advice. Take all of you into account. Poll the whole crowd for their ideas, interests, needs and desires. See what they have to say before you drag them all, bucking and snorting, down roads they don’t want to go, into places they know they have no business being. Listen to YOU is what I’m saying. Act with YOU in mind. The rest of you will appreciate the kind consideration. 05/19/2012
36. View from Groundhog Mountain, Blue Ridge Parkway, VA — May 17, 2012 — The foundation of the revolution is eyes that see, ears that hear, a heart that understands. Develop those babies and you turn the world upside down, inside out, and you are likely to disturb the sleep of the sleeping ones—which is the true work of revolution! 05/20/2012
37. Field of Yellow, Price Park Butterfly Meadow, Greensboro, NC—May 18, 2012 — The sleeping ones are asleep. Yelling at them will not wake them up. If you want to wake someone up spend time with people who are more awake than you are. The catch here is that most of us think we are wide awake and don’t know anyone more awake than we are. See what I mean about waking people up? It’s hard from all angles. 05/20/2012
38. Rhododendron Hillside, Blue Ridge Parkway near Thunder Hill Overlook, NC—May 11, 2012 — When you look through your camera’s view finder or at the LCD screen, do you see what you are looking at? Do you like what you see? Seeing what you are looking at means noticing the edges to make sure they are clean, that is absent of tree branches or hat brims or fingers. It means noticing if there is anything too bright or too dark and whether a utility pole is sprouting from someone’s head. Liking what you see means does it make you smile. Don’t just take a photo of tunnel view at Yosemite because everyone else does and you are expected to. Take one that you like. Think about that. What would it take for you to like what you see? The emotional connection between you and the scene you see will be evident in the photo. If it is a ho-hummer for you when you click the shutter button, it will be a ho-hummer when you view the print. Having an interest in the scene and liking what you see are two of the key ingredients in taking photos you’ll be proud of. 5/21/2012
39. Pilot Mountain BW, Hwy 52 near Pinnacle, NC—May 17, 2012 —The truth of a person’s position varies in inverse proportion to the length and passion of the person’s argument. Live without having to defend, explain, justify, excuse your way with life. If you are always having to defend, etc. what you do or the way you do it, you have to begin to question the capacity of the people you hang with to see, hear, understand and be any help at all along the way. Help consists of grace, compassion, kindness, generosity, acceptance, charity, peace, gentleness, tenderness and the like. The harder someone is to please and the more you have to work to make them happy, the less helpful they are able to be. Choosing the right kind of friends is as necessary as choosing the right path. You cannot live the right life with the wrong people advising you. 05/22/2012
40. Appalachian Meadow, Blue Ridge Parkway near Volunteer Gap, VA—May 17, 2012 —We live our life doing what our life asks of us—enjoying what can be enjoyed, loving what can be loved, grieving what must be grieved, mourning what is to be mourned, practicing our art, doing our work, tending our business, bringing forth the gift that is ours to offer, helping one another along the way and working out what has to be worked out in the service of the true good of all. We loose sight of the true good of all from time to time, but it is always hoping we remember it and live in light of it. 05/22/2012
41. Blue Ridge Tree, Blue Ridge Parkway near Blowing Rock, NC—May 12, 2012 —Everything we call truth is borne out by our experience. The Buddhists aren’t lying about what they call truth. Neither are the Christians. Or the Muslims. Or the Jews. And they all think their truth is truer than the truth of any of the others. Our truth we call truth. Their truth we call falsehood, or error, or delusion, or heresy. We are Enlightened. They are the Infidel. “Hell, Jim,” said the farmer standing in his cotton field talking about racism, “This isn’t the way I see things—this is the way things ARE!” Our point of view isn’t just a point of view—it is the absolute, unadulterated, TRUTH. And we aren’t changing our minds—that would be to renounce all that we hold dear. THEY have to change THEIR minds, and we have to talk them into doing it. We have to CONVERT them. It would be funny if it weren’t so ridiculous. It’s all points of view. And a point of view is only valid to the extent that it enables us to exhibit the values that bless and grace everyone who comes our way, regardless of their point of view. 05/23/2012
42. Clouds, Blue Ridge Parkway near Orchard Gap, VA—May 01, 2012 —Experience is self-validating. We take experience to be the solid ground of truth. We know “it”—whatever “it” may be—is true because we experience the truth of “it.” This simple test of the validity of “it” fails to take into account the perception which interprets, evaluates, and determines what an experience is—what an experience means. We cannot experience what we do not perceive. What trumps, or transforms, perception? Inquiry, curiosity, examination, exploration, imagination… We walk around the perception, probing, prodding, wondering how many different ways there might be to understand the thing that has happened—and what inclines us toward one way and away from the others. Why do we see the way we see and not some other way instead? If we were raised in a Hindu family, how would we see a hamburger? Why do we suppose that our view of a hamburger is superior to that of a Hindu family’s view? When we confuse the way we see things with the way things are, perception goes over into delusion. Nothing is more arrogant or willfully ignorant than a perception that refuses to take itself into account. 05/23/2012
43. Buffalo Mountain 02, Blue Ridge Parkway, near Volunteer Gap, VA—May 17, 2012 — 99 Our life is successful to the degree that we size things up accurately and respond appropriately. Learning to read situations as they develop around us is an essential life skill. We get a lot of practice and make a lot of mistakes, but the hope is that we get it down over time—seeing things as they are and responding to them in ways that are right for the occasion. Too often we run from the responsibility of deciding what to do on the run, and take refuge in The Rules. The Ten Commandments are hide-outs for those who will not make the call regarding what needs to be done in the moment of their living. Jesus said, “You have heard it said, but I say unto you!” and healed on the Sabbath and hung out with outcasts, “sinners and tax collectors,” and prostitutes. No rule can know what needs to be done when, where. We have to override the rules in responding appropriately to what the moment is asking of us, trusting our read of the moment to be right—knowing that we will get another chance to get it right in the next moment. 05/24/2012
44. Used in Short Talks On Contradiction, etc., X Wetlands Sunrise, Four Mile Greenway, Charlotte, NC—December 26, 2011 — There is something that I indicate by placing my closed fist against my chest at the level of my heart—call it the Core, or God, or the Holy Spirit, or the Christ or the Buddha within… I don’t care what you call it, just know that it is there and that it knows and it needs you to assist it in what it needs to do—that it needs you to trust it with your life, and your reputation, and everything you value. You have the time left for living to work out your relationship with it, to know when it’s nudging you in one direction and away from another, to know how to read it and listen to it and do its bidding. Here’s a tip for you: Thinking is going to get in the way. This is not rational, logical, or reasonable. You will never make sense of it. Don’t even try. Joseph Campbell tells a story about a Native American tribe that would tell its young men on their way to manhood, “When you leave home to follow your vision, the birds of the air will paste you with their droppings. Do not pause even to wipe it off.” Same thing goes with you following the guidance of your Center. There is no Plan for our life. There is only the drift of the current of our life in each situation, a current that changes its direction and flow in response to what is happening then, there, calling us to trust ourselves to it and see where it goes. May we be so bold! Doing it this way in one situation and that way in the next, without pausing to explain, defend, justify or excuse our actions—living the contradictions and letting our light shine!05/24/2012
45. Dugger’s Creek Falls 01, Blue Ridge Parkway near Linville Falls, NC—May 11, 2012 — The help we want—the help we have in mind—is not the help we receive. Our idea of help is in the form of wealth, prosperity, privilege, power and control—help to make our life easier. The help we get is help with the work that is ours to do. The Core, the Center, the Ground, the Source needs us to do its work. We find the help we need to serve its work, which is our work—the work that is truly ours to do. Its need is our work. Our primary relationship is with the Source. Every other thing serves, or helps us serve, that relationship—or severs it. Our only question to answer—again and again, throughout our life—is “Whose side are we on?” 05/25/2012
46. Reeds at Sunset, Blue Ridge Parkway, Peaks of Otter, Abbot Lake, VA—May 27, 2012  — We are all moved by something. We are all moved by something different at different points in our life. Different from what moves other people, and different from what moved us at earlier times. The universal law of soul, spirit, heart and life is: Move toward what moves you! See where it goes! If you are ever going to keep a commandment, keep this one. The people who aren’t moved by anything have learned—have been taught—not to be moved by anything have no soul, even if they presume to be holy people. Life is movement. When you do not allow yourself to move, you are dead, even if you are 98.6 and breathing. The Hero’s Journey begins when you move toward what moves you—particularly if everyone you know says, “What are you dong that for?” 05/29/2012
47. Catawba Rhododendron, Blue Ridge Parkway near Peaks of Otter, VA—May 27, 2012 —Here are two more commandments everyone should adhere to: Live to protect, honor, respect and encourage one another in the exploration and expression of who we are. Do nothing to restrict and inhibit the good faith exploration and expression of who we are, and do everything to expand, nourish and encourage it. What a place the world would be if everyone did those things well! 05/29/2012
48. Hay In The Field, Near Bedford, VA—May 25, 2012 — Our place with each other is to keep each other safe for the work that is ours to do, the journey that is ours to undertake—which is the exploration and expression of ourselves so that we might develop the gifts and interests that are ours to use in the service of the good of the whole, and become who we are over the course of our life. How many people have you known who saw it as their place to keep you safe? How can so many of us not understand the basics of life together? If you are going to fix something, fix that! 05/30/2012
49. Iris, Greensboro, NC—May 24, 2012 — Our life—the life that is truly our life to live, the life that needs us to live it—is always being put on hold by the circumstances of our living. We are always having to get back to what needs us to do it after we take care of what must be done. Necessity overrides all other considerations. Our role is to see to it that what must be done must be done in order to do what needs to be done. We have to examine and reexamine our choices. How is what we are doing serving the life that is our life to live? Are the bills we incur the right bills? We have one focus, one burning, desperate, need—to find our life and live it. All that we call necessary must serve that necessity. 05/31/2012
50. Shafts of Light 01, Cherokee National Forest, Roan Mountain Highlands, TN—May 30, 2012 — We need help with our life. We need help knowing what our life is and living it. We need help all along the way. If you take a second and look around, you will see there is no one here but us. We find the help we need in each other, or we don’t find it at all. That being the case, it seems to me that we would work as hard at being helpful as at finding the help we need. I must be missing something. 05/31/2012
51. Blackberry Leaves, Bog Garden, Greensboro, NC—May, 2012 — 100 All the religions tell us how it is and what to do about it. They all spell it all out. Answer all the questions. Leave nothing unexplained. You discount or ignore what they say to your everlasting peril. Religion takes all the fun out of it. It would be like you taking my camera away from me and handing me a book of Ansel Adams’ pictures. Telling me to be happy with the way Ansel did it because that’s the way it’s supposed to be done. Giving me the religion of Ansel kills my soul. Giving me any religion kills my soul. Religion kills our soul. Straps them down on beds of nails called facts. Refuses to allow them the freedom to explore their own interest and joy. Facts dine on souls. Souls dine on laughter and imagination. Facts destroy both. Souls live to play. Facts say, “No Playing Allowed!” Souls enjoy wondering about possibilities and dancing with dreams. Religion says, “Here. Believe this. It will make you happy.” Souls ARE happy! And only want us to find whatever the equivalent of a camera is for each of us and go take pictures. The way only we can do it. 05/31/2012
52. Reeds BW, Blue Ridge Parkway, Peaks of Otter, VA—May 29, 2012 — 98 What are your contradictions? The Spiritual Journey/Hero’s Journey/Growing Up consists, let’s say, entirely of squaring yourself up with—coming to terms with—your contradictions. We have to recognize and bear the pain of our contradictions, our ambivalences, our two-or-more-ways-at-the-same-time-ness. The work of wholeness is the work of integrating our opposites, or, of allowing them to peacefully coexist side-by-side in each other’s company. What is true about us lives bound eternally with what is also true about us. We are Yin and Yang to the core. Face up to it! Live your contradictions! In complete, defiant, rejection of those who tell you you must be who you “Really Are”—one way only always and forever. When we live to be one way only, we deny, repress, suppress who we also are, except that everyone but us sees very clearly who we pretend not to be. We Really Are different within! We have to recognize that and work out the differences—being who we are and who we also are in ways that are appropriate to the occasion in each situation as it arises—never mind how we are supposed to be! 05/31/2012
53. Trees in Fog 07, Sioux Falls, SD—March 28, 2012 — An iPhone photo—Live so as to be worth talking to, that’s my best advice. Live so as to have something to say. Live so as to have had an interesting life—that would be a life that interests YOU, that YOU find interesting, that YOU are interested in. If you are interested in your own life, other people will be as well—and you will be interested in their life, if they are, if they are worth talking to. It is one of our obligations to each other, to be sources of good conversation. 06/01/2012
54. Sharp Top Reflection, Blue Ridge Parkway, Peaks of Otter, Abbot Lake, VA—May 25, 2012 —You can think of success in terms of accomplishment, achievement and acquisition if you want to. I’m going to think of it in terms of participation. Life comes along and I step into it, engage it, embrace it, say “Yes!” to it and “Show me what you got and we’ll see what I can do with it!” A successful life, in my book, is a life you live the way it needs to be lived—the way only you can live it—the way nobody could live it better than you. 06/01/2012
55. Tree at Peaks of Otter, Blue Ridge Parkway, VA—May 30, 2012 — They think there is a formula and they think they have found it. I think there is a formula and I think I have found it. We disagree about the nature of the formula. Their formula guarantees them that they never have to worry about mine. Their formula stipulates if they do this, and this, and this they can avoid that and that, and enjoy that and that, forever. My formula stipulates if I do this, this will happen but there are no certainties regarding any of the that’s. My formula states there are no immunities. Anything can happen at any time. The Cyclops comes out of nowhere, grinning. There is no protection, no exemption, no impunity. There is only grinning back and stepping forward to meet the Cyclops again. That’s my formula, by the way. Grin back, step forward, see what you can do, see where it goes. 06/02/2012
56. Roan Mountain Rhododendron, Cherokee National Forest, Carver’s Gap, Roan Mountain Highlands, TN—May 30, 2012 — 97 We need to form alliances with people who can help us with our life, who can help us be alive—whom we can help with their life. We need allies in the work to be who we are, to do what is ours to do. We are all looking for a life, for LIFE. We want to be alive before we die. We only need to connect with the life that is looking for us—and we need help making that connection. We need help overcoming the opposition, the resistance, that comes at us from all sides—as though it is the worst form of sin and insolence to even think of taking up the work of living our own life, particularly since there are so many around who are ready to tell us how to live. What are we thinking, hanging out with people who cannot help us with our life—and I don’t mean help us get ahead—who cannot help us be alive? Who are the people who bring you to life? Who are the people who kill your soul, deplete your enthusiasm for life and leave you mostly dead? You are going to have a difficult time being more alive than the people you spend time with. And don’t call them friends if time with them leaves you more dead than alive. Find the people who help you find and live the life that is your life to live. Learning to help one another be alive is one of the keys to a vibrant, vital life. 05/02/2012
57. Carver’s Gap, Cherokee National Forest, Roan Mountain Highlands, TN—May 30, 2012 — Photographers belong to the light, are owned by the light. They have to go when the light is right, forget their other obligations. We have to understand that we are owned by our LIFE, the life that is truly our life to live. We have to go when LIFE beckons. We put off too easily the life that is ours to live. We embrace too quickly the life we want to be ours to live. We are Adam, we are Eve, in Eden. Forget what’s right for us, we know what we want! 06/02/2012
58. Reeds at Sunset 02, Blue Ridge Parkway, Peaks of Otter, VA—May 29, 2012 — 96 The most important thing is to be alive in the time left for living—to live the life that is ours yet to live. This could certainly pass for the Categorical Imperative in that it is imperative across all categories and concerns. Even when we choose to sacrifice ourselves, as Jesus did, for some cause greater than we are, the cause is really our integrity—we couldn’t live with ourselves if we didn’t sacrifice ourselves! We live to serve the life that is our life to live. We can’t just make up some life here and say it is ours because we like it. We don’t get to choose our life any more than we get to choose our choices. Our choices are our choices. Our LIFE is our LIFE. Oh, sure. We can live just any old life—any old life that is handed to us off the shelf, or one that we are entranced by like a child following some Pied Piper—but not with meaning, zest, vitality, enthusiasm and joy. That belongs to the one that is ours to live. We have to trust ourselves to our LIFE and see where it goes. It may not seem so good but it may be good. We owe it to ourselves to find out. We cannot die not knowing. 06/02/2012
59. Carver’s Gap 02, Cherokee National Forest, Roan Mountain Highlands, TN—May 30, 2012 — 95 Our LIFE—the life that is our life to live, the life that is waiting on us to live it in the time left for living—will eat our old life alive. The way we have been doing things will no longer do. The shift over from life to LIFE is not just a matter of tweaking this and adjusting that. “The OLD has passed away (Dead, Gone, Kaput, No More, Out Of The Picture Entirely), behold the NEW has come, behold I make ALL THINGS NEW!” The NEW supplants, replaces, erases the OLD. Oh, you’re still married (if you were before), you still have your job, you still have your dog and cat—but now they don’t have you! You have to work out your responsibilities and obligations to both worlds—this is called walking two paths at the same time—but now you are free and responsible and obligated to working out the conflicts and differences. “Leave the dead to bury the dead. Whoever puts her/his hand to the plow and looks back is not fit for the kingdom of heaven (that would be the LIFE that is your life to live)!” We have to work it out. Another manifestation of the Cyclops blocking our way. Are we going to live the LIFE that is ours to live or not? Are we going to work it out or not? Are we going to die in order to live or not? 06/03/2012
60. Carver’s Gap 03, Cherokee National Park, Roan Mountain Highlands, TN—May 30, 2012 — 94 We have to live it in order to see it, get it, understand. We can’t just talk about it. Listen to lectures. Watch videos. Read up on it. Memorize creeds. Follow directions. Do what we are told. Step in the black footprints all our life long. Life has to hit us between the eyes before we can see things as they are. Life has to plant a big juicy wet one right on our kisser. We wake up by being shocked awake. We can’t hit the snooze button a dozen times and yawn while we wait for breakfast in bed. Waking up is a shock to all systems. Our neat little way of arranging our life with its plans and dreams and stepping stones to glory goes “Poof.” We wake up to the realization that things are not the way we have been told they are, the way we thought they were, the way we think they ought to be. There are contradictions everywhere! When we wake up we wake up to contradictions everywhere! We have to work it all out. With our eyes open. Another term for waking up is “the shock of betrayal.” We thought this and discovered that. The truth of reality is “Not this! Not that!” How are things REALLY? “Not this! Not that!” There is no absolute, unchanging, constant, steady REALITY. It’s all in motion, dynamic, alive. We go to bed in one world and get up in another. Happens all the time. We turn a corner and nothing is ever again what it used to be. We have our formulas and our recipes and our pat little answers and it’s all a box of smoke. There are no guarantees, no immunities. This is the Adventure. The Mystery. The Wonder. The Hero’s Journey. Our life is the treasure that we live our life looking for. Wake up! Wake up! Live your LIFE! Be ALIVE in the time left for living! 06/03/2012
61. Dugger’s Creek Falls, Blue Ridge Parkway near Linville Falls, NC—May 11, 2012 — 93 Every living thing knows its thing and does it, knows its business, and tends it. Roses do rose things. Hummingbirds do Hummingbird things. They never get their things mixed up. They never tire of their things and start doing dog or gorilla things just for kicks, or because they wish they were dogs or gorillas. Then we get to human beings. Human beings dream of being something other than who they are. They long for things they wish were their things or are handed things they are told are their things and lose track of what their thing actually is. We don’t know what our business is. We do what we are told or pick something that looks good or looks like we could do it and off we go. We spend way too much of our life finding out what our thing is not, what we have no business doing, without any notion of how to find out what our thing, our business, is. Every living thing but us knows its thing and does it. We start out at a disadvantage, and by now, have no time to waste. We have to know we are looking for our thing and look for it. Start by asking for help from the internal guides. Seriously. Say, “Help!” and mean it. When you go to bed tonight ask for a dream that will point you toward the life that is yours to live or the gift that is yours to give or the knack that is yours to develop or the ability that is yours to serve. And see what happens. 06/03/2012
62. Summer Idyl, Blue Ridge Parkway, Peaks of Otter, Abbot Lake, VA—May 26, 2012 — 92 It’s a terrible thing when things don’t happen like they are supposed to. The more significant the thing, the more terrible it is. We have been dealing with some form of terrible all our life long, as individuals and as a species. Every individual, every species, has. It’s one thing we have in common with every living thing. When dealing with terrible, we have to sit with it for a while. When life steamrolls us, we just have to lie there and gather ourselves. We’ve been steamrolled. We aren’t one of those Bozo The Clown bounce back hit me again harder toys. We are a kind and gentle human being who has been steamrolled. Lying there, we collect ourselves and call forth all our inner resources—connections that go back through millennia. We carry the strength and fortitude of generations in our genes and can rely on the compassion and grace of those who know terrible in ways we cannot imagine to restore our souls and work with us in doing what must be done to put things back together and adjust to life amid the ruins. We face the situation in the company of those who have faced similar situations, in the form of invisible ancestors and actual friends/family, asking, “What now? What next? What needs to happen here and now? How can we find what we need to do what needs to be done?” 06/04/2012
63. Farm Road Fog 04, Yadkin River Valley, Dinkins Bottom, Yadkin County, NC—May 11, 2012 — We think we are justified in punishing people who are not like us for being not like us (The Very Idea!) even though they are not harming or threatening us in any measurable way. “Mamma, he’s looking at me!” becomes excuse enough to banish him and those like him to the far fringes of society and shun him/them forever. We can do better. Jesus said, “Love your enemies,” and “Do unto others as you would have them do unto you,” and “Love your neighbor as you love yourself,” and “Treat well the outcasts and the tax collectors and the ones society considers to be beneath consideration” (Or words to that effect). Who would be the outcasts today? They would be the ones we cast out: Homosexuals, Immigrants, the Homeless Poor—using the Bible, of all things, to justify our actions. Jesus would tell us to do better. 06/04/2012
64. The Hydrangea Variations 01, Greensboro, NC—May 2012 — 91 When we listen with compassion and understanding to one another, we enable the other to hear what she, what he, is saying. When we hear what we are saying, we may shift our perspective to better say what we mean—to better integrate what we just said with what we said a minute ago. When we hear what we are saying we may better align contradictions, discrepancies, ambivalences, and conflicts. We grow, deepen, enlarge, expand our perspective by recognizing our own contraries and working to adjust our perspective to take them into account. It all comes with being listened to, with being heard with compassion and understanding. We possess the tools needed for the transformation of the world: Eyes that see, ears that hear and a heart that understands. 06/04/2012
65. The Hydrangea Variations 02, Greensboro, NC—May 2012 — 90 Life leaves its mark on us. With so many confrontations with the Cyclops—with that which stands in our way, which too often is us—it is bound to. In every situation there is what needs to be done and what we choose to do, which may, or may not, be what needs to be done. No matter. Either way, doing what needs to be done or doing what we want to do, or what we are expected to do, or what we feel like we have to do, or what we can’t see any way to not do, leaves its mark on us. We are damned (marked) if we do and damned (marked) if we don’t. Life leaves its mark on us. It the time left for living, it’s up to us to see to it that we collect the right kind of scars. We need to be paying the right price, being marked up in the service of what truly needs to be done, never mind the consequences. To do that, we need to be waking up, living with our eyes open, in the company of the right kind of people—the kind of people who can help us with our life, the life that is our life to live, who, themselves, are being marked up in the right way. After a while, alone with the struggle of trying to do right by our life, by the life that needs us to live it, that only we can live, we begin to recognize one another in the same way that alcoholics can pick out alcoholics in a room full of drinking people. Who knows how it works, but we find the people who are looking for us, and we help each other with the work that needs to be done. 06/05/2012
66. The Hydrangea Variations 03, Greensboro, NC—May 2012 — 90 We dig ourselves into emotional holes by having opinions about things we can’t change. Our opinions make it difficult for us to do what can be done about what needs to be done about the things we cannot change. If we just go belly up in the presence of things we don’t like and can’t change—sitting in a corner facing the wall, or wrapping our arms about ourselves and rocking to and fro moaning, “Poor me! Poor me!”—we will contribute more to our difficulties than to the relief of our difficulties. Look at the opinions you have about life, about the things that happen in life, and see what you can do about seeing things without having an opinion about what you see. See things as they are and see what can be done about them and see what needs to be done of all that can be done and do it without having an opinion about any of it. Physicians in emergency rooms don’t have time to react emotionally to the situations that come through their door. They see the situation, size it up and get to work. See what you can do about living your life as though you are an emergency room physician. 06/05/2012
67. The Hydrangea Variations 04, Greensboro, NC—May 2012 — Waking up is paying attention, being aware. Of every little thing. Notice what you dismiss, what you ignore, overlook. See what you look at but don’t see. Practice looking at whatever is before you and seeing everything about it. Practice thinking about whatever you think about and thinking of different ways to think about it. How many tripod positions are there? How many different ways of seeing something are there? Find them. Or half of them. How often do you take lazy refuge in thinking what you’ve always thought, saying what you’ve always said, doing what you’ve always done? Stop it. Think, say, do something else instead. Wake yourself up. See where it goes. 06/05/2012
68. The Hydrangea Variations 05, Greensboro, NC—May 2012 — 89 Joy is the soul’s love child. Turn your soul loose in your life and your soul will find the joy. And the laughter. And the exuberance. The dancing and the singing. That’s all soul stuff. Enjoying itself is what soul does best. The only thing blocking that is us. We have to get out of soul’s way and let soul show us how to do it. Rules? Our parents invented rules to keep our soul from embarrassing them. Society, you know. What will people say? Gotta keep people happy. Never mind if our souls shrivel and die. Long as people are happy, that’s what counts. And so the recurring question: Whose side are you on? Show it by dancing into the Post Office the next time you mail a package. 06/05/2012
69. Rhododendron at Mabry Mill, Blue Ridge Parkway near Meadows of Dan, VA—May 17, 2012 — 88 No one can do our work for us. No one could be Jesus but Jesus. No one can be you but you. Photographers have to take pictures of things they like to look at. Wouldn’t do to tell me to take photographs of socks. I’d last maybe two pairs. What do you like? What brings you to life? Spend time with those thing. See if they lead you to the work that is yours to do. But here’s the thing about the work that is ours to do. It’s work, not some lark that we pick up when we feel like it and put down when we want to. Part of my work is writing. I have to write what needs to be written when it needs to be written whether I want to or not. Whether I feel like it or not. Say, like at 4am. I can’t put it off until I’ve had my coffee and I don’t have anything better to do. Don’t be thinking your work is some romantic slide to glory. It’s work. And no one can do it for you. If it is to be done, you have to do it. And it has to be done, you know. Everything rides on it. 06/06/2012
70. Rhododendron Trunks 02, Pisgah National Forest, Roan Mountain, NC—June 6, 2012 — 87 If you are burdened with guilt chunk some responsibility. I’ve never known an overly guilty person who wasn’t bound by responsibility for every little thing. Oh, if they would only try harder! Not! In order to bless the world with who you are, you have to understand the world can get along just fine without you. Once you know that your managing all your responsibilities is not necessary to the functioning of life around you, you can be free to offer what is truly, uniquely, yours to offer and stop spending/wasting your time doing all the things that don’t belong to you, plagued by guilt for all you are not doing or failing to do well enough. Start under-functioning. Become increasingly helpless. Forget to wake the kids up for school, say twice a week. They will begin waking themselves up. Apologize profusely. Say you don’t know what’s happening to you. You used to be so dependable. Now you can barely tie your shoes. You must be getting old. Let the right things go. Do the right things well. Learn to distinguish between the right things and all the other things. Fumble your way into doing the things that are yours to do with the major amount of your time and energy and giving the lesser amount to all of the other things you once tended to. The world will be blessed, and you will come alive for the first time in a long time. 06/07/2012
71. Secondary Road, Blue Ridge Parkway near Boone, NC—May 06, 2012 — 86 The road never ends. The challenges do not stop. The journey is always waiting to resume the next day. So stop thinking about quitting, propping up your feet, having drinks delivered on a silver tray, having it made. Wishful thinking is the Siren’s song. Spend time there and you never come back. The focus is on each situation as it arises and what needs to happen there. We have what it takes to rise to any occasion. We are here to wear out the Cyclops—who is our partner, really, in the work that is ours to do, bringing forth who we are, expanding, deepening, enlarging ourselves to discover gifts we didn’t know we had, and would have never known if it weren’t for the Cyclops and the road that never ends. 06/07/2012
72. Sunflower on White 2012, Wright Farm, Rockingham County, NC—May 7, 2012 — To say that our work is to be who we are is not to place ourselves at the egocentric center of our world and reduce the significance of everyone else relative to ourselves. We become who we are in right relationship with one another. AND as we become who we are, we become as everyone else is. In right relationship with everyone else, we all are deepened, expanded, enlarged past the point of who we each think we have the ability to become. We surprise ourselves at the depths we are capable of reaching. We all say that we have the capacity to be the best of people and the worst of people. We all have the capacity to be everyone—to be Jesus, to be the Buddha, to be our mother, our father, Hitler, Gandhi… The potential is there. In right relationship with everyone else, we integrate, reconcile, square up with—live in sync with—who we are and who we also are. We become one with all (Or one with everything as the old joke goes). Just think about this if you have trouble sleeping tonight. The sure cure for insomnia.  06/07/2012
73. Sunflower on Black 2012, Wright Farm, Rockingham County, NC—May 7, 2012 — 85 We integrate and reconcile. This is called “Making Peace.” We make peace. Within and without. We love our enemies. Our enemies are within and without. Call them “conflicts” instead of “enemies.” Call them “contradictions.” Call them “ambivalences.” Call them “opposites.” And invite them to the table—the great feast of peace and reconciliation—and work it out. How do we work out left and right, gay and straight, Democrat and Republican, Tea Party and Progressives, black and white, male and female, darkness and light, and all of the polarities there may be? It would be easier to just kill our enemies and be done with it—except that only takes care of our enemies without. What do we do with the inner conflicts and opposites? How do we work those out? Drugs, sex and alcohol help us take our mind off the problem. For a while. They really deepen the problem. Create emotional waves that heave and roll and sink the boat, the little boat of consciousness afloat upon the Great Sea of Life. If we knew what we were doing and where our best interest lies, we would be pulling up a chair at the table, asking those gathered there for their take on things, trusting the conversation to lead us all—together—along the way. 06/08/2012
74. Hay Field Panorama, Wright Farm, Rockingham County, NC — June 8, 2012 — We have to talk ourselves into doing most of the things that need to be done. No one volunteers to go up against the Cyclops. We grow up against our will. The Hero’s Journey is undertaken by those who have neither the intention nor the desire to be a hero. They’re just trying to get to the bottom of that which will not leave them alone. 06/08/2012
75. Hemlock Woods 03, Carver’s Gap, Cherokee National Forest, Roan Mountain Highlands, TN— June 6, 2012 — 84 Be the container of your own emotional reactivity. We can invent things to react to and spend our lives responding to things we are afraid will happen or are happening or might happen or will never happen or can’t happen… Contain your anxiety, fear, anger, depression. Don’t let it spill over into your life. Don’t pour it all over those who share your space. Hold it within. You owe it to yourself and all sentient beings to see if you have anything to be afraid of, to be anxious about, to fear. What if Gay Marriage ISN’T the end of all that is good and worthy in the world? Bear the pain that you create through the spin you apply and then imagine to be reality. Live to see if things are as bad as you are sure they are, or will be. If they are, trust yourself to deal with them. If they are not, celebrate far into the night. 06/09/2012
76. Otter Creek Spillway, Blue Ridge Parkway near James River Locks, VA — May 26, 2012 — 83 There is no plan for waking people up and turning the world around. There is only working to wake up ourselves and seeing where it goes. We see what we can wake up to today—what we can see today—what we can realize today. There is no one great slap on the forehead when everything becomes clear. Everything becomes clear in time but not the same time. By the time we get this, we have forgotten that and have to get it again. It is not a straight, linear path with sequential steps that we are on. We roam and wander about, going “Wow!” a lot, but when it comes to helping others, we can only listen them to the depth they are capable of hearing. If they talk without hearing what they are saying, there isn’t anything we can do for them. When we find someone who is able to listen us to the depth we are capable of hearing, we can help each other to say as much as each can hear, which is as awake as we can be at this point in our life. We have to live longer to wake up more. The rest of them are on their own. Until they can hear what they are saying, we can’t tell them anything they don’t already know. 06/10/2012
77. On Roan Mountain 05, Pisgah National Forest, Rhododendron Gardens, NC — June 6, 2012 — We talk about what we can talk about with different people—and don’t talk about what we can’t talk about. We can’t talk about everything with anybody. Some things are nobody’s business. Not even our therapist is privy to every little thing. We are genuine/authentic with some people and superficial with some people. Some people cannot hear some things we might say. Others can hear whatever we say, but some things are private and personal and we choose not to say them. So don’t think that everybody should be able to listen carefully with understanding to everything you have to say. Some people cannot. Other people can. What some can hear cannot be heard by all. It’s a matter of discernment. Say what you can to those who can receive what you have to say, and keep looking to find those who can hear whatever you choose to tell them. They will help right your boat and find your center for the next thing along the way. 06/10/2012
78. Wild Arrangement, Roan Mountain Highlands, Cherokee National Forest, near Carver’s Gap, TN — June 6, 2012 — 82 If you want to wake up, find the people who can listen you to the truth of who you are—which includes who you also are—and start talking. We wake ourselves up by hearing what we have to say. The people who are soundly asleep are the people who are telling everyone else what they need to hear. That isn’t how waking up works. WE have to hear what WE are saying—all the way down to the truth of who we are, and also are. We can’t get there without waking up. And, when we wake up, that’s what we wake up to: Who we are—which includes who we also are. Of course, everybody thinks they already know who they are. We are asleep, dreaming that we know who we are. 06/11/2012
79. Shafts of Light 02, Hemlock Forest, Cherokee National Forest, Roan Mountain Highlands, TN — May, 2012 — We have to work to do the work that is ours to do. The work to do the work is balancing, reconciling, negotiating, integrating all of the contrary claims upon our time and attention. It’s so hard! Don’t let that stop you! Just because it’s hard is no reason not to do it! Just because it’s hard is no reason to quit! It is called the Hero’s Journey, after all. 06/11/2012
80. Appalachian Trail 02, Carver’s Gap, Cherokee National Forest, Roan Mountain Highlands, TN — June 6, 2012 — 81 We have to gather together regularly for encouragement and reorientation—to be nurtured and revived, nourished and sustained for the journey. We cannot give ourselves what we need to do what is ours to do in the time left for living. We are on our own, but we cannot do it alone. We require the right kind of company to remain centered in, grounded in, focused on, what is happening and what we can do about it. We come together to remember and remind one another of who we are and what we are about, and to find in each other’s presence what we need in order to step back into our life and do there what needs to be done. 06/11/2012
81. Roan Mountain Highlands, Cherokee National Forest near Carver’s Gap, TN — June 6, 2012 — 80 Jesus said, “Who is my mother? Who are my brothers? My family are those who know what I mean and therefore can understand what I’m talking about!” (or words to that effect). Just because we are kin to those people doesn’t make them good for us. Abraham left home, so did Jesus. The Buddha ran away from home. The Dali Lama was given away by his family at an early age. There is a pattern here. One thing is essential in the work to become who we are: Distance. Distance is physical and emotional. Just because you move across the country doesn’t mean you have left home. Leaving home emotionally is easier if you leave home physically, but it doesn’t necessarily follow. Emergency room physicians employ emotional distance when they treat their patients, but they don’t treat their own family members. Emotional distance is difficult to achieve, but essential if you are going to be you apart from your family’s idea of who you Should Be. You have to just not give a damn what they think, on a certain level. Hard to find and maintain that level—close enough to care about their well-being (“Mother, behold your son”) and distant enough to be immune to their ways. Sometimes, we have to take a little pill or two just to get through Thanksgiving. Little pills are distance in a bottle. They get you away from what you need to get away from. They also get you away from everything so you have to use your best judgment as to when to use them and for how long, but for some of us, they keep the Idiots from killing our soul. 06/12/2012
82. Magnolia 2012 01, Greensboro, NC — June 1, 2012 — 79 How many people understand you, respect your positions, tics and tendencies, honor your boundaries and do not tell you how to run your life? How many people invade, intrude, demean, ridicule, attack, denounce and generally treat you as though you don’t know the first thing about living your life? Which group of people do you think you need to spend the most time with? 06/12/2012
83. Don’t Rock the Boat! — This is a faux reflection created by coping the sky, flipping it and attaching it to itself to produce the illusion of a reflection. — Notice who listens to you without interruption, without cutting you off, without changing the subject, without breaking in to argue or debate—allowing you to say what you have to say. Notice how often you listen to others that way. That’s all. Just be aware of these things. 06/12/2012
84. Low Clouds, Foothills Farm near Wilkesboro, NC — June 6, 2012 — 78 Everything we do is based on the benefit we derive from doing it. We live to exploit everything—to turn it all to our advantage. The trick is to be good for nothing. To do what needs to be done without an eye out for our advantage. All of life is a sales pitch. The revolution is living without trying to exploit anything—living with no benefit or advantage in mind—doing what is good whether it does any good or not. Give the gift that is yours to give in ways that are appropriate to the situation, and let that be that. Bring your best to bear upon the work that is yours to do with nothing in it for you. Sing the song that is yours to sing because you like the music. The treasure is the work that we do, the life we live. Laugh at the idea that there is more to it than that! 06/13/2012
85. Roadside Fence 01, Blue Ridge Parkway near Boone, NC—June 13, 2012 — The work is developing eyes that see, ears that hear and a heart that understands—how things are and how things also are and what needs to be done about it with the gifts that are, with the genius that is, ours to give in each situation as it arises. What do we get out of it? We get to see, hear, and understand and do what needs to be done with the gifts that are ours to give, the genius that is ours to share. If you are looking for more than that, there are plenty of people around who can tell you how to get it. 06/13/2012
86. Roan Mountain Highlands Panorama, Cherokee National Forest near Carver’s Gap, TN—June 13, 2012 — 77 What are we looking for? What do we think it’s going to take? What are we dismissing as not worthy of consideration in the category of What Is Worthwhile? What IS important? What DOES matter most? What should rightfully be our highest priority? The center and focus of our life? The ground of our being? You get that right and you have it made. The work is developing eyes that see, ears that hear and a heart that understands—how things are and how things also are and what needs to be done about it with the gifts that are, with the genius that is, ours to give in each situation as it arises. What do we get out of it? We get to see, hear, and understand and do what needs to be done with the gifts that are ours to give, the genius that is ours to share. Here’s a tip for you: Don’t go after what everyone else is chasing. Look through your reject pile. Think carefully about the things you don’t give a second thought to. “The stone the builders reject,” you know. 06/14/2012
87. The White Blaze 01, Appalachian Trail across Grassy Ridge to Jane Bald, Cherokee National Forest, Roan Mountain Highlands, Carver’s Gap, TN — June 13, 2012 — 76 We have to live out of our heart, out of the heart of who we are, out of our own center, out of that which is truly who we are and also are, out of the core of our very being. This is to live with integrity. We each have a flow and a rhythm all our own. We cannot be who someone else is, or who someone else wants us to be. We have to honor the truth of ourselves whether anyone else does or not. We honor our truth by being aware of it and finding ways to express it in our lives, so that the life we live becomes The Way of our coming forth into the world of space and time. An Incarnation of spirit into flesh, of soul into body, of God into human beings. We take our cue for living, for being, from our deepest sense of what is right and true and real and good—not because that is what we have been told but because it resonates with our heart, center, core, and we know in our body the truth of what is important and needs to be done in this situation, here and now. To do that thing—even though it might be the opposite of what everyone thinks ought to be done—is to live truthfully. To live truthfully is to live aligned with heart and living so as to exhibit that alignment in all that we do. May it be so of all of us always! 06/14/2012
88. The White Blaze 02, The Appalachian Trail winds through a Hemlock forest, Cherokee National Forest, Roan Mountain Highlands, Carver’s Gap, TN—June 13, 2012 — We each have a flow and a rhythm all our own. We cannot be who someone else is, or who someone else wants us to be. We have to honor the truth of ourselves whether anyone else does or not. We honor our truth by being aware of it and finding ways to express it in our lives, so that the life we live becomes The Way of our coming forth into the world of space and time. An Incarnation of spirit into flesh, of soul into body, of God into human beings. 06/14/2012
89. Rhododendron Tunnel, Pisgah National Forest, Rhododendron Gardens, NC—Roan Mountain and the Roan Mountain Highlands are on the border of Tennessee and North Carolina. The Highlands and the Balds are supervised by the Cherokee National Forest in Tennessee and the Gardens and the trail to Roan High Bluff are supervised by the Pisgah National Forest in North Carolina. It is a wonderful area of the world. — 75 When you are playing Solitaire, everything rides on the cards. You can be great, alert, awake, aware, and not miss a play, but the game is out of your hands. With Solitaire, you can be excused for not taking things seriously. “It’s just a game.” Deal a new game and hope for a different outcome. Our life is also out of our hands, but we have a harder time letting things go. We think if we were smarter, more responsible, more diligent, a better person… The list is long. I don’t care how smart, etc., you are, things unforeseen and unforeseeable whack you a good one every now and then. (Get ready. Here it comes.) Don’t take it seriously! Pick up the pieces, as you are able. Reorder your life insofar as that is possible. And hope for the best (The best, by the way, is a longer time between whacks). We are pulling ourselves forth to meet the circumstances of our living. We are not arranging a life of ease and pleasure to last without interruption into the far distant future. If we remember what we are doing here, we have a better chance of actually doing it. 06/14/2012
90. On Roan Mountain, Pisgah National Forest, Rhododendron Gardens, NC—June 13, 2012 — The Hemlock forest on Roan Mountain in North Carolina is the closest thing to a rain forest I know of in the south. You’d have to go to Oregon or Washington State to beat it. Ferns and mosses own the woods, and if you stand still long enough, you put down roots and wonder why leave. — 74 We need to be incubated, protected, insulated against all that threatens our life and would replace it with others’ ideas of how we should be. And yet. To be insulated is to be imprisoned, locked in, up, and away from the experiences that are required for life. The truth is that we have to go up against it. We have to leave home. Walk away from the safety and security of Mother’s Love, or whatever you call the protective shield warding off the threats to life which are also invitations to life. Jacob wrestled with the angel for the blessing. Odysseus spit in the Cyclops’ eye. We have to wade into it and see what we can do, trusting that we have what it takes to rise to the occasion again and again, and grow through facing the opposition to growth.  06/15/2012
91. On Roan Mountain 02, Pisgah National Forest, Rhododendron Gardens, NC— June 13, 2012 — We transform and redeem our life by engaging it on all levels. Our voluntary participation in the experience of life—the life that meets us at birth and the life that is ours to live with the gifts and genius that are ours to share—is the Hero’s Journey. We trust ourselves to the journey and see what happens—and see who we become through the process of engagement and participation. 06/15/2012
92. Flame Azaleas 01, Cherokee National Forest, Roan Mountain Highlands, Carver’s Gap, TN—June 13, 2012 — 73 Being afraid of what might happen keeps us safely and securely imprisoned in The Way Life Ought To Be According To Those Who Know Best. We have to take our chances if we want to be alive. If you are living according to someone else’s idea of how you ought to live, you aren’t living. You have to leave “home” to be alive. Home is where they tell you what to do, what to think, what not to think, how to live, who to be. They lay out the plan for your life at home. They give you the chart with the black foot prints. The rules to live by. You can’t fly without leaving the nest. How different can you be from the people you hang out with? Graveyards are homogenous. Dead people are all alike. People who are alive are alive in different ways. Spend time with people who help you with your life. Who ask you about your work—the work that is yours to do, not your job. Where do you go to talk about your work, your life that is calling you to live it? Who talks to you about their work, their life? Anybody? Start asking people to tell you about their life. See where it goes. 06/15/2012
93. Picnic Heaven, Cherokee National Forest, Roan Mountain Highlands, Carver’s Gap, TN—June 13, 2012 — 72 May you do well what is yours to do! Understanding, of course, that what is yours to do has no necessary connection with what you want to do, with what you wish would be yours to do, with what you feel like doing, with what you are in the mood to do. These conditions mean these photos are available and those aren’t. This light means these photos are available and those aren’t. Our purposes are not always served by our circumstances. We don’t always get what we want. We take what we find and do what we can think to do with it. And that’s that. Photography is a lot like life in this way. We don’t order our lives. We don’t get to choose our choices. We wake up to a leak in the basement, to mold above the ceiling in the bathroom, to flat tires and chest pains and a lump in our breast… What the hell is going on? Would somebody please saddle up the horse we want to ride through our life? The high one, with no time for the small stuff! We want to solve the problem of world peace and we get grandchildren squabbling over what to eat for breakfast. We cannot get to the life that is worth living because this current one keeps throwing smoking refrigerators and dogs throwing up with the vet on vacation at us! Where is that bell between rounds? What are we doing in a life that isn’t housebroken? That doesn’t obey the rules? That laughs at the idea of rules? That keeps giving us things that must be done that we don’t want to do? Now you’re getting it. May we all do well what is ours to do whether we want to or not, all our life long! 06/16/2012
94. Rhododendron Gardens, Pisgah National Park, Roan Mountain, NC—June 13, 2012 — These conditions mean these photos are available and those aren’t. This light means these photos are available and those aren’t. Our purposes are not always served by our circumstances. We don’t always get what we want. We take what we find and do what we can think to do with it. And that’s that. Photography is a lot like life in this way. 06/16/2012
95. Price Lake Fog 03, Julian Price Memorial Park, Blue Ridge Parkway near Blowing Rock, NC—June 13, 2012 — 71 The ground of what we are about is this: See how things are (which includes seeing how things also are). See what needs to be done about it, and do it—in each situation as it arises. That’s all there ever is to it. We size things up and respond appropriately to them with the gifts we have to offer in each situation as it arises. Think of yourself as an emergency room physician dealing with situations arising in your life as though they are patients being delivered to your care. How you respond to them makes all the difference. Make it your practice to see into the heart of things, determine what needs to be done, and do it. The world will be a better place. 06/16/2012
96. Flame Azalea 01, Cherokee National Forest, Roan Mountain Highlands, Carver’s Gap, TN — June 13, 2012 — 70 We have to let things be as hopeless as they are and shift our focus from the outcome to the work. If we live long enough our choices are going to be restricted over time to a sad shadow of our former life—of the life anyone would wish for herself, for himself. We are likely to lose our hearing, our sight, our mobility, our memory. We will be in a plight if we take this seriously. Our focus has to be on the work to bring forth our gifts as a blessing to the time and place of our life regardless of the context, circumstances and conditions of our living. We have to nurture and nourish our perspective — and our connection with heart/soul/psyche — all the way to our final breath. This isn’t something we suddenly pick up after the first heart attack. It is something we cultivate and develop over time—starting now. We are living to be who we are—and that is not contingent upon anything we have or upon anything that happens to us. We bring ourselves forth in rising to every occasion, and saying, again, to the Cyclops: “If I couldn’t do any better than that, I wouldn’t call myself a Bad Guy!” 06/17/2012
97. Roan Mountain Highlands 03, Cherokee National Forest, Carver’s Gap, TN—June 13, 2012 — 69 The happy fantasy is to be free and wealthy enough to do whatever we want to do. The truth is that we can never be free of our wants. We are bound to want what we want whether or not it is good for us. We can only want what we want—not what we ought to want. How do we want what we ought to want? Can you imagine a seventh grader wanting to go to school? Or to the dentist? So, we have these fantasies that we nourish with time and attention, wistfully dreaming of having this or doing that, never once thinking of what we ought to be dreaming of, thinking about—namely the life that is waiting for us to live it, the soul/psyche that needs us to consciously attend its leadings, learn its language, sense its guidance. We have work to do that has nothing to do with how we earn a living or pay the bills. If we are going to drift off into reverie, we could go in its direction, imagining what it might be and how we might serve it in the time left for living. Productive fantasies are the stuff of invention and creativity and life beyond being 98.6 and breathing. 06/17/2012
98. Mark’s Dad and Dog, Cherokee National Forest, Roan Mountain Highlands, Carver’s Gap, TN—June 13, 2012 — Push yourself to follow your interests and see where they lead you. If you can find better advice, take it! 06/17/2012
99. View from Round Bald, Cherokee National Forest, Roan Mountain Highlands, Carver’s Gap, TN — June 13, 2012 — Do the work! Your work! The work that is yours to do! Everything falls into place around allegiance to, your alignment with, your work. Your life comes to life around your work. Which means everything about your life should be centered on, revolving around, seeking your work, acquiescing to your work, serving your work, doing your work. There is really nothing else for you to be thinking about. Does it help you bring forth your work? If not, what’s it doing in your life? If it isn’t serving your work, it is opposing your work, resisting your work. And the only person who can do something about that is, well, you. 06/18/2012
100. Rhododendron Blossoms, Cherokee National Forest, Roan Mountain Highlands, Carver’s Gap, TN — June 13, 2012 — 68 Trust your life to unfold before you and start walking. Don’t wait to know what you’re doing, what you should do, what you’re supposed to do. Don’t wait to have it all planned and plotted, drawn up, figured out, in place. Do not kill the mystery. If you are ever going to listen to anything I say, listen to this: Trust yourself to figure it out over time. Let your life be the Great Adventure that it is. Get going! See what you can do in the time left for living. Why die not knowing?  06/18/2012
101. Blue Ridge Morning, Buffalo Mountain, Blue Ridge Parkway near Orchard Gap, VA—May 18, 2012 — 67 When we understand things are not the way we have been told that they are, it’s a fresh start, a clean slate. We start over with what we’ve heard off the table, seeking to see things as they are without the smokescreen of how people wish they were getting in the way, complicating the picture, confusing our sensors. Learning to trust our own take on things is a wild and sometimes wicked road, but once we see and know that we see into the heart of how things are (and also are), we have a different relationship with ourselves, and can begin to trust ourselves to know when to say yes and when to say no for no other reason than because it resonates with us and we can be trusted. When we trust ourselves, we are a force to be reckoned with in our own life. When we live out of our own heart, the Cyclops knows his is a lost cause from the start. 06/17/2012
102. Rhododendron 02, Blue Ridge Parkway near Peaks of Otter, VA — May 27, 2012 — 66 May all of our transitions be smooth. May all of our moves be fluid. We are learning, you know, to dance with our life. The music is the situation, the time and place, the context and circumstances of our living. We dance with the moment, with the now, and the what now, and the now what, and the NOW what. The goal is to do it without a hitch, twitch or bobble. The damn orchestra, composed as it is of a thousand Cyclops who have never played a note, can’t give us anything we can’t make look good. We listen past the music, look beyond the moment, to the flow of our life, to the vibrant core of our being, and bring THAT forth here, now, blending and shaping this with that, bringing forth a wonder of wonders with our timing and motion, with our response—unseen, unheard of, unimagined—knocking the audience and the critics off their seats, propelling them as one to their feet in an ovation unmatched in the long march of time, marking the performance of a lifetime, which is nothing compared to what we will do next, keep watching, jaw dropped, eyes open wide, breathing forgotten. Yeah—may it be just like that for us all always. 06/19/2012
103. The Old Mill of Guilford (AKA, Bailes Mill), Greensboro, NC — June 8, 2012 — 65 We have to live looking for our life as a moth looks for the flame. Our life—the life that is truly our life to live, the life with our name on it, the life no one can live but us—has to be our driving passion, our deepest allegiance, our abiding loyalty. But, we sell our birthright for whatever is easy or entertaining and live empty lives, stuffing them with empty calories, wondering why nothing is fulfilling. We have to live looking for our life as a moth looks for the flame! 06/19/2012
104. Rhododendron 03, Blue Ridge Parkway near Peaks of Otter, VA — May 27, 2012 — 64 What does what we think about keep us from thinking about? How often in a day do we think something we have never thought about? If we keep thinking the same things, how are we going to live differently? If we keep living the same way we’ve always lived, what does the future hold? How is the life that is our life to live ever going to break into the life we are living if we keep things rigidly in place beginning with the thoughts we think? Promise me you will think something new tomorrow. Before noon. See how many new thoughts you can think in a day. You’re changing your life just by breaking out of your crusty old thinking patterns. Who knows where this will lead? All great adventures begin this way, with us not knowing where we are going, or what’s happening, or what will happen next. Our life is an action-adventure thriller just waiting to get on board so it can leave the harbor. Woo-Whee! I can’t wait! How ‘bout you? 06/19/2012
105. Hay Field Sunrise 02, near Pilot Mountain, NC— June 20, 2012 — If you are ever going to listen to anything I say, listen to this: Trust yourself to figure it out over time. 06/20/2012
106. Sunrise at the Rest Stop, near Pilot Mountain, NC — June 20, 2012 — If you are ever going to listen to anything else I say, listen to this: See what you can do in the time left for living. Why die not knowing? 06/21/2012
107. Black-eyed Susans, near Pilot Mountain, NC — June 20, 2012 — The next time your advisers gather around with their directions and recommendations for how you should be living your life, say this: “You know, what I really need help with is knowing whether there is something better I should be doing with my time.” When they ask you what you mean, say, “I know that was too hard for you. I’m sorry. Here’s an easier one: I need to know how to want what I ought to want and not what I want. Can you help me with that?” And when they sputter on that one, say, “Well, could you tell me how to stop being lectured to by people who want to tell me what to do? I could really use some help with that.” If they are going to tell you how to run your life, they should at least address the things you think would be truly helpful. 06/21/2012
108. Rhododendron 14, near Peaks of Otter, VA — May 27, 2012 — 63 Everybody has a plan, or thinks they ought to, but when things fail to go as planned, we make matters worse when we “stick to the plan.” The plan has to take the situation into account: In light of this, we can do this, this, or this. We live in response to the situation as it arises, develops—not according to The Plan. The is no plan that can take into account all of the contingencies we might face before breakfast. We sit loose in the saddle and live light on our feet, moving with the music and the mood of the moment. We can’t think fast enough to keep up with the action but we can respond faster than we can think. We can live well without knowing what we are doing. The Plan, then, is to give ourselves to the situation as it arises, trusting ourselves to rise to any occasion IF we can get out of the way and allow ourselves to see what is happening and what needs to happen, to see how things are and what needs to be done about it, and offer what is needed out of the gifts that are ours to give—and see where it goes. If you can find a better plan than that, buy it! 06/21/2012
109. Shady View, Doughton Park, Blue Ridge Parkway near Sparta, NC—July 20, 2012 — 62 Village life remains recognizably the same no matter how many conquering armies march through town over long epochs of time. The people there all have their place and the social codes keep them in their place, maintaining the traditions and serving the needs of the village. What would a village look like that served the needs of the people? What would a village composed entirely of artists, or physicians, or lawyers, look like? Who would make the coffee and the pizza? How many villages do you know of that work out the balance between the needs of each and the needs of all? Give me a village where each person is expected to serve her or his own interest/passion and the community exists to help bring forth the individuals making up the community—and not to disappear the individuals for the so-called good of the community! Where would you go to find such a place? The political climate of the US, and I think of the world, lends itself to the disappearance of individuals. Talk radio homogenizes the masses: “If you don’t think like WE do, you are a bad person, and maybe not a person at all!” The foundation of incivility. 06/22/2012
110. The Woods at Springer’s Point Panorama, Ocracoke Island, Cape Hatteras National Seashore, NC — October, 2008 — 61 I was positioning my tripod for a photo at Mirror Lake in Yosemite when a group of Vietnamese Buddhist Monks walked by as a part of a tour hike. One asked about my camera and I told him it was smarter than I am, that my main purpose is to carry the equipment and get out of the way—like the Zen story of the butcher holding the knife and letting the knife find its way. The monk jumped back in mock alarm, protesting, “Are YOU going to Zen ME?” I said, “Yeah,” and we all enjoyed the sound of our own laughter. We have to allow ourselves to be Zened by those who don’t know nearly as much about Zen as we do. Not one of us sees it all. Every one of us can be helped along by the ways others of us see things. None of us is smart enough to reject the insight offered by any of us. May we all learn to see together, and help each other along the way! 06/22/2012
111. Split Rail Fence, Doughton Park, Blue Ridge Parkway near Sparta, NC — June 20, 2012 — 60 Think of Karma as Momentum. Movement toward something. There are only two choices here. We can move toward life or death. The drift of our life is in one direction or the other. If we are not moving toward life, we are moving toward death. We build momentum toward life or death, toward living or dying, with the choices we make each day. Reasonably consistent life choices builds momentum toward life. Reasonably consistent death choices builds momentum toward death. What are we choosing here? Is this a death choice or a life choice? Death choices are status quo choices, keeping things in place choices, not doing anything different choices, static/stuck choices, don’t rock the boat don’t make waves don’t change anything ever choices. Life choices are, from the viewpoint of death, asking for it choices, risk-taking choices, taking a chance on something new and different choices, vibrant/dynamic/pulsating choices, who wouda thought it choices, out of the ordinary choices, trust in more than meets the eye choices. We build momentum toward life by believing in our life and in our work that brings our life forth in spite of solid evidence to the contrary. We build momentum toward life by not pausing to defend, justify, explain or excuse the choices we make. We don’t try to make our choices pleasing to or right by any other authority. WE are the authority for our own life, for  our own choices. We live or we die by virtue of what WE think is life and death. This is integrity: Living aligned with what we believe to be life—living in opposition to what we believe to be death—regardless of what our detractors have to say. 06/23/2012
112. The Woods at Springer’s Point 03, Ocracoke Island, Cape Hatteras National Seashore, NC —October, 2008 — 59 We know when we have had enough coffee. We know when it’s time for bed. We know which book to read next. And we know much more than we know we know. Time to start listening. Checking in with the Knower. Asking for direction and paying attention to what comes. Time to start being aware of who is guiding our boat on its path through the sea. Wait! How can there be a path on the sea? Exactly. We seek the path where there can be no path. We seek the Way where there is no Way. Who is the “we” in charge of the finding/seeing? It’s time to begin getting to know who all we are. 06/23/2012
113. The Woods at Springer’s Point 02, Ocracoke Island, Cape Hatteras National Seashore, NC —October 2008 — 58 Jesus came living his life, the life that was his to live, calling us to follow him. Not by living his life! By living OUR life! We wear Jesus’ cross. Jesus wore his own cross. We have to wear OUR cross, or it’s modern equivalent. How would we symbolize the burden, the cross, the death, of living our own life, the life that is ours to live, within the context and circumstances of our living? This is what Jesus’ cross symbolized in his life—the burden, the payment, of being who he was, when he was, where he was given how things were. What does it cost us to be who we are, when we are, where we are, given how things are? We have to get out of our left-brained, literal mindset when we consider these things, and allow ourselves to awaken to the possibilities—and SEE the significance of being who we are and bringing our gifts to bear upon the time and place of our living. This is the revolution that transforms the world. 06/23/2012
114. The Woods at Springer’s Point 01, Ocracoke Island, Cape Hatteras National Seashore, NC —October 2008 — 57 We have to pay the bills and we have to live our own life, the life that is our life to live. This is called walking two paths at the same time. We’ve been cheating our life. The bills get all our attention. We have to start tuning in to the life that is calling our name. You know the one I’m talking about. The one that won’t go away. The one standing there at the hitching post, stamping the ground, wondering when you are going to let it take you for the ride of your life. You only have one real problem: To see how ALIVE you can be in the time left for living. Here’s a hint for you: LIFE is found only in living the life that is your life to live. Lots of folks promise you life, living and the thrill of being alive, but the Real Thing is tied up at the hitching post, stamping its foot, giving you the mean eye. 06/23/2012
115. Stone Mountain View, Blue Ridge Parkway near Doughton Park, NC — June 23, 2012 — 56 Greed is the primary motivator. How much do we need to do what truly needs us to do it? A lot less than we have! I walk through my stuff from time to time, wondering what was I—am I—thinking. I expect we all could pare down and be no worse off. But, that isn’t the point. Greed is the point. Greed is compensation for having lost the point. Our life is empty so we have to have more. Having more in our life is a substitute for having no purpose to our life whatsoever. When we recover our sense of purpose—when we live in service to our life—when our work proceeds from and produces LIFE—greed diminishes and disappears and we have what we need to do what needs us to do it. Woe be unto those who have no sense of being needed by their life! We need to do what needs us to do it. Making more money and buying more stuff isn’t it. What is? Where do we go to find it? We only have to open ourselves to it and practice being receptive to what is calling our name—and be aware of what we dismiss as “that couldn’t possibly be it.” 06/24/2012
116. Foothills, seen from the Blue Ridge Parkway near Fancy Gap, VA—June 20, 2012 — 55 It helps to have no opinion about the things we can’t do anything about. If it is raining and we want to play golf or take photographs of the moonrise, it’s just raining. If we have our mind on a glass of wine and discover a sinkhole forming in our front yard, it’s just a sinkhole. We do what we can to deal with things as they are and hope for the best (And, I’m sure, you remember what the best we can hope for is—Longer intervals between whacks!). Strong opinions get in the way and delay, or sometimes, prevent, appropriate responses to our circumstances. Buddhism is all about avoiding suffering. We avoid suffering when we have no strong opinion about it—when we do what can be done to deal with the cause of suffering, and let that be that—and hope for the best! 06/24/2012
117. Price Lake Fog 40 BW, Julian Price Memorial Park, Blue Ridge Parkway near Blowing Rock, NC—June 13, 2012 — 54 The traumatic impact of seeing squalor, starvation and human suffering shaped the young Buddha’s life and formed his approach to the facts he could not deny. Under the Bo Tree, enlightenment came, as it always does, as he made the mental/emotional/spiritual/physical adjustments necessary to square himself with the truth of how things are and also are, and what needed to be done about it. His life flowed from there in response to the truth of how things are. The work, the struggle, the agony is squaring ourselves up with how things are and what needs to be done about it. This is the foundation, the groundwork, of enlightenment and the initiation rite to LIFE. Any wonder why so few are Buddhas and Christs? Or why we’ve made the entrance requirement to heaven BELIEVING and not LIVING? 06/24/2012
118. Hwy 52 and Pilot Mountain, NC — June 20, 2012 — 53 Jacob Bronowski said, “If you want to know the truth, you have to live in certain ways.” He meant if we want to know the truth, we have to live truthful lives. This does not mean telling the truth. It means living truthfully. When we live truthfully, we live aligned with the truth of how things are and also are. In order to live this way, we have to square ourselves with the truth of how things are, which is generally completely out of square with how we wish things were, or how we want things to be. Hitler, for example, refused to square himself with the truth of how things are and the world paid a terrible price for his insistence that how he wanted things to be was how things were. The spiritual law at work here is: When we refuse to bear legitimate pain, the world suffers. We increase suffering by refusing to suffer. Alcoholics, hiding in the bottle from the pain of their life, add untold suffering to the pain of others. Squaring ourselves up with, reconciling ourselves with, living in accord with the truth of how things are is the essential step in living truthfully, which is the silent revolution that transforms the world. 06/25/2012
119. A Fair View, Doughton Park, Blue Ridge Parkway near Sparta, NC — June 20, 2012 — 52 Living truthfully requires us to be transparent to ourselves—to know how WE are and also are—as well as to be cognizant of how it is around us. We take everything into account, internally and externally, in knowing how things are (and also are) and what to do about it—in each situation as it arises. This is a lot to be aware of but. We only use a small percentage of the brain cells available to us, and we keep that small percentage focused on small matters like where’s the next party, what will we wear, who will win the pennant and World Series, the Super Bowl and the BCS Championship, and does he/she love me or love me not? We can do better. Our work is to see into the heart of how things are and do what needs to be done about it. It takes being awake to do the work. It takes being alive to do the work. And that’s exactly what we get as a payoff. We get to wake up and be alive. 06/25/2012
120. Morning Light, Blue Ridge Parkway near Boone, NC — June 13, 2012 — 51 Waking up begins with hearing what we are saying, seeing what we are doing. We wake up to who we are, and how it is with us, and what we are doing, and whether that is helping or hurting, and what we might do instead. We wake up by becoming transparent to ourselves. If you want to wake up start listening to what you are saying. Start seeing what you are doing. Asking, “How’s that helping? How’s that hurting?” Asking, “Where does that thought/idea/reaction come from?” Who are we trying to please? Who are we trying to irritate? Who is pulling our strings, making it easy for us to do what we are doing, say what we are saying, think what we are thinking? As we get to the bottom of us and see how things are with us, we bring ourselves into focus, gain a sense of what is life for us and what is death, decide what matters most and how we might make that our work and serve it with the gifts that are ours in each situation as it arises—and see where it goes. 06/26/2012
121. Brinegar Cabin, Doughton Park, Blue Ridge Parkway near Sparta, NC — June 20, 2012 — 50 What would you do that you couldn’t be paid enough to not do? The things you come up with to put on that list are clues to where your heart lies—to the grounding center of your life. How often do you do the things on the list? How central are those things in the actual living of your life? Your work is to bring them into the center. Bring what is central to the center. Don’t leave your heart out there on the periphery of your life. Bring it into the center. Let your life revolve around its true center. That’s the right order of things. This is the work of defragmentation, of reorientation, of integration and renewal. It is the work of becoming who you are. 06/26/2012
122. Fence, Doughton Park, Blue Ridge Parkway near Sparta NC — June 26, 2012 — 49 We pay a price for our unfolding, emerging. And we pay a price for refusing to unfold, emerge. Life is death and death is life. There is no avoiding the difficulties involved with being alive on any level. Pay the fare and ride the ride! Joseph Campbell would say, “Throw yourself into it and do your thing. Don’t worry about the outcome!” He talked a lot about the importance of voluntary participation in life as it is. It is all a practice field for the soul’s own becoming. See what you can do in the time left for living! You will learn all you need to know about life from living it! You didn’t know anything when you came forth from the womb, and look at you now! Look at all you think you know! Amazing! Throw yourself into what remains of it and do your thing! Don’t hold back because you aren’t sure what your thing is—make your best guess and GO! Everything becomes clear with time. Do what you think your thing is and see where it goes. Clutching some system of doctrine about the structure of reality isn’t going to help you. You came naked from the womb the first time. It’s no different this time. Don’t waste your time looking for reassurance and certainty and somebody telling you what to do. Exercise a little responsibility here for figuring out what you need to know as you go. The right kind of help will come from amazing places. The wrong kind of help always advertises itself and falls apart at the first sign of trouble. Soul snatchers are everywhere, telling you to have faith in what they have to say. Have faith in yourself, that’s what I say. You’ve come this far. You have what it takes to make it the rest of the way. You’ll figure out a wrong turn when you make one. Just keep turning. Divining truth. Dowsing life. Doodlebugging wonder. 06/27/2012
123. Magnolia 05, Greensboro, NC — June 2012 — 48 The Taoists understood doing nothing to be doing something. The world would be in much better shape if more people did nothing. We over-do with the best of them. There are times to step back, sit down and wait. When you get to a place where you have done all that can be done, wait and see where it goes. You plant the seeds and wait. You mix the yeast with the dough and wait. When everything rests in someone else’s hands, give yourself over to the circumstances and wait to see where it goes. You can achieve astonishing results by doing nothing at the right time, in the right way. 06/27/2012
124. Magnolia 06, Greensboro, NC — June 2012 — 47 There is no immunity—there are no guarantees. We get out of bed each day and take our chances. This is one thing we all have in common. Before this fundamental reality we are all one. There is no gay, no straight, no male, no female, no black, no Hispanic, no… Well, you get the idea. No one has a leg up on the rest of us when it comes to avoiding the worst life can do. We all grapple with situations and circumstances nightmares are made of—and if we don’t there has just been a delay in delivery, our time is coming. We are one with all sentient beings in the work to come to terms with how things are and what to do about it with the gifts that are ours in each situation as it arises. And, it would appear that we are one with all human beings in trying to escape, avoid, deny that work all the way to the grave. We have more in common with the people we think are our polar opposites than in the things that are oppositional. That being the case, you would think we would treat each other better, and try to help one another with the plight of being human. Ah but, escape, avoidance, denial works its way into the system and we see enemies everywhere and blame them all for the things we don’t like about our lives. THOSE people bring down the wrath of God upon us all, you know. And we see scapegoats where we should be finding allies, compatriots, comrades, friends. Because we are all up against it and we all need all the help we can get. 06/27/2012
125. Two Trees, Doughton Park, Blue Ridge Parkway near Sparta, NC — June 25, 2012 — 46 The Buddha said, “Be a light unto yourself.” I take that to mean: “Follow your own heart, your heart’s own dream. Do your own work—the work that is truly yours to do. Be the self you were created to be in this world. Live the life that needs you to live it! And don’t let anyone else tell you they have a better idea for who you ought to be and how you ought to live your life than you are capable having on your own!” 06/28/2012
126. Magnolia 03, Greensboro, NC — June 2012 — Money can’t buy maturity, wisdom, or sound judgment. There you are. 06/29/2012
127. Carver’s Gap 05, Cherokee National Forest, Roan Mountain Highlands, TN — June 06, 2012 — 45 Joseph Campbell said, “The influence of a vital person vitalizes.” Vitality is believing the things we do matter and living as though they do. It won’t hurt to believe that the things we do matters, and it will help on every level. Right now, you are breathing and your heart is beating. Your body is in your care. It matters how you treat it. It matters how we live our life. We say it doesn’t matter when things aren’t going our way, when it appears that nothing we do will deliver what we want. Well, what does wanting know? Wanting leads us a merry chase into the far reaches of the Wasteland. Every advertisement attempts to appeal to what we want. What do we want? More of what does not satisfy! We never get enough of that! The core of your spiritual life is the heart of your LIFE, the life that is yours to live, that needs you to live it—whether you want to or not. We do not have to want what is good for us to do it! Wanting is the Cyclops’ best weapon in turning us aside from the journey, from the path, from the work that is ours to do, the life that is ours to live. Ah, but, without wanting to guide us what will lead us along the way? To be alive, we have to establish, maintain and serve our connection with our heart, with the core of our life, with who we are. Living out of our heart, core, self changes how we live, transforms our life, sends us off in a new direction. But we like our old life. We like the old life that is killing us. We are addicted to the old routines that are death. On a ventilator, emphysema victims want to smoke. And so, the fundamental question: Whose Side Are You On? We are divided against ourselves. Who guides our boat on its path through the sea? It is up to us to lay wanting aside and establish a relationship with—trust ourselves to—The One Who Knows within. 06/30/2012
128. Peggy Woods’ Ordinary, Peaks of Otter, Blue Ridge Parkway near Bedford, VA — June 28, 2012 — Peggy Wood’s took care of the Ordinary needs of travelers, that would be a meal and a place to sleep and good conversation. A prototype bed and breakfast.— 44 You have to do the work. You can’t read some book or listen to some lecture or let someone tell you what to do. You have to work it out yourself. You have to square yourself up with the way things are, come to terms with the difference between how things are and how you want them to be, how you wish they were, and decide what needs to be done about it, and do it. In each situation as it arises. Your whole life long. This is the work of True Human Being-hood. Doing the work of adjusting ourselves to the reality of our life over the course of our life, with compassion and grace, kindness, gentleness, generosity and a bent for doing things as right and as well as they can be done makes a True Human Being out of all of us. 06/30/2012
129. Common as a Yard Dog, Is the southern saying about orange Day Lilies which are everywhere this time of the year, Doughton Park, Blue Ridge Parkway near Sparta, NC — June 26, 2012 — 43 Every age has to reinterpret the meaningful symbols of the previous ages in order to keep alive the metaphors which inform our soul. Mind and Soul have to be in synch. Soul cannot hold onto something that Mind cannot carry. This is the problem with the literalization of religion—and it is characteristic of bad religion to literalize everything. It tries to force on Mind things that do not fit. The people are told to believe things that are not believable and do not make sense. Makes for a religion that cannot look experienced truth in the eye and has to deny how things are in favor of how it proclaims things to be. If we want to know the truth, we have to live truthfully—and find those who can help us interpret the truth in light of what is also true—and bear the weight and the wonder of that contradiction, to square up with the differences among how things are and how things also are and how we wish they were and how we want them to be, and rise to every occasion, living boldly and courageously in all contexts and circumstances of life. 07/01/2012
130. The Hydrangea Variations 06, Greensboro, NC — June 2012 — 42 Our point of view is the most important thing about us. From that springs everything. Cultivate the right point of view and you have it made, as much as you can have it made—as much as a Giant Sequoia, say, has it made, or a red barn on a hillside in the setting sun. Our point of view turns the key that opens the door to LIFE all the way to the grave, and perhaps beyond, who knows? If you are going to work on anything, work on your point of view. You want a point of view that is ready for action anytime, day or night, in all weather conditions, no matter what, and is able to see into the heart of whatever it looks at and is transparent to itself, that is, able to take itself into account, so that nothing is hidden from eyes that see, ears that hear and heart that understands. And don’t leave out compassion. Once you get seeing with the eyes of compassion down, the world may as well hand itself over to  you for all the good being ornery and obstinate is going to do for it. Then you can walk into your day knowing that no day can give you anything you can’t transform just by looking at it and seeing it for what it is and for what it might become with the right touch and a little luck. 07/01/2012
131. Price Lake Fog 04, Julian Price Memorial Park, Blue Ridge Parkway near Blowing Rock, NC — June 10, 2012 — 41 All we have to work with, really, are our perspective and our proclivities and our relationship with the inner world. The inner world doesn’t get much press, much favorable press anyway, but that’s where protection and guidance and what I call “working distance” come from. Now, everything here depends on the strength of our ego in developing the right relationship with the inner and outer worlds. We have to have an “I” in order to be a “We” anywhere, on any level. We have to be able to say, “No!” and mean it, and we have to be able to take “No!” for an answer. We have to be able to draw lines and honor lines that are drawn by others, or by our circumstances. If we have that going for us, we have all we need to walk into the inner world and look around, and say, “Is anybody there?” and wait in the silence while they all look at one another and wonder if they can trust us to care about them and have their best interest at heart and understand that “they” and “we” are one, and that our joint work is bringing who we all are together, and bringing who we all are forth into the light of day, into the world of normal, apparent, here-and-now reality. And you thought your life was boring. That’s a joke, and the joke is on you! Your life is the greatest adventure imaginable just waiting for you to live it, just waiting for you to give it a chance to show you what it can do. 07/02/2012
132. Grassy Ridge Road, Blue Ridge Parkway near Doughton Park, NC — June 20, 2012 — 40 Live in good faith with those all around you, on both sides of the ball, on both sides of the street. Live transparent to yourself in all circumstances. Don’t claim to see more clearly than you see, to know more than you know, to be able to do more than you are able to do. And when the rest of them do not return the favor, when they do not live in good faith back to you, respond to their incivility as appropriately as possible under the circumstances, knowing that everything depends upon the good faith of all concerned and that nothing can guarantee that, and, therefore, it all hangs by a thread always, and we find ourselves picking up the pieces more often than not. Pick up the pieces in good faith with those all around you, on both sides of the ball… 07/02/2012
133. A Far View, Blue Ridge Parkway near Boone, NC — June 26, 2012 — Part of being lucky is being smart. Part of being stupid is being stubborn. Part of being smart is taking this and applying it to the way you are living your life and seeing where it goes. 07/03/2012
134. Fog Bound, Blue Ridge Parkway near Boone, NC — June 06, 2012 — 39 The meaning of life is not a problem for those living a meaningful life. A child with an ice cream cone wouldn’t waste a second with you wondering about the meaning of life. The meaning of her, of his, life is enjoying the ice cream cone. Get out of her, of his, way with your question! She, he, has work to do! You see, of course, where this is going. We have work to do! And doing the work that is ours to do—living the life that is ours to live—is interesting and meaningful beyond all measurement and assessment. It is when, for lack of courage or imagination, we live cutoff from heart and soul, in a Wasteland of Discontent and Hopelessness, that we bemoan the lack of meaning and wonder where a purpose is that could save the whole thing like a thunderbolt from God showing the way to the Land of Milk and Honey. Meaning isn’t something we think up any more than we think up the life that is our life to live (“May I’ll try scuba diving!”). We wake up to the realization that we couldn’t live without doing what we are doing—without loving what we love with our whole life. And we smile, and get back to doing it, like a child with ice cream. 07/03/2012
135. Blue Ridge Idyll, Blue Ridge Parkway near Mt. Jefferson, NC — June 20, 2012 — 38 We have to know what is important and serve it, defend it, with our life, because what is life divorced from what is important? The people who drift through their life looking for meaning, purpose, and the point of it all have either been wrong about what is important or they failed to serve and defend it with their life—failed to live loyally allied with what is important no matter what. Of course, it’s tricky. In any situation there are all manner of competing claimants to the title of The Most Important Thing In This Situation—and we have to decide again what will it be this time. It is not always the same thing, or the same combination of things. Sometimes it’s this way and sometimes it’s that way, and we have to decide each time what way is it going to be this time. We want to make rules and policies to get us off the hook. We want to know we are right. We want someone to tell us what to do. We want to hide out in The Law Says, or Mamma Says, or Daddy Says or The Bible Says. We do not want to decide for ourselves each time what is important here and now. So we drift through our life with some rule book tucked under our arm looking for meaning, purpose, and the point of it all because we don’t know what is important, or refuse to serve and defend it with our life. 07/04/2012
136. Hay Field Sunrise 01, near Pilot Mountain, NC — June 2012 — 37 Freedom means maybe yes and maybe no. Sometimes like this and sometimes like that. Sometimes this way, sometimes that way. And we get to say what, when. I think commerce should be regulated but individual freedom to move about the country and mind our own business should not be. What business is it of anybody if gay people marry? Gay people are trying their best to live the life they woke up in, just like everybody else. We all need all the help and encouragement we can get. We don’t need to be making things harder for any of us. Immigrants are trying to make a better life for themselves and their families, just like everybody else. How can we help them is the question, not how can we make things increasingly impossible for them. How can we be open and gracious, kind and compassionate, generous and considerate is the question. We don’t need to be trying to be mean and snarly. There is enough of that everywhere we go. 07/04/2012
137. Hay Field Panorama 02, Wright Farm, Rockingham County, NC — June 7, 2012 — 36 We are our own authority regarding the way we live our life. If we say the authority by which we live our life is the Holy Bible, or the Qur’an, or the Diamond Sutra, or the Bhagavad Gita, or the Torah, then we are the authority by which we say the Bible, the Qur’an, etc. is authoritative. We alone say how we live our life and we have no authority over anyone else’s life. They are the authority over their life. When our life interferes with someone else’s life, or theirs with ours, the authority of the State then intercedes on someone’s behalf to straighten out the conflict. But in strictly personal matters where my life does not impact anyone else’s life, I am the sole authority determining what I do and don’t do, believe and don’t believe, how I live and don’t live. Jesus said, “Why don’t you judge for yourselves what is right?” and “Who made me a judge over you?” We make a mess of things when we take someone else’s word as the law over our life, betray our own deep sense of what is good and right, and do what we are told until we die. 07/05/2012
138. Pleasant View, Doughton Park, Blue Ridge Parkway near Sparta, NC — June 26, 2012 — 35 How do we get our feet under us? How do we stand against the prevailing winds of the culture or society in compliance with our own way of seeing, our own sense of what is good and right in a particular situation, when the overriding weight of opinion is stoutly against us? When we have no one to stand with us or encourage us or urge us on? How do we live true to the drift of our own convictions when we are alone and on our own against family and friends? Where do we find what we need to be who we are? Where do we go to listen to our own soul in order to know what we know and look for what we need to assert that in our life? We have to ask the questions in order to seek the answers. 07/05/2012
139. Cornfield Sunrise 01, Dinkins Bottom, Yadkin County, NC — July 06, 2012 — 34 Our relationship with our soul is our primary relationship, coloring all our other relationships. We are soul’s guardian, protector, servant and friend. Soul is our life and guide, guiding us to life, through life. It works well for both, for all, when it works, when we work it, when we understand what we are to be about and are about it, guarding, protecting, serving, befriending. Generally, we don’t have a clue about any of this. No one ever spells it out, offers direction, answers our questions. We wake up in some life with someone saying, “I’m your Mommie,” and someone else saying, “I’m your Daddy,” who have no notion whatsoever about what those words mean, much less “soul,” and we are on our own from the start, figuring things out, making sense of what we can make sense of and trying to stay out of the way of the rest, all the while with the instruction book tucked away inside each of us, waiting to be consulted, listened to, heard. We are all a variation of ET, only we have Home within and spend our life looking for Home, like the man on his ox looking for his ox, like the woman holding her car keys looking for her car keys. You’d have to live it to believe it. 07/06/2012
140. Summer Arrangement 01, Blowing Rock, NC — July 06, 2012 — 33 I wish things were the way they appear to be, don’t you? That people would be who they say they are? That they would do what they say they will do? Wouldn’t that be a great way to start rearranging the world in order to make it a better, more reliable, trustworthy, place for all of us to live? If we knew what we were getting, or getting into, we wouldn’t make nearly the number of errors in judgment, for which we generally blame ourselves. We blame ourselves for believing the lie. Again. When are we ever going to learn? You know the routine. When are they going to stop lying? That’s what I want to know. Believing the lie is doing our part. Lying is failing, or refusing, to doing their part. They are the ones who deserve the blame! And the fallout! They lie and we have to clean up the mess? That’s no good. Well. We can’t do anything about their lying but. We can stop blaming ourselves for believing what we hear. What kind of world would it be if no one believed anyone? If everyone regarded everything they heard with suspicion and doubt? We hold the liars’ world together for them, hoping they will wake up and join us in the work of making this a better, more reliable, trustworthy, place for all of us to be. That is not asking for too much. 07/07/2012
141. Black-Eyed Susan on Black, Blowing Rock, NC — July 6, 2012 — Introduction “Right forever on the scaffold, wrong forever on the throne”—J.R. Lowell (Or words to that effect). We cannot let the impact, or lack thereof, of our actions in the service of what needs to be done impact us, dissuading us from the work that is ours to do. The idiots always have the high ground. Don’t let it stop you, or even slow you down. Yours—ours—is the work that must be done anyway, nevertheless, even so. Force the Cyclops to feast on you for breakfast, lunch and dinner every day until he throws up and runs at the sight of you coming back for another round. 07/07/2012
142. Black-Eyed Susan on White, Blowing Rock, NC — July 6, 2012 — 31 Fraser Snowden said, “The only true philosophical question is: Where do you draw the line?” You don’t have to be right about where you draw the line—you can generally always redraw it, and on those occasions when you can’t, you’ll have to work through it and use the experience to know better where to draw it next time—but you have to know where YOU would draw it and YOU have to draw it. Knowing where you would draw the line and drawing it is the foundational act in becoming who you are. It is the essential spiritual practice. If you are going to practice anything, practice drawing lines! Drawing lines defines you as an individual human being, establishes your boundaries, declares to everyone in your field of influence, “This is where you stop and I start!”—which is the point at which relationship begins (And ends, but if a relationship cannot sustain the boundaries of both, or all, people in the relationship it is not a relationship, but is more on the order of an owner/slave arrangement). So, draw your lines! Draw them with compassion and kindness, but firmly and with conviction. It is an art that will serve you well from this point forward. 07/07/2012
143. Purple Cone Flower on Black, Blowing Rock, NC — July 6, 2012 — 30 There is no science for connecting you with your life—it is art all the way. Your life is your art. There is no science for connecting you with your art. How could that be? It’s a contradiction in terms! What does science know of art? Science is all formulas and recipes and equations and left-brained stuff about stuff that can be weighed and measured and mapped and seen and touched and tasted and smelled and heard—all of which is a world apart from art. Which is the world of your life, the gift which is yours to serve. You serve your life with your life, with the time left for living. And there is no science for connecting you with that, with your art, your life. No formulas, or recipes, or black footsteps to follow. But there are lots of rules: Look at something until you see it. That’s a rule for finding your life, your art. Look closer at the things that catch your eye. Another. Sit down and shut up. Find the current of your life and let it carry you into the wonder of being alive. Ask the questions that need to be asked. Don’t waste your time with questions that don’t lead to more questions. The path opens before those who start walking. It is a large book that contains the rules of life. It’s waiting for you to write it. 07/08/2012
144. Nodding Thistle on Black, Greensboro, NC — May 2012 — 29 DO NOT QUIT! That’s the message from voice at the heart of things to all of us. It’s hard. There are times we want to quit, times we cannot avoid the steady press of the questions: So What? Who Cares? Why Try? What Difference Does It (or Will It) Make? What’s The Use? What’s The Point? What Good Will It Do? Terry Malloy (“On The Waterfront”) speaks for all of us: “I coulda had class. I coulda been a contender. I coulda been somebody, instead of a bum, which is what I am,” or what we feel like we are much too often, or what we are afraid we are too much of the time. And, like Terry Malloy, we never had a chance—and yet, we keep getting chances, chances to show our stuff, chances to be who we also are—the champ, NOT the bum! And we kill those chances, too many times, with one or more of the questions above—another quote from Terry Malloy: “What good does do you but get you in trouble?” We need voices countering our own voice. We can’t do it on our own. We need help remembering and reconnecting with the core, the center, the heart of who we are and working against all odds to believe in the goodness of the life that keeps trying to come forth, that keeps calling us to live it no matter what, “anyway, nevertheless, even so!” We come into the world and the world does a number on us, separates us from the life that is ours to live, laughs at us for thinking that we have a life to live, and we have to spend our life finding our way to our life, and living it—against all odds. We have to champion ourselves. We have to live on behalf of ourselves. And we have to find those who can help us do that. Everything depends on it. 07/09/2012
145. Orange Flame Azalea, Groundhog Mountain, Blue Ridge Parkway, VA — May 17, 2012 — 28 If you are depressed because you have been thinking about how things are in your life and it’s hopeless, there is nothing wrong with you. You are right to be depressed. Anybody would be depressed who had the remotest notion of how things are. The odds stacked against us alone would be cause for a grand mal bout of the blues. The facts cannot be denied but. The can be reinterpreted. It’s the power of perspective to spin the facts until they are dizzy, begging us to please, please let them rest. Here’s my favorite spin: So what if it’s hopeless? Try that one on The Facts. Makes them crazy. So what if it’s useless, pointless, futile and coming to a very bad end? It’s what we do in the meantime that matters, like being genuine and kind and compassionate and a warm, caring human being. That will make all the difference. And The Facts know it. The Facts know they don’t matter, that it’s how we respond to them that turns the key in the door of everyone’s future. That’s one spin. Here’s another: The Facts are just excuses to keep from doing what needs to be done, and what needs to be done needs to be done not because it’s going to work in your favor and make everything just great but because it needs to be done. The baby needs to be fed, for instance, or the baby’s diaper needs to be changed, or the dishes need to be washed. These things aren’t going to turn life your way but they need to be done and it is essential that you do them exactly the way they need to be done. Being the kind of parent that baby needs is going to have more impact for the good than you can possibly imagine, never mind that it isn’t going to be your ticket to success, fame, fortune and glory beyond imagining. Tell The Facts, the next time they come sauntering into your life, smiling, asking how it’s going, to get out of your way because you have work to do that needs you to do it whether it does any good or not, and smile back. And wink. 07/09/2012
146. Peaks of Otter, from Sharp Top Mountain, Blue Ridge Parkway near Bedford, VA — May 28, 2012 — 27 Oneness is not automatic, inevitable. Oneness is not some foundational, ultimate, reality that we all fall into eventually, no matter how disarrayed or fractured or compartmentalized our life is. You can’t say to someone about Oneness, “Just wait. You’ll see.” Maybe, maybe not. Oneness is our work. Healing, wholeness, you know. Reconciliation, integration, union. Making peace. Harmonizing the discordances. Orchestrating the mutually exclusive incompatibilities. Ordering chaos. Perceiving patterns. Finding meaning. It’s one of the human things about human beings. Our gift to the cosmos. Perspective. We SEE Oneness, and there it is. And it isn’t there until we SEE it. See? So preaching, proclaiming Oneness is like preaching, proclaiming Salvation. Neither of those things exists without me doing the work required to bring them into existence. The work is realization, recognition, enlightenment, the perspective shift that sees how things are and how things also are and steps into the tension created by the polarities, integrating, reconciling, harmonizing, making peace through compassionate truthfulness about it all. No one can tell us anything we aren’t able to hear. Seers point out the way to those who are looking for it. You can say, “Wake up! Do the work! It’s all right there for anyone with eyes to see! Look!” but you can’t make anyone wake up, do the work, see. Eyes to see, see. Eyes that don’t see, don’t see. The distance from one to the other is the length of the spiritual quest, the Hero’s Journey. 07/10/2012
147. Shafts of Light 03, Hemlock Forest, Roan Mountain Highlands, Cherokee National Forest, Carver’s Gap, TN — May 30, 2012 — Introduction We live in prisons without bars or walls. We move freely about the country, locked securely in our point of view, our esteemed customs, our prized traditions, our established procedures for doing what we do—carrying how we see into every situation, imprisoned by the values we cherish, the principles we hold dear, free to question everyone’s ways but our own forever. 07/11/2012
148. Waterline, Bass Lake, Moses H. Cone Memorial Park, Blue Ridge Parkway near Blowing Rock, NC — June 2012 — 25 The Inner World is the source of inspiration, insight, courage, values and direction. We dig dry wells in the Outer World searching for the water of life. We have to revise our approach to both worlds. We do not find the meaning we seek in the external world, buying, spending, amassing and consuming. We find meaning in aligning ourselves with, in living the life that is ours to live—the life that has its source in the internal world. A good job is not one with a high salary and low hours, but one that resonates with us—that brings forth in us the gifts that are ours to relish, enjoy and give. The water of life flowing through us to a parched and dying world. 07/11/2012
149. Short Season, Rhododendron Gardens, Pisgah National Forest, NC — June 15, 2012 — 24 It’s a popular view to believe there is a reason for everything. Not hardly, as they say in the deep south. There isn’t a reason for anything. Nothing is as it has to be. Everything could be different, and will be, keep watching, it’s changing as you look. Life is dynamic, fluid, flowing, moving, evolving. Only death is static. Even a rock is becoming something else. The reason for everything theory takes us off the hook. We can become passive geese in a pen waiting for some benevolent master’s hand to feed and water us, and we spend our time on the earth at the mercy of The Plan for Our Life, without any responsibility for anything we do because “It’s all a part of The Plan.” We see every little detail of every life—every event—as some printout from some master’s computer mind, merging into some great crescendo of meaning and purpose beyond imagining to the delight and amazement of all. Well. There’s another way but. We have to step into it as full participants in the creation of what, nobody knows. It’s an abstract painting we all are producing: Life In The Abstract. Nobody knows where it’s going. We are all here to see what becomes of it. Our part is to be alive to the possibilities, options, and choices that exist for each of us in each situation as it arises—to see things as they are here and now, and see what needs to happen about it, and do it and see where it goes and what is called for in the next moment, the next situation, and we play it out like a game of Improv, bringing our gift(s), our genius, our creative imagination to play in the play, in the game, in the painting, to see what contribution we can make in the time left for living with what we have to offer in the service of the true good of all. 07/12/2012
150. The Hydrangea Variations 07, Greensboro, NC — May 2012 — 23 The shift in our life occurs when our perspective changes. Our perspective changes when we hear ourselves saying what/how we see and see it as though for the first time. SEEING how we see is seeing that calls into question how we see, that changes how we see. Now we are not just seeing, but are also seeing ourselves seeing, and that opens us to a new world, a new way of seeing. “I can’t believe I just said that,” we say, when we see what we are saying/seeing, and we can no longer see what we saw the way we saw it before we saw ourselves seeing it. I’m good for this kind of sentence, aren’t I? It’s what I do best. But, as I was saying, seeing comes from hearing ourselves say what/how we are seeing. It is the articulation of what we see that opens our eyes to seeing differently, that opens us to a new world, that enables us to, that requires us to, live differently because now we see differently and once we see, we cannot live as though we do not see. Seeing differently does not depend on what somebody tells us but on what we hear ourselves saying but. We cannot just recite the old formulas, the old constructions. That becomes a hypnotic recitation of the old way of seeing. We don’t hear that. We speak from a trance state when we talk that way. And the difference between talking and reciting is in the person who is listening to us. When we recite and the person listening doesn’t nod in agreement, but asks probing questions that force us out of the trance state in order to articulate what we mean by what we are saying, and have to think about what we are saying, BOOM!—as John Madden would say, REVELATION! So if you want to transform the world, listen to it in the right kind of way. 07/12/2012

