Jim Dollar's Published Works

One Minute Monologues 033

May 15, 2016 – June 29, 2016

05/15/2016 — No one can tell you what your business is.
No one can tell you what is meaningful to you.
No one can tell you what is important to you.
No one can tell you what makes your heart sing.
No one can tell you what you love.
No one can tell you where your life is to be found. Why do you listen to everyone on the planet
Except yourself?
Why do you allow just anyone
To lead you away from what
Is central,
Foundational,
Essential and primary
To you?
To give you boxes of smoke
And bags of sawdust
As substitutes
For the grounding core of your life and being?
Whose. Side. Are. You. On?
05/16/2016 —Great Solomon’s Seal 2016 02 Panorama — Chestnut Trail, McDowell Nature Center & Preserve, Chestnut Trail, Mecklenburg County Parks & Recreation, Charlotte, NC, April 28, 2016 The test is always the same
For the heroes of every generation:
Do you have what it takes
To do what is hard?
It is never any more difficult
Than doing what is hard.
Odysseus leads the way:
“I will endure through suffering hardship,
And when the heaving sea
Has shaken my raft to pieces,
Then I will swim!”
Suffering the hardship
Of our trials and ordeals
Is the nature of the Hero’s Journey,
And the only thing required of those
Who seek the treasure hard to find.
05/16/2016 —McDowell Barred Owl 2016 13 B&W — Cove Trail, McDowell Nature Center & Preserve, Chestnut Trail, Mecklenburg County Parks & Recreation, Charlotte, NC, May 12, 2016 You have to make some decisions
When it comes to the Spiritual Quest,
The Hero’s Journey.
One is “Whose life is it?”
If you are trying to get some invisible help
With achieving your goals, aims, desires, purposes,
That’s one thing.
If you are trying to assist some invisible intention
By aligning yourself with its goals, aims, desires, purposes,
That’s another thing.
You cannot blend the two things.
What do you think
“Thy will, not mine, be done”
Means?
But don’t get Christian (Or Jewish) theology and doctrine
Mixed up in this.
It’s just you and your life.
That would be you and your relationship with your life.
Think in terms of your life’s will for your life
And your will for your life.
How does your life want to be lived?
How does your life want you to live it?
How far is the life you are living
From the life that wants to be lived?
Sit quietly and contemplate these things
And see what occurs to you.
You aren’t trying to think something up.
You are watching your mind
To see what comes along.
Take up the practice of watching your mind
To see what occurs to you.
05/17/2016 —Goodale 2015 53 — Goodale State Park, Camden, South Carolina, November 11, 2015 Your routine has to allow enough quiet time
For you to seek the solace of silence,
Become mindfully aware
Of your life and your place in it,
And watch/listen for what occurs to you
Spontaneously
On its own,
Out of the heaving sea
Of your context and circumstances,
Surprising you with its
Simplicity and relevance,
And suggesting possibilities
You would never think up
Using only the left side of your brain.
05/17/2016 —McDowell Barred Owl 2016 14 — Cove Trail, McDowell Nature Center & Preserve, Chestnut Trail, Mecklenburg County Parks & Recreation, Charlotte, NC, May 12, 2016 You can’t just go sit down somewhere
When the mood strikes you
And be quiet for 10 minutes
And think you have done something.
You have to cultivate a culture of silence
So that it forms the source and ground
Of your life—
So that your life depends on the quietness
As much as on food and water.
Soul food is silence.
But it takes regular,
Recurring,
Returns to silence—
It takes immersions in silence—
To get past “being quiet”
And enter into The Great Quietness From Which All Things Come.
It takes the practice of silence
To come alive in the silence
And know it as the origin of life and being.
05/17/2016 —Blurred Leaves 2016 01 — Cove Trail, McDowell Nature Center & Preserve, Chestnut Trail, Mecklenburg County Parks & Recreation, Charlotte, NC, May 12, 2016 The Big Surprise about retirement and aging
Is the ease with which things I am not interested in
Deplete and exhaust me.
My doctor asks me at each year’s physical exam,
“How’s your energy level.”
Each year, I tell him,
“I have plenty for the things I like to do.”
Walking around the block is a pain and a chore.
Walking in search of an owl is a joy.
I used to be able to kid myself.
My body no longer plays the game.
05/18/2016 —Hatteras Sunrise 2003 — Cape Hatteras National Seashore, Ocracoke Island, NC, October 2003 Every photograph is a dance with synchronicity.
I get up to take a sunrise at the beach and meet this.
I go to the restroom at McDowell and the owl flies by.
Each photo is the intersection of me with time and place,
And stands as a reminder
Of the sacredness of all our times and places.
Every one of them.
The ones we miss on our way to somewhere else.
The ones we don’t have time for
Because we have to be in some other place.
This sunrise would slow down even the most pressed traveler,
But the closer we look everywhere
The more there is to see.
Time is sacred.
Place is holy.
It only takes looking
To see it is so.
05/18/2016 —McDowell Barred Owl 2016 08 Detail — Four Seasons Trail, McDowell Nature Center & Preserve, Mecklenburg County Parks & Recreation, Charlotte, NC, March 24, 2016 If you are going to know anything,
Know where to draw the line.
That is knowing that establishes your identity.
It is your rock and your foundation,
Your stabilizing force and your guiding light.
When you know where to draw the line,
You know all you need to know
To know what you need to know.
It grounds you in all your inquiring and exploring.
Secures you in all your wondering and imagining.
You can go anywhere when you know where to draw the line.
Scale any heights.
Span any chasm.
Plumb any depth.
You have it made when you know where to draw the line,
And are never without the confidence
Of your own sense of what is right for you,
And what is wrong.
05/19/2016 — Four Daisies 2016 01 Panorama — Indian Land, South Carolina, May 17, 2015 The people who decry “political correctness”
Brandish hatred.
I ask you:
Is it better to display
Respect, kindness, compassion, civility, courtesy, understanding and benevolent, positive, regard
For one another,
Or to deepen divides, instill fear, and spawn hatred and distrust?
You tell me the kind of person
You want to be your Governor
And your President.
05/19/2016 —Christmas Fern 2016 01 — Four Seasons Trail, Cove Trail, McDowell Nature Center & Preserve, Chestnut Trail, Mecklenburg County Parks & Recreation, Charlotte, NC, May 12, 2016 You know what your life is,
And what it is not.
You may not think you know what it is,
But you know that you know what it is not.
You also know what it is—
It just isn’t what you think it should be.
You are looking for some bigger, finer life.
Some life that will take you somewhere,
Some life you could ride to fame and fortune and glory everlasting.
My life is looking out the window,
And getting to the bottom of things.
Does that give you an idea of the kind of life you are looking for?
My life is also seeing how things could work,
Making connections
Interpreting things properly.
These are the things I’m good at,
And things I enjoy doing.
But they won’t pay the mortgage.
The life that is our life to live won’t likely pay the bills.
We will have to do something else for that.
But, we always have to keep our eye on our real life,
And give it our full attention on a regular basis.
You know what I’m talking about.
You just have to know what you know.
Once you get you out of the way,
There it is.
05/20/2016 —McDowell Barred Owl 2016 16 — Cove Trail, McDowell Nature Center & Preserve, Chestnut Trail, Mecklenburg County Parks & Recreation, Charlotte, NC, May 12, 2016 We size things up
And do what needs to be done about them
The way only we can do it.
Lao Tzu finally said, “The hell with it,”
And walked off to live alone in the forest.
Yoda holed-up on Dagobah.
Sometimes, you have to walk away and wait it out.
There are no scripts to follow,
No equations to compute to know when to do what.
WE size things up
And WE decide what needs to be done about them
The way only WE can do it.
It’s all on us.
We have to live our life the way we think it needs to be lived
In each situation as it arises.
It begins with seeing what we look at.
And looking at everything.
05/20/2016 —Pitcher Plants 2016 05 — Goodale State Park, Camden, South Carolina, May 13, 2016 We are being who we are
When we see what we look at,
When we hear what we listen to,
When we taste what we taste,
When we smell what we smell,
When we touch what we touch,
When we think what we think,
When we know what we know,
When we feel what we feel,
When we love what we love,
When we honor what is important to us,
When we live in accord
With what is deepest, truest and best about us,
When we are grounded on the foundation
Of our own experience
And trust ourselves to have what we need
To find what we need
To be who we are
In the context and circumstances of our life.
05/20/2016 —Goodale 2016 03 — Goodale State Park, Camden, South Carolina, May 13, 2016 In the silence—
That would be,
Not just any silence,
But the right kind of silence—
We become “the still point of the turning world.”
And we see all that can be seen,
And know the things that can be known
Exactly as they are.
And that seeing,
That knowing,
Becomes for us as a guiding light
Directing us
To what needs us to do it
In each situation as it arises.
This is the power of the still point.
Our place is to carry the stillness
With us when we leave the silence,
As a blessing and a grace
Upon the situations that,
And the people who,
Come our way.
It is not for our merit or advantage
That we serve the stillness.
There is nothing to exploit,
no gain to seek.
It is enough to be still
And to see, and know, and do
As a blessing and a grace.
05/21/2016 —Goodale 2015 54 — Goodale State Park, Camden, South Carolina, November 11, 2015 Life is lived between what we can do
And what we cannot do—
Between what we will do
And what we will not do.
It is lived best
When we do not kid ourselves
About which is which.
05/21/2016 —McDowell Barred Owl 2016 17 — Cove Trail, McDowell Nature Center & Preserve, Chestnut Trail, Mecklenburg County Parks & Recreation, Charlotte, NC, May 12, 2016 A Vision Quest is a search for our essential identity—
The shape is to assume—
How we are to mold ourselves
In accordance with the dictates of heart and soul.
A Sumo wrestler requires a different regimen
Than a harpist.
How might we bring out the we we are built to be?
Our interests, proclivities, gifts and abilities
Lend themselves to a particular mode of expression.
How do we give form to our content?
The answer is not to be thought,
But to be seen, heard, felt.
We do not know we are in love
By thinking about it.
We do not get to our heart/soul through our head
But through our body!
Listen to your body!
It will show you the way!
Our Vision Quest
Is to see what our body has to say.
05/22/2016 —Pamlico Sound Sunset — Cape Hatteras National Seashore, Ocracoke Island, Outer Banks, NC, October, 2012 There is grief and mourning, joy and gladness, but.
There is very little drama in the natural world.
Things happen there for good and for ill,
And no matter what, life finds a way.
Grounded in our own life,
In our own particular way of being in the world,
We will find a way.
We are as resilient and as resourceful
As any life-form ever in the history of life-forms.
Once we step aside from the drama—
The OMG’s and the Why Me’s and the When Will It Be My Turn—
And take a reckoning of what has happened
And what needs to be done about it,
We will find ourselves doing what it takes
To deal with the deal
And make the best of the situation
Like the servants of life that we are.
05/22/2016 —Two Daisies 2016 01 — Indian Land, South Carolina, May 17, 2015 We have to live in the stillness
Long enough and frequently enough
To be able to live out of the stillness
When we are not in it.
The stillness has to become one with us,
So that it defines us
And we learn from it—
And exhibit it in all of our interactions
With the world of
Normal, apparent, reality.
We become the source of the world’s stillness
By the way we live in the world. We also have to hold the world at a distance
In order to keep the noise
Of the 10,000 things from drowning the silent stillness
At the core of our being.
We have to begin noting the things and the people
Who rob us of our stillness,
Recognize them as being toxic to our soul,
And find ways to limit our time in their presence—
And compensate ourselves
With double doses of silence
Whenever we cannot avoid them.
We have to live in the stillness
To be able to live out of it,
And living out of it transforms the world.
05/25/2016 —Four Seasons Creek 01 — Four Seasons Trail, McDowell Nature Center & Preserve, Chestnut Trail, Mecklenburg County Parks & Recreation, Charlotte, NC, May 21, 2016 The work of becoming human
Is the work of becoming the best individual
We are capable of being.
Best and worst are competing within
For the control of our life.
As conscious egos,
We have to make the peace,
Heal the breach,
Reconcile the differences,
Integrate the polarities
Restore wholeness
And live as One.
The best individual we are capable of being
Is a compromise and a collaboration
Of the best and the worst of our innate potential.
We work it out
In each situation as it arises—
Never being quite as good,
Or as bad,
As we could be,
But always being who we are and also are.
Used in Short Talks On Contradictions, etc., 05/23/2016 —McDowell Barred Owl 2016 34 — Shady Hollow Trail, McDowell Nature Center & Preserve, Chestnut Trail, Mecklenburg County Parks & Recreation, Charlotte, NC, May 21, 2016 The work of becoming whole
Is the work of consciousness,
The work of mindful (compassionate, non-judgmental) awareness,
The work of seeing (what we look at),
Hearing (what is being said, verbally and non-verbally),
And understanding (what’s what on all levels).
It is the work of bearing the realization of our contradictions,
Living within the tension of our conflicts,
Transcending our polarities,
And knowing what we know.
It is the work of being transparent to ourselves,
And accomplished in the art of integrity/integration.
That’s wholeness for you.
05/23/2016 —Christmas Fern 2016 02 — Four Seasons Trail, McDowell Nature Center & Preserve, Chestnut Trail, Mecklenburg County Parks & Recreation, Charlotte, NC, May 12, 2016 There is nothing new in the field of human experience.
We’ve seen it all before.
Bungee jumping may be a new way to be stupid,
But being stupid has been around forever.
There are new ways to work
But working is nothing new.
Free love and open marriage and gay marriage
Are new, geologically speaking,
But the problems of living together
Are as old as sex itself.
There are no new experiences.
Why are we still walking into walls and off cliffs?
Why haven’t we figured out war?
Why do we keep responding
To the same old experiences
In the same old ways?
Why is it so easy to be stupid,
After all these years?
05/23/2016 —Honeysuckle 2016 02 — Chestnut Trail, McDowell Nature Center & Preserve, Chestnut Trail, Mecklenburg County Parks & Recreation, Charlotte, NC, May 5, 2016 There is no ideology.
No theology.
No doctrine.
No creed.
Nothing to deliver you
Or save you
From the struggle of squaring up to yourself
And to the truth of your own experience.
What we are seeking is “the treasure hard to find,”
Namely, the inner confidence, assurance, certainty, foundation
That we have what it takes
To enter any situation,
To face any circumstance or condition of life,
And be who we are
Without any chance of losing our connection
With the core, the center, the ground, the foundation
Of our own individual identity.
We are seeking ourselves!
We are seeking to know who we are
With such clarity and conviction
That it will never be taken from us
By anything that comes our way.
There is no ideology.
No theology.
No doctrine.
No creed.
That can hand you yourself.
You have to find your way to you on your own.
Here is a hint for you:
Compassion is the way.
Stillness and silence are the path.
Sit quietly,
See what comes up.
Work with it.
Dialogue with it.
Write it out.
Paint it out.
Put it to music.
Dance it out.
Do not run away.
You are seeking yourself
And yourself is seeking you.
So, what’s the problem?
05/24/2016 —Ebony Spleenwort Fern 2016 01 — Four Seasons Trail, McDowell Nature Center & Preserve, Chestnut Trail, Mecklenburg County Parks & Recreation, Charlotte, NC, April 7, 2016 We are seeking a Mythic Vision,
Hoping to be swept up on a Mythic Journey,
Where we lose all sense of caution
And simply have to do the thing that needs us to do it.
Falling in love is the closest thing in our experience
To what we are after.
Ever tried to fall in love?
We are not in charge of the process, but.
We can block it easily
By not being attuned to the life we are living—
By being distracted by the bright colors
And Siren songs
Of the lives that are not it.
The Buddha waited under the Bo Tree
Through all of the empty dreams.
Jesus wandered through the deserted places,
Past the glimmering promises of surrogate bliss.
Stillness filters out the noise
So that we might hear the whisper of truth
Calling our name.
Believe in the silence,
And in the reality of that which knows your name.
05/24/2016 — I Should Apologize For The Soft Focus On The House Finch 2016 05 — Charlotte, NC, May 22, 2016 Stop being so rational, logical, left-brain driven!
Lean toward those autonomous,
Spontaneous,
Urgent calls for action,
Rising up from within.
Naps are autonomous.
Sleep is autonomous.
Dreams are autonomous.
You can’t order any of them up,
Or schedule them in advance.
Slips of the tongue.
“Being in the mood” for a particular restaurant,
Or menu item.
Forgetting where you put the keys,
Or remembering.
Our right hemisphere
Is well-suited for leading us along the path of its choosing.
Trust yourself to its direction.
Believe in its guidance.
Don’t have to know what you are doing.
Numinous seizures have been out of vogue for too long.
05/25/2016 —Goodale 2015 55 — Goodale State Park, Camden, South Carolina, November 11, 2015 There are three things that keep us off the path,
Three dragons that block the way
To the treasure hard to find:
Greed, Fear and Lethargy.
Greed is wanting to exploit everything,
Even the path, the way,
In the service of our own ends.
“What am I going to get out of it,
What’s in it for me,
And when will it start paying off?”
Fear is the 10,000 What Ifs
That have to be explained again and again
And never can be satisfied.
Lethargy is “Maybe I’ll get started tomorrow.”
That’s a lot to overcome
Just to be who you are.
The alternative is oblivion.
Which doesn’t sound all that bad
With three very real dragons
Standing in the path.
05/25/2016 —McDowell Barred Owl 09 Detail — Four Seasons Trail, McDowell Nature Center & Preserve, Mecklenburg County Parks & Recreation, Charlotte, NC, March 24, 2016 We act as though our will
Is the only one at work in a situation,
Or, at least, the most important one.
The truth is a bit different.
Everything in the situation has a will for the situation,
Has a stake in the situation.
To work in the service of our will for the situation
Is to miss the mark
(To “sin” according to the Biblical understanding of the term).
The higher calling is
To seek the good of the situation as a whole—
To ask not what the situation can do for us,
But what we can do for the situation,
Using the gifts that we have to give
In the service of the good of the whole.
We step into the situation
Centered and grounded in our identity—
Who we are and what we have to offer—
And look for ways to bring ourselves forth
In doing what needs to be done there.
We know who we are and who we are not.
What we can do and what we cannot do.
Enter the situation with that knowledge in mind,
And live to be who you are—
Not to get what you want.
05/26/2016 —Broad-winged Hawk 2016 01 — I crack myself up sometimes. And, besides that, this may not actually be a Broad-winged Hawk. Cove Trail, McDowell Nature Center & Preserve, Mecklenburg County Parks & Recreation, Charlotte, NC, May 26, 2016 What is your problem?
You know the one I mean.
I mean THE PROBLEM.
The one that came immediately to mind.
That problem.
Well, that problem is not the problem.
The problem is how you feel about that problem.
That problem would not be the problem it is
If you felt differently about it.
Carl Jung said,
“The greatest and most important problems of life are all fundamentally insoluble. They can never be solved but only outgrown.”
When we outgrow something,
We feel differently about it.
Feeling differently about something
Changes everything.
If you can’t do anything about your problems,
Do something about the way you feel about them.
05/27/2016 —I don’t know if this is a Broad-winged Hawk, but. I’ll bet someone knows. If you can ID it for me, you’ll get three wishes. Who knows, maybe one will come true. #2 Cove Trail, McDowell Nature Center & Preserve, Mecklenburg County Parks & Recreation, Charlotte, NC, May 26, 2016 Where does your deepest loyalty lie?
To whom, or what, do you owe your all?
Who, or what, do you serve above all else?
Who, or what, will you not forsake or neglect ever in the slightest way?
What matters most to you?
How would other people, looking at your life,
Know that it is so,
Without you saying a word?
I look out the window a lot.
And I don’t answer the phone. That puts me at the center of my life.
I recommend that you find your way
To the center of yours.
05/27/2016 —Broad-winged Hawk 06 Sequence — Cove Trail, McDowell Nature Center & Preserve, Mecklenburg County Parks & Recreation, Charlotte, NC, May 26, 2016 Every situation can be improved
With grace and compassion.
Consciousness without grace and compassion
Is Hell.
Those who are conscious without grace and compassion
Are the incarnation of Satan
In the world of space and time.
Our work is to become who we are
In the time and place of our living
(That would be in each situation as it arises)
As agents of grace and compassion.
We are to do our work
Graciously, with compassion.
Mindfulness leads the way
With grace and compassion.
Get living with grace and compassion down,
And the world will be a better place.
05/27/2016 —Barn and Shed 02 — Lancaster County, South Carolina, May 13, 2016 There is a price to be paid.
We can do what is hard,
Or we can do it the hard way.
This is the message of all rites of initiation.
There are no shortcuts.
We have to complete the tasks
Associated with each stage of development
In order to advance on to the next stage.
Carl Jung thought that the purpose of our life
Is to “individuate,”
That is to say, “grow up” into the unique individual we are.
We cannot become the unique individual we are
Without growing up.
Anthony Stevens says we have to “earn the right”
To individuate “by discharging our biological (sexual, bonding, child rearing)
And socioeconomic (professional, property-holding, money-making) obligations.”
Too many people think they can avoid adulthood
And progress smoothly from one grand party to the next,
Living forever as an Eternal Youth,
With no obligations, commitments, duties and responsibilities
They can’t escape.
All they need is a surfboard and the next wave (or their equivalents). All must submit to the rites of passage.
The Life Unlived is the Life Unlived
However we choose to not live it.
And the price we pay for not living it
Is the Burden Of The Blown Opportunity
To carry through all eternity.
05/28/2016 —Queen Anne’s Lace 2016 01 B&W Panorama — Mecklenburg County, North Carolina, May 26, 2016 We have to be the center of our life,
Our life has to be central to us.
We have to collaborate with our life,
To put ourselves in accord with our life,
To live the life that is ours to live,
To dance with our life all the way to the grave.
We live to be one with our life.
Everything else has to fall into place
Around this.
05/28/2016 —Scarab Beetle 2016 01 — Indian Land, South Carolina, May 28, 2016 The Dung Beetle was considered sacred in Ancient Egypt,
And a metaphor for “the treasure hard to find.”
Who would think of looking there, of all places?
Yet, there we are.
We cannot deny that the Dung Beetle
Has found treasure
Where we would never seek it,
And it stands for us as a reminder
To notice when we are dismissing something,
And reconsider.
05/28/2016 — The Scarab Beetle Encounter: Holiness Is A Very Personal Designation The Scarab Beetle photo will be a series, and is for me a miracle of serendipitous grace and the surprising presence of the Numen at work in my life. I knew Dung Beetles well in my childhood and youth in the Deep South. They would be about, doing their work, in the dust of hot, humid, summer days. Children played outside then and made regular encounters with the denizens of the natural world. One of our regular pastimes was to rake the lake. Five, or maybe seven, of us would pack together and roam through each day. A ready source of entertainment was to take a garden rake and walk along the shoreline of Roebuck Lake (In Itta Bena, Mississippi), thrusting the rake as far into the lake as short arms could manage, letting it sink to the bottom, and then hauling it up onto the shore, as we walked backwards up the bank, with our catch. We were always astounded at what came up. Mussels and crawfish, minnows and sunfish, turtles and tadpoles, snakes and eels, leeches and catfish… We would dip into the aquarium and explore our find with wonder at the world beneath the surface. I’m still amazed at the world beneath the surface, and remain fascinated at all things I am unconscious of— still raking the lake, poking around in unknown depths. Depths which rise up from time to time and drop at my feet things like a Scarab Beetle. After I left the wilds of my early years and entered my civilized phase of development, Scarab Beetles became a museum piece in my distant memory. Then I began to read Joseph Campbell and Carl Jung, and discovered the sacred nature of the beetle and its ball of dung, which is pushes backward with its long rear legs on each side of the ball, rolling it along as haphazard as a butterfly on the wing, to wherever it is going. “I’ll be damned,” I thought, “You never know holiness when it rolls right by.” And I began to look for the things, to reward then with respect and attention appropriate to the occasion. I took up photography, hoping to photograph one as it went diligently about its business. Never saw another one, until this morning. I was in the back yard watering flowers and plants when I noticed a fine specimen of a mushroom glistening in my recently applied wetness, and thought what a fine photo it would make. I put down the hose and fetched my camera. As I moved in to get the mushroom’s portrait, I saw the Scarab Beetle doing its thing. There on the forest floor at the edge of my backyard. My jaw surely dropped. I don’t remember it, but dropping jaws always mark the advent of a serendipitous engagement with numinous reality breaking into our life. The very chance of it all! The mushroom and my response to it, getting the camera, for the very moment that the beetle’s path crossed my own! Grace upon Grace, Benevolence beyond measure! I watched the beetle at work, taking photos all along, for maybe ten minutes, until it reached the shade of the forest’s trees. I took my camera back into the house and returned to wish the beetle well. I was gone two minutes max. I’d watched the beetle make its way for ten. I knew about how far it would have gone in two. The beetle was nowhere to be found. I scoured the area carefully. No beetle. Where had it come from? Where was it going? How did it disappear? Now you see it, now you don’t. The Numen at work in our life.
05/29/2016 — Cardinal 2016 01 — Food for the Babies, Indian Land, South Carolina, May 28, 2016 We think safety, security, stability and peace
Depend upon a weapon, or weapons,
Of indomitable, destructive, ability.
“One ring to rule them all.”
“The Elder Wand.”
“The Bomb.”
We think in terms of domination and dominion.
We think power is the source of peace,
And that it is conveyed to the one
Who wields the magic sword.
This is at the heart of all action-adventure stories/movies
Ever written, told, or made,
So, it must be true.
It takes power, or leverage,
To impose our will upon others
Or to keep them from imposing their will upon us.
Our way has to be forced,
You know,
Compelled, Coerced, Made.
And thus, the difference
Between Our Way and The Way
Is the difference
That makes
All the difference
In the world.
05/30/2016 — Scarab Beetle Poster 01 — Indian Land, South Carolina, May 28, 2016 There is the “I” and there is the “We.”
Though it isn’t that simple because every “I” is an amalgamation
Of “we’s” beyond counting—
Partial “I’s,” “I” wannabe’s.
Each “I” is a bundle of multiple personalities
Striving for “I-hood.”
The “I’s” and the “We’s” have to find ways
Of working it out on every level.
The complexities and agonies involved here
Do not get enough press,
And certainly do not get enough R.E.S.P.E.C.T.
“We” have to allow, and provide for,
Living room for every “I.”
And every “I” has to honor the needs and claims of each “We.”
Among other things,
This means “We” all have to slow down,
And give the “I’s” that “We” are
And that “They” are
Some hallowed space of “Their” own.
And the “I’s” have to put themselves in accord
With the reality of each “We.”
Doing this work
Requires a place for silent reflection
For all “I’s” and every “We.”
There is much room-making to be done.
05/30/2016 —Last Light Revisited — Edisto Beach State Park, Edisto Island, South Carolina, November 18, 2013 There is the peace that comes with denial,
And the peace that comes with Clarity.
Clarity is synonymous with knowing—
Not with knowing facts or fantasies mistaken for facts,
But with knowing what’s what
And what’s to be done about it.
Sometimes, there is nothing to be done about it,
And being clear about that,
Knowing that,
Still brings peace.
Peace is the peace of settling into
Who we are,
Where we are,
When we are,
How we are,
That we are,
This is the way things are,
And that’s that.
Of course, you can know these things
And still have no peace
Because you hate it
And are saying, “NO! NO! NO!”
About it all.
At that point,
There is one more thing to be clear about:
You will never have peace
Because you cannot accept the truth
Of the way things are.
You have to opt for denial
To be at peace with your life.
05/30/2016 — Cardinal 2016 03 — Indian Land, South Carolina, May 30, 2016 Mithrandir, also known as Gandalf, said to Lady Galadriel (in “The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey”):
“Saruman believes that it is only great power
That can hold evil in check, but that is not
What I have found.
“I have found that it is the small things…
“Everyday deeds of ordinary folk
That keeps the darkness at bay.
“Simple acts of kindness and love.”
05/31/2016 —Carolina Wren 2016 01 — Indian Land, South Carolina, May 30, 2016 Believe in your genius— your YOU!
Believe in the work that is yours to do!
Believe in the path that has your name on it!
Believe in what resonates with you!
Live transparent to yourself!
Live in good faith with yourself and with others!
Trust yourself to your sense of what needs to be done—
Of what the situation is calling for—
And say the things that cry out to be said,
Ask the questions that beg to be asked,
Do the things that need to be done—
That need you to do them!
Do not try to figure things out,
Or have to know what you are doing,
Or think you must be able to defend, justify, explain, excuse
What you are up to, or about!
Do not try to exploit any situation to your advantage!
No path can do more than wake us up
And call us forth—
Think of doing your work,
Living mindfully, compassionately, non-judgmentally—
In each situation as it arises—
Not of finding the best path
And trading up!
Be content with being who you are
Doing what is yours to do.
06/01/2016 —Female Black-and-white Warbler 2016 01 — Indian Land, South Carolina, May 31, 2016 We think independence means autonomy,
Means Free Will,
Means doing it our way,
Means “Being Captain of our own ship,”
“Master of our own destiny,”
And like that.
We have to re-think independence.
On the one hand, I don’t want anyone telling me what to do.
And, on the other hand, I don’t know what to do.
SOMEBODY needs to be telling me what to do!
This is the essential, unresolvable, conflict.
We transcend, transform, it when we realize
That we tell ourselves what to do
And that “we” are both conscious and unconscious,
Both left-brained and right-brained,
And that in order to know what to do,
I have to listen to all of ME.
We can’t just go flying off in charge of our life.
We have to sit quietly with what to do here and now,
In each situation as it arises,
And see how it unfolds,
Without imposing demands and restrictions
And working to effect our agenda no matter what.
Our agenda is to figure out what OUR agenda needs to be
For each of the times and places of our living.
“Hello Silence, my old friend/I’ve come to talk to you again…”
06/01/2016 —Carolina Wren 2016 02 — Indian Land, South Carolina, June 1, 2016 Think of the people you love.
Take your time with this.
Make a list of all of the qualities, characteristics and character traits
That you love about each person on the list.
Make it your practice
To consciously bring all the qualities, characteristics and character traits
To life in your life.
Live to incarnate each person you love—
To BE each person you love—f
The way only you can be—
By bringing the qualities, etc., that you love to life in your life.
This is SO the way to love someone!
Be who you love.
Should be a bumper sticker.
06/02/2016 — Black-capped Chickadee 2016 01 — Indian Land, South Carolina, May 30, 2016 What are we about?
What are we after?
Where is IT for you?
How often do you go there?
How long do you stay?
We have to know what we are striving for,
And when we have it in hand.
Then what?
When do you stop
And simply be at one with your life
In the time and place of your living?
It’s like this:
There is the way things are,
And there is the way things need to be.
And there is what can be done about the discrepancy,
And that’s that.
What is keeping you from being at peace with this?
06/02/2016 — Broad-winged Hawk 2016 07 — Cove Trail, McDowell Nature Center & Preserve, Mecklenburg County Parks & Recreation, Charlotte, NC, May 26, 2016 I told one of my Twitter buds today that I’ve never been able to argue anyone out of their perspective.
And, no one has ever been able to argue me out of mine. We should all stop trying— not that this statement will sway anyone of the opposite perspective. But.
Our perspectives are sacred territory, And the Old Testament law applies: “Thou shalt not remove thy neighbor’s landmark!” We have to honor the way other people see things, Even as we point out that the way they see things is not the way we see things. We have to be clear about the differences among us, and let them stand. And work to find common ground with people who are far removed from where we are. We have to work to make friends and stop working to make enemies. Hajib’s have their place! And gun control has its place! And all the things that divide us cannot make us enemies! And we are not here to change anyone’s perspective, but to work with everyone toward a future we all can live in together. Trump is doing his best to erect diving walls within this country, not just between this country and Mexico! We cannot allow him to polarize the world. We resist polarization by refusing to slam the door on anyone, but keep all doors open, as we look for things we can agree on, and honor one another with respect and compassion even as we disagree on important matters.
06/02/2016 —Black Snake Hiding 01 — Indian Land, South Carolina, May 31, 2016 We know about silence by being silent;
About stillness by being still;
About mindfulness by being mindful;
About compassion by being compassionate;
About all of the values and qualities
That humans have always esteemed
By incarnating them in the life we are living.
What’s with all the talking about the things
We can only know by doing?
06/03/2016 —Cardinal 2016 04 — Indian Land, South Carolina, May 30, 2016 Everything waits for us to recover our work
And do it.
Don’t know what your work is?
Yes you do!
You just don’t know what you know!
Sit quietly until it dawns on you.
Wait in stillness until it slips up on you.
Look at all you are dismissing
As “obviously NOT it.”
Poke around in your reject pile.
Stop wanting your work to pay off handsomely
With some extravagant lifestyle
Too much of which has the world exactly where it is,
And the abandonment of which
Is so essential to the reclamation of a planet
That can feed our souls—
And experience how doing your work
Is all your soul will ever need.
Oh, and pass the word!
06/03/2016 —Downy Woodpecker 2016 01 — Indian Land, South Carolina, June 3, 2016 People have too much of one or more of these three characteristics:
They are greedy and/or fearful and/or lazy.
The propensity for one or more of these traits
Works against us all our life long
Because
The Way requires us to be
Benevolent AND courageous AND willing to do the work
That is called for
In each situation as it arises.
We just want to let Mamma or Daddy
(Or Money, which is a surrogate of both)
Take care of us,
And make our way smooth
And our path easy.
Nothing can happen
Until we forsake ourselves
And pledge our allegiance and loyalty
To our Self.
But, why would we do that?
06/04/2016 —Carolina Wren 2016 03 — Indian Land, South Carolina, June 2, 2016 “We have to have guns because someone will kill us and our family if we don’t!”
That’s the NRA’s only talking point.
Guns will keep people from killing us.
We have to protect ourselves and our families from those who would harm us.
Those who would harm us could be anywhere, might be anyone.
Anyone who isn’t like us could be out to get us.
We have to get rid of everyone who is not like us.
Build walls. Kick them out of the country. Send them back where they came from.
Look around! THEY are everywhere!
Extremes beget extremes and soon there is no center.
When the center fails to hold, we are left with fragmentation, disintegration, and the loss of a grounding vision. What to do? What to do?
How do we get THEM ALL to wake up to what THEY are doing and return to the center?
WE have to return to the center ourselves!
WE have to refuse the inclination to move to the extreme opposite of THEM.
WE have to DO nothing.
But.
It has to be the right kind of nothing.
It has to be the “nothing” of silent reflection and realization—
Silent META-reflection.
Silent META-realization.
Sit quietly. Begin the practice. Today.
06/04/2016 —Can You Name This Bird? Someone? Anyone? — Indian Land, South Carolina, June 3, 2016 How can we make THEM as WE are?
And, if we cannot make THEM as WE are,
How can we shun them, expel them, ostracize them, deport them, disappear them
So that they pose no threat to US and OUR way of life?
This seems to be the way business has been done through the ages.
Except that it was easier in earlier ages.
Then, we burned them at the stake, strung them up, fed them to the lions, tarred and feathered them and ran them out of town on a rail.
We could get by with it then,
But now we are all civilized and supposed to be polite, except that we aren’t actually.
Donald Trump exposes us for who we are,
And through him we see how little has changed over time.
We still hate THEM, though THEY might be Trump and his legions and not the THEM THEY want us to hate.
We cannot get along with THOSE who are not as WE are.
That’s where we have to get to work.
We all have to live together on this planet.
We cannot build walls or ship anyone off— there is no place to put THEM!
WE have to live with THEM,
And THEY with US!
We have to make it work by making room for everyone.
We might start by reading Rumi’s “The Guest House,”
And beginning with ourselves.
06/05/2016 —Damselflies 2016 01 — Indian Land, South Carolina, June 4, 2016 Meta-perception is perception that takes itself into account,
And, more than that, every other perception as well.
Meta-perception is seeing that sees seeing,
And knows what’s what,
Around the table, across the board.
That is the kind of seeing that puts things in their place,
Restores harmony,
Lives from the center
And saves the world.
When meta-perception is combined with
Meta-reflection
And meta-realization
We have a situation in which
What needs to happen happens
In each situation that arises
For as long as there are situations to arise.
We cannot think that we see, hear, and understand
Until we reach the place
Of meta-perception, meta-reflection and meta-realization.
Don’t stop too soon,
Thinking you know something.
Know everything.
That’s knowing that knows!
06/05/2016 — Black Snake 2016 03 — Indian Land, South Carolina, June 5, 2016 — I estimated this snake to be in the 8-foot range, and while Black Snakes are not poisonous, no snake is harmless— in that their bites carry a strong possibility of infection which can lead to a number of undesirable outcomes. So I carry a garden hoe with me to the hammock to have something to put between me and the snakes that roam the woods. This one went its way and I went mine, but the next one may be in a bad mood. We have to spend time with ourselves,
Seeing ourselves,
Understanding ourselves,
Knowing ourselves,
Enjoying ourselves.
I like my own company as well as I like anyone’s.
And, if I cannot be good company with myself,
I cannot be good company with anyone.
The people who make the best company
Are the people who like themselves a lot.
That makes it easy for other people to like them as well.
Liking ourselves comes from knowing ourselves,
Which comes from spending time with ourselves.
The next time you are alone for an extended period,
Notice what is going on with in—
Your thoughts, your moods, your memories, where your mind wanders…
Simply observe yourself being alone with yourself,
And see what occurs to you.
06/06/2016 —Goodale 2015 57 Panorama B&W — Goodale State Park, Camden, South Carolina, November 11, 2015 Your life will ask things of you.
How you respond tells the tale.
Not one of the heroes on any of the journey’s ever made
Outlined the nature of their journey,
Laid out the steps in sequential fashion,
Rehearsed what would be required of them by each one,
Put the plan in place,
And carefully followed the map they had devised
From start to finish.
There is no formula for success on the Hero’s Journey.
You start by doing what needs to be done
The way it needs to be done,
When it needs to be done,
For no other reason that because it needs to be done–
And needs you to do it–
Like changing the baby’s diaper, say,
Or washing the dishes,
And, like that, one thing leads to another
And you find yourself alone with you at the end,
Preeminently proud of what you have done
And who you have become
By way of doing what you did the way you did it–
The way only you could do it.
06/06/2016 —Cardinal 2016 11 — Indian Land, South Carolina, June 5, 2016 We have witnessed the erosion of democracy in our lifetime.
Wealth and power like ignoring reality,
And do not care what their arrogance and greed
Mean for those who provide the means of their wealth and power.
“Give them bread and circuses,
Or let them eat cake!”
Is another way of saying, “To hell with them!”
An economy that takes justice, equality, compassion and kindness to heart
Is essential for the good of humankind, but.
What is good for humankind
Is anathema to wealth and power.
If we could get everyone to the table,
We might have a chance, but.
The top 1% is not talking,
And is not interested in what the rest of us say.
That leaves us with having to make democracy work.
We cannot give up on the greatest idea the world has ever had.
Democracy is the hope of free people
And free people are the hope of the world.
What this means for me and you is that we have to vote.
And we have to vote for the candidate
Who stands as the best advocate for the true good of the entire commonwealth.
Everything depends on it.
06/07/2016 —Downy Woodpecker 2016 06 — Indian Land, South Carolina, June 7, 2016 We have to sit quietly on a regular basis
To remember who we are and what we are about–
To find the center and live out of it–
To regain our perspective
And put ourselves in accord with our life.
This is called “making an adjustment.”
I came home for lunch one day
and found the carpenter my wife and I had hired
(to replace a section fascia board behind our gutter)
sitting atop his ladder.
“What’s the trouble?” I asked.
He replied, “I’m adjusting myself to what has to be done.”
He had run into unexpected rotting,
and the job had become more involved
than he had anticipated.
Ain’t that the way it is, though?
We have to adjust ourselves
to our lives from time to time.
Sitting quietly helps
with all the things
that need to be done in a day.
06/08/2016 —Mushroom 2016 01 — Indian Land, South Carolina, May 28, 2016 Your life matters!
How you live it makes all the difference!
If you are going to believe anything, believe these two things!
Self-gratification can carry you only so far.
It is the first thing to go
When things stop being fun,
Toughen up,
Become impossible.
“Impossible” has infinite layers.
We think this is impossible,
But just wait for that,
And that, and that, and that…
Try telling yourself it’s all about the good times then.
See how far that gets you.
It comes down to this:
Do you have what it takes to grind it out?
To be tougher than the toughest situation?
To tell the really impossible situations,
“It’s impossible to make me quit,
But don’t take my word for it–
I want to show you what I’m made of”?
If you are going to believe anything,
Believe in your life–
And live like you believe in what you are doing!
Live like you mean it!
06/08/2016 —Chameleon 2016 02 — The Tree Dragon Dines, Indian Land, South Carolina, June 7, 2016 Listen to me when I say don’t listen to me–listen to YOU!
I don’t know how you need to be you.
Only you know how you need to be you.
Sit quietly.
Listen to you.
Look at your life.
How does it need to be changed
to better express YOU?
How are YOU being dismissed
by the life you are living?
What are the things that are YOU
That you never do?
How would YOU run things
if you put YOU in charge of your life?
What do YOU have to say to you?
Explore these questions sitting quietly.
See what stirs within.
What occurs to you?
06/08/2016 —Downy Woodpecker 2016 02 — Indian Land, South Carolina, June 4, 2016 We only need enough money for the basics–
And each of us is responsible
for determining that list for ourselves.
Beyond that, there is only being who we are,
where we are,
when we are,
how we are
and why we are–
All of which we are also
responsible for figuring out for ourselves.
So, we have two areas of responsibility:
Getting the money angle squared away,
And getting the what we need money for–
The what we pay the bills to do–
Angle squared away.
Once those two things are in place,
It is only a matter of doing what is ours to do
In each situation as it arises
Throughout the time left for living.
06/09/2016 —Cardinal 2016 08 — Indian Land, South Carolina, June 1, 2016 How much money does it take
To be who we are?
We can be who we are with none whatsoever.
Money just allows us to increase
Our means of self-expression,
Furthers our avenues for self-realization,
Enlarges our field of experience,
Expands our possibilities for reflection and realization, If we are not interested
in discovering and being who we are,
Money is of no use at all
In the work of self-development,
And is only used then
To distract and entertain us until we die.
We are only asked to find our life and live it,
And be who we are,
Offering what is ours to give,
In the service of what needs to be done–
What needs us to do it as only we can do it–
In each situation as it arises.
Why does this receive such little press?
06/10/2016 —Cottontail 2016 01 — Indian Land, South Carolina, June 8, 2016 Call it “The Social Contract”–one of many.
We have to provide ourselves with the means of living our life.
We have to be able to pay for the life we are living.
This is not easy
And it is not often fun.
“Wining or losing, it’s still a grind.”
We make it harder by wanting what we cannot afford.
There are people who want to live in New York, for instance,
Who cannot afford to live in New York,
Who move to New York,
Believing in magic.
There are millions of people
without the means of supporting themselves
in the life they are living.
And millions more rushing to join them.
Sea levels are rising.
That means inhabitable areas
along all cost lines
are going to disappear.
People are still moving to Miami and New Orleans.
Global warming is making life
less livable in large portions of the planet.
War and poverty are making refugees
beyond counting or tracking
Who will never be able
to support themselves.
Catastrophe looms
While we move to New York, Miami, New Orleans…
Looking for the life we want to live.
It’s going to be difficult enough
finding a life we can afford to live,
And that’s the life we better be seeking–
Along with how to live it,
At one with who we are,
Serving the genius that is ours to serve,
Offering the gifts that are ours to give.
06/10/2016 — Tufted Titmouse 04 — Indian Land, South Carolina, June 7, 2016 Return to the center.
That would be your center.
The center of you.
The center of what is most important to/about you.
That would be your identity.
The unshifting ground that makes you you.
The unchanging and unchangeable essence
That everyone knows to be Y-O-U.
What is that?
I look out the window a lot–
Trying to see what is to be seen.
Trying to see what it is
and what it means
and what’s at the bottom of it
and how it all fits together.
Trying to make sense of it,
interpret it,
say what it means
and what the implications are f
or every single thing.
That is who I am and what I do.
Hermes/Mercury.
The Messenger of the Gods.
Hermeneutics is so what I am about.
When I return to the center,
I look out the window,
And am grounded in the essence of me.
Find your center.
Return there often.
Know what it means to be you.
Live out of your center.
Do what you do.
And you will be just fine.
No matter what.
06/11/2016 — Guard Toad 2016 01 — Indian Land, South Carolina, June 10, 2016 — Every Glen has a Guard Toad or two to keep the interlopers away.