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02/05/2012 — 05/03/12

1. Calloway Gap Road, Blue Ridge Parkway near West Jefferson, NC—February 03, 2012 — We bring ourselves forth within the terms and conditions of our life. This is called walking two paths at the same time. Or, multitasking. We have to think about what we are doing. This is where the left hemisphere earns its keep. The right hemisphere is good at getting lost like a good LSD trip in the wonder of our calling, or like a bad trip in the overwhelming terror of the terms and conditions within which we live. The left hemisphere puts the right hemisphere’s feet on the ground and says, “Look. We want to do that and we have to deal with this. Don’t forget where you’re going but watch where you are stepping. What’s next right now?” Then the right hemisphere, with its short little attention span and its propensity for grand schemes can focus, for a while, on the business at hand: Being who we are right here, right now. Then comes again the Inflation/Deflation cycle and the left hemisphere has to say once more, “Who are we? What are we about? What does that mean for right here, right now?” And so it goes, back and forth, all along the way. The Dance of Life. 02/05/2012
2. Flowers of Spring 04, Crocus, Bicentennial Garden, Greensboro, NC—February 02, 2012 — Live toward what you love and see where it goes and allow it to change as it will with time into something else you love and see where that goes. Don’t even think about settling down with what you love, locking it up, tying it down, nailing it in place, keeping it exactly as it is forever. Love isn’t for pickling. It’s for living. See where it leads you, what becomes of it and what you become because of it. And don’t stop until you are good and dead. 02/05/2012
3. Maple at Forest Lawn, Forest Lawn Cemetery, Greensboro, NC—November 04, 2011 — There are no black footprints on the path of life. We make up the steps all along the way. If we are taking direction, we are on someone else’s path. We figure it out for ourselves, what to do next, now what, what now. We work it out. We decide. We take our chances with everything on the line, and live with the wind of the spirit that blows where it will forever in our hair. There are no stop signs on the road of life. There is no end point. No destination. We never arrive. Never settle down. Never settle in with the life of our dreams gathered about us and live happily ever after. It’s one damn thing after another all the way. It’s deciding for ourselves what to do next, what now, now what. The path winds on, the road keeps going. What we love hands us off to something else that needs loving, that needs us to love it, and do it, just to see where it goes. We live, don’t you know, just to see where it goes, and what will happen, and what we’ll do about it when it does. 02/06/2012
4. Flowers of Spring 05, Crocus, Bicentennial Garden, Greensboro, NC—February 02, 2012 — When we grow spiritually we grow into ourselves, into who we are, into what we have been given to offer to the world, into what we are called to do/be/become, into our destiny, our calling, our life. This is not conducive to fitting in, and taking your place (that would be the place you are told to take by Those Who Know Best And Must Be Pleased), and sitting quietly, and thinking what you are told to think, and believing what you are told to believe, and doing what you are told to do all your life long. You don’t become a Good Church Member, or a Good Company Woman or Man, along the Spiritual Path. You become an Iconoclast. A heretic. A renegade. A revolutionary. An individual. Individuals are the hope of the world. Individuals with the vision of the child who said, “Mommy! He’s not wearing any clothes!” 02/06/2012
5. Rural Wonder, Wilkes County, NC, — February 02, 2012 — The only way to get the good out of religion is to not take it seriously—certainly not as seriously as the adherents of the religion take it. All religion mires you down in the way it was, which is the way it is supposed to be. It’s like this. When the Gurus and Masters get together, they laugh and enjoy one another’s company. When their disciples get together they fight and go to war. That’s taking religion too seriously. Religion is a path and a practice replete with rituals that open us to the truth of our experience, offering meditation points that enlarge, deepen, expand our awareness of who we are, what we are about, how it is and also is, and what needs to be done about it for the true good of all, but. That is quickly lost in the quest to maintain the purity of the religion. if it is to do its work, religion has to go, disappear. It puts us on the path and gets out of the way. That isn’t what happens. The religion becomes the way, the Only Way, and denounces all other religions as false and blasphemous. This is taking things too seriously. The first rule of the way that is The Way is don’t take it too seriously. You’re on, you’re off, you’re on, you’re off. That’s just the way it is. If you take being on or off too seriously, you’re off. The finger pointing to the moon can’t become more important than the moon. 02/07/2012
6. Daffodil, Bicentennial Garden, Greensboro, NC—February 07, 2012 — I know you remember that Carl Jung said, “It’s what you do that reveals who you are, not what you think about doing or what you say you will do” (Or words to that effect). It’s what we do that carries us along the way, not what we think or believe or know. We exhibit who we are by the way we live our lives. We are crafting a life—shaping, forming, molding, creating a life—by the way we live. So. Start with your life. Meditate on your life. Reflect on your life. Examine, explore, consider your life. Where are you stuck? Where are you blocking your own way? What do you need to do differently? Instead? Not at all? No one knows you better than you. Face up to what you’re doing, to how you’re living, to what you need to be doing instead and see where it goes. 02/07/2012
7. Blue Ridge Overlook, Blue Ridge Parkway near Boone, NC—February 02, 2012 — The Hero’s Journey is largely about our proving to ourselves that we are worthy of our trust. The whole thing is crazy. Who could make this up? We are characters in a book none of us would read because it is so outlandish, off the wall, in a “Yeah. Right,” kind of way. But. You can’t deny that this is how it is. The unconscious, invisible, world from which we spring is a swirling mass of chaotic emotional fragments looking for some trustworthy center around which to revolve, coalesce, by which to be formed, shaped, ordered and structured. That would be us. We are the great hope of the unconscious realm. We exist to bring it into conscious, tangible, visible existence. Maybe not, but it’s a good story line. We are the champion of the unconscious urge to realization. We organize the mess and bring it forth. As though to test our capacity to be its hero, the unconscious plagues us regularly with heavy doses of inflation/deflation, fear, anguish, agony and the like. We think it’s our stuff but it doesn’t belong to us. Our place is to receive it well and integrate it with our calling, which is also of unconscious origin, the core around which we all come into being together, conscious and unconscious, yin and yang, in a Thou Art That kind of way. Now really, when did you hear anything nearly this interesting in Sunday School? 02/08/2012
8. Flowers of Spring 06, Crocus, Bicentennial Garden, Greensboro, NC—February 07, 2012 — We have different ways of seeing and evaluating what we see. What do you see when you see a gay person? What do you think when you think of abortion? God? Buddha? Jesus? Whiskey? Sex? People shake out in different places along the lines from Yea to Nay on all these terms. Who is right? Whose point of view should be elevated to THE RIGHT WAY TO SEE? How lenient can we be of views contrary to our own? To what extent can we grant one another the right to a life that is different from the way we think life ought to be lived? “The Right To Self-Determination And Self-Expression Shall Not Be Infringed!”—How close can we come to affirming that and ratifying our affirmation by the way we treat one another, and all others? How safe are those with us who do not see the way we see or value what we value? How do we work out our differences? How can we live together when we are threats to the other’s point of view? Hmmm? 02/08/2012
9. Sheets’ Gap, Blue Ridge Parkway near Laurel Springs, NC—February 02, 2012 — We have to work it out. The visible world of normal, apparent reality makes its claims on us and the invisible world of insubstantial, uncertain reality makes its claims on us as well. We live in two worlds with ties to both, with responsibilities and obligations to each. We cannot ignore either and hope to live well. We have to come to terms with how things are and how they also are, negotiate the conflicts of interest, compromise, compromise, compromise, and bear the pain of making peace. It keeps things interesting, walking two paths at the same time. 02/09/2012
10. Flowers of Spring 07, Bicentennial Garden, Greensboro, NC—February 07, 2012 —  There is eating an apple and there is knowing you are eating an apple and there is knowing all there is to know about you eating an apple. The more you know about you and the apple, the more you are likely to know about you and everything else. Knowing modifies your behavior. Changes the way you think. Transforms your life. If you are going to know anything, know all there is to know about something, which includes your relationship with it and its relationship with everything else, and one thing leads to another and you wind up knowing everything there is to know about everything, not because someone told you because what can be said about anything is only the surface layer of what is true and also true about it, but because you got to know everything on a level that knowing leads to when you know something with your heart of compassion and grace. Try knowing everything that way. See where it goes. 02/10/2012
11. Glencoe Mill Door 06, Glencoe, NC—January 30, 2012 — It doesn’t take much to shift us from where we have been to where we need to be. Anything can do it. A dripping faucet. A bird song. A kind, or cruel, word. The magic is in the timing. We have to be ready to receive what is being offered in every moment. We are immersed in truth at all times and don’t know it. The truth of being—the truth of who we are and what we are about—the truth of what needs us and what seduces us and what abuses us. We walk through truth, past truth, unseeing, unknowing, and then there it is. We see. We know. Then what? Ah, where are those sounding boards when we could benefit from one? Where do we go to talk things over and out? To untangle the mass of contradictory interests, claims, demands, ultimatums? Once we know what’s what, where do we find the courage to do what needs to be done about it? They don’t call it the Hero’s Journey for nothin’, honey. 02/11/2012
12. Jessie Brown’s Place, Blue Ridge Parkway near E.B. Jeffress Park, NC—February 02, 2011 — Sitting quietly brings it all up. The list making. The things we have to do. The reasons we can’t be sitting quietly. These are the things we do to keep from facing up to the truth of the other things. The ghosts of our past and present. The 10,000 versions of Bad. All the things that have happened and are happening and could well happen. These are the things that keep us from risking everything in the service of the other things. The wishful thinking. The flights of fancy. The day dreams of deliverance and salvation and an easy walk to fortune and glory. These are the things that keep us from paying the price of creating a life of our own one choice and courageous act at a time. The interests, attractions, inclinations, enthusiasms, urges, ideas that begin to stir something within, some faint desire for movement, for risk taking, for adventure. These are the things that will if we cooperate lead us from where we are to somewhere else if we have what it takes to discern a wild goose from a white rabbit and give ourselves to the chase and see where it goes. 02/12/2012
13. Virginia Landscape 02 — January 21, 2012 — On our own, we can’t do much better than distraction and diversion (which comes down to money and what money can do for us to keep our minds off the troubling truth that we don’t know what to do with our life). We need one of those, what are they called, guides. One we could trust with our life. Question is, would we? If the guide called out “No!” and we wanted “Yes!” who would we follow? How many bad marriages have come to grief with us knowing it wasn’t the thing to do from the start, and I don’t mean from the start of the marriage—I mean from the start of the relationship—and not caring? How many times will we shoot ourselves in the foot before we decide this isn’t getting us anywhere and is making going anywhere increasingly difficult? We all come complete with the guide we need. None of us is on our own. We have immediate access to an entire world of experience upon which to rely, with instinct and intuition being primary points of contact. We only have to work out the fine points of collaboration. We are not puppets to be yanked around by unconscious, invisible, strings. We have our own voice and our own sense of how things are to be done in the world of visible, physical reality. It is a joint work, our life together, visible and invisible, conscious with unconscious, left hemisphere with right hemisphere, waiting for us to put consciousness to work listening to and speaking with unconsciousness—for the true good of the whole. 02/13/2012
14. Horne Creek Barn, Horne Creek Historic Farm, once the Hauser Family farm, near Pinnacle, NC—January 19, 2012 — We wear a lot of hats and masks, assume a lot of roles, play a lot of parts. Which ones do we identify with? Which ones do we think we are? I gravitate to the hermit with the walking stick and the camera—the walking stick for walking and the camera for making myself whole (to the extent that we can make ourselves whole). I see my photos as variety of poetry, rectangular mandalas. They are my soul’s way of pulling itself together, of finding satisfaction, contentment, peace. I, of course, am making all this up. We make it all up. Every bit of it. Or we buy into something someone else made up. I think it is important for what we make up to sound plausible, at least to ourselves—to “ring true.” Otherwise, it’s wishful thinking with a hollow, tinny ring to it. What say you about you? Of all your roles, which is, which are, most truly you? 02/14/2012
15. Hatteras Sunrise, Cape Hatteras National Seashore, Ocracoke Island—October, 2011 — What excites you? What are you passionate about? In what direction does your life lie? These are grounding questions, centering questions, focusing questions. They take you to the core, point you toward your North Star, accompany you throughout your journey to who you are and what you are about. Reflect on them from time to time and consider the distance between where you are and what you are doing and where the answers to the questions would have you be and what they would have you doing. And see what you can do about closing the gap. 02/15/2012
16. Inside the Roundhouse, NC Transportation Museum, Spencer, NC—February 13, 2012 — We live toward what we love, what excites us, moves us. Move toward what moves you. Toward what attracts you, enthuses you, brings you to life. Live toward what enlivens you. “The influence of a vital person, vitalizes” (Joseph Campbell). And the vital person is vitalized by what vitalizes her, him. They are brilliant enough to allow themselves to be embraced by what they love. To serve it with their life. Working out all the things that must be worked out to pay the bills and meet their responsibilities and do what they love. We are all asked to be that same kind of brilliant by the life that waits to be lived, hoping we will find what it takes to live it and vitalize the world by modeling for it what vitality requires. 02/16/2012
17. Outside the Roundhouse, NC Transportation Museum, Spencer, NC—February 13, 2012 — Our life is a gift—a work—from the right hemisphere of our brain, unless it is co-opted, shanghaied, by the left and used for its purposes to achieve its ends as though the left knows a valid end when it sees one. Our lives are works of art produced by the right hemisphere (when everything is in synch and on track) for contemplation and meditation by the left. We act, do, explore, reflect. We bring up what needs to come forth, examine it in the light of consciousness with curiosity and wonder—mine it for its meaning, really its meanings—and integrate inner with outer for the good of the whole. Our life is a metaphor of infinite depth and breadth, revealing the soul to those with eyes to see (that would be eyes of compassion, kindness and grace). When we think our life is ours to do with as we will, and set off to achieve fame and fortune, glory and happiness ever after, we screw with the process and veer off track into a mess of our own making—which we do not resolve by trying harder or cooking up different schemes to get what we want. What we want is driving our boat into the shoals and reefs. We, that is our conscious ego generated by the left hemisphere, are here to “trust and obey” the drift and leading (via instinct and intuition) of the right hemisphere and see where it goes, working out the details and managing the conflicts that must be managed between the inner and outer worlds. Not your basic five-year plan, or a course in the curriculum of the Harvard Business School. 02/17/2012
18. Daffodil B/W, Bicentennial Garden, Greensboro, NC—February 07, 2012 — It is good to have a way and to not push our way onto anyone else. “Thou shalt not remove thy neighbor’s landmark,” is how the Old Testament puts it. It seems that we cannot be committed to a way if we respect someone else’s right to a different way. That makes it sound like one way is as good as another, and that any way will do. And we don’t want to hear, “Yes. That’s right. At least for the time being, because any way followed long enough will lead to a different way. And any way followed to the exclusion of other ways will not be as vital and vibrant as it would have been if it led to enlightening interchanges, conversations, and mergers with other ways.” We don’t like to consider the relative merits of the ways. We like to think that we are right and that everyone else is wrong and they all should do it like we are doing it. Makes us feel righteous and powerful to know we have it—the only version of it that will do—and that it is our place to thrust it on all people. Our way keeps getting in the way that way. 02/18/2012
19. Colors of Fall Abstract, Bog Garden Reflections, Greensboro, NC—December, 2011 — We are to support one another in our plight and help each other come to a carefully considered decision regarding what needs to be done in the situation as it arises without putting barriers in the other’s way or imposing our idea of what he or she ought to do. There are women who are pregnant who cannot carry their pregnancy to term. Abortion needs to be an option. There are people who are gay who love each other deeply. Marriage needs to be an option. We are not to think that we have the road map for someone else’s life and if they would only listen to us they would be deliriously happy with no regrets ever. There are no road maps. We help one another find the way that is our own way by listening each other to the truth of how it is with us and how it also is with us, trusting each other to decide what needs to be done about it, and supporting one another in the aftermath of the choice. It helps to have nothing at stake in someone else’s life, nothing to gain, nothing to lose—to be a compassionate ally in the work to see how things are and also are and what needs to be done about it in each situation as it arises, without tilting the table or interfering with other’s effort to see, hear and understand what needs to be seen, heard, and understood. 02/18/2012
20. Grandfather Mountain Dawn, Price Lake, Julian Price Memorial Park, Blue Ridge Parkway near Blowing Rock, NC—December, 2011 — Scaring ourselves is what we do best. The Nightly Terrors visit us all, sometimes carrying over into the Daytime Dreads. It can be around-the-clock for some of us, who fear we have cancer, say, to the exclusion of all medical exams, tests, and reassurances to the contrary. We might think of the Terrorist as an inner personality fragment—unconscious, unknown, childlike—that needs our firm avowal that we will square up to, face, and deal with whatever comes our way with all we have at our disposal and end with “Stop Scaring Me! I have enough on my plate as it is and I need to devote my full attention to what needs to be done without you sneaking up on me going BOO!” There is much that is out of our hands, and there is much we can do in response to the things that could happen. We will deal with it as well as we can if and when the time comes. Until then, we will live with this here, this now, in ways that are appropriate and called for—and will not diminish our ability to see it as it is by imagining hellish monsters arising in some other here, some other now. 02/19/2012
21. Spring Homestead, Blue Ridge Parkway near Fancy Gap, VA—April, 2011 — There is the recoil from what happens to us in our life, and there is the bringing forth of who we are to engage our life, and there is the day-to-day interchanges and routines of living our life, and there is working to effect our agenda for our life in our life—to make happen what we want to happen. Getting the ratios right means increasing the time we spend with two and decreasing the amount we spend with one and three and ignoring four entirely. Our calling is to attend and serve the destiny that is ours to embrace—to do the work that is ours to do with the gifts we have been given (and lie largely latent, waiting to be needed). The ideas of calling and destiny are dismissed as fairytale and fantasy by the culture—the stone the builders reject—yet they transform the lives of those who honor them with time and attention. It’s our call whether to respond to our calling or keep living like we know what we are doing. The foundational realization is that we don’t know what to do with our lives or where to go from here. Everything waits for us to know that we don’t know and take up the search for that which is seeking us. 02/19/2012
22. Glencoe Mill Door 02, Glencoe, NC—January 30, 2012 — “Dovetail your suspicions” is a paperback detective mantra, meaning “Don’t let anything get by. Don’t dismiss a thing. Hook everything that raises an eyebrow together. Hook everything together. Put it all on the table and consider carefully the table. Eventually, the table will speak. It’s like looking at an optical illusion. Something will move. Things will fall into place. Case closed.” Things are not always what we take them to be. This enhances, alters, that. Observe everything. Discount nothing. Assume nothing. About how things are, what they mean. Just watch, look, wait. For clarity, understanding, illumination. For an idea to come forth that springs you past stuck into movement, past not knowing what to do into action. Possibilities exist you haven’t considered, or dismissed years ago. There is life yet to be lived. Prove. Me. Wrong. 02/20/2012
23. Clear Cut, Rural NC near Madison—January 31, 2012 — Post Trauma Stress Disorder has mild forms where you can’t walk into a funeral home, say, following your Father’s, or your Mother’s, or your Spouse’s, our your Child’s funeral. There are things you once were able to do that you can no longer do. This may not interfere with your life at all. If you are never called on to attend another funeral, you might not even know you can’t do it. We associate some past trauma with some present experience—fireworks for a Viet Nam, or now Iraq War or Afghanistan War, Vet—and have to avoid the present experience. The Disorder becomes extreme when you can’t avoid the present experience. You have to have been there to know what I’m talking about and I hope none of you have been there, or ever are ever will be. I’m just here to say that some people cannot talk themselves into doing some things. This world has handed them experiences that no one should have to deal with. Treat them tenderly, with compassion—and hope for them a soft future with warm laughter and gentle breezes. And be aware of the things you cannot do for no apparent reason. And get off your back about them. Stop trying to understand them, or reason them out, or explain to yourself that there is nothing to them and that anybody ought to be able to do that. Especially stop trying to make yourself do that. Your gift to you. 02/21/2012
24. Early Light 01, Moraine Lake, Banff National Park, Alberta—September, 2009 — It just comes down to working it out. We have to work it out. Our craziness, for example, and our duties and responsibilities, and our destiny/calling—the work that is ours to do with the gifts we have been given for that work. We make it work. We don’t hide out in the 10,000 diversions/addictions. We don’t blame our friends, enemies and loves ones. We don’t make excuses. We say something on the order of: “This is a problem, and this is a problem, and this is a problem, and this is what I can think to do about my situation, and this is what I am going to do.” And we try that and see where it goes, and repeat the process until we die long years in the far distant future. We are NOT going to expect, look for, dream of an immediate solution to appear in the form of some wonderful savior who is going to intervene in our behalf and deliver us from all of our difficulties. We are going to wade right into all that is out of synch in our life and do what we can think to do about it for the rest of our life. We are going to work it out if it takes forever. That’s what time is for. 02/21/2012
25. Hanging Rock Vista 04, Hanging Rock State Park near Danbury, NC—November 03, 2011 — Caring can immobilize us, incapacitate us. We have to care enough to overcome lethargy and do what needs to be done the way it needs to be done, but not care so much that we become fixated on doing what we want and avoiding what we don’t want. It’s tricky, getting the ratio right. No one can do it for you, or tell you how it’s done. Something else you have to work out on your own. Caring too much about what happens or too little keeps us from exercising what influence we have. Being at the balance point between too much and too little is the freest freedom there is. 02/22/2012
26. Early Light 02, Moraine Lake, Banff National Park, Alberta—September, 2009 — Our lives take shape around our interests and concerns, around our desires and fears. We live toward something, away from something else. And we live to realize ourselves, to bring ourselves forth, to know who we are for the first time. Who we are has no necessary connection with who we think we are, or who we wish we were, or who we want to be, or who we are afraid we might be. We are a mystery unto ourselves. We are the present we live to open as on Christmas morning. Who will we find beneath the layers of shoulds and oughts and wannabes? We have to live the mystery to make the discovery, following instinct, intuition and the direction of our internal guidance system, we stumble our way to Bethlehem to behold again the miracle. 02/22/2012
27. Canadian Landscape, Moraine Lake, Banff National Park, Alberta, Canadian Rockies—September, 2009 — We cannot bring ourselves forth into this here, this now—into ANY here and now. It won’t tolerate us. We are too far removed from who we ought to be to fit in, take our place, belong, be Good Company Women and Men. We would wreck the economy. Shake the foundations. Knock down the walls. Erase the borders. Demolish the structures. Question the value of all that is held to be sacred. Unleash the Revolution. It would be like Jesus coming all over again. You know what happened to him. At the end of every Hero’s Journey, the hero returns with the boon, the blessing, for the people and the people say, “Who do you think you are? We know your parents. You aren’t anything like them. And what’s this you’re handing out? What are we going to do with that? We don’t want anything to do with it.” And they would turn back to their Super Bowls and their wars which have comprised life for the people through the ages, leaving the hero to walk among the ruins with one more challenge to to face as the stone the builders reject. So. As you take up the work of bringing yourself forth, be clear about the nature of the task and ready to deal with all the challenges, especially the last one. 02/23/2012
28. Used in Short Talks On Contradiction, etc., Moraine Memory, Moraine Lake, Banff National Park, Alberta, Canadian Rockies—We are torn between the requirements of life in two different worlds—the visible world of normal, apparent, reality and the invisible world of numinous, abstruse reality. We live on the boundary between yin and yang—and make peace, establish diplomatic relations, between worlds. Takes being awake to do it. Aware. Conscious. Feeling Conscious, not just Thinking Conscious. Conscious of everything. Of All of it. And bearing the pain. The pain of discrepancy. Contradiction. Integration, reconciliation, is wrought in the agony of the conflict of opposites in the clash of worlds. This is the plight of the Hero, the Christ, the Buddha within each of us in every age. Can we bear the pain? Face the truth of contradiction? Bring forth in this world of dog-eat-dog, survival of the fittest and doing whatever it takes to win, that world of grace and compassion and love your enemies and your neighbors as you love yourself? Both of the worlds hope that we can. 02/23/2012
29. Lake Louise Canoes, Banff National Park, Alberta, Canadian Rockies—September, 2009 — What do you like to do? How often do you do it? How open are you to allowing what you like to do to lead you to something else you might like to do if you would give it a chance? How dedicated, committed, are you to doing what you like to do and doing it well—as well as you can do it? How self-disciplined are you in the service of doing what you like to do requires you to do? How much trouble does doing what you like to do require you to go through to do it? What does doing what you like to do ask you to set aside, not do? How much are you willing to give up in order to do what you like to do? What price will you pay to do what you like to do? What do you like to do that you will do no matter what? Our life is the search for what we like to do so much that we will serve it with our life—and allow it to evolve, to lead us, into something else we like to do so much that we will serve it with our life. We find it by picking something that we like to do and see where it goes. Do not just sit with your hands folded in your lap waiting for your life to come ask you for a date. Search the thing out like Jalapeno Pie would send you for water. 02/24/2012
30. Banff Depot, Banff, Alberta, Banff National Park, Canadian Rockies—September, 2009 — I’ll bet you think it’s about answers. I’ll bet you think if you had all the answers, your life would be just grand. You have been lied to about the answers. All an answer is good for is the formulation of additional questions. Any answer should lead to about 10,000 questions. The questions themselves should lead to questions. But we have been told that answers are the end of questions. An answer that cuts off questions is heresy. Blasphemy. And should be burned at the stake. The only thing that deserves to be burned at the stake is an answer that cuts off questions. Anybody who tries to cut off your questions with an answer deserves to have his/her answer burned at the stake on the spot. You should carry a supply of stakes around with you for that very purpose. The only valuable answer is one that raises questions that haven’t been asked. You’re on to something when you start asking questions that haven’t been asked. Don’t let them stop you. Show them your stakes. And your matches. 02/24/2012
31. Morant’s Curve, Canadian Rockies, Banff National Park, Alberta—September, 2009 — Waking up is waking up to our responsibility for our life just as it is. We do it to ourselves. This life we are living is our work. Now, we also redeem ourselves. Waking up is also waking up to our responsibility for the life yet to be lived. The life we are called to live is also our work. We stand, upon awakening, between two worlds—two lives. Where we have been and where we are going. We did where we have been and we are going to do where we are going if we have what it takes to square ourselves up with the truth of both worlds. Waking up is squaring up, you know. Facing up. Standing up and doing what needs to be done—about both worlds. We don’t get enough of the help we wish we had in either world, but we get enough help in each world to make it, to get by “with a little help from our friends.” And our friends aren’t drugs. They are “a very present help in time of trouble.” We are here, now, by virtue of the hands that have helped us along the way. We didn’t get here on our own and we won’t go into the world that waits on our own either. But, it will feel like it from time to time—like we are on our own, abandoned and all alone. And we have to trust that this is not the case, that there is more to our situation than meets the eye, give ourselves to the task that needs us to do it and see where it goes. We will be amazed. It will likely be hell—the Cyclops is real in all of his manifestations—and it will be amazing. You’ll see. Let’s go! 02/25/2012
32. Afternoon Light, Canadian Rockies, Jasper National Park, Alberta—September 2009 — We’re here to see what we can do with it and to see where it goes. “Get in there and do your thing and see where it goes” is Joseph Campbell’s take on the Bhagavad Gita (or words to that effect). It’s the best advice in the entire book of advice. Too bad they didn’t read that book to us when we were small. Think of the stuff we could have seen by now! 02/25/2012
33. Used in Short Talks On Contradiction, etc., Telus, Canadian Rockies, Banff National Park, Alberta—September, 2009 — It’s easier being stupid. Being stupid is one step up from being dead. Everything is so simple when you’re stupid. Tomorrow is just like yesterday when you’re stupid. Nothing ever changes. The way things are spozed to be done is always the way things are spozed to be done. You don’t have to think about anything. No Thinking Allowed is the first rule of stupidity. Never Spot A Contradiction is the second rule. There are no contradictions for stupid people. An encounter with contradiction would require thinking. So everything is always just like they say it is. No Questions Permitted is the third rule of stupidity. Only thinking people ask questions. And no one in their right mind would ever think of being a thinking person. It all began going downhill when people started thinking. Stupidity is the hope of the world. 02/26/2010
34. Through the Rockies, Mt. Robson Provencial Park, Canadian Rockies, British Columbia—September 2009 — Joseph Campbell said he knew a lot of artists in his life and everyone of them would be glad to take money for their work and not one of the would sell themselves out for money, that is, they wouldn’t use their art in the service of making money—they wouldn’t be paid to do “art” that wasn’t truly their art. Franklin W. Dixon, the author of the Hardy Boys detective series hated what he did, spinning out tales about Joe and Frank instead of writing what he considered to be worthy of him which he couldn’t sell. I would have told him, and I think Campbell’s artist friends would have been with me here, to use the money to fuel his art. Write Hardy Boys stories on the side and write your heart’s true desire in the main. Walk two paths. Live under the conviction that money serves art, not the other way around. Our art must be developed—and our art might be flower beds or underground irrigation systems. Our art is whatever brings us to life. Money serves whatever brings us to life. And we can’t sell ourselves out for money. You can’t pay me to not take pictures. And when I sell a picture, I just fold it right back in to taking more pictures. Money serves art. Art is not about making money. It takes what it needs to do more art. Too bad there isn’t an art equivalent to Wall Street. 02/26/2012
35. Mt. Rundle, Canadian Rockies, Banff National Park, Alberta—September, 2009 — We work it out. We put everything on the table and take all the contraries into account and work it out. This is the plan for your life. Everybody has interests—you included—and we all have to work it out, figure ways to fit in what needs to be fitted in and put aside what needs to be put aside. I didn’t take photographs for 18 years because we couldn’t afford film and diapers and the diaper equivalents during that time. When the kids were out of college and on their own, I got back into the world of photography. I call that working it out. If you can’t do it now, if you can’t have it now, when can you do it, have it? We wait and see. We do what we can and see where it goes. While I wasn’t taking pictures, I was still seeing them. They are always everywhere. Something is forever catching my eye. Enjoy what can be enjoyed while you are working it out. The whole panic, time pressure, gotta have it, do it, now is something we do to ourselves. It took me 40 years to get my writing into book form, but I was writing the entire time. We have to serve our art—forget what form it takes. I call this working it out. There is what we have to do—what is ours to do—and there are the terms and conditions, the context and circumstances of our life, which are not friendly to our interests and needs. We have to work it out. 02/27/2012
36. Mt. Rundle Autumn, Canadian Rockies, Banff National Park, Alberta—September, 2009 — There are those who think they are privileged, kings and queens in exile, waiting to be recognized and accorded the entitlements of the realm. They don’t have to work anything out. They should be handed life on a platter and peeled grapes on satin pillows. A lot of people are beyond reach, out of touch with what most of us recognize as the reality of how things are. They refuse to acknowledge a world that is different from the one they have in mind—so they live in their world while life in the world the rest of us live in passes them by. It is an interesting thing how some of us can check out and check into a parallel universe of delusion and self-deception: “Delta Dawn, what’s that flower you have on?” Checking out is a way of refusing to work it out, of having nothing to do with a world as ornery and uncooperative as this world is. What they fail to appreciate is that the oppositional nature of this world is the Cyclops in our path requiring us to pull things forth from ourselves we did not know were there—and would not know were there without occasions that force us to rise to them. With a magic wand in hand we would live the most shallow, bland, nothing little life. Working it out brings us out, births us, enables us to become who we are capable of being—who we would never be with a free ticket to Easy Street. 02/27/2012
37. Vermillion Lakes Sunrise, Canadian Rockies, Banff National Park, Alberta—September, 2009 — Complaining about having to always be working it out is like playing shortstop and complaining about ground balls, being miffed because they all don’t strike out or hit fly balls to center field. Our job is working things out. Accommodation. Accommodation. Accommodation. Adjusting ourselves again and again to how things are and what needs to happen. Enlightenment, illumination, just recognizes how things are and what needs to happen—without being all bent out of shape, frenzied and frazzled, running out of the room and looking for the nearest diversion, distraction, escape, addiction to get our minds off the damn ground balls. THEY KEEP HITTING ME GROUND BALLS!!! How would that sound, coming from your shortstop, slamming his glove down, stalking off the field? He would not be an enlightened shortstop. Someone that lacking in illumination probably wouldn’t get it if you explained it to him. 02/28/2012
38. Sunrise, Vermillion Lakes, Canadian Rockies, Banff National Park, Alberta—September, 2009 — When we’re singing, or humming a little tune, as we go through our day or taking a shower, we’re just singing, humming. We aren’t doing it for any reason. We can’t explain why we are doing it. We don’t know why we are doing it. It is a spontaneous act with no purpose beyond the simple joy of the experience of singing, humming. Now you might want to sit down for this because it is going be a jolt. You might try thinking of you as your soul’s song. You are the song your soul is singing for the simple joy of the experience of being a living, breathing, alive human being. You are your soul’s joyful experience of life. Even the sorrow and pain is joyful—along the lines of Fran Tarkenton saying he missed everything about football: The wins and the losses, the long completions and scrambles and sacks and mud, everything, all of it, he loved it so. That’s your soul talking about the life you are living, about the song your soul is singing through you. And what about you, you say. Well, there is a sense in which you are just along for the ride, but invited to participate with your soul in the song you are singing together, in the life you are living together. The more you align yourself with your soul buy living the life that is yours to live and using the gifts that are yours to develop and explore, the more fun you will have, and the more you live at cross-purposes with your soul and try to effect YOUR way on your life, the less fun you will have, but. It’s your call all the way. Soul’s gonna sing no matter what. 02/28/2012
39. Soft Hues of Sunrise, Vermillion Lakes, Mt. Rundle, Canadian Rockies, Banff National Park, Alberta—September, 2009 — Carl Jung said something on the order of, “Do not listen only to what is being said. Listen also to what is talking.” Hearing what is talking is more important than hearing what is being said. Is it Jealousy talking? Fear? Hatred? Shame? Anger? Arrogance? Hostility? Compassion? Mistrust? Passion? Depression? Ennui? Lethargy? Desire? Joy? Hopelessness? Hope? What is the ground of what is being said? We have to hear it all—receive it all well—if we are to know what needs to be done in response. To whom, to what, are we talking? The drift of the conversation depends on us knowing what is being said and what is talking. 02/29/2012
40. Day Comes, Canadian Rockies, Banff National Park, Alberta—September, 2009 — When we are in the flow, on the beam, on track, at one with the life that is our life to live, things hum (that word again). We aren’t trying, we aren’t thinking, we aren’t arranging, we aren’t exploiting—we are seeing, hearing, grasping what the situation is calling for, asking for, needs as it arises and bringing forth what we have to offer to do what is needed. It doesn’t make sense. We can’t figure it out or think two steps ahead we are simply “here, now” responding to the moment, doing what needs to be done. To get there, don’t think about going there. Sit and listen to what needs to happen here and now. Read the situation. Practice reading the situation. Practice seeing, hearing, understanding what the situation is asking for, is needing. What do you have to offer that might help? See where it goes. 02/29/2012
41. Mt. Rundle and Vermillion Lakes, Canadian Rockies, Banff National Park, Alberta—September, 2009 — We are all waking up. We are always waking up. No one is ever as awake as he, as she, needs to be. The Buddha died from eating spoiled pork. How awake was that? There is always more than meets the eye. We are forever being taken in by appearances. Declaring everything to be hopeless, pointless, futile and a complete waste of our time. Quitting. Giving up. Because it makes no sense to go on. Listen to me! Do. Not. Quit. Perspective shifts! Count on it! It can seem, from one point of view, chaotic, disjointed, disconnected, fragmented, meaningless, like we are going in circles, getting nowhere fast, spinning our wheels, lost in the wilderness—and from another point of view, looking back on the mess, we see the connections, the flow, the movement, with one thing leading to another, like it has direction and purpose, and here we are. Believe in the journey! Believe one book is opening another! And be awake, as awake as you can be—sensing the pull, the drift, of soul at work in your life and trusting yourself to it through it all. 03/01/2012
42. Alberta Skies, Canadian Rockies, Banff National Park, Alberta—September, 2009 — We don’t have to know where we are going, we only have to sense the pull, the drift, of our soul in the moment of our living and trust it. It can seem like nothing is working, like nothing is going our way, like everything is against us and all is lost, particularly us, going in circles, running into walls. It is crucial that we do not quit. We make our best guess about what needs to be done and do it until a better idea comes along. We are always looking for clarity. We don’t know what will work in some situations. We don’t know what it would mean for something to be working. We do what we can imagine to do, what feels as though it needs doing.  We do what we can imagine to do, even as we wonder what else we might do, what else might need to be done. We gather ourselves and go forward to meet the situation—to do there what needs to be done to the best of our ability to sense that and do it. When it feels as though nothing is working, we work it to the best of our ability and give it more time to see how things work out. 03/01/2012
43. Light on Pyramid Mountain, Patricia Lake, Jasper National Park, Canadian Rockies, Alberta—September, 2009 — It is all a part of the mix—an aspect of how things are. The promotions and the flat tires, illness and euphoria. When we wake up, we wake up to how things are and what needs to be done about it. Maybe what needs to be done is accommodating ourselves to the reality of how things are. An essential aspect of waking up is waking up to our helplessness. There is nothing to be done about some things. When we come up against one of those things, the tendency is to run, hide, escape, denounce, deny… When we run out of places to run to, two things are still going to be true: The thing we don’t like and the fact that we don’t like it. Now begins the work. The work is squaring up, growing up, getting up and doing what needs to be done in relation to the Thing (call it the Cyclops in one of its many manifestations) that we don’t like and can’t do anything about. It’s all a part of the mix. Grist for the mill. The things we deal with on the journey of life. 03/02/2012
44. Sleepy Elk Sequence 01, Jasper National Park, Canadian Rockies, Alberta—September, 2009 — Our pact with each other is to be a safe, secure place for the other to be—to have the best interest of the other at heart—to be on the other’s side—to be who the other needs us to be in every situation as it arises. What we couldn’t do with people like that in our lives! 03/02/2012
45. Hidden Falls B/W, Hanging Rock State Park near Danbury, NC—January, 2012 — How do the cattlemen and the sheep herders work it out? How do the Israelis and Palestinians work it out? How do you and your brother-in-law, or your and your mother, work it out? It is for those involved to come together in good faith and figure it out. No one can impose a solution from the outside. We cannot tell them what to do. They cannot tell us. We. Work. It. Out. Everything depends on it. 03/02/2012
46. Light on Pyramid Mountain, Pyramid Lake, Canadian Rockies, Jasper National Park, Alberta—September, 2009 — We have to live naked. Vulnerable. Exposed. There is no protection. Stop seeking immunity and seek to live open to all that comes, and goes. That is the untouchable perspective, the fulcrum that positions us to do what is right and needful in every situation as it arises. Look life in the eye. Stare it down. You have work to do, a destiny to fulfill, a path to walk and it’s standing in your way like some drooling Cyclops of lore, thinking it’s going to stop you. Don’t even pause to bury it. You have bigger fish to fry—another life that needs you desperately, is dying for what you have to give. Live for that life, and let the one throwing death threats and misery at you go to back to hell. 02/03/2012
47. Pyramid Mountain and Athabasca River, Canadian Rockies, Jasper National Park, Alberta—September, 2009 — The only problem we have is that we don’t have enough going our way. With more things going our way, we would all be just fine. Well, you know the easy solution to that one, change our way. Not what we have in mind. We want to GET our way not change it. And there you have it: All that’s wrong with us is not getting our way and not being able to change our way. Stuck, is what it’s called. Getting unstuck is what enlightenment/illumination is all about. “Enlightened” could be a synonym for “Unstuck.” They mean the same thing. How to get there? I recommend sitting and looking at the wall. Not just any wall. The wall that has you boxed in. The wall that has you walled-off. The wall that keeps you stuck. Look at that wall until the shift happens. It will be great. You won’t be able to stop laughing. 03/-3/2012
48. Meeting the Challenge, Canadian Rockies, Jasper National Park, Alberta—September, 2009 — Focus and concentration, kid. Focus and concentration. It all comes down to focus and concentration. These are the two elements of life, across the board and around the table, from being a Zen Master (And while we are on the subject of Zen, I’ll point out as an aside that will not cost you one penny more for the trip, that Zen is what happened when Taoism in China met Buddhism tripping over from India) to playing third base to the Radio City Rockettes to going grocery shopping. We cannot hope to size up the situation as it arises and offer there what is needed out of the gifts we have to give—or find the path with our name on it—or stay on the beam through the gyrations of our life—without focus and concentration. If you are going to practice anything, become adept at anything, let it be focus and concentration. 03/04/2012
49. Bugling, Canadian Rockies, Jasper National Park, Alberta—September, 2009 — You know what you love and what you do not like at all, what excites you, stirs you, moves you and what does not interest you in the least. So. Where do you spend your time? How much of what you love in a week? How much of what you despise? My bet is that you need to work on your ratios. 03/04/2012
50. Regal Pose, Canadian Rockies, Jasper National Park, Alberta—September, 2009 — The only thing that makes focus and concentration difficult is the 10,000 Distractions. Everything. Everything works against focus and concentration. And so, we practice. We practice coming back to the moment—this here, this now. We practice focusing and concentrating on what is happening right now, right here and what needs to be done about it. What response are we being asked to make to it. What’s happening? What needs to happen in response to what is happening? These are the questions we practice asking. We practice until it becomes automatic. Until our life becomes our practice and our work is what we do. 03/05/2012
51. Bedding Down, Canadian Rockies, Banff National Park, Alberta—September, 2009 — Live toward the light. And when you are in complete darkness and there is no light to be seen in any direction, live in the darkness until your eyes adjust to no light and then wait for the faintest glimmer of light and live toward that. Don’t be running panic stricken in all directions at once, or grasping onto something that talks about light, or says it knows someone who knows something about light. You’ll know light when you see it. You will resonate with it. It will stir something within you like the sunlight stirs something within trees and flowers. They don’t have any problem living toward the light. Neither will you once you stop looking with a fixed notion of what you are looking for and wait for the light in whatever form it takes. 03/06/2012
52. Sunrise on Castle Mountain, Canadian Rockies, Banff National Park, Alberta—September, 2009 — It comes down to how we treat the moment, how well we handle what we find there. It doesn’t matter what our plans are, what our hopes, dreams, aspirations are, what our potential is. The folks on the Titanic had all those things. How did they handle the sinking? How did those who survived handle the aftermath? How do we deal with our life is the question, on a day-to-day, one situation after another, basis? It’s like this (Shirley, you’ve heard me say this before, even if your name isn’t Shirley): “This is how things are, and this is what we can do about it, and that’s that.” We choose from among the things we can do about it and impact as much of the future as can be impacted for good or for ill. May we choose wisely and do what needs to be done the way it needs to be done every step along the way. 03/06/2012
53. Takakkaw Falls, Yoho National Park, Canadian Rockies, British Columbia—September, 2009 — Life is dynamic. Changing. Moving. Evolving. Death is static. Rigid. Unbending. Unchanging. More of the same forever. We want our life to be more like death than life. We want things to stay like they are even if we don’t like them as they are. Even if they are killing us. We don’t want anything changing. It’s like we think to change is to die. We have to square up to what death is. We want to be comfortable, safe, stable. We want things to be predictable, planable, routine. We have to square up to what life is. 03/07/2012
54. Emerald Lake, Yoho National Park, Canadian Rockies, British Columbia—September, 2009 — Our lives coalesce around our ideas of what is important—around our values—which may, or may not, be borne out by our experience. We can think the wrong things are valuable all our lives long. How do we change our mind? What does it take to wake us up? Reality is our best bet but. Denial and stupidity trump everything, even reality. We can expand every stupid idea to take into account—to explain away—every intrusion of reality into our lives. This is to say, in that wonderful phrase from the 60’s, “Reason cannot uproot what reason did not plant.” Irrationality carries the day. Our hope lies in our willingness to adopt a perspective that takes itself into account, that questions its own fundamental assumptions, that always seeks to see how things also are. 03/07/2012
55. Sunwapta Falls 04, Canadian Rockies, Jasper National Park, Alberta—September, 2009 — Sometimes things fall into place and flow right along, and sometimes you forget to fill the gas tank on your car and you sputter out on the side of the road on your way to your wedding or something equally essential to your life. That’s how it is. That’s a different kind of situation from the one where everything is all smooth and joyful, with victory speeches and celebratory parades but. What is called for from us is the same in both situations—in all situations: Rise to the occasion. Do what needs to be done. “This is the way things are. This is what you can do about it. And that’s that.” Do what you can do about it. Redeem what can be redeemed. Grieve what must be grieved. And get ready for the next situation because it’s on the way even as I speak. 03/08/2012
56. Sunwapta Falls 02, Canadian Rockies, Jasper National Park, Alberta—September, 2009 — We have our business and the entire world seems dead set as they say in the deep south against us doing it. Everybody wants to give us what they want our business to be and have us do that. When have you ever been paid to do your business? When have you ever been assisted with doing your business? When has anybody ever cooperated with you in getting your business done? Oh, people mind your business all the time. They pry into your business. They tell you how to do it and what to do instead. But they don’t help you do what is yours to do. They look at you doing it and say, “Since you’re not doing anything, I need you to come over here and help me do this, then that, and then that over there.” They want us to help them with their business—they want us to do their business for them. We have our work cut out for us just getting through all the opposition and resistance in order to do our work. Well, do it! Don’t let them stop you! You have your business. You do it! 03/08/2012
57. Mt. Robson, Mt. Robson Provencial Park, British Columbia, Canadian Rockies—September, 2009 — I barely burned a finger last week getting the cornbread out of the oven. It is still healing. Physical injuries and wounds take a while to heal. We don’t just pop back from breaks and surgeries. But. When our dog dies we are expected to be our old self in a day or two. Emotional trauma is as every bit as real as physical trauma. When you are run over by a garbage truck, you have to lie there a while. Then there is the stint in the hospital and the one in the rehab unit and the one convalescing at home and you will always walk with a limp. There are emotional equivalents to garbage trucks with us in their sights. We will always walk with a limp. Do not work against your own recovery by thinking you should be running marathons and wondering what’s wrong with you. You were run over by a garbage truck. Whose side are you on? 03/09/2012
58. Trout Lilies, Bog Garden, Greensboro, NC—March 06, 2012 — Always the work is to come back to the center: What’s happening? What needs to happen in response to what is happening? Always the work is to refocus, reconcentrate. To bring ourselves consciously into this here, this now, and do what needs to be done in light of all that can be taken into account. Always. 03/09/2012
59. Mistaya Canyon, Canadian Rockies, Jasper National Park, Alberta—September, 2009—We dream of power. Because we live with vulnerability and impotence. We compensate for the insecurity and instability of our lives with cocoons of invincibility that money can buy. But. We are vincible. And so. We dream of power. 03/10/2012
60. Cardinal, Bog Garden, Greensboro, NC—September 08, 2012—Listening to our life means waking up to how things are with us. What are we doing? What are we not doing? What are we missing? Where are we spending our time and attention? What are we discounting, ignoring? Is the offense or defense seeing most of the action? Where do we find help? Where do we need help? Where are we running on empty? How do we refuel? Being alive in the time of our living does not just happen. It is not an accident. We bring ourselves to life by the quality of our living—by attending the things that feed our soul. By doing the things that draw on the gifts that are ours to give. Not by dancing constantly to someone else’s tune. 03/10/2012
61. Medicine Lake Bed, Canadian Rockies, Jasper National Park, Alberta, Medicine Lake Bed is very porous and the annual snow melt gradually drains over the summer, making room for the next snow melt.—September, 2009 — Some of you have heard this before: It’s all useless, pointless, hopeless, futile and coming to a very bad end—and how we live in the meantime makes all the difference. We don’t do what we do because it is going to disappear our problems and usher in happy ever after. We do what we do because it needs to be done. There will always be something to complain about—significant things, monstrous things, Cyclops-sized things not right about our lives. What are we going to do about it is the question. We live to do the right thing about the wrong things. And ask the Cyclops how he liked that. And tell him there is more where that came from. And spit in his eye. And laugh. 03/11/2012
62. Been Fishing (The guy in the lower center of the photo had been trout fishing in what I take to be the Maligne River flowing on the far side of the exposed lake bed. The river goes underground where it becomes one of the most extensive underground rivers in the world before it appears again and merges with the Athabasca River. How much of this I’m making up, I don’t know. It’s great to be old. Not only do you not know how much of anything you are making up, but you don’t care. That’s the best part), Medicine Lake, Canadian Rockies, Jasper National Park, Alberta—September 2009 — We think we have to have a bigger, better, finer life than is the case. An ordinary hum-drum affair is just fine. Celebrity status is a new thing in geologic time. For millions of years being able to get back to whatever served as a bed at night was quite enough of an accomplishment. No one worried about the bright lights and glory for the vast majority of human history. So, do the chores, run the errands, prepare the meals, enjoy a little wine, read a good book, love the people you love and let that be quite enough. The High Up Gurus in the Spiritual Hierarchy across the ages couldn’t do better than that. 03/11/2012
63. Kicking Horse River, Natural Bridge, Yoho National Park, Canadian Rockies, British Columbia—September, 2009 — When you are dealing with something or someone who has been the way it/he/she/they has/have been for some time, say, your entire life long, perhaps like your parents, or your in-laws, just for an example, the chances of them being different in relation to you are strictly dependent upon your ability to be different in relation to them first and to maintain your different-ness over time. Initially, your different-ness will only strengthen them in their sameness. You must persevere! Do not let their staunch and escalating sameness snap you out of your different-ness and back into responding to their sickening sameness the same way you always have responded to it. You have to be different in relation to them over time no matter what they do if you have any hope of enabling them to be different in relation to you. If you ever get any better advice than this, take it. 03/12/2012
64. Johnson Canyon, Canadian Rockies, Banff National Park, Alberta—September, 2009 — We spend a lot of time waiting to be gripped, to be seized, by a cause, a mission, a project, “a Mythic Vision” (Joseph Campbell’s term meaning “a vision of Mythic proportions,” like the Odyssey or Jesus’ Return to Jerusalem). It can be so long between rounds that we drift off into other pursuits, hanging out at the mall, perhaps, or exploring the joys of cocaine, or babysitting the grandchildren—and forget what we are about: Serving our gifts, following the way, realizing our destiny. We have to watch for the white rabbits even when it has been a long time since the last one. We have to notice what catches our eye, stirs our soul, presents itself as a threshold to adventure and life. These things keep coming around, winking at those who are awake, watching. 03/13/2012
65. Aspen Grove, Canadian Rockies, Jasper National Park, Alberta—September, 2009 — Nothing works for long. You could look it up. We are always being asked to come up with something to deal with something we never imagined having to deal with. We have to stop thinking in terms of things working like they are supposed to and start thinking in terms of having to deal in an ongoing way with things that don’t work at all like they are supposed to. We have to stop thinking if all these things would just get out of our way we could have a life. Our life is dealing with all the things that are in our way. Once you reconcile yourself with that, you have it made. As much as you can have it made. 03/13/2012
66. Adrift, Penobscot Bay, Deer Isle, Maine—September, 2010 — The past and future inform our present but so does what is happening here and now. We have to live here and now in light of all that can be taken into account. Our ability to assess the current situation and respond appropriately to it is the single most important factor in determining the quality of our life and legacy. We mess with that ability with drugs and too much alcohol, with neurotic obsessions and compulsions—including worry and anxiety, and grasping, snatching desire. What guides our boat on its path through the sea? Better be eyes that see, ears that hear, a heart that understands—all that can be seen, heard and understood. 03/14/2012
67. Hemlock Islands, Penobscot Bay, Deer Isle, Maine—September, 2010 — Each moment, every situation, has it’s own rhythm, pace and timing. We step into them and look around, listening, waiting for our eyes and ears to adjust to this time and place. What is happening? What needs to happen in response to what is happening? What is being asked of us? Offered to us? What waits, hoping for the gift we have to give? The quality of our life hinges on the degree to which we are able to size up the moment of our living and offer what is needed out of what is ours to give. 03/14/2012
68. High Tide, Penobscot Bay, Deer Isle, Maine—September, 2010 — We think we know what we need and go in search for it, ignoring what we need when it comes knocking on our door. Our agenda keeps getting in our way. Our idea for our life keeps interfering with our life. But. We know what we like, what we want, what we are afraid of, what our duty is. The first order of business is unknowing what we know. The Messiah has to die. Our idea of the Messiah. Our plans for the Messiah. Who the Messiah is supposed to be. Is going to be. Has to be. Because we say, or someone remarkably like us says, so. There is no Messiah like we want the Messiah to be. And the life we want to be our life? Death dressed to the nines. 03/15/2012
69. Rockport Harbor, Rockport, Maine—September, 2010 — Sitting, listening, walking slowly through the world, looking, watching, being present with what is present with us, open to the moment and all that is therein, allowing our life to have access to us, to inform us, show us how things are and also are, receptive to the world, aware of our place in it—this is the matrix forming eyes that see, ears that hear, and a heart that understands. Essential elements for the way of life. 03/15/2012
70. Fogged In, Stonington Harbor, Deer Isle, Stonington, Maine—September, 2010 — Live like you don’t care what your chances are. Live like you have nothing to lose. Don’t read from the script, doing it like it’s supposed to be done. Doing it like it’s been done by everyone who has ever done it. The people who don’t do it like anyone ever did it become the people other people try to do it like. Jesus, for instance. The Buddha. Of course, they pay a price. But. You pay a price trying to get out of paying a price. So. Pay the fare and ride the ride. Live your life the way only you can live it. Taking all the responsibilities, duties and obligations you have accumulated over the years into account. They are a part of the landscape in which you live. You have to work out your life within the context of your life. That’s part of the price you pay to ride the ride. I never said this was going to be easy. Meaningful. Interesting. That’s what I said. 03/16/2012
71. Lobster Boats, Rockport Harbor, Rockport, Maine—September, 2010 — “Give them bread and circuses,” (with circuses being gladiators fighting something to the death in the Coliseum) was the Roman way of keeping the masses under control. “Feed and entertain them and they will be happy.” Some things don’t change. The theory is still at work today. The economy that it’s about (Stupid), is largely based on food and entertainment. What else is there to buy? Which leads to the question: What’s in your life beyond food and entertainment? What is life for you beyond food and entertainment? What do you think about your ratios? 03/16/2012
72. Stonington Anchorage, Stonington, Maine—September, 2010 — If you have a plan, a goal, something important in mind that you want to achieve, acquire, possess in your lifetime for all to see and envy or admire, ruthlessness is the way to do it. Ruthlessness works every time. You can’t beat ruthlessness for being effective. The sure path to success everlasting (you must understand the ephemeral nature of such a term) is to be more ruthless than your enemies—and your friends and family. Ruthlessness prevails. There is no fix for ruthlessness, no cue or remedy. No immunity to it, no protection against. It is a great tsunami of anything goes sweeping through the world, destroying all in its path. The sages and gurus can preach peace and love, but ruthlessness gets things done. If you beat ruthlessness, you beat it at its own game. Or you get out of the way. The sages and gurus generally hide out in the mountains and caves. If they don’t, they are done for. 02/17/2012
73. Tulip Tree Blossoms, Bog Garden, Greensboro, NC—March 14, 2012 — Ruthlessness has no response to make to the moment of its living. It serves a grander goal. The value of individual moments is found in their collective force. All moments must serve the vision of ruthlessness. Ruthlessness meets its comeuppance in the value of moments that calls into question all goals beyond service—subjection—to the moment and what its needs are, what it calls for. Such consideration is beyond the capacity of ruthlessness to grasp. Moments are without value—only the end has meaning. Those who see and serve the value of the moment are subversive to the cause of ruthlessness and create “a disturbance in the force” whose influence is incalculable and whose potential is miraculous. 03/17/2012
74. Stonington Harbor, Deer Isle, Stonington, Maine—September 2010 — We are rarely content to be where we are, when we are, how we are, who we are, what we are, why we are. We can always imagine a better world than the one we live in—and do—and long for it as though we will die if we have to live one more minute in this hellhole. We live to be somewhere else. Here is the hard truth: We cannot be anywhere else until we can be here. We cannot benefit from the boon, the blessing, offered by some other place until we can receive what is being offered here. If we spit on the stone the builders reject here, we will not find the pearl of great price there. We are always just one slight perspective shift away from Nirvana. Seeing begins with seeing what we look at. Seeing ALL we look at, all there is to everything we look at—seeing what is true and what is also true about every situation. Not missing nothing.  Eyes to see are rooted in eyes that look. The world is transformed when we are able to transcend what is obvious and apprehend what is hidden, invisible. We are transformed as well. 02/18/2012
75. Tulip Tree, Bicentennial Garden, Greensboro, NC—March 17, 2012 — I love making things up, don’t you? Tunes, and dances, and things in the kitchen like Jim’s Chicken Spaghetti, and poems, and ideas. Making up ideas is like sculpting elephants and humming birds out of marble or clay. You keep at it until you like what you have then you quit. Jim’s Chicken Spaghetti started out as an idea. Tunes don’t start out as anything. They just are. I wonder where all this stuff comes from, don’t you? 03/18/2012
76. Penobscot Bay, Edgar M. Tennis Preserve, Deer Isle, Maine—September, 2010 — We all have our own business—the things we do and the way we do them—and we don’t like anyone minding our business, or messing with it. We like to be left alone to do the things we do the way we do them. We brush our teeth the way we brush our teeth. We don’t want to be using our other hand. The hand we use is just fine, thank you. The things we do and the way we do them is just fine, thank you. So, what’s the problem. Why all the books in the self-help section of Barnes and Noble? Why all the prescription medication? Why all the support groups? And the therapy bills? And the sleepless nights? And the nagging sense of emptiness, meaninglessness, about our lives? How come our business isn’t better for us? What are we missing? 03/19/2012
77. Used in Short Talks On Contradiction, etc., Bloodroot, Bicentennial Garden, Greensboro, NC—March 16, 2012 — We are blind to our own blindness, our own shortsightedness, our own prejudice, our own racism… The list is forever. We are blind to all that is so that we think is not so. How do we ever wake up? It is not by our own hand that we do. We wake up, to the extent that we wake up, against our will, protesting all the way about the wall we’ve been slammed into—the wall that has opened our eyes to the inconsistencies and contradictions and incompatibilities at work in our life, and forced upon us the work of opening ourselves to more truth than we are comfortable having to face. We could make it easier by not being so sure we know what we know and are right about it. But. If you look you’ll see no one is standing in that line. 03/19/2012
78. Inside (The Other) Ft. Knox, Prospect, Maine—September, 2010 — Trees need room to grow but they will take what they can get, competing with everything for light and air and water. A forest is hardly a friendly place. There is a war going on unnoticed, out of sight, fought with roots and leaves, with all involved trying to find enough of what they need to keep the fight going. All living things are up against it—and each other. Humans bring an additional element to the contest: Themselves. Humans are up against their environment, each other and themselves—as if we need something else to contend with in the short time that is ours on the earth. We would be wise to implement a cease fire and seek terms of peace—pursuing a complimentary relationship with the inner world, looking for ways we all can come together for the good of the whole. 03/20/2012
79. Mesa Arch, Canyonlands National Park, near Moab, Utah—June, 2010 — I like the idea of hunting for photos with the camera—stalking them like some spear heaving Cro-Magnon man. Planning them, plotting them, learning their feeding habits and their watering holes, getting there before them, waiting for their arrival, walking like a mist through the brush, soundlessly gracing the day with the wonder of their beauty, flaunting their wares before the camera, pretending they don’t know I’m there. 03/20/2012
80. Canyonlands Sunrise, Canyonlands National Park near Moab, Utah—June, 2010 — You know the Inner Critic, Judge, Reviewer, Fault-finder who is always with us to take our best effort, our grandest moment, and turn it into material for a SNL skit or a late night series of one-liners? And if you don’t, I’ll take the role and say “Poor thing. Of all of us, you are the most to be pitied!” The Inner Critic is our most faithful and helpful companion, playing the part of the Roman slave who rode in all the parades with the Caesars, those sons of God who were always resplendent in their glory, saying things like, “You have really bad breath, you know,” and other grounding things to keep it all in perspective, as they say, and inflation at bay. So, welcome the personal comedian into your chariot as your hedge against egocentricity and become his, her, greatest fan. Enjoy providing him, her, with material, saying, “See what you can do with this—it’s the best I’ve done yet. You’re going to love it!” And relish what comes, balancing out our tendency to take parades in our honor personally, even those that should happen and don’t—keeping us grounded and good company, laughing at ourselves. 03/21/2010
81. Sunset at the Visitor’s Center, Canyonlands National Park, near Moab, Utah—June, 2010 — We get tired, depleted, exhausted, fed up, worn out, and want to quit. Sometimes, quitting is the thing to do. I retired. That’s quitting. I don’t do meetings any more. That’s quitting. I stay away from groups of people who know my name. That’s quitting. If you think I’m going to talk you out of quitting, I’m going to surprise you. I’m going to say quit if you need to. Here’s the formula: Evaluate every situation in terms of what is happening, what needs to happen, and what you need to do in response. It may take quite some time for you to work through all this, so don’t be in a hurry. No quick fixes. Take all the time it takes to decide what to do, and then deal with the fallout, the outcome, which will create another situation for you to work through. You thought there was more to life than bringing forth what needs to happen in each situation as it arises? Who have you been listening to? 03/21/2012
82. Green River Canon, Canyonlands National Park, near Moab, Utah—June, 2010 —We grow into who we are and can only be different by continuing to grow. We don’t read a book or have a few hours of psychotherapy or listen to a lecture and become transformed. We look at how we are and how we need to be and accommodate ourselves to the circumstances of our lives over time. Our life asks hard things of us. We have to adjust our expectations, our preferences, our inclinations and proclivities in order to make room for obtruding realities. This changes things. How we adapt to the changes—the attitude we exhibit in response to them—makes all the difference. The spirit with which we live our life is as important as what we do. Spiritual growth is growth into the spirit of right-being in our life, in the world—living as life truly needs to be lived in each moment—blessing the here and now with generosity and loving-kindness, justice, mercy, goodness and truth. That is an organic, inside-out, transcendent experience with the miracle of awareness and grace. We don’t buy that off the selves of Wal Mart or Target. 03/22/2012
83. Green River Canyon 02, Canyonlands National Park near Moab, Utah—June, 2010 —Things are so far out of sync with anything approaching kindness, decency and common courtesy that we are going to have to begin getting up earlier to work at getting them back into line. I think we should divide the world into districts small enough for each of us to be able to cover one and start talking to people. It’s worth a try anyway. 03/23/2012
84. Green River Canyon 03, Canyonlands National Park near Moab, Utah—June, 2010 —I’m thinking wonder cuts across the species and graces every living thing to the extent that it can be graced. Human beings don’t have a corner on the wonder market. Dogs and dolphins, cats and owlets go “Wow!” in their own way. And if I’m making this up, it’s better than some things I could make up, and I like it. And hope you do. The idea, that is, of all living things going “Wow!” in their own way. May it be ever so! 03/24/2012
85. Needles District, Canyonlands National Park near Moab, Utah—June, 2010 —Practice having no plan. Stand before your clothes closet and see what you will wear with nothing in mind. Drive out of your drive way and see what you do then, with nothing in mind. Give yourself over to your day with nothing in mind. See where it goes. Don’t know where you are going to eat lunch, or dinner. Live listening to what now, what next. Be surprised. Amazed. Astounded. 03/26/2012
86. Needles District 02, Canyonlands National Park near Moab, Utah—June, 2010 —What stops us? What keeps us going? What happen when what stops us clashes with what keeps us going? When do we need to stop? When do we need to keep going no matter what? Answer these questions correctly and you have it made. 03/27/2012
87. Needles District 03, Canyonlands National Park near Moab, Utah—June, 2010 —We can look at anything and either see it or not see it, a flower, our life partner, our child, our job… We can listen to anything and either hear it or not hear it. Attention, awareness, could transform the world. They certainly could change our life and the lives of those impacted by our life. It’s a rather simple solution to a wide swath of ails and it doesn’t cost anything. What do you think? Are you up for it? 03/27/2012
88. False Kiva, Canyonlands National Park near Moab, Utah—June, 2010 —We take our chances—confident in our ability to find what we need to do what needs to be done about whatever happens. As a species, we have been dealing with life for as long as life has been around. As individuals, we have been dealing with life for as long as we have been around. We. Are. Still. Here. You can’t deny that. So. What are we worried about? We can assess any situation and respond appropriately to what we find there. We may not like having to do what we have to do but that’s our biggest problem—doing what we don’t like to do. That means we are up against ourselves. Our biggest obstacle is not wanting to do what we have to do. Our problem is not that we don’t know what needs to be done. Our problem is not that we cannot do what needs to be done. Our problem is that we don’t want to do it. What do you think? Is this something you would actually call a problem? 03/28/2012
89. Pink Dogwood 02, Greensboro, NC—March 27, 2012 —It’s likely that we will often find ourselves feeling as thought we don’t know what we are doing or what to do or where we are going, at loose ends, bobbing up and down in our life like ducks on the waves. When that’s the case, the only thing to do is wait it out. What is also true is that nothing lasts. Everything is in flux, on the way to something else. It is only a matter of time before how things appear to be will appear to be something else. What is also true is that we will know what to do when the time comes. When the time comes for action, we will be quite capable of acting—of sizing things up, assessing what is happening and what needs to happen and what we need to do about it. The ducks are resting on the waves, getting ready for the next round. 03/28/2012
90. Trees In Fog 01, Sioux Falls, SD—March 24, 2012 —An iPhone photo—Some of us, maybe all of us, are gripped by crazy urges to draw, or paint, or weave tapestries, or write poems, or ride bulls, or take photographs—not to make a living at it but because it’s somehow life itself. Sometimes it seems to be a curse and a burden as much as a joy and a blessing and we are not sure which it is, not that it matters, stuck with it as we are, for life. 03/28/2012
91. Trees In Fog 02, Sioux Falls, SD—March 24, 2012 —An iPhone photo—This is not hard, this being alive in the time of our living, this living well, this living aligned with what is deepest, best and truest about us, this living in sync with the beam—walking the path with our name on it. It only requires us to do what is hard. But. If we don’t do it, we do what is hard. Either way, we do what is hard. Either way, we die to something. Why not choose the way of death that leads to life? Every legitimate crucifixion results in resurrection. You should trust me in this. 03/29/2012
92. First Light-Bow River, Canadian Rockies, Banff National Park, Alberta—September, 2009 —We all think something is important. We all have our business. We all live in the service of some dream for our life, some idea of how our life ought to be. We all have to deal with not enough cooperation—with resistance and opposition and things not going our way. We all need a place to talk about how it is with us, and how we wish it were, and where that leaves us, and where we might go from here. We need somebody to listen to us with interest, with compassion and understanding while we talk about how we got here and what it means to us that we are alive and what our hope for our life is even yet—what our dream is still—and how we might live in its service in order to realize what still might be realized in the time we have left to live. 03/29/2012
93. Trees In Fog 03, Sioux Falls, SD—March 24, 2012 —An iPhone photo—If I could give you anything, I would give you a sounding board. All we need is some careful listener to talk to on a regular but not too often basis—someone who can hear us with compassion and disinterest, as in having nothing at stake in us, and help us get to the bottom of things—help us walk around our life, investigating it, exploring it, poking, prodding, peering into it, wondering about it, without taking it personally or being ashamed of it or trying to defend, justify, explain, or excuse it for being what it is and not something else. What happened? What did/do you wish had happened instead? What did you do in response to what happened? What do you wish you had done instead? What’s happening now? What do you think is trying to happen? What do you wish were happening, trying to happen? What are you doing in response to what is happening? These questions would do for starters but they are just opening the door. You need to walk through the door with someone who can listen you to the truth of who you are and how things are with you—which is all any of us ever need to know to take the next step, which then becomes part of the package. Something else to talk about. 03/30/2012
94. Used in Short Talks On Contradiction, etc., Desert Bouquet, Canyonlands National Park near Moab, Utah—June, 2010 —Integrity is the rock solid foundation of spirituality—being who we are and who we also are and doing what is ours to do. Integrity is reconciling our contradictions, our contraries, our polarities—waking up, squaring up, to how it is with us on every level and living in ways that affirm it all, that deny nothing. No mask, no shadow. It’s all in the light of awareness, consciousness. When we are transparent to ourselves and one another, we are also “transparent to transcendence” (Joseph Campbell) and God is apparent in and through us: “The Father and I are one.” I don’t know how to make that any plainer. 03/30/2012
95. Dogwood Among the Trees, Guilford Courthouse National Military Park, Greensboro, NC—March 22, 2012 —Christ is the Anti-Christ, saying, “I am not who you think I am! And you are not who you think you are!” When we get who’s who figured out we have it made, and are one with the Christ, and one with God: “The Father and I are one!” 03/31/2012
96. Horseshoe Bend Panorama, Page, AZ—June, 2010 —There is the work to sustain our life—to provide the food, clothing and shelter stuff—and the lives of those who live with us. And there is the work that we live to to, that brings us to life, infuses us with life, and is what we are alive to do. Take that away from us and we live with hollow eyes, shriveled spirits, as those who have lost their souls. The work we do is done on two levels and we cannot think we can get by with really fine food, really nice clothes, and really nice shelters. Money cannot buy what our spirit and soul need. We have to do what spirit and soul need to do in order to be alive. They like hands on stuff even though they don’t have hands. They have to use ours. That’s what we are here for. To loan out our hands. 03/31/2012
97. Tobacco Barn Panorama, Rural NC —March 30, 2012 —Start with what you like, see where it goes. Notice when it begins to pass you on to something else you like. We have to be aware of our transitions and assist the shift that’s trying to happen. This is attending the flow of our life and is one of our primary roles. We are here to assist our life in doing what it needs to do, in going where it needs to go. How much trouble it is for us, or how much easier it would be for us to remain stuck in the comfortable routines until we die—just hanging out in the familiar ways, never changing our routes, our topic of conversation, or our mind—is not our life’s problem. WE are our life’s problem. How to get US up off of it and into the things our life would love to be doing, to be about, before we die. 04/01/2012
98. Penobscot Bay Sunset, Deer Isle, Maine—September, 2009 —Our life brings us forth and we bring our life forth. Our life is our work, our opus, our art, our masterpiece, our creation, our gift… And we are a partner with our life in the production of our life. Our life is alive, vibrant, pulsating with vitality, meaning, purpose and direction calling us to wake up to the reality that we are being asked to bring into existence—to birth into the world. We are mid-wives and the mother of our own becoming. We participate with our life in giving it shape and form and substance in the particulars of the context and circumstances of our living. The two—we and our life, our potential, our destiny—consciousness and unconsciousness—become one in the time and place of our living. Our life is alive and need us to bring it to live. Our life is not a blank canvass that we can do anything we want with. The canvass has a life of its own and calls us forth even as we bring it into being. This is the wonder and the mystery of who we are coming out for the good of all the world. I hope you buy this. Everything hangs on it. 04/01/2012
99. Rock Castle Creek, Rock Castle Gorge, Blue Ridge Parkway near Rocky Knob, VA—March 31, 2012 —How much of our heart is in what we do? For me, when it’s yard work, not much. When it’s walking around looking for photos, or writing with a cup of coffee at the ready, I’m operating at full capacity heart-in-action. The trick is to off-set the yard work kind of things with the walking-looking-writing kind of things. The trick is to be conscious of the degree of Heart Level our activities have and weigh our lives down toward the Whole-Hearted end of the spectrum. Whole-Hearted Living is the best kind of living but we also have to mow the grass along the way. 04/02/2012
100. Looking South from Lakies Head, Cabot Trail, Cape Breton Highlands, Nova Scotia—September, 2008 —The idea life, from my point of view, comes down to knowing and doing what is called for in each situation as it arises, or knowing and doing what needs to be done—same thing. This is it. All there is to it. Forget all the shoulds, oughts, musts—all the protocol, all the rules, all the mama saids, daddy saids, preacher saids—and pay close attention to the situation as it arises. Eyes that see, see what is called for. Ears that hear, hear what is called for. A heart that understands, understands what is called for. All that is needed then, to do what is needed, is the courage to get up and do the thing. In each situation as it arises. All. There. Is. To. It. 04/02/2012
101. Bryce Moon and Venus, Bryce Canyon National Park, Utah—June, 2010 —The catch about knowing what the situation calls for and doing it is this: The situation calls for one thing from the antelope and it calls for another thing from the lion. Sometimes it goes the antelope’s way and sometimes it goes the lion’s way. The lion and the antelope work out which way it will be in each situation as it arises. That’s what the situation calls for—for the lion and the antelope to work it out. The lion cannot stop being the lion in the situation and the antelope cannot stop being the antelope. They both have to do their part in doing what the situation calls them to do, never mind the outcome. We have to bring ourselves into every situation as though we are the lion or the antelope in that situation, and give ourselves as completely to the work the situation calls for as the lion and antelope give themselves to their work in their situation, never mind the outcome. That’s Jesus and the cross, Ulysses and the Cyclops. We play it out and see where it goes. The antelope doesn’t say, “I don’t like the odds—I’m not playing this game!” We do what is called for in each situation and take our chances. 04/03/2012
102. Window Display, Phillips Ave., Sioux Falls, SD, iPhone Photo—March 2012 — We have to work it out. That’s all there is to it. Life comes at us, makes its withdrawals and deposits, and leaves it to us to work it out. What to do now. What to do next. What to do. It’s ours to see and to do. 04/03/2012
103. Bryce Point Panorama, Bryce Canyon National Park, Utah—June 2010 —When life is too much for us, we disengage. We must. We immerse ourselves in the mindlessly mundane. We don’t want to think about anything, face anything, deal with anything. We are buying ourselves time. Distancing ourselves from the overwhelming. Distracting ourselves from intolerable confrontations. How distant can we be without losing touch entirely, forgetting the way back, being lost forever in a fog of our own making? Always the fear: “Mama left after her third pregnancy (the first was twins) in three years and never came back. Though she was always with us physically. She was never with us emotionally. It would have been better for us—maybe for her—if she had just run away.” Making things conscious makes things real. Talking things out with the right kind of people helps find the handles, the strategies, the approaches, the means for managing our life that could easily be unmanageable. We can’t make it alone. Wanting to r-u-n-n-o-f-t is a warning sign indicating that we need to draw our resources close around us and find strength for the task at hand in the caring presence of good company. May we all always have the good company we need! 04/04/2012
104. Quartzite, Falls Park, Sioux Falls, SD—March 2012 —An iPhone photo—The fact that we die colors everything we do. The fact that we die means we do not have enough time. Our time is short and running out. That means it is easy for us to think we missed our chance. Now it’s too late. We can never go back and take piano lessons or play center field for the Yankees, or be a Radio City Rockette. It’s all over for us. We may as well drink ourselves to death. On the other hand, we have to grab and snatch and make it any way we can while we can, so out of our way, we are going to the top, we will make a name for ourselves that will never be forgotten. Either way, we live under the shadow of our death. The life we form is formed with dying in mind. Life means what it means because we die, and that means we have to make our peace with dying and live with death at our side. We begin that process by exploring the implications our dying has for our life. How does our death impact, shape, alter the way we live? What do we need to do before we die? It is my theory that in order to die well we have to live well—that the people who fear death most are the people who have never lived. We have to LIVE in order to die. If we die without having lived, we are “of all people most to be pitied.” So, what does LIFE mean? What aren’t we doing that we need to do in order to be alive before we die? Death becomes a friend in this regard, ushering us into living the life we have yet to live in the time left for living. 04/04/2012
105. Along the Path to Bryce Point, Bryce Canyon National Park, Utah—June, 2010 —One of the tasks of life—of being fully alive—is figuring out what is important and what is not. What we think is important can turn out to be not so important after all. Takes a while to know what’s what—to learn to live with our eyes open, walking around things, poking, prodding, looking, listening, evaluating, assessing, waiting to see, hear, understand. The world is not as it appears to be. There is more to everything than meets the eye. The way things are conceals the way things also are, and it takes a while to know whether this thing is important or only apparently so (or apparently not so). But once we get it figured out, we are off to the races. Whatever that means. 04/05/2012
106. Used in Short Talks On Contradiction, etc., Pink Dogwood 01, Greenway Park, Greensboro, NC—March 2012 —How do we know what is important? How do we change our mind about what is important? What are the values at the heart of our life? What is the process by which replace values, exchange values? How do we evaluate values? Appraise values? Assess values? Where do our values come from? Did someone—parents, teachers, preachers, radio talk show hosts—tell you what you should value? Do you feel as though you are betraying them to question their values? We grow—we grow up—through the excruciating experience of the conflict of values. When we avoid such conflicts by refusing to consider the implications that valuing one thing might have for valuing another and hold that government should stay out of our lives and government should outlaw gay marriage with no contradiction in sight. Conflict awakens us to the importance of seeing, hearing, understanding what is important for ourselves—and the importance of changing our minds about what is important when the occasion arises which calls for that. When we avoid values conflicts we never grow up and remain too shallow to splash forever. 04/05/2012
107. Bryce Landscape, Bryce Canyon National Park, Utah—June 2010 —The work to arrange our life according to our liking is without end. We can always imagine a better world than the world we live in. At some point, we have to realize “this is it,” and shift our focus from changing things “out there” to bringing forth what is “in here” into the “out there,” just as it is. Our true work is to come forth, to bloom, blossom, unveil ourselves as a blessing and a grace exactly here, exactly now, in the time and place of our living—never mind that it is not the way we want it to be. As we bring ourselves forth, we transform the world—but not with intention and by design. The world shifts adjusting to us, responding to us. We cannot predict the nature of the alteration but we cannot change without changing significant aspects of the time and place of our living. Want to change the world? Change yourself. Bring yourself forth. Unfold yourself. Give the gift that is yours to give. Be you, loving what you love and doing what you love to do, what best expresses who you are. The world will not be the same. 04/06/2012
108. Rainbow Point Panorama, Bryce Canyon National Park, Utah—June 2010 —Violence and aggression laugh at Rumi’s observation: “If you are not here with us in good faith, you are doing terrible damage.” “Terrible damage” is the idea. “Terrible damage” is the source of the power enjoyed by violence and aggression. The threat of “terrible damage” opens the way before them and presents the boon of the realm unto them. They like “doing terrible damage,” leaving the rest of us with nowhere to turn.I believe Rumi’s family fled the advance of Genghis Khan, so he would have known the reality of “terrible damage” first hand. The Dali Lama escaped the Chinese invasion of Tibet. When they come in the front door, leave through the back and hope for the best. 04/07/2012
109. Pink Dogwood 03, Greenway Park, Greensboro, NC—March 28, 2012 —No matter what our life looks like—high rise or hovel—we still have to live it. We still have to do the work. The work is always the same no matter what the external circumstances: We have to pour ourselves into our life. We have to bring ourselves forth into our life. We have to birth ourselves into our life. This is not easy in any context. We have to sit with our Self and with our life and get the two together. We aren’t taught how to do this anywhere. So it’s trial and error all the way. Who is it that needs to come forth? How can we assist the birthing process? We are mid-wives to our own delivery. And you thought it was about making a lot of money and retiring early! Money won’t help and we never retire. The work is always waiting. Bringing ourselves forth into our life. 04/07/2012
110. Citizens of Bryce, Bryce Canyon National Park, Utah—June 2010 —We have to be still from time to time in order to remember what we know, see into the heart of how things are (which includes how things also are), reorient ourselves for the task at hand and do what needs to be done. We can be untracked with the greatest of ease. Lose the way. Sink into despair. Wander among the Soul Killers: So what? Who cares? What difference does it make? Why try? —And think of giving up. So, we have to be still and remember what we know. This is called Taking Stock. We have to Take Stock from time to time: What is happening? How is it impacting me? What am I doing in response? What would be a better response? What do I wish were happening instead? What needs to happen about what is happening? How can I assist the happening of what needs to happen about what is happening? How can I enlist myself in the work to make things better than they are? How can I find the help I need to do what needs to be done about what is happening? As you Take Stock, you’ll probably think up better questions. Just asking the questions, wondering what questions to ask, gives us a breather from the press of circumstances, provides a shift in perspective, opens the way before us, breaks the spell. We need a spell breaker from time to time. 04/08/2012
111. Outskirts of Bryce, Bryce Canyon National Park, Utah—June 2010 —Start with your life. Take stock. Inventory. What’s there? What do you have to work with? Resources. Who can you count on? Who is on your side? What do you have going for you? When you think about your life, how does your body react? What physical sensation are you aware of? Focus on that sensation. Let the sensation become an image, an object, a scene—something you could show me that would communicate to me how it feels to have that sensation. Once you have the image/object/scene in mind, sit with it. Ask it what it has to say to you. Receive well everything it has to say. If you have something to say in response, say it. See what comes back to you in response to what you said. Let the conversation roam. See where it goes. This is called Becoming Aware Of Your Life. Or, Letting Your Life Speak. We think it’s our life and we know all there is to know about it, so we don’t look at it, see it, make inquiries. Everything begins with our life and flows from there. We can’t skip that part and expect to get anywhere. 04/09/2012
112. Trees in Fog 05, Sioux Falls, SD—March 2012 —An iPhone Photo—What? You thought it would be easier? And more fun? 94/09/2012
113. Sevier River Falls, Utah—June 2010 —Wait a minute! I see your problem. You don’t have enough things going your way. There is too much that you don’t like about your life in your life. If your life were more like you want it to by, things would be just fine. It’s amazing how much work we put into trying to arrange things like we want them to be. It is the theme that runs through all self-help books and is the foundation of horoscopes and astrological consultation. It’s the cornerstone of all religions, psychotherapy and prescription and non-prescription drug sales. The major thrust of all economies. Too much—and that would be just a little more—contentment and the whole edifice goes to hell. Dissatisfaction and disgruntlement keep it all afloat. The fortunes and future of the entire world as we know it depend upon your unhappiness. Take heart. The more miserable you are, the better off everyone else is. Thanks for all you do for us! 04/10/2012
114. North Rim 01, Grand Canyon National Park, AZ—June 2010 —The problem is not that we listen to and are influenced by other people. The problem is that we do not listen to and are not influenced by enough people. We should listen to everyone. We should allow everyone to influence our thinking. And we should be conscious of how we respond to them all. If you are going to make Chicken Pot Pie, it will have a better outcome if you are influenced by a lot of recipes instead of making your Mom’s for the hundredth time. Who says you have to have a crust? Why not serve it over brown rice? When you bring in a multitude of recipes, you open the door to thinking creatively on your own and begin to dance with the possibilities. Same goes for living your life. If you just listen to the Preacher you are going to be stuck with what the Preacher was capable of. What are YOU capable of? That’s what you are here to discover. Explore! Experiment! Play! You would have a lot more fun if you looked at your life as a playground or a kitchen where you were invited to invent a new recipe every day. If you ain’t dancin’, you ain’t livin’! 04/11/2012
115. North Rim 07, Grand Canyon National Park, AZ—June 2010 —We exhaust ourselves in the work to be happy—to be reasonably content with our life—missing the point that happiness and contentment are not ends to realize but fringe benefits to be enjoyed about finding and doing what is ours to do. Exhaustion in the work of heart and soul is the key to a happy life. So, forget seeking happiness! Seek your work, which may have nothing to do with how you pay your bills. I have a friend who works for a utility company by day, and plays the drums and builds fine furniture by night. Guess what he’s happy doing. You have the rest of your life to figure out what is yours to do, and do it. Here’s a hint: What resonates with you? What stirs something within? What kind of thing catches your eye? Where would your heart take you if you let it have its way? 04/12/2012
116. Tulips, Greensboro, NC—March 28, 2012 —Listen to one another! Without correcting, chastising, advising, arguing, debating, condemning, fixing, suggesting, or doing anything other than understanding with compassion. This is Jim’s Quick Fix for the world as we know it. 04/12/2012
117. Buttes and Mesas, near Kodachrome Basin State Park, Utah—June 2010 — Listen one another to the truth of your life. Do what you love even though the money does not follow and you have to make sacrifices in the service of your heart. Look until you see things as they are and also are—and know what needs to be done in each situation as it arises. And do it. We make this hard by trying to exploit it for our own benefit, by trying to get something out of it. We’re going to die. That’s what we get out of it. In the meantime, it matters how we live. We are here to do what is ours to do in the meantime, before we die. Not to get anything out of it. 04/13/2012
118. Backlighting, Blue Ridge Parkway, NC—April 11, 2012 —What we get out of it—all we get out of it—is doing it. There is nothing in integrity—that is, living in ways that are integral with what is deepest, best and truest about us—living aligned with who we are and who we also are (And if you think that’s easy, slip into the saddle and have them open the chute)—for us. We live with integrity for the sake of living with integrity. No fame, no fortune, no glory, no parades, no headlines. It’s like a child learning to walk. You get walking out of the deal. See? Integrity is like that. 04/13/2012
119. A View of Kodachrome Basin, Kodachrome Basin State Park, Utah—June 2010 —We are all neurotic at 2 AM. Neurotic being enlarging something beyond all reasonable proportions until it engulfs you, laughing at your paltry efforts at defense and escape. I think this tendency may be a carryover from our ancestral days in the wilds, when all we had was a rock or a sharp stick to keep away the beasts that come for us in the night. We remember things like helplessness and utter vulnerability long past living under African skies. We may sleep in high-rises and think of fire and earthquakes. We can always think of something no one can do anything about. Brain tumors. IRS audits. The list is endless. And real. We ARE up against it. We are all standing in some line, waiting our turn with the lions and leopards. We will run out of options one day. Here’s the present option to eventually having no options: In The Meantime, LIVE! You can reduce this to nothing more substantive than “Eat, drink and be merry for tomorrow we die,” or you can square yourself up to the fact that some tomorrow we will die but we are going to live this day exactly as though our life depends on it—as it does! Our life needs us to live it as it needs to be lived, as only we can live it! And we not die before our time by allowing our eventual demise rob us of this here, this now and the things that need us to do them—to bring them to life in our living—while we are still able to see the good and do it. We will die, but. How we live in the meantime makes all the difference. Believe it! Do it! 04/14/2012
120. Pink Flame Azalea, Blue Ridge Parkway, NC—April 11, 2012 —Our life is alive with possibilities. It needs us to believe in it, to trust ourselves to it. But. We are afraid. Remember Jesus walking on the water? Calling Peter to step out onto the waves? This is a metaphor for trusting ourselves to our life. The waves churning, tossing are our life, saying, “Come on in! The water’s fine!” And we are saying, “Yeah, right!” We can do it our way or our life’s way. Think you are smart enough to figure it out on your own? Have at it. 04/14/2012
121. Buffalo Valley Road, Near Grand Teton National Park, WY—June 2011 —We have to put up a wall from time to time to protect ourselves from the unwarranted intrusion of Guilt Mongers or Soul Thieves or Body Snatchers who hijack, infiltrate, dominate, rule our life. “That’s what YOU say!” Practice saying that line until you can deliver it perfectly the next time someone makes an invasive comment about anything pertaining to you. You can also try out, “How much do I owe you for minding my business?” Or “Now I know what a Hostile Takeover feels like!” Toxic Personalities have no respect for boundaries and will not voluntarily relinquish their effort to control the lives of all in their sphere of influence. We have to draw the line marking where they stop and we start—and defend it consistently, dependably. Our Self has to know it is safe with us, that we can be trusted with its expression and protection. We owe it to our Self to live free from the coercive influence of others. 04/15/2012
122. Lodgepole Fence, Buffalo Valley, near Grand Teton National Park, WY—June 2011 — We can become increasingly focused on, and deliberate about, bringing forth the gifts that are ours to share with the world. We are all blessed in order to be a blessing. None of us are blessed in order to exploit our blessings and dominate others. We get off the beam when we think we are here to reap the benefits of our own genius. We are here to share the treasure that we are for the good of all. The focus, then, is on what we have that is of value to those about us and to bring it forth for their good. If they don’t see the worth of what we are presenting to them (“Nothing good can come from Nazareth,” you know), we walk on, looking for those who can receive what we have to offer. Meanwhile, we have to be awake to recognize what is being offered to us, in order to receive it well with appreciation and gratitude. 04/16/2012
123. Doughton Park 01, Blue Ridge Parkway, NC—April 11, 2012 —We receive each other well AND we put up walls, draw lines, establish appropriate boundaries to keep others from invading our life. It’s tricky, this business about tending and caring for relationships. It comes down to honoring the other person and requiring that the other person honor us. If you’re going to practice anything, practice that! 04/16/2012
124. Lodgepole Pine Fence 02, Grand Teton National Park, WY—June 2011 —We cannot hurry the time of our awakening AND living with people who know what they are doing makes all the difference. For instance, how many thoughtful alternatives to Orthodox Christian Doctrine do you know of? Our choice is take it or leave it. No one we know is making alterations to it and inviting us to join them in that process. How awake can we hope to be in a land where everyone is walking in their sleep? We may not be able to be more awake than we can be at any point in our life, but we can delay seeing, hearing and understanding—that would be, put off, avoid—our entire life long. We need more help than we get. Our life languishes waiting for us to Wake UP! Square UP! Grow UP! Get Up And Do What Needs Us To Do It—largely because we don’t know anyone who is doing that. It’s doubly difficult when we have to figure everything out on our own! 04/17/2012
125. Used in Short Talks On Contradiction, etc., Cunningham Cabin, Grand Teton National Park, WY—June 2011 —We shake out at different points along every line. Eye-to-eye-ness and like-minded-ness happen in politics, sports, and religion when the issue is intense enough to blind us to our differences for the short life of the issue then things shift back to normal with tastes and interests and enthusiasms falling out beautifully in a bell-shaped curve. The kind of eye-to-eye-ness and like-minded-ness that matters for life on the bell-shaped curve is the kind that agrees that disagreements are just fine and help us all toward the growth and development of who we are in the world. William Blake said, “Without contraries is no progression.” Instead of cancelling each other out, polarities and contradictions deepen, enlarge and expand each other, and enable us to see more clearly and to know more fully than we would ever be able to see and know if it were just us and our narrow little perspective all our life long. Opposites make a better world for all to grow up in. We can see eye-to-eye about the importance of seeing differently. 04/17/2012
126. Hidden Falls, Grand Teton National Park, WY—June 2011 —It takes a crisis of the spirit to wake us up. This is a spiritual crisis that has little to do with questions about doctrine and religion and cannot be avoided with better answers or different doctrines. It is a spiritual crisis that requires us to discover “of what spirit we are made.” What is the spiritual fabric of our nature? What enables us to face the current manifestation of the Cyclops in our life and to find what it takes to triumph again? We discover who we are in coming up against the shock of how things are. We grow up through handling the trials of our life. Or, we remain terminally immature by refusing to do what is asked of us. Look at the escapes available to us—we are a culture of distraction, diversion, and denial. We live to be entertained, to be drawn away from what needs to be done. What helps us to engage our life? Where do we find assistance in coming to terms with truth we do not want to acknowledge? What does the culture offer to aid us in growing up? Who can manage that task alone? We are going to have to change some things to have a chance. I see us forming small pockets of resistance to the refusal to face how it is with us, talking together about how things are, and helping one another find ways of dealing with it. This is the kind of revolution the world has always needed and we have settled for putting a different crook on the throne. 04/18/2012
127. Blue Ridge Pastoral, Blue Ridge Parkway near Boone, NC—April 17, 2012 —Here’s a little something just for you: Crumble enough Vanilla Wafers to make a cup and a half of crumbs. Mix that with about 1/3 stick of melted butter and spread it in an 8-inch pie pan. Bake it at 350 degrees for 5 or 8 minutes and allow it to cool. Pour in a can of Apple Pie Filling or Blueberry Pie Filling or Cherry Pie filling. Smooth that out and bake it at 350 for about 30 minutes (don’t burn the edges of the crust). Serve warm with a scoop of Vanilla Ice Cream and a squeeze of caramel topping. You’ll be glad you did. 04/18/2012
128. Into Lake Powell, Page, AZ—June 2010 —We meet the day with what we have to offer and do with it what we can imagine doing. Some days, that’s more than others. We could improve our average with more time to prepare. We need more time between days. More time in the Recovery Room. It’s like we are in a Tag Team Match with only the day getting to tag out between days. How can it already be time for another round? How do we regroup on the run? In the clutches of the Next Thing? I recommend not getting ahead of ourselves. We slow life down by dealing with this now and that then. And create breathing room in each day where we sit and breathe, consciously counting our breaths, slowing down and deepening our respiration. The day isn’t likely to let up. We have to step out, then step back in—spelling ourselves with gifts of sanity. 04/19/2012
129. Blue Ridge Farm, Blue Ridge Parkway near Rocky Knob, VA—April 11, 2012 —The older I get the more I find myself awash in memories of my childhood and youth. They are not fond, happy memories, and I am wondering if they were pushed aside by the responsibilities of job and family until a quieter, slower life in retirement allowed them to come up for review. I am now their witness and acknowledge the truth of what passes before me. There are no memories of being held lovingly, read to, cuddled, adored. What happened to all of that adoration? I don’t think any of my siblings cornered that market. It was in short supply. So, I watch the old movies of what happened, and did not happen, bearing witness to the truth of the recollections and declaring wrong to be wrong and abuse to be abuse and celebrating with myself the wonder that we didn’t turn out any worse than we did. 04/19/2012
130. Entering Zion, Zion National Park, Springdale, Utah — June 2010 — Springdale, Utah is the home of Zion Pizza & Noodle Co, and is worth the trip to Zion NP all by itself. It earned a spot on the Dedication Page of my eBook A Handbook for the Spiritual Journey, along with other fine dinning places, making the Dedication Page worth the price of the book alone. You don’t normally find Dedication Pages worth reading. I’m happy to break that trend. — Part of our work, and maybe the most important part, is to find ways of doing more of the things we like to do and fewer of the things we don’t like to do. We have to work it out. The more responsibilities and duties and obligations we have, the harder it is to work in things we like to do and work out things we don’t like to do. So we have to ease out of our responsibilities. Even though I’m retired, ministerial duties follow me around like a hungry dog looking for a handout, weddings, funerals, preaching opportunities, counseling requests, things like that. And no one is going to draw lines for me. We could live our life just meeting obligations. Or not.
131. Mile Post 289, Blue Ridge Parkway near Boone, NC — April 17, 2012 — See what’s coming and get out of the way. That’s my best advice. Preventing problems is the best way to avoid them. Most of what’s wrong with most of us could have been foreseen. Why shoot ourselves in the foot, thinking maybe it won’t happen like we think it will? Why not listen to ourselves for a change? 04/21/2012
132. Checkerboard Mesa, Zion National Park, Utah — June 2010 — If we live long enough, our life will wake us up. When we wake up we see things as they are and what can be done about it—then we either do it or not. But we know. Seeing is one thing. Courage is another. But when we see, we see that we have no real choice but to do what needs to be done, because, even though that will mean trouble, not doing it will also mean trouble. Our life is as it is because we have tried to save ourselves from trouble and in so doing have created trouble for ourselves. When we wake up, we see that and see what we have to do. This is too much trouble so we resist waking up by dousing ourselves with denial, numbing ourselves to the truth of how things are with our addiction of choice, including religion, and chanting ourselves to sleep with our favorite mantra, hoping that all our dreams come true. 04/22/2012
133. Doughton Park 02, Blue Ridge Parkway, NC —  April 11, 2012 —  Native Americans would go into the wilderness on vision quests waiting, watching, for guidance and direction. We need something similar. We have developed the means but have lost sight of the end. What’s money good for if you don’t know the right bills from the wrong ones? We can live through anything with purpose. Take meaning away and we’re lost, no matter how large or how many the checks we can write. There is life yet to be lived— how will we live it? Toward what? For what? What will we do with what is left of our days? We are not free to make up just any purpose, proclaim meaning in just any endeavor. We have to listen and look in order to see and hear. What is calling our name? Listen! Look! And trust yourself to the thing that catches your eye! 04/22/2012
134. The Lone Pine, Pinion Pine, Zion National Park, Utah —  June 2010 —  Know what is important and act as though it is. That’s my best advice. Center your life on what’s important. Build your life around what’s important. Be able to say what is important in one short sentence. Once you get it said, hold it up to the light. Walk around it. Say it backwards. Ask yourself if you are right about this being important, or if you say it is because that’s what you are supposed to say. If that’s the case, say, “Saying what you are supposed to say is important!” and walk around that, poking it, probing it, seeing it it is really all that important. Do that with everything you think is important until you narrow your list down to the things that are truly important to you. Then act as though everything on that list is truly important to you. That’s all there is to it. 04/23/2012
135. Zion Landscape, Zion National Park, Utah —  June 2010 —  There are impossible situations in which nothing can be done. We have to avoid those whenever possible (Don’t go home for Christmas with your alcoholic mother and/or father, for example), and get out of them whenever possible (Quit your job or your marriage, for example, as soon as you are able). Hang on in those you can’t avoid or leave, waiting for a turn, for a shift, for something to happen, for things to change (Live through adolescence, for example). People had to live through the Dark Ages for generations. Nothing could be done about the Spirit of Those Times. Slaves had to live through eons of slavery until the times changed and something could be done and then they had to live through eons of abuse. Women and homosexuals face a similar reality. The idiots who hamstring the country are always elected by the idiots who vote for them. Just try to do something about idiocy! Enlightenment is always fighting for its life with deliberate, willful, intentional, determined ignorance. Whose side are you on is the question. It’s up to you to wake up to what you are doing and help out how you can. It matters how you think, how you live. 04/24/2012
136. Doughton Park 03, Blue Ridge Parkway, NC —  April 11, 2012 —  Many of our problems have their roots in the bad preaching we have been subjected to in our life. How we have been told that things are is not always how things are. How we have been told that things are supposed to be is not always how things are supposed to be. We have done what we have been told to do and things have not turned out like we have been told they would turn out. Bad preaching sent the settlers to the Dakotas. “The rain will follow the plow,” said the preachers who told the settlers they were doing “The will of the Almighty.” The rain did not follow the plow. Native Americans were displaced and the settlers never experienced the glory they were promised in their new digs. But the railroad followed the plow and some people profited royally from the settler’s opening up the frontier. Maybe that was “the will of the Almighty.” The Almighty Dollar, anyway. So, we are left with having to make sense of the discrepancy between what we have been told and what we have experienced. This is the work of the spiritual journey. It’s Jesus’ parable of the catch of fishes where the fishermen (that would be me and you) cull the catch, throwing out what is useless and keeping what is helpful. Just because we’ve heard it preached doesn’t make it helpful, or so. 04/24/2012
137. The Virgin and the Watchman, Zion National Park, Utah —  June 2010 —  You never know who your guardians will be or who will guide you along the way. It is enough to know you can’t make it on your own, and to be open to help from unexpected places. This doesn’t mean we are dependent on someone else telling us what to do and that we cannot trust ourselves to know what’s what and what to do about it. We have to know a guide when we see one and trust ourselves to her, to him, when we have reached the end of our string of options. A guide is only worth having around when we need one. A guardian is in the way when we’re just eating ice cream. To be guide and guardian worthy, we have to be actually living our life. We have to be creating messes, making waves, getting ourselves in tight spots, reaching the limit of things we can think of on our own. We have to be alive to need help with life. What’s a guide going to do with someone who isn’t going anywhere? 04/25/2012
138. Appalachian Pond, Blue Ridge Parkway near Doughton Park, April 10, 2012 —  May you see how things are and do what needs to be done about it with the gifts that are yours to offer in each situation as it arises— and let that be that. 04/25/2012
139. The Watchman, Zion National Park, Utah —  June 2010 —  Too much matters. It’s all important. We want to do everything, keep everybody happy. We never stop. Even when we sleep, we are still churning, running, chasing trains that just left the station. Nothing matters. Nothing is important. Our life has no center, no ground, no focus. It’s all surface fluff of equal value. Our life is meaningful to the extent that we are serving something of value with our life. What would that be? What is worth our life? 04/26/2012
140. Appalachian Pasture, Blue Ridge Parkway near Blowing Rock, NC —  April 17, 2012 —  What you receive in your life isn’t as important as how you receive what you receive. We have the ability to trump everything that happens to us by the quality of our response to it. That’s the second time you’ve heard me say that, and it won’t be the last. Our life depends on us—not on what happens to us. Our role is to bring our life—the life that is our life to live—forth, to unfold it, birth it, assist its emergence into the world of normal, apparent, reality. That is what we are here to do. We can’t let what happens to us stop us. We have to find our life and live it. Getting to the heart of our life and bringing it forth is our focus in the time left for living. 04/26/2012
141. Kolob Canyon, Zion National Park, Utah — June 2010 — There are 10,000 takes on what we are supposed to be doing with our life. Everybody has an idea. If you give your life to your mother, it would look different than if you give your life to your Aunt Louise, or to your father. The Preacher would say you are supposed to be keeping the Ten Commandments. Who are you going to give your life to? You better not give it to any of them—or parcel out pieces of it to all of them! You better keep it all for yourself—and decide for yourself what you are going to do with it. That’s what you are supposed to be doing with your life: Deciding for yourself what that is to be. I’ll use myself as a model for you. I don’t have any idea where I am going with my life or what I’m supposed to be doing in the time left for living. But. By this point I have some rock solid notions of what that is NOT going to be. So I do what has life for me, what enthuses me, what enlivens me, what is ME, and see where it goes. I also have to do what is necessary to take care of my responsibilities to my family and pay the bills. I have to work it all out. My primary responsibility is listening to my life to know what it is asking of me and not listening to all the voices, both within and without, shouting their take on what I’m supposed to be doing. Your life—what has life for you—is your most reliable guide. Listen to it. 04/27/2012
142. Linville River, Blue Ridge Parkway near Linville, NC — October 2010 — Experiment with your life! You live on a playground! Take advantage of being able to play around with your life, looking for combinations that work. You know what works and what doesn’t work. That’s all you need to know. I’ve created four, no five, knockout recipes fooling around with ingredients. Your life is a kitchen! You are the cook! Stop serving up the same old same old! Create some new dishes! Two watchwords for the rest of your life—for the time left for living: Experimentation! Exploration! Make a game of finding out all you can find out about what you are capable of before you die. What do you have to lose? 04/28/2012
143. Along the Path 01, Nodding Thistle Flower Pod, Piedmont Land Conservancy trail, Greensboro, NC — April 26, 2012 — Nothing kills creativity, imagination, joy, delight, good humor and playfulness like having to do it right. Whoever came up with the idea of doing it right did it wrong. Life is death without the freedom to fail, to flop, to throw it out and start over again, again, and again. You are doing it wrong if you aren’t doing it wrong! Roll up your sleeves and get into the fun of living your life without having to know what you are doing and doing it right. If anybody asks you what you think you are doing, tell them you have no idea what you are doing, and laugh. It will be great, though only small children will understand. 04/28/2012
144. Trolling for Photos, DuPont State Forest near Brevard, NC — October 2010 — The help we get isn’t the help we have in mind. We want help to get and keep what we want to have. We want help with the life we want to live. We want help to have the life we wish were our life. The help we get helps us with the life that is our life to live. Check the sources. All the legends, myths and fairy tales are about getting help with the life that is our life to live. Frodo gets help getting the Ring to Mount Doom—not rain for his garden and dates with the girl down the street. Luke Skywalker? The Force was with him as long as he was aligned with his destiny. Step out of alignment, off the beam, we’re on our own. What are you not doing that you know is yours to do that you have been fighting all your life wondering why your life is such a fight? Waking up means getting on the right horse and seeing where it goes. 04/29/2012
145. False Hellebore, Blue Ridge Parkway near Rocky Knob, VA — April 20, 2002 — There is a wonderful old saying that may not have its origin in the Deep South, but is found in abundance there: “You did it to your own self!”—with “Fool” unstated but always implied. Pretty well sums it up. We make a mess trying to avoid a mess. We create intolerable situations for everyone trying to smooth everything over and make everyone happy. We create pain by refusing to bear pain, face pain, admit pain; Looking the other way, we crash again into the Wall we never saw coming again. We think we are creating weal and we are making woe. We think we are doing one thing and we are doing another. What to do? What needs to be done? How do we determine what needs to be done? Do we tiptoe around on egg shells or do we stomp and smash the damn things? Do we not say the thing that obviously needs to be said because someone will not like it if we do or do we say it and deal with the fallout? What needs to happen? How we decide that makes all the difference. The heart of wisdom is seeing what needs to be done and doing it. Seeing is doing. We don’t want to do, so we refuse to see. And we do it to our own self. 04/30/2012
146. Sweet Pea, Piedmont Land Conservancy trail, Greensboro, NC—April 2012 —Nothing can be done for those who think the wrong things are important. Beer, for instance. And cheap—or not so cheap—red wine. The world is full of things that are not important, but pretend to be, and fool all of the people some of the time. Salvation, if you will permit a little theological rumination, is when we get to the end of our rope and change our mind about what is important. It doesn’t always take the end of our rope to do it. Some of us are luckier, or brighter, or quicker on the uptake than others of us. Some of us wake up quickly. Some of us hit the snooze button forever it seems. But. Nothing can be done for any of us as long as we think the wrong things are important. And you can’t wake any of us up before our time. Which means, if you have to help some of us, any of us, you are just going to have to wait around until we can be helped. In the meantime, you might find someone who is already waking up to what matters and help them. All of this is contingent, of course, on your knowing what matters. Otherwise, we have the blind leading the blind. 04/30/2012
147. Blue Ridge Dogwood, Blue Ridge Parkway, Rocky Knob, VA—May 01, 2012 — The Dali Lama could not live your life. Tag out with him. You could last longer in his life than he could in yours. The Dali Lama doesn’t drive. Can’t parallel park. Doesn’t have a drivers license. Has never grocery shopped in his entire life. Or buttered bread. Or made oatmeal. The Dali Lama has keepers, people who take care of all the details for him. He has never used a credit card, balanced a check book, or lost one. No wonder he is so serene and holy. Give him an hour and a half in traffic getting home from work and let’s see how long his detachment from the outcome lasts. But, not to pick on the Dali Lama. He’s one of my favorite people. So is Jesus. Jesus could not live your life either. Neither could Mohammed. Or Moses. They would all run if they saw you coming. They aren’t about to tag out with you. So stand a little straighter. Walk a little taller. Swagger a bit. You’re doing a hell of a job even on your bad days. Prance around the room. Moon walk to work. At least to the car. You don’t get—or give yourself—nearly enough credit. So start taking some credit, and take a bow two or three times a day. You’re good. If you don’t believe me, ask the Dali Lama. 05/01/2012
148. Leaving Roosevelt Lodge, Yellowstone National Park, WY—June 2011 — Photography comes down to knowing where to place the tripod. If you don’t use a tripod, you are limited in the type and quality of the photos you can take but, the same rule applies—photography comes down to knowing where to place the camera. Photography requires you to see the scene and select what part of the scene you are going to hang on your wall. Of course, then you have to know how to capture the portion you have selected, but that isn’t the hard part. The hard part is knowing where to stand. The hard part is getting out of the way and allowing your Inner Knower place your tripod for you. Your part is shutting up and doing what you are told to do. Don’t have to think about it. Don’t have to figure it out. Don’t have to know what you are doing. Allow yourself to be led, directed. And when  you take the picture, keep listening. There may be another tripod position nearby. Look behind you. Wonder what the scene might look like from a different vantage point. See what else there is. Transfer what you do there to what you do throughout your life. Knowing where to put the tripod is like knowing how to respond to each situation as it arises. Shut up and do what you’re told—by the Inner Knower. It’s the key to everything that follows. 05/02/2012
149. Blue Ridge Farm Road, Blue Ridge Parkway near Rake’s Mill Pond, VA—May 1, 2012 —At some point, we all need help with our lives. One of the worst things is to feel cutoff from our own life—to be detached from emotional engagement with life—to be empty, hollow, adrift on “the wine dark sea.” Vitality, vibrancy, enthusiasm can too easily become words without a connection to our experience. Not a problem. Puts us in the perfect position to be open and receptive to what our life has in mind for us. We have to get to the end of our rope before we will consider the rabbit trail. That would be the White Rabbit Trail, also known as the Hero’s Journey. We have to know that on our own we can only run out of options and that we need help with our life. At that point we say, “HELP!” And wait to see what happens but. We have to mean it. We have to be willing to receive the help that comes—and we have to be open to help coming from the most unexpected, even ridiculous (Nothing good could come from Nazareth, remember) places. White Rabbits appear in every disguise imaginable, or unimaginable. When you say, “HELP!” be ready for anything. Adventure always starts out that way. 05/02/2012
150. Fence Posts, Blue Ridge Parkway near Orchard Gap, VA—May 1, 2012 —We all care about different things and care differently about the same things. We shake out in different places along the caring line. Then we take up religion, or politics, or sports and join large groups of people caring the same way about the same thing. We erase the lines that distinguish our caring from that of everyone else and disappear into the group. We have to see Jesus or Mohammed or the Yankees like everyone around us does. Our identity—at least in this regard—is a group identity. We think like the “We” thinks, not like the “I” thinks. It doesn’t take long before the “We” replaces the “I” across the board, around the table—and you cannot have a life of your own, with thoughts, beliefs and opinions of your own, with a perspective, a point of view, of your own. If you don’t espouse the doctrines and speak in boilerplate, you are suspect and will soon find yourself excluded, excommunicated, banned, shunned, boycotted for daring to see things like you see them. All the heroes have to leave home—leave the group—and enter the wilderness on her, on his, own and find the way that is her, that is his, way and not the way of someone else. Separation Anxiety keeps a lot of people from making the trip to the Land of Promise, which is the center of our own soul, heart, self, life. We have to face our own fear to find our own path. We have to care about what we care about the way we care about it—and see where it goes. 05/03/2012

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11/17/2011 — 02/04/2012

1. 11/17/2011 — We can serve our life, bring forth our life, live our life anywhere, within any context, every circumstance. We don’t have to have anything to be who we are. Prisoner of War camps are as good as Penthouses for serving the needs of soul and expressing what is ours to make plain in the world of concrete facts and apparent reality. The ongoing theme of the Hero’s Journey is adapting ourselves to every present situation and bringing ourselves forth to meet what we find there. Joseph Campbell said, “It took the Cyclops to bring out the hero in Ulysses.” We become “who we always have been and who we will be” (Carl Jung) in response to what each day delivers. We cannot think that we are to be consistently the same forever, living today exactly as we lived yesterday, repeating our clichés and platitudes on cue without thinking, and calling that being alive. The pattern we repeat is to engage each moment with creativity, imagination, compassion and courage—meeting the needs of the situation as it arises with what we have to offer—and see where it goes. May it be so with us all!
   