Reality is an assortment of facts
that make things what they are
And keep things
from being what they are not. Each fact comes bundled
with its own field of additional facts–
A fact that keeps reality
from being all cut and dried.
Reality is a very dynamic,
fluid,
living,
moving,
changing experience.
A fact cannot be divorced
from its meaning,
Its impact,
Its implications.
A fact is meaningless
apart from the experience of said fact,
And, a meaningless fact
is the same as no fact at all.
So, reality consists of four elements:
The What (What is happening?)
The So What? (What does it mean for me personally
and for life generally?)
The Now What? (What am I to do about it?)
And the What Next? (What implications does the fact and my response to it
have for my personal future,
and the future of life on the planet?)
In order to be grounded in reality,
We have to be aware of reality’s impact
in each of these areas in our life.
Or, we could deny all of this,
Live oblivious to all facts at odds
with the way we want things to be,
And let the good times roll.
06/11/2016 — Goodale 2015 58 — Goodale State Park, Camden, South Carolina, November 11, 2015
Jesus was who he was.
The Buddha was who he was.
Jesus was the Buddha.
The Buddha was Jesus.
Elizabeth Warren is who she is.
Elizabeth Warren is Jesus and the Buddha.
When you are being who you are,
And when I am being who I am,
We are Elizabeth Warren, Jesus and the Buddha.
When you understand this
And apply it in your life
In each situation that arises,
That’s it.
There is nothing more to understand or to do.
Integrity is at the heart of life and being.
But it has to be who you ARE,
And not who you wish you were,
Or who you think you ought to be.
We have to live from the center
In doing the work of integration,
Which is the work of integrity,
Inner with outer
For all to see.
06/11/2016 — Black Snake 2016 08 — Indian Land, South Carolina, June 11, 2016 There is no reward.
There is no punishment.
There is no merit to be earned,
No damnation to be avoided.
There is only this life that is asking us to live it
In ways that are commensurate with its urge
For mindfulness, self-realization and self-expression.
To the extent that we do that,
There is peace and joy aplenty.
To the extent that we do not do that,
There is hostility, animosity and opposition on every side.
Good karma is being at one with our life,
Bad karma is being at odds with our life.
Anyone who tells you something else
Is selling something.
06/11/2016 — Lake Crawford 2015 14 — Kings Mountain State Park, Blacksburg, South Carolina, December 15, 2015 What hunger drives your boat on its path through the sea?
What, or who, are you seeking to appease
(Or escape)
With the way you live your life?
What ghosts will not give you any rest?
Don’t think up an answer.
Simply sit quietly with the questions,
Reflecting, wondering, curious,
And see what occurs to you.
Let seeing what occurs to you
Become your way of finding your way.
Don’t have to know what you are doing,
Or be able to defend, excuse, justify or explain
The logic and reasons behind your choices.
Live from a deeper place than your left hemisphere.
Call your right hemisphere to life–
Or the older reptilian brain,
With its bent for instinct.
Ponder your questions or your choices
And see what occurs to you.
06/12/2016 — Downy Woodpecker 2016 10 — Indian Land, South Carolina, June 9, 2016 – Used in Short Talks On Good Religion and Bad Religion The massacre at the Orlando Gay bar
Is yet another mindless agony
Perpetrated by the mindless,
Hypnotic, trance-inducing, repetition
Of who is evil and who is not,
And what must be done to those who are.
Mindlessness kills mindlessly–
Making the foundation of all good religion
The mantra:
“Wake Up! Wake Up! Wake Up!”
And the reminder:
“If you think you are awake, you are not!”
06/12/2016 — Box Turtle 2016 01 — The Tortoise of the Glen, Indian Land, South Carolina, June 12, 2016 When we find ourselves resisting our life,
And not wanting to go where it is taking us,
That is a sign that we are about to miss a turn.
We cannot will our life along its natural course
To its chosen destination.
All the problems of humanity
Can be traced to forcing our way upon The Way,
Wresting command and control away from the internal guides,
And refusing to align ourselves—and live in accord—with
The life that wants us to live it—
The life that is our life to live,
That no one but us can live.
All of the rites of initiation
Are about forcing the initiates to do
What they do not want to do.
Now, there are none to force us to do
What we do not want to do.
We alone say what we do and do not.
No one ever grew up doing what he, what she,
Wanted to do.
06/13/2016 — Red-bellied Woodpecker 2016 01 — Indian Land, South Carolina, June 12, 2015 The work of a true human being
Is the work of being true to ourselves,
The work of becoming who only we can be—
Of being the individual we are (and also are).
It is the work of being conscious of who we are (and also are),
It is the work of living so as to align our life
With the identity we know to be our own.
We live to incarnate the truth
Of our own character, nature and being—
To express who we are (and also are)
Within the context and circumstances of our life.
This requires us to know
What we are doing,
What we are thinking,
What we are feeling,
What we are fearing,
What we are desiring,
What we are seeing,
Hearing,
Tasting,
Smelling,
Touching,
Sensing, As well as what is happening,
And what needs to happen in response or instead,
And what we might do about it
With the genius and gifts that are ours to give
In each situation as it arises,
All our life long.
The work of a true human being
requires us to be transparent to ourselves,
And to take up the task of the full integration
Of inner with outer,
And of being with doing,
Which is integrity
In the deepest sense of the word.
We are to live so that our life
Is integral with the truth
Of our heart and our soul,
For the good of all sentient beings everywhere.
May it be forever so!
06/13/2016 — Tufted Titmouse 2016 08 — Pecking Order, Indian Land, South Carolina, June 12, 2016 Terrorism triumphs when it can ignite fear into rage and hatred.
Hatred begets hatred. Extremes beget extremes.
Possessed by rage and hatred, we lose all sense of The Good.
We don’t care about anything but the destruction of what we despise.
There is no cure for rage and hatred,
And its viciousness consumes all things.
However, it can be circumvented
By mindful awareness
That perceives and holds all things in non-judgmental compassion,
And waits to see what needs to be done.
When we contain something in mindful awareness,
We prevent it from contaminating and infecting everything else.
06/13/2016 — Tufted Titmouse 2016 07 — Opening a Sunflower Seed, Indian Land, South Carolina, June 12, 2016 What persona do you identify with?
Military personnel have a persona
(Or way of “being in the world”).
Lawyers do, MD’s do, Ministers do…
What business, professional, or social group
Do you identify with?
Who are “your kind of people”?
Be clear about who you belong with.
Now, be clear about this:
What positions, opinions, views, beliefs, values and behaviors
Do you hold/do that are at a variance from
Those of your primary persona?
Where do you stand apart from “your people”?
Where are you YOU and not THEM?
06/14/2016 — Carolina Wren 2016 11 — Indian Land, South Carolina, June 12, 2016 — Don’t miss any turns!
The Path is always twisting and turning,
And asking things of us
That we don’t want to do.
We have to complete the tasks appropriate
To each stage of development.
We cannot freeze time
And remain as we were at 27, or 17, forever.
If we miss a turn,
we cannot go back and pick it up,
And will always walk with a limp
Because of it.
The skills and lessons commensurate with each age
Are age specific, and, when missed,
Create problems for us in each succeeding age.
Commit yourself to the tasks of each stage of development,
No matter how distasteful they are,
Or how easily you could avoid them.
DON’T MISS ANY TURNS!
The work of growing up
Requires discipline and surrender
In a “Thy will, not mine, be done” kind of way.
06/14/2016 — Cardinal 2016 19 Detail — Indian Land, South Carolina, June 14, 2016 We have to dig for the gold!
Digging is the work of reflection and inquiry.
The gold is realization.
For example,
When we catch ourselves in the act of being defensive,
It is because an insecurity has been aroused.
We have to dig around
And see what we can uncover–
And what occurs to us.
If you take up the practice of looking,
You will be amazed at what you see.
In any situation,
There is what you see,
And what you don’t see about what you see,
And what you don’t see.
Look at everything
Until you see what all there is to see.
That is digging for the gold!
06/15/2016 — Carolina Wren 2016 13 — Indian Land, South Carolina, June 14, 2016 Our life is uniquely designed to grow us up
Because life depends upon our being grown up.
We are life’s great hope.
We are the carriers of consciousness,
And are the culmination of millions of years
Of evolutionary development
With life working out its plan
For making the world safe for life.
Are. It.
The joke appears to be on life.
We are not cooperating with the plan.
We deal in death, not life.
We kill all that we hate,
And we hate all that is not like we are.
Growing up means making room
For all that is not like we are.
Growing up means having compassion
For all living things.
The most mature people you have ever known
Were the most loving and kind.
The most immature were the most malicious, vicious, ruthless and evil.
Life has a lot riding on our realizing what we are doing,
Waking up, growing up, standing up to ourselves
And being what life needs us to be.
Never has the question been more important:
Whose side are we on?
06/15/2016 — Black Snake 2016 07 Detail — Indian Land, South Carolina, June 11, 2016 We are always growing up.
That is the only kind of growth there is.
Personal growth?
Spiritual growth?
They are nothing if they aren’t euphemisms for growing up.
The Hero’s Journey and the Spiritual Journey
Follow the same path–
The path to maturity, wisdom (which is actually knowing) and grace.
Maturity, Knowing and Grace are all that is worth our time and effort.
(And, Knowing is not to be confused with knowledge.
You can answer all of the Jeopardy questions
And still not know anything worth knowing.)
Some of us are more mature than others in some areas,
And less mature than others in other areas.
Our life is always asking us to grow up
In areas where we are behaving like we’re still in The Terrible Two’s.
06/16/2016 — Goodale 2015 59 — Goodale State Park, Camden, South Carolina, November 11, 2015 I wish I could impose my will on each situation as it arises—
And prevent others from imposing their will on me.
Don’t you?
This is the real value of weapons and money.
They aid us in imposing our will
And keeping the will of others from being imposed upon us.
If money and weapons didn’t do that,
They would be useless,
And we would never wish we had The Elder Wand,
Or that we would win the lottery.
Discovering the proper place of our will in our life
And willing it there
Is the foundation of the Hero’s Journey.
Too much will.
And we are the Dumb Bad Guys With Power
In every generation since the beginning.
Too little will,
And we are the people with no life,
No motivation,
No ambition,
No prospects,
And no future
Since the same point in time.
The right mix of will with acquiescence
And we take our place
With those who found the secret of living well
In every age.
06/16/2016 — Canopy 2016 01 — Zen Glen, Indian Land, South Carolina, June 12, 2016 Every situation can be transformed by seeing things for what they are.
“Seeing” is short for seeing, hearing and understanding.
I say “seeing,”
But I mean “seeing, hearing and understanding.”
We cannot see a situation without hearing and understanding.
Seeing, hearing and understanding are the tools of transformation,
Changing everything they apprehend by the power of realization.
The practice of looking until we see,
Listening until we hear,
And inquiring–by asking the questions that beg to be asked–
Until we understand,
Will shake the foundations
And restructure reality
06/17/2016 — Downy Woodpecker 2016 05 — Zen Glen, Indian Land, South Carolina, June 4, 2016 The solution to every one of your problems
Is to hold each one in your awareness,
And see what occurs to you.
Then, hold that in your awareness
And see what occurs to you.
As you carry out this process
Of mindful awareness with each of your problems,
What needs to happen in each case
Will become apparent
And you will know what you need to do.
Having the courage to do it
Is another problem.
And, you know what to do with problems.
06/17/2016 — Black-capped Chickadee 05 — Zen Glen, Indian Land, South Carolina, June 17, 2016 Our vulnerability keeps us awake nights,
Or wakes us up with nightmares about snakes
And monsters
We cannot escape or destroy.
That’s vulnerability for you.
It’s as though our dreamer is throwing it in our face,
Laughing,
Taunting us,
Asking, “What are you going to do about your vulnerability?”
It is a question we do not otherwise consider.
We deny our vulnerability,
Run from it,
Hide in the ten thousand diversions/distractions,
And pretend it is not so.
It is so.
We have to confess it,
Face it,
Square ourselves up with it,
Come to terms with it,
Make our peace with it,
And live our life out in its shadow.
It is never going away.
Our place is to let that be so,
Because it is.
And to go on about our business
Anyway, nevertheless, even so.
We have to be as vulnerable as we are.
Embracing our vulnerability
Puts us in possession of the weapons/tools of survival
In every circumstance in every age:
Seeing, hearing and understanding.
That would be,
Right seeing, right hearing and right understanding.
In possession of those,
We are not merely vulnerable and at the mercy of forces beyond us,
We are also in charge of our ability to make the right response
To whatever comes knocking on our door,
Inviting us to dance.
So, the Cyclops better mean it
If he wants us to step with him onto the floor—
Because we are going to the mat with him!
06/18/2016 — Carolina Wren 2016 14 — Zen Glen, Indian Land, South Carolina, June 17, 2016 Realization comes to those
Who wait in the right way.
Looking, listening, seeing, hearing,
Asking, searching, seeking,
Grasping, understanding, knowing.
We want The Answer Now!
We should be looking for
The Way,
The Process,
The Manner Of Responding
At The Opportune Moment
When The Time Is Right.
We want to get rid of our problems
So that we might get on with our life.
Our life is asking us
To become proficient
In seeing, hearing, understanding, knowing, doing, being.
We think it is about getting things lined up
Like we like them.
It is about getting ourselves in accord with our life,
Aligned with what needs to happen
In each situation as it arises
For the good of the moment.
Who do we need to be NOW?
Not in order to get our way,
But in order to be who we need to be!
When we are who our life needs us to be,
Everything falls into place around that.
06/18/2016 — Cottontail 2016 02 — Zen Glen, Indian Land, South Carolina, June 15, 2016 Putting ourselves in accord with our life
Is an on-going task of life.
There is no “once-and-done” here.
Each stage of development–
And each turn in the path within the stages–
Require us to adjust ourselves
To what has to be done
With the situation as it is,
Here and now.
And so the necessity
Of starting each day with silence,
And working places for silence within each day,
As a way of making room for recovery, reflection and realization.
We get through the trials and ordeals of the path
By seeing, hearing and understanding
What is being asked of us,
How that impacts us,
And how we need to respond.
The right kind of stillness
Provides us with what we need
To step forward and face the moment,
And, like Power Milk Biscuits, “gives shy persons the strength
To get up and do what needs to be done.”
06/19/2016 — Lake Crawford 2015 15 — Kings Mountain State Park, Blacksburg, South Carolina, December 12, 2015 We want what we do not have
And anything goes to get it,
All our life long,
Because there is always something else
Calling us on.
Or, we despair of ever having it
And turn to one of the 10,000 addictions
To take our mind off all
That exceeds our grasp,
Becoming mired in resentment, hopelessness,
Helplessness and rage–
Sometimes turned inward,
Sometimes outward–
With nowhere to turn
And no consolation for the life we did not get to live.
Either way, we miss the path
To the treasure hard to find,
Because we know what we want
And live in its service,
Unable to wake up
And lay it aside.
06/19/2016 — Hummingbird 2016 01 — Zen Glen, Indian Land, South Carolina, June 19, 2016 Two months ago, lightening struck a 125 foot tall White Oak tree standing about 70 feet from our house, on the north side. All its heavy branches are on the south side of the tree. My hammock runs north and south directly between the tree and the house. It took the tree about two weeks to completely die. The lightening bolt hit about 1/3rd the way down from the top and stripped bark in a zig-zag strip to the ground. Everything along that track died instantly. It took the crown a while to follow. I don’t have any idea how long a dead tree can stand before it falls, but I think about it every day, lying in the hammock, rehearsing my escape route should today be the day. The tree has become for me as a slave riding in the back of a Roman Emperor’s chariot, whispering, “You, too, will die.” The dead tree is a reminder that “I, too, will die,” and it poses a threat to the Zen Glen and our house even if I am nowhere around when it comes down. That would be “like dying,” in that it would significantly interfere with my enjoyment of the portion of my life that the Glen and the house represent.
The tree is Death. And I get it. And I work to make my peace with it, and prepare for it, by opening myself to the reality, and mentally “letting go” before anything is gone. Every day I look at the tree looming above me (it’s about 20 feet from my hammock), and nod in its direction, acknowledging the truth of what it stands for. And rehearse my escape route should today be the day.
06/20/2016 — Carolina Wren 2016 16 — Soaking Up Some Rays 1, Zen Glen, Indian Land, South Carolina, June 19, 2016 — I’ve watched Barred Owls stretch out in the sun and lie there for a while. Here it is with a Wren. Humans have no corner on “sun bathing.” Weird, erratic, off-the-wall behavior
Stems from frustration or panic
At the end of our rope.
Mindful (compassionate, non-judgmental) awareness
Holds all of that in awareness
And waits
To see.
Seeing the path
To what needs to be done
In the present moment
Opens the way
To doing what needs to be done–
Which is rarely weird, erratic, off-the-wall behavior.
We begin to live better
The instant we begin to see.
06/20/2016 — Bluebird 2016 01 — Zen Glen, Indian Land, South Carolina, June 03, 2016 Seeing things changes things.
Or, the corollary,
Nothing changes things like seeing things.
Leading to the conclusion:
Seeing is discouraged to prevent change.
Seeing is certainly discouraged.
Nothing about any culture that has ever been,
Or will be,
Encourages seeing throughout the culture.
“Shut up, sit down, stay in your place, do what you are told,
Don’t think for yourselves,
And don’t ask any questions!”
Is the instruction the people are always given from on high.
Or, as George Bush so nicely summarized it following 9/11,
“Go shopping!”
The intentional practice of mindful meditation
In the service of developing and deepening
Mindful (compassionate, non-judgmental) awareness
Of our life as it is lived
Moment to moment,
Is as counter-cultural,
And as revolutionary,
As it gets.
Join the revolution!
Teach yourself to see what’s what
In each situation as it arises!
06/21/2016 — Chameleon 2016 03 — Calling All Babes, Zen Glen, Indian Land, South Carolina, June 19, 2016 Life cannot sustain itself indefinitely,
And so there is death.
Our contract with life calls us to realize this
As basic, fundamental, foundational to the nature of things,
And live all-out until it becomes impossible to go on–
To not quit before our time.
Life is a mess across the board.
Every living thing has to bear the pain
Of the compromises required to be alive.
Every living thing not human
Seems to take that in stride
And get on with the game.
Humans have invented denial,
Which itself is a compromise. The refusal to live without dying
Makes a travesty of both life and death,
And we die without having lived.
06/21/2016 — Black-capped Chickadee 09 — Zen Glen, Indian Land, South Carolina, June 18, 2016 “Own it, and don’t let it show,”
Could be a motto for emergency room personnel.
Everything comes through the doors.
You can’t respond the way you feel to any of it.
You have to respond in ways appropriate to the occasion.
Every occasion.
The time and place of our living determine/limit
The expression of our response
To the events and circumstances of our life.
If we don’t understand and practice this simple rule,
We are clueless about compassion and grace,
And give the world who we are in the raw
All the time,
Requiring the world to receive us with compassion and grace.
06/22/2016 — Red-bellied Woodpecker 03 — Zen Glen, Indian Land, South Carolina, June 12, 2016 The life we opt for
Is the life the culture hands us
And tells us is just right for us.
The culture hands us our life
In a number of ways:
Movies, TV shows, Advertisements, Newspapers, Popular Opinion, and Availability.
We grow up learning what is good and what is not good
Based on what we see and hear around us.
Looking within
And listening to the silence
Never comes to our attention.
Native Americans went on Vision Quests.
We go to college.
It could be the same thing.
It isn’t.
We wake up if we are lucky in mid-life
Realizing that no one knows what they are doing,
Especially us,
And take up the work–
That should have been handed to us from the start–
Of discovering who we are
And what we are about,
In order to find our life and live it
In the time left for living.
Hoping it isn’t too late.
06/22/2016 — Carolina Wren 2016 12 — Zen Glen, Indian Land, South Carolina, June 14, 2016 What do you do that makes you smile:
While you are doing it?
After you have done it?
Looking at the results of doing it?
How many of those things are in your life?
What can you do to increase their number—
And the amount of time you spend doing them?
06/22/2016 — June Bug and Blackberry 2016 01 — Zen Glen, Indian Land, South Carolina, June 19, 2016 The Numinous reality that has always been called “God,”
Is experienced everywhere people are being themselves
(Which includes making art and music)
And where nature is being itself.
The experience of God is right there,
That close,
All of the time.
If the Numen is not experienced,
It is because we are closed off
From the experience of our experience,
Sleepwalking through life,
Dead to the world
Though we be 98.6 and ambulatory.
The God isn’t dead–
WE are.
The answer to the question of when life begins
Isn’t at conception,
Or at birth,
But when we wake up,
At whatever age,
And experience our experience,
And know what we know,
And be who we are.
Eyes that see,
See Numinous reality
Through June Bugs and Blackberries,
And everywhere else they look.
06/23/2016 —Bluebird with Blackberry 2016 01 — Zen Glen, Indian Land, South Carolina, June 19, 2016 When we see, hear and understand
The situation as it unfolds before us,
We lay aside our interests and agenda
In order to see what the situation means
Beyond what it means for us.
What is going on here?
What is happening?
What is at the bottom of how things are?
What is motivating the situation to be what it is?
What is at the heart of the matter?
To look until we see,
To listen until we hear,
To reflect until we realize the essence of what is before us,
Is to exegete the situation
And interpret it correctly.
Nothing transforms a scene
Like right interpretation.
Once we correctly interpret ourselves to ourselves,
We become transparent to ourselves,
And everything changes instantly.
Once we interpret another person to himself, to herself,
He, she, becomes transparent to himself, to herself,
And that entirely alters the drift of his, of her, life in that moment,
And makes all the difference.
06/23/2016 — Black Snake 2016 10 — Zen Glen, Indian Land, South Carolina, June 23, 2016 — I watched, and photographed, this 8-ft (My guess) Black Snake slithering through the treetops above the hammock in search of lizards, birds, bird nests with baby birds or bird eggs, or anything smaller than it is for about 15 minutes, until it climbed out of sight in the canopy. I went into the house for another cup of coffee, and coming back, found it out of the trees and crossing the woods road just to the north of my hammock. I live in a zoo.

Reality will correct our interpretation of reality—
IF we remain open to the possibility of being wrong!
Here’s the thing:
Explanations of the facts
Are generally as close
as we get to interpretation of the facts.
Interpretation of the facts is what science does.
Explanation of the facts is what politics and religion do.
Once a fact is interpreted by science,
Science looks for ways
to deepen, enlarge, expand the interpretation,
Or revise the interpretation,
Or rule it out as a valid way of looking at the fact.
Once a fact is explained by politics and/or religion,
No more thinking about the fact is allowed.
The explanation becomes dogma.
Is enshrined, worshiped, revered and adored
As eternal and unchangeable forever and ever, Amen.
And people are excommunicated,
shunned,
chastised,
persecuted,
discriminated against
and killed
Because they fail to honor
the Hallowed Explanation of the fact.
And no contrary fact
can alter the explanation of the fact so explained.
The rule is simple and to the point:
All explanations of the facts
can be embellished to take contradictory facts into account.
So the fossil record and continental drift do not negate
The explanation known as Intelligent Design
Offered as the political/religious counter to
The explanation know as evolution,
But are declared to be “tests of the faith of the faithful,”
And not proof of the error of their ways.
Reality cannot correct those whose explanation of reality
Cannot be questioned.
But it can certainly correct everyone else.
06/24/2016 — Brown Thrush 2016 01 — Zen Glen, Indian Land, South Carolina, June 22, 2016 The deepest and most horrific divide
Through all existence
Is between those who see that they do not see,
And those who do not see that they do not see;
Between those who can hear that they do not hear,
And those who cannot hear that they do not hear;
Between those who understand that they do not understand,
And those who do not understand that they do not understand;
Between those who know that they do not know,
And those who do not know that they do not know.
We can only be as awake as we can be
In the time and place of our living,
And live to be increasingly awake
In the times and places yet to be lived–
By asking the questions that beg to be asked,
And saying the things that cry out to be said,
And doing the things that need to be done
In each situation as it arises.
06/24/2016 — Cardinal 2016 22 — Zen Glen, Indian Land, South Carolina, June 22, 2016 Silence is with us always,
To the end of time.
Receiving the situation as it arises
In our awareness,
And reflecting on it
In the silence,
Is the path to action
In the field of action.
Is the way of knowing what to do
With the resources available to us
In the service of what needs to be done.
At the end of our rope,
With our backs to the wall
And nowhere to turn,
Hold everything in awareness
And listen in the silence
For what stirs there,
Hoping for a chance to save the day.
06/25/2016 — Goodale 2015 63 — Goodale State Park, Camden, South Carolina, November 11, 2-15
Everybody is dying to be heard.
Dying because being heard is the key to life.
We are able to overhear ourselves being heard,
And know ourselves for the first time.
This is the gift of psychotherapy.
We are listened to on a level that reveals us to us.
Being heard is being interpreted is being understood.
In the process of talking,
We clarify what we are saying
To those who listen to us beyond the words
To the essence of what is being said.
It is the clarification that enables us to say what we need to hear.
Who listens to you deeply enough
To ground you in who you are?
To uncover what is of primary importance to you?
To show you yourself?
If you don’t have anyone like that in your life,
You better meet some new people,
Or find a therapist
Who can hear what you have to say.
06/25/2016 — Squirrel with Blackberry 01 — Zen Glen, Indian Land, South Carolina, June 21, 2016 The woods are just so.
That’s what I like best about them.
No pretense.
No ambition.
No games or agendas.
Every single denizen of the forest is just what it is.
Everything there is going about its business
Exactly as it is built to go about its business.
It is being who it is.
Straight up.
Even when its game is deception,
As with Chameleons and certain insects,
They don’t attempt to hide the fact that they are hiding.
It’s who they are,
And all the rest know it,
And fold them into the family,
Like the best families do,
Without shaming them,
Humiliating them,
Or trying to convert them.
I like that.
Everything in the woods has a place,
And is pleased to take its place
Without trying to occupy some other better finer place.
I wish more places in my experience were just so like that.
We begin the work to make that happen
By being just so ourselves wherever we are,
Whatever the consequences.
That’s asking too much in some places,
But not every place.
06/26/2016 —Ruby-throated Hummingbird 2016 02 — Zen Glen, Indian Land, South Carolina, June 20, 2016 When you can allow things to take their course,
Allow things to take their course.
You have to interfere with the course of things
When they are out of the range
Of tolerable and acceptable.
I water our plants and lawn as necessary
Because letting things take their course
Would result in dead plants and grass.
Farmers irrigate their crops,
Police disrupt bank robberies and home invasions.
We have to say “NO!” to some things,
And each of us has our own list
Of things in that category.
The idea is to shorten our list
Of things we say “NO!” to,
And lengthen our list
Of things we say “YES!” to.
Upon examination and reflection,
We will discover that we
Have been saying “NO!”
To the wrong things
All our life–
And “YES!” to the wrong things
As well.
Once we get our YES and NO in place,
Our world will rock.
06/26/2016 — Pink Cone Flower 2016 01 — Indian Land, South Carolina, June 26, 2016 What is being offered to me?
What is being asked of me?
What am I realizing?
What am I ignoring?
What am I receiving?
What am I rejecting?
We need to know these things
In each situation as it arises.
06/27/2016 — Carolina Wren 2016 20 — Airing Out, What birds do when it’s 95 degrees F, Zen Glen, Indian Land, South Carolina, June 26, 2016 Let hope use its legs!
And its arms,
And its eyes,
And its ears,
And its …
We cannot just sit back and hope.
Though we may sit in the silence
And wait for something to occur to us,
Or wait for the propitious time
To act in the service of hope
In the field of action.
People who say they have hope,
Or tell us to,
Without acting in the service of hope
Are being ridiculous.
06/27/2016 — Cardinal 2016 23 — Airing Out, What birds do when it’s 95 degrees F. Zen Glen, Indian Land, South Carolina, June 26, 2016 Our unconscious is setting things up
In our 20’s, 30’s, 40’s and 50’s
For life in our 60’s, 70’s, 80’s and 90’s.
It takes the experience of the first half of life
To serve as the foundation for the second half.
It takes reflection on the life we have lived
To generate the realizations
Necessary to transform the life we are living.
In the second half of life,
We throw out all of the things we have heard that are not so,
And ground ourselves in the things we know to be so
In living toward the things we know nothing about
As explorers of worlds unknown and unknowable
Except through the experience of personal encounter
With That Which Cannot Be Said.
06/27/2016 — Downy Woodpecker 2016 12 — Zen Glen, Indian Land, South Carolina, June 13, 2016 Our unconscious
Is always at work
In every situation
To grow us up
Against our will.
06/28/2016 — Black-and-white Warbler 3016 02 — Zen Glen, Indian Land, South Carolina, June 17, 2016 When Jesus said of the people of Jerusalem,
“How often I would have gathered you
as a hen gathers her chicks,
but you would not,”
That is the Unconscious speaking to consciousness.
Consciousness hides itself in a fog of not getting it,
While the Unconscious does
everything possible to break through
And wake up those walking in their sleep
But they would not.
We prefer the dream we make up about our life
To the reality that waits for us to live it.
Everything real waits for us
to open ourselves to the reality of the Unconscious
And collaborate with it
in living the life that is ours to live,
So that the two become as one,
And the world is transformed
By the presence of True Human Beings
Making their way through it.
06/28/2016 — Black Snake 2016 11 — At Home In The Branches Or On The Ground, Zen Glen, Indian Land, South Carolina, June 23, 2016 Who do you say God is?
And don’t repeat what
someone else told you, even Jesus.
That’s hearsay,
and you don’t know it to be so—
You only know
that someone told you it was so.
Who do you say God is
out of your own personal experience with God?
Who do you KNOW God to be
because you have experienced it for yourself?
And no one can talk you out of it,
Or shame you out of it,
Or take it away from you in any way ever?
Let’s get back to Jesus.
Jesus said, “Who do YOU say that I am?”
And, “Why don’t you decide for yourselves what is right?”
That’s what I’m saying.
Who do you say God is?
Why don’t you decide for yourself what is right?
06/29/2016 — Whitetail Doe 2016 01 — Zen Glen, Indian Land, South Carolina, June 28, 2016 Our life is designed to grow us up.
We cannot wake up without growing up.
Growing up is the purpose and goal
Of the Hero’s Journey,
Of the Spiritual Journey,
Of all our journeys,
Of all our life.
We cannot be the same person at the end of our life
That we were at the beginning,
Or in our 30’s, or 40’s, or 50’s, or 60’s…
Growing up is becoming who Jesus was–
As only we can be Jesus.
Growing up is becoming who the Buddha was–
As only we can be the Buddha.
Growing up is becoming who all of the True Human Beings have been–
As only we can be the True Human Being.
We are on a path to maturity,
wisdom (And another term for wisdom is knowing–
knowing what’s what
and what to do about it,
and doing it),
and grace.
So stop thinking it’s about getting your way
And having what you want.
Thinking that way is to be stuck in the Terrible Two’s forever.
06/20/2016 — Snakeskin 2016 01 — Zen Glen, Indian Land, South Carolina, June 23, 2016 Carl Jung thought
there were three levels to the Unconscious/Psyche/Soul:
The level of the Personal Unconscious,
the reservoir of personal histories of experiences
and encounters,
circumstances,
responses, etc.
The level of the Collective Unconscious,
the library of the impact of cultural,
social,
religious,
and political events and experiences
of humanity upon humanity.
And, what he called “The Self,”
the ideal image each of us
is called to strive for
and approximate,
reflect
and express,
through our life.
“The Self” is what we call “Buddha mind,”
or “The mind of Christ.”
It is who the Buddha and the Christ
lived out in their own life.
I think of Jung’s “Self” as Lao Tzu’s “Tao.”
I see the Tao at the center of ourselves,
unconscious to us because we are not conscious of it,
yet always accessible to those
with eyes to see,
ears to hear,
and hearts to understand
what’s what and what to do about it.
Aligned with the Tao,
we are at one with ourselves
and in harmony with each other—
and do naturally,
spontaneously,
what truly ought to be done,
what needs to be done,
in each situation as it arises.
When the Tao is honored
with mindful awareness,
things fall into place,
and people are at peace
with themselves and one another.
And all are Buddha,
all are Christ.

One Minute Monologues 032

March 26, 2016 – May 15, 2016

03/26/2016 — Why should I care?
Why should I do the right thing?
Why should I help, you or anyone?
Why should I work in the service
Of the good of the situation as a whole?
Particularly when it is an inconvenience to me—
Or, worse, puts me in a bind, personally,
Or creates a hardship for me to deal with?
Tell me why I should!
It doesn’t matter why!
“Why?” is another manifestation of the Cyclops
Standing in the way,
Another distraction.
Another excuse.
We deal with it,
Not by being clear about the advantages,
The gains,
The benefits,
The profit,
And what is in it for us,
But by standing up ourselves,
Striding forward,
And doing the thing that needs us to do it—
Without bothering with “Why?”
03/26/2016 — Campbell’s Nursery 2016 10 — Charlotte, North Carolina, March 3, 2016 The right to self-determination shall not be infringed.
The responsibility for self-determination shall not be avoided.
The help needed for self-determination shall always be at hand.
If I had three wishes, they would be these.
The world would fly completely to pieces.
03/27/2016 — McDowell Barred Owl 01 Detail 02 — McDowell Nature Center & Preserve, Mecklenburg County Parks & Recreation, Charlotte, NC, March 24, 2016 Lao Tzu said, “Do your work and let nature take its course.”
He’s saying, “No pushing, no pulling,
No making happen, no keeping from happening,
No forcing, no controlling,
No manipulating, no conning,
No scheming, no conniving,
No blocking, no discriminating,
No lying, no cheating,
No subterfuge, no extortion,
No gerrymandering, no jury rigging,
No nepotism, no favoritism,
Just do your work.”
It’s that simple.
03/27/2016 — Dogwood 2016 04 —
Andrew Jackson State Park, Lancaster County, South Carolina, March 27, 2016 Rainer Maria Rilke, in “Letters to a Young Poet,”
Says, “A good marriage
is one in which
each partner appoints the other
to be the guardian of his, of her, solitude.”
Solitude is the fertile soil of life,
“The wellspring of living water,”
The matrix of all things holy.
We have to guard our own solitude
Against the unwarranted intrusions
Of those who would crash our life.
Predators abound,
Circling ’round and ’round
To feed upon our time and attention,
Viewing us as little more than entertaining relief
From a “world that is too much with (them) late and soon.”
The solution to their situation
Is to bear the pain of their own solitude,
And wait for it to open into
Reflection,
realization,
insight,
understanding,
compassion,
grace,
justice
and peace.
All things flow from listening to the sound of silence
Until we hear the music,
And dance with our life
Through the time left for living.
03/28/2016 — McDowell Barred Owl 01 Detail 03 — McDowell Nature Center & Preserve, Mecklenburg County Parks & Recreation, Charlotte, NC, March 24, 2016 We swim in unimaginable depths.
We splash around on the surface of our life
And make light conversation
About celebrities and weather and the price of gasoline,
While the deep regions groan and ache for recognition
And acknowledgement,
Waiting to show us a thing or two
About Mystery
And Wonder
And the boundless capabilities of our Soul.
03/28/2016 — Cherry Blossom Panorama 01 — Indian Land, South Carolina, March 25, 2016 Self-determination
Self-direction
Self-examination
Self-reflection
Self-correction
Are all ongoing requirements for
Self-realization,
Or self-actualization.
We cannot put our life on autopilot or cruise control
And live without a thought as to how we are living.
We have to take stock on a regular basis.
Who are we?
What are we about?
What do we intend with our life?
What are we living toward?
What does our life say about what is important?
Is that what we say is important?
How important is what we think is important?
How is what we think is important reflected in our life?
How is what we think is important denied by our life?
What is directing our boat on its path through the sea?
03/29/2016 — McDowell Poster 02 — McDowell Nature Center & Preserve, Mecklenburg County Parks & Recreation, Charlotte, NC, March 24, 2016 Jesus said, “Who do YOU say that I am?”
And, “Why don’t YOU decide for yourselves what is right?”
You could look it up.
The first thing Christians do
is abdicate all responsibility in the matter.
Any matter.
They hide behind “the Bible says.”
If you ask them, “How do you know that what the Bible says is so?”
They will say, “I take it on faith.”
If you ask them what makes them think they should take it on faith,
They will say they will go to hell if they don’t.
If you ask them how they know they will go to hell if they don’t,
They will tell you they take it on faith.
They have no responsibility beyond
believing what they are told to believe (“on faith”),
And doing what they are told to do (“on faith”).
Asking them to decide for themselves what is right
Gets you nowhere.
But, that is exactly what the rest of us are stuck with having to do.
Decide for ourselves what is right.
And evaluate our decisions in light of what happens next.
And then decide for ourselves what is right
in response to whatever happens.
And so on, ad infinitum.
We take it on faith
That we have what it takes
To know what needs to be done and do it,
Or to figure it out
Over time.
THAT is called “Living on faith”!
Used in Short Talks on Good and Bad Religion — 03/30/2016 — McDowell Poster 03 — McDowell Nature Center & Preserve, Mecklenburg County Parks & Recreation, Charlotte, NC, March 24, 2016 All religion is true religion
To its adherents,
And nonsense to everyone else.
All religion speaks, or spoke, to someone,
And has nothing to say to everyone else.
The ground, core, foundation, source, meaning and hope
Of every religion—
Of ALL religion—
Is the search for the ground,
core,
foundation,
source,
meaning
and hope
Of ourselves and our life.
We all,
From the very beginning,
Wake up (more or less),
And discover that here we are,
And immediately wonder
“What does it mean that we are here?”
“Now what?”
Where would we be without religion
And the culture
(And where do those two things begin and end,
Merge and part company?)
To nurture and guide us?
Our quest is the common quest of our species.
We have to make sense of being here, now.
What shall we make of it?
What do we make of it?
There is your religion for you.
And your culture.
Wherever you turn for help with the
“What does it mean that we are here now what?”
Questions
Is your way of seeking the
Ground, core, foundation, source, meaning and hope
Of your life.
Used in Short Talks on Good and Bad Religion — 03/30/2016 — Bloodroot 2016 03 — McDowell Nature Center & Preserve, Mecklenburg County Parks & Recreation, Charlotte, NC, March 24, 2016 We have to find our own religion
And respect everyone else’s.
Religion is that collection
Of symbols, rites and rituals
That constellates for us
The ground, center, foundation and source
Of meaning,
purpose,
direction,
vitality,
zeal,
enthusiasm,
hope,
resilience,
loyalty,
allegiance,
faithfulness,
dedication,
determination,
resolve,
courage,
character
and all the high values —
And serves for us as an avenue of lifelong
Reflection and realization.
It is not a compendium of beliefs.
It is the heart of life and being
Beating in rhythm with our heart,
Connecting us with all hearts
In the service of life and being.
No one can hand anyone
The religion at the heart of life and being.
We all have to find it for ourselves.
What are the symbols, rites and rituals
That connect you with the ground of meaning?
03/31/2016 — McDowell Poster 01 — McDowell Nature Center & Preserve, Mecklenburg County Parks & Recreation, Charlotte, NC, March 24, 2016 Each age must find its own meanings,
Against the resistance and opposition of the previous age.
There is a saying, “God doesn’t have any grandchildren.”
The God of the Fathers and Mothers
cannot be passed on to the children.
None of the meanings of the Fathers and Mothers
can be passed on to the children.
The children must find their own.
Because the context will have changed.
“It’s a new world Goldie.”
The theology and doctrines of the Fathers and Mothers
Must be replaced,
Or renounced altogether,
By the children,
Who find new meanings to the old questions—
New ways of living in light of the perennial questions—
And answer new questions raised
by new contexts and new situations.
The answers of the parents are of no help to the children.
But the tools of the parents are the same eternally:
Imagination,
curiosity,
creativity,
courage,
good faith with oneself and with others,
being transparent to oneself,
mindfulness,
compassion,
awareness The parents must teach the children
to use the tools of survival in any age
In every age.
And woe be to the age
When the parents don’t know
how to use the tools themselves!
03/31/2016 — Goodale 2015 43 Panorama — Goodale State Park, Camden, South Carolina, November 11, 2015 There is a life beyond the life we are living
Waiting for us to live it—
To align ourselves with it,
To place ourselves in accord with it,
To plight our troth to it,
To pledge our loyalty to it,
To honor it above all other claims
And serve it with all our heart.
When we place ourselves in our life’s service,
There will be tests of will and spirit.
Trials and ordeals pull us forth and show us who we are
And the mettle of which we are made.
And, said Joseph Campbell,
Doors will open where we think there are no doors,
And helping hands will come to our aid
Where we think there is no one to offer a hand.
Our destiny is waiting.
And everything waits along with it
To see whether we will do what is ours to do
Or wile away the hours running errands,
Doing chores,
And watching old movies.
04/01/2016 — Wisteria 2016 01 — Indian Land, South Carolina, March 26, 2016 Begin to ask people,
“What do you pay the bills to do?”
If they say,
“To live,”
Ask them,
“What do you live to do?”
If they say, “Pay the bills,”
You are talking to someone
Who pays the bills to pay the bills,
And wanders aimlessly
In a wasteland of the soul,
Between obligations and escapes,
Looking forward to nothing
Beyond the next entertaining pastime.
Is it life,
Or an escape from life?
How can we tell the difference?
04/02/2016 — Campbell’s Nursery 2016 02 — Charlotte, North Carolina, March 3, 2016 Propitious coincidence has always been seen
As evidence of the favor of the gods.
How else could it be understood?
Nothing like THIS could “just happen”!
What are the chances?
It is impossible to think that THIS is
Nothing but coincidence!
It is too much exactly what we needed to happen
Exactly when we needed it to happen!
The universe, the angels, the gods, The God…
All theology is derived from an astounding encounter
With chance.
“Grace” and “luck” are interchangeable terms.
Lao Tzu discovered eons ago
That if you want to improve your chances
Of being graced by an astounding encounter with chance,
Throw in with the Tao,
That is, step into the flow of your life,
And place yourself in accord
With the way things are and need to be
In each situation as it arises.
Living like that will sensitize you to the abiding presence
Of reality beneath, behind, beyond apparent reality.
You will live “transparent to transcendence,”
And embody,
As you experience,
The Numinous Mystery at the heart of life.
See if you can simply live it
Without trying to master it—
Or, worse by far,
Explain it.
04/02/2016 — McDowell Barred Owl 04 Detail — McDowell Nature Center & Preserve, Mecklenburg County Parks & Recreation, Charlotte, NC, March 24, 2016 It’s all perspective.
All the way down.
Or up.
Depending on how you look at it.
Everything is sacred from one standpoint.
Nothing is from another.
Comedians make fun of,
Have fun with,
Everything
Except the things they take seriously.
Robin Williams made jokes about it all
But depression.
You don’t laugh about,
Or at, That’s some serious stuff.
The people who make fun of the Prophet
And, trough him, all Muslims everywhere,
Don’t make fun of their own religion
(Which is making fun of everyone else’s).
What is sacred
Is what we take,
And treat,
Seriously.
But, not everyone treats it seriously.
So.
What is SERIOUS!!! ?
04/02/2016 — McDowell Cascade 01 — McDowell Nature Center & Preserve, Mecklenburg County Parks & Recreation, Charlotte, NC, March 31, 2016 If you are going to start anywhere, start here:
“Reasonable minds can look at the same facts
and make different interpretations,
draw different conclusions,
and come to different decisions
about what to do in response to the fact-set.” Now—
Stop it with the who is right and who is wrong,
Who is good and who is bad.
Who is going to heaven and who is going to hell.
And put your complete focus
On living your life,
Working your work,
And doing what you think needs to be done
About the fact-set
As you see it—
And trust other people to do the same things
Out of their own perspective and point of view.
04/03/2016 — McDowell Barred Owl 04 Detail 03 — McDowell Nature Center & Preserve, Mecklenburg County Parks & Recreation, Charlotte, NC, March 24, 2016 EB White said, “I revise a great deal.
I know when something is right
because bells begin ringing and lights flash.” The ringing bells and flashing lights
Are what Native Americans were looking for on their Vision Quests.
We know when something is right for us,
and when it is wrong—
IF
We take the time to know what we know. The path that is right for us can feel wrong.
The path that is wrong for us can feel right.
We have to take our time with our paths
To know what we know
Past what we feel and think, fear, and desire. The Buddha said, “You aren’t seeking to be on the path.
You are seeking to BE the path.”
Or words to that effect.
We have to take the time required
To know who we are,
And who we are not,
And who we need to be.
That’s our Vision Quest.
04/04/2016 — Banded Watersnake — Glencaren Garden, Rock Hill, South Carolina, April 3, 2016 It is always a matter
Of sitting down with the situation
And coming to terms with how things are there,
And what can be done about it
And doing it
With the gifts that are at our disposal
In the service of the good of the situation as a whole. Like Jesus,
We all come “not to be served,
But to serve,”
And give our life
For the true good of the whole.
For this purpose we were born,
And to this end
We are to live all our days long. We bring forth our destiny
By living in service to the situation
One situation at a time.
What is your present situation?
Sit down with it.
Get to the bottom of it.
Do what needs to be done about it
With the gifts that are yours to use
In blessing the situation with your presence.
It is never any more difficult than that.
04/04/2016 — Yellow Flame Azalea 01 — Indian Land, South Carolina, April 3, 2016 We are here to serve our destiny.
Forget about our destiny
being something we dream up for ourselves,
Or that we might love to do,
Like some Hollywood script writer might imagine it
With a “rags to riches” kind of plot line. We don’t get to choose our destiny,
And we wouldn’t likely pick it out of a Destiny Bin,
All cute and cuddly and begging to have us for its owner.
Our destiny is our destiny, but
We belong to it.
We serve it
As liege servants
Serve their master,
While it drags us all over the place
And keeps finding the weirdest things
For us to do.
Our place is to sense what is being asked of us
And comply—
Trusting ourselves to the unfolding of things,
as those who are just along for the ride.
04/05/2016 — Dogwood 2016 05 Panorama — Andrew Jackson State Park, Lancaster County, South Carolina, March 31, 2016 Men are uniquely, psychically, configured
to show women who they are capable of being,
And likewise with women and men.
We bring out the best and the worst in each other,
And the more intimate the relationship,
The more we impact the other for better, or worse. The magic works whether we are aware of it or not, but.
For us to get it,
We have to see/know what is going on
And participate as full partners in the joint production of each other. As it is, we generally only have eyes for our agenda,
And try to position the other to get what we want
Without understanding that it is the place of the other
In our life
To show us who we are, and also are. We say to the other,
“YOU make me so _____ !”
Without seeing that the _____ ! is what we produce
Out of our own makeup
In response to the other’s behavior.
The _____! is who we are capable of being
In certain circumstances.
That is important information
to those who are intent on
becoming themselves in relation to the other,
thanks to the other. Put another man, or woman,
In our place
And their reaction would likely be different.
It is not automatic that X results in Y.
We are being shown who we are, and also are.
What we do with that information
Has everything to do with who we become. What we do with who we are, and also are,
Is who we ARE.
Wake up.
Open your eyes.
Get to work.
In the service of your own becoming.
Becoming who we ARE is our only valid agenda.
04/05/2016 — Goodale 2015 44 Panorama — Goodale State Park, Camden, South Carolina, November 11, 2015 We grow each other up—
To the extent that we can grow up—
All along the way.
No hermit ever matured one fraction
Beyond entering the woods or the cave.
There are no solitary spiritual masters.
Yet the capacity for solitude is
A quality of all masters.
We seek it out in order
To reflect on the impact of the others.
Yet, without their impact
Reflection quickly becomes a circle
Winding itself ever closer
Until our thoughts become a rut
Becoming a grave.
New experiences feed new reflections
And produce new realizations.
Of course, we have to be worth talking to.
Entire congregations have been known
To repeat the old thoughts
Down the rut
To the grave.
Used in Short Talks On Politics, 04/06/2016 — McDowell Great Blue Herron 01 Detail 02 — McDowell Nature Center & Preserve, Mecklenburg County Parks & Recreation, Charlotte, NC, April 06, 2016 I don’t know what to do about
the idiocy of certain state governments.
I do know that idiocy
can take over if the electorate sleeps.
I do know the electorate has been asleep,
Or worse—absent without leave—
For sometime now.
Complacency set in.
Or boredom.
Or resignation.
Less than 45% of registered voters
vote in any given election.
A majority is one vote more than half of 45%.
I could win an election with 22% of the vote.
The Tea Party Republicans rarely carry more than a 35%
Approval rating anywhere.
That leads me to believe that nationwide
Tea Party Republicans weigh in
at no more than 35% of those eligible to vote.
But they would need only 22% of the vote to win.
And they, by God, show up on election day—
EVERY election day.
Now let’s wonder why idiocy has taken over.
Where is the missing 55% of the electorate?
We can lay the responsibility for idiocy at their door.
Let them wade through it on their way to work every day.
Oh, and let’s thank them with a
Big Juicy Wet One Right On The Kisser.
And tell them “Thanks a lot,
Chump, for not showing up.”
04/06/2016 — Campbell’s Nursery 2016 08 — Charlotte, North Carolina, March 3, 2016 Lemme ‘splane…
Our life is fluid, dynamic, alive.
Our life has a life of its own.
Our life isn’t an extension of our will, our wants, our wishes.
Our life is a thing apart from us,
Beyond us,
Out there,
Calling us to catch up
And live it while there is still time left for living.
Our life is not ours to decide what to do with.
Our life is ours to listen to,
To sense,
To intuit,
To imagine,
To align ourselves with
Get out of the way
And allow it to live itself through us.
It is,
To borrow a Biblical image,
The potter, we are the clay.
The worse thing, therefore,
After ignoring the right order of things
And thinking we are the boss of our life,
Is to think that we are to live one
Frozen, rigid, standardized, unchanging, unchangeable,
Always the same life forever.
Who we have been
Is not who we will be.
We are always and forever
Becoming who we are.
I don’t care how old we are,
We have only just begun.
So, put your dancing shoes on, Baby,
And step onto the floor.
Your life has a step or two to show you,
With more outlandish ones on the way!
Used in Short Talks On Politics, 04/07/2016 — Rue Anemone 2016 02 — McDowell Nature Center & Preserve, Mecklenburg County Parks & Recreation, Charlotte, NC, March 26, 2016 Democracy hinges on two things:
The electorate must vote
The citizens must obey the laws.
When members of congress
And state governors and legislatures
Refuse to be law-abiding,
Dismiss, discount, disregard, flaunt or ignore
Laws guarding the constitutional rights of all citizens,
They place themselves outside the law,
And become outlaws.
Thugs, gangs, hoodlums, goons and villains.
Each one took an oath of office,
Promising, among other things,
To uphold and obey the Constitution of the United States.
At the very least,
They deserve to be dispelled from office.
I would prefer to see them arrested and jailed
For treason and sedition.
Until that happens,
The electorate has to rise to the occasion
And vote them out of office—
And vote into office those
Who will keep the law they swear to uphold.
When neither those who govern
Nor the electorate do their jobs
Democracy becomes a sham and a shame.
04/08/2016 — Banded Watersnake 02 Detail — Glencaren Garden, Rock Hill, South Carolina, April 3, 2016 A “Philosophy of Life” is what we tell ourselves to keep going.
The three most popular philosophies of life
Are some variation, or combination, of
Resignation, Hopelessness and Denial.
“There is a reason for everything
And it will all be made up to us one day.”
“Don’t ask any questions,
Just keep your nose to the grindstone
And do what you’re told—
And it will all work out in the end.”
“Eat, drink and be merry,
For death is on the way.
In the meantime,
Let’s pass a good time!”
“Just take it one day, or one step, at a time,
And hope for the best!”
“Money! Wealth! Privilege! Fame! Renown!
The more we have,
The happier we will be!”
Most of the people we know,
Or might have known,
Are stumbling around
In a culturally, or religiously, or self-imposed fog,
With no sense of purpose or direction,
Living aimless, meaningless, lives,
Hanging out and going through the motions of being alive
Until they die.
What about you?
Why are you here?
What keeps you going?
04/08/2016 — Bleeding Heart 2016 02 — Indian Land, South Carolina, April 7, 2016 The truth is that things are not the way they ought to be,
And they are certainly not the way we wish they were,
Or want them to be.
Squaring ourselves up with that truth
And embracing it, in an “Okay, I got it, now what?” kind of way
Is the truth that sets us free to respond to any calamity,
Catastrophe,
Context
In the confidence that we have what it takes
To face it and deal with it, again and again forever—
In the manner of Odysseus who said,
“I will stay with it and endure suffering hardship/
And once the heaving sea has shaken my raft to pieces,
Then I will swim.”
That is the Foundation Stone.
Grounded upon that
We are safe knowing that we do not have to be safe
To be safe.
The freedom of being free from fear and desire,
And thus able to be who we are,
Where we are,
When we are,
Why we are,
How we are
“At the still point of the turning world.”
04/09/2016 — Trumpet Vine Panorama 01 — Landsford Canal State Park, Chester County, South Carolina, April 8, 2016 It is important that we know who our heroes are,
And consciously live to incarnate
the qualities we admire in them,
Bringing them forth,
Making them real,
As only we can,
In the life we are living.
Our heroes are who we are yet-to-be,
Inspiring us toward the “I” within
That needs to be intentionally birthed
Within the situations that call for her,
For his,
Qualities and characteristics.
And we are both male and female,
Living to be the best woman,
And the best man,
We are capable of being.
Dolly Parton is the woman I would love to be,
And George Clooney is the man.
On a fictional level,
Hester Prynne and Mary Poppins are the women,
And Atticus Finch and Tevya are the men.
I can’t imagine being a better woman than those women,
Or a better man that those men.
And they all help me toward
The best woman, and the best man,
I am capable of being
In each situation as it arises.
04/09/2016 — Atamasco Lily B&W — Landsford Canal State Park, Chester County, South Carolina, April 8, 2016 We build a life out of our experience
And our interpretation, understanding, of our experience.
If no new experiences come along
Our interpretation of our experience will work for us
Over long stretches of time.
Things will be as we say they are,
And our experience will validate it.
The sacrifice of our first born sons
Will cause the sun to come back to us
Every winter solstice,
And we will keep sacrificing our first born sons
Until some invading army
Lays waste to our land
And tells us we are stupid to think
Our god was in charge of the sun,
When their god is clearly the superior god.
New experience
And new ways of understanding experience
Change our world.
They are the only things that do.
Our world is the way it is
Because of the way we experience it
And understand it.
How do we see things differently?
What have you changed your mind about lately?
When was your most recent realization?
How are we avoiding new experiences
And refusing to interpret old experiences in new ways?
What are the things we say about the way things are
That we won’t stop saying?
04/10/2016 — There’s An Eagle In There I Swear — Landsford Canal State Park, Chester County, South Carolina, April 8, 2016 We structure reality
(The facts that define and limit our existence)
To conform to our interpretation of our experience of reality.
Something happens,
Or fails to happen,
And we have to explain it,
Understand it,
In order to keep it happening
Or keep it from happening
Or make it happen
Or not happen
And have things work in our favor.
“Learning from our experience”
Is taking what happens
And figuring out what we can do
To keep it happening,
Or to make it not happen.
Superstition and religion—
And where does that line lie?—
Work to help us get things like we want them to be.
How we live in relation to the facts that govern our life
Governs our life.
We are always doing this
And never doing that
So that this or that will happen or not happen.
How would we live
If we weren’t positioning, posturing, maneuvering ourselves
To enjoy some favorable advantage?
How would we live
If we were only concerned with living our life,
And not with getting something out of it?
04/10/2016 — Goodale 2015 45 — Goodale State Park, Camden, South Carolina, November 11, 2015 It takes too much to make us happy.
We are saturated with bliss.
Most of us can have a hot shower any time we want one.
None of the kings and queens of antiquity could dream
Of the things we take so for granted we never notice
In our bathroom.
Then, there is the kitchen.
And we have the gall to be discontent.
We cast about waiting for the next new piece of technological plastic WOW
On its way to the landfill by way of us,
Because we are so bored with our life
And need something to entertain us
To take our minds off how bored we are.
Poor us.
I recommend we sit down with our life
And listen to it.
Ask it what it needs from us in order to come forth
In us and through us.
I’m serious.
We have a destiny that is dying in the delivery room
Because we are all about what is going to make us happy now.
No, now.
No, now…
And won’t cooperate with our own birthing
In the time left for living.
Go stand in a hot shower and ask your life what it needs of you
In order to come to life in you.
And do it.
04/11/2016 — White Fence, Red Barn — Chester County, South Carolina, April 8, 2016 We are formed, shaped, by our innate tendencies
In concert with our context
And how we interpret it.
We cannot change our tendencies
Or our context,
Though we can influence both
By the way we interpret, understand, explain, make sense of,
What is happening and how we are responding to it.
We have to perceive our perceptions.
We cannot allow ourselves to get by with “just reacting.”
We have to see how we are reacting—
How “that” in our environment
Means “this” in our response to our environment,
And what we are saying/thinking/feeling about “that”
To make “this” what it is.
Nothing is automatic.
A father’s anger
Can have a different impact
All his children.
Poverty can mean one thing to one person
And another thing to someone else.
What does “that” mean to us?
Why does “that” mean what it does and not something else?
We have to work with our meanings
To change the impact of our context
And transform our life.
04/12/2016 — Catesby’s Trillium 2016 01 — Chestnut trail, McDowell Nature Center & Preserve, Mecklenburg County Parks & Recreation, Charlotte, NC, April 11, 2016 Finding
And living out of—
Aligned with—
The center of what is central
To you
Puts you on
The path that is YOUR path
That no one can give you
Or take away from you.
Consider your life.
How much of what goes on there
Is geared to helping you
Find
And live out of—
Aligned with—
The center of what is central
To you?
How much of what goes on there
Is geared to distracting you
From that work
And replacing it
With what someone else thinks
Should be central to you?
Whose side are you on?
04/12/2016 — Bloodroot 2016 05 — McDowell Nature Center & Preserve, Chestnut Trail, Mecklenburg County Parks & Recreation, Charlotte, NC, March 28, 2016 If all of our symbols have to be explained to us,
We don’t have a living symbol to our name.
Symbols cannot be told to anyone,
Handed to anyone,
Defined, spelled out, made plain…
The value of a symbol is that
There is more to it than words can say,
And we have to do the work of imagining,
Intuiting,
Articulating
What it is about the symbol(s) in question
That sets it, set them, apart
And make them alive for us.
What are the objects and images
That have the power of attraction
For you?
A campfire, perhaps, or even gas logs in a fire place?
The ocean?
Storm clouds?
Pay attention to the things that stand apart for you.
Reflect on them.
See what comes to mind.
We are surrounded by
“Symbols of Transformation” (Carl Jung)
Calling us to see what they have to show us,
Hear what they have to say to us.
Their meaning is with us,
Waiting to be discovered.
The treasure hard to find.
04/13/2016 — Japanese Maple in the Sun — Glencairn Garden, Rock Hill, South Carolina, April 10, 2016 We are the meaning we seek.
We think it is out there, over there,
Beyond the mountains, across the sea.
We carry the treasure with us
Looking for the treasure.
We are the man on his ox
Looking for his ox,
The woman holding her car keys
Looking for her car keys.
We live searching for meaning
Without knowing who wants to know.
Who are you?
What is yours to do?
What lies at the core,
At the center,
At the foundation
Of YOU?
Get to the bottom
Of YOU,
And there it is.
The treasure hard to find.
Wondering what took so long.
04/13/2016 — Wood Sorrel 2016 01 — McDowell Nature Center & Preserve, Chestnut Trail, Mecklenburg County Parks & Recreation, Charlotte, NC, April 11, 2016 People have been doing rain dances
for as long as there have been people.
And when we become civilized
to the point of being self-conscious dancing for rain,
we pray for it instead.
The primary focus of the species
is controlling the natural world.
Never mind the rhythms of nature.
Ignore the Biblical observation
“To everything there is a season,
and a time for everything under heaven.”
We want it to rain NOW!
Our crops and our lives depend on it!
When you depend on things you can’t control,
you trick yourself into believing
you can control it if you find the magic dance,
or the magic prayer,
or the magic whatever.
We influence the heavens, the gods, the God.
That is the foundational doctrine
in every book of doctrines.
What we do determines
what the heavens,
the gods,
the God
does to us, or for us.
That is the belief behind all of the beliefs.
If we believe correctly,
the heavens, the gods, the God
are/is ours to command,
And will rush to do our bidding
With rain for a bountiful harvest,
Pearly gates,
And streets of resplendent gold.
Not a bad story line
For those helpless and at the mercy
Of the 10,000 things.
04/14/2016 — Blue Star 2016 01 — McDowell Nature Center & Preserve, Chestnut Trail, Mecklenburg County Parks & Recreation, Charlotte, NC, April 11, 2016 It starts with this:
If you were to live your life
without pursuing the advantage—
Any advantage—
How would you live it? Actually, it starts before there.
It starts with your vulnerability—
With your impotence.
With your Helplessness,
Hopelessness,
Desperate for the advantage—
Any advantage.
It starts with your agony,
With your pain.
With the recognition of your aloneness,
And your loneliness.
With your realization
That you are responsible for you
With too few resources
And no prospects of ever having enough.
It starts with your back to the wall
Standing on the brink.
It starts with your fear
And your grief—
Your loss of all hope,
And your sorrow.
It starts with your feeling the ache
Of your lostness
In the pit of your stomach
And in the marrow of your bones.
It starts with the truth
Of who and how you are.
If you can face that truth,
It is in the strength—
The crazy, ludicrous, absurd strength—
Of another truth,
That even so,
It is up to you,
And you are enough,
Just as you are,
Because you are more than you appear to be.
There is more to you than meets the eye.
You have all you need—
In spite of what you think, or feel—
And it only takes trusting that it is so
To know that it is so.
At that point,
You are ready to begin.
Used in Short Talks On Contradiction, etc., 04/14/2016 — Watersnake Love — Glencairn Garden, Rock Hill, SC, April 3, 2016 Begin with your contradictions,
Your polarities,
Your ambivalence,
Your conflicts.
It is said that “truth is found between the hands.”
On the one hand, what?
On the other hand, what?
Where are you strung out between mutually exclusive
And equally compelling
Options?
Where does your Doctor Jekyll stumble over your Mr. Hyde?
Sit down with them
And don’t get up
Until you have explored each
To the very bottom of his/your little heart.
You have to get to the bottom of you
As exhibited in your contradictions.
You keep canceling yourself out.
Shooting yourself in the foot.
Blocking yourself at every turn.
Stop! Look! Listen!
Listen! Listen! Listen!
The time you spend in self-exploration
And self-reflection
Is an investment in your future.
You are trying to tell you
What you need to hear.
Listen! Listen! Listen!
04/15/2016 — Spring Beauty 2016 01 — Landsford Canal State Park, Chester, South Carolina, April 9, 2016 We have become a culture of diversion and distraction.
We live to be entertained.
We have nothing compelling to do.
We fill up our time
With anything available
To take our minds off the emptiness of our lives.
We seek the comforts and advantages,
But why?
What purpose does it serve?
What purpose do WE serve?
What is OUR purpose?
What do we MEAN by our life?
What do we MEAN to say, to do, with our life?
What do we INTEND with the life we are living?
Everybody is on the way to somewhere else.
Everybody wants to be someone else.
Actors want to be singers.
Singers want to be actors.
Who is at peace with who, and where, they are?
Who can stand being alone with themselves
In a culture of rampant discontent?
04/15/2016 — May Apple 01 Panorama — McDowell Nature Center & Preserve, Chestnut Trail, Mecklenburg County Parks & Recreation, Charlotte, NC, April 11, 2016 What would it take to wake up Johnny Manziel and turn his life around?
Somebody? Anybody?
If you could answer that question
with a sure-fire, never-fail, answer, solution, recipe
You could name your price.
Parents and siblings,
Spouses and partners,
Bosses, co-workers and friends
Would stand in line to buy your book and hear you lecture.
Rehab programs don’t come
with absolute, rock-solid-sure, guaranteed formulas
for doing what needs to be done
For Johnny Manziel and a teeming multitude of others like him—
All with people who love them
shaking their heads wondering how it can happen.
Yet, it happens all the time.
And sometimes it unhappens.
Sometimes, people wake up and turn their life around.
12-step programs are filled with people who are working the program.
And with people who are not.
What’s the difference?
Ask them and they will tell you it comes down to one thing.
Call it grace, or good luck.
It comes down to the same thing.
We are lucky that grace is at work in the world,
And graced by good luck every time we stumble into it.
We strive to keep people like Johnny Manziel alive long enough
To be lucky to be blessed with the grace of resurrection and new life
While there is still time left to be lived.
It happens often enough to keep us hoping it will happen this time every time.
It’s that hard-headed hope that keeps us going
In the work that has to be done
In the lives of so many:
“The work of our hands, establish Thou it!”
Indeed, by all means, “Establish Thou it!”
04/16/2016 — Buttercup 2016 01 — McDowell Nature Center & Preserve, Chestnut Trail, Mecklenburg County Parks & Recreation, Charlotte, NC, April 11, 2016 We live to discover and express who we are.
We are here to develop and convey our individuality.
Integrity, identity, definition, distinction characterize the nature of our work.
The cost of doing business
Is the price we pay for being who we are.
There is a catch.
We also have to stay in touch.
We have to be who we are
In relationship with those who are being who they are.
We cannot be who we are alone,
In a cave,
In a hut in the woods.
We have to be who we are in community—
In a diverse community of people
Who may, or may not, be supportive of our work
To discover and express who we are.
We have to develop our social skills
While we are developing our sense of direction
And our feel for what our life is asking of us.
This is called walking two paths at the same time.
We do that by being aware of “the other path” at all times.
“The other path” keeps us alert
To the nuances and subtleties of the path we are currently negotiating.
We cannot ignore “that path,”
For the sake of this one. “What a slippery slope this is!”
“Like the edge of a razor!”
Anyone can define herself, himself, on a deserted island.
It doesn’t count until you can be yourself at home
Around a Thanksgiving table,
Without anyone withdrawing, sulking, or slamming doors.
04/16/2016 — Wisteria 2016 02 — Glencairn Garden, Rock Hill, SC, April 3, 2016 It comes down to this:
See what is happening in each situation as it arises.
Know what it means
And what needs to be done about it.
Do what can be done about it
With the gifts that are yours to serve
And the resources available to you.
And let that be that.
It is never more complicated, complex or difficult than this.
04/17/2016 — Goodale 2015 46 — Goodale State Park, Camden, South Carolina, November 11, 2015 At the bottom,
We all are crazy.
We want what we cannot have,
What we have no business having,
And are driven by mad desires
For things we cannot use
And have no interest in.
Make sense of that
If you can. Don’t waste your time
Trying to make sense of it.
Laugh,
And say to yourself,
“Ain’t that just the way it is though!”
And turn your attention
To the other path—
The path we also walk,
The path with our name on it,
The path that is pulling us forth
Against our will,
Bringing us out
Like a bird from an egg
To fly of all things.
And we want to remain egg bound forever.
Crazy to the core.
Wanting to live
And to remain dead.
Walking two paths at the same time.
Not knowing which is life,
And which is death.
Thinking death is life,
And life is death.
Stupid crazy
All the way to the bottom.
Laugh and walk two paths,
Knowingly,
Mindfully.
Holy laughter rights the boat,
As much as it can be righted,
And sails us on
To the land of promise,
On the far side
Of the heaving seas
Tossing about in our own soul.
04/18/2016 — McDowell Barred Owl 05 Detail — McDowell Nature Center & Preserve, Chestnut Trail, Mecklenburg County Parks & Recreation, Charlotte, NC, March 24, 2016 Making our peace with our circumstances
Could mean resigning ourselves to the way things are
And allowing them to remain so,
Unchallenged and undisturbed.
And it could mean taking up the causes
That need to be taken up
No matter how absurd, ridiculous, foolish and hopeless it is—
Because that is what our circumstances require.
Making our peace with our circumstances
Could mean taking no for an answer every time.
And it could mean seeing no as someone else’s idea
That things should remain as they are,
And saying no to no in the service of your own
Interpretation of what needs to happen in response to the way things are,
Understanding that saying yes to no,
And saying no to no,
Constitute the dynamics of life on every level,
And knowing when to say yes to no,
And when to say no to no,
Is the essence of wisdom
And the nature of the circumstances
With which we must make our peace.
If you would like to help in the work of saying no to no
Look up Rancho Feliz Charitable Foundation on the internet
And send them some cash encouragement
In their efforts in behalf of the Mexican poor
On both sides of the border.
It is a cause that calls us beyond
How things are
To how things ought to be—
As a way of making our peace
With the circumstances that need us.
04/18/2016 — Flame Azalea 02 — Indian Land, South Carolina, April 5, 2016 The Tao is the way of life,
The current of life,
The flow of life.
It is how life works.
To place ourselves in accord with the Tao
Is to place ourselves in accord with the way life works.
It is to acquiesce to the way things are, to how things are. This is not a culturally imposed order.
“The way things are”
Has been used to justify and keep in place
Every injustice and discriminatory practice through out the ages.
When Jesus said,
“In as much as you have done injustice
to the least of my brothers and sisters,
you have done it unto me—
And in as much as you have not done justice
to the least of my brothers and sisters,
you have not done it unto me,”
He was talking about the poor and outcast in Israel,
And about the Samaritans and Syrians and Phoneticians,
And all those who would have been unwelcome
In the Temple and synagogues of his day.
Who would you think “the least of my brothers and sisters”
Might be today?
Who is more least than the LGBT community?
To deny them basic human rights
Because “that’s the way things are,”
Is to ignore the fact that the way things actually are
Is for a certain percentage of the population
To be LGBT in every country in every age.
LGBT is a fact that everybody else
Needs to be putting themselves in accord with.
To be out of accord with that fact
Is to be out of accord with Tao,
And you do not want to be out of accord with Tao.
Tao does not like it when people are out of accord with Tao.
And when Tao is not happy, nobody is happy.
Just ask Lao Tzu.
04/19/2016 — Dwarf Crested Iris 01 — Chestnut Trail, McDowell Nature Center & Preserve, Chestnut Trail, Mecklenburg County Parks & Recreation, Charlotte, NC, April 13,, 2016 Being on our own side
Means doing what is hard,
Straight up
And bearing the pain
Because it is important
That the thing be done,
And it is important
For you to do it,
And you know it
Without knowing why
Or being able to explain it
To anyone’s satisfaction.
It means living your life
The way you know it needs to be lived
In spite of what anyone else thinks—
In spite of what everyone else thinks.
It means knowing that YOU
Are the Foundation Stone
Of your own life.
What you say goes
Where you are concerned.
You say what your business is
And what it is not.
You say what you need to do
And what you do not need to do.
You consult with yourself
Before making any decision,
Taking any action,
And decide for yourself what you will do.
It means you are sovereign over your own life.
It means you seek no one’s permission or approval
For thinking what you think,
Feeling what you feel,
Knowing what you know,
And doing what you do.
If someone else has the keys to your life,
Take them back.
Be you.
04/19/2016 — Creekside Trail 2016 01 Panorama — McDowell Nature Center & Preserve, Chestnut Trail, Mecklenburg County Parks & Recreation, Charlotte, NC, April 16, 2016 Our authority is grounded in our identity.
When we KNOW who we are
And what we will do,
And not do,
Because our doing,
And not doing,
Express, exhibit, reflect
Who we are,
We are the authority
Who is solely responsible for
Determining the direction and flow
Of the life we live.
WE are the ones who say so
About all matters pertaining to us and our life.
Our yes is YES!
Our no is NO!
Because WE say so!
There can be no ambivalence or equivocation
About what we LOVE.
The hammock and I are one—
I don’t care what you or anyone thinks about hammocks.
I know what I think,
And cannot be moved.
That is the way it is with us
Across the board
When we know what is true for us.
When we know who we are
And who we are not.
04/19/2016 — Campbell’s Nursery 09 – Charlotte, North Carolina, March 3, 2016 There are Christians–
Not just a few–
Who take it on faith that God is a fact
And that the Bible is the literal Word of God,
And that all of Christian doctrine and theology are also facts,
And who deride and denounce evolution
Because it is just “a theory,”
Unproven and unproveable. Why take it on faith that God, the Bible, the Doctrines and the theology are all facts,
And not something else instead?
If you are going to take it on faith that God, etc., are facts,
Why not take it on faith that evolution is a fact?
Why take one set of facts on faith and reject the others?
And how, exactly, is taking something on faith–
Anything–
Different from making up something about the thing
And saying we are taking it on faith
That what we just made up
Is a fact?
How is taking something on faith different
From pretending that we are not pretending?
How is it different from kidding ourselves
About kidding ourselves?
04/20/2016 — Perfoliate Bellwort 2016 01 — Chestnut Trail, McDowell Nature Center & Preserve, Chestnut Trail, Mecklenburg County Parks & Recreation, Charlotte, NC, April 16, 2016 What we need
Is a place where we can hear ourselves think.
Silence or a sounding board—
Both work equally well,
And work best in concert with the other.
A good therapist is a sounding board,
And the work we do in the silence between sessions
Makes all the difference.
Silence is for reflecting and forming new realizations.
A sounding board is for articulating our finds
And making necessary adjustments
In our procedures and conclusions.
We develop our spiritual side
(That would be our apprehension of
The unconscious reality
That is the ground and source
Of life and being)
Only with the proper mix of
Silence and sounding boards.
How much of either do you have in your life?
04/20/2016 — House Finch 2016 01 — Male House Finch, Charlotte, NC, April 20, 2016 The religions of the world
Are killing the world.
Religious wars (And what war is not religious on some level?)
Have no goal in mind
Beyond the eradication
Of all those not like us,
Which is, of course, ridiculous,
But when has religion ever been rational?
So here we are.
Now what?
04/20/2016 — Goodale 2015 45/46 Panorama — Goodale State Park, Camden, South Carolina, November 11, 2015 Be driven by your interests,
Not by your fears or desires.
Give yourself to what your love,
Regardless of the price.
Live to serve what is meaningful and important to you.
Let what calls your name
Direct your path
And led you into the company
Of what else calls your name.
You will not regret it.
04/20/2016 — House Finch 02 — Female, Charlotte, North Carolina, April 20, 2016 There is an intelligence at work in our life,
And our role is to place ourselves in accord with it,
And dance together throughout our days.
Two things prevent this from happening. 1) Calling the intelligence “God.”
As soon as the word “God” is even thought,
In comes instantly,
“The Father Almighty Creator of Heaven and Earth
And Jesus Christ His (sic) only Son Our Lord
Who Was Conceived by the Holy Spirit,
Born of the Virgin Mary,
Was Crucified, Dead and Buried…
And, like that, the intelligence is crowded out
by the doctrines and dogmas,
the confessions and creeds,
the decrees and encyclicals
and the entire weight of Christendom.
The intelligence is lost amid all the brouhaha and that’s that.
“Doing God’s will” replaces
“Placing ourselves in accord
with the intelligence at work in our life.”
And all is lost. 2) Thinking we can
put the intelligence to work in our behalf.
The instant we form the concept
“intelligence at work in our life,”
We leap to how to enlist it in our service,
And work it to our advantage.
“Give to Gain” is a popular idea.
“The Prayer of Jabez,”
and “The Power of Attraction” were others. We can milk an oyster shell.
We kill every good thing
by trying to get it to plow our fields
and pave our way.
If we cannot exploit something,
it is of no use to us,
and we have no interest in it. With these two “Do Not Go There’s” guarding our thoughts,
Let’s start over:
,
There is an intelligence at work in our life
And our role is to place ourselves in accord with it,
And dance together throughout our days. The intelligence at work in our life
Is with us to bring us forth in our life
So that we might know what we are capable of
And assist the intelligence
In its work to bring life forth all around us
For the good of all living things. We are here to live our life—
the life that is truly our life to live—
and what we get out of it
is living our life.
04/22/2016 — McDowell Woods 01 — Four Season Trail, McDowell Nature Center & Preserve, Chestnut Trail, Mecklenburg County Parks & Recreation, Charlotte, NC, April 21, 2016 Putting ourselves in accord
With the intelligence at work in our life
Is a matter of seeing,
hearing,
understanding,
knowing,
doing/being. It is a matter of getting ourselves out of the way
And being mindfully, compassionately, non-judgmentally
Aware of each situation as it arises—
Knowing all that can be known about it
And what is going on
Within us and around us. The practice of mindfulness
(Check out Jon Kabat-Zinn’s You Tube Videos)
Is the foundation
Of seeing, hearing, understanding, knowing, doing/being,
And the doorway to
A future worth having
For all living things.
04/22/2016 — Catesby’s Trillium 2016 02 — Chestnut Trail, McDowell Nature Center & Preserve, Chestnut Trail, Mecklenburg County Parks & Recreation, Charlotte, NC, April 21, 2016 There are our options and our choices.
That is all we have to work with.
Our life is the result of the interplay of options and choices.
That being the case, you might think we would be more conscious
Of each—
That we would take the time to wake up,
realize,
reflect on,
explore,
examine,
imagine,
intuit,
inspect,
consider
What is happening and what needs to be done about it
In each situation as it arises,
Rather than react without thinking
To the things that come our way. The intelligence at work in our life
Needs some intelligence to work with
For things to be as good as they can be.
Our life is waiting for us to live mindfully,
And we are acting like that is asking too much.
04/22/2016 — Campbell’s Nursery 2016 13 — Charlotte, NC, March 3, 2016 The intelligence at work in our life
Goes by different names, among them:
Grace,
Synchronicity,
Chance,
Luck,
Magic,
Mystery,
Tao,
Way,
.. The intelligence at work in our life
Is the thread leading from the beginning to here, now, and beyond.
The wonder is the way all the disparate parts—
The wrong turns,
False starts,
Dead ends,
Wins and losses,
Triumphs and defeats,
Glory and shame,
All came together
As though some
Invisible hand were writing the script,
Directing the performance,
Producing us,
Often against our will,
And generally without our cooperation.
04/23/2016 — Azalea Blossoms 2016 02 — Indian Land, South Carolina, April 1, 2016 Our art is our life.
We are all learning to be artists.
Our particular mode, or modality, or way of doing art
Lies dormant and innate within,
Waiting to be discovered and expressed.
Our art will lead us to it
If we wait,
Playfully, respectfully, confidently, securely
In the silence,
Wondering what we are doing there
And why it’s taking so long.
The waiting is one of the tests. There are tests all along the way.
Do we have what it takes is always the question.
We need to gather in small groups
As seekers seeking
To be encouraged and sustained
By the presence of those who are like us
With more questions than answers,
And more need of faith than faith. Faith in ourselves.
Faith in the journey, in the quest, in the search, the seeking.
Faith in the art—OUR art.
Faith in the silence.
The silence is awful,
And filled with the grace and wonder of being.
We meet the monsters in the silence. Dread.
Anxiety.
Guilt.
Shame.
Depression…
The minute we are quiet,
There IT is.
Paranoia.
Delusions,
obsessions,
compulsions,
impulses…
And desire.
Fantasies,
and a different variety of
Delusions,
obsessions,
compulsions,
impulses… It’s no wonder we avoid silence,
And turn up the volume on our life
In order to stay sane.
But it isn’t sanity, it’s denial.
Silence is truth in waiting.
It all settles out in the silence,
And there is clarity,
Enlightenment.
Realization.
Life. Ask the Buddha.
He waited past the monsters
And found the treasure.
As with the Buddha,
So with us all.
Silence is the threshold, the doorway,
To our art.
We are led all the way,
Waiting, listening, looking,
Alive at last.
If we live that long.
04/23/2016 — Squaw Root 2016 01 — Canal Trail, Landsford Canal State Park, Chester County, South Carolina, April 8, 2016 I would like it if we could talk things over,
Being mindfully present with one another.
All others.
Understanding with compassion how things are
From the other’s point of view.
And caring about the other’s well-being
As much as we care about our own.
If some genie ever gives me three wishes,
That’s the first one.
Used in Short Talks on Good and Bad Religion — 04/24/2016 — Yellow Wood Sorrel 2016 01 — Chestnut Trail, McDowell Nature Center & Preserve, Chestnut Trail, Mecklenburg County Parks & Recreation, Charlotte, NC, April 21, 2016 Any time we make an approach to truth—
the truth of our experience, of the way things are—
THE way to truth,
we block the way to truth.
There is no sacrosanct formula,
doctrine, There is only seeing how things are now
and what needs to be done about them,
in response to them. Any path that becomes THE path
becomes a worn path,
becomes a rut,
becomes a narrow way of thinking,
perceiving,
experiencing,
and cuts us off from the fullness of our experience,
and keeps us from seeing
how things are and also are
in the moment-to-moment encounter
with each situation as it arises. The work is always to see—
and respond appropriately to—
how things are now,
no now,
no now…
No religion can help us with that work.
We are on our own there.
Mindfulness is our responsibility
In every instant of our life.
We are always getting to the bottom of things
And deciding how to respond
in ways that are fitting to the occasion
in every occasion.
The work of a true human being
is spontaneously being
what the situation calls for
out of the gifts that are ours
to give in each situation as it arises.
04/24/2016 — Jack In The Pulpit 2016 01 Panorama — Indian Land, South Carolina, April 23, 2016 One of the leading causes of depression
Is living an inauthentic life.
That is a life that is not you.
That doesn’t have enough room in it for you.
That doesn’t have enough places
for your soul to breathe. If there is space in your life
for your soul to come to life,
Depression will not likely be
one of your chief problems. How much soul-space is there in your life?
How much of Y-O-U shines through
each day in the life you live?
If you were to give your soul
what it needs tomorrow,
What would it be? What are the chances of you doing that,
If not tomorrow, one day this week?
This month?
Too many of us are owned
by too many things
That are not things our soul enjoys.
We have to work our soul
back into our life.
We have to give our soul
room to breathe.
We have to bring ourselves to life in our life. That is your mission—
Bringing your soul, yourself,
to life in your life.
How can you begin to do that
in what is left of today?
Tomorrow? The rest of your life will be lighter,
and brighter, and more fun
When you devote some time
to playing with your soul,
And doing what your soul loves.
Live to close the gap between
you and authenticity.
Your soul told me to say that.
04/25/2016 — Bluet 2016 02 — Chestnut Trail, McDowell Nature Center & Preserve, Chestnut Trail, Mecklenburg County Parks & Recreation, Charlotte, NC, April 21, 2016 Two leading causes of depression
are hopelessness and futility,
The realization that nothing we do matters.
Rational minds can look at the same set of facts
And make different interpretations,
Draw different conclusions. Here’s the deal with hopelessness and futility:
We look at them and say “Nothing we do matters!”
As though it matters that nothing we do matters.
But if that matters, then it is possible
that something else matters,
Like getting the dog to the Vet
And changing the baby’s diapers, Here is the grounding realization:
“It is all hopeless, pointless, useless, futile, absurd,
And coming to a very bad, inevitable, end—
AND how we live in the meantime makes all the difference!”
A cup of cool water to a dying person
Is not absurd.
It is the essence of kindness and compassion. To spit on the dying person and turn away,
Refusing to offer the cup of cool water,
And ourselves as a caring, consoling presence
At the time of death,
Would the the height of obscenity, cruelty and inhumanity. The humane thing—
The human thing—
Is to live in the worst life can do
As lights in the darkness,
As agents of love,
kindness,
gentleness,
graciousness,
generosity,
beauty,
decency,
benevolence,
mercy,
warmth
and oneness-of-being
With those who suffer too much
the absence of those things,
And sets us apart from the inhumane and the inhuman. So it comes down to this:
How will we live in this present situation?
Will we be a source of light and life,
Or a source of darkness and death?
It is our call to make in every situation,
And our choice makes all the difference.