2. Cedar Island Ferry seen from Springer’s Point, Ocracoke Island, Cape Hatteras National Seashore, NC—In Four Quartets, T.S. Eliot says, “We shall not cease from exploration, and the end of all our exploring will be to arrive where we started and know the place for the first time.” This is an excellent summation of the Hero’s Journey, the Search for the Holy Grail, the trek to the Land of Promise, the Spiritual Quest, and the scope of the Process of Individuation. We seek ourselves, our Self—and in searching, find, in the words of Carl Jung, “We are who we have always been, and who we will be.” 11/17/2011
3. Pied-billed Grebe, a Bog Garden Personality, Bog Garden, Greensboro, NC—Who wouldn’t fall in love with this guy/gal (How would we know?)? This little duck is alone on the pond (no other Grebes present), and seems to be quite at home with that. He/she dives and scoots long distances underwater, evidently for the sheer joy of it. The books say you rarely see these babies flying, and I’ve never seen him/her air-borne. She/he is the most active duck of those gathered (Hybrids, Mallards and Ring-necked Ducks at the moment), the most alive and definitely the most interesting. I wish for her/him a long and happy life, and wonder how long she/he will stay before migrating on. 11/17/2011
4. Cypress Balls, Bog Garden, Greensboro, NC—Overheard at Barnes & Noble: “She said, ‘There are two rules to writing: Write what wants to be written and Don’t have to know where it’s going.’ ‘That’s crazy,’ he said. ‘If that were all there is to it, any fool could write.’ ‘The fools can’t keep the rules,’ she said.” 11/18/2011
5. Take-off, Great Blue Heron, Bog Garden, Greensboro, NC—We are often freer than we think we are. To fly we have to spread our wings and trust ourselves to the air. To what do we trust ourselves? Playing it safe is no way to live if it keeps you from living. What are you saving up for? 11/18/2011
6. Air Borne, Great Blue Heron, Bog Garden, Greensboro, NC—“Where do we go from here?” “What now?” “What next?” Hmm. We aren’t here to think all this out, we live it out. We will see where we go from here, what now, what next, when we find ourselves on the way. We hamper the journey by trying to pin it down: “This, then that.” We’ll see. Our life is not a gradated series of accomplishments, a sequential set of steps from, say, Pre-School to PhD (And then what?). When I tell people I write 500-ish words a day and spend 2 to 5 hours photographing the world, they ask, without exception, “What are you going to do with it?” I take pictures and I write. I don’t think about what I’m going to do with it or what is going to become of me. I’ll see where it goes but. I’m not in charge of the going. We do what has life for us and see where it goes. If you are withholding yourself from what has life for you because you don’t know what you would do with it or how you would make it pay off or how you would defend, justify, explain, or excuse its place in your life, I recommend that you stop thinking about all of the things that don’t have anything to do with doing what you love, with what has life for you, and start doing it. And see where it goes. 11/19/2011
7. In Flight 01, Great Blue Heron, Bog Garden, Greensboro, NC—We don’t want to change. We don’t want to be different. We just want our lives to be better—to have things go our way more often—to get what we want. We will do anything to get what we want but the one thing that is absolutely guaranteed to give it to us: Change what we want. The process of spiritual development, of spiritual growth, calls for change. Development is change. Growth is change. We become different over the course of the Hero’s Journey, the Spiritual Quest. We think differently. We believe differently. We behave differently. We live differently. Not what we want to hear. We have to change in order to hear that we have to change. This will not be easy. 11/19/2011
8. In Flight 02, Great Blue Heron, Bog Garden, Greensboro, NC—We begin every journey where we are. The path to where we need to be lies under our feet. What’s the next step? Pay attention. Be awake, aware, alive to what is calling your name here and now. What inclination, interest is stirring? Don’t know? Ask for help. The invisible world is replete with would-be helpers waiting for a truthful invitation. There is a catch, however. To ask for help, we must be serious about receiving it, we must actually need it and depend on it to move us along the path with our name on it. You know all the stories, myths and fairy-tales, where the hero spurns the help that comes because it doesn’t come as expected or lead where the hero wants to go. The hero wants to go up and the path goes down and the hero says, “No way am I going down!”? When we ask for help we have to mean it, and take what comes, and go where it leads, trusting ourselves to That Which Knows because we have declared ourselves to be empty, not knowing what to do now, next. Empty is the place to be but, we have to remember that we are empty, unseeing, and allow ourselves to be led. 11/20/2011
9. In Flight 03, Great Blue Heron, Bog Garden, Greensboro, NC—Since the Age of Reason we have thought we could think our way to a perfect world, with justice and love for all. Well, like it or not, wherever the left brain goes, the right brain tags along, demanding to be taken into account. We cannot create much of a world with intellectual capital and spiritual destitution. So, back to the starting blocks we go—to develop eyes that see, ears that hear, and a heart that understands to go along with the brain that calculates, formulates and reasons. If we can get the ratios right, we’ll have a chance at that perfect world. 11/20/2011
10. In Flight 04, Great Blue Heron, Bog Garden, Greensboro, NC—We take our peace, and our consolation, where we find it. Maybe it’s in the flight of a Great Blue Heron. Or in waiting for a Great Blue Heron to fly. And for the light to be right. And for the wind to stop blowing. And to be good enough with the camera and its controls to not miss it when it happens. No one can dictate to us where our peace, where our consolation, is to be found—and we must refuse to let anyone deny us the right to where we find it. And we must know where it is to be found. And go there often. 11/20/2011
11. In Flight 05, Great Blue Heron, Bog Garden, Greensboro, NC—In my neighborhood it is a Christmas tradition to hang large balls made from chicken wire and wrapped with lights in the trees in our yards. It is a task requiring careful planning and execution and each year it comes down to waiting for night to fall to see if the photo cell on the six-plug receptacle will work. I generally have to reset the device, but I can’t tell until darkness comes to know if resetting has done the job. It’s all a great mystery to me. I’m quite helpless to do anything that will let me know things are in working order. I’ve tried covering the light cell to no avail. I have to wait. Aha! It works! or Dang! Have to go reset the thing. Which will it be? I wait. This year, it works! But who knows what next year will bring? We have to wait to see. No assurances. No certainties. Our lives are great mysteries which we are quite helpless to control. We do what we can imagine doing and wait to see how it all works out. May it be well with us all! 11/20/2011
12. Coming Down 01, Great Blue Heron, Bog Garden, Greensboro, NC—Knowing what we can live with is knowing where to draw lines, set boundaries, get ourselves backed up and turned around. It’s a right brained thing to know “No Not For Nothing” when we see it, but to know what we know is a left brained decision to tune in, listen up, pay attention to the red flags our right brain is waving before our eyes. Knowing is one thing, and knowing what we know is another. We generally know more than we know we know and so. We have to make a point to check in with the Knower who lives in our right brain from time to time. This is what devotional moments, or meditation, or prayer are good for, checking in with the Knower—feeling what we are feeling, seeing what we are looking at, hearing what we are listening to, noticing how it is with us—so that we might draw the lines that need to be drawn and say “No Not For Nothing” when it needs to be said. 11/20/2011
13. Coming Down 02, Great Blue Heron, Bog Garden, Greensboro, NC—Our life is our charge. We are responsible for its care and tending. Life doesn’t just happen, any more than tomatoes and cinnamon rolls do. Life isn’t automatic, guaranteed. All our vital signs can be perfectly normal and we can be as dead as the oak leaves blowing across our lawns. Life is meaning, enthusiasm, emotion, vitality—and we have to cultivate these things, serve them, by living to be alive, intentionally, deliberately, willfully in every day that comes our way. So. What will you do to bring yourself to life in what’s left of today? Tomorrow? 11/20/2011
14. Used in Short Talks on Contradiction, etc., Springer’s Point Oak Panorama, Ocracoke Island, Cape Hatteras National Seashore, NC—The stress of life will wear you down if you don’t have a buffer, a way of cushioning the impact of “normal wear and tear” and extraordinary blows and burdens. Buffer’s come in all styles and sizes. You have to find the ones that are right for you. Could be time with the dog or a five-mile run. A slow walk through the woods, a rocking chair with a glass of wine or a cup of tea or coffee. My favorite all-weather, anytime buffer is a sounding board—a person or a small group of people who let you air it out without advising, directing, suggesting—without even sympathizing. We need a community of the right kind of people who listen closely and ask the right kind of questions that take us to the heart of the matter: Conflict ID. All of our stress is the result of conflict, contradiction, opposition. Something is happening that we don’t want to happen (even a promotion at work or a fat inheritance can be stressful in that it has implications we don’t like). We have to square up with the ambivalence: On the one hand this, on the other hand that, and on other hands, that, that, and that. Making the conflict conscious helps with the emotional adjustment and nothing aids consciousness quite like talking. We don’t think it, see it, until we hear ourselves saying it. There is nothing like a sounding board for keeping us stable and sane. If you don’t have one, form one—a community of the right kind of listeners, hearing us to the truth of our life. 11/21/2011
15. Heron Dance, Bog Garden, Greensboro, NC—This is really the last one. And, it’s too cute, but. We all can be too cute if we want to be. Inhibition has its place but. It can’t be allowed to run the whole show. We have to permit ourselves to be inhibited about being inhibited. And draw the line against drawing lines. And be too cute, or too something else, anything else, why not, when the situation calls for too something, too anything, rise to the occasion, I say. Strut your stuff, I say. Show them a thing or two, being too something or other. 11/21/2011
16. Sassafras, Blue Ridge Parkway, Mt. Pisgah Inn near Brevard, NC—It is about work and we are about lazy and there you are. The whole problem laid neatly out before you and I haven’t even had breakfast yet. What could I do with a little biscuits and gravy, ham and eggs, toast and coffee? That’s another problem. I don’t do breakfast. Things are as they are because I don’t eat breakfast. I’ll take full responsibility—which is what we all have to do where the fact of our laziness is concerned. We have to pick ourselves up and step into the mess and do what we can with it without hope of anything being significantly different in our lifetime. Both Gandhi and Winston Churchill are credited with saying, “Nothing worth doing is accomplished in a single lifetime.” We think if it can’t be done by nightfall, forget it. If there is no hope of immediate success why do it? We are easily stopped by the Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse, the four questions that kill all incentive and initiative: “Who Cares? Why Try? What Good Would It Do? What Difference Will It Make?” We say it’s hopeless so we aren’t going to waste our time trying. The first step toward the way things ought to be is to look Hopelessness in its ugly red eye, spit in its face and say, “Get out of my way damn you! I have work to do!” Everything rides on our doing the work that is ours to do no matter what. Hopeless is just a bump in the road.  11/22/2011
17. Black Walnut, Price Park, Greensboro, NC—Everything rides on our being open to that which arises within. We can’t ignore the inner world or think that our aims and goals are the only aims and goals. Consciousness works out a partnership with the unconscious, collaborating on what needs to be done and how it is to be done. We do not impose our will on our life. We align ourselves with our life’s will for us—in a “Thy will, not mine, be done” kind of way. 11/22/2011
18. Used in Short Talks On Good And Bad Religion–Leaves on the Water, Bog Garden, Greensboro, NC—We keep looking for God “out there,” “up there,” “over there” to help us with the life we are living. You can see how well that’s working. We need to shift the entire religious orientation. It—what we are looking for—is not “out there” but “in here.” It is between you and you. It is found in working out the relationship, the partnership, between ourselves. It is found in the integration, the harmony, the oneness of selves, of who we are and who we also are. Bad religion says, “Shun the devil.” Good religion says, “Welcome the Prodigal home.” The work of good religion, of the spiritual quest, of the Hero’s Journey, the search for the Holy Grail and the Promised Land, is the work of bringing the conflicts, the contradictions, the ambivalence to life—that is where the vitality lies. Bad religion would have us suppress, deny, ignore these things. What we are seeking is not found in suppressing the truth but in bringing it forth. Make your inner conflicts and contradictions and ambivalence real, present, alive AND WORK THEM OUT. We work them out by asserting the authority we have over them—they are our children, our creation, we are their mother, their father—and listening to them with compassion and grace. They all have value, they all have something to say, something helpful to offer, and they all, believe it or not, have what they take to be our best interest at heart. We are the Prodigal’s father/mother welcoming all of our children home, receiving them well, honoring them with our attention, and working out the relationships among them. This is the work of oneness, of wholeness, of reconciliation and peace. It is Rumi’s “The Guesthouse” being experienced in our own life. 11/23/2011
19. Colors of Fall Abstract 06, Bog Garden, Greensboro, NC—In the beginning there was something. There has always been something. You could call it God, or the Unconscious, or Chaos, or the Demiurge, or a Carbon Atom. It’s been called all those things and more, and it has always been conceived of as something. Not nothing. Nothing has never been posited. Even those theologians who came up with “Creation ex Nihilo”—“out of nothing”—didn’t mean nothing. God was there to create “out of nothing.” Well, anybody can see that if you have God you don’t have nothing. So. There has always been something. In the beginning there was something. And here we are. You can’t deny the fact that we are here, now. How we got here and why we got here and what we are doing here and what we are to do now that we are here is all subject to debate and speculation. Lots of people have ideas, but what we know is that here we are, and the question that hangs in the air is “Now what?” ¿Aquí estamos y ahora qué? How we answer that question tells the tale. 11/23/2011
20. Marsh Road Sunset, Ocracoke Island, Cape Hatteras National Seashore, NC—We like this, we don’t like that. We bounce through our life like a pinball being flipped from one side of the machine to the other. Like. Don’t Like. Good. Bad. Yes. No. There is a perspective beyond Like and Don’t Like that enables us to do what is needed where we are, never mind liking or not liking. Emergency room nurses and doctors and technicians are beyond liking or not liking. They do what is needed without thinking about how much they like or don’t like it. They respond to the moment, to the situation, as it arises without the opposition or partiality that we bring to the things we meet each day. With awareness of what we’re doing, we could do what needs us as much as emergency room clientele need the people they find there, and live as a blessing and a grace, beyond like and don’t like. 11/23/2011
21. Reedy Fork Trail, Greensboro Parks and Trails, Greensboro, NC—An iPhone Photo—We have to play with the moment to see what might become of it but. We develop an adversarial relationship with our life somewhere along the line and lose the capacity for playfulness. Life becomes serious business and we become bulldozers, forcing our way along the path of our own choosing, oblivious to the possibility of fortuitous intrusions, disruptions, distractions, plowing headlong toward goals we know will be grand. Let’s see a show of hands from those who think this strategy is working. You could do worse than engage your life in a spirit of play. You have done worse. Are doing worse. You have absolutely nothing to lose. Even a bulldozer would like those odds. 11/24/2011
22. Red, Price Park, Greensboro, NC—The path unfolds before those who see things as they are—and also are. This means seeing what we look at, hearing what we listen to. Seeing things as they are and also are requires the spirit of right interpretation. What is being said? What is being revealed, expressed? How many possibilities can we imagine? Put them all on the table. Walk around the table. Consider the table. Don’t go with the most obvious, the usual, the unmistakable meaning. Look. Listen. Ask the most pertinent meaning to come forth. Respond to the situation as though that meaning is the authentic meaning, never mind the smoke screens and the red herrings. You go for the meaning of this here, this now. Right seeing. Right hearing. Right understanding. Lead to Right knowing. Right Doing. Right Being. This all adds up to Right living. You can’t beat that with two books of etiquette. Big ones, at that. 11/25/2011
23. Cedar Island Ferry Sunset, Pamlico Sound, Cape Hatteras National Seashore, Ocracoke Island, NC—We have to give ourselves adventures. We go forth to meet our life. We can’t just huddle in our comfortable routines waiting for some Snow White, some Handsome Young Prince, some Fairy Godmother to show up and hand us happily ever after. This is hard work, finding our life and living it. It’s the HERO’s journey, not the Slacker’s Slide into Glory! We venture into all kinds of things we’ve never tried before. New dishes at restaurants. New restaurants. New routes to work. New jobs at work. New work. New, new, new! What is new about your life today? How can you expect to have an adventure in a life in which nothing is allowed to change? Do something today you’ve never done before! Get into the old rut of doing something new everyday! See where it goes. We are here to see where it goes, you know. To do that we have to actually be going. Not sitting in our favorite chair with our hands in our lap watching the Telly, reading a book, working on the computer. The Hero’s Journey requires us to go somewhere we’ve never been, do some things we’ve never done. I wouldn’t kid you about this. Why would I lie? 11/27/2011
24. Pamlico Sound Sunset Panorama, Cape Hatteras National Seashore, Ocracoke Island, NC—I changed my mind about homosexuality in the 70’s listening to gay people talk about being gay. I think that’s the way it works. When we stop listening to people talk about Those People, and start listening to Those People, things change, whether the people in question are gay or Communists or Muslims or Hispanic Immigrants or some other manifestation of The Enemy. When we listen to The Enemy a shift occurs and they become increasingly less Them and increasingly more Us. It is strange what listening with understanding will do for you, to you. Listening, though, is listening and not arguing, debating, haranguing, ranting, attacking… Listening is the path to peace and reconciliation—if we listen to Them and not those who talk about Them. Which, of course, is my problem with Talk Radio. 11/27/2011
25. Silver Lake Sunrise, Cape Hatteras National Seashore, Ocracoke Island, NC—We live in two worlds—the visible, physical world of literal, tangible, apparent reality and the invisible, spiritual world of symbols and images and emerging meaning. Since the Age of Reason, we have been living as though the visible world is the only world. The Hero’s Journey, Spiritual Quest, Search for the Promised Land and the Holy Grail consists of reestablishing our connection with the invisible ground of existence and wandering around in the symbolic nature of the “real world” going, “Wow!” with our increasing immersion into meaning. Let’s say you fall in love. Happens all the time with everybody who is a little bit alive. It isn’t about the person with whom you fall in love. It’s about you. The other person is a mirror reflecting back to you the aspects of yourself that you need to bring forth. What are the qualities that you find attractive in the other person? What do you anticipate him/her bringing to life in your relationship with him/her? In your life? What is missing that he/she will supply? These are the things you need to bring forth in yourself—latent qualities and traits and interests which you are to develop in you. The other person may help you with that work or hinder it, which determines whether he/she is actually worth your time or simply functions to wake you up to the wonder of you. The work of bringing yourself forth is the thing of true value, not the relationship with your new-found honey. Don’t let the literal person distract you from the symbolic truth of his/her place in your life. And Do The Work! 11/28/2011
26. Lake Brandt Reflection, Bur-Mil Park, Greensboro, NC—It is a universal experience to sleep and dream of The Impossible Situation. We find ourselves in a fix for which there is no solution. Now What? One of the attractions of Action/Thriller’s like the Indiana Jones movies is watching him come up with a way out long after normal human beings—that would be everyone in the audience—had given up and submitted to their fate. Fate is what happens to us when we abandon our destiny. Our destiny calls us to find a way—THE way—the ONLY way. Just like Indiana Jones, or Luke Skywalker, or Harry Potter, or Frodo, or any of the heroes and heroines of lore. Our destiny requires us to sit with “Now What?” until the light blub goes off over our head, something occurs to us and we see the way: THE WAY. The way to our destiny within the impossible situation of this here and this now. Do Not Give Up! This is the universal message behind the universal dream of The Impossible Situation. Do. Not. Give. Up. Do not abandon your destiny, your calling, your work, your gift, your genius. Do not quit serving it until the end and do not accept anything as the end until your final breath. Any other perceived end of the trail is premature. Until then, Find The Way! Our destiny is counting on us. its hopes are pinned on us. It sits on the edge of its seat, holding its breath, crossing its fingers, praying that we will come up with “Now What?” again and again, living in its service all our lives long. Amen! May it be so! 11/29/2011
27. View from Grandfather Mountain, Grandfather Mountain State Park, near Linville, NC—Serve the gifts that are yours to give, bring them forth as needed in each situation as it arises and see where it goes. If you can find better advice, take it! 11/29/2011
28. Hatteras Lighthouse, Cape Hatteras National Seashore, Hatteras Island, Buxton, NC—What does liking or not liking something have to do with it—with the life we are called to live? How many of us like to change diapers? Like to wash clothes? Like to vacuum and mop? Since when does liking something or not liking it get to determine what we do? What needs to be done is the question. What needs us to do it is the question. Liking it or not liking it is completely irrelevant—and in the way. Growing up is growing beyond like and like not. It’s stepping into a sphere of life where we live to bring our best forth to meet the situation as it arises, like it or not. The pitcher’s job is to put his, or if it’s softball we’re talking, her best into each pitch, never mind what the other players do after that. Never mind liking or not liking how the game is going. Live beyond liking and not liking. Live to do what needs to be done in the moment of its doing, as it needs to be done, and let that be that. If you are going to like something, like being alive no matter what. If you are going to not like something, don’t like being unable to respond to the moment because you are so gripped by your resistance to the moment that you miss the moment and the chance you had to bring forth your best and grace the world. 11/30/2011
29. Used in Short Talks on Contradiction, etc., Greenbriar Highway 01, Great Smoky Mountains National Park, TN—The only rule of faith and practice is this: Live truthfully. This doesn’t mean always tell the truth. It means live a truthful life. A truthful life squares up with what is true and what is also true, and does not pretend that the opposite of truth is a lie. The opposite of truth is truth. Stand between the opposites and live in ways that take the polarity—all the polarities—into account. Maintain the tension of the contradictions. In this way, you force awareness, awakening, realization—which, of course, increases the tension which brings about the shift, and sometimes the explosion, which transforms the situation and the world. This does not make for happily ever after. It makes for the hard, endless, work of integration, reconciliation, peace, harmony and justice for all. And it’s hell because it’s difficult. And it’s heaven because it’s worth the effort. Israelis and Palestinians working it out. You and your sister, or sister-in-law, working it out. Being deepened, enlarged, expanded in the process. Becoming True Human Beings by living truthful lives. 12/01/2011
30. Ocracoke Lighthouse, Cape Hatteras National Seashore, Ocracoke Island, NC—We come alive in trusting ourselves to our life, our destiny—trusting that there is a life that is our life to live beyond the life that we can think up on our own—opening ourselves to that possibility and seeing where that takes us. This is the formula for adventure on “the wheel of fortune and pain, the circle of life.” It connects us with the invisible world and requires us to find our sustenance and courage from the depth of that connection, a connection that is grounded in trust, or to use the biblical term, faith. We have to believe that it is real, more real than anything in the visible world of normal, apparent reality—and live as though it is so. Our life waits, wondering if we have what it takes to take up the Hero’s Journey, the Spiritual Quest, the Search for the Land of Promise and the Holy Grail. Time will tell. 12/02/2011
31. Hooded Merganser, Bog Garden, Greensboro, NC, December 02, 2011 — We need a little help along the way, a little wind in our sails, a pick-me-up, a lift, a boost. There are people who do that for us. We feel better in their presence, are blessed by their being. We don’t know what it is. They don’t know. But. It’s real, and we are glad to be numbered among their friends, those who mediate the gift of life, and bring us to life by the quality of the time we spend together. May we all have enough of people like that in our life, and may we be like that in the lives of others. May it be certainly so! 12/02/2011
32. Sumac, Blue Ridge Parkway near Rocky Knob, VA, November 02, 2011 — I’m sitting listening to soft, quiet Christmas music, thinking this is my first Christmas retired. I don’t have to do anything, oversee anything, orchestrate anything. This is how Christmas should be. And I invite you to look at the birth of the baby Jesus as the birth of our individual destiny—the awakening of us to the fact of our destiny, of the life that is ours to live. We are born on Christmas Day, born as the Christ, the Anointed One—each of us being anointed for the life that only we can live, to do what only we can do. Merry Christmas to you all, and with it, the realization of your own calling to gather yourself up and live the life that needs you to live it. 12/02/2011
33. Puckett Cabin, Blue Ridge Parkway, Groundhog Mountain, VA—Aunt Orelena Puckett was a mid-wife who helped deliver over a thousand Appalachian babies, though she and her husband John did not have a child of their own. Life is funny that way. Our cross to bear is the disparity between how things are and how we want them to be, the difference between the life that is our life to live and the life that we wish were our life to live. How well we square up to that discrepancy and live with it, bear it, tells the tale. We have work to do and we cannot allow hopelessness and difficulties stand between us and our work. We are to bring forth who we are no matter what. We all are, each of us is, the Christ, Emmanuel, the Anointed One—anointed, chosen, for the life that needs us to live it, that only we can live, that no one but us can live. We cannot dismiss that as unworthy of us because it doesn’t match up with our inflated ideas for ourselves. Each of us is the Christ as only we can be the Christ. Our cross to bear is the question of whether that will be good enough for us, whether we have what it takes to bring forth who we are as a blessing and a grace to the world no matter what. Our cross is the question to which we are the answer. 12/03/2011
34. Ocracoke Lighthouse, Cape Hatteras National Seashore, Ocracoke Island, NC, October 27, 2011 — Integrity is being who we are. And also are. It is not being who we are not. Too much of the time we are required to be who we are not by lives that are out of synch with the life that is our life to live, that is our destiny to live, which usurped by the powers and principalities of the way things are—you know, money and politics, and politics has as much to do with making our parents, or your spouse, or your in-laws, etc. happy as it has to do with Democrats and Republicans. Our work is to do the work that is ours to do—over the opposition and resistance we meet from all quarters. This is the work of integrity against the forces of disintegration. Which gets us to the fundamental question of life, living, being alive: Whose side are you on? 12/03/2011
35. Rock Castle Creek, Blue Ridge Parkway near Tuggle Gap, VA, November 11, 2011 — Some of us have less to like about our parents, or our spouses, or our lovers, or our jobs, or our dogs, etc. than others of us, but. If we live long enough, all of us will have more to not like about our life than we want to deal with. If we live long enough, we all come up against it. “It” being how things are as opposed to how we want things to be. What we do in response to that will tell the tale. I recommend squaring ourselves up with the truth of how things are and the truth of how we wish they were and working to integrate, reconcile, these contrary truths. That means facing the discrepancy and bearing the pain, the tension, of the consciousness of contradictory and mutually exclusive truths until a shift occurs. The shift will probably occur in us, allowing us to adjust to how it is and how it also is and go on with our lives to the extent that is possible. All of this, of course, is hell. The Hero’s Journey is not a stroll through the meadows of spring. We pay a price to be alive but. There is consolation along the way but. We have to choose wisely among what appears to be consoling. A six-pack for breakfast and dinner is not the right kind of consolation. Always the picking and the choosing. Can’t something be easy? Death is easy. Life is hard. We can die in 10,000 ways, and in a lot of them you have to look closely to see how dead we are. What is helpful? What is harmful? We know this better in retrospect, which means we have to back up and tun around right often. It’s all a part of the path, and you’ll have a lot of good company along the way, and everybody will be in the same boat, on the path. 12/04/2011
36. Two Ducks Flying, the Bog Garden, Greensboro, NC, November 30, 2011 — These are our parents, these are our sibs, this is our point of origin and the date of our birth, this is our hat size and our shoe size, the shape of our nose, the quality of our smile, our affinity for math or English, music or art, the curl of our hair, the color of our eyes, the stuff we stepped into, that came with us, at birth, that waited like a great welcoming party to give us what would be ours to work with, the facts of life, our fate. And in the background, there by the door, waiting its turn to bless or curse, depending on our point of view, wondering how we would receive its offering, hoping for the best, stood our destiny with the other gifts of birth, our work, our life, the meaning and purpose that call us forth as we call them forth, creating us anew and breaking our heart again and again—Mary’s baby waiting at her crib for her to carry and birth and bury—destiny’s child with child, the story of us all. We are all the Virgin born to give birth if we will in this God-forsaken place and time—of all places and times why this one why these facts, this fate in which to work out this destiny? Wrong question. Will we do it is the question? Will we say YES! and serve our destiny within these facts, this fate, no matter what all our lives long so help us God? …Will we? 12/05/2011
37. Triple Falls on Little River, DuPont State Forest, near Brevard, NC, October 14, 2011 — Our destiny is a warm puppy looking for love without pedigree or papers hoping we will pick it up, receive its gift, share its life for as long as life lasts but. We have our eye on a big show horse that we can ride to glory, waving and smiling to a world of admirers cheering and calling our name. We don’t get to choose our destiny. We get to serve it. Or not. We get to say yes or no—not: That one over there, the big one, showing off. Our destiny is a puppy hoping we will pick it up, carry it home, treat it well for no reason beyond the joy of loving what is ours to love, do. What’s important may not be what you think it is, may not be what you want it to be, may be a puppy waiting for you to love it for life and see what happens. 12/06/2011
38. Nags Head Sunrise Panorama, Nags Head, NC, October 23, 2011 — There is our idea for our life and there is our life’s idea for us. This is the arena of death and resurrection. If we do not die to our idea of what our life is to be and live to serve our life’s idea of what it is to be, we die without having lived. If we die to our idea of what our life is to be, we are resurrected to live in the service of our life’s idea of what it is to be. This is to have life and have it abundantly. But. There is nothing in that about fame, fortune, glory, easy living and having it made. All we get is life. And. That is more than enough. 12/06/2011
39. Pamlico Sound Sunset, Cape Hatteras National Seashore, Ocracoke Island, NC, October 31, 2011 — You are writing the book of your spiritual development out of your experience—your awareness—of your own growth into you. We are all in the same boat on the path, and each path is unique. We find our own way on a path that we make as we go. Joseph Campbell has said that if we are on a path that has been defined and described by someone else, it is someone else’s path—not our path. We have to get off that one and find the way that is our way, or allow it to find us. As we engage the invisible world, we discover that magic, mystery and miracle are as real as the old stories suggest they are, and that help is rarely what we want or expect but always just what we need if we can be open to it coming as it does from the most unlikely and surprising sources. We also encourage and sustain one another in the work to become who we are, True Human Beings with gifts that will bless and restore the world. 12/06/2011
40. Cedar Rock Falls, Pisgah National Forest near Brevard, NC, October 13, 2011 — I’m sure I could take better photographs with better scenes to work with but. My scenes are my scenes. I’m limited to the time and place of my being. Any scene could be better at a different time, with different light. When I walk into a scene, that’s what I have to work with. The task is taking this scene, here and now, and doing what I can with it. I could take better photos if I had more to work with. We could live a better life with better choices. Our choices are our choices. The people we live with are the people we live with. What can we do with this life, these choices, this here, this now? What is the best we can do with what we have to work with? We all could have a better life with more to work with but. This is it. We walk into a scene, we step into our life. Now what? 12/07/2011
41. Rock Castle Creek, Rock Castle Gorge, Blue Ridge Parkway near Tuggle Gap, VA, November 03, 2011 — One of the Laws of Photography states: “We are always limited by our equipment.” For instance, Jay Maisel says, “The more equipment we have, the fewer photographs we take.” A lot of equipment is limiting. A little equipment is limiting. There will always be photos we cannot take because of our equipment, too much or too little. So, we resign ourselves to taking the photographs we can take with the equipment we have on hand. We live with our limitations and do what we can within the restrictions thus imposed. Sound like life to you? It should. We are always limited. The art of living is coming to terms with that which limits us and living as fully as possible anyway, never the less, even so. We cannot do this once and be done with it. It is a continuing adjustment, a never-ending dance with limits and life. So put those dancing shoes on and step lively now. 12/07/2011
42. Eno River Fall, Eno River State Park near Durham, NC, November 09, 2011 — We are the tip of the ice berg. What you see is not what you get. What you get is all the stuff underwater, hidden from view even our own view, unconscious—not just repressed and forgotten, but also never known, unknown but not altogether unknowable for eyes that see, ears that hear, hearts that understand. There is more to us than meets the eye and so, we have to be alert to the all-ness of us that we do not know—to motives, and interests, and moods, and agendas that are not ours but that are at work in us and through us in the service of ends and incentives we do not understand. Part of our work is to know as much of what is unconscious and unknown about us as we are able to know in the time left for living—listening to dreams and flights of fancy, to impulses and strange attractions—paying attention to what resonates with us, catches our eye, calls our name, and to depths of grief and sadness beyond what we think we have any right to feel. There is a world within that is every bit as complex as the world without. Honoring the invisible world with attention and respect is a step toward establishing diplomatic relations and negotiating treaties for the well-being of both worlds. 12/07/2011
43. Ramsey Creek, Greenbriar District, Great Smoky Mountains National Park, TN, November 07, 2011 — I wish we could be counted on to do right by one another, which would also mean doing right by ourselves. We don’t know, or care, what right is. We just know what we want and we want more of it. We want easy. Smooth. Fast. Exciting. Happy. Shortcuts—we like shortcuts. Doing what it takes and paying the price to do right by ourselves and one another is not on the table. I don’t like that about us as much as I don’t like anything. Don’t you? 12/08/2011
44. Thorns Panorama, Pisgah Inn, Blue Ridge Parkway near Brevard, NC—October 13, 2011 —  We spend a lot of time searching for the right place to be, the right people to be with, in order to unfold ourselves and step into the world. We have to have a receiving room it seems, not unlike any delivery room—a welcoming environment where we can come forth and survive. You might think that would not be hard to find, given that it is everyone’s fundamental need, to be safely born, but. The second birth is resisted by those who are still trying to get the first one down, and they are not hesitant to abort a soul aborning. We are left, if we are lucky, with a stall in a manger and only a few animals as attendants to witness the struggling birth of who we are. 12/09/2011
45. Stack Rock, with Hawk’s Bill Mountain in the distance, Blue Ridge Parkway near Linville, NC—October 12, 2011 — May we know what is being asked of us in each moment of life—in each situation as it arises—and may we have what it takes to do what needs to be done. Our agenda, our interests, keep us from knowing what is being asked of us and prevent us from doing what needs to be done. We act with our advantage foremost in mind. We look for what is in the moment that we can use, for how we can exploit the situation to our good. And we lose another opportunity to bring forth what is ours to give for the good of the world. We do not understand the concept of what is to our advantage, or how what is good for all is good for us. This is what growing up entails, which is a synonym for the Spiritual Quest, the Hero’s Journey, the Search for the Land of Promise and the Holy Grail. Growing up. Waking up. The two are one, and that’s all there is to it. 12/09/2011
46. Hanging Rock Vista, Hanging Rock State Park near Danbury, NC—November 03, 2011 — We have to be able to say, “NO!” and we have to be able to take “NO!” for an answer. We have to be able to draw lines and allow lines to be drawn. We don’t get very far along the path running over people or allowing people to run over us. The boundaries of relationship are capable of adjustment and relocation but. They are always in place and we do not have to wonder where we stop and someone else starts. Relationship does not exist where “NO!” is not permitted. Practice saying “NO!” without defending, excusing, justifying or explaining—without making it okay that you said no. Practice with your dog. It’s amazing how many people can’t say “NO!” to their dog. Or take “NO!” for an answer from their dog. Or know when to do which. 12/10/2011
47. Swinging Bridge, Eno River State Park near Durham, NC—November 09, 2011 — November 09, 2011 — Aqui estamos y ahora que? Here we are, and now what? This is the starting point for everything that follows. It doesn’t matter how we got here, whose fault it is, what should have been done that wasn’t or what shouldn’t have been done that was, where we should be instead, how things might be except, but, only… HERE we are. Now what? Whatever we do in response to where we are will lead us somewhere, and there we will begin the process anew. Our life unfolds that way, one response to this here, this now, at a time. 12/11/2011
48. Moonset 02, Price Lake, Julian Price Memorial Park, Blue Ridge Parkway near Blowing Rock, NC—December 10, 2011 — It takes a while to get back in the groove. We have to give ourselves time. If you ride horses a lot and then don’t ride horses for a while, you can’t hop back in the saddle and ride like you were riding before the interlude. You can’t treat now as then. You have to give yourself time to acclimate yourself again to the horse, to the saddle, to the entire experience. You’ll be a bit off center, out of synch. The horse will know it and you have to be open to it. You can’t rush being the rider you were. You have to ease back into it over time. And get off your back about your disconnection with the horse’s back. It is a natural occurrence, being out of synch. You can’t not sing for a while and be on key. That’s why professional singers practice, practice, practice. And you think you don’t have to ride your horse regularly to be able to ride your horse like you want to? Or be with your grandchildren? It takes work being in the groove. Practice, practice, practice! And while I’m practicing taking pictures of birds in flight at the Bog Garden, I am not practicing taking landscapes in low light on the Blue Ridge Parkway. Don’t think camera practice is camera practice. Being in the groove at the Bog Garden doesn’t translate into being in the groove on the Parkway. Takes time, moving from one scene to another. Give yourself time. Be easy with you. 12/12/2011
49. Used in Short Talks on Contradiction, etc., Moonrise Panorama, Blue Ridge Parkway near Blowing Rock, NC—December 10, 2011 — We live on the boundary between yin and yang, in the tension created by what is true and what is also true, awash in the reality of polarity. Ambivalence is not not-knowing what to do—it is knowing this ought to be done and that ought to be done and having to decide what is to be done. The way through the opposites and contradictions that impinge upon our life begins with our rising above the conventional should’s, ought’s, and must’s that pretend to be “guides” and giving our own instinct and intuition free rein in determining when and where to do what. Consistency is out of the question. Sometimes we do it like this and sometimes we do it like that. We do it this way when it needs to be done this way and we do it that way when it needs to be done that way. Sometimes we say “Yes” and sometimes we say “No” to the same question. We strive to respond to the situation as it arises out of our sense of what needs to be done in that situation. This is the only kind of freedom—being free to live here and now as we determine, based on our consideration of all that can be taken into account, we need to live. They will crucify us, you know, but that’s a lot better than being buried alive beneath the directives of Those Who Know Best. 12/13/2011
50. Goose Wars, Bog Garden, Greensboro, NC—December, 2011 — Worrying about things can be a way of getting to the bottom of them, coming to terms with them, squaring up with them, imagining different ways of dealing with them, rehearsing our response to them, making preparation for them… There is a place for worry in our life. There are things we should be worried about, planning for. And, there are some things we can’t do anything about until we get there. We have to trust ourselves to think things up as we go, to improvise, invent and astound, to meet the unheard of with the unheard of, and rise to the occasion. Bring life on! We are here for the living of it on every level! 12/13/1011
51. Country Y Panorama, Blue Ridge Parkway near Blowing Rock, NC—December 10, 2011 — Start with what it true. It could be anything. You hate your nose. Or you love it. Now, say what is also true about your nose. Say all you can say that is true about your nose. Soon you will be awash in truth about your nose. You can do this about every single aspect of your experience. What is true? What is also true? We are awash in truth. Contradictory truth. Off-setting truth. Mutually exclusive truth. And we side with one end of the polarity or another. What’s with this taking sides? With this emotional involvement with one aspect of truth? We’re pulling for truth against truth. No matter how hard we pull for this, that is going to still be true. No matter how we insist that THIS is true, that is also true. Face up to the truth of truth! Truth does not cancel out truth. Truth enlarges, expands, deepens truth. I’m going to get theological on you. Jesus said, “I am the way, the truth and the life and no one comes to the Father but by me.” What is also true? Jesus also said, “No one can come to me unless drawn by the Father.” Which way is it? “No one can come to the Father but by me”? “No one can come to me but by the Father”? Truth will do this to you every time if you stay with it. Which is what I’m recommending, that you stay with it. Don’t try to figure it out. Just be aware of all of it, of all that is true and all that is also true. And how you are going to decide what to do about it. This process will wake you up. Open your eyes. You will be a bigger, deeper person for it. Centered. Grounded. Good to be with. The good to be with part is the best part. You should do it just for that. 12/14/2011
52. Branches, Blue Ridge Parkway near Blowing Rock, NC—December 10, 2011 — The first rule of spiritual growth is: Take everything anybody tells you under advisement, that is, under careful consideration, and nothing as the final word. When I was a young spurt of a photographer, my advisers were in favor of manual focusing instead of auto-focus. Maybe they weren’t working with tri-focals, and it WAS in the early days of auto-focus cameras but. Their advice stuck with me through a number of significant failures on the focus front. I kept thinking they knew what they were talking about in spite of the of the mounting evidence to the contrary. Took me way too long to ditch the guru’s and go with experience. So. I’m telling you don’t listen to me, or anyone else, over what your own experience is saying to you. Listen to me when I say Don’t Listen To Me! 12/14/2001
53. Three Goats, Appalachian Homestead near Todd, NC—December 14, 2011 — We have a difficult time distancing ourselves from the people in our lives who don’t understand the concept of boundaries, who are always invading, intruding, violating the space we think of as ours, who don’t know—or care—where they stop and we start, who insist that we do it the way they think it ought to be done and “get their feelings hurt” when we don’t. As far as I can tell, there is no  hope of relationship with people like that even if they are family or extended family members. We have to divorce them, either literally or metaphorically, to have a chance. The proverb “Good fences make good neighbors,” reflects what I think should be the Eleventh Commandment in the Old Testament (It is found there anyway): “Thou shalt not remove thy neighbor’s landmark.” How to get our neighbor to understand and respect that is the best trick in the book of tricks—particularly if you do it without hurting his or her feelings. 12/15/2001
54. Moonset Panorama, Price Lake and Grandfather Mountain, Julian Price Memorial Park, Blue Ridge Parkway near Blowing Rock, NC—December 10, 2011 — Children stringing beads don’t have to have a reason to string beads. They are stringing beads. “Why are you stringing beads?” “Because I like to.” That’s reason enough. They aren’t making a necklace. They aren’t practicing hand/eye coordination. They aren’t burning calories. They are stringing beads because they like to. What do you do because you like to? How often do you do it? How long do you allow yourself to do it before you say something along the lines of, “Well, this isn’t getting it done,” and move on to something you have plenty of reason to do and no excuse not to do? We need to live more like children string beads. Because we like to. 12/15/2011
55. Neighborhood Lights, Sunset Hills, Greensboro, NC—December 15, 2011 — What do you think enlightenment will do for you? You’ll still have to pay your bills. Your job will continue to be your job. Your life partner and his or her extended family, and your own family and extended family, will be the same. The people you don’t like will still be the people you don’t like. Your problems will still be your problems. The Dalai Lama was enlightened and the Chinese chased him out of Tibet. Jesus was enlightened and you know what happened to him. Enlightenment is not the cure-all for the things that are wrong about your life. You don’t seek enlightenment for things to finally be fine. It is no escape from the firestorm of life. So, what’s enlightenment good for? What is life good for? What do you get out of being alive? You’re still going to die. Who are we kidding? Being alive doesn’t do anything about any of the things we hate about living. Neither does enlightenment. But. With enlightenment, everything falls into place. Just as it is. And we stop battling to get it into place, into the place we want it to be. We stop wanting, needing, having to have life be different than it is. We just leave Tibet when the Chinese come for us. We do what we can do to deal appropriately with what must be dealt with, and we don’t let the fact that we have to deal with it interfere with our ability to be fully, deeply, alive in the time left for living. Why do we want to be alive? What does being alive do for us? What does life have to offer? If I have to sell you on life, you are too far gone to have any chance at enlightenment. It would be like the Dalai Lama talking to the Chinese about waking up. The better course is to leave Tibet. When enlightened people see an elephant coming down the trail toward them, they get off the trail.12/16/2011
56. Clingman’s Dome Sunset Panorama 01, Great Smoky Mountains National Park, NC—November, 2011 —
    
    Don’t you have
    some sense
    of the part
    you play
    in creating
    the life
    you complain
    about living?               12/17/2011
57. Ramsey Creek Panorama, Greenbriar District, Great Smoky Mountains Naitonal Park, TN—November 08, 2011 — A life of true value doesn’t just fall off the bus, doesn’t just appear at our door. We work it into being. We cultivate it, serve it. What has life for us has value for us. We must live consciously, aware of what has life, value, for us and what does not, aware of protecting our life, recovering it, living it. We have sacred items which carry our life and reflect what has value for us. My walking shoes and hiking boots, my coffee cups, my camera equipment, my rocking chairs… My life. What are the objects, items, that carry our life? These are our sacred symbols connecting us with life, reminding us of what has life and value for us. Keep them close. It’s hard to imagine living without the objects, items, that carry our life, that set us apart, announce us to the world, express the deep truth of our being, our soul, our Self. The deep truth of our being, our soul, our Self is exhibited in the objects, items, that carry our life, that ARE our life, without which we could not live. We make ourselves aware of our life, the life that is truly our life, by becoming aware of the objects, items, that carry our life. We have a life unlike any other life that has ever been lived, or will be lived, which we too often put under a basket, hide in a back room, deny, ignore. We cannot be alive without embracing our life, our individuality, and living in ways which express our uniqueness in the time left for living. Living the life that is our life to live does not mean recognition, fame, fortune, glory, etc. It means being alive. We are here to be alive. May we all be! 12/17/2011
58. Molasses Creek Impressionistic Panorama, Ocracoke Island, Cape Hatteraas National Seashore, NC—October 27, 2011 — We can easily settle for a life of no value by mindlessly following the cow path from the barn to the pasture to the barn. We can life a life of no value by living as we are supposed to live, doing what someone says we ought to do, keeping them all happy. The military has a phrase for maintaining your own sense of true value under the thumb of protocol: “Defect in place.” The culture, any culture, is an oppressive system of protocol, of ought-to-be’s. We serve our individuality within the culture with symbolic acts of life. We fight for our life, for our right—obligation—to live our life the way it needs us to live it in the face of overwhelming opposition to our stepping out of line and being who we are. Under the heavy thumb of protocol, we have to remember who we are with symbolic acts of life. They cannot have our soul! We will not surrender our claim to the life of our own! So we carry objects, wear items, make gestures of life, to life, within the oppressive cultures of living to remind ourselves who we are and what we are about, keeping soul alive. Remembering we are “not that, not that.” 12/17/2011
59. Great Blue Heron, Bog Garden, Greensboro, NC—November 21, 2011 — We see what is true and what is also true. We decide what needs to be done in response to it. We do it. And repeat the cycle endlessly. The road is always as long as it ever was. That’s the way it is, with a circle. We despair because it seems that we aren’t getting anywhere—like there is somewhere to be, like if we were doing it right it would be easier, we would see progress, long periods of time with nothing but peace and joy to deal with and things going our way. We think things ought to be going our way. And that there is something we can do to get them to go our way. Think positive thoughts and attract prosperity. Pray and keep the Ten Commandments and have Jesus run interference for us. Something. Sorry to be the one to break the news to you but. We do what we can think to do in every situation as it arises. And then, we do what we can think to do with the situation that developed in response to what we did. We never get beyond doing what needs us to do it in the situation as it arises. The good thing is that the situation will tell you what to do. Listen to the situation. Look at the situation. Hear the situation. See the situation. Those who can see, must see—and live as though they do. That’s all there is to the Hero’s Journey. 12/18/2011
60. Great Blue Heron, Bog Garden, Greensboro, NC—December 17, 2011 — We all are Jesus, and the Buddha, when we succeed in getting out of the way. 12/18/2011
61. Curve, Blue Ridge Parkway near Doughton Park, NC—December 13, 2011 — The only thing standing between us and God is, well, us. When we disappear into oneness with “Thy will not mine be done,” there is nothing but the Holy One for all to see. But there is a catch. Who says what “Thy will” is? That would be us. And there just might be a bit of conflict of interest going on. “Of course God wanted me to take that anchor. If not why would He have arranged for it to be left lying right there on that guy’s boat seat?”, said an acquaintance about a boat anchor he “found.” Funny how God’s will is always what our will would be if we were God, how God’s will so regularly coincides with what we think God’s will should be. Which leaves us conveniently able to live our life exactly as we think it should be lived. Which has created the world as we know it. If you’re going to fix something, fix that. 12/19/2011
62. Blue Ridge Vista HDR 03, Near Craggy Gardens, NC, October 21, 2011 — The man or woman of your dreams is dreaming, too. If you want to increase your odds of finding Mr. or Ms. Right you have to work at becoming Mr. or Ms. Right, that is the Right Person You Were Born To Be. You do that by looking closely at your Dreamboat and identifying the qualities he or she would bring to life in your relationship. What characteristics set him or her apart? Those are the qualities and characteristics you are to bring to life in yourself and in your life. You are to become who you long for. The person of your dreams carries the projection of the aspects of yourself that need to be more strongly developed in you and your life. You see in him or her who you need to be, and your are wasting your time idly wishing to be redeemed, saved, sanctified and glorified by another. You are your work to bring forth as a blessing to the world. Get with it! 12/19/2011
63. The Other Lone Cypress Impressionistic Panorama, Lake Brandt at Reedy Fork, Greensboro, NC—November 11, 2011 — We need a community of innocence (Innocent in the sense that it doesn’t have anything at stake in us, nothing to gain or lose by having us as a member) to listen us to the truth of ourselves, enlarge our perspective, deepen our understanding, expand our place in our own lives, bring us forth to meet each situation as it arises, call us to rise to every occasion in offering what we have to give to that which needs what we have to offer, enable us to be who we are and to do what is ours to do in each moment of our life throughout the time left for living. Now where are we going to find one of those babies? The stark absence of that which is most necessary for life in our lives is just ridiculous. 12/20/2011
64. Cedar Island Ferry, Pamlico Sound, Cape Hatteras National Seashore, Ocracoke Island, NC—October 23, 2011 — The transformation of perspective is another term for waking up, which is another term for growing up. You can’t wake up without growing up. You can’t grow up without waking up. And the transformation of perspective is at the bottom of it all. You could complete the Hero’s Journey, the Spiritual Quest, the Search for the Holy Grail and the Promised Land in the privacy of your own home—if you could figure out a way to transform your perspective from the inside. It takes being whammed by something from the outside, the Cyclops, say, to do that. It is not an inside job. 12/20/2011
65. The Woods at Rock Castle Gorge 01, Blue Ridge Parkway near Tuggle Gap, VA—December 02, 2011 — We think it’s like this and it is really like that. We think it is one way and it is another way. No one just sits down and figures it out. Everyone hits the wall. And tries to run through the wall. And looks for a door in the wall. And complains loudly to all who will listen, or not listen, it is all the same to the complainer: “WHAT’S THIS WALL DOING IN MY LIFE???” And takes up alcohol and drugs to numb out about the ridiculous wall. And says in 10,000 ways, “I coulda had class. I coulda been a contender. I coulda been somebody, instead of a bum, which is what I am” if it hadn’t have been for that damn wall. When we wake up we say, “Oh. That’s a wall. NOW I see,” and wonder why it took so long. 12/21/2011
66. Lake Brandt Sunset Impressionistic Panorama, Greensboro, NC—If you see things like I do, you believe that we are working to achieve an environment that will allow us—all of us, every last one of us, worldwide, I’m talking—to play with our lives. What else is there? If we aren’t striving to be free enough of the pain and anguish and uncertainty of living to be able to play with our lives, what??? Well. Why put it off? Why not play right now with our lives, to the extent that is possible, as often as we can? Why wait? How long has it been since you played with your life? Played anywhere in your life? What has taking everything so seriously done for you? What has not allowing yourself the freedom to live lightly enabled you to do that you couldn’t have done living lightly? If you were going to do something playful, what would it be? See how playfully you can live in the next 24 hours. Your Christmas gift to me. No. To yourself! 12/21/2011
67. Cape Hatteras Sunrise Impressionistic Panorama 01, Cape Hatteras National Seashore, Ocracoke Island, NC—October 31, 2011 — The older we get, the fewer plates we can keep spinning, and the more often we are apt to wonder, “What’s with keeping plates spinning?” This business of questioning why spin plates as we age is one of the developmental tasks of life. Each phase, or period, or age of life has its tasks. We crawl, then walk. We grow teeth then we lose them. There are tasks of life appropriate to each age of living—and it is crucial that we complete them at the time of their doing. The problem is, particularly as we age, that we don’t want to do them. We want to stay forever young. So we neglect the tasks of the last stage of life, pretending things are not what they are. We opt for plastic surgery instead of wrinkles. The list is long. We cannot avoid the developmental tasks and live well. Each age has its walls. Waking up requires walls. We wake up at the bottom of some damn wall. It’s the way waking up works. If we are going to be as awake as we can be in the time left for living, we are going to have to hit all the walls. Another term for “wall” is “developmental task.” We have to do what is asked of us by our stage of life. But we don’t want to. Exactly. That’s what makes a wall a wall. A wall would never wake us up if we wanted to hit it. We have to do what we don’t want to do whether we want to or not. 12/22/2011
68. Across the Fence, Blue Ridge Parkway near Blowing Rock, NC—October 20, 2011 — We rarely ever marry the person we marry. We nearly always marry our idea of that person. As long as the person we marry is content to play the game, things go along but. If she, if he, begins to bring herself, himself, forth, things hit a snag. Then we have to divorce the other person or divorce our idea of the other person or settle for a lifetime of conflict over who the other person is going to be. The same setup goes, of course, for us in the eyes of the other person. This makes marriage a very tricky enterprise, guaranteed to challenge our idea of self and other at some point, and perhaps all the way. As it does so, marriage becomes a wall, waking us up by slamming us down, forcing us to consider there on our duff in the dirt all those down to earth (Where else would we ever spend time pondering them?) essential matters: who we are, what we are about, what is important, what is true and what is also true and what we are going to do about it. The questions of life. 12/23/2011
69. Urban Sunset, Charlotte, NC—December 23, 2011 — An iPhone photo—When we wake up, we see things as they are and as they also are which is how things really are. Once we see things as they really are, then we have to wake up to what truly needs to be done about it. It is one thing to see things as they are and another to see what to do about it. We wake up further when we find what we need to do what needs to be done. We wake up further when we do it and face the consequences, which creates another situation requiring us to see things as they are and as they also are, so we are forever waking up to this here, this now, what needs to be done about it and where we find what we need to do it. This is not easy. It is easier to be dead in one of the 10,000 ways to die and still be 98.6 and breathing with all our vital signs in place. So, why would anyone do it? There is no logical, rational, left-brained reason to wake up. It is a right-brain process that needs left-brain cooperation, collaboration. The left-brain has to trust the right-brain all the way. And trust is a right-brain thing. How things are and how things also are at the very heart of things. Living in and awake to the tension of polarities brings miracle into the mix and transforms all of life which we try to talk about with words like rebirth, deliverance, salvation, redemption, resurrection—which makes the work to wake up like the labor to be born. Why would anyone do that? Where would we be if we didn’t? 12/24/2011
70. The Oak Tree, Blue Ridge Parkway near Rocky Knob, VA—November 02, 2011 — See. Do. Be. That’s the formula for life. See what needs to be done in each situation as it arises. Do it. Be transformed by the work to put yourself aside in favor of what needs to be done, which means doing what YOU need to have done when YOU need it to be done and putting aside your dumb notion that YOU should come in last all the time! Seeing what needs to be done means seeing what YOU need to be done for YOU (Like taking a nap, for instance, or just going to the bath room). YOU are as important as any other aspect of your life. YOUR needs are equal to all other needs that are present in any moment. You are to put YOU on the table with all the rest as you walk around the table and consider what needs to be done in each situation as it arises. YOU are your Christmas gift to YOU and to the world. You decide how much for YOU and how much for THEM, giving YOU equal rights to what needs you to do it. 12/25/2011
71. Pylon Panorama, Four Mile Creek Greenway, Charlotte, NC—December 25, 2011 — We grow up, that is, get older, thinking things are the way we are told they are. We begin to grow up, that is, wake up and take up the path to true human being-hood, when we understand that things are not the way we were told they are—and do the on-going work of experimenting, exploring and experiencing how things actually are and what they are asking of us in the here-and-now of our living. “Oh! So THAT’s how things are!” is the fundamental ground of revelation, realization, enlightenment. “Oh! NOW I get it!” is the liturgical response of the people to the experience of their experience. We “get it” only to discover that “getting it” is just a step on the journey without end, and, laughing, look for what we have yet to see. 12/25/2011
72. Wetlands Sunrise Impressionistic Panorama, Four Mile Creek Greenway, Charlotte, NC—December 26, 2011 — We have an idea of who we are. Maybe we want to be that way and maybe we wish we weren’t that way but. Our idea of who we are is frozen in time and place, unchanging and unchangeable through all eternity. “That’s just who we are,” we say. “This is just the way I am.” Wait, wait, wait. Stop the cameras. Cut, cut. Take it again from the top. Our idea of us is the first thing to go. Or, to put it another way, nothing goes until it does. Nothing changes until it changes. We don’t grow one smidgen beyond where and who we are until we change the way we think about ourselves and give ourselves the freedom to live in ways we have declared to be off-limits. “Un-uh. That’s not me! I don’t ____ (fill in the blank)!” We have to let ourselves show us what we are capable of—show us who ALL we are. You know how old people are said to be “set in their ways”? It started when they were 25, or 15, or 5. If you are going to be conscious of anything, be conscious of your stiff, frozen, inflexible, rigid, unbending, unmoving places and get out of your way. Let you show you what you can do, who you can be. Surprise yourself with your range of motion. Become who you think you aren’t. See what you are capable of before you die. Amaze yourself. 12/26/2011
73. Wetlands Sunrise Impressionistic Panorama, Four Mile Creek Greenway, Charlotte, NC—December 26, 2011 — We dumb our way to smart. We get it by not getting it 10,000 times, and then we forget it and have to get it again. And we just want to be there. Sitting in the cat bird’s seat. Sitting on top of the world. Sitting on a rainbow. With the world on a string. We want to skip all of the hard parts, pass on the work, and go straight to bliss. Bring it on. Now. Please. It isn’t going to happen. There is only the work. The work of seeing, hearing, understanding, knowing, doing, being. That’s all there is. There is nothing beyond that to lust for. What would life be without the work of life? The work of right seeing, right hearing, right understanding, right knowing, right doing, right being? Without the work, you’re dead. Don’t die before you’re dead. Do the work of life in every moment for as long as you are alive. 12/27/2011
74. Little River, DuPont State Forest near Brevard, NC—October 14, 2011 — The Buddha died, it is said, from eating bad pork. Enlightenment doesn’t tell you everything. It just enables you to take everything in stride, bad pork and all. It enables you to play your position the way it needs to be played, no matter what. Keeps you from getting lost in mental anguish about the state of the world or your life. Keeps you present and accounted for, here and now, in order to live your life the way only you can live it for as long as life is possible. People keep looking for the advantages, thinking enlightenment is the path to glory. It’s the path to life. Life is the only advantage. Being alive has it all over being dead. Live to be alive in the time left for living—seeing things as they are and also are and doing what needs to be done about it. 12/27/2011
75. Geese at Sunrise, Four Mile Creek Greenway, Charlotte, NC—December 26, 2011 — Enlightenment gets you out of the way. Out of the way of the way. So that it is only you and the way—instead of you and your way. The way is not your way. This is what they are holding back from you, all those people who make quick bucks telling you what you want to hear: How to be happy and prosperous. How to get what you want. How to live the life of your dreams. How to have it made. “The Prayer of Jabez,” “The Secret,” and all books of this ilk are about you and your way and how to have it. Enlightenment stands in your path and asks unmistakably, “What are you doing on THIS path? THAT’s the path!” The Hero’s Journey requires us to give up THIS path in favor of THAT one. No wonder so many people talk about enlightenment and so few actually bother to be enlightened. 12/28/2011
76. Hawk’s Bill Sunset, Blue Ridge Parkway near Blowing Rock, NC—December 11, 2011 — We are to embrace our life—and all of life—as voluntary participants in “the circle of pain and fortune” that is the lot of all living things, all sentient beings. This is it, whatever your life has been and will be, that’s your life. What are you going to do? Not live it? Sit this one out? Wait for something more on the order of what you have in mind? You’re burning daylight here. Refusing to live by what light there is is to die before you’re dead. Why would you want to be dead? Ah, don’t tell me. “The Pain! The Pain!” Right. Pain is a pain, all right. And it is an individual call whether pain is a stopper, whether the pain is too great to go on. But I’m here to call you on, in spite of the pain, into what life there can be between now and the end of life. Live it! That’s what we do with life, we live it while we can, in what light there is, for as long as life is possible. And, in so doing we show what we’re made of. We bring forth what we have to offer as a blessing and grace before we are gone. Where would we be if we hadn’t come into each other’s life? Where would the world be if we opted to sit it out, holding ourselves aloof, waiting for something more our style? 12/28/2011
77. The Cabin, Blue Ridge Parkway near West Jefferson, NC—December 14, 2011 — Understanding is what WE understand, not what someone else explains to us. You can’t take the someone else out of the picture, but no one can give us understanding. Remember Algebra with it’s x’s and y’s, or Organic Chemistry with it’s balanced equations? We all sat in the same classroom and heard the same lecture, the same explanation, and some of us got it and some of us, like me, never did. The switch is in us. We click or we don’t. No one can give it to us. We have to get it ourselves. We can only know there is something to get, some shift to experience, something beyond what we currently understand to be the way it is, and wait for the shift to happen. Until the shift happens, we trust ourselves to the Quest, to the Search, to the Journey, to the Way, to Ourselves. We trust ourselves to the Knower within and wait to know what the Knower knows. We trust ourselves to the Company of those who receive us well, and treat us well, and tell us to trust ourselves to know what we need to know when we need to know it, and listen us to the truth of our own experience. Which is the ground of being. And wait for the shift to happen that is called “Enlightenment.” 12/29/2011
78. Price Lake, Julian Price Memorial Park, Blue Ridge Parkway near Blowing Rock, NC—December 11, 2011 — We are on our own. It is all up to us. We are OUR responsibility. AND. We cannot do it alone. We need a community of innocence with nothing at stake in us (We don’t teach their Sunday School classes, or sing in their choirs, or give 10% of our income to their budget, or give up our Wednesday evenings for their Fellowship Suppers), who can listen us to the truth of ourselves and encourage us in the work that is ours to do. AND we need to connect with the invisible community within for their guidance and support and the resources that are available to us there. BUT this does not mean using either community for our own ends, to get what we want and live the life we have in mind for ourselves. Our idea of our life is the first thing that has to go when we embrace what has to be embraced: Living from a “Thy will not mine be done” orientation. At that point, we open ourselves to the wisdom of both communities in finding and serving ends worthy of us, and collaborate with them in guiding our boat on its path through the sea. 12/30/2011
79. A “happy new year” reminds me of the phrase “one big happy family.” The happiness of the family is either a charade, a façade, or a hell-of-a-lot of work on the part of those who don’t mind doing their share of compromising, relenting and standing aside. Happy new years follow suit. Happy doesn’t just drop out of the sky, just land at our feet, just appear one day out of nowhere to thrill and delight. Happy is the result of authenticity, genuineness, compassion and compromise being worked out in the heat and grime of our lives. Happy is squaring ourselves up to the truth of how things are and how they also are and doing what can be done about the polarities within which we live—and making our peace with all of the things that cannot be done. Happy wrings us out and bleeds us dry. Happy is the satisfaction that comes with knowing we stood our ground with yet another manifestation of the Cyclops, facing what had to be faced, doing what needed to be done, and did not quit again. May your New Year bring forth exactly that kind of response to all of the situations you will encounter as a blessing and a grace upon all who can be blessed and graced by your presence, compassion, vulnerability and resilience. Amen! May it be so! 12/31/2011
80. Blue Ridge Vista 05, Blue Ridge Parkway near Asheville, NC—October 21, 2011 — Here’s my staple blessing for the New Year: May you see things as they are (which includes seeing things as they also are). May you be clear and correct about what needs to be done in each situation as it arises. And, may you have the courage to do it. Amen! May it be certainly so!
81. Pamlico Sunset, Pamlico Sound, Cape Hatteras National Seashore, Ocracoke Island, NC—October 31, 2011 — We don’t just hand ourselves over to the invisible world, we stand between worlds and work out the connections, the implications. We receive our identity, our calling, our destiny from the invisible world and work them out in the visible world of normal, apparent, reality. “Who we are,” says Jung, “is who we always have been and who we will be.” But. The visible world can bury us beneath its requirements and demands. We can become too easily one with the visible world, buy too thoroughly into its ideas of what is worth our time and what is not. We forget too quickly who we are and embrace too swiftly who we are not. We have to distance ourselves from both worlds in order to be the point of contact for each. We live our way into right relationship with the two worlds. The path is easily lost and easily found—it is always under our feet, requiring only eyes that see, ears that hear, a heart that understands, asking only that we wake up, square up, grow up, get up and do what needs to be done in each situation as it arises—what WE say needs to be done after listening carefully to all sides, ALL sides. We live the adventure of seeing, hearing, knowing, doing, being as those who are awake, aware, and alive. Amen! May it be so! 01/01/2012
82. Bass Lake 10, Blue Ridge Parkway near Blowing Rock, NC—October 06, 2011 — Listen to the Inner Other and see how it goes. That’s my best advice. Oh, and if it doesn’t go so well, listen to the Inner Other about what to do about that and see where it goes. Oh, and be sure the Inner Other you listen to is not you. Tricky. Interesting. Could be fun. See where it goes. 01/01/2012
83. The Beach House, Ocracoke Island, NC—November 01, 2011 — May we all be alert to moments of crucial importance when they come upon us! May we know what is before us and what is being asked of us and what the implications of acting, or failing to act, are! May we not be so lost in the concern for our own advantage that we miss the opportunity to serve a larger concern! May we sense the significance of each situation as it arises and rise to every occasion in bringing forth what we have to offer for the good that is the greatest good in that time and place no matter what! Amen! May it be so! 01/01/2012
84. The Woods at Springer’s Point, Cape Hatteras National Seashore, Ocracoke Island, NC—October 28, 2011 — We don’t have any moments to burn. There is no time to waste. We cannot be flip and casual with our life. Everything rides on how we handle this here, this now—and all the ones following. This doesn’t mean we can’t be playful. Playful is one of the most important things to be. It means we can’t be asleep. Awake is THE most important thing to be. To be awake is to respond to the situation as it arises in the way most appropriate to that situation. To be awake is to know what’s what and what now. We can’t blow off any moment, any situation, just because things aren’t going our way and we aren’t in the mood to be attentive to any needs other than our own. To be awake is to live beyond our mood of the moment. It is to rise to the occasion and offer what the moment needs us to give. In every moment. 01/02/2012
85. View From Grandfather Mountain 07, Grandfather Mountain State Park, Blue Ridge Parkway, near Linville, NC—October 13, 2011 — It is up to us to find the meaning in the flow of time—in the string of days—that add up to old age. Meaning doesn’t happen without our intentional participation in its production. It takes the determined pursuit of meaning, the willful engagement with meaning to live a meaningful life. Meaning and value—the two are the same—characterize the lives of those who know a good thing when they see one and do not pass it by, either because it is too much trouble, asks too much of them, or because they hope to find something better or just as good and a lot easier down the road. We seize meaning like Jacob seized the angel and do not let it go until we have received the blessing (and the limp). All meaningful lives pay a price for the experience of the wonder of meaning. Meaninglessness is free for the taking—not that we want it, but it is the only thing left those who let meaning go, who don’t have what it takes to hang on and enjoy the ride, who aren’t awake enough to know what’s what and what’s now. What’s what and what’s now where meaning is concerned is what matters, what’s important, what has true value. What’s now is throwing our arms around it, giving ourselves to it for better or worse as long as we both shall live—because we know there is no living without it, only the empty shell of a life that missed its chance at life when it had one. 01/03/2012
86. Silver Lake Dawn, Ocracoke Island, NC, Cape Hatteras National Seashore, October 26, 2011 — Your primary relationship—the one you must tend and serve, love and honor all your life long, maybe, who knows, not even parting at death—is with your calling, your work, the work that is yours to do, that only you can do, your genius, your gift, your life. How many so-called “life partners” last nearly that along? And, if they do, how much of your calling did you both have to deny in order to maintain what is really a secondary relationship—and has to be recognized as such if we are to have any hope of becoming the True Human Beings our calling might bring into existence? Our calling is the gift and the curse that brings us to life and asks us to die again and again in its service. Apart from it we are lost and alone I don’t care how married or bound to another we are. Apart from it, our life is a wasteland and we are wearing a mask that does not fit, pretending to be what we are not, pretending we aren’t pretending, living shadow lives. Our “life partner” must be a partner in the truest sense in the life that is ours alone to live—and we return the favor, supporting our partner in his, in her, quest to bring forth and serve his, her, gift in the world. We help one another birth ourselves to life in our lives. In marriage, we are mid-wives to each other. That is a marriage, a partnership, worthy of us! 01/04/2012
87. The Woods at Springer’s Point, Cape Hatteras National Seashore, Ocracoke Island, NC—October 28, 2011 — What’s different about us? Where are we changing, shifting, growing, developing? What can we do that we couldn’t do a year ago? Ten years ago? Where are we stuck, unchanging, frozen in time and place, continuing to respond to the same conditions in the same ways? Where is the movement in our life? Where are we coming forth, bringing ourselves forth, to meet our life, to express our gift, our genius in the here and now of our living? Where are we refusing to change, to grow, to shift, to move? Where are we embracing our stuckness because “That’s just the way I am”? Where are we as obsessed with achieving what is important to us as Voldemort was with achieving what was important to him—without exploring whether we are right about its value? Where do we see ourselves, hear ourselves, understand ourselves and ask, “How can we do this better?” What are we doing to change, grow, expand, deepen, enlarge, develop ourselves in response to our life and the gift we are asked to bring forth in our life? Hmmm? 01/04/2012
88. Springer’s Point Silhouette, Cape Hatteras National Seashore, Ocracoke Island, NC—October 28, 2011 – In doing what is ours to do we become who we are. Doing is the only path to being. 01/04/2012
89. The Woods at Springer’s Point, Cape Hatteras National Seashore, Ocracoke Island, NC—October 28, 2011 — Do the work, the work that is yours to do. Believe in the work. Be transformed by the work. This is the Revolution—the Revolution beyond all revolutions. This is a revolutionary as it gets. You cannot be more subversive, more of a dissident. Jesus and the Buddha, Gandhi and Lao Tzu… The list is long of true revolutionaries, True Human Beings, who did nothing to eliminate the suffering of their contemporary generation, but the work these people did transformed the world and led all who picked up their work by doing their own work to a better grasp of the world and their place in it. This is how it is to be with all of us. Do the work! May they say that about each of us when we have been gathered unto those who have gone before us. Amen! May it be so! 01/04/2012
90. Another Barn, Transylvania County near Brevard, NC—October 17, 2011 — The Zen path to happiness ever after is to let go what’s going and to let come what’s coming. If you can find a better one, walk it! 01/05/2011
91. October Colors, DuPont State Forest, Transylvania County near Brevard, NC—October 15, 2011 – When we wake up, we wake up to the reality of our gift, our work, our genius over time, over the course of our life. So THAT’s it! Who would have imagined it? The pearl of great price is the stone the builders reject. One way to spot what is ours to do is to pay attention to what interests us. What do we drift to? Where do we spend idle time? What do we do that isn’t required? What characterizes our way in the world? What do friends notice about us that may be invisible to us? What claims us and will not let us go? What keeps standing before us in a “Here I am and I’m not going away” kind of way? 01/05/2011
92. Blackberry Stem 01, Price Park, Greensboro, NC—November 11, 2011 — Being who we are requires us to be who we are not. Who we are is always beyond who we want to be, who we are comfortable being. We cannot grow without growing beyond ourselves, beyond our current configuration, into who we are not, through who we are not. We expand, deepen, enlarge ourselves by becoming more than we have been up to any point. Who we also are is who we are not. So. In determining what needs to be done in the situation as it arises, in determining what is ours to do and leave undone, we cannot fall back on “who we are.” Changing diapers may not be your thing, it may not float your boat or toast your bread or top your chart but. If the baby needs changing, you change the baby. If the dog throws up on the carpet, you clean up the mess. Everything goes on the table as we consider what is to be done. We don’t rule out any possibilities. We may have to pick ourselves up and do the unwanted thing, like it or not. 01/06/2012
93. Puckett Cabin, Blue Ridge Parkway near Rocky Knob, VA—November 02, 2011 — Our task is to grow up into the child we ought to be. And into the mother we ought to be. And into the father, And into all the roles of true-human-being-hood. A True Human Being gets the ratios right in each situation as it arises, coming forth to be exactly what is needed in the moment of living. But because the roles of true-human-being-hood are infinitely expansive we can only hope to approximate true-human-being-hood in any moment. We are never all grown up and resplendent in our Human-Being-Hood. We are always growing up into who we need to be here and now. The roles themselves are beyond us, expanding, deepening themselves as we approach approximation, so our work is never completed, finished. We cannot think we are ever grown up because we must always be growing up. There is no finished state to True-Human-Being-Hood. What is to be avoided is rigid compliance to an idea of how we ought to be in any moment. The moment calls us forth. We get out of the way! Each of us is to be all the roles a human being can be and work out for ourselves how much of what to be when. Life is art, play, a quest. 01/06/2012
94. Mossy Boulders, Great Smoky Mountains National Park, Greenbriar District, TN—November 07, 2011 — Part of the task before us is to find the magic in the scenes, in the moments, of our lives. Magic isn’t something we generate so much as something we uncover, discover, unearth, reveal. Eyes to see, see the magic that transforms the world and our place in it. We are never more than a perspective shift away from the wonder of being alive, even here, even now, in this old place, this old life. Who woulda though it? The trick is to see more than meets the eye, to see what meets the eye in different ways, to say more about it than is evident and obvious. What else is true, here, now? The Taoist approach is to find whatever can be found about the current situation that will lift us, buoy us, along to the next situation. Stop looking at wherever you are, at whatever you face, as a dead end. Everything is a step on the way to something else. You are just along for the ride. So. Enjoy what can be enjoyed about it and see where it goes! 01/07/2012
95. The Woods of Rock Castle Gorge (05), Blue Ridge Parkway near Tuggle Gap, VA—December 02, 2011 — With apologies to Immanuel Kant, my version of the Categorical Imperative (because it is a must beyond all categories, moral or rational) is this: Wake up! Grow up! Face up! Square up to the way things are and also are and what needs to be done about it. Stand up and do it! Repeat the process in each situation as it arises. All there is to it. 01/07/2012
96. Hanging Rock Vista, Hanging Rock State Park near Danbury, NC—October 03, 2011 — Which would we choose? “I will love you forever!” Or “I will treat you lovingly forever, regardless of how I feel about you.” 01/08/2012
97. Fall Colors, Price Lake, Blue Ridge Parkway near Blowing Rock, NC—October 17, 2011 — We all need what we can give ourselves. We are new-born babies at every stage of our lives, hoping someone will pick us up, keep us safe, love us as we need to be loved, surround us with all the resources required to face what must be faced and do what must be done in each stage of our lives. We are the ones! We parent ourselves, nurture and nourish ourselves, and bring ourselves forth to meet the day. Every day. It’s all up to us and we cannot do it alone. We need someone to remind us it’s all up to us. 01/08/2012
98. Rake’s Mill Pond, Blue Ridge Parkway near Floyd, VA—December 02, 2011 — We look for it everywhere, maybe this, maybe that, over here, over there, and not finding it, become frustrated, then angry, then despondent, then irreconcilable, empty, hopeless, dispassionate, cruel—perhaps only cruel to ourselves, but cruelty becomes our primary characteristic, evidenced in the life-denying, denouncing, way we live: carelessly, recklessly, excessively—and why not? What difference does it make how we live? Who cares? Not us. We quit caring years ago, when it became apparent to us that it doesn’t matter what we do, so why try? We give up because we know it doesn’t exist, life as we think it ought to be. We give up in protest because life as it is is not worth having. If this is the best we can hope for the joke is on us and we aren’t laughing. We’ll opt for making ourselves numb until we die. Anybody who tries to talk us out of it is a fool to think we’ll change our minds and live on any terms other than our own. Changing our minds is another term for shifting our perspective, for seeing things differently, for waking up, for growing up, for facing up to the truth of how things are AND HOW THEY ALSO ARE and what can be done about it (WHAT ALL CAN BE DONE ABOUT IT), for standing up and doing what needs to be done in each situation as it arises all our life long no matter what. Being alive hinges on being able to change our minds. 01/09/2012
99. Remnant, Stone Mountain State Park near Roaring Gap, NC—November 04, 2011 — Life all around us spends most of its time waiting and very little of its time acting. Waiting for the right time to act. We spend most of our time acting and very little of our time waiting. Wondering why things don’t go more our way. We act with no inkling of the rightness or wrongness of the time of our acting. We invented the term “knee jerk reaction.” And the term “impulse buying.” And the term “shooting from the hip.” Which came along just before “shooting ourselves in the foot.” Nature waits, watching us ricochet through our lives like nuclear powered ping pong balls thinking we will get it eventually, which is what we are thinking, going after it on full throttle all the time.  01/20/2012
100. Rock Castle Creek, Blue Ridge Parkway near Tuggle Gap, VA—December 02, 2011 — Our moods are not necessarily our own. If we find ourselves gripped in a mood arising “out of nowhere for no reason,” we might ascribe its origin to “a source of ancestral nature” and feel it while living around it. We do not know all there is to know. We do not know half of all there is to know. The entire invisible world is, well, invisible. Unconscious. Not Known. We do not know what it is capable of, what it suffers from, what its needs are, how we might help or hinder its operation. It’s a safe bet to assume that it is as much of, if not more of, a mess as the visible world of normal, apparent reality. It is also a safe bet to assume that our ancestors have experienced horrors we cannot imagine. Emotion must be felt, made conscious, witnessed, acknowledged in order to be assimilated, integrated, reconciled. We bear the emotional weight of the species and help the unconscious, invisible world work through its pain. Interesting theory, you’ll have to admit. Whether it is anywhere near accurate is a shot in the, well, dark. But how can it hurt to live as though it is? To think that the pain of the species is working its way out in us—that the invisible world is becoming conscious of its pain through us—as though we need more pain to deal with but. To divvy up the pain into “mine” and “theirs” makes it more bearable, more doable. Give it a shot and see if you don’t think it’s so. 01/11/2012
101. Leaves on the Water, Bog Garden, Greensboro, NC—November 22, 2011 — If you are going to listen to yourself, you are going to have to create listening room. You can’t listen at full throttle, careening through your life, bouncing from one thing to another, volume on high. You have to be still. And quiet. Two things our life will not allow. When sitting, just sit. When listening, just listen. When sitting and listening, just sit and listen. Prayer is thinking and listening to your thoughts. Prayer changes things when you hear what you are saying and adjust your living accordingly. Meditation and prayer are great aids to “hearing yourself think” but. You have to listen. When you are under a great deal of stress, listening is the first thing that goes. Then we’re living blind, deaf. Not seeing, not hearing, not knowing what to do next. And so. The routine. Establish a routine. Make a space in your day, or several spaces, for sitting and listening. And sit. And listen. Regularly. If writing helps you listen, as it does me, then write. If playing the drums helps you quiet down and listen, then play the drums. Design your own space for listening to yourself and go there often. 01/12/2012
102. Forest Lawn, Greensboro, NC—January 11, 2012 — No borders, no walls. That’s the essence of the Promised Land. The Chinese can take over Tibet but they can’t touch the heart of Buddhism. When truth is attacked, truth just becomes invisible, goes underground, shifts shape and lives on without borders or walls. When you have borders and walls you have a standing army and police on patrol, weapons at the ready. Truth asks us to die again and again—to relinquish our old life—in order to live, to embrace New Life—but. It doesn’t kill anyone. “Making disciples of all nations,” as in compelling their compliance whether they are ready or not, is ridiculous. Truth waits for readiness. We all wake up against our will but. No one can be forced to wake up against their will. Truth waits us out. And if we die first? Oh well. No boundaries, no walls calls for communities of innocence—innocent in the sense of having nothing at stake—to form as needed and disperse. Communities of innocence have no paid clergy, no buildings, no parking lots, no doctrine or dogma, no boundaries, no walls. They serve truth with compassion and grace. Communities of innocence enable us to hear the truth of our life, to know how things are and also are and what to do about it. Communities of innocence enable us to know what we need to know do do what needs to be done without telling us anything. Just listening. All it takes is honest conversation straight from the heart in good faith. Why is this hard? 01/12/2012
103. View from Pilot Mountain, Pilot Mountain State Park, NC—November 04, 2011 — The Bringer of Fire does not bring anything new to anyone but, announcing, unveils what is already there, smoldering, awaiting the word of release, of recognition, to resonate and ignite what has been praying to brightly burn. In the beginning was the Word but. The Word was a mere invitation meeting readiness, uniting to engulf the great all-ness in creative flame. Here, in these little paragraphs, I hope to play the Angel to your Virgin Mary, stirring something that is already in place for you to bring forth for the salvation—the awakening—of the world, which you do, of course, by being awake yourself to the wonder of you. And if you are already beginning to turn away and shut me out, it is only fair of me to ask, “Whose side are you on?” 01/13/2012
104. The Woods at Stone Mountain, Stone Mountain State Park near Roaring Gap, NC—November 04, 2011 — We are here to serve the Source. Forget what do you want to be when you grow up. It isn’t about what you want. Rich. Powerful. Happy. Famous. It’s all forgotten in the grip of what Joesph Campbell calls “the Mythic Vision.” The Mythic Vision is your sense of what the Source needs of you. Your experience of the Source’s need might come on you like falling in love. You may see a book title on some esoteric aspect of mathematics and be smitten, never to recover. You don’t find what needs you. It finds you. Your task is to not dismiss the white rabbit when it winks at you and says something on the order of “How about me, Honey?” We keep tossing aside the life, the path, with our name on it in favor of the life, the path, we have in mind for ourselves. Turning away from the Mythic Vision, we enter a Void of our own making. Serving the Mythic Vision puts us squarely in the center of the Hero’s Journey, with all it’s wonders and terrors. There is no Life like that one! 01/14/2012
105. Colors of Fall Abstract, Bog Garden, Greensboro, NC—December 04, 2011 — When we speak of our experience with the Source, our words fall under the category of “You have to know what I’m talking about in order to understand what I’m saying.” We cannot talk about an experience to those who do not share the experience and hope for anything more than blank expressions or eye rolls and “Oh, no! Here we go again!” So we talk in order to find the people who can hear what we have to say and reply with words that are music to our ears. Know what I mean? 01/14/2012
106. Four Mile Creek Wetlands, Four Mile Creek Greenway, Charlotte, NC—December 25 2011 — We sustain and encourage one another for the task at hand: Bringing ourselves forth, seeing things as they are and also are, being clear and correct about what needs to be done in the situation as it arises, and doing it no matter what. The no matter what part is the stopper. It’s easier to follow a worn path than to make your own. Life, in the deepest, richest sense of the word, calls us to do what’s hard—no matter what. On our own, we don’t have a chance. We need the right kind of company—the right kind of people—on our side, those who are more on our side than we are, to wake us up to what we are doing and ask us, “Whose side are you on?”—getting us back into the work of blazing our own trail back to the Source by being aligned with that which is deepest and best and truest about us in every moment. 01/15/2012
107. Spanning the Gorge, New River Gorge National River near Fayetteville, WV—September 24, 2011 — Want to beat aging? Be alive! Want to be alive? Do the work! The work that is yours to do. The work that is ours to do requires us to do it within the constraints and limitations, the terms and conditions of our life. As we get older, those terms and conditions change, become to some degree more restrictive, confining, yet the work remains the same. The work calls us forth, brings us out, unfolds us in increasingly surprising, amazing, astounding, bumfuzzling and confounding ways. The work is the Fountain of Youth—youth properly understood as vibrant, pulsating with life, eager to leap into the day every day to discover what the day holds and what we will do with it like gifts on Christmas morning. What does the work offer to us and ask of us today? How shall we serve the Source today, an a “Thy will not mine be done” kind of way? Where will our life take us today? Align yourself with the Source and see where it goes. It will be the ride of a lifetime, and perhaps—who knows—beyond. 01/15/2012
108. View from the Barn, Tannenbaum Historic Park, Joseph and Sarah Hoskins’ Farm, Greensboro, NC—January 15, 2012 — To be alive we have to be interested in what we are doing. What we are doing has to be alive for us. We have to believe in our life—in the way we go about life, who we are, what we are about. We have to exhibit, express, our deepest beliefs, our highest values. The way we live has to be an authentic demonstration of what is important to us, of what matters most to us. “Don’t preach it, brother/sister! LIVE it!” We get caught up in the cultural obsession with having something to show for our effort—in having to see results, garner a payoff—and think “So what? Who cares? Why try? What difference does it make?” about the things that have value to us when they don’t accrue fortune and glory. And so, the test. Will we believe in what we believe in, exhibiting the values that have value to us, anyway, nevertheless, even so? Because that is where the life is for us and that’s all the payoff we need? 01/16/2012
109. South Shore, Lake Louise, Banff National Park, Alberta—September, 2003 — There are things that are important, whether or not they are important to us. Compassion, for instance. Grace, Mercy, Peace. Justice, Kindness, Generosity, Gentleness, Tenderness, Authenticity, Genuineness, Joy, Patience… The list is long. These things don’t have to matter to us to matter. They are always in season. They don’t wait for us to feel like doing them to do them. These things comprise the center, the ground of being and life. They are the North Star of the spiritual journey, always there to orient, direct, enable us to find our bearings and bring ourselves back to the important matters. When we live in the service of the core values of the species, we place ourselves on the beam and serve the good while we wait for our personal sense of destiny and purpose to be restored. Life’s blows can disorient us, traumatize us and rob us of any sense of meaning and purpose. When that happens, the core values remain viable and vital—a life support system in the interim while we reorient ourselves and find our way back to who we are and what we are about. “Do justice, love kindness…” “Whatever is true, whatever is noble, whatever is right, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely, whatever is admirable—if anything is excellent or worthy of praise…” Live to serve these things and they will get you back to the place of serving the things that are your things in particular to serve. 01/16/2012
110. Urban Sunset, Old Ardrey Kell Road, Charlotte, NC—January 13, 2012 — All of my problems are imaginary. I make them up in anticipation of the real thing. I can’t wait. I am so eager for the Impossible Predicament, the End of the Line, the Dead End Dilemma that I hurry it up just to be able to stand transfixed, immobilized. It’s great. Scaring myself is what I do best. Inventing monsters when the real ones are on maternity leave. Gives me something to do. It is much better to sit and fret than to just sit. So I conjure up the dread du jour and cook it to perfection. I know it’s only a matter of time until the Shoe Falls. The suspense is killing me. So I hurry it up. It falls in my mind in differently chilling and increasingly morbid ways. I’m sure it’s a Dollar trait. Dollar, by the way, is from the Scottish word “dolour,” meaning sadness, grief, gloom, misery. I am proud to maintain my ancestral heritage, looking for better things to worry about than the course, common stuff that litters my life. If you ever get bored with your lot, let me know. I have monsters to share. Good ones. They will keep you awake nights. My pledge to you. 01/17/2012
111. North Shore, Lake Louise, Banff National Park, Alberta—September 2006 — We can wake up but. We can’t wake ourselves up. We can’t help being awake or asleep but. We can recognize our helplessness. We can only be as awake as we are. Seeing what we can see in this moment leads us to seeing what we can see in the next moment. There is no seeing all there is to see in any moment. There is no seeing as a general state of being. Just seeing this, here, now. There is more to any moment than meets the eye. Any eye. See as much of the moment as you can see. Hear as much as you can hear. Perceive as much as you can perceive. Do as much of what truly needs to be done as you can see needs doing. No one can do more or ask you to do more. 01/17/2012
112. Upper Falls, Hanging Rock State Park near Danbury, NC—January 16, 2012 — Energy and enthusiasm for the tasks at hand are functions of our affinity with the tasks, of the degree of our resonation with the tasks, of the depth of our belief in the value of the tasks. We can stand at a copy machine, copying someone else’s documents, with energy and enthusiasm, only so long. Comes a point they can’t pay you enough to run one more copy or free one more paper jam. You can feel like doing something that doesn’t exhibit and express who you are only so long. You can do something you don’t feel like doing only so long. When your heart isn’t in your life—your life, the life that is your life to live, isn’t your life, isn’t in the life you are living—and your task then becomes getting your heart and the life that is your life to live together with your life. This is a problem for a very large majority of human beings. We are living lives that do not belong to us. We are running someone else’s copies, pretending things are just fine. It’s time to dust off that soul mirror and stand before it and have a heart-to-heart talk with our heart. There is life to be lived yet, in the time left for living. 01/18/2012
113. Hanging Rock Vista 03, Hanging Rock State Park near Danbury, NC—November 03, 2011 — I have one sermon: In every moment, in each situation as it arises, look around. See as much of how things are and also are as you are capable of seeing. See as much of what to do about it, how to respond to it, as you are capable of seeing. Do it. Repeat this process throughout all of the moments and situations of your life for as long as life is possible. Amen. May it be so! 01/19/2012
114. Puckett Cabin, Blue Ridge Parkway near Tuggle Gap, VA—November 03, 2011 — Joseph Campbell says, “Everything that comes, goes.” He also says, “What remains when all is lost?” I say, if you know what remains when all is lost, you have it made. Now, look. Life is about coming and going. We make a big deal about both. A birth. A wedding. A death. A divorce. We worry about getting old and losing all our faculties. Our sight goes, our hearing goes, our teeth go, our mind goes. We agonize over all that “downsizing.” What remains when all is lost? Our destiny remains, for one thing. Our calling is still intact. We are to bring forth our gift in every circumstance and condition of life. We. Are. To. Be. Who. We. Are. No matter what. Wherever and however we are, we are to be ourselves, us, me, you. WE remain US, OURSELVES, when all is lost. The inexhaustible Source remains constant, always there, always with us, when all is lost. We have who we are, our calling, and the Source. That’s a Holy Trinity if there ever was one! What are we worried about? That isn’t going away! We can always do what is ours to do wherever we are, however we are, whenever we are. HA! 01/19/2012
115. Dirt Road, Pilot Mountain State Park, Yadkin River Section, Bean Shoals Access, near Pinnacle, NC—January 18, 2012 — If we are wrapped up in, embracing and embraced by, the calling, the work, we can do anything, rise to any occasion, meet any obstacle. Then “one book opens another,” and every choice is charmed, and all roads lead home. But.  We cannot take up the call, the work, in order to be protected. Our heart has to be in the call, the work. We cannot take up the call, do the work, with one eye on what’s in it for us. Sin is the profit motive. Just try to be rid of it. Just try saying, “Thy will not mine be done” without thinking of the advantages that will accrue when we do “Thy will.” Only a good faith journey in service of the journey, of the call, the work, will protect those on the journey. Just try living in good faith exploiting good faith! PS: Being protected on the journey doesn’t mean bad things won’t happen to you. “It rains on the just and unjust alike.” It means you have what it takes to do what needs to be done in dealing with the things you don’t like. You find help with the things you need help with, on the journey. 01/20/2012
116. The Bison—a Panorama, Hayden Valley, Yellowstone National Park, WY—It is easy to talk ourselves into standing at the copy machine copying someone else’s documents all our life long. It is hard to talk ourselves into living our own life, bringing up from the inexhaustible source what needs to come forth, here and now. Standing at the copy machine is safe, secure, comfortable. We know how to do that. Living our own life is anxiety producing: The Unknown! Living life for someone else, the company, our parents, is well-structured and carefully spelled out. We have to work out our own life always. Living our own life requires us to work it out amid the details, the duties and responsibilities of the life we have lived up to this point. We hate working it out! We just want to be left alone to enjoy our life. Our responsibilities clash with our responsibilities! Damn it all! Lao Tzu is said to have said “To hell with it,” or words to that effect, and walked off into the forest. We all know the feeling. There is always something else to be worked out. We have to square ourselves up with this and this up with that. Juggling, dancing, forever. If we can add “laughing” to the list, we have it made. Can we work it out, juggling, dancing AND laughing? The test of true-human-being-hood! The holy fools are those who work it out laughing. They let come what’s coming and let go what’s going, laughing. When we laugh, we dance differently, we juggle with our heart in it. We are no longer resisting, we are just doing it in a way that is not-doing anything. 01/20/2012
117. The Tree by the Side of the Road, Rural Virginia—January 20, 2012 — The toughest thing about photography is giving your eye something to see. You can’t take your eye somewhere without going with it. And a quiet day reading by the fire with a cup of coffee is out of the question. You want to do this and you want to do that. That conflicts with this. What are you going to do? Enlist the agony! Bear the pain! The only people who live pain free lives immune to agony are dead. They may be upright, intact, 98.6 and breathing, but they have been dead for years past counting. If you are going to be alive, you have to live with the pain and agony—the reality—of this negating that. Mutually exclusive wants, wishes, options, choices and desires characterize being alive. You get this by giving up that. You get that by handing over this. Trade-offs are the price of being alive. When you are damned if you do and damned if you don’t, be damned and be done with it. Make a choice. Decide. Get the camera and give your eye something to see. Or sit with the book and read. It’s your life, live it—and bear the pain of being alive! 01/21/2012
118. Black Birch, Rocky Knob, Blue Ridge Parkway near Tuggle Gap, VA—January 20, 2011 — People kill themselves to avoid bearing the pain of life. “Life is suffering” is one of the foundational realizations of Buddhism and of life—of being alive. Life is lived on life’s terms. Those who cannot accept life’s terms turn away, numb themselves to the truth of existence with drugs and alcohol, distract themselves with the 10,000 diversions, or sit facing the wall moaning, “Poor me, poor me.” Some people can’t take it. Can’t pay the price of being alive. Can’t live on life’s terms. They reject “the deal.” Demand a better one. But. This. Is. It. We can always imagine a better world than the one we live in. We don’t get the world of our dreams. We get this world, just as it is. We live here, now, or not at all. Takes courage. Takes concession. Takes accommodation. Takes acquiescence. Takes waking up. Growing up. Facing up. Squaring up to the truth of how things are and how they also are, and of what needs to be done in response, and doing it, no matter what. Standing up and doing it. Bearing the pain. Being willing to be alive anyway, nevertheless, even so. Let’s do it. What do you say? 01/21/2012
119. Appalachian Still Life, Blue Ridge Parkway near Rocky Knolb, VA—January 20, 2012 — Coleman Barks tells a story about his granddaughter’s soft ball team’s lopsided loss to their cross-town rivals. The winning team gathered outside their dugout chanting, “We Won! We Won! We Won!” His granddaughter’s team spontaneously started a chant in front of their dugout: “We Lost! We Lost! We Lost!” You can’t beat that for how it needs to be. That is the Buddhist concept of joyful participation in the suffering of the world. Somebody wins and somebody loses. That’s how it is and it’s just fine. When we see suffering and pain, not as the end of all hope and meaning, but as the threshold to the reconciliation of ourselves with how things are and also are—to the integration and oneness of ourselves with all things—the shift happens and we say “Yes!” to life as it is, embracing the wonder of it all, and continue the journey to ourselves, the Source, Home. Fran Tarkenton, the pro football quarterback with the Vikings and Giants, talked about missing everything about football when he retired—the wins and the losses, the touchdowns and the sacks, playing in the rain and mud, snow and broiling sun. That’s it. We are alive. We win and we lose. It comes and it goes. And it is a completely wonderful, unbelievable, unimaginable experience. We will miss it so much when it’s gone—or would if we weren’t dead—that it behooves us completely to embrace it fully and live it with our eyes and hearts wide open, joyfully participating in the sorrows and the triumphs of life in this world. 01/21/2012
120. Mabry Mill, Blue Ridge Parkway near Meadows of Dan, VA—January 20, 2012 — YOU do it! YOU are the one! YOU are the only one who can—who can do it the way YOU can do it. Your life, of course, that is. No one can do it like you can, or has any business trying, or has any business telling you how to do it. Our place is to get out of your way and cheer you on, trusting you to do what you see needs to be done as it needs to be done according to your own sense of what needs what you have to offer. The thing to bear in mind—the guiding principle, so to speak—is that as you do what needs to be done, you aren’t trying to do anything with it. I was walking slowly along a Charlotte Greenway with my camera when who turned out to be a sure enough make a living at it photographer walks by with his girlfriend, stops and asks me, “Who are you working for?” like I was on assignment from National Geographic. I asked him, “Who are you walking for?” The three of us laughed and enjoyed a conversation that got me to a place where something caught my eye. This is the attitude we take when we do what needs to be done. We walk for ourselves. We take pictures for ourselves. We do what needs to be done because it needs to be done—NOT to do something with it, turn it to our advantage, exploit it, profit from it. We are not here to make a profit. What are you going to do with a profit that would be better than doing what needs to be done in the situation as it arises as only you can do it? Hmmm? 01/22/2012
121. Sidna Allen House, Hwy 52 near Hillsville, VA—January 20, 2011 — This from the Virginia is for Lovers travel guide: “This capricious, if provincial, expression of the Queen Anne style was briefly the home of the notorious Sidna Allen. Allen was member of the so-called Allen Gang involved in the Carroll County Courthouse shooting in 1912. The house, finished the year before the shooting, was designed by Allen and his wife. It was built by Preston Dickens, a local carpenter, with Allen assisting. Allen dreamed of the finest house in Carroll County, and the house was his dream come true until confiscated by the state after his conviction for the courthouse incident.” What that says to me is that you have to know what is important. That’s your primary responsibility. You have to be able to tell a white rabbit from a wild goose—and you can’t pursue a wild goose past the point of recognition. If you set your jaw and pursue your way come hell or high water, you better be right about your way being the right way. Good judgment is your only guide. 01/22/2012
122. The Farm House, Rural Virginia near Hillsville—January 20, 2012 — If you do what truly needs to be done, you will be surprised—perhaps shocked or appalled—at what you find yourself doing. You can’t approach your life with fixed ideas about what you should do or not do, about how life should be lived. The more fixed your ideas, the less alive you can be. Life is fluid, moving, sometimes like this and sometimes like that. Always “like the wind that blows where it will.” You will probably not be able to defend, justify, explain or excuse what you do. The left brain won’t know what the right brain is doing. 01/22/2012
123. Midnight Hole, Big Creek Campground, Great Smoky Mountains National Park, along the TN/NC border—Our rituals seal us off or open us up, depending on how conscious we are of the rituals, of whether we see through them or hide out in them. Singing the Doxology or repeating the Apostles’ Creed, making coffee or watching the fire in the fireplace, can open us to the moment of our experience or close us all from all moments, from all experience. OM can be just another way of avoiding the pain of being alive or enable us to transcend the pain with compassion and grace for our circumstances and all those with us in this here, this now. It’s a question of how awake we are and how awake we are willing to be. Seeing means seeing everything as it is and as it also is. Our rituals remind us to see, and seeking, look beyond what is apparent to what is also true. Grace before meals can connect us with all those who are responsible for, who had a part in, getting this meal to this table—including the plants and the animals that were sacrificed in our behalf. It is a humble experience to thank all—the Great Allness—for our life, to realize how dependent we are upon all that contributes to our living and keeps us alive. And for what? What are we doing with the life that so many, so much, contributes to? In this way, the ritual of grace becomes a point of meditation, opening us to depths beyond the apparent reality of this hamburger and these fries in the worst hamburger joint on the eastern seaboard. There is always more to see than meets the eye. See what you can in every moment. 01/23/2012
124. Bass Lake Reflections, Moses H. Cone Memorial Park, Blue Ridge Parkway near Blowing Rock, NC—Joseph Campbell quotes the Bhagavad Gita as saying, “Get in there and do your thing! Don’t worry about the outcome!” That’s quite different from what a lot of us heard growing up, “Keep your nose clean and to the grindstone, believe in God and say your prayers, do your part and God will take care of you (through every day, o’er all the way) and it will all turn out well for you in the end.” Most of us didn’t hear anything about doing our thing. We heard a lot about doing God’s will, but that was far removed from our thing. We were sinful, you know, and our thing was a bad thing. We were misled. We need to unlearn most of what we have been told is true, and learn how to know our thing when we see it and how to throw ourselves into doing it, not worrying about the outcome. That’s my wish for us all! 01/23/2012
125. Totem Dawn, Monument Valley Navajo Tribal Park, NM/AZ —  Another aspect of the Bhagavad Gita paraphrase by Joseph Campbell, “Get in there and do your thing! Don’t worry about the outcome!” is the “Get in there” part. “Get in there into your life just as it is! Don’t be holding yourself back, waiting for a better life, the life of your dreams, perhaps, life as it ought to be. Get in there now! Don’t hold ANYTHING back! Step right into this ‘vale of tears,’ into the suffering and pain, into the uncertainty, the fear, the anguish, and bring yourself forth there, here, now, doing your thing as only you can do it, as you were born to do it, to hell with the outcome. Bring yourself forth as the Virgin brought forth the Christ Child, into the squalor of the manger and the terrible instability of Roman occupation, and the inability of the religious leaders and political authorities and even the masses of the people to receive with understanding what he had to say. It’s always that way with those who have the courage to be the next incarnation of the Christ within. Just another manifestation of the Cyclops waiting to bring out the hero in all of us. So get in there and do it!” 01/23/2012
126. Virginia Landscape, Hwy 52 between Fancy Gap and Hillsville—January 20, 2012 — Edward Hicks painted over a hundred versions of “The Peaceable Kingdom” between 1820 and his death in in 1849. That’s having to get it right—having to do it well. This is the primary distinction between the artist in both the practical arts and the fine arts and those who aspire to be artists by doodling around, owning all the props and wearing the costume. A plumber is as much an artist in what he does as the painter or the poet is in what she does. What makes them both artists is the drive to do it well. My wife has never taken a landscape photograph in her life, but she has landscaped beautifully and well the yards of every house we’ve lived in. It’s where your gift lies. Everyone is an artist who knows what gift she, he, has been given and lives to serve that gift, to bring it forth and do it well according to his or her own sense of perfection, no matter what the critics say—and the critics there be many whether they get paid to write reviews or snicker about your flowerbed as they walk down the street. What do you have to do well? Who says when it’s done well? Joseph Campbell said, “If you can do something you love to do without fear of criticism, you will move. You will feel the joy in it. You don’t have to move more than an inch to feel the joy. Remember, the Buddha’s third temptation was duty, doing what people expect you to do. That’s the censorship fear.” Live your art, express your gift, do your work—and do it well, according to your own sense of completion. 01/24/2012
127. North Carolina Wetlands, Guilford County near Summerfield, NC—January 15, 2012 — In order to wake up we have to bear the pain, the discomfort, the uncertainty of waking up. Waking up requires us to leave the fixed ideas—the things our Mama told us, or the Preacher told us, or the Bible told us, etc.—behind and begin trusting our own judgment based on our own experience and our own intuitive, instinctive, sense of what needs to be done in each situation as it arises. The transition between always knowing what to do because somebody told you to do it and why would they lie and deciding what to do even though there is no way of knowing for sure if that is the right thing to do but you are going to take a chance and be responsible for dealing with the outcome no matter what it turns out to be—this is a terrible place to be, emotionally, psychologically. This is growing up, leaving home, waking up to our own sense of how things are and how they also are and what needs to be done about it. It is much easier to follow orders, to go where we are led, to do what we are told. We get the shakes and the 2AM terrors when we take our life in our own hands and live it as we think it needs to be lived. Another of the 10,000 manifestations of the Cyclops blocking our way, saying to us, “If you want to wake up, grow up and be alive, you’re gonna have to come through me,” grinning. 01/25/2012
128. Wetlands Sunrise Panorama, Four Mile Creek Greenway, Charlotte, NC—December 26, 2011 — The moment does not last or return. This is the foundational lesson of photography and of Harry Chapin’s “Cat’s in the Cradle.” Don’t be throwing away any moments. Treasure each one. Do with it what needs to be done with it. It is a pearl of great price—and the stone tossed aside by the builders. So, which is it? It’s your moment. Which do you say it is? 01/25/2012
129. Wetlands Sunrise Panorama, Four Mile Creek Greenway, Charlotte, NC—December 26, 2011 — We—that is the “I Want, I Fear, I Lothe,” side of us—have to disappear in order that we—that is who we are called to become, the True Human Being, the Christ, the Buddha, within—might come forth into the world of normal, apparent, reality. We disappear and come forth into the moment of our living when we see the moment as a meditation point and allow it to open us to the truth of how things are and how things also are. Our life is not the arena where we amass what we want and avoid what we don’t want, but the matrix within which we are born and grow into who we are. The goal of the spiritual journey is our emergence into our self. Our self is the pearl of great price and the stone the builders reject. So is the moment of our living. We have to see our self and the moment for what they are and for what they also are, and consciously move from the wanting-fearing-loathing me to the trusting-gracious-compassionate me in an “It is no longer I who live but the Christ who lives in me” kind of way. We do this by allowing the moment to show us who we are and who we also are and let go what is going and let come what is coming—in a “The old has passed away, behold the new has come,” and “I must decrease (so that I might) increase” kind of way. It’s all laid out there in the holy writ of all religions. Only takes seeing to know it is so. 01/26/2012
130. Revolution Mill, Greensboro, NC—January 26, 2012 — People don’t want to do the work. They want to read about the work, listen to lectures about the work, watch interviews of people who are doing the work, but they don’t want to do it themselves. You. Have. To. Do. The. Work. Waking up. Growing up. Facing up. Squaring up. Standing up. And doing what needs to be done—what needs you to do it—in each situation as it arises. People just want to feel better about their lives, their lot, their place in the world. They don’t want to do the work required to get better. To have a life. To be alive. They just want to have it made and be happy. Don’t let me be talking about you. 01/26/2012
131. Textile Mill Ruins 01, Franklinville, NC, Built in the 1930’s, closed down in the 1970’s, burned in 2010 — January 25, 2012 — Think of the work as running consciously, intentionally, with full awareness into an unmovable wall. It is impossible. It cannot be done. The work of being a True Human Being. Ridiculous. Whose idea is this? The Wall is what we encounter when we take what we have to do, what has to be done, what is ours to do (ending poverty, feeding the hungry, preaching the gospel—some gospel, any gospel—paying the bills, etc.), in one hand and what we have to do it with (the nature and circumstances of the life we are born into including our genetic makeup, call it our fate) in the other hand and try to get them together. In each of us, our fate (what we have to work with) meets our destiny (what we have to do). In that equation, our perspective, outlook, attitude, courage, spirit makes all the difference. Our Moxie hits The Wall. How much can we take? How long can we keep up our spirit for the work, our Moxie for the Wall? How soon do we have to have results before we say to hell with it and see how much beer we can drink before we die? Two things keep us going. The title of a Paul Watzlawick book, “The Situation Is Hopeless But Not Serious” is one key to keeping at it. We are losing but what do we have to lose? The other is the splendid company of those with us who also understand the nature of what we are about and wink at us from time to time as if to say, “Let’s go show that Wall a thing or two!” 01/27/2012
132. Light on Grandfather Mountain, Price Lake, Julian Price Memorial Park, Blue Ridge Parkway near Blowing Rock, NC—December 12, 2011 — We are stuck with the problem of having to interpret our experience correctly in order to incorporate it properly and respond to it well. The meaning we assign to things determines the way we live with things. It all comes down to eyes that see, ears that hear, and a heart that understands. When we flub up the basic tasks of seeing, hearing and understanding, things go downhill fast. Here’s a hint for you: It is all metaphorical. Here’s another: Everything is a starting point for meditation. Sleeping Beauty, Rapunzel, and Cinderella can be read as the process of a young woman’s maturation into the strength of her own womanhood and tackling life as a fully operational human being, waking up to the masculine/active powers of her own makeup. Is that the right interpretation? Sit with it and see how it sits with you. See where it leads you. See what it has to offer. And decide for yourself how you will interpret the fairy tales. Do the same with everything whose meaning you have assumed you’ve grasped. Consider how else you might have interpreted the event/experience. See where it goes. How things are is neatly complimented by how things also are. Fixed ideas and One Way Only Thinking are the quickest ways to get untracked I know of, Oh, except for Telling Ourselves What We Want To Hear. 01/27/2012
133. Textile Mill Ruins 02, Franklinville, NC—January 25, 2012 — Built in the 1930’s, closed down in the 1970’s, burned in 2010 — Play to the right crowd, that’s what I say. Live to make the right people happy—to please the people who know what’s pleasing. You find these people by pulling up from your own depths what is deepest, best and truest about you and seeing who smiles. In his Flower Sermon, the Buddha held out a flower, which is where every sermon should stop, and one person in the crowd smiled. You may find you are working with the same percentage. Great. Play to that crowd! Keep them before you when surrounded by the glassy eyes and the cat calls and the complaints and the sarcasm as you bring out the flowers. You’ll be just fine. 01/28/2012
134. Used in Short Talks on Contradictions, etc., Country Y, Moses H. Cone Memorial Park, Blue Ridge Parkway, NC—December 13, 2011 — We have to work it out. The Work is working it out. The Way is working it out. We work it out with ourselves, with one another, with the Neighbor and the Enemy and the Sister-in-Law (you know the one I mean), with all sentient beings everywhere. Working it out is reconciliation, integration, peace and wholeness. Working it out is coming to terms with mutual exclusive interests, wishes, desires, claims—with contradictions, conflicts, ambivalences internally and externally. We have to work it all out. We have to work our lives out, what we will do and not do, how we will live, who we will be. There is no end to it. Negotiation and compromise, kid. Negotiation and compromise. If you can walk up to that and give it a big, juicy, wet one right on the kisser, you have it made as much as you can have it made, and you’re one of my kind of people. 01/28/2012
135. Tobacco Barn, Guilford County, NC—January 27, 2012 — The first order of business, maybe the only order of business, is figuring out how to get our way. Crying works for a while, sometimes forever. Most of us have to learn increasingly sophisticated ways of getting our way. Power, control, seduction are three favorite cards to play. We barter. We trade. We buy low and sell high. The only thing money is good for is getting our way. Indoctrination and propaganda? Somebody’s strategy for getting their way. You have it. I want it. And I have to figure out how to get it. This is the basic dynamic at work in all of our relationships: Getting what we want while keeping other people from getting what we have. Then comes along the idea that getting, having, owning, possessing, acquiring, amassing isn’t what we think it is. We, some of us, wake up to the realization that what we value is over-rated. Sometimes that leads to despair and despondency and sometimes it comes in conjunction with the crazy notion that there is more to life than living would lead us to believe. That we are being asked to give up everything, so to speak, to give up our attachment to things, to let nothing matter more than our allegiance to That Which Calls Our Name. And we follow That Which Calls Us along strange paths, into the company of unfamiliar people who we recognize as friends—no family—into the land of no boundaries or walls, and know what it means to be alive for the first time. 01/29/2012
136. Glencoe Mill Village, A Renovated Mill House Community, Glencoe, NC—January 29, 2012 — Cotton beat the everlasting hell out of the working poor. From the field hands who chopped Johnson Grass and then picked and stuffed into long bags for a penny a pound, to the mill workers who inhaled cotton dust and belonged to the company, we rose to the top of the textile world on the backs of those with their backs to the wall. We are doing the same thing today with the Chinese labor market. Profit making becomes profiteering in a wink. And we all like a bargain. Who pays for the savings we relish? It isn’t The Man. The Man always makes his. But, what to do? The Man is laughing because we have no effective recourse. A world-wide minimum wage would be a start. Think that would float at the UN? About like Gay rights. Here is one more place where what is right and what is wrong is very clear and no mechanism exists to right the wrong the advantaged classes always exact on the disadvantaged classes across societies and cultures, nations and ages. But, what to do? Wake up. Each one of us. Individually. Personally. Compassionately identify with the “least of these my (and your) brothers and sisters” world-wide throughout time. It will make a difference for the good by changing even slightly how we live. How we live matters. 01/29/2012
137. Pecan Hulls, Old Ardrey Kell Road, Charlotte, NC—December 26, 2011 — The real difficulties have no solutions. There is no fix for much that is wrong about our life. Alcoholism and Autism and Alzheimer’s and I’m only in the “A’s.” I haven’t gotten to a parent dying prematurely or a child dying at any time. We would all be old by the time I got to the end of the list. The list has no end. We labor beneath burdens we cannot bear or lay down, deal with problems we cannot solve. Don’t let it get you down. This is the way it is but. It is not the only way it is. It is not all there is. There is also what needs to be done, what needs us to do it, the life we have to live—anyway, nevertheless, even so. “Oh, but how can we go on?” we say, “How can we sing the Lord’s song in a foreign land?” It’s called Walking Two Paths At The Same Time. This doesn’t cancel out That. We have problems that have no solution AND we have a life yet to be lived. We cannot be dying before our time. Our task, our work, is to live until we are dead, stiff and not breathing, but alive and looking for that which needs what we have to offer, for the life that needs us to live it—not because it’s a duty but because it is a joy, it’s where we come to life, it’s where we counter the weight of the world with life and light and peace and all the other old values that are at the heart of all that is worthy of us. Life is sorrowful AND we embrace The Deal and “participate joyfully” in the beauty and wonder of being alive, doing what we can imagine doing to establish “the other pole” and maintain the polarity between sorrow and joy all our lives long. 01/30/2012
138. Glencoe Mill Door, Glencoe, NC—January 29, 2012 — Repeat after me: This is it! This is it! This is it! And this: If it gets better it will be because of what I do to make it better! There is magic out there, don’t get me wrong, but it is largely conditional on what we do in response to how things are. That makes us, in a manner of speaking, the magicians, the wizards and wizettes. We bring magic to bear upon the way things are by the way we respond to the way things are. We keep waiting for magic to happen to us. It happens THROUGH us. Big difference. 01/30/2012
139. Flood Plain Wetlands, Lake Brandt, Greensboro, NC—January 21, 2012 — Our perspective is the magic wand transforming all of life, the magic carpet whisking us into new worlds. Our life rides our perspective into all it might become. 01/31/2012
140. Pecan Hulls, Old Ardrey Kell Road, Charlotte, NC—December, 26, 2011 — To what do you say no? To what do you say yes?  Your no’s and yes’s have gotten you to this point in your life. How have you been doing? 01/31/2012
141. Textile Mill Ruins 03, Franklinville, NC—January 25, 2012 — Built in the 1930’s, closed down in the 1970’s, burned in 2010 — We are constantly having to adjust ourselves to how things are. This is not what we do best. We hate it. We would prefer alcohol in large quantities. Or any one of the 10,000 addictions to divert us from the task at hand: Squaring up to how it is and doing what must be done about it. Every year I have to do my taxes. Think I rush gleefully to embrace the task? How long does it take? Maybe four hours, with regular breaks for sustenance and courage. It might as well be Life At Hard Labor. I’m going to publish an eBook of these photos and reflections but I have to use a program I am not familiar with to format the content. You would think I was fifteen having to call a girl for a date. Or having to dance with the girl once we got to the party. And you would think I might get better at just doing what has to be done. Hate to disappoint you but. I buck and snort all the way. And you can’t tell me anything to make the process easier. I’m going to hate doing taxes next year. And the year following. Adjusting ourselves to the way things are is not our strong suit. It’s another manifestation of the Cyclops laughing at us, drooling. And we have to gather ourselves again, draw ourselves up and go spit in his ugly damn eye. That’s just how it is. 01/31/2012
142. Stone Mountain Vista, Stone Mountain State Park near Roaring Gap, NC—November 11, 2011 — Start with what excites you and see where it goes. This is not easy. William Alexander Percy nails it: “They cast their nets in Galilee/Just off the hills of brown/Such happy, simple fisherfolk/Before the Lord came down…” Before they went with what excited them. And found out where it took them. But. It remains our best bet at what James Hollis calls “an interesting, meaningful life.” Understand though, it won’t work out like you think it might, hope it will. Back to Percy: “Contented, peaceful, fishermen/Before they ever knew/The peace of God that filled their hearts/Brimful, and broke them, too.” The peace of God is being on the beam, on track, fulfilling your destiny, doing what your life needs you to do and knowing you are right in the center of where you need to be. You pay a price to be there. The Cyclops grins, knowing about our tendency for second thoughts, our lust for shortcuts and Easy Street, the likelihood of our cutting and running. See where it goes! Abdicate control! Trust yourself explicitly to whatever “fills your heart brimful.” It will be quite the ride. 02/01/2012
143. Tobacco Barn 02, Guilford County, NC—January 27, 2012 — We are all Moses in search of the Promised Land like a man on his ox looking for his ox like a woman with her sunglasses on her head looking for her sunglasses. We are what we seek. “Thou Art That!” “Get in there and do your thing, and don’t worry about the outcome!” “Start with what excites you and see where it goes!” This is not difficult. We make it difficult by wanting someone to explain it to us, and hand us the rules, and give us a road map, make certain we are doing it right, and tell us what to do. It’s your life—LIVE IT! From the ground up. From the inside out. Beginning right now. And don’t keep score. 02/01/2012
144. Black Birch B, Blue Ridge Parkway, Rocky Knob, VA—January 20, 2012 — Prosperity is having enough money to buy what it takes to do what needs to be done the way only you can do it—to do what needs you to do it. We buy the tools required to do the work. Maybe you need a Grand Piano. Or a barn. You need a set up. A poet needs something to write with, and on. We need enough money to pay the right bills. We have to know what the right bills are. And the wrong ones. And incur the right ones. And we have to use the tools we buy in the service of the work that is ours to do. We can’t settle for looking like a writer, with the latest laptop and maybe a beret. We have to actually write. Every day. Not when the mood strikes and we have an inspiration. A big hat and spurs don’t a cowboy make. Or a pickup. It takes more than a pickup. You have to be able to back a trailer. And get a cow in it. Exactly when does a cowboy become a cowboy? It’s a heart thing. A being thing. Not a costume thing. A cowboy is a cowboy when a cowboy does what cowboys do. Mend fences, brand cattle, shoe horses, roundup strays… It isn’t about having the cowboy look about  you. Same goes for the work that is your work to do. You. Have. To. Do. The. Work. You can’t just buy the tools. 02/01/2012
145. Rock Castle Creek, Rock Castle Gorge, Blue Ridge Parkway near Tuggle Gap, VA—November 03, 2011 — Everything is an entry point for reflection and meditation, a threshold to another world. Everything has metaphorical qualities—there is more to it than meets the eye—inviting us to consider what else—what all—there is to it and wake up to possibilities and alternatives beyond counting beneath the surface of our lives. Every strong emotion, love, attraction, desire, fear, anger, desperation, despair, loathing, hatred, jealousy, resentment…is a call to consider what is going on here. What is the pull, the push, the compulsion, the obsession ALL about? The antecedents come together in a great Gordian Knot of emotional entanglement and it is our place to untie the threads and see where they lead, remembering, experiencing, reconciling, integrating, incorporating, deepening, expanding, enlarging, seeing, hearing, understanding, knowing, becoming, growing and repeating the process throughout our lives, meeting ourselves again and again until we all are one. 02/02/2012
146. Greenbriar Highway, Greenbriar District, Great Smoky Mountains National Park, TN—November 30, 2011 — Enlightenment settles us into our life, into the way things are, into how it is with us and what we can do about it, into what is called for from us in response to the way things are. If you couldn’t bat .350 before enlightenment, you won’t be able to bat .350 after enlightenment. But, if it mattered to you before enlightenment, it may not matter to you after enlightenment. Enlightenment shifts what’s important, rearranges priorities, increases the amount of stuff we send to the dump. Lightens our load. Dances us along the way. 02/02/2012
147. Flowers of Spring, Crocus, Bicentennial Garden, Greensboro, NC—February 02, 2012 — We do what is ours to do, say what is ours to say, right up to the end and let that be that. Why hold anything back? Why wait? Know what the pressing matters are and tend them. Things are always coming up which push other things to the side. When you break your arm, you may not type for a while but. You do what you can while you can when you can how you can in doing what is yours to do, saying what is yours to say. And trust that it will be enough. We all die before the work is done, before the things that need to be said are all said. That’s the magic of the work, of the talk—it lives on, and we all take our turn, as we are able, serving one another in the task of life. 02/03/2012
148. Grown Over, Near Sparta, NC—February 02, 2012 — This was once the Big House. Still is a big house. “Time and chance happen to us all.” So, we have to be awake to Joseph Campbell’s observation, “Everything that comes, goes,” and let that be, because it is, and stop acting like living in the Big House is something, because it isn’t. 02/03/2012
149. Used in Short Talks on Contradiction, etc., Flowers of Spring 02, Crocus, Bicentennial Garden, Greensboro, NC—February 02, 2012 — We need a weapon to defend ourselves against those who attack and kill, brutalize and destroy. There are bad guys (mostly guys, anyway) who rape, pillage, burn or worse and laugh about it. The Dali Lama flees the onslaught but seeks protection of those who have weapons and will use them in his defense. It’s a fine line that is wasted on me, not killing but taking refuge with those who will. All the heroes had weapons. Give us laser swords to carve out a safe space for our OM’s and peaceful way of life. So what if it is a contradiction? Everything is! Give us something with which to draw a line! “Those who live by the sword, die by the sword” is no excuse to not use the sword—those who DON’T live by the sword die by the sword! At least, with swords in hand they have to think before the run us over, or through. Ah but, the meek and defenseless drift through time as refugees with no place to settle, to be. Bullied about, told to leave, praying for deliverance and hoping to just be left alone. The monks and hermits seek poverty and high mountain caves to have nothing to lose and nothing to invite attack, the rest live on the run, the plight of the gentle-hearted and kind, who can’t be intimate, authentic, genuine and real without being vulnerable and exposed. It’s a hell of a price for true-human-being-hood, but warriors have their own brand of brokenness with which to deal. And those who know know we heal one another with sighs too deep for words. 02/04/2012
150. Flowers of Spring 03, Crocus, Bicentennial Garden, Greensboro, NC—February 02, 2012 – We’ve never had optimal conditions within which to work but. Our conditions have brought us forth in a way that optimal could not have done. So don’t think twice about your working conditions. “Get in there and do your thing and don’t worry about the outcome!” (Joseph Campbell) 02/04/2012