04/25/2016 — Canal Trail 2016 01 — Landsford Canal State Park, Chester County, South Carolina, April 8, 2016

Here is my poem, “The Jailer,” from my book, “I Call This Poetry”:

Saying “YES!” to the way things are,
And working with them
To see what we can do with them
In the time left for living,
Transforms everything,
And opens us to possibilities
We never knew existed.

This is the “transcendent function” (Carl Jung)
Of imagination coming to life in our life,
And the power of Perspective Shifts
To move mountains
And to create doorways
In the walls
Boxing us in.

We all are magicians in this way.
We all are the magic wand we wish we had.

Waiting for the jailer to let us out,
We become the jailer keeping us in,
Holding the key,
Wishing we had a key.

04/25/2016 — Hammock Selfie — The point not to be missed here is that my feet are above the level of my heart. As we age, it is a good idea to give our heart a break,
and use gravity to help with circulation.
Poor circulation can result in swelling in ankles and knees,
painful joints and difficulties with balance and walking.
Hammocks to the rescue! There is not a more comfortable and relaxing way
to keep one’s feet higher than the level of one’s heart—
and it remains one of the unsold features of hammock life. Plop down,
lean back,
and let gravity do the work
of reducing swelling and easing pain.
And if you don’t have a problem
with swelling and pain,
a preventive program of hammock lying
will keep you happy for long years
into the far distant future. Nobody is paying me to say these things.
04/25/2016 — Goodale 2015 47 Panorama — Goodale State Park, Camden, South Carolina, November 11, 2015 The only thing wrong with us
Is that we lack the courage of our convictions.
What ARE our convictions?
We have opinions.
A few preferences.
We believe in the importance
of having the advantages,
But we will surrender
just about everything
in order to have them. We want to be where we are better off,
And that could be anywhere,
So we have to keep our options open
And be ready to change course with the wind,
The tide,
The current,
The flow… We have to go sit down somewhere
And wait for clarity about what is important.
We have to know where we stand
And stand there,
Grounded on the Foundation Stone
Of our own identity:
Who we are and what matters to us.
And live out of that “still point of the turning world”
For the rest of time
And on through all eternity.
04/26/2016 — Atamasco Lily 01 — Landsford Canal State Park, Chester County, South Carolina, April 8, 2016 Silence is wasted on people
who lack the capacity for self-reflection.
Who never question anything.
Examine anything.
Work to get to the bottom of anything.
Leave everything exactly as it is.
Think what they assume is so is so.
Do what they are told.
Think what has always been thought.
Repeat what has always been said.
Keep things exactly as they have always been.
Never making waves,
Or rocking boats,
Or turning over any apple carts.
Or taking full responsibility for their own life,
And living it.
Used in Short Talks on Good and Bad Religion — 04/26/2016 — Bloodroot 2016 04 — Chestnut Trail, McDowell Nature Center & Preserve, Chestnut Trail, Mecklenburg County Parks & Recreation, Charlotte, NC, March 28, 2016 There is an intelligence at work in our life,
Which we sense by realizing that we
Know more than we know we know,
And then it’s gone in trying to know more than we can know. We flirt with the limits along the edge of consciousness,
Intuition and instinct feel but do not say,
And we are left with knowing there is more than we know. The test is whether we will put ourselves in its service,
In the service of that which we do not know. Good religion says the service itself is life.
Bad religion sees the service as a way of bartering
For a better life—
Either in this world or the world to come,
Or both.
Give to get or to gain is the essence of bad religion. Good religion says
Live to give yourself in the service of what, you do not know,
And let that be that.
There is an intelligence at work in our life.
How we choose to live in relationship with it
Tells the tale.
04/27/2016 — McDowell Barred Owl 05 Detail 02 — McDowell Nature Center & Preserve, Chestnut Trail, Mecklenburg County Parks & Recreation, Charlotte, NC, March 24, 2016 When we know that we don’t know
Even a slight percentage
Of all there is to know,
And open ourselves to possibilities
Beyond imagining—
Not to exploit the unknown,
But to serve it—
Strange things happen. Sheldon Kopp said,
“Some things can be experienced,
But not understood.
And some things can be understood,
But not explained.” We live in a swirling universe
Of psychic reality
Waiting to be experienced, but not understood,
Understood, but not explained—
Needing our collaboration
To transform the universe of physical reality. But we don’t have any use
For anything we can’t use
To our perceived advantage.
And that is the kink in the hose.
04/27/2016 — The Outing — An old fave from the Bog Garden Collection, Greensboro, NC, March 17, 2014 I am amazed at how easily I am knocked off center. Distractions abound,
From within and without,
And I am looping through countless scenarios
Before I catch myself in the act of wandering
Through another wilderness of my own making,
And bring myself back to the center. I assume that as it is with me,
So it is with you,
And I find this propensity of ours
For aimlessly wandering far from the Foundation Stone
To be the primary purpose for meditation. Meditation seats us at the center
(Or, if your Zazen cushion is a hammock,
Lays us at the center),
And reminds us where we come from
And where we belong. My hammock is my anchor,
My touchstone
Connecting me to the source, the heart, the ground of me.
I am at one with me in the hammock.
There is nothing there to take me away from me.
There, even when my thoughts stray,
They always have something to say to me about me.
Noting that, I remember it
When I am not hammock sitting/lying,
And see what the wandering mind
Has to say to me about me
In my present here and now,
And am grounded there
In the moment of my drifting away. A meditative practice is the path to the center and ground
Of our being,
And makes the way back
An enlightening journey with our companion Self.
04/28/2016 — Fleabane Daisy 2016 01 — Chestnut Trail, McDowell Nature Center & Preserve, Chestnut Trail, Mecklenburg County Parks & Recreation, Charlotte, NC, April 17, 2016 Jesus in the wilderness,
The Buddha under the Bo Tree,
Carl Jung at Bollingen,
Me in my hammock,
You wherever you are
when you are quiet and alone and aware… We have to knowingly, mindfully, with non-judgmental compassion
Face the truth of our life,
The truth of who we are and how it is, and also is, with us. We have to know who we are
Past all the diversions and distractions
and titillating,
interesting,
tempting,
attractive,
fearsome We have to know what is important to us,
What matters most to us,
What is central to us—
Not because we like it,
or desire it,
But because it is central to us. We have to know what grounds us,
Supports us, establishes us,
And is our Bedrock.
What is it that is immovable and unchangeable about us?
What is the eternal and everlasting truth of who we are? I look out the window a lot.
What am I doing when I look out the window?
I am being who I am.
Living with integrity is living in ways which honor who I am—
Which express, exhibit and serve who I am. Jesus in the wilderness,
The Buddha under the Bo Tree,
Carl Jung at Bollingen,
Me in my hammock,
You wherever you are when you are quiet and alone and aware. Finding ourselves,
Knowing ourselves,
Being ourselves.
Nobody can do it for us.
It is ours to do alone.
Know what your hammock is.
Go there often.
04/28/2016 — Phlox 2016 01 — Four Seasons Trail, McDowell Nature Center & Preserve, Chestnut Trail, Mecklenburg County Parks & Recreation, Charlotte, NC, April 21, 2016 I hold it to be entirely likely
that the intelligence at work in our life
Is the full component of knowledge we don’t know we know—
and the knowledge we do not know,
and will never know.
We call the body of knowledge we are unconscious of
“The Unconscious.”
Another term for it is “Psyche,” or “Soul.”
We live in at least two worlds—two different realities—simultaneously,
Aware, to some extent, of one,
Oblivious to the presence of the other. The other will not be ignored,
And keeps breaking into our conscious life
With insights,
revelation,
enlightenment,
“holy nudges,”
brainstorms…
All credited to the gods and the muses,
All belonging to the psychic world of unconscious reality. Our work is to know what we know.
But.
We want to get ahead,
Sock it away,
Retire early
And enjoy our accumulated wealth and boundless privilege
Until we die. We live at crosspurposes with ourselves.
And pay the price.
04/29/2016 — Solomon’s Seal 2016 01 — Four Seasons Trail, McDowell Nature Center & Preserve, Chestnut Trail, Mecklenburg County Parks & Recreation, Charlotte, NC, April 28, 2016 How long can you sit quietly—
Not reading,
not listening to music,
not watching TV,
not doing anything but sitting quietly? Work to extend the duration
and increase the frequency.
And devote yourself to the task
Of becoming mindfully,
non-judgmentally,
compassionately aware
Of what goes on in the silence—
Of thoughts and feelings, moods and memories… Become interested in what happens in the silence,
Letting things come and go as they will,
Observing it all without judgment or opinion,
Watching patterns develop,
Seeing themes being played out,
Curious and interested about it all.
04/29/2016 — Cedar Tree 2016 01 Panorama — Four Seasons Trail, McDowell Nature Center & Preserve, Chestnut Trail, Mecklenburg County Parks & Recreation, Charlotte, NC, April 28, 2016 Silence is the source of all things.
Reflection on our life experience
leads to new realizations.
We cannot just experience silence—
We have to reflect on our experience of silence.
In silence. Out of that reflection,
Introspection,
Examination,
Imagination,
Contemplation,
Exploration
Comes all we need to meet our life straight up,
And gather more experience
To take with us
Back into the silence.
Used in Short Talks on Good and Bad Religion — 04/29/2016 — Goodale 2015 49 — Goodale Sate Park, Camden, South Carolina, November 11, 2015 Good religion is absolutely essential
in the work to be who we are.
Good religion speaks
the language of Psyche, of Soul,
And is a treasure trove of “symbols of transformation”
(Carl Jung). Good religion grows us up
Through all of the stages of development,
Helping us to recognize the signs along the way,
And reminding us that the primary requirement
Of the Hero’s Journey
Is to see it through,
To not quit too soon,
To press on,
To persevere,
Whispering to us the words of the Greek poet Homer
Spoken from the lips 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.” Good religion is the servant of Psyche/Soul,
And is, to us, “a very present help in time of trouble.”
The trouble is
Good religion is hard to find.
04/30/2016 — Great Solomon’s Seal 2016 01 — Four Seasons Trail, McDowell Nature Center & Preserve, Chestnut Trail, Mecklenburg County Parks & Recreation, Charlotte, NC, April 28, 2016 We are born into a family and into a culture
That tells us who we are,
And who we are to be,
And how we are to live our life. Growing up means growing up into
Our own idea of who we are,
And who we are to be,
And how we are to live our life. We cannot do it—
Grow up—
Without mindful awareness
(Which implies compassion
And non-judgmental acceptance)
Of ourselves,
Our context and circumstances. It starts with seeing how things are
On all levels—
And we cannot see what we cannot accept
As being the way it is.
“This is the way things are,
And this is what needs to be done about it,
And this is what I can do
With the gifts and resources at my disposal.” Then it is only a matter
Of doing our work
And letting things fall into place,
However they will,
Around that.
Used in Short Talks on Good and Bad Religion — 04/30/2016 — McDowell Barred Owl 2016 06 Detail — McDowell Nature Center & Preserve, Chestnut Trail, Mecklenburg County Parks & Recreation, Charlotte, NC, March 24, 2016 Good religion is religion without theology and doctrine. Good religion is Zen without the Buddhist or Taoist trappings. Good religion is our experience of this here, this now,
And our sense of what is happening,
And what needs to happen,
And what needs to be done about it
With the gifts and resources at our disposal,
And our ability to know what we know
On all levels,
Which implies living transparent to ourselves
And open to possibilities we cannot imagine,
Trusting ourselves to ourselves,
And allowing the path to open before us
As we start walking. Good religion helps us interpret our experience
In light of the shared experiences
Of the species
Through the symbols, parables and metaphors
That have been doorways to transcendence
Through the ages
And connect us with truth
At the core of who we are,
Enabling us to live out of—
And grounded upon—
The Foundation Stone
Of our essential identity,
And be at-one with ourselves
In each situation as it arises
Throughout our life.
05/01/2016 — Pitcher Plants 2016 01 Panorama — Goodale State Park, Camden, South Carolina, April 30, 2016 The price of being alive
Is the work of articulation. Saying is seeing.
We cannot see what we do not say. Our world expands
As our vocabulary increases.
Unless we say the same old same old forever,
but who needs a larger vocabulary
to say the same old things? The struggle to say what we see,
And what it means
Is the work of being human.
And the work is never done. We want to be finished with it,
And sit by the sea
Drinking beer.
So, we nail down our meanings
And refuse to let them evolve,
Shift,
Change…
And, like that,
We die,
by the sea,
with a beer in hand. We hate it when our meanings become obsolete
And new meanings try to replace them.
WE WANT TO KEEP THINGS AS THEY ARE FOREVER!!!
No gay marriages!
No transgender rights!
No nothing that isn’t like it was in the Good Old Days
When everything was exactly what it was supposed to be! We haven’t allowed a new idea about God
Into the Book of Christian Doctrine
In 2,000 years.
The wind that blows where it will
Becomes “infinite, eternal, and unchangeable,”
And that’s all we need to say about that. In the work to say better what has been said,
We see more than has been seen
And begin to say things that have never been said.
New realizations lead to new reflections
lead to new experiences lead to new realizations…
And nothing is as it was,
And who knows where it will go. That is the Hero’s Journey—
The great adventure of being alive!
If we are up for it,
05/02/2016 — McDowell Barred Owl 2016 06 Detail 02 — McDowell Nature Center & Preserve, Chestnut Trail, Mecklenburg County Parks & Recreation, Charlotte, NC, March 24, 2016 We live out of the silence. We know what to do when we do nothing
But sit with what is before us
And wait for the action to happen through us
In response to what needs us to do it. We don’t think anything up.
We consider all that is to be considered—
We see the full context of our present situation—
And wait quietly
To see what we will do. This is trusting ourselves to
More than we know we know. You will likely never hear anything about it
Other than here,
So maybe you should read this again.
05/02/2016 — Foam Flower 2016 02 — Creekside Trail, McDowell Nature Center & Preserve, Chestnut Trail, Mecklenburg County Parks & Recreation, Charlotte, NC, April 24, 2016 No one can tell us what is right for us.
We have to figure that out for ourselves.
We have to know what is good for us,
Important to us,
Meaningful to us—
And live in ways which serve
What is right,
What is good,
What is important,
What is meaningful,
To us
All our life long. Sounds easy enough, Fooling ourselves is what we do best.
No! Tricking 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.
No! Being our own worst enemy is what we do best.
And so,
We have to take up the life-long work
Of being transparent to ourselves,
So that we know what we know
And live with both eyes on us at all times.
Because conning ourselves is what we do best.
05/04/2016 — Wild Parsnip 2016 01 — Chestnut Trail, McDowell Nature Center & Preserve, Chestnut Trail, Mecklenburg County Parks & Recreation, Charlotte, NC, April 24, 2016 If you cannot be vulnerable
You will never be safe. Safety is the untouchable place of refuge
Amid the din of ravenous threats
And dreadful possibilities. It is the confidence of one who knows
That she, that he, stands grounded in the center
Of who she, of who he, is
And cannot be moved by the worst that can happen. “I am fine and will be fine no matter what.”
The worst that I can imagine
Would be Auschwitz,
Knowing full well what’s what
And what your chances are.
Live that out in your mind,
Your last ten days or two weeks,
Walking in the line to the ovens
Or packed into the truck that will take you to the ovens. Direct that scene as though it were a movie.
How would you have you walk that final 3/4 mile?
What would you exude by your demeanor?
How would play your role?
I would have me do it with the attitude of, “You can kill me in the most horrendous possible way,
But you can’t touch a hair on my head.”
My role is to live my life from this vantage point
Throughout what remains of it to be lived.
05/03/2016 — Goodale 2015 50 — Goodale State Park, Camden, South Carolina, November 11, 2015 The Hero’s Journey
Consists of squaring up with the divisions within,
Reconciling our opposites,
Integrating our polarities
Making peace
Becoming whole. We are at war with ourselves,
And want nothing to do with the life that is ours to live,
Preferring instead
Any of the lives we wish we were living. Begin there
With the work to reconcile,
Integrate,
Make peace,
Become whole.
05/03/2016 — One of my faves from my Roan Mountain Flickr Album: “Golden Ragwort Panorama” We like to think we are the Captains of Our Ship
And the Masters of our Destiny,
And love to say,
“It’s MY life and I can do what I want to with it!” The unrelenting truth is that
We have to get out of the way
And let our life live us. Living well
Is mastering the art
Of allowing our life
To direct our living. Sound like something a bull would leave behind?
Keep living.
It will make more sense in 10 years,
And, you will be a firm believer in 25.
05/04/2016 — Catesby’s Trillium 2016 03 — Chestnut Trail, McDowell Nature Center & Preserve, Chestnut Trail, Mecklenburg County Parks & Recreation, Charlotte, NC, April 24, 2016 My hammock hangs on the edge of the Deep Woods
(“Deep” is metaphorical, not actual, literal,
And is as true as any fact has ever been),
And, in my hammock, I realize that in the Deep Woods
Yesterday is the same as tomorrow. The Deep Woods is/are as timeless as all eternity.
It is never anything other than Now in the Deep Woods
Now it is sunny, Now it is dark, Now it is raining…
No plans exist in the Deep Woods
No disappointment, fear, depression, excitement, anticipation, etc.
Ever come to life there. Life just IS there,
And then, it IS NOT.
The Deep Woods know(s),
But it (they) does (do) not know
That it (etc.) knows.
Yet, it (etc.) responds appropriately to what it (etc.) knows,
And lives in full accord with what needs to happen
In each situation that arises,
Without interfering with that,
Or imposing its (etc.) on it,
Or wrestling with the way things are in the moment. Consciousness imposes a complexity upon things
That did not exist before consciousness.
Consciousness implies the possibility
Of bringing into effect our ideas for the world upon the world. Wisdom knows when to step in and when to step back.
Consciousness without wisdom
Is not an improvement on the way of things in the Deep Woods.
Used in Short Talks on Good and Bad Religion — 05/04/2016 — Chestnut Trail 2016 01 — McDowell Nature Center & Preserve, Chestnut Trail, Mecklenburg County Parks & Recreation, Charlotte, NC, March 24, 2016 Everybody’s religion is so because they say it is so.
Everybody’s religion is grounded upon what they say is so.
It is so because we say it is. Taking something, anything, “on faith” is saying
It is so because we say it is so,
We believe it to be so,
We are sure it is so.
We either affirm what someone else tells us is so,
Saying it is so for us, too,
Or we make it up for ourselves.
Either way, it is so ultimately because we say so.
We are the authority behind our own faith.
We believe what we believe
Because we believe it is true,
And therefore worth believing. The validity of all religion is self-evident to its adherents.
They believe it because they think it is so.
Because they KNOW it is so.
Because their experience has confirmed them in their beliefs.
Religion is true because we say it is true.
False religion is always someone else’s religion.
Religious wars are differences of opinion
About things that cannot be verified by independent observers.
05/05/2016 — Eastern Sweetshrub 2016 01 — Chestnut Trail, McDowell Nature Center & Preserve, Chestnut Trail, Mecklenburg County Parks & Recreation, Charlotte, NC, April 13, 2016 When we “marry” ourselves
And devote ourselves to the life-long task
Of becoming who we are—
Of being one with our soul(mate)—
We “forsake all others,”
And “plight Thee our troth”
to our Self.
We do not keep company
With who, and what, we are not. The Dalai Lama does not go to movies
NASCAR events or football games,
And he doesn’t eat pizza, hamburgers or hotdogs,
Attend cocktail parties or hangout in bars.
He is NOT, and does NOT, a lot of things.
He is completely who he is.
Jesus was that way. They were not in any sense “Renaissance men.”
They did not pretend to do all things well.
They did what mattered to them,
Was important and meaningful to them,
And let the rest go. Letting things go can be as difficult
As devoting ourselves to the things that are essential to us,
And as important.
We are known by what we do
And by what we do not. How much of what you do today
Will be YOU
And how much will be NOT YOU?
How much of the NOT YOU can you get by with not doing?
Used in Short Talks On Contradiction, etc., 05/06/2016 — McDowell Barred Owl 07 Detail — McDowell Nature Center & Preserve, Chestnut Trail, Mecklenburg County Parks & Recreation, Charlotte, NC, March 24, 2016 The path is actually two, or more, paths.
The way is two, or more, ways.
We are always walking two paths at the same time,
Taking two ways at once.
Contradiction is characteristic of every path, each way.
This is true AND the opposite is also true.
I want to be the best father in all the world
AND
I don’t want to be a father at all. Compassion is the way, the path
AND
The Dalai Lama, the voice of compassion world-wide,
Has bodyguards who carry automatic weapons.
This is walking two paths at the same time. What we say and do is incompatible
With what we also say and do.
We cannot say YES to some aspect of ourselves
Without saying NO to other aspects of ourselves
And we cannot say YES to one aspect of ourselves
Without saying NO to other aspects of ourselves
Who would compassion have us ignore, dismiss, disregard?
Who is served well by the good we call good?
Who suffers from the good we call good?
All of those fine advantages we seek for ourselves and others
Are detrimental to a large number of living things.
Pluses are counter-balanced by minuses.
This cancels out that.
What do we do? Walk two paths, follow two ways, at once.
We walk this path with that one always in mind—
Aware of the contradictions
Transparent to ourselves,
Bearing the pain of our excesses and deficiencies,
And the realization of the implications our actions
Have for all sentient beings.
As we do what needs us to do it
In each situation as it arises
Anyway, nevertheless, even so.
05/07/2016 — Shagbark Hickory 2016 01 Panorama — Four Seasons Trail, McDowell Nature Center & Preserve, Chestnut Trail, Mecklenburg County Parks & Recreation, Charlotte, NC, April 24, 2016 When your life frustrates your ideas for your life,
How do you respond?
All suffering has its origin
In the discrepancy between how things are
And how we want them to be. Our “NO!” meets life’s “YES!”
And we suffer the impact of that collision.
No “NO!” no suffering.
Saying “YES!” to life
Is the end of suffering
And the beginning of LIFE. What do you think
“Thy will, not mine, be done” means?
It means that we place ourselves in accord
With the facts, the givens, the context and circumstances
Of the way things are,
And see what is being asked of us
In terms of what needs to happen here and now
In light of the truth of our situation. Our life is always asking things of us.
Each situation as it arises needs a particular response from us
In order for things to be as good as they can be
In that situation.
Our response determines the quality of life then and there.
Why hold anything back?
Pouting, whining, moaning, moping, remonstrating, floundering…? Why not give ourselves wholeheartedly
To the situation
And do all that can be done there
With the gifts and resources that are ours to share
For the good of the situation?
We can make every situation that arises
Better or worse
By the quality of our response to it.
Why go for worse?
05/07/2016 — Stream Still Life 2016 01 — Four Seasons Trail, McDowell Nature Center & Preserve, Chestnut Trail, Mecklenburg County Parks & Recreation, Charlotte, NC, April 28, 2016 I recommend living one situation at a time.
What is needed here, now?
What is happening?
What is called for?
What is being asked of me?
Offered to me?
How am I being asked
to accommodate myself to the situation?
How am I being challenged
to place myself in accord with what is going on?
How am I uniquely suited to rise to this occasion?
How might I step forth to meet what I find here? Stepping mindfully, compassionately and non-judgmentally
Into each situation as it arises,
Curious about what will happen
And how we will respond
Keeps us alert and responsive to what is needed,
And to what gifts and resources we have
That might match up with the need. This approach transforms the humdrum same old same old every day
Into the field of action and adventure,
Where we are pulled forth to become who we are.
We will look forward to tomorrow
Each time we go to bed.
05/08/2016 — Goodale 2015 51 Panorama — Goodale State Park, Camden, South Carolina, November 11, 2015 We have all we need
To do what needs us to do it
In each situation as it arises. So, what’s with the whining,
moaning,
complaining
and casting ourselves about?
What’s with the protesting and the remonstration? Stand yourself up and go do the thing!
We spend a good portion of our life—
The only life we have to live—
In a posture of “Not No Way! Not No How!”
Before a world of things
That clearly need to be done,
And clearly need us to do them. We will reduce the corporate level of pain in the world
Caused by the spillover of our own pain
Into the lives of others,
Simply by shouldering our own personal pain.
Stand up and do the thing!
And do it well—exactly as it needs to be done! We size up the situation
And do what needs to be done in response to it.
And if that is hard,
That is all it is.
It is only hard,
And we have done what is hard before,
And will do it again. It’s called “Growing Up.”
Refusing to do it keeps things as they are forever.
Doing it changes everything.
It all depends upon our growing up
In each situation as it arises.
Starting with the next one.
05/08/2016 — Wild Geranium 2015 01 — Chestnut Trail, McDowell Nature Center & Preserve, Chestnut Trail, Mecklenburg County Parks & Recreation, Charlotte, NC, April 28, 2016 Everything we do shows us
who we are at that point in our life,
and asks us:
“Is this who you intend to be?
Is this what you have in mind?
Is this the you you want to bring forth in your life?” We form and shape our identity over the course of our life
By reflecting on our actions
And modifying them,
transforming them,
adjusting
and altering them
To better express the “Me”
That is the “Me”
We would be proud to be. We grow into who we are
By being mindfully (compassionately, non-judgmentally) aware
Of what our actions say about us,
And making the changes necessary
To align and integrate our life
With the deepest, truest, values
Of the person living it.
05/08/2016 — Cross Vine 2016 03 Panorama — Four Seasons Trail, McDowell Nature Center & Preserve, Chestnut Trail, Mecklenburg County Parks & Recreation, Charlotte, NC, April 16, 2016 We have to know what our business is
And what it isn’t.
Knowing what our business is (and isn’t)
Is central to our identity.
Our business is who we are,
And we are what it is,
So that we cannot separate who we are
From what we do (and don’t do).
Our business and our identity are one,
And together they form the ground,
The foundation,
Of our life. I have my business,
And you have yours,
And when we are offering each other
“The kind of help that help is all about” (Shel Silverstein),
We are helping each other
Tend our respective business.
And when we are offering each other
“The kind of help that we all could do without” (Shel Silverstein),
We are interfering with each other’s business
And not minding our own.
05/09/2016 — Deer’s Tongue 2016 01 — Chestnut Trail, McDowell Nature Center & Preserve, Chestnut Trail, Mecklenburg County Parks & Recreation, Charlotte, NC, April 16, 2016 The Great Knowing is the origin of everything.
Nothing exists apart from it,
But everything that is distant from it
Thinks there is nothing to it,
Yet, it is the source of all that is
And will be. The Great Knowing is called many things,
But it is no sooner called “God”
Than those who call it that
Begin to put a human face on it
And think of it in human terms,
And distance themselves
from the source that is the Great Knowing. David, the shepherd,
at one with the Great Knowing,
Killed Goliath.
David, the king, distanced from the Great Knowing,
Was taken with Bathsheba. Jesus, at one with the Great Knowing,
Led people to encounters with it.
His disciples, distanced from the Great Knowing,
Led people astray. Everything depends upon
its being in accord with the Great Knowing.
But, as luck would have it,
We are, more often than not,
estranged from the Great Knowing
And it is to us as the Great Unknown.
Moving from Unknown to Knowing
Is the task of life.
How is it coming along?
05/09/2016 — Four Seasons Trail Panorama 2016 01 — Four Seasons Trail, McDowell Nature Center & Preserve, Chestnut Trail, Mecklenburg County Parks & Recreation, Charlotte, NC, March 31, 2016 The Great Knowing knows
What it is time for when.
Our place is to know what the Great Knowing knows
By placing ourselves in accord with it
And waiting, watching, looking, listening
Until we see, hear and understand. All of the ancient peoples knew this
And lived aligned with the fullness of time,
doing what was called for
when it was called for. What is it time for in each situation as it arises?
What is being called for?
What is crying out to be seen, acknowledged, said, asked, done?
Those who live in accord with the Great Knowing
Do things without knowing why,
And the things that are done
are exactly what needs to be done. How do they know?
They are at one with the Great Knowing.
How do we achieve oneness with the Great Knowing?
Cultivate humility and compassion.
Know that you don’t know 1% of all there is to know.
Sit quietly regularly,
Waiting, watching, looking, listening. When you are not sitting,
Develop your ability to be mindfully aware
of the time and place of your living.
Recognize urgencies arising on their own,
Calling you to comply,
Inspiring you to action.
Live looking forward
To what you will find yourself doing.
05/10/2016 — Chickweed 2016 01 — Chestnut Trail, McDowell Nature Center & Preserve, Chestnut Trail, Mecklenburg County Parks & Recreation, Charlotte, NC, March 24, 2016 We spend too much time
Seeking consolation and compensation,
And too little time
Seeking what is being asked of us,
And doing what needs us to do it. Recovery is preparation.
Nothing is going to be made up to us.
Our losses are our losses.
We have to grieve what is to be grieved,
Mourn what is to be mourned,
And get ready for the next round. Life isn’t waiting for us to feel like doing it.
Isn’t standing around until we give it the signal.
We have to pick ourselves up
And put ourselves in accord with the here and now
Of each situation as it arises.
Shake it off.
Stand tall.
It is already now
05/10/2016 — Zen Glen 04 — Indian Land, South Carolina, May 10, 2016 Why be anywhere else?
The sin of hubris is living beyond ourselves,
Over-reaching ourselves,
Not knowing when or where to stop.
This is my stopping place:
No public appearances.
No speaking engagements.
No social activities.
No civic responsibilities.
No business transactions.
No TV. Get the idea?
Retirement is a hammock for Zazen
And reflection,
A camera for exercise as I look for a photograph,
And a computer to connect with the world. I’ve created my own monastic order
With my own Rules of the Day.
It’s easier to pull off when you are retired,
But anyone could carve out a space for themselves
In a week, or in a month.
It all starts with making room for yourself in your life.
Used in Short Talks on Good and Bad Religion — 05/11/2016 — McDowell Barred Owl 07 Detail B — McDowell Nature Center & Preserve, Chestnut Trail, Mecklenburg County Parks & Recreation, Charlotte, NC, March 24, 2016 At the heart level,
Practitioners of Zen,
Buddhism and Taoism
know the same thing:
What’s what.
The further we get away from what’s what
Into the why, and how, and when, and where, and who—
That is to say,
The further we get away from the raw experience
Of the situation as it arises,
And what is happening there,
And what needs to happen in response,
In light of the true good of the situation as a whole,
Out of the gifts and resources available to us individually,
Regardless of the implications for us personally—
And the further we get into doctrine, theology and ideology—
The further we get from the level of our heart and bones and stomach,
The further we get into head stuff, mental stuff, rational, logical stuff,
And the more we become automatons,
robots,
androids,
a face in the crowd,
a member of the masses,
lost to our Self,
with no idea of who we are
and what matters most
in any situation as it arises. Bad religion alienates us from ourselves
And makes us a digital reproduction of everyone else
Standing as one,
Reciting the creeds of the bad religion.
05/11/2016 — Foam Flower 2016 03 — Four Seasons Trail, McDowell Nature Center & Preserve, Chestnut Trail, Mecklenburg County Parks & Recreation, Charlotte, NC, April 16, 2016 What is truest for you?
Not in terms of what your head knows,
Or thinks it knows,
But in terms of what your heart
And hands
And body
Know? What are you built for?
Where do you belong?
What is the nature of the drift of your soul.
What are you inclined toward?
Away from?
Where do you have no business being?
What do you know that you don’t know that you know?
What do you know that you know you know and dismiss,
Discount,
Ignore,
Reject?
The work of resurrection,
Of salvation,
Of deliverance,
Is the work of knowing these things. The work of the Hero’s Journey,
The Spiritual Path,
The way back to Eden,
Is the work of healing the division within,
Recognizing our alienation from ourselves—
From our Self—
And living to close the breach,
And live aligned with heart/soul/Self,
In collaboration with,
In full accord with,
The foundational truth
At the ground of our being:
Who we are and are to be
In the time left for living.
05/11/2016 — Zen Glen 2016 02 Panorama — Indian Land, South Carolina, May 10, 2016 In my hammock in the glen
Comes true the word
Wendell Berry speaks
In “The Peace of Wild Things”: “If your heart is fearful,
Or your spirit crushed,
And your hope is at a low ebb,
Seek out some natural corner
And sit there
Until the stillness
Drowns out the depressing
din of civilization,
And you rest there,
Finally,
In the gift freely given
To those who come seeking,
Desperately needing solace,
Revitalization,
And the courage to go on.”
05/12/2016 — Goodale 2015 52 — Goodale State Park, Camden, South Carolina, November 11, 2015 We need to step back more often.
From the things that drive us,
Like fear and desire. Fear and desire are problems
Only when they consume us. At a safe working distance,
They inform us—
Warn us of our ever-present tendency
To “leave the way, get off the path”
And wander amid the things
That pretend to matter,
But only lead us further away
From the things that do. Fear and desire remind us
To recommit ourselves
In the service of what matters most,
And remain faithful to the cause
Of being grounded and centered
In the work of living aligned with that
Which is integral to us—
No matter what version of the Cyclops or Sirens
Stands before us at the moment.
05/12/2016 — McDowell Barred Owl 2016 11 — Cove Trail, McDowell Nature Center & Preserve, Chestnut Trail, Mecklenburg County Parks & Recreation, Charlotte, NC, May 12, 2016 You can’t give yourself to the 10,000 things
And have anything left for the important things
When they come along. How do you know what is important?
Spend large amounts of time
Paying attention to yourself. You know what is meaningful and important.
You only have to know what you know—
And refuse to be swept along in the crowd
That is going everywhere,
Doing everything. Say “No.”
Even to yourself.
So that you can say “Yes,” to yourself
When “Yes” needs to be said.
Used in Short Talks On Politics, 05/13/2016 — Pitcher Plants 2016 04 Panorama — Goodale State Park, Camden, South Carolina, April 30, 2016 Bigotry is unacceptable.
Discrimination/oppression has no place among us.
Inequality,
favoritism,
injustice,
cruelty,
brutality,
..
No, No, No, NO! Political INcorrectness has become acceptable
To a growing percentage of high ranking public officials,
Encouraging the unranked masses
To flaunt their contempt of laws protecting the rights of all people
And declare,
“If a law threatens my religious liberty, I don’t have to obey it.” This is anarchy,
And beyond appalling. The declaration,
“Your religious liberty ends where my constitutional rights begin,”
Needs to be affirmed and reaffirmed by every elected official
In every state in the United States. Every official taking office
takes an oath promising to uphold
and obey the laws of the land.
And too many of them
are making laws which void laws
They hold to be distasteful—
Because the laws in question protect the rights of people
The legislators do not like. The trend will continue and grow stronger
As long as people who could vote
for office seekers of a different mind-set refuse to vote.
The people elect the people who abuse the people—
Often by failing to vote at all. By not voting, we contribute to the creation
Of an environment of incivility and inhumanity. If you don’t vote, I’m talking to you.
Used in Short Talks On Politics, 05/14/2016 — Southern Wood Fern 2016 01 — Chestnut Trail, McDowell Nature Center & Preserve, Chestnut Trail, Mecklenburg County Parks & Recreation, Charlotte, NC, May 05, 2016 Hatred and fear feed off each other
And consume the world. Traveling the blue highways seeking photographs,
I drive past a number of rural homes
With Confederate flags flying
And Trump for President signs standing
In their front yards. The combination is not surprising,
But it is chilling. Trump can stir hatred and fear
To milk them for votes,
But he cannot contain them,
Or even channel them. No reliable,
responsible,
stable
and sane person
Can act in any way
to encourage hatred and fear.
“Just making a suggestion,”
“Just thinking out loud,”
“Just saying what people are thinking,”
“Just kidding”
Are just providing
the spark for the conflagration.
A leader’s primary responsibility,
In politics and in business,
Is to create a climate of safety
and respect for all people.
Demonizing “them,”
Or just making “them”
bear the brunt of our jokes and disdain,
Puts “them” at risk
And encourages distrust,
And incites violence.
We cannot do it,
Or allow it to be done
Without calling it out
And demanding that it stop at once
And never be repeated.
05/14/2016 — McDowell Barred Owl 2016 12 — Cove Trail, McDowell Nature Center & Preserve, Chestnut Trail, Mecklenburg County Parks & Recreation, Charlotte, NC, May 12, 2016 Jesus said, “Love your neighbor as you love yourself.”
A man asked, “But who exactly is my neighbor?”
Jesus told those gathered the Parable of the Good Samaritan,
And asked “Who, of all those who walked by, was the neighbor
To the man in the ditch?”
They said, “The one who showed mercy to him.”
Jesus said, “That’s it. YOU are the neighbor!
You go be neighbors to everyone who needs a neighbor.” So what is this national trend toward
Treating those who need a neighbor—
The LGBT population,
Minorities,
Immigrants,
Latinos,
Muslims,
—
As though they don’t need a neighbor?
The people in position to help them
Certainly aren’t going to be one! What’s with all this spitting on Jesus?
By people who say they love Jesus?
05/15/2016 — Pitcher Plants 2016 07 — Goodale State Park, Camden, South Carolina, May 13, 2016 If you can be quiet enough,
You can hear everything
You need to hear
To know what needs to be done
In each situation
As it arises. Silence is the solution
To every problem
You have
Or will have. There is a catch.
It must be the right kind of silence.
Spending our life
Seeking the silence
In the right kind of way
Is not a waste of time.
It is the way time
Is meant to be spent.
A lot of listening,
A little doing.
The less we do
In the right kind of way,
The more we get done. Over the course of a life
Lived this way,
We transform the world.

One Minute Monologues 030

12/17/2015 – 01/27/2016

12/17/2015 — Lao Tzu called it “the Tao.”
Carl Jung called it “Synchronicity.”
I call it “Grace.”
Call it what you will,
It is an experience of an encounter
With more than words can say.
That means more than can be explained:
”The Tao that can be told
is not the eternal Tao”—
and reflects a Reality
directing,
influencing,
upholding,
grounding,
guiding,
supporting,
encouraging,
enabling
our life,
and all of life,
inviting us to trust ourselves to it
relax ourselves in it,
and allow it to carry us into an unfolding wonder
beyond belief and denial. What is beyond belief and denial?
12/17/2015
We know too easily, too quickly,
What is good and what is bad,
What is right and what is wrong,
What is preferred and what is disdained.
Who is the Devil,
and who is the Christ.
We draw our lines
and peer out at them,
as though they are the enemy,
the infidel,
And we are the Chosen People Of God. Lao Tzu said, “All others are clear and bright,
I alone am cloudy and confused.”
Something is to be said for seeing
the validity of all sides,
of understanding the value of opposites,
and being able to stand
in the tension between extremes,
integrate polarities,
reconcile divisions,
and befriend both meaning and meaninglessness,
sense and nonsense,
laughing and dancing with all of life. To live at the center
is to join the extremes
so that all become one in our heart.
12/18/2015
Rumi said, “One glimpse of a true human being,
and we are in love.”
We carry within a sense of the ideal we are to be—
The ideal everything—
woman,
man,
husband,
wife,
mother,
..
everything.
And, when we see it in someone else,
we are in love.
We are powerfully attracted to the ideal,
to that which we are yet to be,
in all those who reflect it. Even though, we are projecting it onto them
we cannot project it onto just anyone.
Only certain people are capable of reflecting
our projections back to us,
enabling us to see in them,
who we are asked to be,
so that they become carriers of the ideal us. When we fail to understand
what is happening,
we think they are ideal,
when they are only carrying/reflecting
the ideal we are capable of being.
When we think it is about them,
and not about us,
we confuse the roles
and try to possess them
instead of allowing them to serve as the model
of our own becoming. We worship them,
idolize them,
adore them,
love them
all the while misinterpreting the symbol
they represent,
and fail to develop in ourselves
the qualities lying latent within us
that call to us from the other.
12/18/2015
The work of being a True Human Being
is the work of authenticity,
integrity,
genuineness,
wholeness,
oneness
and completion. It is the work of being who we are,
which is who we ought to be—
not in some moral sense,
but in the practical sense
of being exactly who we are capable of being
in responding appropriately to each situation as it arises. It is the work of being exactly
what the situation calls for
and exactly who we are,
by bringing ourselves
and our gifts
forth to meet our life,
regardless of the implications
for us personally. We do not exploit our gifts for our own good.
We are burdened by the gifts we carry
for the good of the situation—
for the good of the whole—
the whole world.
”We come not to be served, but to serve,
And to give our life in the service of freeing others
to live in the service of their own gifts.” One True Human Being
sparks the ignition of others,
starting fires of True Human Being-hood
throughout the species,
transforming the world.
12/18/2015
A meaningful life is a life lived
with integrity and authenticity.
Integrity is living in ways that are integral
with the center—the core—of what is important to us.
When we live aligned with that center,
our life is meaningful. When our life is meaningless, aimless and empty,
it is because we have lost connection
with the center of what is important to us,
and are living out of accord
with the life that is truly our life to live.
We are living inauthentically,
cut off from what is deepest, best and truest about us.
We have forgotten who we are,
and what our business is. When we do not know what we mean with our life,
our life is meaningless.
To live with meaning and purpose,
we have to find our way back to our heart,
remember what is of central importance to us,
and live in ways that reflect our connection
with what means the most to us.
12/19/2015
The art of letting things happen
requires us to be open at all times
to what needs to happen—
to what is trying to happen—
and to allow that to take precedent over
what we want to happen. It is the art of stepping back,
of standing aside,
of acquiescing to,
and living in the service of,
the shape of things to come,
regardless of the implications
that might have for us personally. It is living in a
“Thy will, not mine, be done”
kind of way—
as a servant of grace
at work in our life.
12/19/2015
Grace is a gift of perception
that allows us to see the good in all things.
The source of anger and frustration in our life
can also be the source of compassion, forgiveness, acceptance and love—
can also be the source of creativity, good humor, patience and resiliency—
can also be the source of our growing up, awakening, enlightenment and peace—
can be what is needed to deepen, expand and enlarge us. No one ever became a True Human Being
with everything going his, or her, way.
Grace may go our way,
or transcend our way,
transform our way,
enabling us to see the good
in a multitude of ways.
12/20/2015
We do it for the love of the game.
If you don’t love the game,
you are playing the wrong game.
You have to get in THE game!
Not knowing what game we are playing
is the easiest thing—
thinking we are playing one game,
when we are actually playing another,
is not knowing what game we are playing. What game are you playing?
That’s the question all the gurus and masters ask us.
Jesus came asking it.
The Buddha asked it.
Rumi asked it.
The Prophet asked it.
Gandhi asked it. All of them were into playing the right game.
Too many play a different game.
Call it “the getting ahead game.”
buying, spending, amassing, consuming,
in the service of wealth and privilege,
fortune and glory.
Others play “the survival game.”
just getting by
desperate and consumed, themselves, by desperation
in an “eat or be eaten” world,
to be hated,
or borne with resignation and hopelessness
until death takes them away. The gurus and masters rejected wealth
and were poor without hating it.
They played a different game—
and they did it for the love of the game,
whether or not things went their way
(And they never go anyone’s way for long). Call it, Being Alive.
Be Alive in the time and place of your living
regardless of your context and circumstances.
Do it for the love of that game.
12/20/2015
Our work generally consists of two things: 1) Putting ourselves in accord with
(Coming to terms with,
Making our peace with,
Being in right relationship with):
The context, nature and circumstances
Of the “here and now”
(The Umwelt)
Of our living conditions. 2) Aligning ourselves with who we are
so that the life we live reflects
our own nature and qualities,
gifts, passions and interests,
and is a transparent expression
of the truth of the person who is living it—
in each situation as it arises. That’s it.
What do you need to do The Two Things?
Answering that question
Is The Third Thing. Your mission is to spend the rest of your life
in the service of these three things.
12/20/2015
We are responsible for the response
we make to the experience of being alive.
We can talk about the poor quality
of our parenting and upbringing,
and wail about the lack
of opportunities and possibilities,
and write ourselves excuse after excuse
for being unable to do anything
with this sorry old life,
and shirk all responsibility for doing anything
with the miserable hand
we were dealt
and the shoddy lot that befell us, We are responsible for that response.
Other people have done more with less.
Where does that leave us?
With squaring ourselves up with ourselves,
looking our life in the eye,
living transparent to ourselves
from this point on,
and doing what can yet be done
with the life that waits for us
to get out of bed in the morning,
just as it is,
every day that we get out of bed.
12/21/2015
If you are going to judge people,
extend to them the grace
of looking at them with the unbiased eye
of an actual judge,
and not an audience. Too many people look without seeing,
listen without hearing,
and talk without saying anything. Too many people live as unconscious
extensions of the culture,
with an opinion about everything
and knowledge of nothing. See what you look at.
hear what you listen to
and what you are saying.
know whereof you speak
before you say anything.
12/21/2015
Become what you seek.
Be what you need.
This is all there is to it.
12/22/2015
We have everything we need
to live transparent to ourselves,
aligned with ourselves,
at one with ourselves,
integrated with ourselves,
true to ourselves,
and so be True Human Beings
within the context and circumstances of our life,
in each situation as it arises,
all our life long. All it takes is getting out of the way,
knowing what we know,
and understanding that we are
just along for the ride.
12/22/2015
We cannot be true to ourselves
without contradicting ourselves.
Being true to ourselves
requires us to “live a lie.”
The lie is a necessary aspect of the truth. For example (You’ve heard it before):
the Dalai Lama’s bodyguards carry automatic weapons.
You can’t be more contradictory than that.
We all have to be at least that contradictory.
There has to be more to each of us than meets the eye—
even our own eye!
We cannot hide that from ourselves,
lie to ourselves,
pretend to ourselves that we are
only who we say we are. Living transparent to ourselves
allows us to be necessarily antithetical
in the one life we have to live
and always open to the possibility
of surprising ourselves
with something we never saw coming.
12/22/2015
The way things are is not the way
we have been told that they would be.
This is the primary realization
leading the way to all the ones that follow.
How we follow it is crucial to our development.
The way things are is not the way
we have been told that they would be—
..
What? Where do we go from here?
Everything hangs on our answer to:
“Now what?”
Here, we are at the swing point
to a number of possible futures.
How we answer the question
leads us further away from, or ever closer to,
the Self at the center of the “I.”
Everything hangs on what we say. ”What a slippery slope this is!”
12/22/2015
You can’t pare it down.
There are no shortcuts.
Our whole life is our practice.
We live to be transparent to ourselves,
reading our nighttime dreams,
and our daytime flights of fantasy,
reflecting on our drifts of mood and mind,
for insight into the ways
and workings of our inner world,
in order to relate that world to our life
In the outer world of normal, apparent, reality. We bridge the worlds!
Connect the worlds!
Harmonize the worlds!
So that inner and outer are one world—
forming,
expressing,
shaping,
impacting,
bringing forth,
making real
our life
and who we are,
that we might be fully,
consciously,
alive in the life we are living. We cannot do that on the side,
in our spare time,
while we tend the important matters
with the full focus of our complete attention.
Our life is the only thing that matters.
We live to bring ourselves to life
in the time left for living.
12/22/2015
Good religion doesn’t kill anyone.
Doesn’t hate anyone.
Doesn’t condemn anyone.
Doesn’t focus on converting anyone.
Doesn’t spend its time talking about anyone.
Doesn’t care who is saved and who isn’t.
Isn’t obsessed with sin and sinners.
Isn’t interested in proving it is the only religion.
Has no time for debates or discussions about theology, doctrine and dogma.
Thinks it is enough to know what your own business is and mind it, tend it, do it, and let that be enough.
12/23/2015
Our inner world has a stake
in the life we are living in the outer world—
seeking expression,
realization,
actualization,
in the life we are living. Soul isn’t interested in spectating,
and strives to make itself real—
vital, not virtual—
in the way we go about living
in the world of normal, apparent, reality. How soulfully do we live?
How much playing time do we grant Soul each day?
How seriously to we take Soul’s need for self-expression?
When is the last time we listened to Soul?
Invited Soul’s guidance through the daily maze? Soul is sometimes called Psyche,
and sometimes called the Unconscious
because we are unconscious of Soul’s, Psyche’s,
reality, nature, aims and ways. Yet, Soul speaks to us in our nighttime dreams,
and our daytime flights of fantasy—
through our symptoms,
intuition,
instincts
and sensations. We are all psychic,
as Psyche’s children should be,
and have only to learn the language of Soul,
and align ourselves with Soul’s leanings,
to enter the partnership that seeks our participation,
transforming and revitalizing what’s left to be lived.
12/25/2015
Listen to your body.
Your body will tell you how it is with you.
Move away from people who make you uncomfortable.
This is Fortune Cookie wisdom. You wouldn’t eat a rancid Fortune Cookie.
Why do you stay in the company of a rancid personality?
Your body tells you, “Don’t eat this cookie!”
”Don’t stay in the proximity of this person!”
Why would you override your body’s instruction?
Why would you allow social convention to overrule
your body’s wisdom?
You have to be the champion of your own cause!
The hero of your own princess-held-hostage!
To The Rescue! On Guard! To Arms! To Arms!
Do not eat the rancid cookie!
12/25/2015
We are in charge of our own salvation.
Salvation is restoration.
We are responsible for restoring ourselves
to ends worthy of us—
to a life that is worthy of us.
We are responsible for finding our way
to the life that is our life to live—
that only WE can live. We cannot be satisfied with a life anyone could live.
Our life cannot be like that of one cow following another
from the barn to the pasture back to the barn.
Our life has to be uniquely our own,
reflecting and expressing who we are
and what means the most to us. We are charged with bringing ourselves forth,
and gifting US to the world.
We save ourselves by restoring ourselves to our life
and living at-one with who we are
in the deepest sense of the word
in the time left for living. We start by listening to our dreams and fantasies,
our symptoms,
interests,
instinct
and intuition.
We already know what we need to know.
We only need to know what we know,
and have the courage to live it into being.
12/26/2015
We ground ourselves,
express ourselves,
define ourselves,
give shape and form to ourselves,
through the work of our hands and body
in the outer world of normal, apparent, reality. If we are lost,
blown about,
confused,
uncertain,
fear dissolution
and disintegration—
dis-integration—
on the inside,
it is important that we work with stones,
or dig in the earth (the ground),
or rearrange the furniture in our house
with a specific design in mind,
in order to settle the unsettled nature of our inner world. We bring ourselves into focus—
integrate the disparate aspects of our Psyche—
calm ourselves
and restore our souls,
by physically moving things into place
In the outer world. We live ourselves into place
by consciously applying the metaphor,
Thou Art That,
to our life in specific ways,
so that Inner reflects Outer,
and we become still by being busy
with the work of our hands and body,
arranging things “in here”
by arranging things “out there.”
12/26/2015
We participate as full partners
in our own reclamation,
restoration, And hell is not something
that happens when we die,
but what happens in our life
when we refuse the invitation
to collaborate in the work
of becoming who we are. We cooperate with ourselves—
with our Self at the center of the “I” —
when we seek the Self at the center of the “I,”
and move from the known to the unknown,
from what we are conscious of about ourselves
to what we are unconscious of about ourselves. We enter a new world—
the world of inner reality—
and find there amazing resources—
not to use as we will in the service of the “I”—
but to equip
and enable our work,
our life,
in the service of the Self
at the center of the “I.” We have to give up our idea of our life
in order to find and live our LIFE.
And that’s the catch that keeps things as they are.
We cannot live without dying to all we think of as life.
You see the problem.
This is what it means to bear our own cross.
Crucifixion and resurrection in real time everyday.
12/26/2015
We are afraid of pain.
The pain of loneliness,
lostness,
aimlessness,
emptiness,
isolation,
.. Our life consists of denying the pain,
running from the pain,
hiding from the pain,
escaping the pain.
We have to bear the pain.
We have to face it,
feel it,
acknowledge it,
honor it,
and wait it out. Waiting the pain out
is the key to reconciling
ourselves to it,
transcending it,
and putting it in its place. It will always be with us, but.
In waiting it out,
we know it isn’t the final word.
Something shifts,
stirs,
comes to life—
or will if we are waiting out the pain
and not nurturing, nourishing it forever,
refusing to let it go. If that’s our story, we cannot be helped, but
if we are waiting it out,
a shift will occur,
a light flickers,
something catches our eye,
hope and courage ignite,
and before you know it,
we are coming back to life. Amazing.
Grace in the darkness,
birthing us again.
And again.
12/27/2015
We are a lazy lot,
and have a lot of inertia to overcome
in taking up the work
of the spiritual journey. My friend Ogi was talking about his friends in AA
when he said, “All we ever wanted was smooth and easy,”
but he could have been talking about all of us,
and all of our ancestors and progeny. “Smooth and easy” about raps it up.
We like the idea of the spiritual journey,
but the word “practice” puts us off.
We don’t what to have to actually DO anything to be spiritual.
Taking up the practice of mindful meditation
is asking too much. We hear about “tools for the Journey,”
and we have an immediate affinity
with the guy who said,
”Just tell us what to believe, Preacher,
and don’t meddle with our lives!” Smooth and Easy
Are the Scylla and Charybdis of the Journey,
and keep us from ever making the trip.
12/27/2015
What needs to happen, here, now, next?
That is our question to answer in each here, now, of our life. We answer it in light of our present situation,
and in light of all that has happened up to this point,
and in light of what needs to happen from this point on. We answer it in light of what has been done to us,
and in light of what we have done in response.
In light of what we have done,
and in light of what has been done in response.
In light of our values,
and the character we live to express in,
even as it is shaped by,
the circumstances in which we live. Taking all of this,
and the context and circumstances
into account,
what needs to happen, here, now, next? It helps me to be still
and quiet for a while,
and see what occurs to me.
I recommend that procedure
to all who have the luxury
of time and silence.
12/28/2015
What would have helped me
Would have been some early, middle, and late
Lessons in mindfulness. Or, just living with mindful people. Being with people who were
seeing,
hearing,
understanding,
asking,
seeking,
probing,
.. Who weren’t afraid to ask questions.
Who were reading, and writing, poetry.
Who were creative and imaginative.
Who were self-reflective,
and capable of examining everything they saw,
and heard,
and felt,
and thought—
In light of everything else they saw,
and heard,
and felt,
and thought. Who believed more in the value of hypotheses
than in the value of rules.
Who knew the importance of music beyond hymns.
Who danced and laughed,
and indulged regularly in joy for no reason. I would have been a lot better off
with a different set of people in my life,
Maybe, you know what I mean.
12/28/2015
The problem is time. We don’t realize how precious it is early enough.
Whave to be intensely aware of each moment,
And how we might use it
to bring forth the life that is ours to bring forth—
giving birth to new ideas,
new realizations,
new thoughts,
concepts,
kindnesses,
generosities,
.. How to make the most of each day
includes being quiet,
still,
and mindful
in order to see
what needs us to do it each day—
and to take our time with doing it,
so that we do it
the way it needs to be done. There is no time to lose.
What needs to be done
cannot be hurried.
It is like yeast in the dough,
and seeds in the earth,
and six eggs hatching under a sitting hen.
12/29/2015
We spend our life
trying to get together
with ourselves.
It would help to know
that from the start.
And be given tips and suggestions
for how we might go about it. We are told nothing about the things that matter.
They leave it up to us
to figure it out on our own
over time.
Over long stretches of time. It starts out with our not knowing
what’s wrong with us.
It’s like we are never quite satisfied,
no matter how much we have.
It’s like we are looking for something,
we don’t know what.
But we think it might be
found in the eyes of strangers,
0r on the other side of the sea.
Somewhere far away
and difficult to get to.
All we know is we are dissatisfied
and troubled by a nagging sense
that there is something more.
Something we are unconscious of
is trying to become conscious. Our Self is seeking us!
Whispering our name.
Winking at us in a multitude of ways.
Appearing as a mirage in the desert,
a ghost in the night.
Flirting with us, What we seek is as near as our next breath,
But it may as well be in a deep cave
in a high mountain
on the backside of Tibet,
for all the good being close does. We were separated at birth
from our antenatal best friend,
and almost remember what we lost—
almost know how good life would be
with him, with her, to collaborate with,
enjoying the wonder of Two being One
for the rest of our life.
12/29/2015
Our Other Self is always
trying to get our attention.
Dreams,
fantasies,
walk-a-bouts,
symptoms,
moods,
urges,
instinctive feelings,
intuitive inclinations,
strange occurrences,
memories
inexplicable coincidences,
things that occur to us out of nowhere,
things we find ourselves doing without intending to,
saying without meaning to… All are visitations from our invisible Other—
Invitations to sit down,
open up,
and be fully available
to that which is always present with us,
yet unknown to us. How can this be?
How can we not know our Other Self?
How can we be as old as we are
and know as little as we do
about the world within? We were enlisted to bring that world
with us when we came forth from the womb,
and to bring it to life
in the world of space and time. But there were none to help us
remember our mission
reconnect with our purpose,
and live the life that was prepared for us
before we were born—
the life that only we can live—
and can still live yet,
if we only realize the irrepressible truth
of the Inner Other
as one who is full available
to that which has been
forever present with us,
and say something on the order of,
“Help me help you
become as real as I am
in the time we have left to live.” And mean it.
12/30/2015
Kobe Brant, in talking about his team,
the Los Angeles Lakers, said,
“You aren’t going to make a cat bark.
And yelling at it isn’t going to help.
At some point, you just have to sit back
and enjoy what can be enjoyed about the ride”
(Or words to that effect). We think our Other Self can be taught to bark,
and agree to sign on with it
with the understanding—
all on our part—
that our Other Self will do things our way. Thinking this way gives us “The Prayer of Jabez”
and “The Law of Attraction,”
wherein if we do things a certain way,
we’ll get a barking cat,
and everything will be just rosy. Jesus put it this way:
“Those who seek to save their life
will lose it, and those who lose their life
in the service of that which is greater than they are
will gain it” (Or words to that effect). Our Other Side will eat our old life—
and the life of our happy fantasies—alive.
When we sign on with our Other Side,
we get the life that only we can live,
packed down,
spilling over,
pouring out, We have to give up our idea of life
in order to come to life
and be fully, wholly, alive. Always.
Always.
The trade off.
If you can square up with that,
you have it made.
And can sit back and enjoy
all that is to be enjoyed
about the ride.
And, it will be quite a ride. But the cat won’t be barking.
12/30/2015
Our Other Self possesses
full working knowledge
of the blueprint that is ours
to bring forth in our life. We each have a life that is as unique to us
as our fingerprints or the patterns of our irises.
There is no one like us,
present,
past
or future.
What do we mean,
trying to fit in,
belong,
by looking like them
and doing it like they would do it?
The idea is to be who we are,
living the life that is our life to live,
serving the good of ourselves
and the good of humankind.
By being true to ourselves,
we bring forth what is most needed
in service to the whole.
The individual realizing herself,
realizing himself,
as a true human being
is the hope of the world.
And our Other Self has in hand
the template that is ours
to effect and implement.
It is our place to get together
with our Other Self,
enter into full collaboration with our Other Self,
and live the life that is
our joint life to live
in the time left for living. You might say our sole responsibility
is to our soul throughout what remains of our life.
12/30/2015
Inside and outside compliment each other,
dance with one another,
become one with the other. We take this as confirmation
of being on the beam,
in the zone,
at one with the flow of our life. If an opportunity arises
without sparking our
interest and enthusiasm,
let it go. If what we are interested in
and enthusiastic about
finds nothing but
locked doors and dead ends,
don’t keep insisting on being a rock star,
or the next Michael Jordan. Read the outer signs and the inner signals.
Seek resonance and ratification.
Just because something invites you
doesn’t make it inviting.
Just because you want something
doesn’t mean it’s right for you. But when outer clicks with inner,
Smile to yourself,
And see where it goes.
12/30/2015
To live in conscious relationship
with the present moment
is to be aware of whatever is happening now.
Our awareness contains everything
we are capable of being aware of.
It is all here, now.
Thoughts,
sights,
sounds,
sensations,
memories,
moods,
..
It is all contained in awareness.
Receive it well,
without evaluation
or opinion.
See how long you can be aware
of being aware of the moment
that is eternally now.
12/31/2015
We cannot rest in the full awareness of the moment
and be embroiled in the moment.
We cannot be alive to the moment
and be directed by the moment,
controlled by the moment.
We are not the moment.
We live in the moment,
choosing in the moment of our living
how best that is to be done. Some ways of living are better than others.
Some ways of living are much worse than others.
Living as those who are owned by the moment
forfeits the option of seeing what is happening,
knowing what is needed,
and responding in ways
that take the allness of the moment
into account. Seeing things as they are
eschews shortcuts,
avoids rote responses,
examines assumptions,
rushes neither to judgment
nor to solution,
listens carefully to what
is being said
and not being said,
recognizes that what is on the line
in any situation
may not be what appears
to be on the line—
and responds to what is on the line.
12/31/2015
Everything relating to our growth and development
as individuals and True Human Beings
is grounded upon,
and flows from,
our living out of,
our own personal authority. We have to live the life
we say is worth living.
We have to live in the service
of what we declare to be of value.
We have to express,
exhibit,
incarnate who we know ourselves to be.
We have to make our own calls
regarding what we say yes to
and no to. All of this hinges
upon our achieving
the right kind of compassionate
working distance
with the other people in our life.
It’s important that they matter to us,
but not so much that they stand in our way.
A life worthy of us
comes down to our ability
to work out the ratios,
and know where to draw the lines
separating who we are
from who others would have us be.
12/31/2015
If we could live
without ignoring
any aspect of our experience,
so that each situation
were transparent to us,
and we were transparent to ourselves,
we would be able
to live there with superhuman powers
of comprehension and integrity,
seeing and doing what needed to be done
in the service of the highest/deepest values
and the good of the entire world. Mindfulness leads the way.
If you are going to practice anything,
be anything,
practice mindfulness,
be mindful—
compassionately present,
attentive to and aware of,
without evaluation or opinion,
what is present with you
in each situation as it arises—
doing so will transform your life and the world.
12/31/2015
We cannot live with integrity without living mindfully.
We cannot live mindfully without living with integrity.
Integrity is the alignment of inner with outer,
so that we are who we are.
Integrity is the essential characteristic of God:
”Tell them ‘I Am Who I Am’ sent you!”
When we are mindful enough to know who we are,
we have no excuse for failing to be who we are.
How can we face ourselves in living contrary to ourselves,
against ourselves?
Our fundamental responsibility is to be who we are
in each situation as it arises
for the good of the situation—
in an “I came not to be served, but to serve”
kind of way.
12/31/2015
It is our place—
the place of individuals
becoming/being themselves—
to raise the level of authenticity,
genuineness
and integrity in the world. We live these things into being.
We raise the level of authenticity by being authentic.
We raise the level of genuineness by being genuine.
We raise the level of integrity by being integrated—
by living in ways that are integral with that which
is deepest, best and truest about us,
in ways that are at one with our Best Self,
which would be our Other Self,
the Inner Self we also are. We raise the level of authenticity,
genuineness
and integrity
by being mindfully,
compassionately,
aware
of how things are with us and about us,
and how they also are—
without evaluation or opinion. Just knowing how things are (and also are),
changes how things are (and also are).
Knowing what we are dismissing,
discounting,
overlooking,
ignoring,
changes our relationship with those things,
and enables us to know better what we are doing.
Knowing better what we are doing
is all that is necessary
to change what we are doing
in ways that are beneficial
to ourselves and others,
and the world will be better off for it.
01/01/2016
There is no plan.
Life unfolds according to its own purpose,
in its own time.
Your life,
my life,
are not yours and mine
to do with as we please
at a time
in a manner
that is pleasing to us. We wait for the propitious time,
the fullness of time,
when the time is right,
and our life unfolds before us
and the way opens to us
and it is as though
this is the moment we have been waiting for,
all that time we were
wondering what we were doing
and what we are here for. We are all caterpillars
waiting to fly.
Do you think when caterpillars
have their conventions,
seminars,
and weekend retreats,
anybody ever talks of flying?
We are all caterpillars
waiting to fly.
01/01/2016
I see my place in your life
as being that of putting you
in touch with your life—
in touch with the idea
that you have a life—
not the one you are living,
the one that is yours to live. I’m here to goad you into considering
what you are doing
and how you feel about
what you are doing.
How do you feel about the life you are living?
How well does it fit you?
Is there any sense of being out of place somehow,
of this being not quite it, somehow? I’m here to nag you into squaring up with
how it is with you,
and into wondering how it
might be even yet.
I’m here to throw questions at you
until one strikes a cord, hits home,
and you look at what you are doing,
and what you might do in addition,
or instead. I’m here to deepen,
expand,
enlarge
your awareness of you
and your possibilities for life—
your awareness of what is struggling
to come to life in your life,
and how you might be alive
in the life you are living. I trust you’re getting your money’s worth.
01/01/2016
In each situation,
there exist possibilities f
or the unique,
the creative,
the novel,
the unimagined,
the unheard of,
the outlandish,
the surreal,
the new,
the heretical,
the blasphemous… All available for consideration and implementation
for those with eyes that see,
ears that hear, and hearts that are courageous
and capable of doing what cries out to be done. Jesus said, “Those of you with eyes,
dare to open them!
And see what is before you!
Those of you with ears, dare to unstop them!
And hear what is begging for your attention!”
(Or, words to that effect.) What needs to be seen is waiting to be seen.
What needs to be heard is waiting to be heard.
What is keeping the seeing from happening?
The hearing from being done?
01/02/2015
We can’t say, “Give God the Glory!” when things go our way
Without understanding the importance of saying,
“Give God the Glory” when things do not go our way.
What does having our way have to do with praising
What is sometimes called “God”? God,
the Tao,
Grace,
is the source of all things great and small,
good and bad.
It is all Grace to eyes that see.
Everything is a step on the way to being who we are.
What do we need to be who we are?
We already have it!
It came with us from the womb!
Under what conditions
would it be impossible to be who we are? All theology is bad theology.
All theologians are bad theologians.
We cannot talk about what we know
in terms of what we don’t know.
All theology is hearsay. All theology is heresy—
and the rock solid truth—
in that it exposes the absurdity
Of saying, “This is absolute and final truth!”
about what we don’t know. Darkness is necessary for seeing the light.
Too much light is as bad for seeing
As too little light.
Too much light is as darkness. Darkness and light are one thing, not two.
Move to the center.
Avoid the extremes.
Live from the heart and let things take their course.
01/02/2016
The hardest things are remembering who we are
and what we are about—
staying on track,
living aligned with our life,
in sync with our Other Self,
at one with who we are and also are
in each situation as it arises,
keeping our balance,
maintaining our focus,
remaining grounded in what is important,
centered in the heart of what matters most. The Buddha under the Bo Tree,
the Christ in the Garden of Gethsemane,
stayed true to themselves
and are models for all regarding how to do it.
But the way is straight and the gate is narrow,
and what a slippery slope it traverses!
Thus the necessity of the practice,
and the helping community,
and the connection with our Other Self,
all along The Way.
01/03/2016We change our relationship with our experience
by being mindfully, compassionately, aware of it,
without evaluation or opinion. When we change our relationship with our experience,
we change its impact on us.
when we change the impact our experience has on us,
we reshape our life. Being compassionately mindful of our experience,
transcends evaluation, opinion,
and the emotional reaction that accompanies them,
softens the impact of our experience,
and enables us to be emotionally balanced in our relationship to it. Jon Kabat-Zinn says,
“Mindfulness is moment-to-moment
non-judgmental awareness,
cultivated by paying attention
to what is happening now.” Mindfulness simply requires us to see what is happening,
internally and externally,
as it is happening,
without evaluation or opinion. As we take up the practice of mindfulness,
we transform our life
and our Umwelt (Our lived environment as we experience it),
and restructure the world—