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08/17/2011 — 11/16/2011

1. Black-eyed Susans and Purple Cone Flowers, Blowing Rock, NC—Everybody wants to bail out from time to time, to eject from this world and float happily down into some other, better, world. Everybody. The Buddha got his start wanting to escape this world. Jesus said, “How long must I bear with you? I can’t wait until I’m out of here!” (or words to that effect). It’s a universal human malady, not wanting what we have, wanting what we can’t have. Something we all have to square up with over and over at different points in our life. So, we need one another to remind us that it is the most natural thing in the world to feel this way, and to encourage us to look our life in the eye and see it as another manifestation of the Cyclops standing in our path, grinning. Here comes the mantra you have to embrace, understand, comprehend, believe and recite: “It’s all hopeless, meaningless, useless, pointless and futile, and coming to a very bad end (we all die, you know)–AND how we live in the meantime makes all the difference!” Look at the difference the Buddha made, and Jesus. And they didn’t change one thing about the world they didn’t like. So, you have to rearrange your thinking about the influence for good you have in your world, and pick yourself up and live your life as only you can live it, with the right attitude and right spirit about you, as a blessing and a grace upon all who come your way. We have to remind one another to do that, because we all want to bail out from time to time, and how we live through that makes all the difference. 08/17/2011
2. Coming In, the Bog Garden, Greensboro, NC—No one can tell us, show us, hand us what is meaningful. We know it on our own. If we are living meaningless, empty lives, it’s our own fault. We said “No” too many times to too many things. We said “No!” to things that were “Yesses,” and we knew it but. We allowed our principles to stop us, or our responsibilities, or our concern for what Those Who Know Best would say. Or we turned away because our Mama or Daddy wouldn’t approve, or because we couldn’t afford it, or because our circumstances wouldn’t allow it. When we let someone else set the course of our life, we are headed for empty and meaningless. When we live in a hole, or a corner, because we will not unleash our imagination and trust ourselves to find ways to serve what is meaningful in spite of our circumstances, we resign ourselves to empty and meaningless. There is a price to be paid for living a meaningful life—some risks to be accepted, some chances to be taken. The Hero’s Journey is not for the faint-hearted, the timid and shy. It is for those who realize there is nothing really to lose so why hold anything back. The good news is that it is never too late to start living meaningful lives. The question for us is always the same at every point in our lives: How alive can you be in the time left for living? We owe it to ourselves to find out. 08/18/2011
3. Beaver Pond Reflection, Schwabacher Landing, Grand Teton National Park, WY—We need the company of the right kind of others to remind us that we have what we need, which is a very good thing because no one can give it to us—our sense of direction, our “feel for the game,” our intuitive grasp of the situation as it unfolds/arises, our sense of flow and timing, our realization of what resonates with us and what “rings true” or doesn’t, our instinctive notion of what is right for us and wrong, good for us and bad, our heart/spirit for holding on and hanging in and doing what needs to be done no matter how hard or how long, our courage and our resilience and our trust in ourselves to “rise to the occasion” and “take care of business” that is truly our business in ways appropriate to the circumstances… We need to be reminded of these things from time to time, and we need to hang out with people who can be our reminders and not try to make us dependent on them to do our living for us. We can do our living for ourselves with the kind of help that says, “Come on. You can do your own living, and if you are afraid you can’t, we’ll keep you company until you see that you can.” 08/18/2011
4. View from Signal Mountain Panorama, Grand Teton National Park, WY—The Trail will take as much from us as it gives to us. The taking is the key to the giving. If you walk the Trail, unbent, unbowed, unchanged—just all triumphant and smiley—you missed something crucial along the way. The Trail requires us to accommodate ourselves to the Trail, to hand ourselves over to the Trail, to become one with the Trail. It’s like this: There is what the Trail demands of you and what you demand of the Trail. The Trail is all Ups and you want all Downs. Something has to give. Guess what it is. It’s like this: There is your one-year-old daughter and there is you. The needs and interests of one conflict with, clash with, the needs and interests of the other. You both have to do your fair share of giving in to the other. Each of you is the Trail for the other. It’s like this: Life is an optical illusion, the old woman who is also a lovely young maiden. The Trail which is a mean SOB and you with your needs, wishes, and desires. You sit with an optical illusion until you can see the opposites and how the opposites are one illusion. The two are one. So you have to sit with the Trail or your daughter until you can see that you and the Trail are one and you and your daughter are one, merging, flowing, into and out of each other. Two, one, two, one… This is not about winning and losing but about accommodating ourselves, acquiescing, to what needs to happen in each moment. It is not surrender and defeat but growth and becoming. We are better people for having walked the Trail, for having the daughter, without having imposed our will on either. 08/19/2011
5. Cunningham Cabin, Grand Teton National Park, WY—If we are here to bring forth and make conscious and visible the high values of the invisible world, we could do a better job of it. The high values are often lost in the effort to have things our way—a problem identified as long ago as the early chapters of the Book of Genesis. This is not called making headway. The problem is compounded by each of us having to wake up to the problem individually and work it out alone. The church in all of its incarnations is evidence that there is no corporate solution, and we are left with the realization that it is up to us, personally, to wake up, grow up and get to work cultivating compassion, civility, grace, mercy, love, kindness, justice, awareness, insight, generosity, beauty, patience, joy, and all their companion values—bringing them forth in our lives, making them visible, tangible, real and ever-present in all of our moments of all of our days. This is the work that saves the world and it is ours to do alone. 08/19/2011
6. Streamside, Bass Lake, Blue Ridge Parkway near Blowing Rock, NC—We tend to opt for the easiest life possible under the circumstances, that is the life most ruled by diversion, distraction, denial. We run, hide, escape from the pain of emptiness, meaninglessness, hopelessness, frustration, futility, grief, loss, sorrow and boredom in a regular and recurring way. “Give them circuses” (or it’s equivalent, drugs, sex, alcohol and all forms of plastic) keeps the masses, that would be us, from roaming the countryside bent on aimless destruction, rioting and mob violence because they/we can’t think of anything else to do. Facing up to and bearing the pain of being alive would be something else to do. We have a life. What are we going to do with it? With the resources at our disposal? In this context? These circumstances? We have been sentenced to life in this here and this now as it is. What are we going to do about it? We have no idea. So we run for the circuses in all forms to take our mind off the problem of what to do with our life and the givens we have to work with. And all the while, the invisible world—that would be the world of our soul/Psyche/Self—waits for our cooperation, collaboration. We have all the help we need “right here.” It only takes waking up to it to know that it is so. Perspective is the best tool in the whole toolbox. With the slightest shift in perspective, everything changes. Seeing, hearing, understanding transforms our world and we live to transform the entire world of normal, apparent reality. We save the world by becoming awake, aware, alive in our world, in this here and this now—by becoming awake, aware, alive to the other world, the invisible world, the world of soul/Psyche/Self. To do that, we have to look beyond circuses and plastic to see what else is there, here, now. 08/20/2011
7. Rosebay Rhododendron, Blue Ridge Parkway near Blowing Rock, NC—Every living thing has something to worry about, whether it knows it or not. The trick here is not to arrange our lives so as to be worry-free, with things like high walls, guarded entrances, a physician on call at all times and more money than we can count, much less spend. The trick is to trust ourselves to deal appropriately with whatever arises. “Bring it on! Show me what ‘cha got! Hit me with your best shot!” We’ll find a way. Always have. Always will. It’s something else we have in common with every living thing. Life finds a way, and lives (and loves) on! 08/20/2011
8. Monroe, NC Depot—We spend too much time and energy trying to keep things as they are in an effort to avoid the work that is to be done. The real work that we put off indefinitely, resist eternally, is to let go what’s going and let come what’s coming. You get that down, you got it made.
9. Taggett Lake, Grand Teton National Park, WY—How much money would we have to pay you to not do what you love to do? I hope they don’t make that much money. You couldn’t buy my camera from me, or pay me to not take photos. My wife likes to say I could make a lot of money from photography if I just quit taking pictures. She thinks she’s funny. But. A lot of us don’t do what we love to do because we cannot sell it, market it, make money from doing it. That’s like being paid to not do it. It’s selling out. It’s being bought off. It’s corrupt, immoral, an outright betrayal of soul. We should be ashamed. We should be ashamed for connecting a monetary value to a spiritual endeavor. We should write poetry, draw, paint, teach children to read or just read ourselves, walk the dog in the woods, ride horses, play golf, fish, swim, run because we love to even though nothing is going to “come of it.” Carl Jung was quite the amateur artist, but he was careful not to market any of his paintings because that would cheapen their value, detract from their true worth, which was the connection they provided to his soul and the work they enabled him to do in understanding his soul and what his soul was communicating to him by way of symbols and images. What we love to do is soul stuff. Do it because you love it and see where it leads you—not in terms of financial profit and reward, but in terms of insight, understanding, grounding, centering, focusing, meaning, purpose, direction and the expression of the high values of the invisible world. 08/21/2011
10. Rosebay Rhododendron, Bass Lake, Blue Ridge Parkway, NC—What are we going to do with the time left for living? This is a problem that cannot be solved by thinking about it. We cannot sit down and make our “Bucket List” of things we want to do before we “kick the bucket,” and hope to come close to the things we need to do in the time that is ours. What does wanting know? Remember your first marriage? You wanted that. Need I say more? Knowing what we need to do with the time left for living is a problem that can only be solved through prayer. But. This is not prayer as it has devolved. We think of prayer as a wireless network for placing orders and requests to a kindly Santa Claus in the sky. We ask, we receive. Simple. Wrong. Stop thinking about getting and start thinking about being. Prayer is the practice of seeking the beam and being aligned with the life that is our life to live, which needs us to live it. Prayer is meditation, contemplation, introspection, and openness to how things are and also are and what needs to be done about it. Prayer is listening for what needs us to do it, here and now, in the situation as it arises. As we move toward what needs us to do it, we find what we need to do it, but rarely more than we need. Prayer is a way of seeing what needs to be done—the path to insight and enlightenment. It is an attitude, an orientation, that takes it all in and perceives responses that are fitting and proper so that we might do what is being asked of us. It is the way of finding our way into what we are going to do with the time left for living, and doing it. 08/22/2011
11. Linville Falls, Blue Ridge Parkway near Linville, NC—We would do well to live more instinctively, more intuitively. We think we have to think things out and make careful, reasoned choices because we might be asked to defend, justify, excuse or explain our actions. We live such tight little defensive lives that we might as well be dead. Anything with life about it is all over the place. Puppies, kittens and children, for example. Not us. We don’t run to do anything except run and we time our distances even there. What do we JUST DO??? FOR NO REASON??? Make this a regular part of your spiritual practice. Just doing stuff that you instinctively, intuitively, sense it’s time to do for no reason other than it’s time has come. 08/22/2011
12. Yellowstone Canyon and River, Yellowstone National Park, WY—Pay the fare and ride the ride, that’s my best advice. What are we holding back for, saving up for? So far as we can tell this is our one shot at life. Why not live while the time for living is upon us? We are afraid of what, exactly? Where is it you have never been that you have always put off going? What is it you have never done that you have always put off doing? How is it that you are refusing to live the life that is waiting to be lived? Why are you keeping it on hold? When do you expect to start living? To move beyond the normal routines, the familiar patterns, the cow track from the barn to the pasture and back to the barn? You think you are safe and secure not venturing out into the life that is dying for you to live it? Lightening could hit the barn tonight. It’s all going up in smoke eventually. Make a routine of shaking up your routine. Create a pattern of life that includes wiggles, whizzes, slides and splashes. Invite the unknown, the unpredictable, the startling and disquieting into your life. See what happens. 08/23/2011
13. Grandfather Mountain from Rich Mountain, Blue Ridge Parkway near Blowing Rock, NC—We think with enough money everything else will fall into place. This is a happy fantasy implanted by a culture grounded on a money-based economy. It’s a mindset. A foundational assumption. And we serve it with our lives. We would be better off serving our life with our lives—the life that has a mind of its own, the life that has its idea of how we should be living, which is not dependent on having a lot of money. But we think our life is what we do with money. We have no grasp of life apart from our ideas of how we spend our money. Listen. To. Me. We have a life separate from our ideas of our life which has ideas for us and the way we need to live. Cut off from our life’s idea of itself, we are left on our own to invent a life for ourselves. The smart thing to do would be to find our way back to our life and its idea for itself and for us. Of course, that would be hard to do, but to not do it is to do things the hard way. Eventually, we get to the point of doing what’s hard and wonder why we didn’t do it that way in the first place. Our life has been wondering that all along. 08/23/2011
14. Beaver Pond Reflection, Schwabacher Landing, Grand Teton National Park, WY—An art dealer told me my photos don’t sell because there is too much blue in them. “People don’t buy blue,” she said, “certainly not bright blue. They are looking for something to go with their sofa, their carpet and their walls.” A quick perusal of my photos will turn up dump truck loads of those that will never sell. Well. The Paleolithic paintings on the wall of the cave in Lascaux, France didn’t sell for 17,000 years. How’s that for not selling? And it didn’t stop the artists from painting. The soul loves an image, it seems. I’m serving my soul with my photography. I’m doing with my photographs what the cave artists did with their pigments and their charcoal and chipping stones. I’m soothing myself, grounding myself, centering myself, calming myself, making it right, somehow, with my soul that things are as they are. When I’m out of sorts, feeling down, grumpy, snarly, pouty, at loose ends and at war with every little thing, I gather up the camera and we go settle me down by finding images that restore my equilibrium and still my soul. I’m particularly fond of blue. And if not one of them ever sells, when you factor in what I’ve saved in psychotherapy bills, you’ll see that I come out way ahead in this game, and we haven’t taken into account prescription medication. 08/24/2011
15. Great, ahem, Blue Heron, the Bog Garden Pond (AKA Starmount Farms Pond), Greensboro, NC—If you want to come to life in the life you’re living, to be alive in the deepest, fullest sense—vibrant, alert, aware of the moment and loving everything about it—you have to find the symbols that grab you and be grabbed by them. Now, a symbol represents something that cannot be said. A sign is just what it is. A stop sign is nothing more than a stop sign. Our symbols have been turned into signs. In the Christian church, for instance, the cross and the communion table, mean just what we have been told they mean, no more and certainly no less. The symbol has become a sign. Not a good thing to have happen to your symbols. In order to bring us to life, our symbols have to be alive—they have to have infinite depths capable of being eternally explored. In order for THAT to happen, we have to reclaim our symbols and the mystery behind them, and immerse ourselves in the wonder of more than words can say. In order to do THAT, we have to say what is true for us about the symbol using words that have never been said. But, here’s the catch, for our symbols to come alive for us in this way, we have to free them and ourselves from the explanations—the theology—we have been handed and told to believe. We have to sit with our symbols and let ourselves imagine what else there is about them that is also true which we have never been told is true. This is resurrecting the symbol. As we bring our symbols to life, they bring us to life, and we dance through the rest of our days. 08/24/2011
16. Footbridge on the Rough Ridge Trail, Blue Ridge Parkway, NC—What makes us think that a man or a woman would make all the difference in our life? That romance is the solution to all of our problems today and tomorrow? After romance, there’s the laundry, the yard work, the cat to the vet and life is back to what it was before romance. Romance is a happy interlude between all the next damn things that demand our time and attention. Romance is not all it is cracked up to be. Nothing is. But. Everything, romance included, is an opportunity to look closer, to dig deeper, to wake up to the depth, and breadth, and wonder of life. Falling in love is an amazing aspect of being alive—an invitation into the depths of life—and we would be crazy to pass it up, to dismiss it as nothing more than a “happy interlude.” It is an opportunity to explore the questions that lead to wherever it is that we are going: What do we need a man or a woman for? What do we need him or her to help us do? What do we imagine the “right man” or “right woman” will bring into the relationship with us? What characteristics and qualities will he, will she, exude? Who can we count on him, on her, to be? What are the deficits that he, that she, will counteract? From what will he, will she, save us? How will our life be different with him, with her in it? And, here’s the jewel, What does thinking about him or her keep us from thinking about? While you wait for the right man or woman to come along, consider the questions. Ponder them. Explore them. Follow them out. See where they lead, what other questions they raise, how they change  your life. 08/25/2011
17. Gardiner, MT—Gardiner is the Northwest Entrance to Yellowstone and a great place to find lunch and regional art work in the shops along the street—We can never be sure where we are going with our lives. We await inspiration, direction, clarity, focus, invitation, chance, grace, luck, the reappearance of the white rabbit… The white rabbit is always coming again, and we have to be ready, watching, waiting. This is the kind of eschatological promise we can count on—the coming of the white rabbit is always at the end of time for one time in our life and the beginning of time for another. The Second Coming is not the Final Coming, just the one after the first and before the third. How many comings are there? Depends on how well you respond to them. Could be thousands. Could be only one, waiting and waiting for you to wake up to its calling and get on with your new life. We live only once? Hardly. We live as many lives as we can cram into a lifetime—if we are up for it. In each moment we stand before an infinite number of futures and choose one. Is it an inspired choice? The right choice? Takes choosing to know for sure. We have to follow what appears to be the white rabbit for a while before we know if it is the white rabbit, or a red herring, or a wild goose. Takes going to know, which means we cannot be afraid of being wrong. The roots of tomorrow’s Right are grounded in yesterday’s Wrong. We are internally guided, self-correcting beings but. To be guided and corrected we have to be moving. We can’t wait long trying to decide if it’s a white rabbit or not. It will be gone by the time we make up our mind. We have to go to know. 08/26/2011
18. Dugger’s Creek Falls, Blue Ridge Parkway near Linville, NC—There are questions we cannot ask, trains of association we cannot allow ourselves to board. This is where the conscious, willful, ego comes to the rescue of the invisible world, where we “save our soul.” Soul drifts toward the woeful sloughs of despond from time to time, and needs us—the conscious ego us—to will ourselves forward, to call ourselves up and on. In this work, to gather all of us for the work that is ours to do, our conscious self relies on an aspect of the invisible world other than soul: Spirit. Think of soul as the interface, the connector, between body and Spirit. As such, soul tends to be “of the earth,” moist, wet, sensual, passionate, etc., and can “lose the way” in its desire to experience fully the physical side of life—and can “give up the ghost” when physically things seem, or are, hopeless, “taking over” and “possessing” us with its moods. At this point, we have to remind soul (Talk about a role reversal!) of its connection to Spirit, and speak for Spirit sternly to soul. Spirit is “of the air and light,” high, clear, the source of highest value, always calling us to the best we can bring forth in every situation and circumstance. Spirit is, all together now, “love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness and self-discipline”—and all the other values as well, including courage, compassion, grace, mercy, justice and perseverance. So, we call on Spirit to urge soul on, which gets us to the questions we cannot ask, the thoughts we cannot think but. The limitations of space here will make that a good topic for next time. 08/27/2011
19. Sunrise, Lower Falls, Yellowstone National Park near Canyon Village, WY—“Why are you so downcast, O my soul, and why are you so disquieted within me?” The Psalmist knew the ways of the soul, how it can “turn on a dime,” bright and shiny one minute and dull and down the next. Carl Jung says that there is no reason to think that all of our moodiness, or our shift in mood, is our doing, because all of our feelings don’t necessarily belong to us. He says that as participants in “the collective unconscious,” we may carry the unresolved emotional baggage of psychic entities we do not know. Heraclitus said in the 6^th century BCE, “If you went in search of it, you would not find the boundaries of the soul, though you traveled every road, so deep is its measure.” There is more to soul than we have likely considered. One thing to consider is its propensity for moods. We think we are feeling the mood when it may well be that soul is feeling the mood through us—we are the vehicle for making conscious soul’s moodiness. If that is the case, then we are in position to wake soul up to, and be responsible for, its own mood of the moment—and refuse to carry a mood that does not belong to us. If we are to stop indulging soul’s propensity to deepen its spiral downward, there are questions we must not ask, thoughts we must not think. They are: “So what? Who cares? Why try? What’s the use? What’s the point? What difference does it make?” And: “Nothing I do matters. It won’t do any good. Nothing good will come of it. It isn’t worth it. It’s a waste of time to try.” Things are difficult enough without our taking sides against ourselves. Our place is to look to the Spirit within as the everlasting source of encouragement and value, and live toward the best we can imagine in each moment, in each situation as it arises, “Anyway, nevertheless, even so!” 08/28/2011
20. Barn on Mormon Row, Grand Teton National Park, WY—The dance dances the dancer. The song sings the singer. When the dancer tries to dance the dance, or the singer tries to sing the song, it is apparent to everyone that things aren’t working. During my last eight years in the ministry (I’m retired), I enjoyed the freedom of an early service which allowed me to invite local singer/songwriters (not religious) to share their music each Sunday in lieu of traditional hymns and praise bands. I relished the time with these folks and their music but. A couple of them looked beyond the music to making it big. The ones who actually made it big—one won a Grammy this past year, and another has enjoyed several appearances on A Prairie Home Companion and written music for plays and orchestra productions—were at one with their music, loved their music, and were in it—are in it—for the pure joy of the music. The others, the ones who were looking for success and using music to get there, are still looking, and will be always. I translate this into photography like so: Don’t step into a scene looking to take THE photo of that scene. Step into every scene bent on taking ALL the photos that scene affords as though each one is THE photo. Enjoy the entire process, the looking as much as the seeing, the seeking as much as the finding. It’s all photography. What’s making it big going to do for you that you don’t have going for you right here, right now? You have a camera—you have a scene—what more could you possibly want? 08/28/2011
21. Summer Wetlands, Guilford County near Greensboro, NC—We cannot be self-directed, self-determined, self-correcting without being self-reflective. We have to think about who we are and what we are about and how we decide to do what we do and what we mean, what we intend, with our lives. A life is not automatic. A life does not flow naturally from being 98.6 and breathing. We can live without being alive. The idea is to be fully, vibrantly alive in the time of our living—in the time left for living. We don’t do that accidentally. If we are going to be alive, we have to work at it, asking, seeking, knocking, looking, listening, inquiring. Ours is the work of developing eyes that see, ears that hear and a heart that understands, so that we might see what we look at, hear what we listen to, grasp what is before us and bring what we have to offer alive in each moment of living as a blessing and a grace to the moment and to all who share it with us. May we always see things as they are (which includes how they also are), be clear and correct about what needs to be done in each situation as it arises, and have the courage to do it. Amen! May it be so! 08/30/2011
22. Peach Orchard, Springs Farm, Fort Mill, SC—It’s easy to love God when all is well with our life, or when we think loving God is the key to having all things be well with our life. As long as things are fine, or as long as we think God is in charge of things becoming fine, love is in the air but. Let life have its way with us and we are right in their with Job, railing, ranting at the God we loved, or curled in a fetal position wondering where God is and why the God we loved so allowed things to be as they are. God is not our ace in the hole or our heavenly hedge against the complete loss of everything—or everything that ever mattered. God is our partner in making this moment all it can be, in doing what truly needs to be done in each situation as it arises—which may not have anything in common with what we think needs to be done, or which we are told (by Those Who Know Best) what needs to be done. God has funny ideas about what needs to be done, so it’s hard to predict what it will be in any here and now—which means we have to take chances and hurl ourselves into what we think needs to be done when, as it turns out, wasn’t what needed to be done at all, but. Doing it opened our eyes to what we can do about it to redeem it, resurrect it, in the next moment or the one after that. We live to bring ourselves forth in the life we are living—to live life as it needs to be lived in each situation—to live our life better than God could live it in our place, and get only having done it out of it. That’s playing the game the way the game was meant to be played. Batter up! 08/31/2011
23. Spider Web, Blue Ridge Parkway near Blowing Rock, NC—Is it a blip? Or, is it a glitch? Or, is it a portent of things to come? Takes living with it to know. The problem is that we want everything to be all right right now, but. Our lives move in and out of all right and good enough all our lives long—and each time, we don’t trust our ability to adapt one more time. We have enough stress in our lives when things are fine. Even when it’s easy, it’s hard. We don’t need the roof to start leaking, the toilet to back-up, the dog to barf on the floor. Well. What helps you through? How do you soothe your soul? Calm yourself? Gather yourself? Provide yourself with the wherewithal to step into the situation and do what is needed one more time? I write it out. Take the camera and go looking. And I carry with me always the happy fantasy of a community something like the regulars in Cheers, with the difference that the one of my dreams would be focused on helping its members face up to and find ways of dealing with the reality of their life. Talking it out. Absent that kind of “community of innocence,” talking becomes writing for me. Whatever squares us up with our lives and enables us to look the angel of life in his/her ugly red eye and say to him/her, “I’m not letting you go until you give me the blessing!” is exactly what we need to walk with the angel into every day. May we all find it and dance daily with the angel of life. 09/01/2011
24. Mallard Landing, the Bog Garden, Greensboro, NC—There are no secrets. Everything is right out in the open. It only takes seeing things as they are (which includes seeing them as they also are) to see what needs to be done about them in each situation as it arises. We interfere with the process by tilting the table toward what we perceive to be our advantage, our gain, our profit, our benefit, our best interest. What needs to happen takes a back seat to what we want to happen and Dollar’s Law prevails: Stupidity trumps everything. We stand poised to play the Stupid Card in every moment, scoop up our winnings and head for the house. So, we have to see that, too, as a part of the way things are, and listen carefully, look closely, for what needs to be done, knowing that we really want to be stupid at every opportunity, and see if we have what it takes to avoid being stupid this time. 09/01/2011
25. Used in Short Talks On Contradiction, etc., Portrait of a Green Heron, the Bog Garden, Greensboro, NC—We wake up gradually, over the course of our life. Living wakes us up, if we can be awakened. Banging into the way things are wakes us up, if we can be awakened. Coming up against life as we have been not told that it is—as we do not want it to be—wakes us up, if we can be awakened. We dismiss, discount, too often what cannot be ignored. We expand our theories about the way things are to explain away the discrepancies and contradictions, and continue snoring and dreaming that the world is how we wish it were. Waking up is coming to terms with the differences between the world as it is and the world as we would like for it to be. I’m getting older by the minute. I cannot pretend that away and live as fully as I’m capable of living for as long as life is possible. My living has to take the reality of my life into account. So does yours. We adjust, adapt, consciously to the facts that define our existence. This is waking up to how things are and what can be done about them and what truly needs to happen in response to them. Every moment is not a call to action. Every situation is not one that asks us to Do Something Now! Often, we can only wait, watching, for the time to be right for our action to be right. Being awake to the moment, waiting for the time for action to come upon us is the key to a Green Heron’s existence, and ours. 09/02/2011
26. Sunset, Water Rock Knob, Blue Ridge Parkway near Waynesville, NC—We work hard to make things work. We do what we can think to do. Working harder isn’t the answer. Perspective and luck are. Perspective takes it all into account: The situation, the Deal, the Way Things Are And Also Are, What Can Be Done About It, and Of That What Needs To Be Done Next—Here And Now. Nothing tops perspective—seeing into the heart of the matter, seeing things as they are and also are—for settling us into what needs to be done and doing it. Will it work? It’s out of our hands. That’s where luck comes in. Now, when I talk about luck, someone who has been told by someone else how to think, always says, “There is no such thing as luck! It’s all Providential! God’s Providence takes care of us all.” My stock reply is to say, “Aren’t we lucky that God is so providential?” Luck, you see, is a matter of perspective. Luck or Grace or Providence—it’s all the same. Call it what you will, it comes down to the fact that there is that which is out of our hands. If it helps, we are lucky, graced, providenced (Okay, I just made that word up). If it hurts, we are unlucky, disgraced, plagued and cursed. Farmers put everything into a crop that is washed away by a hurricane. We can only control our effort, not the outcome. We do what we can think to do and take our chances. And, when we are flat out of luck, we think of what to do about that—seeing things as they are and also are, what can be done about it, and, of that, what needs to be done next, now, here, and doing it. That’s the process that is not harmed by the daily prayer, “O God, Let me be lucky today!” 09/03/2011
27. Sunset, Water Rock Knob, Blue Ridge Parkway near Waynesville, NC—I spent five minutes yesterday watching two snails making their way into their future. It’s astounding how far a snail can go in five minutes, given the fact that it isn’t moving at all. Handed this illustration of the Taoist principle of accomplishing everything without doing anything, I recalled a favorite Dollarism: “You can get anywhere if you go slowly enough.” I formulated this defense against my detractors when they deride me for my slow pace up a mountain trail. Some people, it seems see breathing hard as a sign of being out of shape. I see it as a sign of walking too fast. If you want to breathe easily, slow down. When they tell me to hurry up so I won’t miss anything, I tell them to slow down so they won’t miss anything. Clearly, there are different ways to get to the top of a mountain. The eagle has its way, the snail has its way. The best way, or the right way, is merely the way Those Who Know Best prefer. Left to find our own way up the mountain, we would distribute ourselves over the mountain side in a pattern that would reflect a “normal distribution curve,” with some racing to be first and some being happy to be last and most spread out in between. We would not be all bunched together in a sprint to the top. Just so with everything else about our lives. We find our own pace, our own rhythm, serve our own interests and inclinations, and spread out over the entire spectrum of life, loving what we love and doing what we do in ways that are commensurate with who we are, collaborating with soul and Spirit to come up with what is right for us in the time and place of our living. Amen! May it be so! 09/04/2011
28. Baxter Creek Bridge, Great Smoky Mountains National Park, Big Creek Campgrounds, NC—We live on two levels at once. We walk two paths at the same time. Physical and spiritual. The physical realm has its requirements and demands, duties, obligations and responsibilities. So does the spiritual world. We balance, integrate, reconcile, make compatible the two worlds. Ideally. In practice, we always ignore the spiritual world in favor of the physical world. Sometimes we talk, talk, talk about how wonderful and important the spiritual world is, but. We live in the physical world as though we have never heard of the spiritual world. Which was Jesus’ complaint about the religious authorities of his day. Nothing has changed. So. Our work is cut out for us, bringing the spiritual world forth, giving it equal billing in our lives. We do that by paying attention to “the other side.” Our dreams, for instance. Our intuition, our instinct, the things that catch our eye, the things that resonate with us, that strike a cord, that turn our head. We give these things a place in our life, and live in this world as though that world is real. Which it is. It is the realest world, and the oldest. It was there before this one ever thought about coming into being. 09/04/2011
29. Mouse Creek Falls Panorama, Big Creek Campground, Great Smoky Mountains National Park, NC—The spiritual realm informs and directs our life in the physical realm, or would, if we were not so locked into lives of our own. We think it is just us and our life. “It’s MY life and I can do what I want to with it!” The problem here is that we can only want what we want. We cannot want what we ought to want if it varies in the slightest from what we do want—and, here’s the doozy, what we ought to want may have nothing in common with what we think we ought to want, with what we have been told we ought to want. We don’t know what to want, what we ought to want. It quickly gets to be more than we want to fool with, leaving us exactly where we were: Us and our life with nothing but our wants to guide us. We could use a little spiritual guidance and direction but. We would have to go to the trouble of setting ourselves and our wants aside in order to seek what is always with us, waiting to be found. 09/05/2011
30. Big Creek, Great Smoky Mountains National Park, NC—Show of hands now: Does anyone here see the stupidity of saying, “We would all have more money if we didn’t pay any taxes!”? Here’s another one for you, hands up now, Is there a quicker, cleaner, more efficient way of shooting both of our feet completely off with one shot than by agreeing that taxes are evil and not only are we going to refuse all additional taxes ever, but we are going to repeal all the taxes on the books, and never pay any more taxes, plus we are going to get rid of all unions because what they do is kind of like forcing us all to pay taxes in the form of higher prices for goods and services which we wouldn’t have to pay if there were no unions? Hold them up high so I can be sure to count them all… What we have just voted on is the heart of the Tax, I mean Tea, Party Agenda. More Money For All Of Us Via The Route Of Less Money For Some Of Us. Stupidity comes into play here in that all of us think the “all of us” in that sentence applies to us and the “some of us” applies to someone else. Let me explain this to you in two more very short so you can understand them sentences. The first is from Walt Kelly, “We have met the enemy and he is us.” The second is from me, They are coming after you, stupid! The they in that sentence is all of those who make money at the expense of someone else and the you in that sentence is, well, you. At stake here is the coal miner’s right to a quality of life that is higher than the mine owner’s idea of the life the mineworker ought to be happy with. If you are not the owner, you are the worker, whether you work in a coalmine or teach school or work as a plumber or an auto mechanic. Your quality of life is about to be taken out of your hands, and will be if you raise your hand for no more taxes, no taxes at all, and no unions ever.
31. Moon at Water Rock Knob, Blue Ridge Parkway near Waynesville, NC—As anxiety rises, the tendency is to do something quickly to relieve the tension and get things back to normal. We cannot bear the pain of anxiety, uncertainty, and fear for long—rarely long enough to see if we have anything to be afraid of. We tend to embrace those who tell us smooth things, offer simple solutions and tell us we only have to “get rid of the Jews,” or their present-day equivalent (there is always a scapegoat handy), and our problems will be solved. By focusing on “those people” and their evil ways, we shift attention from us and our anxiety, and feel better by making things worse for those who are not like we are. There is a better approach to the problem for all concerned: Face Your Fear And Befriend It! You have to work it out with your fear or it will work you over. Take your fear on a slow walk around the block. Listen to it well, as though it is your child with nightmares. Become your fear’s loving parent. Tell your fear it has nothing to be afraid of—that you will take care of it and find a way to handle all that is terrorizing it. Comfort your own fear! In so doing, you will be separating yourself from it, not identifying with it, so that now it is afraid but it is no longer scaring you. Reassure your fear that you can be trusted to come up with appropriate responses to everything it is afraid of if they, in fact, come about, and in the meantime, take it out for some ice cream, maybe with a piece of hot apple pie. 09/07/2011
32. Hanging Rock State Park, Lower Cascade, near Danbury, NC—If you want to be spiritual, you have to live in certain ways. Jesus said, “Blessed are those who hear these words of mine and DO them.” This means healing on the Sabbath or it’s modern day equivalent, associating with the Unclean, and calling into question the common assumptions of the day, any day. It means thinking for yourself. It means thinking. It means aligning yourself with the life that is yours to live regardless of the life that would be more profitable or more pleasing to the people in your life. Who are you trying to please with the way you live your life? God? Whose view of God? Whose idea of God? Who is telling you what it would take for God to be pleased? The answer to these last three questions better be YOU. And you better be living so as to expand, deepen, enlarge, transform your view of God and not to better align your view with that of whomever you recognize as The Religious Authority Over Your Life. You better be the religious authority over your life. You are the one who says so, who says this and not that. Jesus didn’t take his directions from anyone. He lived his life straight from the heart, his heart. Your heart is waiting for you to start taking directions. 09/08/2011
33. Used in Short Talks On Contradiction, etc., Hidden Falls, Hanging Rock State Park near Danbury, NC—Awareness needs silence for reflection, introspection, examination, exploration, contemplation, consideration in order to acknowledge the truth of how things are and also are, within and without, and determine what to do about it. No one rushes to insight, understanding, enlightenment, realization. No one speeds up the time to right seeing, right hearing, right understanding, right knowing, right doing, right being. The masters have all been around for awhile. We call them “The Wise Old Woman,” “The Wise Old Man,” for good reason. It takes a lot of looking to be able to see, a lot of listening to be able to hear, a lot of asking to be able to understand, and a lot of wrong turns to get one right. So take up the practice of sitting for a while regularly, or walking slowly, and being open to the allness of how things are. Bring forth the opposites, the contradictions, the conflicts. Listen to all sides. Put everything on the table and consider the table, waiting for what needs to be done to emerge, to become obvious, to entice you into action. 09/09/2011
34. Widow’s Creek Falls, Stone Mountain State Park near Roaring Gap, NC—When you are a writer and you don’t write what needs to be written, when it needs to be written, the way it needs to be written, even for the best of all reasons possible, you pay a price in the form of a missed opportunity at deepening, expanding, enlarging your own sense of how things are and also are, and you can’t get it back, no matter how many pages you start and throw away trying to find the phrase that would have led you to the next phrase and filled out the idea and generated thoughts and created perspective to who knows what unending elaboration of who knows what ephemeral whisper of insight murdered aborning. If you are a writer, you know you are not in charge of the process, and you don’t write at a time, in a place and manner of your own choosing, and it will help if you remember that in all times and places. And, if you are not a writer, the same thing applies to you in the service of whatever it is that you serve. And if you don’t serve anything it’s only because you are not aware of what you were born to serve, because you think you are here to be served and spend your time wondering what somebody could do for you and why don’t they all try harder to be pleasing and where are you going to find the kind of help and cooperation you deserve before you die. 09/10/2011
35. Heron Silhouette, the Bog Garden, Greensboro, NC—We all would be better off if we knew what we had a right to expect from ourselves and from one another. I’m more disappointed in myself and in the people I depend on to do what I think is right than I have any right to be. We’re all doing about what can be reasonably expected. Getting off our backs and stopping the rehashing of how we have been “lied to, made blue, turned down, pushed round, cheated, mistreated,” stomped on and treated like dirt would go a long way toward standing us up and sending us into the next situation with the determination to do there what can be rightly expected of us, and with a little luck more than can be expected, but certainly no less. May it be so with all of us! 09/10/2011
36. Detail of Widow’s Creek Falls, Stone Mountain State Park near Roaring Gap, NC—We are guilty, which makes us easy pickin’s for those promising relief from the burden, forgiveness and redemption. The sad truth remains that after forgiveness and redemption, nothing changes, we are still guilty. We are guilty by virtue of our participation in the world as it is—the world of normal, apparent, reality. This is a world in which we do not get good enough choices. We are damned if we do and damned if we don’t. To get this, we have to give up that. To do this, we also do that. In this world, good and evil come wrapped up together. Someone’s good is someone else’s evil. If you want to reduce the United States’ dependency upon world oil production JUST DRIVE THE POSTED SPEED LIMIT! The good of reduced dependency is mixed up with the bad of having to slow down. It’s like that everywhere you look. Parenthood, you want to talk parenthood? Marriage, you want to talk marriage? Divorce, you want to talk divorce? Not being a parent or not getting married, you want to talk those things? Good and bad all mixed up together, inseparable, conjoined twins, and we feel guilty, are guilty, for something we can’t do anything about. The solution provides no relief but it enables us to function as fully as possible in a crazy world: We see things as they are and as they also are. We step into our life and we bear the burden of guilt by participation. We make what we consider to be the best choices available to us under the circumstances. We sacrifice what must be sacrificed in the service of what truly needs to be done (Which is not often what we are told needs to be done, what we have been led to believe needs to be done—it is what we determine needs to be done after taking everything into account) and see where it goes. 09/11/2011
37. Lower Cascades, Hanging Rock State Park near Danbury, NC—If you are going to deepen your capacity to live in this world on the basis of the other world, the spiritual world that is the source and ground of normal, apparent reality, you are going to have to do some things differently. You are going to have to trust yourself. This is hard. You don’t have anybody in your life except me telling you to trust yourself. Our life is culturally conditioned to not allow ourselves to trust ourselves. We have to be told what to do when and how. We have to ask permission. We can only think officially approved thoughts and ask officially approved questions. Our lives are based on the authoritative directions and instructions of Those Who Know Best And Must Be Pleased. And no matter how much we may say we don’t like it this way, we love it because it takes the pressure off of us. We don’t have to decide which brand of orange juice to buy, we just buy the one the advertisers succeed in convincing us is the right one to buy. We get our directions and instructions from people who have a vested interest in telling us what to do. And we like it that way because otherwise we would have to decide what to do which would keep us tangled in emotional knots trying to know what to do and be right about it. If you are going to be more spiritual than you are, you are going to have to throw the need to know what to do and be right about it out the window. You are going to have to trust yourself to know what to do and to deal with the fallout when you are apparently wrong about it. The saving grace is that you score even when you are wrong, and use what you learn from that experience in countless ways throughout the rest of your life. Tomorrow’s right is rooted in yesterday’s wrong. Remember that as you plunge into today. 09/12/2011
38. Discordant Harmony, Urban Moonrise, Greensboro, NC—The solutions to our problems with life are found in the experience of our problems with life, not in thinking about the problem, not in devising rational, logical approaches to the problem, but in living with the problem. When we live with a problem with life, the solution emerges, naturally, over time. The solution may not be that we disappear the problem but that we disappear our problem with the problem—not that it goes away but that we adjust to its presence, fold it into our life and are truly okay with our life together with what was the problem. Living with the problem sometimes changes us, sometimes changes the problem, and sometimes changes us and the problem. Experience with the problem enables us to work something out. We grow up. No problem. So, all those things you want solved about your life right NOW? It takes living with them for them to go away—in whatever way that turns out to be. There is no magical solution but. The experience of the problem transforms the problem. That’s right magical in itself. It’s certainly amazing. And we cannot explain what happened or how. Life is a wonder untold, un-tell-able. 09/13/2011
39. Little Deer, Stone Mountain State Park near Roaring Gap, NC—There is the kind of thinking that deepens thinking, enlarges thinking, enables thinking—the kind of thinking thinking is all about—and there is the kind of thinking that stifles thinking, disables thinking, obscures thinking and keeps anything from ever being thought. Faux thinking that pretends to be thinking, puts itself forth as intelligent, and arouses the emotions of the masses is destructive to the democratic process and to the recognition of truth on all levels. “My Country Right Or Wrong!” “Better Dead Than Red!” “Love It Or Leave It!” cut off the conversation and rule out any possibility of the exploration of the issues and any chance of understanding things from a perspective different from the one we keep on a short leash and under close supervision. When a member of the NC House said, in support of the Anti-Gay Marriage Amendment, “Two Dads Don’t Make A Mom,” he diverted a responsible consideration of Gay marriage into a dismal swamp of false assumptions, presumptions, inferences and conjectures. We cannot create a world that is better than the one in which we live without deepening, expanding, enlarging, developing our capacity for envisioning and imagining that world. To say, “The Way We’ve Always Done It, Seen It, Thought About It Is The Way It Ought To Be Done, Seen, Thought About,” slams shut the door to a future that is different from the past, and keeps us all in the caves—in the prison without bars—created by the fear of the world beyond. 09/14/2011
40. Middle Cascade, Hanging Rock State Park near Danbury, NC—I keep working through the sins of omission and commission that were committed against me in my childhood and youth as a way, as the way, of squaring myself with how things are. We have to do that, you know. We cannot just wave it away, pretend it did not happen. It happened. It impacted us, and we have to face the happening and the impact, and say, “Yes. That’s the way it is.” Then we have to say, “And now what?” Aqui estamos. y Ahora que? Here we are, and now what? This puts us in charge. Whatever happens from this point is up to us. We are in charge of the input—What we do and how we do it. The outcome is out of our control but. We are in charge of how we respond to the outcome, what we do and how we do it. At some point, we have to square ourselves up with our life and say, “It’s my life and what I’m doing, I’m doing to myself. “ We can either keep doing what we’re doing or we can stop and do something else instead. We don’t have to respond to what happens in our life the way we have always responded. We write the script we read from. We can rewrite it. No one is going to hand us a different life. If we are going to live differently, it’s all up to us. What are we afraid of? How is what we are doing and how we are doing it an attempt to avoid or pre-vent what we are afraid of? What do we fear? We cannot move beyond being stuck where we are until we face what we fear and trust ourselves to deal with it—to find what we need to deal with it. Those sins of omission and commission in my childhood and youth? They were committed by people who were afraid and were afraid to know what they were afraid of, afraid they didn’t know what to do about it. Facing our fear is the first step in redeeming our life and being alive in the time left for living. 09/14/2011
41. Crabtree Falls near Little Switzerland, NC—Don’t let your principles stand between you and what’s important. Tea Party members are willing to sacrifice themselves and everybody in the country (and world) for No More Taxes. The Tea Party would let us all die if we had no medical insurance, that is, if living meant higher taxes. You can’t let your principles run away with you like that. You have to stand apart from what matters to YOU to serve what matters beyond YOU in the moment of your living. You have to be able to see the situation and make an objective determination regarding what needs to happen in the situation as it arises with everything on the table. Everything. “As long as your feet are under this table, you going to cut your hair short, Young Man!” misses a larger point. Short hair has no connection with character and values and the ability to be who our life is asking us to be. Higher taxes are not the end of life in the universe. Life can actually be served with higher taxes. It isn’t about more money in OUR pocket. It’s about the true good of all. 09/16/2011
42. Urban Sunrise, Wilkesboro, NC—No one ever quit, you could look this up, in love when love was returned and the way of love was open. This is not the time to quit. This is the time to go where the path leads you, with your eyes open and all senses alert and receptive to the delights and pleasures of love. Now make the shift with me from love on the outside, in the external world of normal, apparent reality, to inside and the internal world of the really-though-apparently-not real. Being in love is a psychic phenomenon that is experienced as an external event. It’s all projection, a trick done with blondes and beefcakes (or their close-enough approximation). Being in love is Psyche’s way of waking us up to what is also true, Psyche’s way of saying, “Don’t Quit!” What is also true is that the In Here can be stirred to life by the Out There. The In Here and the Out There can mingle and merge and mate and dance their way into deeper, better, greater stuff than either can manage of its own. And consciousness awakens to the wonder and beauty of the allness of the All and throws itself into the everlasting service of Love, which generally lasts until the in-laws stay for a week or some other aspect of the “real world” bursts the bubble but. The reality of being in love hooks us and pulls us into Life, which we never forget no matter how many times the in-laws come or how long they stay. The trick is to make the shift from outer to inner, and allow the experience of being in love on the outside open for us the possibility of being in love on the inside, with the truth of Psyche-Soul-Self, enlisting ourselves in the service of love, and living to express Out There the truth and beauty of the reality of our love for the In Here—never quitting, regardless of the obstacles or difficulties in our way (any more than we would quit the service of love for the person we love in the external world). Love keeps us going. Love keeps us going in the work of merging the two worlds, integrating, reconciling, marrying, bringing forth the truth of the one in the other. If you are going to be anything, be In Love!
43. Little Switzerland Tunnel near Little Switzerland, NC—We spend our lives putting the pieces together, and putting them back together. Figuring things out. Learning to see things as they are—which is not the same as how we have been told that they are, and certainly not the same as how we wish they were. Adjusting ourselves to our lives as they change again. Amid all the fluctuation and turmoil, we are the constant we seek. WE are the ground, the foundation, the core. No matter how the context and circumstances of our lives whirl and churn, we remain who we are, we continue to do what is ours to do. Who are we? What are we about? If we have ever answered these questions truthfully, authentically, we are set to always answer them truthfully, authentically, no matter what happens to us or how our lives change. Who we are and what we are about is the golden thread—the beam, if you will—running through all conditions and every stage of life. Nothing can happen to us that can take us away from us or remove from us the task of bringing ourselves forth to meet the moment and to offer what is ours to give in each situation as it arises. “It’s a new world, Golda,” and we meet it with the confidence born of the ages, knowing we have what it takes to be who we are and do what is ours to do in every world for as long as there are worlds. Amen! May it be so!
44. Moon Over Greensboro Poster, Greensboro where else, NC—We have to wake up sooner or later. Why put it off? It isn’t going to get any easier. We start the process by realizing we don’t know half of what there is to know and that most of what we think we know is wrong. We don’t know how to wake up. Start there. We don’t know who we are or what we ought to be about. Start there. We don’t know what to do. Start there. See where it leads. 09/18/2011
45. Baxter Creek Bridge, Big Creek Campground, Great Smoky Mountains National Park, NC—We wouldn’t quit as easily as we do if the value of what is ours to do were more closely aligned with what we value, or if we were more clear about what is truly important. It’s the clash of values between the two worlds, visible and invisible, that makes cooperation and collaboration so difficult. The invisible world is much more likely to get off on sunsets and daffodils and really good music and a glass of wine at just the right time than on status and wealth and making a good impression and standing ovations and first place finishes and keeping the rules. In taking up the spiritual quest, path, journey, we are exchanging one value system for another. Spirituality is not a way of getting what we value by “getting God on our side.” What we value is transformed by the process whereby all things become new. We have to understand this or we will quit before quitting time. This is the invisible world’s great fear, that we will quit too soon—that we will not see it through—that we will have eyes for other things and leave the path, turn from the way, and settle for glass beads and silver mirrors, or their modern day equivalent. The invisible world knows that the revolution that integrates the worlds is fueled by those with eyes to see, ears to hear and a heart than understands what is truly important, and live in light of it, in service to it, all their lives long. We are the invisible world’s hope for the reconciliation of the worlds, and its real hope is that we don’t quit before it’s done. 09/19/2011
46. Upper Cascade, Hanging Rock State Park near Danbury, NC—You don’t have to wait until you retire to do more of what you like to do and less of what you don’t like to do. You can start working this aspect of retirement into your present life situation. How much of what you like to do can you work into a day? A week? You owe it to yourself to find out. Let me give you all of the justification you need. Your soul comes to life doing the things it loves to do. My deep hunch is that you love what your soul loves, and that if you start doing more of what you genuinely like to do, your soul is going to benefit all the way. When your soul comes to life, you come to life with it. And, here is the really sweet part, if Joseph Campbell is right when he said, “The influence of a vital person vitalizes,” as you come to life, you are going to be bringing to life those who can be brought to life in your “sphere of influence.” Life is contagious. It’s catching. Start an epidemic beginning immediately. 09/19/2011
47. Hay on Groundhog Mountain, Blue Ridge Parkway near Fancy Gap, VA—We owe it to ourselves to find out if we have anything to be afraid of. At 2 AM we can be afraid of everything. We have to live into our fear, dance with it, wrestle with it and demand the blessing. What we are really afraid of is that we don’t have what it takes to handle what we think we are afraid of. Well. We learn to handle the bad stuff by gaining first-hand experience with it. We do not develop self-confidence by thinking about it. We do not wish it up, cast a spell upon ourselves and step forth all confident and ready for anything. We walk right into our fear and look around for what’s there to be afraid of, and thank it for the gift of learning to deal with it. Courage comes from acting courageously, no matter how frightened we are. The only way to be courageous is to act that way no matter what. 09/20/2011
48. Oil Painting Effect, Garden Creek Baptist Church, Stone Mountain State Park near Roaring Gap, NC—The cold, hard facts of life anchor us in this world and keep us from wandering mindlessly through the airy reaches of that world. We can be grounded in the reality of spiritual truth only to the extent that we are also grounded in the reality of physical truth. We have to pay the bills that we incur being who we are called to be. We have to do what is NOT ours to do (mowing the lawn and vacuuming the house, etc.) while we are doing what IS ours to do (coining phrases and writing these little reflections, etc.). The people who give spirituality a bad name think they don’t have to work for a living or do anything they don’t like to do, or don’t feel like doing, because the universe will take care of them and the Law of Attraction will bring them all the prosperity they can dream of having. Jesus was executed in the service of being who he was, doing what was his to do. That should do it for the friendliness of the universe theory. The facts of this reality save us from the La La Woo Woo aspect of that reality—and from the terrible depths of the unconscious sea that wait impatiently for those without a rudder or moorings (Which we see most clearly in schizophrenia). Spiritual reality does not set aside the facts of physical reality, and as mediators of the two realities, we have to be as much the advocate for physical truth as we are for spiritual truth. This is called, Shirley, you have this down by now, “Walking Two Paths At Once.” The Path is Two Paths. If you think it is only one, it quickly becomes a slippery slope to hell. 09/21/2011
49. Tory’s Den Falls, Hanging Rock State Park near Danbury, NC—This is what spirituality (enlightenment) does for you: It helps you square yourself up with your life and it helps you live with your life as though the invisible world is truer than the visible world but it does not dismiss, discount or diminish the visible world or relieve us of our responsibilities in it and to it. That’s it. It does not give you a leg up, provide you with any advantages, or assure you of prosperity and gain. It enables you to live with what you have to live with, to be alive in the time and place, the here and now, of your living. Period. If you are looking for more than that, you have to go somewhere else. Now, one of the things I find interesting is that in order to be spiritual we have to do what spirituality, spiritual growth, requires and enables us to do, we have to square ourselves up with our lives and live in ways appropriate to the occasion. This is generally not the thing we have in mind. We are forever trying to escape our lives. Our parents aren’t the right kind of parents, our spouse isn’t the right kind of spouse, our kids aren’t the right kind of kids, our dog isn’t the right kind of dog, our job isn’t the right kind of job, our neighborhood isn’t the right kind of neighborhood… It always takes a different, better life. THIS old life will never do. Yet, (Bad news coming) THIS old life is exactly the life we have to square up to if we would be spiritual. We have to come to terms with the way things are here and now and do the work of working with what we have to work with in transforming ourselves and the life we don’t want to live. Our life makes us better people when we “voluntarily participate” (Joseph Campbell’s term) in the work of making it better—and we can’t do it without becoming spiritual. 09/22/2011
50. Heron in Flight, the Bog Garden, Greensboro, NC—There is nothing like the natural world for showing us how things are. Life eats life. Can you say “Yes!” to that with compassion and grace, mercy and peace? If you can, you have what it takes to live amid the stark contradictions and irreconcilable differences that constitute the matrix of our lives. Stand between, say, George W. Bush and Saddam Hussein and offer, “Why can’t we all just get along?” See what it gets you. That’s you and your life. You and your spouse or partner, in-laws, children, boss—you and YOU! Our life is a swirl of discordance and incompatibility, and it is our task to integrate the opposites. To do that we have to bear consciously the pain, anguish, agony of contrariness. We hold in tension contrary truths which cannot co-exist and see where it goes. If you think that’s ridiculous, what does war do for you? 09/22/2011
51. Goose Silhouette, the Bog Garden, Greensboro, NC—We work for stability, for equilibrium, for comfort and security, for a life we can live with and the truth is that we can live with anything. We can rise to any occasion. We just don’t want to. We don’t want to spend our time rising to occasions. We don’t want any occasions. Well. There are plenty of places where no occasions are allowed, where no occasion is ever coming along to overwhelm and disrupt, decimate and destroy. Things have been the same there for as long as there have been people to remember how things are supposed to be done. Life left generations ago but people there still go through the motions of living as though they are alive. Life is so steady and dependable there it’s death, and no one notices. That’s being deader than dead. It takes unpredictable disruption and consternation to bring us to life, to bring to life the question, “Now what?” If we aren’t asking that question from time to time, we’re deader than dead. “Now what?” forces us to grapple with things beyond imagining, requires us to rise to another damn occasion. Life leaps at the opportunity. That’s what life does best, tackling another “Now what?” We want it to be about calm, peace and serenity. Life likes action, loves a good mess, thrills over not knowing what to do next, searching for the way, relishing the wonder of being alive. 09/23/2011
52. Glade Creek Mill, Babcock State Park near Clifftop, WV—Where are the real Republicans? The members of the Grand Old Party? The people who are grounded in the value of integrity, straight from the shoulder talking and living, liberty and justice for all? Why aren’t they calling out these late-comers, these Republican-pretenders, who have usurped the throne? Why aren’t they saying, “THAT is not the way WE do it!” Why is there only deafening silence when the crowd boos a gay soldier serving in Iraq? When the crowd applauds at the idea of a poor person without medical insurance being allowed to die? Why aren’t the real Republicans denouncing the low nature of this brand of humanity? Why aren’t they saying to those who so boo and applaud, and those who would, given the chance, “You should be deeply ashamed—as I am of you, and for you and those like you! I don’t want you voting for me! I don’t want to have anything to do with you! Look at you! Look at your heart, your soul! What does love your neighbor—and your enemy—that is, those who are like you and those who are not at all like you—mean to you? What does do unto others as you would have them do unto you mean to you? What does living in this country with its constitution declaring ‘life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness’ as a foundational right to ALL PEOPLE mean to you? Go home! Look in the mirror until you can see yourself as you are, and do not claim to be a Republican until you can be worthy of the name!” ??? 09/25/2011
53. Spanning the New River Gorge, near Fayetteville, WV—The quality and degree of our spirituality is dependent upon the 10,000 things. Nutrition, for instance, hydration. Fasting can be a spiritual discipline, but when your blood sugar level spikes and dives, you are going to be out-of-sync with all that is good and matters. Same goes for hormonal fluctuation. And for finding our way through life’s deep loses. Spirituality is no smooth path through the impinging necessities and inevitabilities of life. It is not a way of living above it all but in touch with it all. Spiritual development does not disconnect us with the reality of the visible world, but connects us in an ever-deepening way with all things. Life impacts us. We bear consciously the burdens of the time and place of our living. Listen up here: There is no immunity! Spirituality enables us to square up to the how-it-is-ness of life in this world, and to live with it as well as it can be lived with, responding appropriately to, what is being asked of us in the time and place of our living. May it be so with us all! 09/26/2011
54. Two Trees in Big Meadows, Shenandoah National Park, VA – Success is not to be measured by the outcome, the results, the impact of our living. It is enough to be influential in the service of good—to have a hand in the things that matter. Success is measured in the depth and quality of our life—in the degree to which we are alive and joyfully participate in the experience of life and increase the wonder of life in the lives of each other by our presence with one another. Who did we show ourselves to be? How did we do it? Any idiot with a suicide belt and nothing to lose can do great things in the eyes of his or her comrades in arms. What can he/she do without blowing anybody up? What can he/she bring to life through the quality of his/her life? What can you bring to life through the quality of your life? Why not spend the rest of it finding out? 09/27/2011
55. Searching for Whitewater Poster, New River Gorge National River near Fayetteville, WV – You are living successfully, have had a successful life, if you have learned to meet what comes with a fitting response, and when—as will certainly be the case—you revisit what has come and wish you had dealt with it differently, better, having the advantage of distance, maturity and hindsight, you can deal with THAT with a fitting response. Successful living comes down to making fitting responses to our present experience. The more consistently and reliably we do that, the more successfully we are living. Measure the quality of your life in terms of the fitness of the responses you have made, and are making, to the experience of being alive. Improve the degree of your success by improving the quality of your responses. Improve the quality of your responses by being aware of what is happening, externally and internally, and what you do in response, and being aware of what happens next. To change what happens next, change your response to what happened when it happens again. Generally, we do what we do because we are afraid of what will happen if we don’t do it, or if we do something else instead. We owe it to ourselves to find out if we have anything to be afraid of. Do not let your fear seal you into less than fitting responses to the things that happen in your life. Give yourself appropriate things to be afraid of and respond in appropriate ways. In so doing, you create for yourself a number of fine adventures in the time left for living. Amen! May it be so! 09/28/2011
56. Peaks of Otter Poster, Blue Ridge Parkway near Bedford, VA – We strongly influence what happens next by the way we respond to what happened last. We are the fulcrum which shifts the future toward or away from as much good as is possible given the nature of our circumstances. Do not dismiss or discount the importance the present moment has for all future moments of your life and the lives of all those impacted by your life. Don’t throw this moment away! There are no throwaway moments! Cherish the time of your living and live to do right by it! You may have no control but you have endless influence, so live as though you do, and treat this present time as though it is precious because it is—not because you if you do this, that will happen, but because doing this is the most fitting response you can imagine to what has just happened. We do not know what will happen if we do this or where this will lead but. How we live in this moment will generate a certain blessing, grace, momentum, karma that carries us into the next moment. As we build momentum for the good we create life and save the world. Amen! May it be so! 09/29/2011
57. Sunset at Peaks of Otter Poster, Blue Ridge Parkway near Bedford, VA—When a situation has no chance of becoming what you want it to be, or of offering you what you want to have, you make things worse by trying to force what you want to happen. Sometimes, you have to take a deep breath and do what you don’t want to do. This doesn’t mean give up on what you want to happen—it means biding your time. It means waiting things out. When you wait things out, you wait for a shift in your circumstances which opens the way to the realization of what you want. Sometimes, the shift is routine and predictable as when the kids get out of college. At other times it is completely unexpected, as when the Great Depression hit. When the situation does not hold any possibility of what you want to happen, you have to wait for the shift and be ready when it happens. And if it doesn’t happen? Oh well. The consolation prize is that you have shifted yourself through long years of making fitting response to a situation that was not to your liking—which has grown you up and made you much deeper, more humane and valuable to those around you than having what you want could have ever done. Either way, you are better off for having waited and, in the meantime, offered what was needed in the time and place of your living.  09/30/2011
58. Abbott Lake Poster, Peaks of Otter, Blue Ridge Parkway near Bedford, VA—There are four questions we have to answer in the time left for living, really two questions asked two different ways: Who are we? What are we about? What do we need to do? What needs us to do it? These questions take us to the heart of the matter: Our gifts, our proclivities, our genius and the situations in life which call for—and call forth—the very things we have to offer. We spend too much of our time trying to offer what we do not have to give—because everybody says we ought to and because we think we have to in order to be somebody. We have to be who we are—and also are—which is not about perfection but about completion, about harmony, about living in sync with ourselves AND with the situation as it arises, with the here and now, the time and place of our living. What is right for us? What does it mean for us to do right by ourselves AND by the time and place of our living? These are the questions. Don’t let anyone else tell you differently. Answer them and you have it made, as much as any of us can ever have it made. Giant Sequoias have it made, but that’s another story. 09/30/2011
59. Peaks of Otter Sunset Poster, Blue Ridge Parkway near Bedford, VA—Consciousness has its work cut out for it. We do that work by actually being conscious, aware, of every little thing, inside and outside. The problem is that while we are focused on this—the deer, say, that just jumped in front of the car we are driving—we are completely oblivious of that, and that, and that, and all the rest of the 10,000 things. The job cannot be done but. It is our task to do it as well as possible, to be conscious of as much as possible—to be aware of all the things that press in on us from all sides, inside and outside, in each moment. We practice awareness of everything, which includes the ability to look past everything in focusing exclusively on the one thing that must be done right here, right now, exactly as it must be done or else. We are better able to do the one thing if we are able to take all things into account and know what our distractions are, and where they come from, and what unfinished business they call us to take up, explore, experience and put in place. This all takes time and attention, which those who do not understand are apt to label “laying about,” and “not getting anything done.” Which is something else for us to be aware of as we do the work of being conscious of every little thing, and doing what needs to be done about the things that need to be done and putting the rest aside. 10/01/2011
60. Sunset at Abbott Lake Poster, Peaks of Otter, Blue Ridge Parkway near Bedford, VA—It was a magical twenty minutes or so that started with me looking out of the window of our room at the Peaks of Otter Lodge on my way to another glass of wine. Who would have guessed a sunset at the bottom of a bowl? Abbott Lake is surrounded by mountains. I don’t know where you’d go for a horizon. I never considered a sunset possibility but. The clouds were catching the light and turning a little pink here and there. Time for Photo Man! There is a moral here. We walk past miracles every day. We swim through magic. We are awash in unexpected gifts, astounding surprises. You get up for a glass of wine and are kissed by a sunset. Oh, sure, it happens along negative lines as well. We wake up to flat tires. We brush our teeth and tear a rotator cuff. A phone call comes out of the blue and our world changes for the worse just like that but. It also happens along positive lines. Sunsets on the way to the wine. Pay attention. Notice throughout your day the things you don’t see everyday. Be astounded in the grocery store, at the traffic light, washing dishes. Things are happening all around us that are magical, wonderful things, wondering why we don’t notice, applaud. 10/02/2011
61. Sharp Top Mountain Sunset Poster, Peaks of Otter, Blue Ridge Parkway near Bedford, VA—We’re still here. You can’t deny that one. Think of all the things we have been through to be here, now. It’ll take your breath away. If we had known about it beforehand, we would never have given the okay. We would have said hell no I can’t do that—I won’t do that. But. We did it. All of it. Every last minute of it. And here we are. Now, the moral here is that we can do anything. We can find a way. We can wade right into the biggest possible mess and deal with it. We can rise to any occasion. We can do it because we have done it. We have the scars to prove it. I would want all of you on my side in a bar fight. And I would hate to go up against any of you. You have what it takes. I’ve always liked that about you. 10/02/2011
62. Abbott Lake Poster, Peaks of Otter, Blue Ridge Parkway near Bedford, VA—We live to be at one with ourselves. We all have had moments in which that was the case, where we were in sync with ourselves, inner expressed in and revealed by outer, and then it was gone, but the memory lingers. Consciousness exists to get the two worlds together, so that we can be in our outer life as we are in our inner life, so that who we truly are and who we truly need to be might be one. The matrix in which, by which, this becomes possible is compassion. And grace. Living compassionately, graciously, we do not force anything but allow everything as is fitting to the occasion. We do not repress, suppress, hide, deny anything, but find ways of bringing it forth in appropriate ways. Our work here is assisted by keeping two ancient principles in mind: Be True To Yourself and Thou Art That. Living consciously between these two poles brings forth the harmony, the union, we seek with ourselves and between ourselves and the world of other selves. This is how True Human Beings do it. 10/03/2011
63. Black Birch at Rocky Knob, Blue Ridge Parkway near Meadows of Dan, VA—The ideal is symmetry, not one-sided-ness. We are many-sided, multifaceted, and must find a place for all of us at the table, on the path. No one is unwelcome, no aspect of us is uninvited in the work of becoming at one with ourselves, living in sync with ourselves, finding appropriate ways to express who we are and also are within the context and circumstances of our living. It takes all of us to make a whole. So. We have to find the disinherited parts, the fragmented parts, the rejected parts—the parts that were not acceptable to the significant others in our life early on, and hence, unacceptable to us—and reclaim them, honor them, as prodigal children coming home. 10/03/2011
64. Black Birch Poster, Rocky Knob, Blue Ridge Parkway near Meadows of Dan, VA—When you draw a line, someone is going to call you selfish. You can’t draw lines and avoid the selfish charge. And you can’t live the life that is your life to live, that is indicative, expressive of who you are and who you also are without refusing to be who you are not. I come from the Deep South. People in the Deep South spend their time being nice to one another, doing anything to keep from hurting anyone’s feelings, doing everything to not appear to be selfish, being mostly who they are not. The Shadow of the Deep South is the deepest, darkest thing about it. The Shadow is who we also are but deny because we are so concerned about being who we are not. Keeps us from being symmetrical, whole, at one with ourselves and in sync with the life that is our life to live. To be who we are and also are, we can’t waste time and energy being who we are not. We have to draw lines. And take the heat. 10/04/2011
65. Whitewater Poster, New River Gorge National River near Fayetteville, WV—If we discount the possibility of communion with Soul and the place of Soul as a guiding, sustaining, principle in our life, we are left with the responsibility of deciding for ourselves what to do with our lives—straight out of the left hemisphere of our brain—without the consultation and collaboration with Soul whispering to us from the right hemisphere. We can’t be more alone than that. 10/04/2011
66. Fall Fern at Big Meadows, Shenandoah National Park, VA—It’s all such a mess I don’t see how anyone could give any credence to the idea of intelligent design. The intelligence is evident and at work in taking this squirming spaghetti bowl of interests, motives, moods, dispositions, aims, urges, incentives, aspirations, fears, etc. and aligning it all in ways that not only make sense but also are strikingly beautiful. We are still creating order out of chaos. It’s what we do. It’s what life does. We bring meaning to life through the associations we make throughout the experience of being alive. This is intelligence at work in our life. It’s called waking up. Enlightenment. Realization. It is religion at its best because it stands us at the brink of the Great Unknown and brings forth the WOW! of amazement at the allness of it all and our place in it. Which we, of course, reduce to something quite manageable and inane with our explanations and interpretations—robbing life of its mystery and wonder and proving there is nothing we cannot cheapen, degrade and empty of all value. This is the opposite of intelligence at work in our lives. Call it stupidity. We stand between the creative powers of God and, well, the most tasteless, tacky town you can think of. Please, let’s not settle for pancake houses and half-pound blocks of fudge, exclaiming, “Ain’t this the life, though!” 10/05/2011
67. Summer Panorama, Blowing Rock, NC—We want to figure it out and know what’s next and what’s after that and where it’s all going and what it means and what’s in it for us and who’s on first. Our left hemisphere wants to run our life. Tell it to sit down and shut up. The purpose of meditation is to force our left hemisphere to sit down and shut up so that our right hemisphere might have a chance at us. There’s a lot of good stuff in our right hemisphere. It is the receptor/source of amazing things, and would, if it could get our attention, lead us on the path of life, to life, knowing, as it does, what life is all about. Give your left hemisphere the task of learning about the right hemisphere. That should keep it busy for a while. 10/05/2011