merely by being aware of it. Nothing alters things like being mindful of them
moment-to-moment. Give it a spin.
Simply sit,
paying attention to the moment.
Bring everything
into your awareness,
and let your experience
be your experience.
Remain there for as long
as you are able.
And return as often
as you can.
01/03/2016
Lets say you are a woman and I am a man,
and we fall in love with each other.
Or one of us falls in love with the other. The experience of falling in love
is not far from the experience of idolization,
wherein we idolize the other as The Perfect One,
all imperfections being unrecognized,
overlooked,
discounted,
dismissed,
disregarded,
denied, This does not mean we
are well-suited for each other,
and should marry,
have many children
and live happily ever after. And it does not matter
if you actually possess the qualities
and characteristics
I ascribe to you
(or you to me).
You may not be courageous and kind at all,
but the meanest coward who ever cut and ran.
It is how I see you that causes me
to fall in love with you
(And it is who you turn out to be
that causes me to divorce you, sometime later).
Being in love is not related to reality in any way.
The experience of being in love
is no predictor of the viability
of the relationship.
Maybe, maybe not. The experience of being in love
is an indicator that the other
has stirred within us our unrealized
unrecognized,
overlooked,
discounted,
dismissed,
disregarded,
denied,
ignored
potential for being The Perfect One
we see exemplified in the other. We project what we do not recognize
as needing to be developed within ourselves
onto the other.
The other stands before us as a mirror,
reflecting back to us our own projections
onto him, onto her,
and we see in the other what is missing,
but available to be realized,
exhibited,
expressed,
incarnated,
within us. You are the woman I need to become.
I am the man you need to be.
I need to become like you in ways
I see you being you,
and you need to become like me
in ways you see me being me.
My work is to become the woman
I see you as being,
exemplifying.
Your work is to become the man
you see me as being,
exemplifying.
My woman needs to be like you.
Your man needs to be like me.
I must spend my life working
to bring you to life in me.
You must spend your life working
to bring me to life in you. In this way,
we “marry” the other,
plight “thee” our troth
through sickness and health,
wealth and poverty,
good times and bad,
’til death do us part if then. Developing my feminine side,
developing your masculine side,
is the androgynous work of soul
wherein the two
sides of our personality,
male and female,
become one
whole,
complete,
integrated,
balanced
symmetrical,
human being. It has nothing to do
with merging two individuals
into the same person
(As if!).
The merger is not an outer,
actual,
physical fact,
but an inner,
vital,
spiritual
reality—
which we pursue as a conscious work of soul
over the full course of our life,
whether we marry
each other in real time,
or not.
01/04/2016
We live in a culture that places
a high premium on being happy.
“I just want to be happy”
is the mantra of the day, every day.
We generally think of being happy as an add on.
It is something that comes
with having something we don’t have,
or doing something we aren’t doing. I propose that we think
of being happy as a take away.
Getting rid of all the things
that are standing between us and being happy. Asking, “What would it take to make you happy?”
Generally gets a response
on the order of,
“More money and time to travel and do the things I enjoy.” Asking, “What can you do right now
to begin doing things you enjoy?”
Generally gets a response
on the order of, “I would have to get away.”
We are living lives we have to escape
in order to be happy.
This is weird.
Why would we do that? Instead of asking, “What would it take to make me happy?”
Ask, “What is standing between me and happiness?”
It will come down to duties,
obligations,
responsibilities,
drains on your time
and attention. Start shucking them.
Pare them down to the absolute minimum.
Say “No” throughout your life.
It will be like going on a holiday
without leaving home.
And if you can’t do that,
if you can’t reduce your current level of duties, etc.,
Look at what is standing in your way,
keeping you from doing it.
And work with that.
01/04/2016
Much of what is wrong with us
can be transformed or transcended
By living with mindfulness
(which implies compassion
and complete absence of evaluation)
in a collaborative relationship with our Other Self
throughout what remains of our life. That being the case,
One would think
we would be quick to become proficient
In living mindfully in that kind of relationship. Nothing is more important
For our own personal future,
Or that of the world.
05/17/2018
If there is nothing
you would go to hell for,
you aren’t invested in this life.
You’re just hanging out,
waiting to go to heaven when you die.You don’t have anything
worth living for,
worth doing with your life.
Your life is just in your way,
delaying heaven and all the glories
of forever everlasting. You are wasting this life
waiting for that one.
The person who buried
his talent
missed the point
and lost everything. Heaven is for people
who are right
about what is worth
going to hell for.
01/05/2016 —
In a 2007 talk at Google,
Jon Kabat-Zinn likened formal mindfulness meditation practice
(The Body Scan, for instance, or 45 minutes of Breath Counting)
to training wheels on a bicycle.
We practice formally to get our body
trained to do the work without
our having to think about it. The idea is to ride the bicycle without thinking about it.
Mindfulness meditation is
how we live our life,
not what we stop living for 20 or 45 minutes to do.
It is being mindfully
(Paying attention on purpose to the present moment),
compassionately,
aware,
without evaluation
or opinion,
throughout our day
(And paying attention to our dreams at night). Then, he takes the bicycle analogy a step further.
Bicycles can be ridden in races,
on pavement,
off pavement through potholes
and over tree roots in the woods,
fast or slow,
by small children
and octogenarians,
commuting to work and school,
around the block,
in the park,
for daily exercise,
or the simple pleasure of taking a ride. There are as many reasons and ways
to ride a bicycle as there are bicycle riders.
And, so it is with mindfulness meditation.
There is no right way to do it.
We ride our own bike.
We live our own life.
We meditate the way we meditate.
If it is right for us, it is right.
We all find our own path,
and walk it.
Find our own work,
and do it. Alan Watts once asked Joseph Campbell,
“Joe, what form does your yoga take?”
Campbell replied,
“I underline passages.”
There you are.
What form does your meditation take? It doesn’t matter.
What matters is that you do it.
01/05/2016
Our personal authority is grounded
in our ability to say, “NO!
To ourselves. We cannot say, “NO!” to anyone else
until we can say, “NO!” to ourselves.
Where do you rein yourself in?
Where do you draw the line?
Impose restrictions, set limits?
What do you refuse to permit,
disallow? Self-discipline and self-restraint
are the heart of self-directed living.
Where are we violating our own curfews?
Ignoring our own boundaries? When are we going
to start taking “No”
from ourselves
for an answer?
01/05/2016
Let other people strive to have more,
and to be somewhere else.
Live to be where you are,
enjoying what you have.
Relish your life,
and the experience of being alive. No matter where we are
or what we have,
it could be better in 10,000 ways—
and worse.
But, here we are,
with a moment inviting us to be who we are—
which is all we can ever be, Why not here, now?
01/06/2016
“Thy will, not mine, be done,”
sets us on a very unpredictable course. Do we mean it, is the question.
Do we trust ourselves to this extent
to our Other Self,
To The Invisible Other—
unknown but intuited and experienced
as numinous and real? Are we willing to put ourselves in the hands
of another whom we do not know? Who guides our boat on its path through the sea?
It is one thing to hand over control
at the end of our rope,
when our backs are too the wall,
and our front is to the Void,
when we have run out of options,
and have no choice but to throw ourselves
upon the good graces of the unknown
and hope for the best, but. To hand ourselves over in the thick
of The Pretty Good Life,
when things are going relatively well,
and we have hopes of better things to come,
right around the corner,
any day now,
and we are still awash in the glow of life as we like it—
why would we do that? Why would we hand over
something that is working well,
or almost working well,
for what could easily turn out to be
the complete loss of everything
we value and dream of? Who would say, “Thy will, not mine, be done”
when things are going well enough,
and nothing much is too bad wrong?
01/06/2016
Jesus walked through crowds
of those who were sound asleep,
dreaming they were awake,
and said, “Wake up!
Come to your senses!
See what you are doing!” And they replied,
“Wake up, yourself, Sonny Boy!
You’re headed down a rough road
toward an end you won’t like!” That’s the way it always is
in the confrontation between
those who are awake
and those who are asleep,
dreaming they are awake. No one can wake anyone up.
We live ourselves awake,
if we wake up at all.
Reality eventually wakes up
those who can be awakened.
Yet, reality can always be interpreted
In ways that take the alarm clock into account,
and allow the dream to continue.
Dreaming we are awake, while sound asleep. Jesus left the dead to bury the dead.
It’s the only option.
The catch is, they killed him.
Being awake is no sanctuary.
Nothing trumps stupidity.
01/07/2016
Happiness is getting out of the way. We think happiness is getting our way.
Happiness is getting out of our way.
Once we get out of our way,
the Way opens before us,
and things are right with us,
until we come up with a better idea,
and leave The Way
in order to pursue our way.
01/08/2016
Where do you go for comfort and solace—
To calm yourself and restore your connection with soul? Drugs, sex and alcohol are popular attempts
at the comfort and solace part of the equation, but.
the backlash WHAM-O! impact takes them off the table
and exposes them as the fraud they are. Exercise, though, is good.
A long walk is about all the exercise I’m good for these days.
And the right kind of music.
I have a friend who says he can’t quiet down and be calm
unless he’s playing his electric guitar.
Another friend feels the same way about her drumming. Time immersed in nature does it for a lot of people.
I like to sit by a lake and watch the ducks flying in and out.
Or drive through the mountains.
Sunrises and sunsets,
Storms and clouds… It’s important to know what works for you,
and go there, do that, as often as necessary,
as a way of offsetting the draining effect
of “the world (that) is too much with us, late and soon.” Where do you go for comfort and solace—
To calm yourself and restore your connection with soul?
01/08/2016
Our seeing is influenced by our emotions.
So is our thinking.
What we fear, want, don’t want, love, hate, desire, despise, etc.
determines how we see
and what we think about it.
Feeling dictates seeing and thinking. We don’t know what we are looking at
if it is so novel we have no feelings about it.
We don’t know what to think about it
if we don’t know how we feel about it. Feelings instruct our living,
guide our behavior.
If we are going to see and think,
we have to learn to see what we are feeling,
and think about it. We have to see how strongly we are influenced
by how we feel about things,
and think about it.
We have to reflect on the place of feeling
that we are unconscious of,
and work to become conscious of it. Otherwise, we will be at the mercy of those
who inflame our fears
and teach us to hate all that is novel and strange.
01/08/2016
When Alabama Chief Justice Roy Moore says, in effect,
“If we don’t like a law,
we shouldn’t have to obey it
or enforce it,
or have it forced on us,”
And when Texas Governor Greg Abbott says, in effect,
“If we don’t like a law,
we shouldn’t have to obey it
or enforce it,
or have it forced on us,”
And when a mob of Oregon ranchers
takes over the office building
of a national wildlife refuge
and says, in effect, “if we don’t like a law,
we shouldn’t have to obey it
or enforce it, or
have it forced on us,”
They are committing treason,
and pushing the country toward anarchy. If you vote for a Republican,
you are voting for someone
who would have no problem
committing treason
and joining in the push toward anarchy. The hope of the world
is for every US citizen
to register to vote,
and vote in every election,
no matter how small,
and never vote for a Republican. That is our only hedge
against treason and anarchy.
Surely, you can see that.
01/09/2016 —
Reality is contradiction. No one ever says “Welcome to the Real World”
when things are running smoothly
and going our way. The Real World is a world of conflict,
opposition,
negation,
limits,
boundaries,
barriers,
polarities,
wars,
walls
and edges. Carl Jung said,
“There is no coming to consciousness without pain.”
We don’t wake up
until required to do so
by circumstances that won’t take
our “NO!” for an answer,
and impose their own “NO!” on us. Contradiction is a reality that requires recognition,
that calls for reflection.
Reflection enables realization.
Realization is revelation,
enlightenment,
understanding,
comprehension,
transcendence,
transformation, Rites of passage are
encounters with contradiction,
and serve as points of reflection
and realization
through all stages of development,
leading to a new way
of being in the world—
the Real World—
where other contradictions await
along the path of the eternal process
of becoming conscious,
and growing up
some more,
again.
01/09/2016
We are responsible for the world
we create by our response to it.
I’m not saying you are responsible
for your husband’s abuse (Or, your wife’s).
I’m saying you are responsible
for the world you create
by the way you respond to your husband’s (wife’s) abuse. There is the abuse,
and there is the response to the abuse.
And the response creates the world
that opens up
in response to the response. The response is the fulcrum,
the turning point,
the change element. If you want to change things,
change the way you respond to things. You know your typical response pattern.
When “this” happens,
“that” always happens in response. Imagine ways you might change your response pattern.
What keeps you locked in the same behavior?
What would it take for you to be able to respond differently?
You have to work all of this out in you mind
before you effect it in your life. Imagine and rehearse, Kid, Imagine and rehearse.
Play out scenarios in your imagination.
Learn by imagining,
by pretending.
Put things in place there
before trying it out in real time. If you can be different in your mind—
and live with compassion
and acceptance for yourself there—
the transition from imagination
to actual will be a natural flow. And working with a good therapist will help.
All a part of being responsible for—
and conscious of—
the world we are creating
by our response to it.
01/10/2016 —
Being fully alive means living in ways
that allow you to know
what no one can tell you. Always doing what “Momma says,”
or following the black footprints laid out
by some self-help book,
or doing what Oprah tells you to do,
is going to put you in the thick of those
who do not know their own mind,
or trust themselves ever to do anything right. Those who know things worth knowing
listen to themselves,
follow their own heart,
live out of their own authority,
see with their own eyes,
hear with their own ears,
work out for themselves what it all means,
decide for themselves what matters most,
live in light of what is life for them,
know how to raise the level
of their own esprit de la vie,
and do what they love doing. But, don’t listen to me tell you what to do.
Listen to you.
01/10/2016
Everything is a vehicle of revelation,
recognized and received,
or ignored,
overlooked,
discounted, It’s like this, she said,
bending down,
pointing to a daffodil
growing from a crack
in the pavement.
“You can look at this flower
and see it,
Or not.” Eyes that see, see—
the flower,
the white rabbit,
the universe in a grain of sand… Eyes that don’t see miss everything.
Seeing what we look at,
and looking at all of it,
is the primary practice.
01/10/2016
Blair Walsh missed a chip shot field goal
in the waning moments
of the Minnesota Vikings’
wild-card play-off game
with the Seattle Seahawks,
and the Seahawks won the game 10 – 9. It was a resounding failure
with everything on the line,
viewed by football fans across the nation.
He will never outlive the shame
of his inability to do his job and win the game. He has only one remaining alternative.
He has to forgive himself.
Simple as that.
He missed the field goal from point blank range.
He can’t miss the follow up: FORGIVENESS!
Surely, he won’t miss that!
They won’t allow him to miss that, will they? We are all always missing it.
The obvious choice goes unchosen
by those who prefer a life of remorse,
shame and sorrow.
You know who I’m talking about now, don’t you?
You look at him, you at look her,
in the mirror every day, don’t you?
You have to forgive yourself! Don’t delay it one minute more!
“You Are Forgiven!”
Say it!
Mean it!
And let it go.
It. Go. I don’t care how big it was.
It’s gone.
It’s over.
It’s kaput.
So.
Let.
It.
Be.
Gone.
Because. It. Is. You will never get better advice.
Why not take it?
Bigger screw-ups are possible
for all of us in the future.
Self-forgiveness now,
for the ones in the past,
is practice.
01/11/2016
Members of the Christian Church
are always wanting everybody
to “Put Jesus first!”
and to “Make Jesus the center of your life!”
and to “Do What Jesus Would do!”
Conveniently refusing to ask,
“Who would Jesus kill because they were black?”
Or, “Who would Jesus turn away because they were immigrants?”
Or, “Who would Jesus chastise,
ostracize,
rebuke,
humiliate,
shame
and hate
because they were LGBTQ?” And, conveniently ignoring the blatant,
impossible to overlook,
fact that Jesus lived out of accord
with every social convention
and Book of Order of his day. To ask Jesus how he would do anything
would be to beg the reply,
“Not the way they say it ought to be done, Kid.
Not the way they say it ought to be done!” Leaving us exactly where Jesus was,
and would have us be in each situation
that comes along—
deciding what needs to be done
and doing it because it needs to be done,
then and there,
without regard for any other consideration. Jesus raised the dead sometimes,
and other times,
he left the dead to bury the dead.
Jesus forgave a guilty woman
and cursed an innocent fig tree.
Jesus fulfilled the law commanding,
“Be perfect as God is perfect,”
by breaking every law defining
what that would be. To do it the way Jesus would do it,
we have to do it the way
WE would do it without worrying
about what anybody,
even Jesus,
might think. With Jesus like that at the center of our life,
even the Buddha
and the Prophet
are Jesus,
not to mention Moses
and Abraham. And the “Us vs THEM” craze
is carried away as nothing more
than dust in the wind
of the Spirit that blows where it will—
because we are all one
with Jesus and each other
in the situation that is unfolding
before us right now,
presenting us with an opportunity
to do there
what needs to be done
as only we can do it.
01/11/2016
Our life is our practice.
We cannot live in ways
that are at odds with our life
and be alive on any level
more vital and vibrant
than being 98.6 and breathing. Vital signs have nothing to do with vitality.
We can be alive on a level that has nothing to do with LIFE. Our LIFE is that which experiences
and expresses
vitality,
meaning,
joy,
enthusiasm
and connection
with the heart of Life and Being. Our LIFE requires us
to take up the practice of being alive—
of finding our LIFE and living it—
Throughout each day. We have consciously seek out
what has life for us,
live in ways that connect us
with the things that have life for us,
and work things
that have life for us
into the life we are living. The aim and goal is for
the life that we are living
to revolve around,
flow to and from,
the things that have life for us. Our life is our practice,
And our practice
is being alive in the life we are living. Where would you place yourself
on a Vitality Scale,
With 1 being mostly dead
and 10 being vibrantly,
fully,
alive? What can you do
in the next 24 hours
to begin moving up the scale?
01/12/2016
If Mozart could have lectured about,
and demonstrated,
his art so that anybody
with the proper amount
of determination
and time spent at the task
could have composed as Mozart composed… Would it have been right for Mozart
to duplicate himself a thousand times over? Would it have been right for the Duplicates
to forego their own particular gifts and life
for the sake of being another Mozart? What have all those Elvis impersonators given up,
in their lifelong longing to be The King? All this, of course, is about Jesus,
and how wrong it is to forsake ourselves
for the sake of doing it like Jesus would do it. Jesus did it like Jesus would do it.
It’s been done.
Duplicates of Jesus are not Jesus.
Anymore than Elvis impersonators are Elvis. If we are going to do it like Jesus did it,
we are going to have to do it like we would do it.
Exactly like we would do it,
down to the most minute detail. We have to be who we are
whether we want to be or not.
It would not be right to be anyone else.
01/12/2016
The word at the center of all practice is: Compromise is the path to the Land of Promise.
Compromise is the nature of the journey.
We all walk two—or many more—paths at the same time.
How well we do that tells the tale. The Dalai Lama preaches non-violence and compassion
and has armed body guards.
Compromise is the path between conflicts, polarities.
We have to make our compromises conscious,
or live a lie. When we live fully,
authentically,
honestly,
we live transparent to ourselves,
and consciously maintain the tension
of the opposing contradictions,
bearing in our body
the pain of the “cross” of opposites. The easy way to do it is to renounce
our ties with the world
and the world’s claim upon us,
and move into a monastery,
or, better, into a cave in the Himalayas,
and tell people how to structure a life of holiness
in the world we left behind. If it can be done,
we should stay there and do it:
spouse,
kids,
pets,
mortgages,
car payments,
jobs,
income tax,
“the full catastrophe!” Give me a Bodhisattva who has done it that way,
And stop talking
of those who drift down from their retreat
to deliver a Sutra when they feel like it
as though holiness can exist apart from
the hell of continual compromise! Tevya remains a master apart from “the masters”!
and, he is fictional—
yet, the model of how to do it.
01/12/2016
We have to have the freedom
to find our own life and live it.
Our spirit demands it.
Our circumstances disfavor it.
There you are.
The stage is set.
We step onto it and play our part—
The one assigned to us by our circumstances,
and the one required of us by our spirit. The Army has a term for it:
“Defect in place!”
We don’t have to go AWOL,
or mount armed resistance,
to have an active life in the underground movement
of soul coming forth in our life. We only have to bear the pain
of the conflict consciously,
as we pay lip service to the one
while living in unwavering allegiance to the other— Making sure we put the right one in its proper place in our life.
01/12/2016
I hate disturbances in the flow of life. Intrusion.
Inconsideration.
Insensitivity.
Refusal to cooperate.
Sabotage.
Destruction.
Mayhem.
The Abomination of Desolation… And I have no idea of how to guarantee
the good faith participation of everyone in life
for the mutual benefit of all living things.
And, therein lies my problem. We have to do our work,
and trust our neighbors to do theirs.
We all need better neighbors.
I wonder where that neighborhood
is to be found.
01/13/2016
We spend a lot of time getting things in place.
If someone asks us what we are doing with our life,
we can say simply, “I’m getting things in place.”
If they say, “Well, it doesn’t seem like much is happening,”
we can say, “That’s the way it is when you’re getting things in place.” It is important, though,
that we are actually getting things in place.
We can’t just be waiting for things to fall into place.
For magic to happen,
for some Prince Charming to drive up,
or some Sleeping Beauty to plop down in our path. In order to be getting things in place,
we have to believe in what we are doing.
If someone asks us what we believe in,
we have to say we believe in what we are doing.
And if they ask us what we are doing,
we say, “I’m getting things in place,”
and mean it.
01/13/2016
Give your hands what they want to do—
what they love to do—
and get out of the way. Your body knows what to do.
Listen to your body
and get out of the way. We are always dismissing our hands,
and not giving them what they want to do.
We are always dismissing our feet,
and not going where they want to go. Our hands know.
Our feet know.
Our place is to get out of the way
and know what our hands and feet know. We think our heads know it all.
We think our intellect is the center of knowing.
Our intellect is for putting the pieces together.
It has no idea what the pieces are.
We have to listen to know.
We have to feel to know.
We have to sense to know.
And trust what our senses tell us. To do that we have to get out of the way.
When we get out of the way,
there is The Way,
with our name on it,
wondering what took so long.
01/13/2016
The place of our intellect
(the predominant function of our left hemisphere)
Would be that of discernment,
discretion,
observation,
reflection,
realization,
judgment,
evaluation,
processing,
and deciding. The place of instinct and intuition—
Of feeling and sensing
(the predominant functions of our right hemisphere)
is to grasp the allness of the situation,
and tell the left hemisphere what needs doing
so the left hemisphere
can figure out the best way to do it. Neither commands
or directs the other,
and neither can
ignore or dismiss the other.
Both work together
for the good of the whole. We have to know what all we know
and what to do about it, with it,
so as to serve the common good—
and live in the best interests
of all living things.
01/13/2016
We could take medication—
Illegal, prescription
or over the counter—
and/or, drink alcohol straight from the bottle,
to enable us to live our life,
(or bear it), We could change our life.
The great difficulty involved
in making the choice to change
suggests to me
that we don’t think change is possible,
or that we like the idea of change,
but don’t have what it takes
to see change through. The burden of change is great,
and the life that change
would result in is not attractive.
Thus, we don’t opt for change. We need a different way of thinking about life,
assessing life,
understanding life.
Life is not automatic.
When does life begin?
Not at conception.
Not at birth.
Not at a six figure income.
Not, Not, Not… Life begins when we wake up to life beyond—
and quite other than—
our idea of life.
We have to change our idea of life
and, open ourselves to the experience
of life in a way
that would make any sacrifice
in order to live it.
01/14/2016
Our Program for our Life
quickly becomes a Pogrom
when one hemisphere (usually the left)
overrides the other hemisphere (usually the right). When we have a reason for everything we do,
and a schedule for doing it,
and we can’t fit in a minute
of unstructured,
unscheduled, time—
or bear the idea of being off schedule,
or having nothing to do—
we are saying
“Damn the shoreline!
FULL SPEED AHEAD!” Who is bearing the pain
of our refusal
to feel the pain
of our life?
Who is the symptom carrier in our family? Who is the sickly one,
the one who is forcing us off schedule,
into waiting rooms
without end?
It could be the dog. What are we saying to ourselves—
what is being said to us—
that we aren’t heeding? We have to notice.
Every time we dismiss,
discount,
overlook,
ignore
anything in our life.
And bear the pain
of knowing.
01/14/2016
The Hero’s Journey
to the Land of Promise,
Resurrection,
New Life,
Enlightenment
and Peace,
Or wherever it is
you think we’re going
to be when we get there—
winds through the heart of Gethsemane
and across the face of Golgotha,
For each one of us,
time after time,
across all times and places,
throughout our life.
It only takes living
to know it is so.
01/14/2016
We get to what has always been called God
through our symptoms and our dreams. Both symptoms and dreams
are means the invisible world uses
to get our attention
and connect us with our life.
Our life flows from,
and leads to,
the Numen that has always been called God. If we want to know God,
we have to live our way there—
by aligning ourselves with the life that is ours to live,
that only we can live—
and bringing it to life within the life we are living. No theology,
no doctrine,
no dogma,
no talk, talk, talk… Just finding our life and living it.
And, like that, there’s God,
laughing because it’s taken us so long to get it.
01/15/2016If you are going to worship anything,
worship your life. Worship the invisible, intangible, connections
between your heart—
the heart of who you are,
the center of your life and being—
and the visible,
tangible,
actual,
real,
physical
expressions,
or ways of incarnating
you in the world of time and space. You are a poem.
You live your life
and write the poem for all to see. You bring you forth
in the way you live.
Your life is a work of art
through which you become
realized in the medium
of material reality
by the way you consciously
align yourself inner with outer. You bring the Numen—
the unspeakable,
unsayable truth
of you at the core of you—
to life in your life,
and create the miracle
of you in time and place. You worship life
by being/doing/exhibiting
the life you are.
01/15/2016If you are as vulnerable
as the rest of us are,
you will do anything
to be able to exercise control
over something.
And we all need
to recognize
how much we need
to be in charge,
because we are not
over any of the things
that matter. We have to come to terms with—
make our peace with—
our vulnerability. We have to be as vulnerable as we are.
which is totally,
absolutely,
unconditionally,
eternally No power.
No control.
Over any of the important things. We are always as though
we just stepped out of the womb.
We have to make our peace with that,
be at home with it,
work with it. Because that is where we are.
However, we fight against
the very idea of Terminal Vulnerability
all the way to the grave. We live out our life in denial,
At war with the very idea
that we should be vulnerable. Being fully alive begins
with our being as vulnerable as we are—
and working with it
to be who we are,
where we are,
how we are, How we do that is
the full scope
of the Hero’s Journey. Coming to terms with our vulnerability
is the essence
of that trip. Mindfulness leads the way.
01/15/2016
We cannot be as vulnerable as we are
without living out of a collaborative relationship
with the force emanating
from the center of ourselves. Inner alignment is the key
to handling all outer threats
to our peace and well-being. The Buddha, seated under the Bo Tree,
was grounded within,
at one with himself,
unmoved by all that would unseat him—
and that remained so throughout his life. Finding our center is the same thing
as finding our life.
Our life flows from our center,
our center expresses itself in our life. Our vulnerability requires us to seek our center,
which enables us to live our life
in the face of all that would engulf us. Find the bedrock,
the foundation stone.
Live from there.
01/16/2016
A National Parks Service motto says,
“Your safety is your responsibility.” We create the world we live in
by the way we live in it.
The key is to live in it consciously—
mindfully, compassionately, aware
of who we are
and what we are doing
and what its implications are. We have to live transparent to ourselves
in an opaque and shape-shifting world. People will not be who they say they are.
We will be blindsided in 10,000 ways.
We have to live so as to not blindside ourselves.
It’s hard enough with the lack of cooperation
from our circumstances.
We cannot refuse,
or fail,
to cooperate with ourselves. We have to be able to count on ourselves
by living in a good faith relationship with ourselves.
The closer we are truthfully,
knowingly,
aligned within,
the better goes our life
on the heaving waves
of the wine dark sea.
01/16/2016
Do things that are unheard of!
Live in ways no one would expect!
Be YOU in exceptionally creative,
unique
and beautiful ways! Invent yourself anew in each situation
that cries out for what you have to offer! Why disappear into the usual fare?
Why hold anything back? Spend yourself completely each day,
And fall into bed
dreaming of ways
to do it again tomorrow.
01/17/2016
Rise!
Shine!
Live to bring forth in each day—
in each moment of the day—
in each situation as it arises—
the wonder, amazement and joy
that babies and toddlers,
puppies, kittens and colts
bring forth simply by being who they are. We don’t have to TRY to be something special!
we only have to get out of the way
and be who we are,
without being underly or overly concerned
about what anyone is thinking,
or what it might look like
on our cumulative record,
or how something else
might spot us more of an advantage,
or enable us to better exploit the circumstances
for our immediate good and lasting benefit. Just live your life as only you can!
Find what is to be enjoyed and enjoy it!
Find what is to be loved and love it!
Find what is to be mourned and mourn it!
Find what is to be suffered and suffer it!
Be what is needed in each here and now of your living!
And let the outcome be the outcome!
01/17/2016 —
It takes stillness,
silence
and solitude
to achieve the level
of awareness
required to reflect
on our experience
to the point of acquiring
new realizations. We have to see what we look at
from all sides,
and enter the dance
of holding all things
in our awareness
without evaluation
or opinion. We cannot do that amid
distractions
and interruptions. People have their best ideas in the shower.
There is a reason for that.
Showers are generally
the quietest,
stillest
and most solitary
time of the day. We also have revelations in our sleep
for the same reason. We increase our chances
for reflection
and realization
by working time
for quiet,
focused,
attention
into our day. If you don’t think you
have anything to reflect on,
just be quiet
and still
for twenty minutes,
here and there. Watch what happens
without disruption
or interference.
Follow the thread of associations
and see where it goes. If it helps to write it out,
write it out.
01/18/2016
We can have too many responsibilities
to be responsible for anything.
To have fewer responsibilities
is to be more responsible. Taking refuge in many responsibilities
is to avoid the work,
pain
and suffering
that characterize our service
to our primary responsibility: We are to bring
our Heart/Soul/Psyche/Self
to life in our life. Our life revolves around
incarnating our Heart/Soul/Psyche/Self
within the circumstances
and context of our life. We live in allegiance to—
in honor of—
our Heart/Soul/Psyche/Self
in all that we do. We live devoted
to the experience of
the Numen within
and to its expression in our life. This is our work,
our practice.
Everything else falls
into place around this
core responsibility,
R\revolves around it,
flows from it. In order to carry out our responsibility
to our Heart/Soul/Psyche/Self,
we have to arrange
our life to take it into account. We have to attend Heart/Soul/Psyche/Self
throughout each day.
We have to dance with
Heart/Soul/Psyche/Self,
play with Heart/Soul/Psyche/Self,
discern Heart/Soul/Psyche/Self,
be Heart/Soul/Psyche/Self—
in our coming out
and our going in
from this day forward