68. First Photo of Fall 2011, Bass Lake, Blue Ridge Parkway near Blowing Rock, NC—Take the Ten Commandments. Who is to say? Who is to say when you’ve killed somebody? My father killed my mother’s spirit. That should count, even though she has outlived him by thirty years. Who is to say when you’ve gone and done any of the things the Ten Commandments say don’t do? And why only those ten? Think of the things that didn’t make the list. Thou Shalt Not Be Stupid. How about that for one?  How is it we get by with being stupid, which is what most highly religious people are who carefully keep the Ten Commandments and treat the people around them in shameful, much less than loving ways? So, throw them all away. Replace the lot of them with two simple rules for life: Live together in good faith and do right by everyone including yourself. That should do it. 10/05/2011
69. You cannot figure it out all at once. Write it down. Refer to it often. Don’t even try. There are no black footprints to where you are going. You make the footprints as you go, and the winds of time blow them away so that going back is like going forward—you don’t KNOW how to do either, and must do something even if it is nothing. Start with paying attention, with being aware. It is the cumulative impact of living that leads us to know what’s what, how things are and also are, and what needs to be done about them in the time and place of our living—to live appropriately in each situation as it arises. You cannot plot these things out. You bring them forth. And are amazed that you could do anything so wonderfully right. Were does that come from? Depths you cannot begin to plum. Trust them to be there, providing what you need. And put yourself in position to need what they offer. My gift to you is, well, you.
70. First Light on Grandfather Mountain, Price Lake, Blue Ridge Parkway near Blowing Rock, NC—A favorite saying among flight attendants going through their pre-flight instructions is, “Shift happens.” This is also the heart of spiritual dogma. Shift happens! Be ready for it! Look forward to it! Believe in it! If you are going to believe anything, believe “Shift happens!” There are situations without end that have no solution. We have to wait for the shift to happen. The shift transforms the situation so that solution becomes unnecessary. Carl Jung said, “Some problems have no solution. We have to out-grow them.” When we out-grow a problem, a shift happens. This means that it’s a waste of time to try to force something to happen before its time. We get out of bed each day and go to war, compelling here, pushing there, wrestling our will into being over there. What? Is our life any better for it? Here’s a different approach: In situations that defy solution, simply hold your ground. Maintain the tension. Keep the situation “in solution.” Oppose all quick fixes, or any fixes. Be the fly in the ointment. Keep everything stirred up. And keep an eye out for the shift. Shifts cannot be predicted, they can only be recognized. When the shift happens, pounce! Go with the shift! See where it goes! It’s all about seeing where it goes, you know. The plan for the rest of your life is wait for the shift to happen and shift with the shift. 10/08/2011 
71. Early Light Panorama, Price Lake, Blue Ridge Parkway near Blowing Rock, NC—I want to be living toward the best end I can imagine when the end comes. I don’t what to be just hanging out, killing time, waiting for the end to come, wondering what’s taking so long. I want to be living as though there is no end. I want to be completely surprised when it comes. I want to be using the time between now and the Great Surprise in the work of bringing myself forth into the world of time and space as though I might be surprised in the next 30 seconds and there is no time to waste on frivolous matters because I have bigger fish to fry. I want to fry the right fish. 10/08/2011
72. Color Line, Price Lake, Blue Ridge Parkway near Blowing Rock, NC—I don’t know how many perspectives there are, or how many tripod positions. Each of us is probably good for several million. Add that up and the number gets unwieldy. We should try to walk around with that number written on a piece of paper in our pocket as a way of keeping our strong feelings and absolute convictions in, well, perspective. 10/08/2011
73. Hand-in-Hand, Bass Lake, Blue Ridge Parkway near Blowing Rock, NC—Adjusting ourselves to the time and place of our living and offering to the moment what is needed in the moment out of what we have to give to the moment—this is to live well upon the earth. All the flap is about getting what we want. What does wanting know? You can’t ride the horse called Wanting to a destination that is good for your soul. It will never arrive, for one thing. It will trot by something else it wants on the way to what it wants and it’s off on a new chase, only to be detoured by something else it wants. We have to sit down with our wanting and have a heart-to-heart, well, okay, heart-to-heartless-passion, with it. “Look,” we have to say, “You want every bright, shiny, plastic thing that comes along. I can’t trust you to know what’s what and what to do about it. So. I’m going to have to listen to another guide.” But what’s another guide? We are so attached to wanting to tell us what to do, we don’t know any other guides. We don’t know there is another guide. Well. We know about the other voices. The Invisible World is packed with voices—our Mom’s voice and our Dad’s, the Judging Critic’s voice, the Pleading Dependent Helpless Victims voice (You know the one: “You can’t leave me! Help me! Don’t do anything for yourself! I need you!”), and however many more there are. Filter out the voices, looking, listening, for the Inner Guide, your Self, the True Human Being within. And pray for the courage to do what you will then know needs to be done. 10/09/2011
74. Out for a Drink, Price Lake, Blue Ridge Parkway near Blowing Rock, NC—What moves you? Move closer to it. See where it goes. We’re always putting what moves us on the back burner until it’s convenient to “get around to it.” It is never quite convenient enough. Soul is shouting at us, jumping up and down, waving its little hands in our face, doing everything it can to get our attention, and we are off in another world, chasing after what we think it will take to make us happy. Look. Happiness is not about getting. It is about doing. Doing what we are built to do. Doing what is ours to do in the time left for living. Doing what moves us. Convenient or not. 10/09/2011
75. And a Beaver Swam By, Price Lake, Blue Ridge Parkway near Blowing Rock, NC—After you achieve understanding, attain enlightenment, and know all there is to know about spiritual reality, you still have to translate it into how you live your life. The practice only deepens, expands. You never graduate, or retire. You have to be with every moment, and allow the moment to be different from the way you want it to be, and allow the moment to show you what it needs, and allow the moment to teach you what you the next lesson in wholeness, compassion and how to be a True Human Being. Practice takes knowing to new levels.
76. Blue Ridge Sunrise, Thunder Hill Overlook, Blue Ridge Parkway near Blowing Rock, NC—What is not-right about your life? Be clear about it. Make a list. Add to it as needed. Do the same thing with what is right about your life. We know what is right and what is wrong about our life the way we know anything is right or wrong. Aspects of our life resonate with us. Other aspects irritate, exasperate, us. Notice, note, do not dismiss or discount the experience or right and wrong. Where you must, consciously accommodate the wrong. Where you can, move away from it. Reduce the amount of time you spend with it. Change your life to reduce the wrong and increase the right. Do more of what is right and less of what is wrong. And when you find yourself stuck with what is mostly wrong, compensate yourself well. Find ways of rewarding yourself for living with what is wrong about your life. Know, though, that it is wrong. Do not let them convince you that you are wrong about what is wrong, that the problem is with you. You have to be your own advocate, your own champion, when you are surrounded by those who would separate you from you and destroy the spirit that is the source and goal of life. Integrity is being one with heart and soul—oneness of being. Integration is our work. We must live toward who we are, and express who we are in the way we live our life. We must live toward what is right for us and away from what is wrong for us. This is the imperative that operates within and beyond all categories and circumstances: Know thyself! To thine own self be true! Amen! May it be so! 10/10/2011
77. Linville Cove Viaduct, Blue Ridge Parkway near Linville, NC—There are toxic places where we have no business being. One of those places may be our family of origin. The Buddha couldn’t go home again, abandoning the royal palace for a rice bowl and a thatched hut. Jesus asked, “Who is my mother? Who are my brothers and sisters?” Can be a problem, finding where we belong, a place that is not toxic to our souls. But, we don’t have to be burdened with the effort to make ourselves fit in everywhere. We won’t fit in lots of places. Recognize it early on and let it be, because it is. The people who are family are the people who receive us well and don’t try to make us into who they think we ought to be. I’ve posted the “Ground Rules for A Community of Innocence” on my blog site: http://outlandspress.blogspot.com/  Check it out if you are interested in my idea of the kind of place that would be the right kind of place to be. If you can’t find one, create one. Call it your new home. 10/10/11
78. Used in Short Talks on Contradiction, etc., Price Lake Panorama, Julian Price Memorial Park, Blue Ridge Parkway near Blowing Rock, NC—If you can consciously maintain the tension of your own contradictions long enough, a shift will occur, and what appears to be mutually exclusive tendencies will become distinctive features capable of being integrated into the wonder of a True Human Being. That would be you. 10/10/2011
79. Beaver’s Been Here, Price Lake, Blue Ridge Parkway near Blowing Rock, NC—The shift that is the ground (Great image, right? Shifting ground. How’s that for a foundation? Well. That’s the way it is. Get used to it) of spiritual development occurs on both inner and outer levels. An internal shift happens as we grow up. Growing up is a shift. Everything is transformed though nothing may change, but the transformation changes everything. Since we are forever growing up (No one is ever all grown up. The minute you think you are, that Sister—you know the one I mean—or that Brother comes for a visit. And we see again how far we have to go), we are forever shifting our perspective and changing the way we live in response to the way things are. The shift is external as well. We lose our job, someone we love dies, our own diagnosis is a shocker… The possibilities are endless. External shifts generally require internal shifts. We grow up in response to our circumstances—against our will, I might add. No one ever volunteers to grow up. Can’t do it. We are drafted, conscripted, into growing up. It’s never our idea. “Oh, I think I’ll grow up today.” We can do all of the spiritual reading, discussing, note taking, list making, we can stomach but it won’t make any changes in our lives until we have to apply what we have learned in a real-time situation when something shifts and our life takes an unwanted turn. So, embrace your unwanted turns and mine them for the gold, rising to the occasion and becoming who you are capable of being, against your will. 10/11/2011
80. Fall Woods Panorama, Blue Ridge Parkway near Linville, NC—This photo is a reward for persistence and perseverance, walking through the North Carolina version of Chinese Water Torture, rain that does not cease ever—Occasionally I am stopped by sadness for the plight of living things. Not just me and you with our struggles and burdens, but the broken-winged goose and the duckling excommunicated from the hatch, swimming alone for some unforgiven sin. The world-wide victims of the War Against Women, robbed of life and soul by men who have neither. The sway-back old horse standing in a pasture of Golden Rod and Iron Weed and the cold drizzle of October, with colder drizzles coming, no shelter in sight. I have begun a list without end, all needing a break, a kind word, an act of grace. All gathering themselves as they are able to meet another day, without hope, going nowhere fast or slow, what’s the difference where they live, unnoticed, unknown, on their own with a life that is more of a curse than a gift. I bow to them all, honoring them for living on, one-eyed or blind, spongy hooved and lame, living on, living on. We, on the other hand, have an opportunity to create a community of innocence for the mutual support and encouragement of the members of the community. We do not have to bear life’s deliveries alone. We can ask, “How are you?” and listen. Compassionate witnesses make all things bearable through their presence that sees and knows and does not turn away. May we do at least that much for one another and all others, sharing as we do the plight of living things. 10/11/2011
81. Crabtree Falls, Blue Ridge Parkway near Little Switzerland, NC—Fold it in. Let it be because it is but don’t make more of it than needs to be made. You have bigger fish to fry. So let this become a part of your background, your gestalt, your sitz im leben, and allow it to open you even more to the way things are that have to be taken into account, considered, as you bring forth your art, your work, to bless and grace the world and all that is therein. This too, this too, becomes grist for the mill, shifting—that word again—our orientation, perspective. Enlarging our experience, deepening our sensitivity, expanding our field of vision, making us—against our will—more human in our being and a better friend to those who need one with our developing brand of softness and practicality. “If the situation calls for a bunt, you bunt—I don’t care if you do think of yourself as a home run king. So stop your grousing and complaining and play the game as the game needs you to play it!” That’s good friend talk. None of this, “Oh poor thing. That mean old coach won’t let you do what you do best. No one understands you like I do. Let’s build a little Pity House together and I’ll take care of you.” Bunt when a bunt is called for and stop trying to force your way in situations that need a different approach. Develop your knack for character acting and be what is needed regardless of who and how you want to be. 10/11/2011
82. Linn Cove Viaduct, Blue Ridge Parkway near Linville, NC—You’ll feel better if you drink enough water and eat enough of the right kinds of things to keep your blood-sugar level in line. And exercise. Eating, drinking and exercising. Jim’s three step plan for improving your mood and your outlook. Want to get crabby quickly? Ignore Jim. 10/12/2011
83. Used in Short Talks On Contradiction, etc., On Grandfather Mountain, Grandfather Mountain State Park near Linville, NC—Learn as much as you can about everything. Be as curious as you can be about everything. Embrace the contradictions. Don’t say, “This cannot be true if that is true.” Just keep the contradictions in mind. Be curious about the contradictions, and see where your curiosity takes you. You may get to a place where you see how this and that can be true, and understand that “all our dichotomies may be false dichotomies.” Wouldn’t that be something? But even if that does not turn out to be the case, do not, whatever you do, settle down with one way of seeing, thinking, believing, feeling, doing. If you cannot embrace, at least be conversant with, a number of ways of seeing, etc. The larger the number, the better. Life keeps coming at you, and the larger your repertory of ways to think about and deal with life, the better your chances of negotiating your way through the complexities of existence. The larger your perspective, the more options you have. Keep working to expand, enlarge, deepen your perspective and your life will thank you for it—and things will come together in amazing ways.  10/13/2011/
84. On Grandfather Mountain, Grandfather Mountain State Park near Linville, NC—There are six elements at work in making a photograph: Subject, Setting, Light, Composition, Focus and Exposure. It’s the photographer’s task to work out the right ratios. Get these six things right and you have a wall-worthy photograph. 10/13/2011
85. Davidson River Fall, Pisgah National Forest near Brevard, NC—The most important thing you can do is ask questions. Inquire about everything. When someone gives you an answer, or even better, THE answer, see what questions THE answer raises. Ask them. Questions aren’t for answering but for wondering about, for keeping aloft like hot air balloons to see where they take you. Questions are the path to seeing all things new—with new eyes—because you inquired about them in ways no one had ever considered, or dared to. Questions open us to a future that is bigger and better than anything the answers could ever provide. See how many questions you can ask in a day. Break the record each tomorrow. 10/13/2011
86. Holding Nothing Back, Pisgah National Forest near Brevard, NC—Why hold anything back? Why sit on red or yellow, or on whatever their equivalent in you is? Why not just BE who you are, OFFERING what you have to give? Oh, wait. They may not like it. Right? Hmmm. These guys better tone down the red, reduce the yellow. Might be too much. Somebody might not like it. The trees are laughing, you know—at the very idea of allowing the Color Police keep them from being up front and out there with who they are and what’s theirs to give. The angel asked Mary if she was up to birthing what was hers to give. “Sure am,” she said, or words to that effect. “Sure am,” say the trees of fall. What say we? 10/13/2011
87. Little River, DuPont State Forest near Brevard, NC—The truth is the bed you sleep in every night. The truth is the world you wake up to every day. The truth is how you respond to your experience in that world. The truth is what keeps you going. What holds you up. What grounds you, centers you, focuses you. What sees you through. What you turn to when you have nowhere else to turn. That’s the truth. All of that is the truth. It helps to be conscious of it. To square up to it. To know what’s what and what you can count on and where the places are that restore your soul and who the people are who can help you along the way. 10/14/2011
88. High Falls, DuPont State Forest near Brevard, NC—We can’t be authentic if we can’t be vulnerable. We can’t be vulnerable if we aren’t safe. If we start out in an unsafe environment, it is very difficult for us to believe that any environment can be safe, so we are afraid we are not safe even when we are. So, in comes courage. You will remember, I’m sure, the story of the Wizard of Oz and where the Lion got courage—from acting courageously! It’s all circular and paradoxical with me—Shirley, you know that by now! Everything hinges on our acting courageously. At some point, we just have to take a deep breath and go—and trust ourselves to deal with the consequences. Amen! May it be so! 10/15/2011
89. Blue Ridge Sunrise Panorama, Thunder Hill Overlook, Blue Ridge Parkway near Blowing Rock, NC—My grandparents on my father’s side, Silas and Sophie, have become over time for me a married pair of Taoist priests. They were lovingly able to take everything in stride. They laughed a lot, embraced life in its fullness, said yes more often than no and blessed everyone who came their way with kindness and grace and a perspective that saw past the apparent, beyond the obvious, and took more into account than met the eye. I didn’t realize then what a gift I had been given, but it has become increasingly valuable, and is now one of my most prized possessions. And the joy is that there are, and have always been, people like Silas and Sophie all over the world, counterbalancing the craziness and offering solace and peace to all who know them. May we all know someone like that and become someone like that in the time left for living! Amen! May it be so! 10/15/2011
90. Trail to Triple Falls, DuPont State Forest near Brevard, NC—Everybody has a different way of seeing things, of sensing what is important, of saying what the truth of their life is and what to do about it, in response to it. Everybody has a different gift, a different art, a different genius and a different way of bringing it forth as a blessing and a grace for everybody else. We get to the way we think by putting the way everything has ever been thought by everybody on the table and walking around the table, considering the table, wondering what to make of the table, until the way we think about it becomes clear. We cannot hurry thinking the way we think and not the way someone else wants us to think, tells us to think. We grow into it over time. We start by having thoughts before we realize we’ve had them. So, we have to start paying attention to our thoughts in order to know when one comes along that we haven’t heard from somewhere else—that isn’t already on the table. It’s hard to believe that anyone can think a thought that hasn’t been thought, but it happens all the time. New thoughts are always popping into our heads. We have to recognize them for what they are and think about them to see if we think they are worth thinking. If they are, we think about them some more and see where thy lead, which, of course, is always to other thoughts that aren’t on the table, and probably to a life we have not thought about living. And a new world opens before us. This is called having bigger fish to fry. We all do, you know. 10/16/2011
91. Used in Short Talks On Contradiction, etc., Cedar Rock Falls, Pisgah National Forest near Brevard, NC—We cannot wake anyone up, including ourselves, but. We can delay being awakened indefinitely so. In order to assist our awakening, we have to stop working against it. We have to stop thinking we are awake. We have to stop clutching so tightly the truth we have been told is true. We have to start looking for what else is true—searching out the polarities, the contradictions, the contraries, the opposites—and live deliberately within the tension of mutually exclusive realities. We have to square up to our lives, to the way things are and the way things also are—which is the way things are. We have to do what can be done about what needs to be done in each situation as it arises and let that be that. We have to wait for the shifts and stop trying to force our way, to will our way, upon our life and the lives of others. We have to sit longer and walk more slowly. We have to see what we are looking at and look at everything. We have to hear what we are listening to and listen to everything. We have to act when the time for acting comes upon us “like a thief in the night.” We have to stop waiting for everything—or anything—to make sense. We have to trust ourselves to deal with whatever comes our way and stop trying to arrange to have only the things we want to deal with come our way. We have to look closer at the things that catch our eye. We have to move toward the things that move us. And see where it goes. 10/17/2011
92. On Grandfather Mountain, Grandfather Mountain State Park near Linville, NC—The center we seek is our own sense of direction, our own knowing, our own grasp of what has value, our own recognition of what is important. We seek to resonate with ourselves, with our own apprehension of where life is to be found, how life is to be lived. We seek to know what we know and to live in ways which honor that and reflect it in the time left for living. Don’t be thinking it’s “out there,” or “over there.” Running away from the center is no way to find the center, except that when we are worn out from running, there it is. 10/17/2011
93. On Stone Mountain, Stone Mountain State Park near Roaring Gap, NC—We find our way with only “Yes” and “No,” Right” and “Wrong” to work with. The trick is knowing when to say “Yes” and when to say “No.” Right is not always what we have been told is right. Wrong is not always what we have been told is wrong. Puts a different light on things when we cannot trust what Those Who (Think They) Know Best know—when we have to “judge for ourselves what is right” (That’s one of the never-quoted sayings of Jesus, by the way: “Why don’t you judge for yourselves what is right?”). We have to take the situation into account and determine what is happening there—what is trying to happen—and how we might assist it, then have the courage to go where we think we are being led. And then deal with the situation that arises from that decision in the same way, assessing and acting to the best of our ability. Now, I know there are those who would stoutly protest that “Scripture alone is the infallible and all-sufficient guide for faith and practice!” Well. What made slavery wrong? It wasn’t Scripture. Scripture was used for generations to justify and condone the institution of slavery. What made the subjugation of women wrong? It wasn’t Scripture. Scripture was used—and is still used—to justify the second, or third, class status of women. What made child labor wrong? It wasn’t Scripture. The list is long of things that are clearly, morally, wrong that Scripture was/is used to justify and sustain. Which puts us back to standing before a situation and listening deeply for what needs to happen there, and having the courage to do it—no matter what the weight of public opinion might be. Growing up happens or happens not in this way. May we all be always growing up! 10/18/2011
94. Two Barns Two Horses, near Etowah, NC—If we own a piano because we love to play the piano and not because we love the idea of owning a piano, the piano is a tool, not a prop. If we own a sail boat because we love to sail and not because we love the idea of owning a sail boat, the boat is a tool, not a prop. If we own a camera because we love to take photographs and not because we love the idea of looking like a photographer, the camera is a tool, not a prop. Our tools bring us forth, enable us to do the work of unfolding ourselves in our lives, of being who we are in the time left for living. Props help us pretend to be who we are not. I think we should buy tools, not props. Of course, it will wreck the economy. Vive la Revolution! 10/18/2011
95. Blue Ridge Parkway as it skirts Grandfather Mountain near Linville, NC—How alive can we be in the time left for living? We owe it to ourselves to find out. One way to begin is to spend more time with what we like and less time with what we don’t like and see where it goes. We let ourselves be talked out of what we like and into what we don’t like too easily. We shouldn’t just hand ourselves over to our circumstances. We do have to put ourselves in indefinite suspension for the sake of some circumstances—but not for all of them, not for every one of them! We have to see to it that we get the same degree of compassionate consideration from ourselves as everybody else in our life. We have to be our own advocate, our own champion, looking out for our own interest. I don’t know you as well as I would like to but I know that you don’t have enough people in your life looking out for your interest, and I know you certainly have to be one of them. So, start with what you like and do more of it as a way of reviving yourself, bringing yourself back to life. The people who have been sapping life away from you may think you’re being selfish, but the world will benefit more from  your living than from your dying. You certainly will. See how alive you can be in the time left for living. 10/19/2011
96. Julia Lake Panorama, B/W, Oil Painting Effect, DuPont State Forest near Brevard, NC—We are to realize our distinctiveness, our individuality, and integrate it—reconcile it—with everyone else’s. NOT merge it with or disappear it into everyone else’s! “We are all One, but not the same one!” The trick is to be who we are in relationship with those who are being who they are—to “Define ourselves while staying in touch.” We can’t do it without compassion for ourselves and each other.
97. Black and White Panorama, Pisgah Inn, Blue Ridge Parkway near Brevard, NC—Everything I have to say is a derivative of this: Think of what you love with all your heart and do it with all your heart and see where it goes.—That’s what I have to say. Your heart is a guide to the associations that lead you where you need to go. One thing leads to another. You may start cutting out paper dolls in the attic like you did when you were a child and that may lead you to the store to buy more paper and something might catch your eye on isle 11 that you had forgotten about loving but now you have to make a lemon meringue pie and before you know it you are planting Giant Sequoia seeds in Northern California. This is how it works. You don’t think your way to planting Giant Sequoia seeds in Northern California. You live your way there. And that isn’t the end of the line. It’s just a way-stop to counting hawks as they migrate through Virginia. You follow your heart wherever it goes AND take care of your responsibilities and duties that  you pick up along the way, spouses or partners and kids and pets and car notes and house payments—and you work it out. You work all of it out, and that’s it. That’s how it works. Everything else I ever say is going to be an off-shoot of this. This is all there is to say. Get it and you got it. 10/19/2011
98. Used in Short Talks On Contradiction, etc., Linn Cove Viaduct, Blue Ridge Parkway near Linville, NC—We have to do the work. The spiritual journey is the Hero’s Journey is work. This is not a matter of understanding the “plan of salvation,” memorizing the catechism or the Books of the Bible in Order, naming the disciples and getting Sunday School pins for perfect attendance our whole life long. This is about waking up, being awake, aware, alive. This is about seeing things as they are and as they also are, living consciously with the contradictions, knowing what needs to be done in the situation as it arises even though it may not be what anyone else thinks needs to be done and doing it. It’s about living in the service of our art, our gift, our genius. It’s about moving in the direction of that which calls our name, which catches our eye, which announces itself to us as that which is ours to do. It’s about knowing what our business is and what it is not—what we have no business doing. It is about separating ourselves from our wants, wishes and feverish desires in order to do what is ours to do in the moment of our living—and doing what it takes to know what is ours to do whether we want to or not. It is about trusting ourselves to find what we need to do what needs to be done in every circumstance of life. Even Bilbo Baggins has a Bilbo Baggins, sometimes internally, sometimes externally. It is about living the life that is ours to live regardless of the payoff or the outcome every day for the rest of our life. Starting now. 10/20/2011
99. Davidson River, Pisgah National Forest near Brevard, NC—Don’t think it is easy or fun doing what you love to do. What you love is “a harsh task master” “planting where it doesn’t plow and reaping what it didn’t sow.” It will beat you to death but. It will resurrect you from the dead. It is a wonder that cannot be duplicated by the lights and action of Gay Paree. Photography, for example, will require you to get up before sunrise and drive for an hour or more to be ready for the sun to come up thirty minutes before it’s due, because sunrises are not about sunrises. They are about the show that happens about thirty minutes before the sun rises. Once you see the sun, it’s pretty much over. The reverse is true of sunsets. It’s about twenty minutes after the sun goes down that the show starts. You have to wait. You have to get there early and wait. And, you can’t tell what the sky will be like two hours before sunrise so you have to “go to know.” You can’t be a photographer without being there. Early. And waiting. Every time. You begin to think you don’t love it after a while. And then, nothing sells. You can’t make a house payment selling photos. You can’t even feed the dog. At this point you realize you have to love it. No one would do this if he, if she, didn’t love it. So you get out of bed and step into the cold of the wee morning hours and go. You go whether you want to or not, feel like it or not, are in the mood for it or not. Doing what you love to do is not always doing what you want to do. So don’t get all romanical on me and think I’m selling La La Land here. You’ll hate me for it after a while. Stay with it. It’s your life. Your ticket to being fully, wonderfully, alive. Which is something Gay Paree can’t touch. 10/20/2011
100. On Grandfather Mountain Panorama, Grandfather Mountain State Park near Linville, NC—We think our work, our talent, our gift, our genius, our art, our calling, our mission—call it what you will—should pay off. We think, “What good is a gift/art/talent if you can’t make money with it?” With us, money is the living end. We don’t understand yet that money is the means with which we buy the tools to do our work, express our gift, make our art. Money is no good whatsoever if it does not go into deepening, expanding, enlarging our ability to do what is ours to do. What’s the first thing people do when they become rich? They stop working. They “travel.” Their art goes to hell and their life with it. Listen to me: Our life is our art, our work, our calling. Take that away from us and we have nothing. Our eyes take on that Little Orphan Annie look and we wander around wondering what’s the point. We never wonder what’s the point when we are engaged in bringing our gift to life. The point then is that we are alive in the fullest possible sense, gripped by a passion for what we are doing. You can’t buy that with lots of money. So, forget about your talent paying off. Serve your talent without demanding that it pay off. The pay off is the joy you derive from doing what is yours to do. You can’t buy that with money, and it’s yours for nothing. It’s a by-product of doing what we love. If we do that, it will be well with our soul. 10/20/2011
101. On Grandfather Mountain, Grandfather Mountain State Park near Linville, NC—We are to get on the horse named My Heart’s True Love and ride her wherever she takes us, doing whatever we can do with our heart truly in it, and see where it goes. It is not our place to “do something with it.” It is not our place to “make something come of it.” It is not our place to steer the horse to fame and fortune. Fame and fortune are grossly over-rated. Nothing comes more quickly between us and our heart’s true love, or blocks us more completely from immersing ourselves in our heart’s true love and expressing it in our life. The idea of making a profit kills the joy of the experience, and we suddenly have to make production and be concerned with market share and all that is involved therein. The horse lives out her life penned in the pasture while we worry about dying. Interesting, isn’t it, that the people who worry about dying are the people who have been dead most of their lives. The people who are alive are thinking about living, not dying. They are riding their horse through the wide open range, not knowing where it’s going, loving every minute. Get on your horse! Enjoy the ride! 10/21/2011
102. Price Lake Framed, Julian Price Memorial Park, Blue Ridge Parkway near Blowing Rock, NC—If you can’t think of anything you love with all your heart—if there is nothing you can think of that you can do with all your heart—think of the last time you did something with all your heart and do it. See where it leads. Your heart is dying to give itself to the thing, or things, it loves, and you are disconnected from the experience of heart-full-ness, so you have to re-establish connections. You have to prove to your heart that you can be trusted with its desires. It won’t take your word for it. It has been disappointed too many times. You have to display your good faith in the matter of knowing what your heart loves and serving its desires with what remains of your life, never mind what you think about this whole business. You are here because something isn’t working about your life. What you think hasn’t done it for you. Thinking, reasoning and logic have brought you to this point. Heart is your only hope. You have to trust yourself to your heart but. For your heart to reveal itself to you, it has to trust you to do right by it so. You have to display your willingness to do anything to reconnect with your heart and serve its desires. So if the last thing you did with all your heart was play baseball and you are too old to do that now, go to a baseball game. If you can’t get a World Series ticket, make plans to go to Spring Training. And carry them out. See where it leads. You have to make a good faith effort to place yourself under your heart’s tutelage. This is your work, believing that your heart knows what it is doing and allowing your heart to direct your life. And if “heart” is too much of a ridiculous concept for you, think “right hemisphere of your brain.” Trust it. Connect with it. And live in its service. You could do worse. You’ve done worse. You have nothing to lose. 10/21/2011
103. Used in Short Talks On Contradiction, etc., Fall Medley, Leaves and Pond Scum, Bog Garden, Greensboro, NC—Two primary principles of spiritual development—and to be more accurate, it’s conscious development. Our spirit is already developed, and waits on the rest of us, namely our left hemisphere, to catch up—are: “See where it goes” and “Work it out.” In seeing where it goes, we trust ourselves to the guidance of our right hemisphere without having a plan, a map, a guidebook, a compass and an itinerary in hand. In working it out, we pile all of the contraries, opposites and contradictions on the table and go about the business of reconciliation, of integration—of holding the mutually exclusive options in conscious tension without relaxing it in favor of either pole—until the shift occurs (The Shift is another principle of conscious development) and then we see where it goes. This is all very intense work with consciousness and unconsciousness, with the left and right hemispheres, and WE have to do it. There are no catechisms to memorize, no doctrines to believe, no plan of salvation to comprehend. There is just seeing where it goes and working it out. People who want an easier way opt out of being alive in favor of being comfortably dead, spiritually/consciously speaking. 10/22/2011
104. Blue Ridge Vista, Blue Ridge Parkway near Mt. Mitchell, NC—There are so many distractions, diversions, it’s no wonder we lose focus, forget to ask the grounding questions: Who am I? What am I about? What is my business here and now? What is happening and what needs to happen in this situation? How might I respond to it in ways that are helpful and are authentically ME? 10/22/2011
105. Used in Short Talks On Contradiction, etc., Nag’s Head Sunrise, Nag’s Head NC—All we need is a sounding board. Everything else is built in. A sounding board helps us hear what we have to say—provides us with a reflective surface by which we can see who we are (and also are)–helps us know what we know—grounds us, centers us in ourselves so that we might remember who we are and what we are about and follow the guidance of our innate sense of direction to where we need to go, to what we need to do. The key characteristic of a sounding board is that it cares about us without having a vested interest in us. It has nothing at stake in us—nothing to gain or lose by virtue of its relationship with us. It exists to help us find the way that is truly our way and not its way for us. It simply listens to us until we can hear ourselves, identify our conflicts and contradictions, and find our way to our way. May we always have the sounding boards we need to find what we need to do what needs to be done and do it. 10/23/2011
106. Bodie Island Sunset, Cape Hatteras National Seashore near Nag’s Head, NC—If we are serving our art, talent, gift, genius, daemon, heart, calling—call it what you will—everything else will fall into place. One of those things is you. You fall into place. Your priorities shift (that word again). Your idea of what matters most shifts. You shift. And everything else shifts as well. The world serves you serving your art. Not so that serving your art is a technique for getting the world to serve you and give you what you want. You give up getting what you want when you take up serving your art. You want to serve your art. Period. What you get is what you get—and it’s okay. It’s just fine. Really. Because you are serving your art and what do you care about anything else? Your art is IT. Then the world serves you serving your art, but not in a way that onlookers would be impressed with. It isn’t a selling point to serving your art. It’s a by-product that impresses only you serving, as you are, your art. But, it’s something to watch for, expect, be impressed by—the world serving you, things falling into place, everything falling into place. That’s something when seen from the standpoint of your new perspective.  10/24/2011
107. Ocracoke to Cedar Island Ferry, Cape Hatteras National Seashore, Ocracoke Island, NC—The concept of free will has no basis in reality. Our will is anything but free. We think of free will as the freedom to do anything we want to do. Therein lies the rub. We are not free to will what we want. We cannot will ourselves to want anything we do not want. We are not free to choose our wants. And we are not free to choose our choices. So we can’t blame free will for our problems. Free will doesn’t exist. But our problems do. The idea is to stop looking for a reason for them and start looking for what to do about them. “Here we are. Now what?” The formula for the rest of the way is “Look, Listen, See, Hear.” We have to “clear a space,” get some distance between ourselves and the situation in order to assess what needs to happen and what we can do to assist its happening. “Too many cooks ruin the broth.” Too many people telling us what to do ruin our chances at doing what needs to be done. Carl Jung said that none of the real problems have a solution—they have to be out-grown. Growing up is our life task. We start by dealing with our present situation as well as we know how and applying what we learn here in the next situation all the way to the end of the line. 10/24/2011
108. Sunset, Pamlico Sound, Ocracoke Island, Cape Hatteras National Seashore, NC—We spend our time trying to arrange our life to suit us. The spiritual path requires us to arrange ourselves to suit our life. Bob Dylan said, “The song was there before me. I just wrote it down.” Our life is there before us. We just live it. We sing our life the way Bob Dylan sang his songs. We sing the life we are given, handed, asked to sing. Where do we stop and where does our life start? We live on the boundary, on the cusp, between ourselves and our life and allow our life to take us where it will. In so doing we have to think of our life as the physical circumstances of our existence—the time and place of our living, our genetic make-up, the choices we have, etc.—and as the art, gift, calling, genius that is ours to serve, express, live out within the terms and conditions of our living. We bring the givens of our gift forth within the givens of space and time. This is enough for us to think about. We don’t have to be worrying about who wins the World Series or building a fortune. How to be who we are, how to do what is ours to do, here and now is all we have time for. 10/25/2011
109. Cape Hatteras National Seashore, Ocracoke Island, NC—We wake up in the world we wake up to every day. What changes? Everything is transformed and nothing changes. Life is an optical illusion. The old hag becomes a young maiden by virtue of the way we see the drawing in front of us. We can look at our life and see the old hag. We can look again at our life and see the young maiden. Which way IS it? It is all ways at once. Start looking for The Other Ways. Don’t settle for the way you have always seen things. Thresholds exist to new worlds on every side, waiting for us to walk through them to new lives. Creative vision sees possibilities everywhere. We all have The Eye. We all are dying to see. There’s a catch, of course. To see more than we have seen, we have to live differently, or be willing to. Seeing enhances, enables, living. If we aren’t seeing it is because we aren’t willing to live toward where seeing will take us. We cannot just see new worlds—we have to live there. It’s called the Hero’s JOURNEY. Get it? 10/26/2011
110. Silver Lake, Ocracoke Island, Cape Hatteras National Seashore, NC—We have to be ready for the wind to stop blowing and the clouds to appear. The shift will come in its own time. Be waiting. Ready.
111. Hatteras Lighthouse Panorama, Buxton Wetlands, Cape Hatteras National Seashore, NC—We make seeing and doing what needs to be done more complex than it needs to be. “Eat when hungry, rest when tired.” What needs to be done is on this basic level. “Do unto others as you would have them do unto you.” “Whoever offers a cup of cold water to one of these little ones will be considered great in the kingdom of heaven” (or words to that effect). See? This is not hard. A kind word when a kind word is needed. Ordinary, every day, impossible to live without stuff. What needs to be done. Do it. Simple. 10/26/2011
112. Silver Lake, Ocracoke Island, Cape Hatteras National Seashore, NC—We start with the givens, the facts, and wonder what needs to happen here and now—wonder what we can do to make things better than they are, more like they ought to be than they are. Maybe there is nothing to do to right things on a large scale (as in a prisoner of war camp), but. There is always something to do to right things on a small scale—a kind word, a cup of cold water, being a caring presence—as we wait for the shift to make possible righting things on a large scale. The Occupy the World Movement is a beautiful way of focusing the world on the wrongness of the way things are. We go on strike to protest working conditions. We mount civil disobedience campaigns to call attention to the social and economic inequities of race, gender, sexual-orientation and class. Gandhi and Martin Luther King, Jr. led the way to changing things that appeared to have no chance of being changed ever. The way opens before those who are open to the way. We don’t have to assume that nothing can be done just because no one is doing anything. We can be the shift we are waiting for by doing things differently here and now. We stop mouthing the platitudes and the liturgical responses. We stop pretending that things are all right as they are. We question authority and would-be authority on all levels: Who says this is the way things ought to be done? Who says this is the best we can do? It’s easy enough to find fault with President Obama—also find fault with those who stand to gain by finding fault with President Obama. No Social Security? Who says that’s a good idea? No More Sound Bites! Push everyone to the limits of their suggested solution over into imagination and creativity and transformation! Let the revolution to a civil, fair, and just world for all begin!
113. Ocracoke Lighthouse, Ocracoke Island, Cape Hatteras National Seashore, NC—An iPhone Photo—The trick is to see what we look at and look at everything. I was looking for the black coffee maker in the house we are renting for the week, and didn’t see the white one on the counter top. The things we don’t see, the things that are completely invisible, are right there in plain sight, waiting to be seen. Eyes that see are eyes that look at everything without looking for anything. We’re working at that. Right? 10/27/2011
114. Molasses Creek, Cape Hatteras National Seashore, Ocracoke Island, NC—There is no having it made. No getting it all together. No arriving. No standing on top of the world. No sitting in the cat bird’s seat. No ain’t I something now. There is only taking care of this moment the way this moment needs to be taken care of—with a long string of moments stretching out before us, waiting their turn. There is no quitting, no stopping, no retiring from the work that is ours to do. There is only doing the work, being who we are (and also are), being about what is ours to be about. There is nothing more to it than that. Receive well the moment. Do there what needs to be done as it needs to be done the way only you can do it. And do it again in the next moment. If you get that down, you’ll have it made.
115. Ocracoke Lighthouse, Ocracoke Island, Cape Hatteras National Seashore, NC—What we tell ourselves enables us to take it or stops us in our tracks. What we tell ourselves provides us with the courage and incentive to make our way through the present circumstances, or folds us up and hands us over. We have a situation. The situation calls for some response. It isn’t the way we would like for it to be. What are we going to do? What are we going to tell ourselves about the situation? What we say to ourselves about our life, about life generally, sets the tone of our living, enables us to do what we do or keeps us from doing much of anything. What do we say? What are we telling ourselves these days? What we say to ourselves helps us deal with the situation at hand or hinders us in dealing with it. What we say about the situation determines what we do about it. Living better begins with talking differently about our lives. How we live depends upon what we say to ourselves about our life. Monitor your self-talk. Change what you say and you’ll change the way you see and the way you live. 10/28/2011
116. Marsh Sunrise, Ocracoke Island, Cape Hatteras National Seashore, NC—Here’s an Internet Gem for you. If the Dalai Lama didn’t say it, he could have: “The Dalai Lama, when asked what surprised him most about humanity, replied: ‘Man—because he sacrifices his health in order to make money, then he sacrifices his money in order to recuperate his health. And then, he is so anxious about his future that he does not enjoy his present, the result being that he does not live in the present or the future. He lives as if he is never going to die, and dies having never lived.’” 10/29/2011
117. Pelican, Ocracoke Island, Cape Hatteras National Seashore, NC—There are things throughout your life that are like knowing where to place the tripod is in my life. I don’t know how I know where to put the tripod. I don’t know why it’s here and not there, or over there. After I’m done here, it may be over there next. Maybe not. I’ll have to wait to see. It’s like that with us in countless places and ways. Why do we choose to wear what we wear each day? How do we know when enough coffee is enough? We know things we don’t know how we know. These are the important things. A street map can tell us how to find a bakery, but when it’s time for a cinnamon roll is beyond a map’s capabilities. How we know what to do with our lives, or what to do next, is like how we know where to place the tripod, or whether to wear the red shirt or the blue one. One place is not as good as another, one shirt is not the same as another. The differences matter. We are guided, led, toward one and away from the others. Why? How? It is enough to know what we know without knowing all there is to know about what we know. Know what you know and trust it without having to know what you don’t know. That’s my best advice. 10/29/2011
118. Limb at Springer’s Point, Ocracoke Island, Cape Hatteras National Seashore, NC—If we were in a foreign country, Italy or Africa, the right thing to do would be to honor the customs and ways of the foreign country. In the United States, we bump into foreign customs and ways at every turn. What is with the attitude that says “THEY (that is anyone who is not one of US) should be like WE are (that is ME and those who agree with ME)”? The right thing to do is honor, respect, perspectives and ways of doing things that are not the way WE see and do things. Our way is just our way. It is not THE way. No way is THE way. There are 10,000 ways of getting it done, of getting life lived. You would hate living the way I live. I would hate living the way you live. Let’s start there, and honor each other for living it the way we live it and making it work as well as it does for us—without trying to force our way on the other. It will be a step on the way to creating a world in which all people are safe to be who they are, which is as basic a human right as I can think of. 10/29/2011
119. Cormorant Run, Pamlico Sound, Ocracoke Island, Cape Hatteras National Seashore, NC—It starts with allowing ourselves to be who we are, where we are, how we are, what we are, why we are. We do not get to where we want to be by trying to get there. We get to where we need to be by being here, now. This doesn’t mean we resist change to stay here, always. It means we stop resisting change—allowing ourselves to change in ways we do not think is conducive to getting where we want to be. Where we want to be is not necessarily where we need to be. Our lives are constructed to get us where we need to be when we need to be there—and then where we need to be after that when we need to be there. There is no steady state of being. Being dead is the only steady state, and who knows how steady that is! But. We do know that a steady state of being-while-alive is death. Life is moving, movement, evolving, becoming, growing. Death is being the same, yesterday, today, tomorrow. When we stop resisting change, we move toward where we need to be in order to move on to where we need to be after that. Your life will bring you what you need for the next step. You only have to be awake enough to receive it. Your life brings you the poem but you have to write it down. 10/30/2011
120. Pamlico Sunset Panorama, Pamlico Sound, Ocracoke Island, Cape Hatteras National Seashore, NC—The top half of this photo is the photo. The bottom half is the top half copied, flipped and merged with the top half to create a faux reflection. Because the wind was in the 15 mph range, down from the 35 mph range early this morning and that moves me beyond taking a picture to making one. We take what we are given and do what we can with it. This is the way things are and this is what we can do about it and that’s that. 10/30/2011
121. Ocracoke Lighthouse, Ocracoke Island, Cape Hatteras National Seashore, NC—We don’t know what drives our boat on its path through the sea, or why this path and not that one, or any of the things that matter. We trust ourselves to it all—without being able to explain, excuse, justify, or defend. We make things up to satisfy our family, friends and critics but. We don’t know what we are doing. I get up to take another picture at sunrise as though the world needs another picture at sunrise. What am I thinking? I’m thinking to talk myself out of getting up to take another picture at sunrise because I have no valid, stand-up-in-court, reason to do so would be to violate something essential and truthful about my core. I have no idea if that is correct but. Something needs me to get up and take another picture of sunrise and I am here to trust myself to that Something and see where it goes, So are you. This is called the secret to having life and having it abundantly. Doing stupid things you can’t begin to understand because Something needs you to do it. May we all live so stupidly and so well! 10/31/2011
122. Hatteras Sunrise, Cape Hatteras National Seashore, Ocracoke Island, NC—“Pie for Strength” is the motto of the Park Cafe and Grocery at the St. Mary entrance to Glacier National Park. I think pie is it’s own reason for existence, and strength is just an added benefit, but we’ll take our strength wherever we find it. Strength and encouragement for the journey, for the work at hand, for what needs us to do it the way only we can do it along the way. It’s good to know where to go for those things, and stock up on them while we can. It may be a long walk between pies. 10/31/2011
123. Pamlico Sound Sunset, Cape Hatteras National Seashore, Ocracoke Island, NC—The thrust of our life is the flow of the stream. We will be who we are. Carl Jung said, “We are who we have always been, and who we will be,” or words to that effect. The stream flows through its context and circumstances, and its character is developed in its interaction with its environment—in its work to find a way to be who it is no matter what is in its path, not with complete disregard for what is in its path, but with taking everything into account and working with it to be itself there, then, in the here and now of its living/being. The stream does not bulldoze its way to the sea, and it does not stop flowing. As Linda Cohn might say, “Are you picking up what I’m laying down here?” 11/01/2011
124. Silver Lake, Ocracoke Island, Cape Hatteras National Seashore, NC—We don’t have long to say what we have to say, to do what we have to do. We can’t be squandering the time that is ours hanging out at the mall, looking for another party. We aren’t skimming stones. Frivolity, banality and superficiality are no substitutes for life. We have bigger fish to fry. The Cyclops, for instance. We are here to take on the Cyclops in all of his myriad manifestations. It matters how we live. We cannot throw life away because we are afraid of living—because we are afraid we don’t know how to live, don’t know what to do, don’t think we have anything to say. We owe it to ourselves—and to each other—to find out if there is anything to us. We cannot allow ourselves to hide in the trivial and the repetitious, bingo, canasta, bridge, shuffle-board and their myriad manifestations. 11/02/2011
125. Cloud Bank at Sunset, Pamlico Sound, Ocracoke Island, Cape Hatteras National Seashore, NC—Unless our dreams encounter reality, they remain forever happy fantasies, incapable of delivering their promise and growing us up. A dream requires barriers the way a butterfly requires a chrysalis and the struggle to exit it. If Odysseus’ father had paid his son’s way, bought off the Cyclops, arranged for the Sirens to not sing, Odysseus would have remained an invalid, clinging to Father’s Love (Not!) forever. The people who deliver our dreams to us wrapped in a ribbon do us no favors. “Some kind of help is the kind of help we all could do without.” The dream has to work us over, call us forth, require us to meet the challenges of serving the dream our whole life-long, else it’s a travesty and a tragedy in the making. The Buddha had to escape the dream-eating power of his royal beginnings. Jesus had to rely on the power of his dream to overcome the demons he encountered along the way. It is a solitary task, dreaming ourselves into existence, our life into being.  11/03/2011
126. Pamlico Sunset, Pamlico Sound, Cape Hatteras National Seashore, Ocracoke Island, NC—Having a dream is not the same as having what it takes to live in the service of our dream. Ten thousand kids dream of being Michael Jordon but. They don’t have what it takes to practice with Michael Jordan’s dedication to the perfection of his art. They don’t have what it takes to study and make the grades to stay in school. They don’t have what it takes to be a part of a team. They dream of being a star but. They don’t have what it takes to be a star. A real dream will beat you into shape. It will shape your life. It will make you over. And over. We think living our dream is like Hollywood, all glory and fame. Wrong. Living our dream is doing what is ours to do whether we want to or not, whether we feel like it or not, whether we are in the mood for it or not, in all weather conditions, no matter what, because we live to serve the dream and not the other way around. So, when you dream up a dream, make sure it’s worth your time because it will take all of it. And it’s worth every minute. Just look at the people who never had a dream—or what it takes to live one out. 11/03/2011
127. Hanging Rock Vista, Hanging Rock State Park near Danbury, NC—We have to celebrate the quality of our effort, not our outcome. The results are not always satisfactory and are usually out of our control. We meet the day as well as we are able and let that be that. We do some things better than Jesus could do them, or God. When I water the yard, I do it as well as it can be done. Rain couldn’t do it better. Rain’s only advantage is that I don’t have to water when it rains, and I hate watering the yard. But I do it well. There are lots of things we do very well that go unnoticed. Making coffee. I make coffee better than Starbucks. Filling the car with gasoline. Too bad I don’t get points for filling the car with gasoline. The list is long of things we all do well without credit, without even noticing. We notice the things that we don’t do well or that don’t have the outcome we want. It’s easily, “Bad Jim,” here and “Bad Jim” there, here a “Bad,” there a “Bad,” everywhere a “Bad, Bad” throughout our day every day. We are culturally trained to not like what we do and not like ourselves for doing it. We suffer from self-inflicted misery because we are taught “Bad Jim” early on and no one—no voice—counters the cultural lessons. It’s time we countered them ourselves. “Nice going, Jim!” Tell yourself “Nice going!” when you load the dishwasher and empty it—and do all the other things you do really well, regardless of the outcome, never mind the results. Stars for effort all the way. 11/04/2011
128. Stone Mountain Woods, Stone Mountain State Park near Roaring Gap, NC—We wrestle with God. “Thy will, not mine, be done,” is not easily wrought. It comes after, “I will not let you go without a blessing!” The blessing is always the two of us walking together along the way we both agree is the way. “Thy will be done,” is recognition of the rightness of “Thy will.” It comes, if you remember, after the struggle, with sweat pouring forth likes “drops of blood,” after it becomes apparent, the rightness of “Thy will.” We must not give in too easily, too soon. The struggle is at the heart of the matter. We have to be convinced that “Thy will” is right about the way. We have a voice. We are not to be ignored. It is not for nothing that we live. God repents before the wisdom of those who call God to task. “Shall not the Judge of the earth do right?” We find the way together, and walk it in consultation with one another, collaborating in justice, compassion, grace and peace. Amen! May it be so! 11/05/2011
129. Buzzard Roost, Walnut Cove Water Tower, Walnut Cove, NC—You’ve heard of the Swallows at Capistrano, well. Here are the Buzzards at Walnut Cove. You couldn’t make this up. “They’ve been coming here as long as I’ve lived next door,” said a neighbor. “That’s over two years now. The town’s tried to scare them away, but they keep coming back.” I love this about life. Buzzards who know a good thing when they see one, and refuse to leave. May we be as persistent and determined in the work that is ours to do. May we know as clearly what is ours to do, and prevail!
130. Black Birch, Blue Ridge Parkway, Rocky Knob, VA—What holds life together for you? It’s the adventure for me. The not knowing what is going to happen today and what I am going to do with it. The wondering what I’ll see. What I’ll think. What I’ll say. Each day can be like Christmas Morning if you approach it with the right kind of spirit, seeing it as a package to be opened, a new bike to be ridden who knows where. Live so that death catches you by surprise, I say, and as though you might die any day. “It’s a good day to die” means, “I’m ready to die because I’ve done everything I could think to do up to this point, but I’m going to be thinking of other things to do all the way to may last breath.” Die with cookies in the oven and crumbs on your plate. Live every day as though it will be your last and as though you’ll never die. One of those ironic parameters that enclose us all in their loving arms and tickle us into laughing out loud. 11/06/2011
131. Bass Lake, Blue Ridge Parkway near Blowing Rock, NC—One of the laws of photography is “You have to go to know.” You have to go see, go looking. The camera is always saying, “Let’s go looking!” I don’t know why I go where I go any more than I know why I place the tripod where I place the tripod. Or, I think I know where I’m going and what I’m looking for and find something unexpected and quite IT along the way. Photography isn’t a thinking thing and you have to be thinking all the while—thinking is autofocus on or off, is the lens clean, is the battery charged, are the settings suitable for the occasion. Another of those ironic parameters. Just when you think you don’t have to think because you’ve thought about it enough that everything is automatic, comes the reminder: No compact flash card in the camera. Great. The camera is always there to remind you to pay attention. Awareness, awareness, awareness. The same old lessons are new every day. Just like with life.  11/06/2011
132. Jennette’s Pier, Nags Head, NC—We have a certain drift of soul, toward this, away from that. We are built for some music and built to avoid other music. Some things “go against the grain.” Some things “carry us away.” Over time, we find our place, know where we belong and where we have no business being. You don’t find the Dalai Lama at football games or strip clubs, and we don’t fault him for that. Why do we fault any of us for where we have to be or cannot go? The young woman who served my lunch today was excited to tell me about her pending tattoo—a colored iris as a memorial to her Grandmother, done by an artist she had spent time searching out. I was honored by her sharing that with me and celebrated it with her, though I am not likely to order one up for myself. They all don’t have to do it the way I do it. We don’t have to oppose the paths others trod. We can be supportive and encouraging without endorsing or subscribing to. There are a lot of ways to wash dishes and to get from here to San Francisco. And, if you are thinking of “the best way,” best in terms of what? Dance to the music you call music, and let the rest of us do the same. 11/06/2011
133. Clingman’s Dome Sunset, Great Smoky Mountains National Park, NC—We find our own way, we make our own path. There is no recipe, no formula, no map or blueprint—no black footprints laid out for us to step on to glory. The disciples must become like the Master in following no Master. We see the path by looking behind us. We are creating the path with each choice, each decision, each act. The path that led us here, now, is the path we made. It’s the same path that will take us wherever we are going. Listen to everything everyone says and then listen to yourself—decide for yourself what you think about it all. How does it strike you? What do you make of it? Learning to listen to yourself—learning to trust yourself—is the primary lesson of life. Education does not pour stuff into us, facts and parts of speech. It pulls stuff out of us, stuff we didn’t know was there, tucked away within us, poems and ideas and questions. It’s already there, waiting for us to listen to what we have to say, to trust ourselves to it, and dance with our lives to glory. 11/07/2011
134. An Old Wagon Road near Walnut Grove, NC—We are in a hurry to be somewhere, somewhere better, somewhere where we have it made, have no worries, no problems, no fears. Wealth seems to represent the place to be for a lot of us. We dream of winning the lottery, of having “our ship come in.” In the not-too-distant past, people dreamed of Glory Land, Paradise, Heaven and all its splendor—where they could lay down their burdens and be free at last. Escape is a happy fantasy. Snoopy in the comic strip Peanuts said all the puppies at the Daisy Hill Puppy Farm dreamed of escape but. “Once you get over the fence you are still in the world.” I recommend squaring up to how things are and how they also are, and what you can do about it—doing it and letting that be that. Too often we dream of miraculous deliverance because we live in binds where no matter what we do we make things worse trying to make them better and we are stuck, trapped, in a life we cannot live. We need resources and help beyond what we are able to generate ourselves. There, we have to walk too paths at once, the reality path—doing what must be done to take care of business as business must be taken care of—and the dream path—doing what must be done to be ready for the door to open when it does. If you are going to believe anything, believe that the door will open and you have to be ready to go through it when going time comes. We can’t lose the hope of the open door even though we have no idea what form it may take. We wait, watching, ready. 11/08/2011
135. Maple Lane, Forest Lawn Cemetery, Greensboro, NC—It isn’t hard to find photos in the fall in North Carolina. It’s hard finding a place to park and a place to set your tripod. The rural roads have no shoulders and people, urban and rural, are funny about you walking through their yard and standing in their flowerbeds. Their dogs are even funnier. So, you are limited to public places with parking and no No Trespassing signs. And you thought it was about having an expensive camera and several lens. You make the same mistake with everyone who comes your way. You look at them and fail to notice what all they are dealing with, how the Cyclops in some present-day manifestation is body-slamming them just for the fun of it, and laughing. So, John Watson’s words are worth carrying around, remembering, living out: “Be Kind; Everyone You Meet is Fighting a Hard Battle.” 11/09/2011
136. Yellow Leaves, Bog Garden, Greensboro, NC—I’m going to miss fall. I love finding photos everywhere, not having to look for them, having to wait on them, not that there isn’t something to complain about: Not enough camera time. That’s my complaint. Fall doesn’t last nearly long enough. If it only lasted as long as July and August! There should be some compensation for July and August! They last six months apiece. That’s a year total. Fall should last a year. Fall should last long enough that I begin to long for winter. Wish it would snow so I could shovel the driveway. That’s how long I want fall to last. Something else to be big about—as though we need something else to be big about! We spend all our time granting concessions, making allowances, adjusting our stride to fit the terrain, accommodating, accommodating, accommodating… The turtles and the fishes, the deer and the Great Horned Owls have to do the same thing, but they don’t know they are doing it. It’s just, “Oh, well,” with them. They don’t sit around grousing about it. Not even the Ruffled Grouse grouses. Something’s wrong about that. Something else to grouse about. To be big about. To get over. Geez. 11/10/2011
137. The Other Lone Cypress, Lake Brandt, Greensboro, NC—The Lord and I love chocolate. And, if you think that is reprehensible and sacrilegious, allow me to remind you that for several thousand years it was high holy dogma that the Lord loved the aroma of burning bulls. I propose that chocolate is much to be preferred over the stench of sacrificial animals, and I am pleased to allow the Lord to enjoy it vicariously through my obedient service to the Lord’s holy will. We take our chocolate dark from the good people at Hershey’s, though Dove is also a good choice and has the advantage of scriptural symbolism on its side. Chocolate bunnies and eggs at Easter have long been connected with the highest of holy days, and I cannot possibly see how anyone could take offense at the idea of chocolate being well up on the Lord’s list of things to do. So, I’m pleased to say that the Lord and I love a good chocolate session together, and we think we will go enjoy one right now. 11/10/2011
138. The Woods at Springer’s Point, Ocracoke Island, Cape Hatteras National Seashore, NC—A moment in our life is like the next pitch in a baseball game. What we do in response to that pitch, to the moment, tells the tale. Everything rides on how we respond to the situation, to the moment, as it arises. We cannot be locked into always doing it the way it is supposed to be done—the way it has always been done. We have to be free—to allow ourselves the freedom—to play with the moment, with the situation, to innovate, create, invent and bring forth the astounding and unheard of. Of course, this will not sit well with Those Who Know Best And Must Be Pleased. So? 11/10/2011
139. Cape Hatteras Lighthouse from the Buxton Wetlands, Cape Hatteras National Seashore, Hatteras Island, NC—I watched a small boy standing with his mother ahead of me in line at the Post Office. He was working on a Post Office give-away sucker while his mother stamped her last letter before her turn at the window. He turned to say something to her and his sucker hit the floor. With a mixture of heartfelt surprise and disbelief he exclaimed, “IT DROPPED!” He didn’t say, “I dropped it,” with a tone suggesting the imminent end of the world with maybe a bit of prosecution, conviction and jail time to compliment his last day on earth. “It dropped! I had nothing to do with it. I was just standing here minding my own business, having a conversation with my Mom. It is obviously not my fault and I will have nothing to do with the outcome. I am as chagrined by this turn of events as anyone would rightly be, and I demand to be cleared of any charges that may be pending.” The kid’s on to something. “The milk split. The car door slammed on my finger. The edge of the cabinet hit my head.” The possibilities are endless. We don’t have to take the rap for anything that ever happens. One of life’s lessons while waiting in line. 11/11/2011
140. Colors of Fall Abstract, Bog Garden Reflections, Greensboro, NC—We are here to help on another along the way but. No one can help us or be helped with the essential matters. We have to grow up on our own. We have to face up to the truth of how things are, and also are, come to terms with our choices and do what we can imagine doing with, and about, all that constitutes the here-and-now of our existence. The truth is that we don’t have good-enough choices. We want better choices but. We don’t get to choose our choices and. No one can help us square ourselves up with that fundamental fact. “Look, Jim, these are your choices. Do what you can imagine to do with them and let that be that.” That’s about as much help as we can be to one another. We have a lot to not like about our life with very little that can be done about any of it. This is called The Human Condition. We can soften the sharp edges of reality, provide a little comic relief, offer a psychological/emotional respite, interlude, oasis—provide a modicum of peace. Peace and understanding, tenderness and compassion, warmth and kindness… That would help. Acknowledging our mutual plight. Agreeing that anybody would want better choices.And then saying, “But. Here you are. Now what are you going to do?” That would help. If you could do that much for me, I will be just fine. 11/11/2011
141. Silver Lake Sunrise, Ocracoke Island, Cape Hatteras National Seashore, NC—If we knew what to want—what we ought to want—and wanted it, and lived in its service, the world would be a quite different place. For the most part—that is, for most of us, most of the time—we know what we want and don’t know, or knowing, we don’t care about, what to want, what we ought to want. The spiritual quest, the Hero’s Journey, is growing up, out of our facilitation with what we want, into our allegiance to and alignment with what we ought to want and living in its service. The catch here is that what we ought to want has no necessary connection with what we think we ought to want, with what we have always been told we ought to want. It is not a simple matter of doing, finally, what your Mamma says—and it is not a matter of NOT doing what she says. Growing up is growing into our own sense of how things ought to be, no matter what anyone says, and being right about it. There is a mysterious, numinous—that is, holy—sense of “YES!” when we are in the center of “the beam,” when we are “on the right track” with our lives. Joseph Campbell says, “We know when we are on the beam and when we are off of it.” There is nothing worth wanting  beyond the beam, nothing worth doing beyond living in its service. The trick is being okay with not knowing what we are doing there, but knowing that it is right, and trusting ourselves to it no matter what Mamma or anyone else says. 11/11/2011
142. Used in Short Talks on Contradiction, etc., Lake Brandt Panorama, Greensboro, NC—Sin is refusing to grow up. All sin can be lumped under the heading: Emotional Immaturity. Refusing to bear the pain of contradiction. Insisting on having our way NOW! Waiting nothing out. Running stop signs. Failing to heed—or read—any of the signs or flashing signals. Barreling down the road of life to destinations we deem worthy. Not listening. Not seeing. Not inquiring. Not understanding. Serving our agenda at the expense of ourselves and everyone else. Thinking if we do this, that will happen, and being undone when it doesn’t. Being undone. Doing whatever we do as a strategy to get what we want. Thinking we know what to want. That we know what we are doing. That we know where we are going. That we know who we are and what we are about. Thinking we know. 11/12/2011
143. Blue Ridge Vista, Blue Ridge Parkway near Asheville, NC—Remember in the 70’s the solution to the drug problem was recreation centers? Tennis courts, soft ball fields? Give kids something to do and they won’t do drugs? That didn’t work out so well. I think it should have been meaning. Give kids meaning and they won’t do drugs. Or, not as many of them will. That’s tricky, though. How do you give someone meaning? Meaning isn’t like a rock that we can pass around. We don’t find meaning so much as we bring it forth. We bring meaning forth in our lives by living meaningfully—by living in ways that have meaning for us. And we are the only ones who can say what that is for us. How do we know? How do we know pie or cake? Chicken salad or spaghetti? I don’t now how we know, but I know that we know. We know what has meaning and what does not, what brings us to life and what kills our soul. And we know when we are living in the service of a substitute for meaning, ersatz meaning, sham meaning, pretend meaning, no meaning at all. It all hangs on our willingness to do what is meaningful. No more kidding ourselves. It all hangs on that. 11/12/2011
144. For Rent, Price Lake, Julian Price Memorial Park, Blue Ridge Parkway near Blowing Rock, NC—We are going to be dead a lot longer than we are alive so. We better do everything we can think of to be as alive as we can be in the time left for living. We don’t have, as they say in the deep south, a minute to waste but. That’s exactly what it takes to be alive. Wasting minutes. Throwing time away in the pursuit of nothing. Sitting silently. Walking slowly through the world with our eyes open. Being not what the world would call productive but. Being alive. In the moment of our living. Open to what is happening here and now—and to what is trying to happen, to what needs to happen, and doing what we can with what we have to work with to assist its happening, to bring it forth in the world of space and time. Not imposing our idea for the moment on the moment but. Listening to the moment and assisting the coming forth of what needs to come forth in each situation as it arises. Being alive to the time of our living and dancing, playing, with what we find there for the good of the moment. Amen! May it be so! 11/13/2011
145. Bodie Island Lighthouse, Cape Hatteras National Seashore, near Nags Head, NC—Brooks Vance told his wife, Louise, “Don’t keep track of the liabilities, Louise. It’ll only depress you.” You couldn’t find better advice in the entire Book of Advice. The losses add up. Some of them are large. The cumulative impact of our losses, even only the small ones, will take our breath away. No. Will take our life away. Now look, it isn’t just our life. We think it is. We think, “It’s our life and we can do what we want to with it.” Two things are wrong with this position. One is it isn’t our life, not wholly, not entirely. Two is we don’t know what we ought to want, just what we want and what do we know? We don’t know nothing. Remember that the next time you think you know when to quit living because your losses have added up to “Stop!” We don’t know nothing. And our life isn’t all ours. We have the hopes of the invisible world riding on us. We live for more than ourselves. The world of unconscious, invisible, psychic reality intersects this world of normal, concrete, apparent reality in and through us. We are the interface between worlds. We have responsibilities and duties we don’t know anything about (because they are unconscious). There is more to us than meets the eye. If you are going to believe anything, believe that there is more to us than meets the eye and that we live for more than ourselves. Explore what that might mean in the time left for living, and don’t be surprised if you discover you’re living in behalf of some of your biggest losses who are now counting on you to live for them. The invisible world has some strange twists and turns, and we don’t know nothing. 11/13/2011
146. Cedar Island Ferry Panorama, Pamlico Sound, Cape Hatteras National Seashore, Ocracoke Island, NC—I’ve been retired from the ministry (Presbyterian Church USA) nearly a year now and what strikes me upon reflection about Sunday morning worship services is how loud they were. The organ was loud, the hymns were loud (“Sing it like you mean it now!”), the anthems were loud, the guitars and percussion were loud… Reflecting the principle “In order to be good it has to be loud.” My friend Bob Taylor taught middle school band early in his career and told me the secret to Jr. High (and high school, and college) half-time shows was to make it loud. “Have the band march toward the home side of the field with the brass blaring and the drums beating and everybody will think it’s great.” Loud is a substitute for good. Give me the infinite echo of a Tibetan singing bowl, the resonating peace of a chorus of “AUM,” the silence of many minds experiencing Mind… Think of the most worshipful, non-church, experience of your life. How loud was it? Turning up the volume is simply a way of letting ourselves off the hook. We impact ourselves with pseudo-WOW and avoid having to do the work of facing the truth of our lives in order to discover God-with-us there. The ground of worship is the individual work each of us does in order to see things as they are and also are in each moment of our life. Work? Did somebody say work? Just bring on the band at full throttle! 11/14/2011
147. Pisgah National Forest, Davidson River near Brevard, NC—We connect with the invisible world through symbols engaged with our imagination, and we exhibit the connection in the way we live our lives. Our nighttime dreams are rich in symbols (it is a rare dream that is to be taken literally) which we decipher and interpret imaginatively, consciously. When we sit quietly, what arises? We are constantly generating, creating, fantasies, stories, scenarios—what themes are being borne out? When our mind “makes something up,” what does it make up? What symbols are being presented to us from the unconscious? What do we make of them, do with them? Are we always scaring ourselves, imagining terrible things happening to us or those we love? Try this: Tell your unconscious that you can be trusted to deal with the absolute worst life can do, that it can rely on you completely, that you will protect it and your relationship with it under all circumstances, as though it is your child and you are its loving parent. And that you will consult it about its needs and concerns and be open to it expressing those to you in dreams and waking fantasies. Your imagination is the interface with your unconscious, you can direct it and consciously make up a story, say about horseback riding in the west, and in the middle of your story something completely surprising happens. Our imagination works both ways, from us and to us from our unconscious. We read the symbols and incorporate our interpretation into our lives, collaborating with our unconscious in a life of joint partnership. Let the adventure begin! 11/14/2011
148. Pied-billed Grebe, the Bog Garden, Greensboro, NC—We keep trying to make sense of things but. It’s as though there is another side at work in the service of disorder and nonsense. The more rational and logical we make the world, the crazier, chaotic and out-of-control the world gets. Insanity erupts. Unless it is honored, respected, allowed its place at the table. Rationality has to get off of its high horse, as they would say in the deep south. We have to take the emotional, irrational, ground of existence into account—in our politics and in our personal life—in order to integrate the whole and make room for all. We cannot just think our way into our life, we also have to intuit our way there, hunch our way there, and feel our way along. Insanity is never without its basis. Chaos is order from far enough away or close enough in, and order is chaos. Sanity and insanity work the same way. Insanity is as sane as it gets from a certain point of view and sanity is crazy as hell. We think AND we feel—consciously, with awareness—and we take both thinking and feeling into account in seeking out the way forward together. 11/15/2011
149. Geese Landing, Bog Garden, Greensboro, NC—There are 10,000 ways of letting yourself go, most of them bad, like, for instance, eating potato chips by the bag full and ice cream right out of the carton, smoking and refusing to exercise beyond walking to the refrigerator. That isn’t the idea. The idea is to let ourselves go in the direction of our heart’s flow toward its life. The idea is to let our heart have its life. We all have a bent, a lean, a tendency toward some things and away from others (And I’m not talking potato chips and ice cream here). We override our innate tendency toward our heart’s true love to our long-term, one might say eternal, detriment. We refuse to let ourselves go. It’s too outlandish, too expensive, too absurd, too far removed from what we are supposed to do, or not do. The excuse list is long, one might say eternal. We have good reasons for not being who our heart needs us to be. If you are going to override something, override your refusal to be who your heart is calling you to be! Let yourself go! Experience being alive before you die! 11/16/2011
150. King of the Pond, Bog Garden, Greensboro, NC—We grant ourselves, each other (and all others) the benefit of the doubt and see where it goes. We would all do better if it weren’t for something. So, cut a little slack, grant a little grace, dish out a little kindness and see what happens. 11/16/2011

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04/29/2011 – 08/16/2011

1. 04/29/2011 — Be aware of what you throw away.
   Notice every time you dismiss something that catches your eye,
   or reject something that appears to be useless or repulsive.
   Every variety of light is the perfect light for some subject.
   The work of photography is finding the subject
   that is suited for the light
   we have to work with.
   Everything has a hidden side.
   Your task is to find the blessing.
2. 04/30/2011 — Photography is about going back to the good places,
   looking again at what you have seen a hundred times already.
   Don’t think you have seen anything worth seeing just
   because you’ve looked it over once or twice.
   Anything worth seeing once is worth looking at again.
   Go look.
   See what happens.
   It’s our arrogance that lets us get by with thinking
   we know what we will see,
   and it won’t be much.
   We have to allow ourselves to look again. Again and again. 
3. 04/30/2011 — What we see is a function of how we look,
   of what we look at,
   of what we look for,
   of the filters we place between ourselves and what’s there,
   before us, waiting to be seen.
   We have to be receptive to receive what is being offered to us.
4. 04/30/2011 — We walked our way, as a species, to where we are today.
   Walking is what we do.
   Why don’t we do more of it?
   The Aborigines restored their connection with soul
   by taking walkabouts,
   not necessarily going anywhere—
   just finding themselves again.
   
   We get lost when we don’t walk.
   Lose our direction,
   sitting at home.
   Drift away from soul driving
   five miles an hour above the posted speed limit,
   thinking we are going somewhere.
   
   We live faster than we can process,
   than we can accommodate,
   than we can adjust ourselves to.
   
   We are built for walking.
   Two miles an hour,
   two-and-a-half downhill.
   We don’t walk,
   and wonder why our lives are unlivable.
5. 05/01/2011 — Every pursuit has it’s rules.
   Horseback riding is done in certain ways.
   So is getting dressed.
   There are no exceptions.
   You don’t play basketball the way you play chess.
   God is approached via The Rules for Approaching God,
   though they aren’t the ones you’ve been told about.
   
   We’ve been handed the wrong set of rules for doing a lot of things.
   We spend our lives figuring out what the rules really are.
   
   Horses and cameras will straighten you out in no time.
   Too bad more of life isn’t that way.
6. 05/01/2011 — Dogwood trees and May Apples have their business—making the most of what they need of the things that come their way.
   
   Their focus is narrow: light, water, pollination, reproduction.
   Wars and weddings and who wears what to the Oscars all go unnoticed.
   
   There are worlds within worlds, each with its own
   rhythms and necessities.
   
   May we be as right about what we think is important
   as Dogwoods and May Apples are about what is important to them.
7. 05/01/2011 — The soil is not deep along the Blue Ridge Parkway,
   the rocks are numerous,
   the Black Berry vines are thick and persistent.
   It takes a resilient spirit to make it under these conditions,
   a strong back,
   a stout heart.
   Life is hard.
   We prefer easy.
   Quick and easy.
   
   Shortcuts everywhere.
   Buffers.
   Cushions.
   Distractions.
   Escapes.
   
   Joseph Campbell said,
   “It took the Cyclops to bring out the hero in Ulysses.”
   The Appalachian wilderness could do it, too.
   Any life could do it if we took what it handed us
   and didn’t rush to denial and diversion.
   
   Bear the pain!
   Square up to the discrepancy between how things are
   and how you wish they were!
   Walk out the back door and milk the cow!
   Every day at the same time!
    
8. 05/02/2011 — Folks are still farming in the region along the Parkway,
   raising livestock,
   growing cabbages
   and pumpkins,
   bailing hay.
   
   Life is the most persistent force in the universe.
   Life does not quit.
   Life finds a way.
   If we are going to be alive,
   that’s the attitude we have to adopt.
   
   We cannot sit around,
   waiting to be pleased with our lives.
   We have to step into them just as they are
   and find a way,
   make it work.
   
   Photography reminds me of the task that is mine,
   ours.
   Stepping into a day
   and finding the photograph
   no matter what.
   Any light is the perfect light for some subject.
   I have to find the subject
   that is coming down the runway
   in this light, saying,
   “How ‘bout me, honey?”
   
   We have to find the gold in this damn gift from the gods.
   That’s life.
9. 05/02/2011 — Fall is one of the reasons I would stay here
   given a free ticket to anywhere.
   
   Waterfalls,
   National Parks (three),
   and fall.
   A conversation with one of the granddaughters
   had me replying to her question
   about what heaven was like,
   saying, “I’m not going to heaven.
   I’m going to stay right here.”
   
   “But Pops, everybody wants to go to heaven.”
   “Not me,” I said, “I’m not getting on the bus.”
   “Mom,” she yelled out,
   “Pops says he’s not going to heaven!”
   Things went downhill from there.
   
   Point is, North Carolina is close enough to heaven for me.
   Who needs pearly gates and angelic choruses?
   A walk in the woods is much to be preferred.
   
   People with their attention on heaven,
   miss what is all around them.
    
10. 05/03/2011 — The spiritual journey
    is never more difficult than growing up.
    Growing up is changing our minds about what is important.
    Shifting our point of view,
    our perspective.
    Evaluating our values.
    Doing what needs to be done in each situation as it arises.
    
    How long do we put off the inevitable?
    Doing our taxes.
    Mowing the lawn.
    Cleaning the bathroom.
    Dodging the odious things in life is not conducive to spiritual growth,
    but too much that passes for spirituality
    raises itself above the odious without engaging it.
    Acceptance that does nothing about what needs to be done is denial.
    
    Those who are spiritually grown up
    wade right into the doing.
    If the baby’s diaper needs changing,
    we change it when it needs to be changed,
    the way it needs to be changed.
    No whining,
    moaning,
    complaining,
    just doing.
    