01/19/2016 —

Theology and doctrine
have taken us as far as they can.

Explaining things that defy explanation,
making things literal
that can only remain forever metaphorical,
giving answers
without allowing them
to raise more questions,
saying again and again
what cannot be said at all,
telling us to “have faith”
through all of its internal contradictions
(Never mind the external ones
it doesn’t begin to address!)
past all of its impasses
beyond all of its obstructions

(“Faith in what?” we say
“Faith in what we tell you
Even though it makes no sense.
That’s what faith is, you know,
Believing things that make no sense!”)

bringing true the old prophesy:
“They have healed
the wound of my people lightly,
Saying, ‘Peace, peace,’
where there is no peace,”
making all things shallow,
insipid,
inane,
killing the souls they pretend to save.

Their only talking point is this:

“Without us,
there is only the empty wasteland
and the Void!”

And this:

“You will be sorry if you do not
heed our warning,
and believe what we tell you—
especially that part about the 10%!!!”

It is well past time
that we lay them to rest,
And take our chances
on the truth of our own experience.

We will discover—
If we seek the way
seekers have sought
through the ages—
the empty wasteland
is filled with the presence
of what has always been called God,
and the Void is nothing more
than the absence
of what we have been told was
lasting truth of greatest value.

And we will find there
wonderful silence
were we can hear at last
the beating of our own heart,
and see the light
that shines in the darkness,
and know the birthplace
of life and peace.

01/19/2016 —
Retirement invites
reflection,
rumination,
realization,
sitting quietly,
working things out,
Making connections,
seeing how things fit,
being amazed. We all find our own way
to wherever we will be
when we get there. No one can hand us a map,
a tour guide,
an itinerary with check points
and time and distance calculations
for us to gauge how well we are doing. The first half of life is spent
figuring out what to do to pay the bills.
The second half of life is spent
figuring out what we pay the bills to do. We sit quietly,
and reflect on what we
have done with our life,
and imagine what we might yet
do in the time left for living.
01/20/2016
We all are numinous at the core.
We all carry the Mystery—
the Numen— There is more to us than meets the eye,
any eye,
even our own.
There is more to us,
each of us,
than can be said. Not one of us has ever had a motive
that we fully understood.
We don’t know why we like what we like,
and don’t like what we don’t like,
or want what we want,
or do what we do. We are lost to ourselves.
cast away from ourselves,
exclude ourselves from our company,
ban ourselves,
shun ourselves,
ostracize ourselves,
because nothing good can come from us,
or be found anywhere near us,
we have to get away from ourselves
to have a chance. And we know it.
Healing begins
when we recognize our place
in our own displacement,
and turn to ourselves
to be reconciled
and take up the work
of becoming whole.
01/20/2016
Black people have always recognized,
faced,
and lived with the fact
of domestic terrorism
in the shape of white supremacy
that is now crossing racial lines
to take a more political form—
supported by the deafening silence
of Republican Party candidates
for the presidency,
and by elected Republican Party
members of congress
and state legislatures nationwide. The torching of the Lamborghini
owned by the Baton Rouge contractor
hired to remove 4 Confederate statues
from New Orleans
(who has since backed out of the contract)
cries out to be denounced and redressed. Republican leaders across the country
have to be unequivocal and relentless
in their opposition
to the kind of atmosphere
that cultivates the expression
of hatred,
racism,
extremism
and white supremacy. Their failure to do that
exemplifies who they are
at the level of their hearts—
and who they will be. Therefore, right-thinking people
of voting age in the United States
must register to vote,
vote in every election,
small and large,
and NOT vote for a Republican
or a member of the Tea Party
running as an independent
in any of those elections. Voting is our only tool
in creating a future
characterized by civility
and its concern for the common good
of all people—
which is how a democracy founded
“of the people, by the people, for the people”
should be. Register to vote. And don’t vote for a Republican.
In all elections,
great and small.
01/21/2016
We live to make the connections between worlds.
We live in this world as envoys, as incarnations,
of the Numen at the center—
at the heart—
of us all. We live in this world
as though we are a world a part—
as though we are from another world,—
as “strangers in a strange land.” And carry the cross
of contradiction, separation,
estrangement. Uniting worlds
by exposing incompatibilities
and dichotomies—
bringing, not peace,
but a sword. Creating divisions.
bearing the pain.
healing wounds
that make us whole,
and unite us
with the source of all
at the center of ourselves.
01/21/2016
The spiritual path is not the way to what we want.
There is no deal:
We give to God, God gives to us.
Thinking there is such a deal
is the fundamental problem
at the foundation of all bad religion. Give to Get.
The basis of every bad religion ever.
What can we do to make God happy
so God will give us
that land flowing with milk and honey,
where everyone lives out their life
and lives in good faith with everyone else? Baruch held out his hand
and asked for favors for being faithful,
and got his life as war booty. That’s as much as any of us get.
We have to square up with that
before stepping onto the spiritual path.
It is not the way to our idea
of having it made. The way that is the way
is the way of being who we are needed to be
by the context and circumstances of our life—
in each situation as it arises—
with nothing in it for us
beyond the satisfaction of a job well done. Why do it?
We get our life as a prize of war.
If that doesn’t interest you,
you don’t understand what it means to be alive. There is only one way to find out.
Be who you are needed to be
in the here and now of your living,
and step onto the path.
01/22/2016
Where do you go to be vulnerable and safe? We cannot be transparent to ourselves
without being vulnerable and safe.
The proper ratio
of vulnerability and safety
is essential to wholeness, health and life. We can be too much on guard
for our own good.
We have to be able to relax,
be known
and be safe,
in order to experience
and explore our life. All knowing flows from,
and leads to,
free and open inquiry
in an atmosphere of safety and vulnerability. Where do you go to be vulnerable and safe?
To experience both safety and vulnerability?
To be free?
01/22/2016
It is about getting—
and keeping—
our ratios right.
We live on a continuum,
between poles,
in every aspect of life. There is too close
and too distant,
Caring too much
and not caring enough,
Too many calories,
not enough.
Too much exercise,
not enough. Like that.
Around the clock.
Throughout our life.
All our life long. We live to live from the center,
away from the extremes—
Except when an extreme
is necessary to counteract,
counterbalance,
the opposite extreme. We are thermostats, of sorts,
keeping all facets of our life
within a normal distribution curve. It helps, I think,
check me out on this
in your own experience,
(Balancing me with you)
To take up this work—
the fundamental work of being human—
of maintaining right ratios across our life
consciously. To do it with awareness.
With compassionate mindfulness.
To know what we are doing.
And do it without hesitation
or loss of balance,
because that is what humans do.
We live from the center,
between extremes,
grounded in the heart of all matters,
for the good of the whole.
01/23/2016
Living in accord with the Tao
is putting ourselves
in the service
of the Self
at the center of ourselves
and all things. It is being clear about who
we are
and who we need to be,
and what is happening,
and what needs to be done about it,
in each situation as it arises— getting out of the way with our
wishes,
hopes,
fears
and desires,
and assisting what needs to happen
as a blessing and a grace
(which may, or may not,
be seen and recognized as such
by anyone there,
including ourselves). Jesus was crucified.
Lao Tzu lived in exile.
Don’t be looking
for peeled grapes
on satin pillows
as a reward
for living in accord with the Tao. Let your alignment with the Center
be reward enough,
be all the reward you need.
01/24/2016
The Bundy Gang
is the latest in a long line
of outlaws in the Old West,
and their ilk is not limited
to a geographical location. Terrorists and thugs
hide out under white sheets
in the Deep South,
and call themselves War Lords
and the Islamic State
in the Middle East,
Boko Haram in Nigeria,
Are referred to as the Cosa Nostra
in Italy and beyond,
and the Drug Cartel in Central America. It’s the same Do It My Way Or Die theme
everywhere you go.
The backwash of civilization.
Thugism in the form of the Goths,
Vandals
Huns
and Genghis Kann
is always at the gates,
and behind the scenes,
working to tear up what is being laid down
and destroy what is being achieved and created. Maybe we could talk to them.
Ask them to reconsider.
Reform their ways.
Be nice.
Or give everybody a gun. We never get far enough away from
the Shootout at the OK Corral,
and sow seeds of discord and discontent
with every advancement
and improvement imagined
and implemented. There is always something to not like,
and someone to not like it
and devise ways to blow it up.
The dance dances on
all through the eons of time
to music we can’t hear or resist.
01/24/2016
After the physical needs
of food, clothing and shelter are met,
comes along the spiritual (because it is “of the spirit,”
“of the heart”)
need for meaning. Here’s one for you:
Money is not meaningful. Here’s another one for you:
More money is not more meaningful. “What is money for?”
is the question.
“How is money to be spent
in the service of meaning?” Where are you going to find meaning? Here’s a hint for you:
What have been the most
meaningful experiences of your life?
The Top 10 meaningful experiences? That should provide you
with all the direction
you need in your search for meaning. But, in case, you are still wallowing in confusion,
here’s another hint for you:
Where are you most creative in your life?
Where does your imagination come most into play?
When is the last time you did something creative, imaginative? If you want to find meaning in your life,
you have to live in ways that are meaningful,
you have to do things that are meaningful—
the things that make your heart sing
and your little feet dance. Often.
01/25/2016 —
No one can tell us what is meaningful,
or where meaning is to be found. Meaning is personal to the core.
Something is meaningful if it is meaningful to US. We can appreciate the fact that it is meaningful to others,
but our relationship to it will never be what it is for them—
unless and until it becomes for us as it is for them. The search meaning is the search
for what is meaningful for, to, us.
A meaningful life is one lived in close association
with what has meaning in life for us. It is our place to be aware
of where meaning is found
and to be devoted
to what has meaning for us. We cannot allow ourselves
to be stripped of life’s meaning
by the ridicule of those
who are not moved by what moves us. We have to guard
what is meaningful when we find it,
and develop our relationship with it,
whether or not anyone shares our interest. Alan Watts once asked Joseph Campbell,
“Joe, what form does your yoga take?”
Campbell replied, “I underline passages.”
Remain loyal to what has meaning for you.
It will take you to interesting places,
and you will live an interesting life.
Of interest, that is, to you,
and you are the one that counts the most
when it comes to living your life.
01/25/2016
We have to rethink everything
we have been told and led to assume.
The cultural orientations toward
wealth,
privilege,
exploitation,
profiteering,
entertainment,
consumption,
and an ever-increasing standard of living
are fictions that cannot sustain life. Religion’s affiliation with,
and support of,
the cultural fictions disqualifies it
as “the voice of God,”
and leaves us in the position
of finding our own way
through all that is false
to the treasure hard to find—
which is the trustworthy
foundation,
source,
and legitimate goal of our life. Our search is the quest for life,
for that which is worth our life,
and provides life to all who find,
and align themselves with,
the Way of Life. To find our way there,
we have to rethink everything
we have been told
and led to assume. Our problem is knowing
what to make of our experience.
Things are not always what they seem to be.
How do we know what to think? Our understanding depends
upon the quality of our interpretation,
which is influenced by 10,000 things.
We must understand that our understanding is
hypothetical,
conditional,
incomplete,
awaiting further clarity. Wait and see.
Time will tell.
Do not rush to judgment. Listen.
Act
and evaluate the outcome.
Test your hypotheses.
Adjust your interpretation
to take the evidence into account.
Allow reflection upon experience
to create new realizations.
Allow reality to adjust your
interpretation/understanding of reality.
Live your way to the truth
of how things are and also are.
One step at a time.
01/26/2016
We have to rethink everything,
And we don’t want to rethink anything.
We want to be told what to think, and do.
And, therein lies the problem. Each of us has to do the work of growing up
And becoming who we are.
None of us is interested in the task.
The Way of Life winds through
Eden,
Gethsemane
and Golgotha
before arriving at the Empty Tomb—
and none of those way-stops is literal,
but all of them are real,
and waiting. We want a shortcut to Glory Land,
and seek out leaders who will take us there,
ignoring the fact that it is a life-long journey,
and we find our own way—
taking cues from the ones who have gone before,
understanding what they mean when they say,
“There is nothing to know
that has not always been known!
There is only doing
what has always been done!”
01/26/2016
We live to be transparent to ourselves—
To know who we are,
and who we also are,
and how it is with us on every level. Being transparent
to our contradictions and polarities
could immobilize us, but.
Being transparent to our paralysis
enables us to transcend our impotence,
see what needs to be done,
and do it. Being transparent to transcendence—
To that which transcends us
and to our ability to transcend ourselves,
our context,
our circumstances,
our chances,
and all that would inhibit us,
and render us incapable of acting—
allows us to live in accord with,
aligned with,
the Self at the center of ourselves,
and to assist in the production
of unimaginable wonders. All because we took up the work
of knowing who we are,
and who we also are,
and how it is with us, on every level.
01/26/2016
We stumble our way along all along the way,
bumping into strange guides,
tripping over false assumptions,
falling into deep pits
of squirming inferences,
crashing into one dead end after another,
taking wrong turns
that take us exactly where we need to be,
ignoring all warning signs,
yet heeding bad advice,
losing our way
to be saved again and again
by grace and good luck
(And where does that line lie?),
wishing there were a
more expedient and cost-effective way—
like maybe a pill to swallow,
or a short book to read,
wondering why it takes
not knowing what we are doing
to know what we are doing
when we say we don’t know what we are doing,
and be fine with that,
with just listening,
just looking,
just waiting to see,
not knowing what
we are looking for,
waiting on.
01/27/2016
There is a difference between wanting to be a photographer
and having to be one,
between wishing you could take pretty pictures,
and being unable to leave one untaken. The dance dances us,
the song sings us,
the music won’t leave us alone.
A lot of people have cameras
and don’t know how to use them
in order to make the most of them.
They have no idea what
the buttons,
knobs
and settings are for,
and have never read the manual,
and don’t intend to. They have a camera,
but they are not a photographer. A lot of people drive through scenes,
past photographs,
every day,
without seeing what they are missing. They think photographs
reside somewhere else,
like the Grand Canyon,
and hope to go there one day,
and maybe they do. They drive up to the view points and take a picture,
and post them online,
but they never saw the scene,
and they don’t see the picture. A lot of people want to be a cowboy,
And buy the hat,
and the jeans,
and maybe the boots,
and the spurs,
but they don’t have even one cow,
and have never been bucked off of a horse,
and never will be. Anybody can be a photographer,
just like anybody can be a cowboy.
Or a stand-up bass player.