    Size up the moment and do what needs to be done.
    That’s as spiritual as it gets.  
11. Middle Cascade, Hanging Rock State Park, near Danbury, NC—There is how things are and there is how we wish things were. We live with the discrepancy. The more conscious we are of the discrepancy, the fewer symptoms we have, but the more we suffer. There is no escape from legitimate suffering. It’s when we try to escape, via diversion, distraction, denial, addiction that our symptoms mount and the real trouble begins. My recommendation is swearing. “Swear like a sailor,” the saying goes. And here’s the important part: Laugh at yourself swearing. It’s great. You’ll love it. It’s the best way I know of through legitimate suffering. All the real gurus swear and laugh. You could look it up. 05/03/2011
12. Cone Manor, AKA Flat Top Manor, Moses H. Cone Memorial Park, Blue Ridge Parkway, near Blowing Rock, NC—There is an inner world—you know the one, where dreams come from, and intuition lives, and imagination creates wonders, and instinct guides with hunches and holy nudges—and an outer world with its stop lights and check-out lines. We would do well to develop our awareness of the inner world to the degree that we develop our awareness of the outer world. We think the external world is the real world. The inner world is “all in our heads,” to be discounted, dismissed, ignored. The entire length of the spiritual journey is the distance from the left side of our brain to the right side.  05/03/2011
13. Lower Cascade, Hanging Rock State Park, near Danbury, NC—It comes down to you and your life. We spend our time focused on our life, trying to arrange things there like we want them to be. Our context and circumstances consume us in a “Not that! This!” kind of way. Streams, on the other hand, have more of an internal direction. A stream’s context is just the conditions under which it flows. It must flow, to hell with the circumstances. What must we do, to hell with the circumstances? Dogwoods bring forth their blooms, bending and stretching to find the light. They must bloom. You are the thing. What is trying to come forth in you? Forget the things on your list. Bring YOU forth, however you can.  05/04/2011
14. Wright Dairy, Rockingham County, NC—It’s all up to us and we cannot do it alone. We need the right kind of company to have a chance. All the heroes on all the journeys have help with golden threads through the maize and sorting the beans and figuring out the name. No one does it alone. But, as Shel Silverstein says, “Some kind of help is the kind of help that help is all about, and some kind of help is the kind of help we all can do without.” Finding the right kind of company is a trick. The key is being the right kind of company ourselves. The rule is: Be what you need! You know what to look for that way. Makes it easier. Glad to be of help. 05/04/2011
15. Upper Cascade, Hanging Rock State Park, near Danbury, NC—May you see things as they are. May you be clear and correct about what needs to be done in each situation as it arises. May you have the courage to do it. Amen! May it be so! 05/05/2011
16. View of Grandfather Mountain from Raven Rock Overlook, Blue Ridge Parkway, near Blowing Rock and Boone, NC—The key to vitality, exuberance, enthusiasm and LIFE is to look closer at the things which catch your eye. We dismiss, discount, ignore too easily the things that catch our eye. The rule is: Don’t do that without first looking closer! Examine the interest, no matter how faint. Give it the full benefit of the doubt. Let your first assumption be that something knows more than you do and is trying to get your attention. You are here to take instruction, to be guided, to be led along the way to the treasure, the precious jewel, the heart of life itself. On your own, you are a leaf being blown by the wind—maybe this, maybe that, maybe that over there. We have to trust ourselves to something. My recommendation is that we trust ourselves to the white rabbits that wink at us, and nod, and sometimes call our name. 05/05/2011
17. View of Grandfather Mountain from the Fire Tower Trail, Moses H. Cone Memorial Park, Blue Ridge Parkway, near Blowing Rock, NC—Jesus is a white rabbit but. All white rabbits are not Jesus. Takes going to know. We don’t live the life that is ours to live, the life that we are made to live, the life that is our destiny (which is not the same thing as fate, by the way), by thinking about it and then doing it. Destiny unfolds in the doing of it. We have to trust ourselves to it to know. Jesus is destiny, our destiny, which means Jesus is different for each of us. We all follow a different Jesus. Tell that to your Sunday school teacher only with EMT’s on hand and at the ready. If you ARE a Sunday school teacher, oops, oh well. 05/06/2011
18. View of Grandfather Mountain and setting moon reflected in Price Lake, Julian Price Memorial Park, Blue Ridge Parkway, near Blowing Rock, NC—Our life is the hero’s journey. Finding our way to the life that is our life to live, and living it, is on par with the Iliad and the Odyssey, the Lord of the Rings, Star Wars, Harry Potter, and the Search for the Holy Grail. It is epic stuff that we are about. If we think otherwise, it is because we have not allowed ourselves to be gripped by the mythic vision and hurled against our will into the destiny that is ours to fulfill. 05/06/2011
19. View of Grandfather Mountain and Price Lake at Sunset, Julian Price Memorial Park, Blue Ridge Parkway, near Blowing Rock, NC—We are here for more than hanging out until we die. We are here to unfold, emerge, come forth—to discover who we are and what we are capable of—to dig ourselves up, bring ourselves out. We do it by following the white rabbits and by challenging ourselves to do the things that intrigue us, attract us, beckon to us, test us. We cannot pass up a test because it’s hard, or threatening, or fearsome. “It took the Cyclops to bring out the hero in Ulysses,” says Joseph Campbell. And, it takes the darkness to bring forth the light. It’s a lot more interesting than hanging out, waiting to die. 06/07/2011
20. View of Grandfather Mountain and Price Lake from the Sims Pond Trail, Blue Ridge Parkway, near Blowing Rock, NC—Don’t wait unless you have to, that’s my best advice. I had to wait to take up photography until the daughters got out of college and I could afford to buy film. There are good reasons to wait, but too often we don’t wait for a good reason, we just wait because it’s easier that way. We put things off until it’s too late to do them. This view of Grandfather Mountain is no longer there—grown up and over with trees in the way. You waited too long. What else are you not doing for no good reason? Life is passing you by! Start doing the things that you don’t want to die having not done! The days are flying by! 05/07/2011
21. View of Grandfather Mountain and Price Lake, Blue Ridge Parkway, near Blowing Rock, NC—We can look at a Trillium, or a waterfall, or a sunset and either see it or not see it. Walking through a scene is no guarantee that you will relish the scene. Walking through wonder does not mean you will be awestruck. In order to see what is before you in each moment, you have to see what stands between you and seeing. What are you “seeing” that keeps you from seeing? Where are you instead of being here, now? Only you can bring yourself into the moment and be present with the moment. There is much to take the moment from us, but a moment unseen, unlived, is like, well, death. 05/08/2011
22. Jesse Brown’s Cabin, Blue Ridge Parkway, near Boone, NC—The National Park Service has a slogan: Your Safety Is Your Responsibility! It doesn’t stop there. Our life is our responsibility. We think life is automatic, natural—that if our vital signs are normal and everything is operational life should flow. Not so. We can be 98.6 and breathing and deader than dead. How to be vibrantly alive in the time left for living is our problem, and our responsibility. We bring ourselves to life by connecting with that which is life for us. We know what brings us to life and what kills our soul. We know where we belong and where we have no business being. Are we waiting for someone to make it easy for us? For someone to invite us to be alive? Our life is our responsibility. 05/08/2011
23. The Old Mill of Guilford, Guilford County, near Oak Ridge, NC—We have to shape ourselves to accommodate the facts of our life and we must not do that all glib and smiley. We must consciously bear the pain of accommodation—without being sour, bitter and doleful. It is an art, living truthfully, consciously, honestly. One that we are not taught to develop. We are taught to pretend it isn’t so. All of the things we don’t like about our lives are so much better than the things someone else has to tolerate, we have no business complaining. So, we dismiss our complaints. Deny the weight we carry. Put on a happy face, and lie our way through life. When we fake it this way, our body keeps score—or someone in our family bears the weight of our denial. Weird how that works, but real. The spiritual law is this: Pain will be borne, consciously or unconsciously. How well we bear it is an indication of how well we live. 05/09/2011
24. Greensboro Skyline Panorama, Greensboro, NC—What is important to you? What are you doing about it? You know how you aren’t doing enough of what’s important to you because you are doing something else that is important to you? This is called a values conflict. It’s when we set aside something we love to do in favor of something we love to do. Something has to go, and it does. Now here’s what I want you to do for me: Bear the pain of that conflict consciously, with full awareness. Suffer the conflict! Suffer all of your conflicts! Do not dismiss them, deny them, discount them, distract yourself from them. Enter the dichotomy: This, or this, or that over there? Do NOT allow your conflicts to cancel each other out and do NOT allow one love to erase and disappear another love. Love things that cannot exist side-by-side. Maintain the tension, bear the pain, consciously for as long as it takes for something to shift. This is where the magic happens. You can’t predict what or when or how, only that. Bear the pain and see where it leads. My best advice. 05/09/2011
25. Flyfishing in the Davidson River, Pisgah National Forest, near Brevard, NC—Lethargy keeps us in place with its deadly questions: “So what? Who cares? What’s the use? What difference will it make? What good will it do?” Instead of following the white rabbits on the adventure of our life, seeing where they take us and what we can do with our lives along the way, we watch TV, read about the lives of movie stars, and go shopping until we die. We lack incentive, motivation, ambition. We are as good as dead. What will it take to get us moving? Where comes the kick in the rear? We dream of magical interventions (winning the lottery) and dismiss the simple magic of moving our body out of its accustomed routine into new patterns of life and giving the white rabbits a chance. 05/10/2011
26. Spring Hills, Blue Ridge Parkway, near Boone, NC—We need a sounding board as much as anything—a place to air things out, to talk our way to clarity and vision and direction and peace. The best therapists offer this kind of safe, caring, space and invite us to explore our unrest, discomfort, conflicts, or the sense of things being not quite right somehow. We talk ourselves to the truth of how things are, and what needs to happen, and into the courage to do what needs to be done. The right kind of conversation restores our soul—restores us to our soul—by allowing us to talk our way to what needs to be said, seen, realized, understood, done. Who do we know who invites and allows this kind of search for the truth that is at the heart of our lives? We may need to meet some new people. 05/10/2011
27. An Oak Limb in the Fog on the Fire Tower Trail, Moses H. Cone Memorial Park, Blue Ridge Parkway, near Blowing Rock, NC—Think of your soul as a child who wants to see, taste, touch, smell, hear, feel, dance, inquire, explore, play, laugh, run, hug, tumble, roll, and not keep score. Give your soul what it wants for a minimum of thirty minutes once a day for the rest of your life. I’m as serious as I can be. My soul is laughing. And dancing. At the very idea of you doing that for your soul. At the very idea that I have a soul that is mine and you have a soul that is yours. My soul thinks that is very funny. But my soul is that way. What way is your soul. I have to stop now. My soul is laughing so hard I can’t think. 05/11/2011
28. High Falls, DuPont State Forest, near Brevard, NC—You cannot be spiritual and spend most of your time being rational, logical, reasonable, intellectual, left-brained. Soul is a right brain experience. Our right brain divines the path to soul. We dowse soul as though it were water (which has always been a metaphor for soul/psyche). We are as dead as we are spiritually because we think we can think our way to being spiritually alive. Nope. We have to live our way there by trusting ourselves to our right brain and seeing where it takes us. The child we are within leads the way to soul, and is soul. Stop thinking and go play! 05/12/2011
29. Dogwood in the Fog, 2011, Blue Ridge Parkway, near Rocky Knob, VA—My soul likes to play a game called “Get the camera and let’s go looking!” Going looking is one of the things my soul loves to do. It’s always up for it, and always calling out, “Stop the car! Turn around! Let’s look closer at that!” So, the soul and I are always out there looking for something to see. My hunch is that all photographers share the same soul. We all share the same soul for all I know. How many souls are there? How many minds are there? We talk about being “like-minded,” well how many different minds exist among us? We share the same sky, the same galaxy, why not the same mind, the same soul? Soul mates, all. We should pretend that is the case, and act like it is. That would make for a better world in a lot of ways. 05/12/2011
30. Swamp Iris, the Bog Garden, Greensboro, NC—We are never more than a perspective shift away from enlightenment, from waking up, from seeing things as they are and also are, from being healed, and whole, and saved (that is restored to ends worthy of us) and well. Seeing is everything. And hearing. And understanding. And living aligned with that which has need of us and the gifts we bring to each situation as it arises. The perspective entails comprehending what it means to say “Thy will, not mine, be done.” Who is the “Thy”? It doesn’t matter. Call it God. Call it Tao. Call it the Great Mother. The Sacred Source of Life and Being. Calling it anything is problematic because once you call it anything you’ve laid the foundation of creating a doctrine of the thing you call it and you have gotten away from “Thy will, not mine, be done” and started serving your idea of how things ought to be. Bad idea. 05/13/2011
31. Pink Dogwood, Greenway Park, Greensboro, NC—When we aren’t trying to make happen what we want to happen or keep from happening what we don’t what to happen, what are we doing? How do we spend our time when we aren’t on a mission? Gardening? Yard work? Sewing? Cooking? Reading? Writing? Walking? These pursuits “between causes” could have “soul value” in the sense of being refreshing and restorative on a spiritual/emotional/psychological (Where DO those lines lie?) level. And, they could be a better indicator of where life is found for us than in the things we do to “wrestle life into submission.” We might be pouring life energy into the wrong things. 05/13/2011
32. Lake Townsend from the Laurel Bluff Trail, Greensboro, NC—We live to serve the center, the core. Everything else is busywork. It may pay the bills, but if they aren’t the right bills, we’re kidding ourselves. If we aren’t paying the right bills, we are living the wrong life. The right bills serve the center, the core, bring forth who we are and also are, and help us do what is ours to do. Finding our way to the center is the quest for the Holy Grail, the spiritual journey, the search for home. We can be distracted from that task by the glass beads and silver mirrors that mesmerize and promise eternal bliss, but we will not be satisfied until we are one with the core in a “Thy will, not mine, be done” kind of way. 05/14/2011
33. Swamp Iris, Bog Garden, Greensboro, NC—Your work is to find the work you believe in, and do it. This may not be work you are paid to do. Lois Hamilton was paid as a bookkeeper, but she believed in Tatting. Tatting kept her going. What keeps you going? You have a happy fantasy of winning the lottery and quitting the work you get paid to do because you don’t believe in it but. What will you do then? Drift around? Hang out at the resorts, on the cruise ships? Pass the time merrily until you die? Your work is to find your work, and do it. 05/15/2011
34. Mallard Drake, Bog Garden, Greensboro, NC—Evil comes in two forms in my way of looking at things. Evil is a shortcut to the good of those taking the shortcut at the expense of everyone else’s good. And evil is anything that interferes with our idea of the good. Sometimes the two are one. 05/15/2011
35. Tulips, Blowing Rock, NC—Every test along the way comes down to “Whom do you trust?” Will we trust ourselves to our idea of the good: “No Lord! This should not happen to you!” Or will we trust ourselves to the work that is ours to do, the life that is ours to live no matter what: “Thy will, not mine, be done!”? Laying aside our work, our life, in favor of our idea of the good is an ongoing temptation, and the nature of every test along the way. We never get beyond thinking we know what we are doing—thinking we’ve got it now—thinking if they would just do it our way it would be a quick run to glory—thinking there is a place to be and we have the map. There is never a better good than doing the work that is ours to do, living the life that is ours to live—and we can do that anywhere, in any context, any circumstance, any time, any place. There is no good place for doing the work that is ours to do, for living the life that is ours to live. One place is as good as any other to live in the service of the good that is good. 05/16/2011
36. Lenten Rose, Greensboro, NC—Fear and laziness keep us stuck in place, miserable but not quite cold enough to get up and get a blanket. We aren’t what you would call real happy with our life as it is, but what good would it do to try to change things? And we might make things worse! There could be dragons waiting beyond the city limits sign! Better to stay where we are, complaining. Actually, it’s better to find what we’re made of. Joseph Campbell says “It took the Cyclops to bring the hero out in Ulysses.” Fear and laziness keep us from finding the hero within. See what you can do with your life in the time left for living. Forget playing it safe! Go for interesting and meaningful every chance you get! Bring on the dragons! See what you can do with them! 05/16/2011
37. Greensboro Grasshopppers Poster, NewBridge Bank Park, Greensboro, NC—We are here to do what is ours to do, to live the life that is ours to live. We think it’s about doing what we want. It’s about aligning ourselves with what wants us. We think money is about doing what we want to do. Money is about buying the tools that assist us in doing what is ours to do, in living the life that is ours to live. We never get a day off, or take a holiday from, being who we are called to be, from doing what is ours to do. Our work—to the extent that it is truly our work, the work we are called to do—is our life. If our life is empty, meaningless, boring and stale it is because we are not doing the work that is ours to do. Our work is interesting, meaningful work but. It probably isn’t what we have in mind. It probably isn’t what we want to do. There you are. The only thing standing between us and life is us. 05/17/2011
38. Boone’s Trace, Blue Ridge Parkway, near Boone, NC—Communities of innocence are innocent in the sense that the community doesn’t have an agenda it is trying to serve at its members expense. The community doesn’t try to talk its members into being this way and not that way, except to the extent that it says “Be who you are and also are!” and does its best to assist its members in doing that. Communities of innocence listen us into hearing what we have to say. They are therapeutic in that they serve the self-development and self-determination of their members, connecting us with who we are and also are and helping us live that out in our lives, but they are not therapy groups. They do not advertise or charge for their services. They exist to serve the cause of wholeness, integrity and peace. Your best chance at finding one is to start it by being the kind of person who offers the right kind of help in the right kind of way to those who come your way. Listening them to recognition and awareness, not telling them a thing. 05/17/2011
39. Davidson River, Pisgah National Forest, near Brevard, NC—We don’t know what our work is, what life is our life to live, by thinking about it. It isn’t a left brain process. We know what our work is, what our life is, instinctively, intuitively. The right side of our brain is clued in from the start. We know what we are built for and we don’t have the faintest idea. Both are true at the same time. Get used to paradox, contradiction. That is the fundamental nature of reality perceived through two different ways of seeing. What we see, you know, depends upon how we look. 05/18/2011
40. Catawba Crossing Poster, Catawba River, near Rock Hill, SC—The spiritual journey comes down to being who we are and also are, and fulfilling our destiny by doing what is ours to do, living the life that is ours to live. We complicate things by having big ideas and dreams of glory. The life we have in mind for ourselves is not the life our self/soul has in mind for us. What we wish were ours to do has little in common with what is ours to do. You see the problem. We are divided within, at odds with ourselves over who is going to guide our boat on its path through the sea. The story of how we resolve the conflict is the stuff of epic poems, Star Wars, and the Lord of the Rings. It’s enough to keep us awake nights, wondering how it is all going to turn out. 05/18/2011
41. Great Blue Heron, Bog Garden, Greensboro, NC—We want what we have no business having. That is as succinctly as you will ever hear, okay see, The Problem presented. All of our aches and agonies can be traced back to this fundamental kink in our makeup. This heron has its business. We have our business. The heron has no aspirations or interest in anything that is not its business. We are a wiggling, wanting, ball of aspirations and interests in everything we can imagine that is not our business. Our life work is saying “Yes!” to that which is our business and “NO!”—maybe, “NO! DAMN IT!”—to that which is not our business. Or, as it is sometimes phrased, “Thy will, not mine, be done!” 05/19/2011
42. Lake Brandt Sunset, Greensboro, NC—We think being smart is the solution to all of our problems today. Not! Being lucky is the solution to our problems! We cannot be lucky if we don’t take chances! We are here to align ourselves with our business and do it, but we aren’t sure what our business is. So, we have to guess! Guess and go! Only do it in good faith. Good faith is the hinge upon which it all turns. You can’t do just anything and say you are guessing it is your business. It has to be your best bet. You can’t get by with saying, “Oh, maybe this, maybe that.” You’ll never have the right kind of luck if you don’t go through life making your best bet about what is and is not your business. 05/19/2011
43. Wright Dairy, Rockingham County, NC—All we have to work with is the moment and the gifts we bring to the moment, the resources available to work with the moment. What are we trying to do? See what can be done in light of our mutual interests, ours and the moment’s. We place all the needs on the table—what needs to happen here and now in this moment as it unfolds? Then we walk around the table, or sit considering the table, until something stirs, separates itself from the pile, and shows itself to be what obviously needs to be done. Then, we do it. We do not step into the moment to show the moment who is boss. We step into the moment to assist the moment with what needs to happen in that moment. We are not separate from our lives or from the moments of our living, any more than a stream is separate from its channel. Our moments carry us where we are going, as we serve them with the gifts we bring to each one. 05/20/2011
44. Fishing Shacks, Peggy’s Cove, Nova Scotia—I’ll go to great lengths and unreasonable expense to put myself in a scene—to have a chance at a photograph. This is, at once, brilliant and stupid, my shame and my glory. I do not know where the line lies between an addiction, a compulsion, and a calling. I cannot begin to explain, justify, defend or excuse what I do for a living—and I don’t mean what I do to EARN a living. I mean what I do to have a life, to be alive. This makes me one with all of you who know what I mean, and quite to be pitied by all of you who have no idea of what I’m talking about. I have to go look for a photograph the way Columbus had to go look for India. 05/20/2011
45. Ramsey Creek, Great Smoky Mountains National Park, TN—The Bible is a treasure trove of metaphorical truth which we miss entirely in our hysterical insistence that everything has to be factual, literal, actual, tangible and concrete in order to be real and true. Abraham left home, left everything that was familiar and comfortable, and wandered in the wilderness in search of the Land of Promise, which he never found. We are Abraham on our own journey to the Promised Land, a destination we will never reach in this physical universe, which is the full realization of who we are and also are, and of our destiny, our work, what is ours to do, the life that is life for us, that is ours to live. The Promised Land does not have latitude and longitude any more than the Garden of Eden did, but it is what we are born for, where we are going. It is who we are, what we are about, what we are called to undertake in the time left for living. 05/21/2011
46. Bass Lake in October, Blue Ridge Parkway, near Blowing Rock, NC—That which has always been thought of as God is experienced as outside of us, beyond us, in a “more than words can say” kind of way. This is called transcendence. The experience transcends us and our world of normal, apparent reality. Anything can be the threshold to transcendence—dogwood blossoms, a waterfall, the birth of a baby, an expression of adoration and wonder on a child’s face… The list is endless. The experience is timeless. And then, like that, we are snapped back into our present circumstances, left with the memory of the transcendent moment and the dream of its hoped-for return. 05/22/2011
47. View of Grandfather Mountain from Price Lake, Julian Price Memorial Park, Blue Ridge Parkway, near Blowing Rock, NC—Our scenes are our scenes. Other photographers have better scenes to work with and will take photographs we will wish we had taken. Our work is to take the photographs that are ours to take—to take them as well as they can be taken—and let that be that. Doing our best with what is ours to work with and letting that be that is the real key to successful living. Other people have better options, more resources. Ours are ours. We get up each day and step into our lives exactly as they are and do what can be done with them—live them as well as they can be lived—and let that be that. Squaring ourselves up with our scenes, our lives, and doing our best with them and letting that be that is to be as successful with our photography and with our living as anyone has ever been. Anyone. Ever. 05/23/2011
48. Lake Louise, Canadian Rockies, Banff National Park, Alberta—Loss of soul in ancient societies was the loss of conscious, self-determined, existence. The person would be “taken over” by forces beyond her, or his, control. Addiction might be a modern equivalent, and religion is as addictive as alcohol or gambling. “You have heard it said, but I say unto you,” said Jesus. And he asked his disciples, “Who do you say that I am?” What do we know of God that we haven’t heard from someone else? How much of what we say of God comes from the common pool of religious platitudes and how much comes from our own experience and point of view? We can lose soul talking about soul when we only say what is being said around us, when we only think what we are told to think by “those who know best” (Truman Capote’s phrase). 05/23/2011
49. Private residence, Blue Ridge Parkway, VA—Our part entails cultivating all the old values—love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, generosity, gentleness, self-discipline, grace, compassion, tenderness, hospitality, etc.—and living in ways which express them appropriately throughout our lives. Hospitality means being open and receptive to a wide variety of ideas, perceptions, perspectives, ways of seeing and doing things. It is the opposite of smugness and arrogance, and it is one of the necessary ingredients in developing eyes that see, ears that hear and a heart that understands. It means knowing we don’t know half of what there is to know and more than half of what we think we know. Makes us a lot more fun to be around. 05/24/2011
50. Otter Point, Acadia National Park, near Bar Harbor, Maine—There is how things are and there is how you wish things were, and how you live with the discrepancy makes all the difference. My recommendation is that you live consciously with it. That you consciously bear the pain of the discrepancy, taking solace in the good aspects of how things also are—that are exactly like you would like for them to be. So, there is how things are, and how things also are, and how you wish they were. That is how things are. Live consciously in that tension. Do not relax it with denial or addiction. If you square up to the truth of how things are, all that you are told that is not true will be unable to stand the heat, and will have to leave the room, and your load will be immediately lighter. You may have to laugh. 05/24/2011
51. Bog Garden, Greensboro, NC—The Bog Garden is five minutes from my house, and I sit at the pond there often, waiting for a photograph, watching life play out before me. There is a goose with a broken wing, making out as she, as he, can. Three families of ducklings slowly being decimated by a large loggerhead snapping turtle—the balance of nature, you know. Green Herons, Blue Herons, Kingfishers, geese, ducks, frogs, sunfish…an entire pond world. Life at that level finds a way without the drama of life at our level. A goose breaks a wing and drags the wing, doing what geese do. A duck family loses three ducklings to the turtle and now there are five instead of eight doing what ducklings do. If it rains, the pond world does what it does in the rain. If the water level drops dramatically in a drought, the pond world does what it does in a drought. Each species has its business and goes about its business as well as it can imagine no matter what. What is your business? It’s important to know, and to be about it, no matter what. 05/25/2011
52. Dawn, Monument Valley Navajo Tribal Park, NM-AZ—One of the advantages to being old is you can repeat yourself with abandon. I can’t remember the last time I said something new. If I haven’t said this to you, I’ve said it to someone, maybe recently: Jacob Bronowski said, “If you want to know the truth, you have to live in certain ways.” He meant  that you have to live truthfully, that is, with a spirit of free and open inquiry—not living trying to prove the validity of something you believe to be true. You can’t make up your mind about what is true and then try to find evidence supporting your contention. That isn’t living truthfully. It’s living with an agenda, stacking the deck. Living truthfully is knowing what you don’t know—to the extent that’s possible—and being up front about it. It’s being as ignorant as you are and asking, seeking, knocking your way to eyes that see, ears that hear and a heart that understands. 05/25/2011
53. Moonrise, Monument Valley Navajo Tribal Park, AZ/NM—There are forces in nature that do not have our best interest at heart. Tornadoes, earthquakes, tsunamis, breast cancer and anacondas, just to mention a few. The idea that the universe is a friendly place and is here to help us toward wealth and prosperity is a happy fantasy that ignores the facts. The universe does not care about us so we better! We better care about ourselves and one another! We are all we have! That being the case, start noticing how often you set yourself aside. You cannot do that and live truthfully. Living truthfully means, among other things, embracing the truth of you, being true to yourself, bringing yourself forth into the time and place of your living—not repressing, suppressing, denying yourself and stuffing yourself into some dark corner because you are not suitable for the light of day. Whose side are you on? The anaconda’s? 05/26/2011
54. Bog Garden, Greensboro, NC—We have to have the freedom of our own life. If you have symptoms, ask yourself where the constraints are. Where are you being held captive by the life you are living, prevented from even thinking about the life you wish you were living, the life you could, maybe, one day live? We can be held hostage by legitimate responsibilities (I thought fatherhood would never end, then I thought work would never end), but the most abusive guard at the prison with no bars is our fear of what might happen if we walked away. We are, too often, our own jailer. Symptoms suggest constraints. Gather yourself and name them all. Become conscious of all that is keeping you bound to a life that is not conducive to being alive. Do not become hopeless and despondent! Part of the work of living truthfully is facing the truth of how it is with us. The wonderful thing about truth is that it has another side: How it also is. Facing how it is, opens us to how it also is. There be doorways and thresholds you haven’t begun to imagine. Life has not given up on you. Don’t you give up on life. 05/26/2011
55. Used in Short Talks On Contradiction, etc., Lupine, Guilford County, near Oak Ridge, NC—When your problems become overwhelming, go sit for a while in a field of Lupine. It won’t do anything about your problems but. It will bring a little solace to your soul. Our soul needs to know, needs to be reassured, from time to time that our problems are not all there are. There are also Lupine. The Lupine do not cancel out the problems. The problems do not cancel out the Lupine. They exist together as eternal contraries in our experience. We integrate the contradictions of our lives, reconciling what can be reconciled and holding in suspension the opposites that will forever be “also true.” Many of our problems have no solution and will be with us for a long time as “also true.” The goose with a broken wing has such a problem. Once we come to terms with the life-long nature of such a problem, a subtle shift occurs within—call it a perspective shift—and the problem is no longer the problem it once was. We have, without trying, changed our mind about the problem, and that changes everything. 05/27/2011
56. Hooker Falls, DuPont State Forest, near Brevard, NC—Don’t miss a side trip. The Path gets all the press, as though it is some kind of interstate super highway to glory. The side trips are the glorious part of glory. We can’t get there if we keep missing them, turning them down, on our high horse with our nose in the air and our manual on how to get to glory tucked under our arm. It’s the side trips that make going worth the trouble. The side trips are the interesting part, the things we remember along the way. You lupine in the previous photo was a side trip. I went to get a photo of the Old Mill of Guilford. I got there about 5 and the light would have been right at 7, but then, who is going to cut down all the overgrowth between me and the mill? Summer is already in the way! On my way home, I took a side trip. Saved the excursion. That’s the way it is with side trips. And then, there are the side trips on the side trips. This is great. Who cares if we ever get there? Why pass up glory on the way to glory? 05/27/2011
57. One and Two, Triple Falls, DuPont State Forest, near Brevard, NC—If you are going to do right by some living thing, do right by your soul. Your soul is, to paraphrase the National Park Service doctrine about your safety, your responsibility. You have to learn the language of soul and live aligned with soul. This is integrity. Living aligned with soul. Soul doesn’t communicate, commune, with words but with emotional charges, popping us from time to time with something akin to an electrical jolt. Any strong emotional reaction, either positive or negative, is soul saying, “Listen to me!” Of course, we have to interpret what soul is saying, and there could be a little conflict of interest at work here so. Good faith is the foundation of our relationship with soul. “If you are not here with us in good faith,” said Rumi, “you are doing terrible damage.” Practice living in good faith with soul and with all who come your way. It is a simple act that will change the course of history—yours and the world’s. 05/28/2011
58. Looking Glass Falls, Pisgah National Forest, Transylvania County, near Brevard, NC—Look around you. Note everything that has a human origin. All of it is just made up. Everything you see was just made up in someone’s head. It all came right out of someone’s imagination. Pianos? Someone imagined a piano, if you can imagine that. Everything we have created over the history of the species originated in our imagination. That being the indisputable case, what is more real, concrete, or the imagination that imagined concrete into existence? Why do we think the world of concrete and steel is the Real World and anything to do with our imagination is frivolous and inconsequential? Why do we dismiss imagination and emphasize the left brain to the exclusion of the right brain at every opportunity? God lives in the right side of our brains. The length of the spiritual journey is the distance from the left side of our brain to the right side of our brain. I’m making all this up. That doesn’t mean you can just throw it away.
59. Used in Short Talks on Contradiction, etc., Dawn, East Fork Overlook, Blue Ridge Parkway, near Brevard, NC—Bearing consciously the pain of contradictions (This is how things are and this is how things also are and that over there is how things also are) is the critical key to spiritual growth (which is indistinguishable from just plain growing up). The trouble with bearing consciously the pain of contradictions is that they get increasingly extreme. We cannot do it apart from an environment which supports us in the work and provides a safe place for us to do the work. Schizophrenics cannot tolerate contradictions and create them constantly, which, as you can see, does them no favors. We avoid the path of schizophrenia in part by avoiding, denying, ignoring contradictions. “That cannot possibly be true if this is true!” A safely understanding environment helps us see how this and that can be true at the same time, how what is good can also be evil, and vice versa. AND it helps us act in wonderfully bold and contradictory ways. May we all find our way to that kind of environment! 05/30/2011
60. East Fork Overlook, Blue Ridge Parkway near Brevard, NC—We are here to do right by ourselves and by each other, and conflicts of interest abound. My good is often your bad. Your good is often my bad. How do we do right by everyone in the room, in the world? We have to work it out. One important aspect of working it out is recognizing early on what can be done, and cannot be. There are people whose good is the only good, who must be coddled to or else. These people are abusive and toxic to our souls. I recommend giving them a wide berth. You will never receive better advice. We desperately need the presence of those who understand and honor the nature of LIFE—the importance of doing right by ourselves and each other, and working out the differences, the conflicts of interest, to everyone’s, more or less, mutual satisfaction across the board and around the table. When you meet people like that, make them your friend. 05/31/2011
61. Skinny Dip Falls, Blue Ridge Parkway, near Brevard, NC—Suicidal thoughts and impulses may indicate that something needs to die but that something is definitely not ourselves. The thoughts are not to be taken literally, but metaphorically. They generally come upon us at the transition points in our lives (adolescence, divorce, job loss, kids leaving home, etc.), and point to the fact that the way we have been living needs to be “laid to rest.” We have to die to our idea of how life ought to be lived—we have to change our minds about what is important—so that we might live the life that we are being called to live. So that new ideas and new perspectives may emerge. Our thoughts and fantasies of suicide indicate that we are at a transition point, that we are being asked to grow beyond, to move beyond, where we have been and live in light of a different goal, a different purpose. Our life is calling us forward and we are being asked to let go of the past and let the adventure begin. The Hero’s Journey, you know. 05/31/2011
62. Mabry Mill, Blue Ridge Parkway, near Meadows of Dan, VA—I keep saying this because it’s my central operating thesis. You’ve heard it before, so you can skip this one. But you’ve probably heard the next one before, too. That’s how things are. Did someone say, “That’s how things are”? What a coincidence. I was just thinking about that. There is how things are and there is how we wish they were, and how we live with the discrepancy makes all the difference. We can always imagine a better world than the one we live in, and everything turns on how well, and to what extent, we square ourselves up to the disparity between the world we live in and the world we dream of. The work to square ourselves up with this disparity, this discrepancy, is called spiritual growth. It’s also called growing up. Spiritual growth is growing up, and you can’t grow up without becoming spiritual in the process. Growing up is squaring up, is waking up, is getting up and doing what needs to be done in each situation as it arises. That’s all there is to it. 06/01/2011
63. Garden Creek Baptist Church, Stone Mountain State Park, NC—This is the way things are. This is what you can do about it. And that’s that. Trying to avoid legitimate suffering by refusing to recognize, accept and live in a world that is not how we wish it were is the source of all our suffering. “Where there is a will, there is a way!” we say, re-doubling our efforts to make the world and our life how we want them to be. What does wanting know? Remember your first marriage? You wanted that, a lot. Sin is wanting what we have no business having, wanting the wrong things, wanting unrestrained, undisciplined, unbounded. But we cannot want what we do not want. The word for this is stuck. We want what we want and are determined to have it even if it kills us. Our wanting is part of the way things are, and we can’t do anything about it. And that’s that. Well, not quite. We can do something about it. We can be aware of it. We can know the degree to which we are enslaved to our reckless, wanton, wanting. Consciousness is freedom but. With consciousness comes suffering consciously. What will it be? 06/02/2011
64. Cathedral Rock, Yosemite National Park, CA—A sermon should do two things. It should help you with your life and help you with your relationship with God. No! Wait! These are not two things! These are one thing! Your life IS your relationship with God! We cannot use God to help us with our life, as though they are two different things—to pave our way and pad our pockets—to deliver to us that which we want and deliver us from that which we do not want. We must use our life to align ourselves with God, with that which has always been called “God,” which may have no connection whatsoever with that which is popularly and currently and fashionably called “God.” Religion as it has devolved narrows God down to that particular religion’s idea of God, which is then proclaimed at the expense of all other ideas of God. Religion at its best, as it always existed until we got our hands on it long about the Age of Reason, perhaps a bit before, expanded our experience of God beyond all ideas, and dogmas, and doctrines. Ah, those were the days, when life and God were one thing. 06/03/2011
65. Looking Glass Rock, Blue Ridge Parkway, near Brevard, NC—Our work is finding our work and doing it, finding our life and living it. We facilitate the search by learning the language of soul. Soul speaks in metaphor, relishes paradox, loves images, approaches us playfully, through imagination, instinct, intuition, paradox and irony. Soul loves the role of devil’s advocate and is always compensating for over-developed states of ego-consciousness, so that if we dream we are a pig wallowing in the mud and are horrified by that image, we might wonder if we are not a bit too pristine and pure in our actual life. If we relish the image, it’s a different matter and we might look at the extent to which we allow ourselves the freedom of personal expression in our actual life. The same dream can have quite different meanings at different stages of our life. Soul speaks a language that is quite context and situation specific. Soul is very much here-and-now, present and real—which is where the work to find our work, to live our life, is always carried out. 06/04/2011
66. The Tetons reflected in Snake River, Grand Teton National Park, WY—In becoming who we are called to be, we never get far from who we already are. It’s just a slight shift in perspective that takes a lifetime to pull off. The work is to be ourselves, to integrate who we are and who we also are, to reconcile the opposites, square up to the conflicts, welcome all sides to the Guest House (Rumi) and enjoy the party. Harmony, wholeness, completion, genuineness, authenticity, integrity, oneness, peace—these are terms that describe the end result of the work that is ours, work that is facilitated, made possible, by grace and compassion for ourselves. And this is the work that takes a lifetime and beyond to complete. But, we’ll never get it done if we don’t get started! 06/04/2011
67. Twilight, East Fork Overlook, Blue Ridge Parkway, near Brevard, NC—The Hero’s Journey consists of doing what needs to be done in each situation as it arises. The Cyclops that stands in our way is always the next thing that we don’t want to do. Do we have what it takes to get up and do the thing without the boost of a Powdermilk Biscuit? Can we step into our lives day after day and do there what needs to be done, when it needs to be done, the way it needs to be done? We long for a different life, a better life, a more thrilling, fun, life, an easier life. All we get is this old stinky life with our name on it. Do we have what it takes to live this life the way it needs to be lived? Do we have what it takes to live this life that only we can live better than anyone else could live it in our place? We want to tag out and take to the hammock, while the Hero’s Journey waits to be trod. 06/05/2011
68. Wright Dairy, Rockingham County, NC – (Duplicated Photo) Our work is our work and not the things we get paid to do. We do the things we get paid to do to buy the tools and the goods (food, clothing, shelter you know) we need to do our work. Our work is our destiny, what we are built for (You wouldn’t want me doing your small engine repair), what is ours to do. Life has a way of separating us from our life, from what has life for us, from our work. The 10,000 things are offered as substitutes for the things that bring us to life and are life for us. There is little to assist us in the work that knows our name, but there is enough. Something stirs within us, something catches our eye. We move toward the thing that moves us and find just enough help to keep going in the service of what we live to do. Trust yourself to the faintest glimmer of hope still smoldering within. Blow gently on the coals. Believe in the fire. 06/06/2011
69. Valley View, Yosemite National Park, CA—We walk into a scene, looking. We step into our life, looking. Hoping to see what is there. Hoping to see things as they are. Hoping to see what truly needs to be done and what we can do about it. We bring with us what we have to offer to the scene, to our life, hoping to find a way to offer what we have to give as a grace and a blessing upon the scene, upon our life. We are not here to plunder the scene, to pillage our life, to loot, ransack, rifle and move on to look for more treasure elsewhere. We are the treasure we bestow upon the scene, upon our life. We are here to give what we have to offer for the good of the world. Our perspective, our presence, can transform for good or for ill. Our challenge is to tread lightly and leave kindness in our wake. 06/07/2011
70. Zabriskie Point Panorama, Death Valley National Park, CA—Not one of us is here, now, as the result of careful planning and minute attention to detail. Yet, not one of us can deny that here we are right now. We don’t know where we will be tomorrow or in 5 years but that doesn’t stop people from asking, “Where will you be in 5 years?” Like 5 years ago we could have told them we would be here, now. The other thing is that we all have come through some bad stuff to get here. We never thought we would make it. But here we are, now. These two facts will be true throughout our future. We won’t get there by planning it out and we will get there by dealing with some bad stuff. We have done it already. The fact that you are here, now, is proof enough that you have done in your past what you will need to do in your future. You can trust yourself to the care of that which has delivered you to this point in your life. If that’s not having it made, I don’t know what is. 06/08/2011
71. Great Blue Heron, Bog Garden, Greensboro, NC—Whoever gave birth to the idea that the universe is a friendly place and has our best interest at heart and will assist us toward happiness and prosperity if we will just get out of the way with our negative thoughts, never sat pondside. The Bog Garden is a study in ruthlessness. It’s like being at Wal Mart when the doors are opened for the After Thanksgiving Sale. Baby ducks are pushed out of the brood for not being quite right somehow. Herons gobble fishes. Snapping turtles eat anything slower than they are. Pecking orders are established and verified with malice and without mercy. Nature’s way. Bullies win. Civilization comes along to give the rest of us a chance. The soft values, compassion, kindness, generosity, altruism and the like, have to have advocates, have to be championed. A balanced budget is not the highest value, particularly when the tax rate is not equitably distributed across all income levels. The bullies have to be stopped by people like me and you. 06/08/2011
72. False Kiva, Canyonlands National Park, UT—Perhaps Primal Peoples worshiped here—its purpose is as obscure as its origin. We all know how nice it would be to have help from on high in dealing with the deep needs of life, like food and water and encroaching Bullies. We all need a sanctuary where we can express our fear and anguish, and invoke the benevolent powers to intervene in our behalf. Where do you go to find what you need? Carl Jung says whenever we encounter something mysterious, we project our own assumptions onto it. We tell ourselves things about it that make sense of it. We create a religion and talk about “the man upstairs.”  Jung also says, “In each of us there is another whom we do not know.” He is speaking of the unconscious realm. We project outward what is inward, and seek “out there” beyond the cosmos, the source of consolation and reassurance—that ever-present help in time of trouble—that dwells within. 06/09/2011
73. South Toe River, Carolina Hemlocks Picnic Area, Pisgah National Forest, near Burnsville, NC—If we replaced the founders of the country with the current set of politicians in Washington, all the English would have had to do is send over a boat load of lobbyists with about a tenth, maybe less, of the money they spent on the Revolutionary War and we would still be a British colony. Complaining about the lack of heart and vision doesn’t change anything. How do we replace the current spirit of politicians with the spirit of the founders? The Dali Lama said, about the Chinese occupation of Tibet, “If what is going on has been going on for a while, it will likely continue to go on,” or words to that effect. Momentum carries us with it. You can’t stop a tsunami, or a glacier. Well, used to be you couldn’t stop a glacier. We’ve stopped a few in our time, sad to say, but. The point is how do we get people to be who we need them to be? When the horse has the bit in its teeth, you hang on for the ride and hope for the best. Like the Dali Lama said, “You ride it out,” or words to that effect. 06/09/2011
74. Kiva Ladder, Mesa Verde National Park, CO—Nature’s timetable leaves a lot of time between the times for action. If you have a pet, you know what I’m talking about. There is a lot of sleeping and lying about going on. The animal world doesn’t live by the clock or keep a full social calendar. Migrations happen on a more or less fixed schedule. The search for food and water is on-going. Sex happens when it needs to. Beyond that lies waiting. Between the times for action, we wait. But. When we wait, we get bored. We cast about, flip through the channels, look for some entertainment, some diversion, some distraction to take our minds off waiting, and miss the time for action when it comes upon us because we are distracted by the 10,000 diversions we have created to fill up the empty time. All time is not empty, but it may as well be because we fill all of it artificially and cannot tell “the fullness of time,” the time that is “right,” from “ordinary, empty, dullsville, boring” time. We have lost the art of waiting. Don’t even know that we are waiting. We think life is passing us by when it is waiting for the time to be right to call our name. 06/10/2011
75. Hwy 163, Monument Valley Navajo Tribal Park, Utah—I watched a Great Blue Heron attack a mother duck and three ducklings today for no reason that I could intuit other than they were in an area he/she had decided belonged to him/her. And he/she had the power to draw a line. Lines are everywhere. Invisible as See-Me-Nots. Without knowing it we are over the line and have to be slammed to the floor a time or two to be reminded to not cross the line. This is crazy. Whose idea was this? We should all get memos upon arising each day that carefully spell out the do’s and don’ts and leave no questions unanswered. Until that happy day dawns, we are stuck with walking unwarned into some damn heron’s favorite stretch of real estate and taking our lumps. May we not take it personally but understand it’s the stupid way of the world, and do our best to be kind to the mother ducks and ducklings who stray across our lines. 06/10/2011
76. Julia Lake, DuPont State Forest, near Brevard, NC—No one ever had a problem with things going her or his way. It’s when things don’t go our way that things go quickly from bad to worse. Things don’t go our way and we respond in a way designed to get things to go our way. This is called The Struggle for Supremacy. It is sometimes called Flailing About in Helplessness. It comes from not being clear about the nature of things. Let me explain it to you. It is all useless, pointless, hopeless and coming to a very bad end. And how we live in the meantime makes all the difference. If you can understand that, you have it made, as well as you can have it made. Things will not go our way and how we live with that makes all the difference. Practice living well with that. You will save the world, and your mental health will be dramatically improved. 06/11/2011
77. Mouse Creek Falls, Smoky Mountains National Park, NC—Yes and No are all we have to work with. We walk into each day with only Yes and No at our disposal. How we apply them determines the outcomes of our days. The process is complicated by our ambivalence about many things. On the one hand, Yes, on the other hand, No. We have to come to terms with our ambivalence—not so as to get rid of it, but to bring it forth, relish it, delight in it, explore it. All of our decisions would be better decisions if we didn’t rush past ambivalence on the way to decision. Splash around in ambivalence! Let the magic work! The magic is the heart of life. We don’t know what to do with our Yes’s and No’s. We’re lost with nothing but Yes and No to work with. Everything depends on the magic, and the magic requires us to be as ambivalent as we are for as long as it takes for the magic to work. So, sit with ambivalence, bring it forth, explore it, inquire of it, listen to it, live it. Put everything on the table and consider the table. Walk around the table. Listening. Looking. Waiting to see, hear, understand and know, in light of the whole shebang, what is Yes! and what is No! 06/13/2011
78. Midnight Hole, Big Creek Campground area, Great Smoky Mountains National Park, NC—Our lives unfold, emerge, in a dance with our circumstances and our proclivities. The place of consciousness is to bring ourselves forth in light of what we know of ourselves at any point in our living. We are mostly unconscious, hidden away, known and made conscious by the one who knows us best—that would be us—within the context of our life. Think of our context as fate—what we are born into, the givens, the things we can’t do anything about, the time and place of our birth, for instance, the constraints and opportunities that define our days. Think of our self, the person we are capable of becoming, as our destiny—who we show ourselves to be through the process of living our lives. We embrace and bring forth our destiny within the confines of our fate. Or not. We can succumb to our fate and be who we are told to be by our circumstances and Those Who Know Best (Truman Capote’s term). Our task is to unfold ourselves and redeem our circumstances as a boon to the world. The Hero’s Journey. 06/14/2011
79. Roaring Fork Falls, Pisgah National Forest, near Burnsville, NC—I’ve been retired from the ministry (Presbyterian Church USA) for four and a half months, and have realized in that time how much time I spent bridging gaps, reconciling differences, healing breeches and disruptions in relationships between me and members of the church and among church members. It was exhausting and ongoing work. It has eased up a bit without an entire congregation to stay in touch with, but it doesn’t stop. There are still family differences to take into account and my own internal riffs and snits to oversee and mend. The work of reconciling differences, within and without, is the work of being consciously human. We do not lay it aside ever. We work to integrate ourselves within and to integrate ourselves with our closest relationships and to integrate our group with other groups, our nation with other nations, so that the interests of all are respected and cared for. It is exhausting and ongoing work. And it must be done. 06/15/2011
80. Used in Short Talks On Contradiction, etc., Flame Azaleas on Roan Mountain, NC/TN—We live such discordant lives! We are torn between a myriad of emotions and values! Conflict abounds! Contradiction and ambivalence prevail! And our work is to integrate the whole, to reconcile the opposites, make peace, serve wholeness, make one… Makes us crazy. Wears us out. Sends us into neuroses and addiction. All of which adds to our workload. Now we have more opposites to reconcile, to make this square with that! Carl Jung says the mandala is the soul’s way of soothing itself, holding itself together in torn and broken world. Life is, well, modern art, all jagged and off-center and out of sync, layers of contrasting colors, loud, ugly. Soul yearns for peace, oneness, wholeness, completion and takes refuge in creating/coloring mandalas—making complimentary what could be contradictory and negating. Photography, for me, is mandala work, using a rectangle or a square instead of a circle, to bring the elements of the photo together into a harmonious whole, grounding and soothing my soul, making peace. 06/16/2011
81. From Round Bald, looking toward Jane Bald and beyond, Roan Mountain Highlands, NC/TN—Nothing makes us happier than busting our butts in the service of that which needs what we have to offer and needs to be done whether it is convenient, easy, fun and enjoyable or not. We think happy is an extension of convenient, easy, fun and enjoyable. We will not be happy until we change our mind about what constitutes happiness. We are in the mental, emotional, physical state we are in because we will not, under any circumstances, change our mind about what is important. Our life has been banging us against the wall of unrelenting reality all our lives long, and we have been just as unrelenting in our insistence that what we say is important IS important! The first lesson of the spiritual journey, which is the journey to wholeness, which is the journey to maturity, which is growing up, which is seeing things as they are, being clear about what truly needs to be done, and doing it—the first lesson of that process is: How we see things isn’t how things are. This is also stated as: How we wish things were isn’t how things are. We have to change our mind about what is important a lot along the way. 06/17/2011
82. Roaring Fork Falls, Pisgah National Forest, McDowell County, near Little Switzerland, NC—The visible world is not the only world. Life is lived on two levels, in two worlds, the visible and the invisible. We do not live in “filling the world and subduing it”—in erecting edifices of concrete and steel—in “making our mark” in the world of normal, apparent reality. When that is the case, we weep along with Alexander the Great when there are no more armies to defeat, no more peoples to add to the list of the conquered. We live as partners, collaborators with—envoys, extensions, expressions of—the invisible world. We take our cues from the invisible world, find our guidance, our direction, in the invisible world. Disconnected, cut off, from the invisible world, we are a flag with no pole, a ship with no rudder. You would think we would nurture and nourish the relationship but. The visible world is replete with seductive pleasures. “You can’t keep them down on the farm once they’ve seen Gay Paree!” We are off after the lights and the action, the achievements, accomplishments, acquirements, acquisitions and success of the visible world, addictions that do not satisfy. 06/18/2011
83. Rhododendron on Roan Mountain, Carter County, TN—Our challenge and our calling is always to live the life that is ours yet to live, within the context and circumstances of our existence—to bring forth who we are here and now—to present ourselves to this time and place so as to express the gift that is ours to give in redemptive, healing, ways, and thereby bless the world, though it may not be seen by the world of that time and place as a blessing. Got that? It means the world of your experience is likely to resist your bringing forth who you are and is not likely to receive well the gift you have to offer for its own benefit, salvation. You cannot let that stop you. It’s just another test along the way, the Cyclops in one of his many configurations. We don’t get a lot of cooperation in the work that is ours to do—being a source of blessing and grace in the time and place of our living—and just enough encouragement, often not from the sources we are looking to for that, to stay on the path. So, buck up! Know as much of who you are and also are as you can know at this place in your life, and bring it forth into your life, for the good of those who are capable of being blessed and graced by the gift of you! 06/19/2011
84. Jane Bald, Roan Mountain Highlands, Carter County, TN—We live to integrate the two worlds, visible and invisible—to bring forth the invisible world into the visible world of normal, apparent, reality. The visible world is a life support system, providing the physical means for physical life, but the invisible world is the source of vitality, enthusiasm, exuberance—“the wellspring of living water”—which brings us to life by providing us with meaning and purpose and the wherewithal to serve and know what is good. We cannot allow the physical world to supplant the invisible world by offering counterfeit purposes, surrogate goals in the form of forbidden fruit and corporate ladders of success. We have to nurture and nourish our connection with the invisible world by developing eyes that see, ears that hear and a heart that understands. Sees what? Hears what? Understands what? More than words can say! We seek out the “thin places” between the two worlds in art, music, nature and in our relationships with one another where experiences with numinous reality (which we call sacred) remind us of the truth of the other world and call us to look, listen, inquire and serve in a “Thy will, not mine, be done” kind of way. 06/20/2011
85. Flame Azalea on Roan Mountain, Carter, County, TN—It is easy to be distracted by, to be overwhelmed by, the events and circumstances of our life in the world of normal, apparent, reality. No connection is easier to lose than the one with the invisible world. Yet, it is only a perspective shift away in any time, any place. Every moment is a threshold to the other world for those with eyes to see, ears to hear, a heart that understands. We only have to open ourselves to the all-ness that is before us in any situation to see what else is there. Stuck in traffic, we can see that we are part of the great river of life, with everyone going her, his, way, yet also participating in the same experience of life that all people in every time and place have experienced, and serving ends quite beyond us that we don’t know anything about, locked in, as we are, to what is important to us. As we begin to wonder what is important and how we know, we are close to asking that of our inner guide, our invisible twin—close to being conscious of the partnership that transforms our ordinary life into a magical tale of epic proportions. Let the wonder begin! 06/21/2011
86. Sun up, East Fork Overlook, Blue Ridge Parkway, near Brevard, NC—We are not here as a tourist walking through our life, liking this, not liking that, wondering what’s for dinner and what’s after that. We have business here. What’s your business? What truly matters? What are the things that you are to be about, that you are here to serve with your life? What is satisfying? What is interesting? What is meaningful? No one can answer these questions for us. They are our questions to answer for ourselves. We would not trust anyone else to order our desert for us, or sweeten our coffee for us. Why do we trust anyone else to tell us what to do with our lives? Our life is our responsibility. We cannot do just anything with it, as though it does not matter how we live. “Maybe I’ll go snowboarding today, or lie in the sun with a good book.” The day is not ours to do with as we please! We have work to do, bringing ourselves forth as a blessing, a grace, a gift to the world. We cannot be casual, indifferent, clueless. We have to take up the work of knowing what our work is, and doing it, in the time left for living. There is no time to waste. 06/22/2011
87. Flame Azalea, Roan Mountain Highlands, Carter County, TN—It is important to know what is important, and what is not. It is important to know what our business is, and what it is not. Ah, but. These things change with time and circumstance. One here and now is not another. What is important here, now has no value there, then. Our business is like the wind that blows where it will, but. It is always our business to know what our business is, what is important, what truly needs to be done, in each situation as it unfolds—and to do it. Formulas, rules, recipes, laws, conventions are no guide. They are shortcuts at best, evidence that we will work harder to avoid the work that is ours to do than doing the work the work requires. Listening, looking, seeing, hearing—and responding courageously to what is being asked of us in each here and now that comes along. How do we know? We have to risk being wrong! We have to take a chance with everything on the line! What is being asked of us? What is important? What is our business—here and now? 06/23/2011
88. Willow Flats, Grand Teton National Park, WY—Play like a rookie. That’s my best advice. Everybody wants to be seen as an Old Pro. Everybody one-ups everybody else, wants to know more than anybody else has ever known. Know nothing. That’s my best advice. Look at the world as though you have never seen the world. Listen like you have not heard the first thing. Ask, inquire, of everyone about anything. Hunger and thirst for understanding—for RIGHT understanding. Everyone can teach you something if you consider them with eyes that see, ears that hear, hearts that comprehend. Everything you know can be known differently, has other sides, can be seen in other ways. Be open to what the world has to show you. Be receptive to what the world has to give to you. Be eager to learn it all all over again fresh every day from the ground up just like a rookie. 06/28/2011
89. Haden Valley, near Canyon Village, Yellowstone National Park, WY—We are born with everything we need. We have what it takes but. It takes nourishing and nurturing our connection with what it takes—with the resourcefulness and resolve that comes with us out of the womb. Apart from a nourishing, nurturing, environment—and the creation of that environment is as much our responsibility (Whose side are we on?) as it is that of those whose charge we are. We cannot place the burden of a failed environment entirely on the shoulders of others—we have a part to play in the crafting of a life of soul. We have to learn the language of soul, tend to the affairs of soul, live soulful lives. When we take care of our relationship with soul, that relationship provides us with all we need to do what is ours to do—to do what truly needs to be done—in each situation as it arises but. That is not what we have in mind. We want more than soul has to offer. Soul can only provide us with an interesting, meaningful life. We want the lights and action, you know. The stuff sold by Madison Avenue, glass beads and silver mirrors and promises of happiness ever after. Given a choice between happiness or interesting and meaningful, go with interesting and meaningful. You will be as happy as can be if you do. Of course, it will take a while. You have to trust me here. 06/28/2011
90. The Beaver Pond at Schwabacher Landing, Grand Teton National Park, WY—A week in Grand Teton and Yellowstone National Parks with two daughters and their husbands and five granddaughters has given everyone ample opportunities to field hard grounders and routine fly balls and decide what to do in the situation as it unfolds before them. Just like the people who do that kind of thing for a living, no one has thrown her, or his, glove in the dirt and stormed off the field exclaiming, “If you are going to keep hitting me those hard ground balls, I’m quitting!” When we put on the uniform and step onto the field, we expect hard ground balls coming our way. When we get out of bed each day and step into our life, we expect things to be dished out to us that we do not order or see coming. We field the hard grounders and do what the situation requires in every situation that arises—deciding what needs to happen in each here, in every how, and assisting its happening in ways that serve the true good of all. This is the work of grace and maturity, and it is what constitutes the spiritual journey, one situation at a time. 07/02/2011
91. Rainbow at the Lower Falls, Yellowstone National Park, WY—The things we like about the people we like are the things that set them apart, that stand them out, that identify them—characterize them—for who they are. We like their uniqueness, their individuality, their special flavor. We don’t go for bland, tasteless, dull, boring, paper doll people. We prefer the company of those who have a style, and a perspective, all their own. Then we work to be like everybody else. We want to look like everybody else, think like everybody else, believe like everybody else and do what everybody else is doing. We take our cues from the crowd, shed our unique colors and hues and blend in, become invisible. You want to help me here? What are we thinking? The Wasteland is where everybody is doing what they are supposed to do (Joseph Campbell)–thinking what they are supposed to think, believing what they are supposed to believe, saying what they are supposed to say. That is the land of death and decay. Don’t live there. Don’t even visit. Hone your own point of view. Cut your own path. Make your own way. Find your own life and live it. Do not throw away the time that is left for living striving to be approved by Those Who Know Best (Truman Capote) And Must Be Pleased! 07/03/2011
92. Used in Short Talks on Contradiction, etc., String Lake, Grand Teton National Park, WY—We wake up when we see how things are and how they also are. We grow up when we square ourselves up (reconcile ourselves) with the contradiction between how things are and also are and how we want them to be (how we wish they were). We wise up when we align ourselves with the core, the center, and live in ways which exhibit/express who we are and also are in serving what truly needs to happen in each situation as it arises. This is all there is to it, waking up, growing up, squaring up, wising up. It all comes down to laying ourselves aside in a “Thy will, not mine, be done” kind of way but. We are the ones who say what is “Thy will” and what is “mine”—we don’t take anyone else’s word for these things. We are the ones who conceptualize the “Thy”—who say who or what the “Thy” is. We live on the basis of our evolving understanding of what constitutes life—of what being alive and really living are all about. It is our task to be as alive as we can be in the time left for living. May we hold nothing back in that work, and amaze ourselves in increasingly wonderful ways! 07/04/2011
93. Used in Short Talks On Contradiction, etc., The Teton Range at Sunrise, Grand Teton National Park, WY—When we run from what is hard about our lives and escape in our addictions, distractions and diversions, we reject the hero’s task and miss out on the miracle of synthesis. The perennial conflict between how things are and how we want things to be requires us to bear the pain of the contradiction while we work to work things out until a shift occurs. The shift may happen in our external situation and it may happen internally. Internally, the shift is called “accommodating ourselves to reality” or “growing up.” Carl Jung says that none of the important problems in our lives have a solution—we don’t solve them or resolve them we simply out-grow them. This is the hero’s work, wrestling with our problems until the shift happens and circumstances change or we change. This shift is the miracle of synthesis, of reconciliation, of integration, of wholeness and completion. It happens in the experience of those who have what it takes to look their life in the eye and say, “Show me what you got.” Who can see into the heart of how things are and how things also are and accept that that’s how things are. These are the people who are there with their eyes open when the shift occurs, who can smile or laugh and say, “How about that. Who would have guessed it? Wow!” 07/05/2011
94. Sun Star, Black Sand Geyser Basin, Yellowstone National Park, WY—One of the characteristic features of human beings is that we aren’t interested in anything we can’t exploit. We turn everything into our advantage but. What’s the advantage of having advantages? We turn everything into money, but. What do we turn money into? Addiction? Distraction? Diversion? More money? We are living a life that has nothing to do with the life we are called to live. Who does the calling? We do. We call ourselves to live a life we aren’t interested in living because we cannot exploit it for our own advantage. We are divided this way. At odds to the core. We want what we have no business having, and know it when we go to the trouble of thinking about it. So, who is guiding our boat on it’s path through the sea? We are. That’s why we go in circles, capsize, sink. And that makes the spiritual journey the work of aligning ourselves with ourselves, making peace within, squaring up with who we are and also are, reconciling ourselves with our invisible twin, and living consciously together the life that is left to be lived. Amen! May it be so! 07/06/2011
95. Grand Prismatic Spring, Midway Geyser Basin, Yellowstone National Park, WY—The only people who go to hell are the people who believe in hell. Joseph Campbell, and T.S. Elliot, talk about The Wasteland. The Wasteland is dry and tasteless and barren. It is where people go through the motions of living but are dead. It is the place Jesus talked about when he said, “Leave the dead to bury the dead.” They are dead because they have no life of their own. They do what they are supposed to do, what somebody else tells them to do. They think what they are supposed to think, believe what they are supposed to believe, vote for who they are supposed to vote for. They never have an idea or an inclination of their own. They never say anything they haven’t been told to say. They paint by the numbers and stay carefully within the lines and all of their paintings look exactly alike. They carefully step in the black footprints laid down by their ancestors and do not deviate in the slightest from how things have always been done because that is they way they are supposed to be done. They are afraid to do it any other way because they have been told they will go to hell if they do. They are in hell because they believe in hell. They have sacrificed their life in the here and now in the hope of avoiding hell in the then and there, that is, after they die. But their lives are hell. Don’t let anything stand between you and the life that is yours to live, particularly the idea of hell. 07/07/2011
96. Mormon Row Barn, Grand Teton National Park, WY—How alive can we be in the time left for living? We owe it to ourselves—and to that which knows what it means for us to be alive—to find out. Carl Jung says, “There is within each of us an unknown other whom we do not know.” This Unknown Other knows what it means for us to be alive. Our work is to know what he, what she, knows—to align ourselves with his, with her, will for our life (which is to embrace our Destiny)–take up the Hero’s Journey (which is the Spiritual Quest)—and discover what we are made of and what we are about. Our work in the time left for living is to find our life—the life that is truly our life, the life with our name on it, the life we are built and called to live—and live it. We are Odysseus, Ulysses, Jesus and the Buddha, searching for the life that waits for us to live it. We only have to believe that it is so and act as though it is to discover the wonder of the gold in the worthless stone we had taken our lives to be. Knowing/believing the truth of the value of the life yet to be lived sets us free to live it, transforms us and the world. Amen! May it be so! 07/08/2011
97. Used in Short Talks On Contradiction, etc., Yellowstone River, Yellowstone Canyon, Yellowstone National Park, WY—We work out all of the discrepancies, reconcile the opposites, integrate the contradictions, come to terms with the discordances, square up with the conflicts, make our peace with how things are and how things also are… This is the Hero’s Task, which is also called the Spiritual Journey, which is also called Growing Up. The tools for the work are awareness, compassion, humor, playfulness, kindness, and the right kind of conversation with the right kind of people. We do not get far in this work without the help of a community of the right kind of people. I call this kind of community a “community of innocence,” because it has nothing at stake in us—it does not seek to exploit us, or any of its members, in any way. It simply receives us well, listens to us attentively, asks us questions that enable us to say what we have to say, and tells us what it has learned through its experience that may be helpful in our situation. That’s it. What we do with all of this is up to us. Progress along the path cannot be hurried. We proceed at our own pace, in our own time, waking up as we are able. The community of innocence does not try to hurry us along, but accompanies us kindly, with compassion, having nothing to gain and nothing to lose. 07/09/2011
98. Sunrise, Yellowstone National Park, WY—We only have to find our life and live it while doing what it takes to maintain, sustain, our life in the world of normal, apparent, reality. Life is lived on two levels. Physical and spiritual. Life on the physical level is food, clothing and shelter. Life on the spiritual level is meaning and purpose. We have to live on both levels at the same time. As it stands, life on the physical level gets all the press and life on the spiritual level is thought to be what we do in church, with the praying and the Bible study and the rule keeping and the “Our God is better than your God” putdowns to all the other ways of thinking about God. We gotta grow up. Spiritual is connection with the truth of who we (also) are and what we (also) are about—with our destiny, with the life we are born (destined) to live—within the world of physical reality. It is what we are here for. One way of cluing into what that might be is to ask for a dream. No kidding. Before going to sleep, ask for a dream: “What area of life is my genius/gift best suited for?” Take what the dream gives you. See where it leads. The basic strategy for the “spiritual journey” (which is finding and living the life that is ours to live) is to see where things lead. Start with the area of life your genius, or gift, is best suited for. See where that takes you. In so doing, you launch yourself on the adventure of your life. Happy trails. 07/10/2011
99. Below the Beaver Dam, Schwabacher Landing, Grand Teton National Park, WY—There is the way things are, and also are, and there is what we can do about it, and that’s that. Either we can take it or we can’t. The hero’s task is to do all that can be done about the way things are and also are and let that be that. Squaring ourselves up with life’s inevitables and refusing to allow the things we cannot do anything about stop us from doing what can be done about the things we can do something about is the high calling of being human. Anybody can say, “No, I am not going to live on these terms.” Everybody can imagine a world that is better than the one they live in. We are asked to live in this world just as it is and work to make it better for our being in it. What say you? 07/10/2011
100. Lewis River Valley, Yellowstone National Park, WY—We don’t have to worry about what we should do to become more spiritual or make progress on the spiritual journey. We only need to do the next thing well and see where it leads. We only need to attend the next situation as it arises and assist its coming forth in ways that are unique to us, that come natural to us. The work that is ours to do, the life that is truly ours to live, are commensurate with the gift, with the genius, that are ours to use in the service of the good of all. The work finds us as the wand chooses the wizard. We don’t go in search of what is ours to do, maybe this, maybe that. We simply do what needs to be done here and now in ways that utilize the gift we have to give and see where that takes us. The gift, genius, work, life will be a boon to all, but their real import is to wake us up, bring us forth, introduce us to ourselves. We are here to be who we are and also are for the true good of all, and we live our way to this end by doing the next thing that needs to be done as we can do it and going where that takes us. 07/11/2011
101. Hayden Valley, near Canyon Village, Yellowstone National Park, WY—We are on our own here. It is all up to us. And we cannot do it alone. We need the right kind of help from the right kind of company. We need the supportive presence of the right kind of community to have a chance. All of the heroes have help. Where would Harry Potter be without the people who keep coming forward to assist him along the way? Or Frodo? Or Luke Skywalker? Or Jesus? But the right kind of help is hard to find. We increase our chances of finding the right kind of company by being the right kind of company ourselves. The kind of company I have in mind is a community of innocence with no interest, investment, or stake in its members—it doesn’t need us, we need it. We need it to listen us to the truth of who we are, to hear what we have to say and to ask the questions which lead us into the struggle of articulation and deepen our own understanding of what we have to say by helping us make conscious what is true and what is also true about our situation in each moment of our lives. Awareness, consciousness, is our only tool in the work to be who we are (and also are), to see what needs to be done and to do it. Communities of innocence are our hedge against the darkness. We create them as much as find them by being what we need and attracting those who are looking for what we are looking for, so that we help each other along the way. 07/12/2011
102. Before sunrise, Lower Falls, Yellowstone National Park, WY—We live too much in the pursuit of some idea of what life has to offer and too little in the service of what life needs us to do. We are trying to get “our fair share” instead of simply offering what is ours to give. We have lived all these years with little or no sense of our gift, our genius, our life, our destiny. It’s time we got to work on these things and find our life and live it in the time left for living. Let’s start with destiny. Destiny is not fate. Fate is how things are. Destiny is what we do with how things are. Fate is all we cannot change about our lives—when and where we were born, who our parents are, our genetic makeup, the “facts of our life.” Destiny is what we are called to do within the terms and conditions, the “facts,” of our life. Our destiny transforms our fate. If we turn our back on our destiny, all we are left with is our fate, and who wants that? So. How do we get to our destiny? Eyes to see, ears to hear, a heart that understands. We intuit our way there, feel our way along. We don’t buy a ticket, or a map, or a book of instructions. We begin by believing we have a destiny, a path with our name on it, a life that is our life to live. If you can’t believe that, I won’t be much help to you. You have to help me help you by believing in yourself and your life and your ability to come alive in the time left for living. Think about it. I’ll get back to you. 07/13/2011
103. Lodge Pole Fence, Buffalo Valley, WY—There is a problem with aligning ourselves with our destiny, finding the life that is our life to live and living it in the time left for living. None of this is a left brain pursuit. The culture is a left brain culture. Our fundamental assumptions are left brain assumptions. It is though we only have one brain and it is the left hemisphere. Spirituality and destiny are right brain matters. This means that there are no formulas, recipes, directions, instructions, etc. that proceed in a linear fashion, with a step by step outline from kindergarten to a graduate degree. There are no black footprints on the spiritual journey. We don’t find the life that is our life to live the way we find Wrigley Field. We have to learn a new approach. The first thing we will notice is that there is no way to measure progress. There is no way to gauge success. There is no way to rank us according to our level of achievement in developing an affinity for our destiny. The first will be last, you know. This is no way to run a business. This is not a business. You cannot market Destiny Finders, Inc. like it’s preparation for the SAT. All of which leaves us up in the air and in the dark about what to do and how to do it. Well, not quite. I have some ideas. For now, get used to the idea that the search for our destiny and the life that is ours to live is a great walk-a-bout in the Outback. Signs are everywhere, pointing to something. We have to learn to read them and remember how to play. 07/14/2011
104. Cunningham Cabin, Grand Teton National Park, WY—The Hero’s Journey and the Spiritual Quest is the trek to the Land of Promise and the Search for the Holy Grail. We are looking for the life that is ours to live in the time left for living, and the courage to live it. If you were looking for “fortune and glory,” this is as fortunate and as glorious as it gets, living the life that is ours to live. There are no shortcuts (Long is short, short is long)–it is a lifelong process that is interesting and meaningful all the way, and provides us with just what we need to do what truly needs to be done in each situation as it arises. Don’t think in terms of outcome and arrival and getting there. Think in terms of vitality and movement and the dynamic flow of life. There is no static mode of being. Death is the only steady state. Living is like taking “a ride on the wall of death” (Check out the Richard Thomas song), but it is not being dead. And hints, clues, signs are everywhere. Everything is a key that opens some door. The Way meanders and winds and wanders, loops, reverses itself, covers the same old ground so that we might see what we missed before, so there is no hurry and there is no time to waste—and here is as good as there, now is as good as then. The path opens before those who are open to the path, and it starts when you open your eyes. 07/15/2011
105. Linville Falls, Blue Ridge Parkway, NC—The Hero’s Journey, the Spiritual Quest, leads to you, to who you also are, to the Invisible Twin within. We cannot get there directly. It is a round-a-bout and curious way that leads us home. We have to leave home to find home. This sounds like doubletalk, like I’m being deliberately abstruse and obscure like some ancient text. This is because poetry is more appropriate than direct discourse when we are talking about soul stuff. We talk in seeming circles because the left hemisphere cannot comprehend what words cannot say, and this is a right hemisphere journey—a round-a-bout and curious way—all the way. We circle around the center like a 3 D labyrinth. There is no straight path. Carl Jung said “We are who we always have been and who we will be.” We already are who we are and who we also are, the trick is waking up to that, knowing it. It takes a lifetime of living with our eyes open to master the trick. It’s like growing up. We don’t grow up just because our parents tell us, “Won’t you please grow up!?” We don’t grow into who we also are just because we are in the mood for something different and think we’ll try spirituality for a while. There is a lot of coming to terms to do on the trail that winds to the center of the Self. We have to set ourselves aside to find our Self. Oops. I did it again. 07/16/2011
106. Used in Short Talks On Contradiction, etc., Rough Ridge Bridge, Blue Ridge Parkway, NC—Waking up is squaring up is growing up. Waking up to how things are is waking up to how things also are. Recognizing the opposites without denying them or pretending they don’t exist is living in the tension, the polarity, of contraries, and to live there is to integrate the opposites, to reconcile them—if not to each other, then to ourselves. WE adjust, WE adapt, WE accommodate ourselves to the oppositional facts of life. This is squaring up, growing up. Carl Jung says none of the important problems in life can be solved, they can only be out-grown. Growing up is another name for the Hero’s Journey, the Spiritual Quest. Enlightenment is coming to terms with how things are and how they also are—which is not how we wish they were. William Blake said “Without contraries is no progression.” We grow through our agony over the contradictions that block our way to how we want things to be. The agony is the price we pay to wake up, square up, grow up, get up and do the things that truly need to be done in spite of what we wish we were doing instead. This is the cross we pick up daily in the work to be like the master by following no master. 07/17/2011
107. The Lower Beaver Pond, Schwabacher Landing, Grand Teton National Park, WY—We grow up against our will. We do not easily accommodate ourselves to a life that is not on our terms, or we accommodate ourselves too easily—handing ourselves over early on, surrendering compliantly to the dictates of Those Who Know Best, going where we are led, doing what we are told to do, all our lives long. For the sake of peace and harmony. we make no waves, rock no boats, just go along. To grow up we have to have a will and have to experience the agony of setting our will aside in the service of a greater will, which is, strangely enough, also our own. The struggle is within, with ourselves, over which good we will serve with our lives. This is the Transforming Ambivalence out of which we are born into the life that is our life to live, acquiescing in a “Thy will, not mine, be done” kind of way. Who is the “Thy” we experience as “other”? My theory is the “Thy” is “Also Us,” our Invisible Twin within, the unconscious part of ourselves who knows more than we do about who we are and what is ours to do. It is our place as conscious ego to reconcile our perspective, our take on things, with that of unconscious psyche/soul/self—physical with spiritual—and live in this world in full partnership with that world. What enlightenment is all about. 07/18/2011
108. Lower Falls, Yellowstone National Park, WY—The way that is our way competes with the 10,000 ways hawking happiness, promising prosperity, boasting of bliss and everlasting ease of living. It’s the story of the Garden of Eden. We think there is something better than paradise, and will trade what is ours in a flash for what we had rather have. What keeps us on the way that is our way past the Sirens’ song offering so much more? Eyes that see. Ears that hear. A heart that understands. How many times would Adam and Eve be fooled again before they wise up, having heard the serpent’s spiel enough to know better than to listen? We wake up over time. It takes every step we have taken to be where we are. If we could be somewhere else, we would be. And when we awaken, the task is the same: To be alive as we can be in the time left for living. And, now we know more about what it means to be alive than we ever knew before, so we won’t make all those wrong turns and have all those false starts. The path to where we are going always begins under our feet. We only have to see things as they are (and also are), be clear and correct about what needs to be done in each situation as it arises, and have the courage to do it. It will be great. Let’s go! 07/19/2011
109. Barn on Mormon Row, Grand Teton National Park, WY—In finding our way back home, to the treasure, which is our self, we have to set our self aside. Your left brain should be flipping out about now. We get to us through us, past all the resistance and obstacles we put in our own way. We are our best friend and worst enemy, and our work is to integrate, to reconcile, to live aligned and in harmony with ourselves. Our two tools for the work are awareness and compassion. Rumi’s poem “The Guest House” is a wonderful synopsis of the work that is ours to do. The path to peace with ourselves requires us to develop the gift that is ours to give (It is not the one we wish were ours to give) and develop our sense of what truly needs to be done now in each situation as it arises (It is not what we have been told should be done or what we want to do). In doing these things, we will be developing our relationship with our Invisible Twin and finding our joint way together to the life that is our joint life to be lived in the time left for living. This is epic stuff we are about and has close parallels with all of the adventure stories about the Hero’s Journey. It is our own Odyssey we are embarking upon. It will not be like a quick trip to the grocery store. 07/20/2011
110. Used in Short Talks On Contradiction, etc., Grand Prismatic Spring, Midway Geyser Basin, Yellowstone National Park, WY—We have to grow up, and the longer we wait to begin the work, the harder it gets. Growing up is waking up, facing up, squaring up to how things are and how things also are and how we wish things were. It is seeing clearly what truly needs to be done in each situation as it arises and having the courage to do it. It is knowing what our gift is, our genius, the thing(s) we do best that no one can do quite like we can do it (them), and offering that, presenting that, as our gift to the world no matter how often the world refuses to acknowledge or receive it. It is living in ways that do not try to exploit our advantage but seek to serve the good of the whole—which includes our own good, but not at the expense of everyone else’s. It is drawing lines where they need to be drawn, knowing where we stop and others start, and refusing to do for others what they have to do for themselves. It is living amid the opposites and contradictions without trying to erase them, but working to integrate them, reconcile them, while respecting them and understanding the role they play in deepening, expanding, enlarging us all and, yes, growing us up, even against our will. This is our work to do. No one can do it for us. It’s up to us. Now is as good a time as any to step into it and see what we can do. 07/21/2011
111. Sunrise, Schwabacher Landing, Grand Teton National Park, WY—At some point, we have to let our life come to us. “Here I am! If you want me, come get me!” Of course, we have to mean it. This is no game we are playing. We are in or we are out. What’s it going to be? Our life is not lived on our terms. This is the hinge upon which our future turns. Are we up for it or not? Don’t be flirting with your life with eyes on some other, finer, life. Shirley, you’ve lived long enough by now to know you don’t know what you’re doing—even if your name isn’t Shirley. Your best bet is trusting yourself to your life and seeing where it leads. So, when you say, “Come and get me,” you have to be ready to go wherever it takes you no matter what. Whose side are you on is the fundamental choice. Be clear about it. Our life is as responsible for finding us as we are for finding it. It is not all up to us—to run here and there, “Maybe this, maybe that!” We wait and watch for that which resonates with us, winks at us, calls our name—and ask when it does, “Are you the life that is mine to live, or shall I wait for another?” And, perhaps we won’t have to ask. Our life may grab us by the neck and hurl us into living it. It’s hard to say anything definitive about The Mystery of Being. 07/22/2011
112. Summer Wetlands Panorama, Guilford County, NC—Photography is mostly waiting. We wait to get to the scene. We wait to see what is to be seen. We wait for the light. We wait for the tourist to get out of the way. We wait for the wind to calm. We spend very little time clicking the shutter. Life is that way. We spend lots of time between innings, between plate appearances, between homeruns and no hitters. We wait to see what needs to be done and what we are going to do about it. We wait for inspiration, for revelation, for insight, for motivation, for encouragement, for direction… One of the toughest things about photography is to be burning the right light looking for a tripod position. At some point we have to take the picture that’s there in the light that is right whether it’s the right tripod position or not. The right light makes a bad photo a good photo. The right tripod position is nothing in the wrong light. Life is that way. When the time for acting is upon us, we can’t wait to be sure that we know what to do. Do something NOW! when the time is right without having everything all figured out, planned to a “T,” polished and in place. Who knows what is going to happen next? We live to see where it goes, where it leads! When the time for acting is upon you ACT! Take the picture that is there when the light is right! See where it leads! 07/23/2011
113. Before Sunrise, Lower Falls, Yellowstone National Park, WY—If you start with whatever is important to you and honor that with your time and attention, it will lead you to something else that is important to you. Keep serving what is important to you and allow yourself to be passed along from one important thing to the next. One important thing will lead to another, and you are just along for the ride in the service of what is important. Over time you will develop your ability to rank things in their order of importance and increasingly serve things of greater importance. Serving what is important will also grow you up by forcing difficult choices on you. You cannot do what is right for you and what is easy for you. What will it be? A word of warning: This exercise fails if you remain stuck with things you like to do but are not important, that do not call you out of your “comfort zone” into doing what needs to be done in the service of what is important. If you think being comfortable is more important than doing what is important, you may be live out your life with the sofa and TV. 07/24/2011
114. Sunrise, Schwabacher Landing, Grand Teton National Park, WY—Jesus came asking, “Who do YOU say that I am?” and “Why don’t YOU judge for yourselves what is right?”, but we let THEM tell us what to think, believe, say and do. Those Who Know Best direct our lives. No one directed Jesus’ life. Jesus thought and acted out of his own authority all the way to the grave. Jesus did what he thought needed to be done in each situation as it arose, healing on the Sabbath, associating with the wrong kind of people, touching the Unclean. We go where we are led and carefully color within the lines. What do we know to be true—what do we know to be right—that we did not hear from someone else? What is it about our lives that is OURS? We even allow THEM to tell us what questions we can ask, and get permission before we do any new thing. How alive is that? Never risking disapproval? Never taking a chance with our own preferences and interests? Never trusting ourselves to what resonates with us? Never going where THEY tell us not to go? Who shame us with, “What would Jesus think?” What would Jesus think of THEM shaming us in his name, and in so doing desecrating all that is holy and untamed? 07/25/2011
115. Canon Village, Yellowstone National Park, WY—We are over 4,000 years removed from the God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob, and over 2,000 years removed from the God of Jesus of Nazareth. Jesus sets the tone for us by seeing God with his own eyes and not with the eyes of traditional religion. Jesus’ God was alive in the moment with Jesus, and that God’s spirit was like the wind, blowing where it would. There is no nailing that God to the wall, locking that God into a cold cell of dogma, chaining that God to doctrines and decrees. Jesus introduces us to the God of our own experience, our own perceiving and calls us to have the courage to wake up, open our eyes and see—and live toward as much as we can intuit of God in each moment of our living. To do this, of course, we have to live truthfully. We cannot be kidding ourselves about who we intuit God to be, and asking us to be, in the here and now of our living—and kidding ourselves is what we do best. No, telling ourselves what we want to hear is what we do best. No, letting ourselves off the hook is what we do best. No, shooting ourselves in the foot is what we do best… We are the work that is ours to do. May we have what it takes to do it as it ought to be done! 07/26/2011
116. Cunningham Cabin, Grand Teton National Park, WY—We don’t find the path with our name one it, or live the life that is our life to live without taking chances. This is a problem. We fear being wrong worse than we fear dragons and giants. Our fear of being wrong IS a dragon and a giant with whom we must deal. All of the old epic themes are a part of our work to be who we are, where we are, when we are, what we are, why we are, how we are (and also are). This is heroic stuff we are about, so we can’t let the fear of being wrong, of looking stupid, of everyone knowing we don’t know what we are doing, etc. stop us from taking chances. We make our best bet about what is our business, and what is not our business, and live toward (and away from) that guess and see what happens—see where it leads. Here’s the all-weather rule: Notice what catches your eye and look closer. Always look closer at what catches your eye. See where it leads. And don’t be in a hurry. This is your LIFE we are talking about, finding and living the life that is truly your life to live over the course of the rest of your life. Just do here and now what you can do here and now and tomorrow will take care of itself. What are you thinking? That you can find out what it is you are here to do, get it done and retire? You are here to DO what is yours to do! Not to get it done! “Are you picking up what I’m laying down here?” (Linda Cohn). 07/27/2011
117. Sunrise, Schwabacher Landing, Grand Teton National Park, WY—We are on our own in doing something about our lives, and we are not alone, but we have to avail ourselves of the right kind of help. The wrong kind of help is everywhere. It is up to us to choose our advisers and supporters. It is up to us to attend the helpers and guides sent to us by our Invisible Twin (If you are going to have an invisible friend, make her or him a really good one, I say). We are on our own in finding our way through the truth of how things are to the truth of how things also are. Everything is exactly as it seems and nothing is as it appears to be. (Your left brain can’t handle that, so you are going to have to learn to see and hear and understand with your right brain—but bring your left brain along for when you need what it has to offer.) In learning to discern the helpers who are helpful, you are creating for yourself a community of innocence who can receive you well and listen you to the truth of how things are and also are and what you need to do about it—without telling you what to do! There is no advising or criticizing or sympathizing (or proselytizing) in a community of innocence, just very deep listening with the right kind of questions and a good bit of the right kind of laughing. It’s a very safe place without answers, except for those you come up with on your own. Just what you need for the work that is yours to do! 07/28/2011
118. Barn on Mormon Row, Grand Teton National Park, WY—The Hero’s Journey, Spiritual Quest, Search for the Promised Land and the Holy Grail, and the Work that Is Ours To Do (These are all the same thing) depend upon our learning the language of the invisible world, of our Invisible Twin, of the Psyche/Soul. This world speaks to us through our body, in our dreams, by way of coincidence and Synchronicity, and calls to us with white rabbits and strange notions. We have to be alert. The foundational rule of the Hero’s Journey, etc. is: Pay Attention! If we are going to be alive in the time left for living, we have to be awake. We have to look until we see. Listen until we hear. Ask questions that lead us to more questions. It’s by our questions that we are saved. If you don’t have any questions, you are walled in, closed off, sealed up, and may be dead—but there is hope for you if you are still reading this. Read on. We have to Pay Attention, Be Awake, Ask Questions and Take Chances all along the way. Start with your body. Listen to it. Let your physical sensations, headaches, shivers, sneezes, pain, etc., lead you to listening to what they have to say. A good guide for this kind of exercise is “The Power of Focusing,” by Ann Weiser Cornell. A tool for the journey. 07/29/2011
119. Lewis River Valley, Yellowstone National Park, WY—The help we receive from the invisible world does not make things easy. It makes things possible, doable. It enables us to do what is hard. The Hero’s Journey (the Spiritual Quest—it’s all the same) isn’t about doing what is easy. It would be called the Slacker’s Stroll, then. The Hero’s Journey is about doing what is hard. The help we get along the way helps us do what is hard—not avoid it, dodge it, escape from it and hide. Doing what is hard grows us up (What the Hero’s Journey and the Spiritual Quest are all about). No one ever grew up doing what was easy. No one ever produced anything that has never been—which is exactly what the life that needs you to live it does—by doing what was easy. Easy is out of the picture. Hard is everywhere you look. But that isn’t a problem, because you have all the help you need to do it. You just have to wade into it. When the water reaches your upper lip, it will begin to part just enough to allow you to survive while you deal with what is hard. It isn’t all that bad, once you get used to it. Doing what’s hard is what you’ll do best before it’s over. And the world will be transformed by your work, and your life will be interesting and meaningful—which it would never have been if you had lolled poolside the whole time, ordering fruit smoothies. 07/30/2011
120. Arrowleaf Balsamroot, Jenny Lake, Grand Teton National Park, WY—We grow up against our will—if we grow up at all. Growing up is another name for the Hero’s Journey, the Spiritual Quest. It is the only thing standing between us and life as enlightened, compassionate, healed and whole human beings. Don’t let the terms “healed” and “whole” fool you. We walk with a limp and carry the scars of those who have been through hell to be where we are. Jesus in the wilderness and Gethsemane and on Golgotha, you know. We find our equivalents in a thousand places. But. Don’t let that scare you. The alternative is much worse for everyone. The refusal to grow up is the source of all of our problems today, any day. We have to do our part for there to be any hope at all. Our part is waking up, facing up, squaring up to the conflict within over not wanting to do what needs to be done in each situation as it arises. Our cross to bear is doing what needs to be done whether we want to or not. If the dog throws up on the carpet, you clean it up. You don’t wait to want to. Your life is like the dog throwing up on the carpet. Get the paper towels and the bowl of water and go to work. There is work to be done that only you can do. The real work is recognizing that and saying, “Okay. Let’s go.” The first step on the Hero’s Journey. 07/31/2011
121. Buffalo Valley Road, approaching Grand Teton National Park, WY—You are the magic you seek. You want help with your life, direction, courage, stability… The list is long. You are the source of all that you need. All you have to do is trust it to be so and, this is the hard part, GET OUT OF THE WAY! The conflict is within. We are Harry Potter and Lord Voldemort but our situation is more difficult because in our case, neither must die. In our case, we have to work it out—not in a once-and-for-always kind of way, but in an ongoing, unending, constant and continuing kind of way. We do that by making the conflict conscious and bearing the pain of negotiation and compromise all the way. The key ingredient is good faith on the part of all parties. Rumi said, “If you are not here with us in good faith, you are doing terrible damage,” or words to that effect. We negotiate, not for what we want to happen but for what truly needs to happen. We seek the truth of how things are and how things need to be. We lay aside everything that interferes with the search for and service of truth—the truth of how things are and the truth of what needs to be done. We acquiesce and let it be. “Thy will, not mine, be done”—with the “Thy” being the Transcendent Reality beyond our personal good, gain, benefit, perspective and ideas of how things ought to be. It’s a trick to pull this off, but when we do, magic happens. 08/01/2011
122. Schwabacher Landing, Grand Teton National Park, WY—When we reach the end of a rope, we always cast about, anxiously wondering, “What am I going to do?” This, believe it or not, is a very good place to be. At this moment, our lives crackle with possibilities and are as magical as they will ever be—because comes the answer to the question we don’t expect to be answered (the “what am I going to do” question): “Whatever you want, honey.” Sometimes this is phrased, “Whatever you say, honey,” and sometimes, “Whatever your little heart desires, honey.” “Honey” seems to be always there. In a pickle, we make the call. We do what seems to us to be the best of all our options and, here is the important part, we see where that leads. We are always being led. This is what we have to realize. We think we are here to settle down, to get cozy and comfortable and enjoy our life. No settling down. No getting things just right, propping our feet up, and smoking cigars. Life is movement. We live on the move, being led along, passed along from one thing to the next. So, in a pinch, we decide what’s next. Here’s the good news: We don’t have to know what we are doing. Everything leads somewhere. We do what seems like the best thing to do under the circumstances and that will lead to different circumstances, and we do what seems like the best thing to do there, and magic begins to happen. Things we could not predict or imagine carry us along to waypoints (not destinations) we would not have chosen, and it’s awesome, wonderful, magnificent, better than anything we could have ordered off the menu, and we couldn’t be more alive. Amen! May it be so! 08/03/2011
123. Dugger’s Creek Falls, Blue Ridge Parkway, NC—It’s always safer and more comfortable to stay stuck. We may be depressed and empty, but we know what to expect. There is nothing unknown and anxiety-producing about our situation. The future is the past forever, and we don’t have anything to worry about that we aren’t well practiced in worrying about. No new worries is worth every sacrifice. So embrace those dull routines! Nail shut those doors! Repeat the mantra: Nothing New Or Out Of The Ordinary Ever And Ever Amen! Otherwise, the risk will be unbearable. Open the door to your future, step over the threshold and “Beyond This Point There Be Dragons,” or worse. Stay with the drudgery and the boredom. Do what is expected of you. Do not have a fresh idea. Do not flirt with the possibilities. Do not imagine a better world. Do not wonder what you could do if you tried. Do not dream of flying. And, above all, do not under any circumstances follow the white rabbit anywhere. Living to be alive in the time left for living will jeopardize the life you have worked so hard to order and arrange. What would all those plastic people, with their worn script of clichés and platitudes, do without you to play your part in their world? Go back to your duties. Find your place. Read your lines. Be safe. And if it begins to feel a little like being dead, well, that’s a small price to pay for the everlasting peace predictability provides. 08/03/2011
124. Linville Falls, Blue Ridge Parkway, NC—What we see is a function of how we look, and where we look and what we look at. We have to be looking if we want to see—not looking for anything in particular, but looking at everything, open to what may be hiding there. There is more to everything than meets the eye. The entire world is an ink blot, concealing and revealing at the same time—reflecting our projections back to us, laughing at us, saying, “Can you see me now, Mr., Ms., Know It All?” When I tell people “Christ is a metaphor,” they hear me say, “Christ is JUST a metaphor,” as though metaphors aren’t real and that I’m taking something away from Christ by suggesting the image is a metaphor. Metaphors are more real than real. Metaphors are the heart of reality itself. Metaphors are divine. Holy. Sacred. But. We’ve lost the ability, the art, of seeing beyond the thing we are looking at to what else, to what all, is there. We go for explanations, eschew mystery, and our lives are too shallow to splash. We look but we do not see. To see, we’re going to have to change the way we look. See? 08/04/2011
125. Fern on Black, the Bog Garden, Greensboro, NC—We can be no more gracious and compassionate than we are mature. Grace and compassion are the hallmarks of maturity, indicators of our having what it takes to bear what must be borne and to deal with what comes our way. May it be so with all of us in time! 08/04/2011
126. Summer Grass 01, black and white, the Bog Garden, Greensboro, NC—How we do it makes all the difference. If you get the how down, the what will come around in time—and if it doesn’t it won’t matter. The teachers you remember you remember for how they were with you, not what they taught you. Give the people in your life a how they will never forget. 08/04/2011
127. Summer Grass 02, the Bog Garden, Greensboro, NC—If you play second base, you spend a lot of your time waiting for the ball to be hit or thrown to you. Most of your doing is waiting. Your life is like playing second base. You are waiting to offer what you have to give to the situation as it unfolds around you. It helps to be clear about what you can do and cannot do so that you don’t try to play all the bases, and the outfield, and pitch just to prove your value to the team. 08/04/2011
128. Summer Grass 03, the Bog Garden, Greensboro, NC—One of the things photography has taught me is that the moment does not last, or return. The moment is precious and fleeting. We cannot be flip or casual or think that one time is as good as another. The sunlight on the summer grass will not last long. Do not let the good leave unacknowledged, unwitnessed, unwelcomed. 08/04/2011
129. Summer Grass 04, the Bog Garden, Greensboro, NC—When we are “in the groove,” we meet the moment with exactly what the moment needs and live without effort toward ends all recognize as worthy. Then something shifts and we are back into pushing and pulling and resisting being pushed and pulled, and live with the memory of “the groove,” and the dream of its hoped-for return. 08/04/2011
130. Hidden Falls, Grand Teton National Park, WY—No one can tell us what our work is. We find it for ourselves. It is a solitary quest made in the company of unlikely helpers and guides. Our life has a drift about it, a flow, toward some things, toward something, and away from others. I’ve never been interested in engine repair. Carl Jung said, “We are who we have always been, and who we will be.” The themes are there, the tune is familiar, a thread runs through it all. What are the recurring themes in your life, the abiding interests, the things you find yourself doing in each stage of life? You’ve been living the life that is yours to live all along. Live it consciously now, intentionally bringing it forth as fully as you’re able. Everything you need to know is in the moment with you. It only takes waking up to know that it is so. There are no secrets. All is in the open, waiting to be seen. What’s to be seen is a function of seeing, of how we see, of how we look, of what we are thinking when we look, see. What’s to be seen is a function of our degree of openness to what is to be seen, of our receptivity to what all is there. To see properly, we have to be able to play well, to dance well. Seeing is dancing, is playing, with life. Those who don’t laugh can’t see. 08/05/2011
131. Peach Orchard, Springs Farm, Fort Mill, SC—May we be open to the presence of truth flowing through our lives, coming to us out of nowhere, when we least expect it, showing itself to us in the most unlikely places, beckoning to us from people who would never be type-cast as those where truth resides, undoing everything we have ever thought to be truth, saying, “These old wineskins can’t hold the new things I have fermenting for you!” May we risk everything in the service of truth that is nothing like anything we have ever heard, and live in the wonder of the surprising nature of truth as those who have nothing to lose, with the wind of the Spirit that blows where it will forever in our hair! Amen! May it be so! 08/06/2011
132. Peach Orchard, Springs Farm, Fort Mill, SC—We think we have to get it right, but we have no idea what would be right, so we take ourselves out of the picture and follow the lead of those who sound like they know what they are talking about. We do what Those Who Presume To Know Best tell us to do. And miss the point. The point is not being right. The point is putting ourselves on the line. The point is saying and doing what WE think is right. The point is making OUR best guess about what is right and doing that and seeing where it leads. Seeing where it leads is the point. Don’t worry about getting it right. Do what you think is right and see how right you are. And see where it leads. If you are wrong, it will lead to being right next time or the time after that. Let them say about you as they say about me: “Anybody that guesses as much as Jim Dollar does is bound to be right some time!” We are practicing finding our own way, hearing our own voice, reading our own intuition, following our own instinct. So what if we are wrong? It’s practice! We’ll get better at it with time, and we’ll learn to trust ourselves along the way. 08/07/2011
133. Looking Glass Falls, Pisgah National Forest, near Brevard, NC—Taking the photos that have been taken 10,000 times is good camera practice. The scenes are worthy or they wouldn’t be popular. They draw us back because that intangible “something” is in the air there and they are good places to be with, or without, a camera. But. We cannot settle for them. We cannot think photography is nothing but them. They open our eyes to what else is to be seen. They sensitize us to the numinous all around, winking at those who have eyes to see. May it be said of us all that we did! 08/07/2011
134. Flame Azaleas, Roan Mountain, Carter County, TN—There is here, where we are now, and there is there, where I was when I took this photo. Within the shifts and spins of our here there is the same kind of recurring “there” that exists on Roan Mountain every second week in every June that rolls around. Within upheaval and change there resides consistency and regularity—constancy amid chaos. There is something calming, centering and grounding about the return of flame azalea blossoms in June on Roan Mountain, like the swallows at Capistrano and the Buzzards at Hinckley Reservation (Who could make that up?). There makes here a better place in a number of ways. 08/07/2011
135. Pisgah National Forest, McDowell County, near Little Switzerland, NC—The best we can do is rarely the best we can do. Generally, it’s the best we want to do, the best we feel like doing, the best we are in the mood to do. We get by with less than our best nearly always. We have to disappear for our best to come forth, to get out of the way, to stop interfering with our spontaneous response to the situation as it arises. Once we start thinking, willing, scheming, planning, strategizing, weighing our options and looking for the most advantageous route this situation to the destination of our choice, our best goes on the back burner or out the window. Our best comes forth when we live instinctively, intuitively, without an eye on what’s in it for us. Ah, but. How do we get ourselves out of the picture? That’s the best trick in the entire Book of Tricks. To live without ourselves in mind, beyond awareness of our good, our gain, our advantage, our interest, our desire… How do we get to the point of living in light of the good of the situation as a whole, in light of the good of the whole? Slowly, I would say, incrementally, over the long sweep of our lives, if we get there at all. 08/08/2011
136. Skinny Dip Falls, Blue Ridge Parkway, NC—You look at the desert menu or you stand before a display of best sellers at the local bookstore. You are pulled toward some selections and pushed away from others. Think of your life as a desert menu or a list of best sellers. Some things have a positive charge, others have a negative charge and the rest don’t move you either way. Notice the charges, positive, negative, neutral, as  you go through your day. See if you jam or override the signals, resisting, forcing, criticizing, interfering, insisting on what you are supposed to do, like, feel, think to the exclusion of your inclinations. Observe the extent to which you mess with your life. Live as a hidden observer of your own living. See where it goes. 08/08/2011
137. The Path Around Bass Lake, Blue Ridge Parkway, NC—If money were manna and we gathered just enough for our needs of the day, how much would it take? Of course, money is not manna and we don’t know how many days there will be, so we have to pile up as much money as we can imagine while we can against the time when none is coming in and all is going out. But. The question remains: How much does it take? Food, clothing, shelter, lights, water, gas, entertainment… It all adds up quickly. To how much? How much do we need to meet the demands of life in the world AND do the work that is ours to do? The research I’m familiar with suggests around $75,000 a year for a family of four. Teachers average around $35,000. Two teachers married with kids have to have a second job to make it. You see what the economy and culture are doing to us. The stress of not having enough money even though we are gainfully employed to meet the legitimate expenses of running a household robs us of our perspective and burdens our soul. The cumulative impact of not having enough money to meet all of the needs we are responsible for meeting weighs us down and keeps us from being alive. Something else to square up to. Another Cyclops in our path. How do we make more and spend less? How do we find the financial resources we need to do what is truly ours to do on the two levels of life (Food, clothing, shelter and soul)? The first task is to find the help we need to live the life that is ours to live. Do not stop looking! 08/09/2011
138. Beaver Pond, Bass Lake, Blue Ridge Parkway, NC —  We quit too easily, we stop too soon in the work to bring forth our gift, our genius, in the service of our destiny, the work that is ours to do. “It’s too hard!” we say. “We don’t have enough help! We can’t do it!” Heart is the easiest thing to lose. The questions that stop us, which we always us as an excuse to not do what is ours to do—So what? Who cares? What’s the point? What difference does it make? Why try?–have to be answered with questions that set them on their heels and send them running: So what if I can’t say so what? Who cares if no one but me cares? What’s the point of having a point? What difference does it make if nothing makes a difference? Why not try? Then we pick ourselves up and turn back to the task of finding what we need to do what needs to be done in each situation as it arises, offering our gift for the good of the whole, anyway, nevertheless, even so! 08/09/2011
139. Mud Cracks at the Mud Volcano, Yellowstone National Park, WY—Things are not what they appear to be. The work is getting past appearances to the heart of the matter. What we see are reflections of projections of how things are with us that we cannot admit to ourselves. The old saw applies: We hate in others what we cannot see in ourselves. It also works like this: We love in others what we cannot see in ourselves. Attraction and repulsion are indicators of projection in action. Something in here is projected out there and reflected back to us with an emotional charge, positive or negative, that stirs our emotions and gets our attention. Anything with a charge to it requires a closer look. Where are we hiding in the object of our affection/aversion? Let’s say you fall in love. We are always falling in love it seems. Falling in love is what we do best. When we fall in love it is not about the honey or the hunk we fall in love with. It is about us, ourselves. What do we see in the other that is hidden, lying latent, in ourselves? What are the qualities we admire in the other beyond her or his physical charms? Those are the qualities that are missing from our repertoire and are the very ones we have to work to bring forth in ourselves. We have to become like the other is in these ways. The same strategy works with repulsion. Those are the qualities that are hidden in us, that everyone knows is there but us, and it is up to us to become conscious of the ways they are seeping through to taint our relationships. The world is an inkblot. In seeing it, we see ourselves. Then the work begins. 08/10/2011
140. Dugger’s Creek Falls, Blue Ridge Parkway, NC—We live too loudly to listen. Listening requires being quiet. Finding the center, the space with enough distance from what is happening to consider what is happening in order to hear what is to be heard and filter through the range of available responses to find one most appropriate to the situation as it arises. Those of you old enough to remember the TV show The Honeymooners know the non-stop loudness of the dialogues between Ralph and Alice that kept things in a rolling boil and ruled out any possibility of kindness, compassion, understanding and wisdom coming to the fore. Our lives are like their dialogue. It is our responsibility to slow down the pace, to turn down the volume, to create the space necessary for the reflection and perspective that are required to make appropriate response to what is going on in our lives. We have to sift things out. We have to think things through. Our life is not a ping pong game. It takes consideration and inquiry, exploration and examination, to get to the bottom of things, see what’s what, and develop a healthy and insightful sense of what is happening and what would be a helpful response. Living lives that are loud and fast is no way to find the way with our name on it and the life that is truly our life to live. You control the speed and the volume. Ease off on the accelerator and turn things down. 08/11/2011
141. Blacktail Ponds, Grand Teton National Park, WY—There is no correlation between how things are and how we want things to be. We can imagine a better world than we can live in. This is good in that it propels us beyond the world wolves or ostriches are capable of creating but. It’s bad in that we have a very difficult squaring ourselves with the world as it is because we wish it were different in 10,000 ways. This how things are. Good is bad and bad is good. Wolves and ostriches don’t have to work things like this out, and most of us refuse to but. It’s ours to do, to square up with how things are, like it or not. To make our peace with it and go on with our lives as well as we are able toward ends worthy of us. Values have nothing to do with what we like or don’t like or how we wish things were or how we want things to be. Good faith, for instance, requires us to live in good faith whether we feel like it or not, want to or not, are in the mood for it or not. So does compassion, and kindness, and generosity, and civility, and every last one of the rest of them. Values require us to live in certain ways no matter what—something else wolves and ostriches don’t have to worry about but. Living aligned with the high values make true human beings of us all and that redeems how things are no matter how they are. Put a true human being in the fat smack middle if the worst situation in the book of terrible situations and that situation is immediately improved. A true human being doesn’t bail, or quit, but lives forever aligned with values worthy of her, of him, to the true good of all, no matter what. 08/12/2011
142. Little Switzerland Tunnel, Blue Ridge Parkway, NC—The things we hate about our lives are the things that bring us forth, bring us out, unfold us and require us to be who we are—against our will, in spite of ourselves. We rise to the occasion—to the occasion we despise—and do what needs to be done, and are deepened, expanded, enlarged in the process. We are better people for the things we have had to accommodate, adjust to, fold into our lives. So. The next time you find yourself resenting this, deploring that, look closer for the qualities this or that brings out in you, requires you to exhibit, express, in response—and how those qualities are your deep strength, existing as a blessing and a grace upon all who come your way, making the world a better place for your being in the world, wishing you were disappeared from this world and plopped into another, better, world, where you didn’t have to do anything you didn’t like to do. 08/13/2011
143. Path to Cone Manor, Blue Ridge Parkway near Blowing Rock, NC—We find the way by wandering around, looking closer at the things that catch our eye, noting when we are on the beam and when we are off of it, letting what has life for us draw us from one thing to the next, until the realization dawns that this approach doesn’t lead to the way, but is the way, and has always been the way. 08/13/2011
144. Flow of Fog, Sunrise at Thunder Hill Overlook, Blue Ridge Parkway, NC—When we live tight, fearful, grasping, forcing lives we miss the things that must be seen with a relaxed, open, presence—and we wonder where this “beam” is, this “path” is, we are supposed to be finding. Frantic to find what must be found, we are like the woman wearing her glasses looking for her glasses.
145. Country Road, Blue Ridge Parkway near Fancy Gap, VA—We think religion, enlightenment is the way to better, smoother, easier lives. How easy did Jesus have it? Or the disciples? Religion, enlightenment doesn’t do anything for us in terms of lightening our load. Religion, enlightenment, helps us carry our load. It does not make our life easy. It helps us do what is hard. If it doesn’t, it isn’t real religion, enlightenment. Ask anyone who knows. They will tell you real religion, real enlightenment, helps you live your life the way it needs to be lived. It doesn’t give you some easy, soft life that anybody could live, that nobody would need religion or enlightenment to live. Your life needs you to live it the way only you can live it. It doesn’t need you bailing out of it in favor of some life anybody could live, blindfolded. 08/14/2011
146. Two Apples, Moses H. Cone Memorial Park, Blue Ridge Parkway, NC—We are here to live our life, the life that only we can live, the life that needs us to live it. The problem is that we want to live a different life. How do we want what we ought to want and not what we want? This is the Hero’s Journey, the Spiritual Quest, the Search for the Holy Grail and the Promised Land. And, it is the task of maturity—what growing up is all about. Get this one down, and you have it made, as much as you can have it made, being saddled as you are with what you ought to want and not what you really, truly, naturally want with all your heart. But that’s it. Your life is never any more difficult than coming to terms with what you don’t want. This doesn’t mean that what you have (which you don’t want) is what you ought to want. We can have some terrible things to deal with that nobody would ever ought to want. It does mean, however, that what we ought to want is tied up somehow in this unwanted situation. Like, for instance, we ought to want to get ourselves up and into dealing with the damn thing we don’t want to deal with, instead of running, hiding, denying, pretending, making believe in a Delta Dawn Kind Of Way that we can have the live we want if we can only find the magical recipe, formula, secret to immunity against all that is unwanted. We have to wade into the Unwanted and do what we can with it. This is the Hero’s Task, the Spiritual Journey, Growing Up: Living our life in the midst of the unordered, unasked for, unwanted stuff that comes our way. May we all have what it takes to do what is ours to do every day all our life long! 08/15/2011
147. Electric Peak, Gallatin Range, Yellowstone National Park, WY—The way things are includes our emotional reaction to the way things are. We take it ALL in and decide what can be done about it, and do it, and let things play out as they will, which creates a different configuration of how things are, all of which we take in and decide what can be done about it, and do it… In this ongoing dance with life, how well we do our part makes all the difference. 08/15/2011
148. Leaving Roosevelt Lodge (on the way to Mammoth Hot Springs), Yellowstone National Park, WY—I would love to have someone tell me what to do and be right about it, wouldn’t you? To lift the responsibility for decision and outcome from my shoulders so that I would know I had done the right thing, the thing that truly needed to be done, the thing that was without doubt the thing to do? That would be great. And, there are those who rush to fill the bill. Who believe they know what’s best for all of us. And, because they are convinced, they are quite convincing, and we would love to be relieved of the burden of knowing which orange juice to choose, for example. So we lean toward handing ourselves over. There’s a test I propose these people pass before we trust them with our lives. Have them choose your dessert for you. Have them make your coffee. That should tell you something about how much they know what they are doing. If they cannot be trusted in small things, they most certainly cannot be trusted in large ones. Like it or not, our lives rest squarely upon our shoulders. And if the cumulative weight of decision making wears us down, we have to find the things and places that restore our soul and allow ourselves to enjoy them often. What are they for you? How long since you availed yourself of them? How regularly can you work them into your life? You have to be the help you need. The care and tending of your own soul is the chief responsibility on that long list of responsibilities. Soothing your soul lightens your load. This is the best advice you’ll get the entire rest of the day. 08/15/2011
149. Price Lake Morning, Julian Price Memorial Park, Blue Ridge Parkway near Blowing Rock, NC—Soothing our soul is a gentle art seldom practiced and in great need of being revived. Addiction is the fast tract to distraction, diversion, denial—which hides us for a while from the press and stress of life, but does nothing to help us live amid the maddening swirl as a calming influence, a blessing and a grace. We can only live that way in the service of soul—tending to the needs of soul and the affairs of soul in an environment that is a soulless wasteland. Our first order of business is becoming an advocate, a champion, of soul. Where in our lives are the places soul loves? How often do we go there? How long do we stay? What are the grounding, centering practices that we pursue? When are we most attuned to soul? How conscious are we of the presence of soul—the drift of soul—the preference of soul—throughout our day? In what ways do you honor, revere, love soul with the way you live your life? What are you thinking? That you can live any old way at all AND enjoy the company of a healthy, vibrant soul? 08/16/2011
150. Thunderstorm at Sunset Panorama #2, Blue Ridge Parkway, NC—Carl Jung said, “We are who we have always been, and who we will be.” We aren’t working to become who we are not, but who we are. Joseph Campbell said that the wasteland is where everyone is being someone else’s idea of who they are supposed to be and no one is living her, or his, own authentic life. The search for the Holy Grail and the Promised Land—the Hero’s Journey and the Spiritual Quest—is the search for our own voice, our own life, so that we do our own thinking and feeling and deciding and doing and believing—and the life we live is not what we are told to live but what comes forth from our own heart and soul. The Path is the path of True Human Beinghood. Human beings who are true to themselves is as true as it gets. 08/16/2011