One Minute Monologues 031

January 28, 2016 – March 25, 2016

01/28/2016 — How bored can you be?
The Boredom Test is the tipping point
of the spiritual journey
Boredom is another manifestation
of the Cyclops standing in the path.
If we run at the first sight of boredom,
We don’t have a prayer. A high boredom threshold
is a prerequisite for the journey.
Boredom is an opportunity
for reflection, rumination, walk-a-bouts,
A chance to examine our assumptions,
Explore our inferences,
Contemplate our experience,
Rethink our thinking.
We cannot rush through boredom
In the panic-driven obsession with
Taking our mind off our life.
Whatever we don’t want to face and consider
Is where we have to go:
“The treasure you seek lies in the depths
Of the cave you most don’t want to enter.” We call it boredom,
But it is fear.
01/29/2016
Living with conscious,
mindful,
compassionate awareness
Is all that is required for living well. We will live toward the good
when we live transparent to ourselves,
Within circumstances that are transparent to us. To see things as they are on all levels
Is to know what needs to be done about them—
And to know is to do. Who among us knowingly would withhold the good?
Who among us would
associate with anyone
who would knowingly withhold the good?
How could any of us face ourselves
(Transparent to ourselves, remember)
Knowingly withholding the good?
How could we bear the truth of the sham of our lives,
Talking righteousness and goodness
And knowingly withholding the good? The fabric of society is based
on “liberty and justice for all.”
Are we who we say we are, or not?
If not, why lie about it?
Why not say, “We don’t give a wet damn about _____!”
And fill in the blank
with all types of people
we don’t give a wet damn about?
What’s with posturing,
posing,
pretending,
shamming?
Why live a sham life?
If we aren’t going to be who we say we are,
We are left with a world of masks,
facades,
veneers
Held together with empty promises
and hollow alibis. Who, knowingly, can live like that?
01/30/2016
We live in the field of incongruity,
incompatibility,
impossibility, In order for things to be
what they need to be,
Something cannot be what it is. Things have to be what they are not
in order for things to work.
The Tea Party cannot accept gay people
and black people
and women
and immigrants…
The list is long. And say,
“People can’t be gay,
and black,
and women,
and immigrants…” Something has to give.
Something has to go so that something else—
Say peace and justice
and compassion
and good faith relationships among all people everywhere—
Might come. The chances of that happening
are about the same
As those of the sun rising
and setting at the same time.
And, here we are.
Something has to go
So that something else might come. And, in the meantime,
we are stuck with having to make things work
As well as they can work,
Here and now, just as it is. Here’s how we do it:
No illusions.
Awareness, awareness, awareness.
Laughing and playing at/with
the very idea that anything can happen,
Here and now, with things as they are. It’s impossible, of course,
But so was everything else f
rom the viewpoint of the cave dwellers.
And now we have grand pianos and jumbo jets. Live with peace,
justice,
compassion
and good faith relationships,
And see where it goes.
Laughing and playing
with the incongruities,
impossibilities
and absurdities.
I especially like the absurdities.
If life weren’t absurd,
it would be no fun at all!
01/31/2016
Recipes are guidelines.
Human beings love a Rule.
Love to be Ruled.
Love to Live By The Rules.
Because, I think, it gets us off the hook.
If we Live By The Rules,
No one can find fault with us,
And we don’t have to go
to the trouble of being responsible
for our own life.
We just do what we are told
without having to think for ourselves—
With all the risks that entails.
Recipes are guidelines
offering suggestions regarding what works.
Recipes are handy that way.
They shorten the time
between feeling like a pancake
and eating a pancake.
Rules keep us from
having to figure out from the start
what’s best in certain situations.
We remember what worked last time
and apply it this time.
Rules and recipes outlive their usefulness
when they stop working
To make things work
and start working to get in the way.
We have to have the freedom
of our own authority
To decide whether a rule or a recipe
is working or not working
In a particular situation,
And do what needs to be done
to make things work.
We set rules aside in order for things to work.
Jesus was out of accord
with every book of order of his day.
He healed on the Sabbath.
What’s the modern equivalent
of healing on the Sabbath in your case?
Swing for the fences.
02/01/2016
Think of your most important relationships,
and add your soul to the list.
Your relationship with your soul
is on a par with your relationships
with all the people who are most important to you.
You are the guardian of all of these relationships,
And your place is to see to it
that all of them get equal attention
and equal place in your life.
You cannot take your soul for granted.
Your role for what remains of your life
is to learn to tend the needs
and interests of your soul
As though it were one of your
most important relationships.
Where will you start?
When will you begin?
02/01/2016
Theology is mythology
that has been baptized
and declared to be literal,
actual,
absolute
and unchangeable
by those who said the earth was flat,
the center of the universe
and created at 6 PM on Saturday, October 23, 4004 BC. It’s past time we put all of that to rest,
and give ourselves to the task of finding,
and living in alignment with,
the Numen at the center of ourselves. Anticipating this turn, G.K. Chesterton said,
“When Jones follows his Inner Light, Jones follows Jones.”
Yet, when Jones follows
those who say they have the light,
Jones follows those who say they have the light.
What’s Jones to do?
Trust his own sense of what is right for Jones,
or do as he is told?
Jones has to decide
if he is going to live out of his own personal authority
and let the outcome be the outcome,
or let someone else tell him how to live.
Either way, it is all up to Jones.
What Jones says goes.
02/02/2016
Any excuse will do,
And excuses abound,
For not doing the things that need to be done,
For not living the life that needs us to live it,
For not finding the Numen at the center of ourselves,
For not living out of a conscious,
living,
relationship with it,
all our life long. “The Tao that can be said
Is not the Eternal Tao,”
But that doesn’t mean anything we say
Is the Eternal Tao.
We have to know what we are talking about.
We have to have an actual relationship
With the Numen within.
Substitutes abound.
Any excuse will do.
02/02/2016
Individuation, in the Jungian sense of the word,
means Becoming who you are built to be—
who only you can be—
growing up into who you are,”
And implies eccentricity
Cutting your own path,”
Being your own authority,
Finding your own way,
Marching to your own drummer,
Singing your own song,
Dancing your own dance,
And allowing your life to unfold,
To take shape,
Around you,
As it will. We do not will our life into a particular shape.
We sense how it needs to be lived,
And allow it to find its own form.
This is the purest magic there is,
Our life falling into place
As we live it.
02/02/2016
In any situation, “reasonable minds” can examine all the facts,
And interpret them differently,
Draw different conclusions,
Pursue different courses of action,
Based on the same facts.
The way we interpret what happens
Makes all the difference.
The way we see
Is not the only way to see.
Whether it is the best way to see
Depends on our interpretation of what “best” means.
“Best” in terms of what?
Everything about us is based on
our interpretation/evaluation/exegesis of everything about us.
We may live in a world of concrete facts,
But, how we live there is based
on the abstract and the ephemeral.
Our life is dependent upon the way our imagination
Interacts with our experience.
The facts are the playthings of ideas,
Which generate ideas,
Which transform the facts,
So that no fact exists in a vacuum,
Separate from some way of seeing,
perspective, understanding.
A meaningless fact means that it has no meaning.
A truly meaningless fact is inconceivable,
invisible, non-existent.
Our life is a disparate collection of interpretations.
And we take it seriously.
What are we thinking?
02/02/2016 — Bryce Canyon 2006—Bryce Canyon National Park, Utah, September 2006Your life is a horse you are riding home, but.
You don’t know where home is,
but the horse does.
Your job is to keep the horse
from stopping to eat grass,
And the horse will take you home. “Stopping to eat grass” is
losing your focus amid the 10,000 things.
We are not here to lose our focus.
We are here to pass through
space and time on our way home.
When we are focused,
We still have experiences that are a part of the journey.
Even stopping to eat grass is part of the journey,
But we cannot forget the journey.
We cannot lose sight of the journey in great fields of grass. Everything is a part of the journey
When we live with the journey in mind.
When we forget the journey,
Nothing is part of the journey. Our life will take us home
If we live with the journey in mind.
We are passing through this place on our way home,
Picking up experiences that will be a part
Of the stories we will tell
when we arrive back where we belong.
02/03/2016 — Mesquite Dunes 2006 03 — Death Valley National Park, California, April 2006It’s important what’s important—
What we recognize as important,
What we treat as important,
What is important. Nothing is more important
than knowing what is important,
And living as though it is.
How we treat one another is important.
More important than any ideology,
Or set of beliefs,
Or collection of customs and social codes. It is important that we treat one another lovingly
No matter how we feel.
“We don’t hate gay people,
or black people,
or immigrants,
or women,
or refugees!” say those who do.
Well, treat them lovingly, then. As it is, they can’t tell your not hating them
from your hating them
By the way you treat them.
So treat them lovingly.
If you don’t hate them,
Treat them so they will have
no reason to think that you may hate them. And, so it goes for all people,
Around the world,
Across the seas,
On the other side of town,
And just down the street.
02/03/2016 — Reelfoot Lake 31 HDR — Reelfoot Lake State Park, Hornbeck, Tennessee, November 4, 2015What is the nature of your productivity?
What do you produce that you are most pleased with?
That you most enjoy producing?
I produce ideas, thoughts, realizations, connections.
These generally take the form of
Poems, paragraphs, photographs or recipes.
In order to clear a space for this kind of production,
I also produce naps.
These are the things I most enjoy producing.
I also produce lists for errands and groceries,
Which I then tend to and procure.
I am convinced that productivity that pleases us
Is an essential component of a life well-lived,
a central aspect of health and wholeness.
And I wholeheartedly recommend
that you become aware of
The things you enjoy producing,
And produce them consciously and often,
Enjoying yourself immensely
In the work of your body, mind and soul.
02/04/2016 — Goodale 2015 37 Panorama — Goodale State Park, Camden, South Carolina, November 11, 2015Ulysses could have shortened his
Hero’s Journey considerably
By being mindfully,
compassionately,
aware of his circumstances. Ulysses was stupid every time
he had the opportunity to be stupid.
The Journey is about overcoming our stupidity. Put Lao Tzu, Jesus, or the Buddha in Ulysses’ place,
And you have a different Journey.
You have a Journey no one would care to read about,
Or go watch at the movies. We like to read about and watch
people being stupider than we would be.
It gives us that superior feeling that we crave.
All of our cultures have been based on superiority.
We love a Lord, and would love to be one,
And in striving to be one, at least on some level,
We throw in with Ulysses on a Journey we despise. Lao Tzu, Jesus and the Buddha
Were superior to being superior.
And were content to be themselves.
Mindfully, compassionately, aware of their circumstances.
Offering what was needed to the moment of their living. And, then, there is Ulysses.
What kind of hero would you like to be?
02/04/2016 — Cadillac Mountain 2009 — Acadia National Park, Bar Harbor, Maine, October 2009Experience is the catalyst
uniting our conscious ego
with our unconscious self,
Enabling the transformation
by which unconscious becomes conscious,
Incarnation is realized,
And the virgin birth,
Or the coniunctio,
Is made real in our own life, In order for the miracle to happen,
We have to experience our experience,
Be present with it
And receive it with right interpretation.
If you think that’s easy,
Hop in the saddle
And tell them to open the chute.
02/04/2016 — Edisto Beach Sunrise 09 — Edisto Beach State Park, Edisto Island, SC, January 29, 2015We are afraid there is nothing to us.
We are afraid we are nothing.
We are afraid of being nothing, of nothingness.
We have looked and can’t find anything there.
We have thought about it, and cannot think of anything
That we are, or might be, or could be
If we put our mind to it.
We have tried putting our mind to it,
And nothing happens.
Just as we thought. So, we live to take our mind off of it,
Off of who we are and what is to become of us.
We live too fast to think,
Too distracted to think,
Too drunk or stoned to think.
We buy into the action.
We don’t care what kind of action.
Diversion. Anything.
To escape nothing. Nothing is the Cyclops we dread the most.
We have nightmares of the Void.
Utter emptiness.
Falling, falling…
Flailing about forever.
We have to do the terrible thing:
Face it.
Our fear.
Nothing.
And step into it.
And see if we fly. On the other side of nothing is the self at the center
With a life waiting for us to live.
Faith is trusting this to be so,
All evidence to the contrary notwithstanding.
We owe it to ourselves to find out
If we are as hopeless as we believe we are.
02/04/2016 — Scott Creek Sunset 04 — Edisto Beach State Park, Edisto Island, South Carolina, January 29, 2015We have to believe in our destiny
In the life that is ours yet to live,
That only we can live. We have to believe that there is more to us than meets the eye
Any eye, even our own. Because what is left to us if we do not?
If we do not believe in ourselves,
And what we are capable of,
And what we might do with the gifts that are ours,
The gifts we don’t even know we have,
Because we have not dared to hope we might have a gift,
And have not have had the courage to trust that we do
Beyond all reason and doubt,
What is left of us? Believe that there is you
The you you know yourself to be
With your history, your past, your prospects and resources.
And believe that there is Also You
The you you have it in you to be,
Even now, even so. Give you to Also You,
And say, “I have nothing to lose so,
I am handing myself over to you,
In complete faith that you can do more with me than I can,
And I will trust that to be so, no matter what happens,
From this day forward.
Beginning now it is this way between us:
Thy will, not mine, be done.
This is my liege oath to you!” Mean it.
Do it.
It has always come down to this through the ages.
02/05/2016 — Kings Mountain Farm 21 B&W — Sorghum Press, Kings Mountain State Park, Blacksburg, South Carolina, December 14, 2015Our experience with our life has to impact our life,
Or it is wasted.
Experience is for reflection,
For realization,
For making connections,
For seeing what fits and what does not fit,
For evaluating what we have been told,
And determining what can be used,
And what is to be thrown away. Yet, we too often gauge our experience
In light of what we are told it is supposed to be.
If something is “not the way we experience it,”
Our experience is discounted
And we are encouraged to toe the “company line”
To see things like they are supposed to be seen. We are disconnected from
the validity of our experience early on,
And the light goes out of our eyes
Long before we are laid to rest.
02/05/2016 — Spring Willow 2004 — Country Park, Greensboro, NC, April 2004Magic happens when we wake up
and begin to see things as they are.
Connections are everywhere.
Signs and wonders whirl around us.
Meaningful coincidences are common occurrences.
Doors open,
Paths appear,
Benevolent guides point the way,
And we are at peace with the universe,
And at home in the world. You would think we would be more interested in
Waking up and seeing things as they are.
02/06/2016 — Walnut Tree 2002 — Cades Cove, Great Smoky Mountains National Park, Townsend, Tennessee, September 2002Johnny Manziel cannot cooperate
with his own best interest.
This is the essence of mental illness:
Being unable to live with your own best interest at heart.
Being incapable of living in good faith with yourself.
Being compelled to shoot yourself in the foot
again and again until you bleed to death.
Or shooting yourself in the head to speed up the process. Addicted to self-destruction.
Johnny Manziel is every addict we know,
or read about in the papers.
Drugs and alcohol get all the press,
But food addiction in all its forms is right in there with them,
And sex addiction,
And physical/verbal/emotional abuse addiction… I once thought I wanted to be a psychotherapist,
But I realized early on in my apprenticeship
That the people who needed the most help
Were unable to help themselves.
They willed to not help themselves.
Try to fix that without their cooperation! And they cannot cooperate in their own recovery, reclamation.
They cannot.
That’s mental illness for you.
And don’t hold those with that condition at fault.
You can’t wake yourself up any more than
they can wake themselves up.
And all any of us ever need is waking up.
And some of us do wake up. It is the hope for us all.
That one day, we will wake up.
So we buy the mentally ill as much time as we can
Against their will
Hoping they will wake up.
Some do.
02/07/2016 — Wild Goose Island B&W — Saint Mary Lake, Glacier National Park, Montana, September 2004Allow me to whine and complain. The ground rule of photography is this:
“You Pays Your Money, And You Takes Your Chances.” You invest in the equipment and in the travel expenses,
And spend the time it takes getting there,
And maybe the photo is there, and maybe it isn’t. Five things are required for a worthy photograph:
Subject,
Lighting,
Focus,
Exposure,
and Composition.
A landscape photographer is in control of three of them. If the subject is a mountain or a waterfall,
Conditions determine its availability.
If it is a moose or a grizzly bear,
You may have to wait past your departing flight time.
The moon rise or set, like the sun rise or set,
May be clouded in for a week,
Or two.
The light can be terrible forever.
So you go, knowing that you may have to go back,
With no guarantees even then. Speaking of “then,”
Then you grow old,
And with the advent of your 72nd year,
You notice the presence of what I like to call “creeping disinclination,”
And you sense “rampant disinclination” gathering itself
Just around the bend.
What are you going to do with another moon rise at the beach,
Anyway? How long will you be interested in continuing to
Pay Your Money And Take Your Chances?
What with arthritic knees
And the comfort of coffee when you like it,
The way you like it?
02/07/2016 — Reelfoot Lake 32 HDR — Reelfoot Lake State Park, Hornbeck, Tennessee, November 4, 2015All healing is miraculous. We create conditions favorable to the healing process,
And turn things over to the body’s innate healing capacities
Which includes the body’s environment,
Both physical, emotional and spiritual
(And by “spiritual” I mean “unconscious,”
That is, “All of that which we are not conscious of.”
I do not mean any
of the supposed religious hierarchies of the “other world”). The body’s environments
Inner and outer
Are either healing environments,
Or they are toxic environments.
Or some combination of both.
Needless to say, we fare better in healing environments,
And owe it to ourselves and all sentient beings
To create, and live in, environments
That are conducive to our health on all levels. That we do not do that is curious,
And exemplifies the fact that we do not much care about
Living in ways that serve our best interest.
We will not devote ourselves to the care of body and soul.
We prefer to live “any old way at all,”
And take our chances.
To “follow the course of least resistance,”
And hope for the best. We could do better and don’t.
We prefer to take pills
And have surgeries,
Rather than change our diet
And our life style.
We blame the cruel fates,
Instead of assisting the benevolent powers,
And never ask ourselves whose side we are on.
02/08/2016 — Hatteras Sunset — Cape Hatteras National Seashore, Ocracoke Island, Outer Banks, North Carolina, October 2004We are at war with life,
And can’t make up out minds
Whether we want to live it
as it could be lived or not.
We settle too easily for less than life could be,
Which is just above death,
Just enough alive to not be declared dead,
And buried,
But fighting life—the life that could be lived—all the way. We don’t exercise,
We don’t follow a healthy diet,
We smoke,
Drink too much alcohol,
Do drugs—
prescription, over the counter, illegal.
And we fall into some easy enough routine
That allows us to pay the bills and get by.
What? We don’t pursue the gift.
Why not?
Why do we not live in the service of the gift?
Dead things float with the current,
Go with the flow.
It doesn’t matter to them where they end up.
Why do we forsake the gift?
We are burning daylight.
There is less time each day.
Why renounce and abandon the gift?
02/08/2016 — Bass Harbor Lighthouse — Bass Harbor, Maine, September 2004My wife and I live “cornered into” a small section of woods,
16 to 20 acres perhaps
With a strip to the north and a larger portion to the west.
It is a short time until the rampant development
That is sweeping all the woods away
Devours “ours” as well. Until then, I relish the sound of the wind through the trees,
Which are pines and a good selection of hardwoods,
And am “at one” with my—all of our—ancestors
Who lived with the sound of the wind through the trees,
And did what was theirs to do. And, when it is no more,
I will adjust,
and remember.
02/08/2016 — Camden Harbor — Camden, Maine, September 2004We have to have the freedom of our own mind,
And have to be free to change our mind
As the result of our on-going reflection on our experience. Changing our mind is an inside job,
And cannot be forced upon us from without.
We have to know when we are being “talked into” something,
And stop it “in its tracks.” “I appreciate your viewpoint, and will take your suggestion
under advisement,” is all we need say
In defining our boundaries and drawing our own line. We are perfectly capable of experiencing our experience,
And deciding for ourselves what is valid and what is not,
What is working and what is not, but.
We have to experience all of our experience,
And catch ourselves in the act of being selective
In favor of old conclusions and tacit assumptions. We must live transparent to ourselves,
Open to the full range of our experience,
If we hope to be able to change our mind
In light of evidence to the contrary
Of our preconceived notions
and comfortable prejudices.
02/09/2016 — Scott Creek Sunset 06 — Edisto Beach State Park, Edisto Island, South Carolina, January 29, 2015We have to be our own heroes.
We are the only ones who can save us.
We do it by waking up,
Coming to our senses,
Seeing, hearing and understanding,
And changing our mind about what is important. We don’t do it to avoid hell and get to heaven.
We do it to be who we are,
Fully alive in the time and place of our living,
Doing the work that makes our heart sing. The monsters that have to be bested,
Again and again are
Fear and Lethargy,
Which is the idea that it is too late,
That it won’t do any good,
That it is no use
And too much trouble,
And maybe we will start tomorrow. No one can talk us into doing what must be done.
We have to stand ourselves up,
And walk into our life,
Living it to the hilt in the time left for living,
No matter what.
02/10/2016 — Black Bayou 15 HDR — Black Bayou Lake National Wildlife Management Refuge, Monroe, Louisiana, November 2, 2015Consciousness carries with it
the possibility of reflection and examination,
Of imagining potential scenarios
and considering different responses,
rehearsing an event before it happens
in order to guide it toward an outcome
that we rank as being better than others we foresee. With consciousness comes
the designations good, better, best,
And bad, worse, worst. Which opens the door to ethics and morality,
culture,
norms,
codes,
standards,
laws
and civilization. With the arrival of consciousness,
We break with the natural world,
And begin to walk two paths at the same time. There is the path of nature,
Where might makes right
and the law of the jungle prevails,
And the path of civilized humanity,
Where the end does not justify the means,
And justice and kindness
call us beyond brutality and ruthlessness. The way of nature still courses through our veins,
But, knowing, we know the call
of a different way, and guilt is born.
And forgiveness, and accountability,
and the necessity of putting things right. We live bearing the cross of two competing natures,
And must bear it consciously,
with mindful compassionate awareness,
If the weight of our distant past
Is not to destroy the hope of our future,
And that of the world.
02/10/2016 — Cane River Pier at Sunset — Natchitoches Parish, Louisiana, July 2004The more we can be mindfully,
compassionately,
non-judgmentally
aware of,
and present with,
a moment,
a situation,
the more we can hold the moment
in our awareness,
without judging
or willing
or resisting
or influencing
or directing
or compelling,
but just being with the moment,
aware of all that is there with us—
the colors,
the lighting,
the objects,
the people,
the emotional tone,
the atmosphere,
the “feel” —
what is foreground
and what is background,
and how, with a shift of focus,
background becomes foreground,
and foreground background,
and how our observing the moment
takes us out of the moment,
yet influences the moment
by removing ourselves from it,
so that the moment
gets its direction from sources
other than ourselves
and the impact we might otherwise have. The more we so this,
the more we are open to,
and aware of,
the presence of “More Than Meets The Eye”
in each moment,
and can see,
and feel,
how this moment,
is an extension of the last moment,
and a precursor of the next one,
and how all of life is in movement,
flowing from one moment to the next,
like a symphony on a cosmic scale,
being played by an orchestra
we cannot hear.
02/11/2016 — Goodale 2015 38 B&W — Goodale State Park, Camden, South Carolina, November 11, 2015Our imagination is a powerful tool
in the service of good or evil,
life or death.
Everything of human origin
is the creation of someone’s imagination.
Arrowheads,
pottery shards,
grand pianos,
atomic bombs…
It all came from “nothing but” our imagination.
We can imagine ourselves sick,
and well.
Imagine ourselves bound and free.
Imagine ourselves dead and alive.
Imagination used mindfully
is a boon to existence.
Used mindlessly,
it is the end of all things.
Observe how you use your imagination
and how it arranges your outcomes,
and impacts your life.
Observe how your awareness of things,
changes things.
02/12/2016 — Kings Mountain Farm 13 HDR Panorama — Kings Mountain State Park, Blacksburg, South Carolina, December 14, 2015Self-discipline does it.
It is key ingredient to the Hero’s Journey,
We can’t take the first step without it. Fear and Lethargy
(Sometimes experienced as Disinclination
maybe tomorrow,
maybe later,
maybe one day,
maybe soon)
are the dragons,
the monsters,
the manifestations of the Cyclops
standing in our way
(James Hollis).
Mindful,
compassionate,
non-judgmental awareness
can point the way, but
after we know clearly what needs to be done,
we still have to do it.
And stay with it.
Over time.
For the long haul. Ben Howland says,
“Winning or losing, it’s still a grind.”
Nothing makes it easy,
doing what is to be done.
We stand ourselves up and step into it each day
throughout the day,
everyday,
swimming up stream against
our natural tendency
to go with the flow
and let nature take its course. We are working against nature,
against our own nature!
It is not the natural thing
being a True Human Being,
being the Hero on her, on his, own journey!
We have to overcome all obstacles to do it,
especially the self-imposed ones.
Always the question:
“Whose side are we on?”
02/12/2016 — Mountain Fall 2004 — Blue Ridge Parkway, North Carolina, October 2004Jesus said on two different occasions:
“If you aren’t with me, you are against me!”
And,
“If you aren’t against me, you are with me!” Apparently, there is no possibility of neutrality in the matter.
My take on everything Jesus is said to have said
is that he is the mouthpiece of the Numen—the Self—the Truth
at the center of us all. When Jesus speaks, WE are talking
to ourselves,
about ourselves,
calling ourselves to come
to our senses
and join together with ourselves. It is the same with everyone of us
who has approached True Human Being-hood:
The Buddha,
Lao Tzu,
Tevya,
Yogi Berra,
Hester Prynne,
Betty White… The call is clear:
“Off the fence with you!
Out of the recliner!
Into the fray!
Into the action!
Make a choice!
Move it NOW!” No hiding our talent,
our gift,
our Self in a sealed Mason Jar,
buried in a deep hole,
under a large rock,
taking no chances
on getting something wrong!
Every day we live
on our side,
or against ourselves.
Every day.
02/12/2016 — Pines 2004 — Down East North Carolina, March 2004Jesus was fond of saying, “Those with ears, let them hear!”
It’s the same as saying, “You have to know what I mean
before you can understand what I’m saying.”
Or, “You have to have thought about this,
wrestled with it,
before you can grasp what I have to say about it.”
Or, “You can only hear
what I am articulating
if you have cultivated
and nurtured
and watered it to the point
of bursting into bloom
when the light strikes it.
Otherwise, all will be dark,
no matter how brightly the sun shines.” In every generation there are those
who say what needs to be said,
and those who can hear what is being said.
And there are those who say
only what has been said,
And those who can hear
only what has been said.
And there we are.
02/13/2016 — Price Lake Blues — Julian Price Memorial Park, Blue Ridge Parkway near Blowing Rock, North Carolina, April 2004Jesus came healing on the Sabbath,
keeping company with the “unclean”
(People with leprosy
or some chronic illness
or injury,
or those simply too poor
to pay the Temple tax,
and obviously afflicted by God
for some unpardonable sin,
hence not to be acknowledged
for fear of becoming guilty by association),
with women and tax-collectors. Jesus was out of accord with every book of order of his day,
yet, in the Sermon on the Mount, said,
“Do not think I have come to abolish the Law.
I have come to fulfill it.”
And then, he proceeds through the rest of the Sermon
to lay aside the Law with things like:
“You have heard it said…
But I say unto you…” Jesus very deliberately lived
so as to abolish the letter of the Law,
the written Law,
so as to fulfill the spirit of the Law,
doing what needed to be done in each situation as it arose,
without regard to what was supposed to be done
according to Jewish Law or social code. But that didn’t mean people were free to do
whatever they felt like doing.
“If you know what you are doing,” he said
to a man he found working on the Sabbath,
“You are blessed.
But if you don’t know what you are doing,
you are accursed and a transgressor of the Law.” And he prayed for the people at his crucifixion saying,
“Father forgive them, they know not what they do.”
Everything revolves around knowing what we are doing—
around living a considered life—
around living consciously,
mindfully,
compassionately,
non-judgmentally,
aware of the time
and place of our living,
and what is being called for there,
what is being asked of us there,
and complying in the moment
out of a heart that
sees,
hears
and understands what is being asked of it. As Jesus might have said,
“You all have a heart!
Go live in its service!”
It is never more difficult than that.
02/13/2016 — Reelfoot Lake 33 HDR — Reelfoot Lake State Park, Hornbeck, Tennessee, November 4, 2015There are two of us living one life.
The one we are conscious of,
And the one we are not conscious of.
The conscious one is here to become conscious
Of the one we are unconscious of—
to bring to life in the life we are living
the life we are capable of living
in collaboration with the one we are
to become conscious of. The question, then, is always pertinent,
and difficult to answer with clarity and certainty:
Whose side are we on?
How do we know?
How can we be sure?
Who is piloting our boat on its path through the sea? We have to read the signs,
interpret our dreams
and our wanderings of mind and body,
consult the Inner Other,
practice mindful,
compassionate,
non-judgmental
awareness
of our interior and external worlds,
and work to put ourselves in accord
with that which is seeking to be in accord with us. All that should keep us occupied
for the rest of time.
02/13/2016 — Price Lake Blues Two — Julian Price Memorial Park, Blue Ridge Parkway near Blowing Rock, North Carolina, April 2004The work of finding our life and living it
is carried out on two different fronts at the same time. There is the matter of establishing connection,
and putting ourselves in accord,
with the Invisible Other at the core,
heart,
ground,
foundation
of our life and being. Robert A. Johnson’s book “Inner Work”
will be a helpful guide
for this part of what is ours to do. The other matter is that
of developing
and deepening our ability
to be mindfully,
compassionately,
non-judgmentally
aware
of the time and place
of our living,
both internally and externally. The work of Jon Kabat-Zinn
with Mindfulness Based Stress Reduction, or MBSR,
will be a very helpful resource here.
You Tube videos are readily available,
and Jon has several books out on the subject. Our life has a depth and breadth
that we cannot imagine,
which it waits for us to experience and explore.
02/14/2016 — Lake Crawford 11 HDR — Kings Mountain State Park, Blacksburg, South Carolina, December 14, 2015Self-reflection leads to self-exploration,
And self-examination,
And self-realization,
And self-discovery,
And self-correction,
And self-development,
And personal growth.
Seeing things as they are
Non-judgmentally and compassionately
Transforms things.
If you want to change the world,
See everything there exactly as it is,
With eyes of compassion
and without judgment,
Starting with yourself.
Used in Short Talks On Contradiction, etc., 02/14/2016 — Smoky Moon — Clingman’s Dome Parking Lot, Great Smoky Mountains National Park, October 2004Several things rank as essential life tasks: Mindfulness, which implies compassion
and detachment to the degree that is non-judgmental.
Self-transparency and keeping good faith with oneself.
Integrity in the sense of living in ways
that are aligned with,
and integral to,
what is deepest, truest and best about us.
The self-discipline necessary
to do what is ours to do in each situation as it arises.
Making the trade-offs
that are required of us throughout our life,
which implies saying no to ourselves
and no to others when that is appropriate
and called for by our circumstances.
Living toward the center and away from the extremes—
balancing,
reconciling,
integrating, the opposites,
contradictions
and polarities
of our life,
and bearing consciously the pain
of maintaining the tension
between/among dichotomies
that can only be recognized, not reconciled.
Making our peace with the way things are,
which includes making our peace
with the lack of peace in important areas of our life. I’m sure I’ll think of something more to add to the list,
but if we cover these items,
we’ll be just fine.
02/15/2016 — Black Bayou 16 HDR — Black Bayou National Lake Wildlife Refuge, Monroe, Louisiana, November 2, 2015President Obama lives in the service
of what he considers to be the right thing to do.
The Affordable Health Care Act,
providing health care to millions of people is one example.
His support of Gay Marriage is another.
Republican members of Congress
have attempted to repeal the Health Care Act over 50 times,
and attempted to defund it many times as well. Republicans in congress,
Republican governors,
at least one Republican Chief Justice,
and other Republican elected officials
have opposed,
and attempted to undermine
and prevent gay marriages on a number of occasions. What is clearly the right thing to do on one level
is clearly the wrong thing to do on another level.
A photographic rule applies:
The brighter the light,
the darker the shadows.
Bright sunshine casts deep shadows. Reasonable minds can look at any fact
and interpret it in radically different ways.
Is it the right thing to do,
or the wrong thing to do?
Who is to say?
Whatever you think is right,
someone is going to think is wrong.
Who decides what is right, what is wrong? Jesus broke the Law
and justified it on the grounds
of knowing what he was doing.
That meant at least two things: A) He felt that the human need and right
to be helped superseded any law
that might interfere with,
or prevent, that help from being offered, and
B) He was quite ready to pay the price
of his civil,
non-violent, Jesus was a conscientious objector
willing to serve his conscience
to death on the cross.
Was he right, or was he wrong? There is never going to be 100%
world-wide agreement
on questions of right and wrong.
Hitler thought he was right,
and had followers who agreed with him,
to the death.
What does conscience know?
Where does conscience come from?
What is the origin of scruples,
qualms,
values,
compunction
and the moral sense?
What is right?
What is wrong?
How do we know?
Who is to say? Mindfulness leads the way.
We have to be transparent to ourselves
and aware of the origin
and ground of our values.
Who says that what we say is so?
Where do we get our ideas of right and wrong?
What makes us think we are right?
That we know what we are doing?
That we are being like Jesus,
and not like Hitler?
02/16/2016 — Goodale 2015 39 B&W — Goodale State Park, Camden, South Carolina, November 11, 2015Knowing what we are doing
Means knowing when we are kidding ourselves
About knowing what we are doing. It means knowing that we don’t know what we are doing
A good portion of the time. It means knowing what we don’t want to know,
Facing what we don’t want to face:
The truth about the aloneness and vulnerability
Of ourselves before the responsibility of our life. We need help with what is to be done.
Two things make this a problem.
We aren’t taught how
to access the help that is “right there”
“A very present help in time of trouble.”
2. It isn’t the kind of help we want.
We want what we have no business having.
And want to know how to have it.
We want help in having what we want. The joke is on us.
Help with knowing what to do
Is not the same help
as help with having what we want.
We can have the first, not the second.
The question we have to answer is this:
Do we have what it takes to know what to do
When it means doing what we don’t want?
How far do we live from
“Thy will, not mine, be done”?
02/17/2016 — April Cascade — Great Smoky Mountains National Park, Gatlinburg, Tennessee, April 2004Your life has meaning
When you do the things that make your heart sing. How long has it been?
Has it been so long that you laugh at the idea of a singing heart? Start with what once made your heart sing.
How far back do you have to go to find yourself lost
In what you were doing?
Begin there.
Do what once was filled with meaning and see where it leads. The old Alchemical formula was
“One book opens another.”
Just so, one engaging activity
leads to another.
Your heart is dying to sing.
Take it to the music.
02/17/2016 — Boulder Beach — Otter Point, Acadia National Park, Bar Harbor, Maine, September 2004We have to dig our own gold.
Or pan for it.
It is our place to search out
The treasure hard to find.
No one can hand it to us,
Much less tell us about it,
Explaining it to us,
Even in great detail,
Outlining it for us,
Defining it,
Describing it,
Quoting the saints,
And the sacred texts,
And the wise, old, masters
Telling us to take their word for it,
Perhaps threatening us with the Everlasting Fires of Hell
If we don’t. No one knows the nature
of the treasure
we alone seek,
and will know it
when we find it. There are no shortcuts,
Or easy routes,
Or fast tracks to glory land.
Joseph Campbell said it:
“The treasure you seek
Is in the depths of the cave you most don’t want to enter.”
And we have to go there,
against our will.
Enter,
and descend into the depths.
02/19/2016 — Sunset Reflection — Price Lake and Grandfather Mountain, Julian Price Memorial Park, Blue Ridge Parkway, Blowing Rock, North Carolina, June 2006The Christian Church calls it “salvation.”
But it is coercion. Always has been. The threat of hell and eternal agony.
The promise of heaven and infinite glory.
Taxing the flock
With “free will offerings”
And talk of “merit.”
Making disciples of all nations.
Dragging people where they are not ready to go.
The end justifying the means.
Concealing in the name of revealing.
No questions allowed.
Take it all on faith.
Believe what you’re told.
Do what they say.
Betray your own soul
by betting everything on it,
And trust yourself to it,
To show you the way.
02/20/2016 — Reelfoot Lake 34 HDR — Reelfoot Lake State Park, Hornbeck, Tennessee, November 4, 2015Our life is our responsibility.
We keep looking for divine intervention to make it easy,
Or even possible,
But we have the tools and have to learn to use them.
The primary tool is mindfulness.
Mindfulness initiates, implements, utilizes, the other tools:
Awareness,
intuition,
instinct,
compassion,
understanding,
imagination,
creativity,
resiliency,
courage,
self-discipline,
..
All of the traits,
characteristics,
temperaments
and values
That make us human
And make life livable. We come packed with all we need.
We are a Swiss Army Knife of responses.
And it is up to us to square up to the fact
That it is up to us,
And find the response
appropriate to the occasion,
On every occasion.
Kings Mountain Farm 16 HDR Panorama — Kings Mountain State Park, Blacksburg, South Carolina, December 14, 2015Joseph Campbell said, “Follow your bliss
and don’t be afraid,
and doors will open
where you didn’t know
there would be doors.” We hear that and think
there is some kind of magic
at work in the universe
to assist us in the work
to get what we want.
We even say
“The Universe will help you,”
like the settlers who moved into the Dakotas
were told by the church of their day,
and told themselves,
“Rain will follow the plow.”
It didn’t.
The Universe is completely uninvested in us. We hear “Follow your bliss,”
and think that means, “Do what you want.” Campbell also said, talking about Abraham Maslow,
“Maslow says that people live for five things:
Survival,
Security,
Personal Relationships,
Prestige,
and Self Development.
Yet, these are precisely not the values
that a mythically inspired person lives for. A person who is really gripped by a dedication,
by a zeal,
will sacrifice all these things
for the sake of his or her own passion.
These five values are the values
people live for who have nothing to live for.
Nothing has seized,
caught,
or driven these people ‘spiritually mad.’
These people aren’t worth talking to.
These people are bores.” Your “bliss” will break your heart
and eat your life alive.
We “die to ourselves”
and live in the service of our heart’s true passion,
of our bliss,
in a “Thy will, not mine, be done” kind of way. That’s when the magic happens
but, it is not that our way is served
and we get what we want.
The magic happens when we surrender
our way and serve our heart’s true purpose.
Then, we put ourselves in accord with our life,
and we see things that were meaningless to us before. Then, there are doors where before there were no doors,
and people to help us who were nowhere around
because we could not see them,
focused as we were on our wants,
our fear,
our lethargy. In the service of our own goals and dreams,
desire, fear and lethargy
jam the signals coming to us
from all around us,
and we cannot see
or hear
or understand
what is available to us
in all times and places. Once we step away
from our idea for our life,
die to ourselves,
and live aligned with our heart’s true purpose,
there it all is,
open doors
and helping hands.
But,
it comes with a price. Golgotha and the empty tomb
are metaphors that are realities
in the lives of all of those
who know what I’m talking about.
We all die to what we thought was life
in order to live the life
at the center of our heart.
Death and resurrection,
does not mean everyone
at the end of time,
but one person at a time.
02/21/2016 — Lake Katherine Panorama — Anne Springs Close Greenway, Dairy Barn Access, Fort Mill, South Carolina, December 12, 2015We aren’t here to “make something happen,”
So much as to “do what needs us to do it.”
To bring ourselves forth to meet the situation as it arises. We have to pay the bills, of course,
But our place here is to meet the moment
As it needs to be met
As only we can meet it. This means we have to get to know ourselves. Compassionately.
Non-judgmentally. This is who we are,
and who we also are.
These are our interests and our gifts.
These are not.
This is what is happening.
This is what needs to happen.
This is what needs to be done about it.
This is where we fit in. How would we do it?
We are to live in ways
Appropriate to the occasion
As only we can.
02/21/2016 — Green River Horseshoe 2007— Dead Horse Point State Park, Moab, Utah, September 2007The Bible is a treasure trove of myth and metaphor,
Speaking from,
and to,
the heart of “the human condition.” If it could be understood and received as such,
The world would be enriched overnight.
The Servant Songs collected in the book bearing the name of Isaiah,
Speak to us, of ourselves:
“He was despised and rejected by others,
A man of sorrows and acquainted with grief…
Surely, he has borne our grief and carried our sorrows,
Upon him was the chastisement we all deserved…
By his wounds we are healed.” We know him, her, well.
He, she, lives within us all,
And enables us to put on our public face
And stride into each day.
But he, she, knows what we dare not remember,
And carries in our behalf the woundedness
Of the blows we have had to put behind. Our Suffering Servant serves us well,
And by his, by her, leave,
We live. Perhaps, if you give yourself time alone, and reflect,
You will know of whom I speak,
And show him, show her,
the kindness of your gratitude
And devotion.
02/22/2016 — Mirror Mirror 04 — Goodale State Park, Camden, SC, November 11, 2015Our life has been compared to a slippery slope and a razor’s edge.
We are always one wrong move away from catastrophe,

And one right move away from having it made for now.
What’s it going to be?

There is a basketball adage, “One bad shot leads to more bad shots.”
And another, “Take care of the ball!”
And one more, “Let the game come to you,”
Which means “Wait for the door to open and walk through.”
Or, “Look for the opening and take the good shot.”

We try to create something that isn’t there,
Try to make something happen out of season,
Try to force our way into being,
Will our way along.
And all the while,
We are always one slight shift of attitude or perspective
From the best life has to offer,
in the time and place of our living.

02/23/2016 — Lake Crawford 12 HDR Panorama — Kings Mountain State Park, Blacksburg, South Carolina, December 13, 2015The hardest thing is settling
for the life that is our life to live—
The one with our name on it,
The one that only we can live—
And living it the way it needs to be lived.
The hardest thing is settling ourselves into it,
And doing right by it.
We have other bigger,
better,
finer,
faster
lives in mind.
This is the struggle that tells the tale.
02/23/2016 — Yosemite Falls 01 2006 — Yosemite National Park, California, April 2006We can always imagine a better place to be,
than this place,
A better life to live
than this life. Thoreau said, “Shall we always study
to obtain more,
and not sometimes be content with less?”
What is the nature of our discontent? I submit for your consideration
That it may be rooted in the absence of roots.
We belong to nothing,
Are owned by nothing,
Nothing serves as the overriding
claim upon our service. We are adrift upon an empty sea
And wander aimlessly about.
One port is as good as another,
And a better one is only an island or two away. We live endlessly looking for somewhere to be,
Hoping to be claimed by some reckless passion
Before we die.
Yet, we withhold ourselves from would-be passions,
Wanting to be certain that this is the One,
And that there isn’t a better one waiting at the next port-of-call
As though we won’t always imagine a better place to be,
A better life to live.
Used in Short Talks On Contradiction, etc., 02/24/2016 — December Orchard 06 — Springs Farms, Lake Haigler Access, Anne Springs Close Greenway, Fort Mill, South Carolina, December 12, 2015There were two living generations before me,
My grandparents’ generation and my parents’ generation,
And their best advice to me was along the lines of,
“Keep your nose clean and to the grindstone.
Believe what you are told and do what we say.
Don’t ask any questions we can’t answer,
And for God’s sake, Jimmy, stop looking out the window!” Nothing from any of them
About the importance of mindfulness.
They never said
“Be aware of everything.
Your awareness will teach you all you need to know.
Always ask the questions that beg to be asked,
And say the things that cry out to be said.
Develop a love for contradictions,
And struggle to reconcile what can be reconciled,
And to bear consciously and graciously the pain
Of opposites that must remain poles apart.
Be open to your experience
And let it lead you to the things you love,
And away from the things you do not love.
Trust your judgment in all cases great and small,
And when it becomes apparent that you made a bad call,
Let that judgment lead you to make amends
And to do better next time.
Don’t look for answers,
But for experiences that force reflection,
And lead to new realizations.
You are on your own with your life,
But you have all you need
To find your way into the company of those
Who are also figuring out who they are and what to do,
And can help by sharing with you what they know.
A large number of that company will be dead,
But their books will illumine their path,
And encourage you in your own path.
When your courage falters,
And your hope fades,
Be still and listen to your heart and your stomach.
They will always lead the way.” It would have helped if they had been a little bit awake.
They didn’t know what to do with me,
But that is ridiculous!
I came from them!
They couldn’t help me
Because they had turned their backs on themselves.
02/24/2016 — Reelfoot Lake 35 HDR — Reelfoot Lake State Park, Hornbeck, Tennessee, November 4, 2015Be mindful of your inner dialogues.
Everything good is already stirring around in there.
You don’t have to think anything up.
Where do you think ideas come from?
We don’t think them up.
They seize us!
Grab us by the neck!
Toss us into the air!
Hurl us into action!
We have to put ourselves in the place of being seized more often.
By paying attention to what is stirring within. Our inner dialogues are the source of creativity and life.
Vitality, meaning, purpose, hope, guidance, direction…
It’s all there
Whispers and inklings of wonder
Welling up from our soul.
Our place is to wait, and watch,
And notice when a word, a phrase, a train of thought,
Catches our eye in a special kind of way
Sparks a little energy in us
Flips our “Yes!” switch—
And look closer,
Seeing where it leads.
Pay attention to your internal dialogue,
Listening for something that says, “Follow me!”
And tag along.
02/25/2016 — Dry Falls — Nantahala National Forest, Highlands, North Carolina, April 2005The “Archetypal Intention” (Stevens) is for the future to be the past
For how it has been done to be how it is to be done.
What worked in the past
(The way to be a man or a woman, for instance,
Or a father or a mother, etc.)
Has been stored in our genes
Via natural selection,
In that those who did it “right”
Were more likely to pass along their characteristics,
Their way of doing “it,”
Than those who did it wrong,
So that, by now, “the way to be human beings”
Is as much apart of us
As the way to be a Robin or a Lion or a Humpback Whale
Is a part of those particular manifestations of life. Except, but, only.
We have reached a point in our evolutionary development
Where the future must be like no past ever lived.
“Fight Or Flight” has to give way to negotiated,
And mutually agreeable,
Peaceful solutions to armed conflict and refugee resettlement.
ad infinitum. We don’t have an archetype for that.
WE are the archetype for that.
We have to find our way into a future that is a break from the past,
Using our inherited capacity
For imagination, creativity, transcendence and transformation.
Call it the Archetype for A Brave New World.
02/25/2016 — Kings Mountain Farm 18 B&W — Kings Mountain State Park, Blacksburg, South Carolina, December 14, 2015The Law of Compensation is realized in each generation
We live to be who our parents were not.
Whatever the excesses and deficiencies were in the parents,
They are likely to be the opposite in their children.
This doesn’t mean Sally cannot be an introvert like her mother was.
It means Sally will not be her mother in other ways. The ways in which we are not our parents’ children
Are the ways in which our parents most needed to be themselves,
And weren’t,
Because the way wasn’t clear for some reason,
Perhaps because they wouldn’t allow themselves the privilege
And they resented it (or applauded) when it bubbled up in their offspring. At any rate, it is an interesting reflection
Of unconscious processes at work
In the development of family systems,
And one of the things revealing
That there is more to all of us than meets the eye.
02/26/2016 — Glade Creek Mill — Babcock State Park, Clifftop, West Virginia, October 2007Consciousness is the most unnatural thing nature ever has done.
Consciousness can imagine a world of justice and peace—
Unlike anything the natural world is capable of producing.
Yet, consciousness’ shortcoming
Is that it cannot be conscious of what it is not conscious of—
And there is more of everything than meets the eye. The Unconscious and the genome, and their relationship—
Mind and consciousness, and their relationship—
The numen, instinct and intuition, and their relationship… All beyond the purview of thinking, reasoning, beings.
What we can’t make out, we make up. May we, at least, be mindful of that,
And hold it in our awareness,
And have the courage to know that we don’t know,
And cannot know what we don’t know,
And make our peace with that,
Enjoying what is to be enjoyed,
Grieving what is to be grieved,
And seeking out good company as we are able,
With whom to share the wonder of being human.
02/27/2016 — Mirror Mirror 03 — Goodale State Park, Camden, South Carolina, November 11, 2015One idea leads to another.
If you are never curious,
Never playful,
Never imaginative,
Never wondering,
Never inquisitive,
Never adventurous,
Never exploring,
Never inventive,
Never looking,
Never examining,
Never reflecting,
Always afraid to question anything,
Guess how many ideas you will have.
02/28/2016 — Lake Crawford 13 HDR — Kings Mountain State Park, Blacksburg, South Carolina, December 13, 2015Fascism,
Racism,
Anti-Semitism,
Islamophobia,
Sexism,
Homophobia,
Bigotry,
..
The list is long
Lay inert in German hearts waiting to be ignited
By the rhetoric of Hitler and the ruthlessness,
Willful, prideful, ignorance of the Nazis
Waiting to be encouraged, permitted, given excuse and reason to be. And Lie even yet in the hearts of good people everywhere,
Waiting to be inflamed by the inciting oratory of those
Living in the far extreme of hatred and fear. In every age comes the question to be answered by the age:
Will you live mindfully or mindlessly?
Each age answers by what it condones and what it condemns.
02/29/2016 — Beaver Pond — Bass Lake, Blue Ridge Parkway, Blowing Rock, NC, June 2009There is our life and what to do with it,
In all of the times and places of our living,
Through all of the stages of our development.
I recommend listening to
what it has to say
In order to determine how it needs to be lived,
And aligning ourselves with it. Our life is alive in its own right,
With a life of its own.
We are here to assist it
In its own becoming
As chance and circumstance allow. What is our life asking of us?
How might we go about
Placing ourselves in accord
with what it has in mind
for us today?
Given the givens that are ours to work with?
Here we are.
Now what?
02/29/2016 — Bethany Church 02 Panorama — Bethany ARPC, Clover, South Carolina, December 13, 2015Our work is to live truthfully.
This doesn’t mean “telling the truth.”
It means living in ways that incarnate the truth of who we are.
It means living in ways that are aligned with the central drift of heart and soul.
It means living in ways that express, exhibit, reveal and make plain
The gifts, character, values at the core of the center of ourselves.
It means doing things that are “in character,”
And not doing things that are “out of character.”
It means living in accord with the life that is our life to live
The life that only we can live
The life that needs us to live it. We were born to be who we are.
That is our purpose and our ultimate good.
And it doesn’t matter if it does no good.
Our Good Work is to be who we are.
It doesn’t have to do big things,
Achieve great ends,
Save the world,
Transform the cosmos. The privilege of being who we are
Is the highest good.
If we live our whole life long being who we are,
And nobody notices or cares,
Nothing changes,
And we make no difference at all in the way life is lived about us,
We still got to be who we are!
We still got to live our life!
We did not let anything stop us from completing the Good Work!
May that be said of us all!
03/01/2016 — Reelfoot Lake 36 HDR— Reelfoot Lake State Park, Hornbeck, Tennessee, November 4, 2015Heavy smokers dying of emphysema are shocked
At the unfairness of being unable to smoke with impunity,
“Why can’t we be flip and casual with life,
And do with it as we please,
Without implication, consequence or outcome?” Society mavens know the rules of the game they have mastered,
And spend their lives looking for a party to bless
Or a festive occasion in which to shine with resplendent glory,
And collect clippings to remind them of that time
When everyone knew their name.
Power brokers ride high on the backs of their workers
And the money of their investors,
Enjoy the gratification of owning people
And being somebody. The unwashed masses and huddled poor
Trudge through their days
Looking for crumbs and coins and other lucky breaks,
Without prospects or hope
Beyond another day without prospects or hope. They all stand at the end of their days
Undone by the quickness of its arrival
Shocked that it has come down to this,
Thinking there would be more to it.
How did they miss the joyful wisdom of knowing
“It’s a good day to die”?
03/01/2016 — Lenten Rose 2016 02 — Indian Land, South Carolina, February 28, 2016What is your present source of deepest joy?
How much time, in a week, say,
do you spend present with the source of your deepest joy?
If you do not currently have a source of deep joy in your life,
It is a concern, but not a problem.
What as been a source of deep joy in your life?
How much time did you spend with it? What is your present source of greatest conflict?
What are the different sides pulling against each other and against you?
Where do you find relief from the conflict? What is your present source of peace, comfort and consolation? Where in your life do you find meaning, purpose, hope and satisfaction? Reflect on these things. Then, reflect on your reflections.
03/02/2016 — Kings Mountain Farm 23 HDR B&W — Kings Mountain State Park, Blacksburg, South Carolina, December 14, 2015The search for the life that is our life to live
The life that needs us to live it
The life that no one but us can live
Is the search for what we love about our life. Too many of us love the wrong things too much
To be able to love anything about our life.
Our life isn’t about any of those things.
Wealth, fame, attention, glory…
We want a life we can show off,
Not a life we can love. With no one to see us,
Admire us,
Applaud us,
Adore us,
Worship us,
Envy us,
We would have no reason to live.
We live looking for a life someone else can love. We’ll never find our life
Until we look for one we can love,
Even if no one else ever does.
How would you live your life
If there were no one else
To see, or know, or care?
03/02/2016 — Green River Canyon 2007 01 — Canyonlands National Park, Moab, Utah, September 2007We have to make room for one another.
It is easy enough to find something
we don’t like about every one of us.
Probably, most of us can find as much
about ourselves that we don’t like.
Who are we to be excluding anybody?
Telling anyone they aren’t welcome?
Demanding that anyone
“go back where they came from”? It isn’t like we have been here forever.
Every one of us came from somewhere else.
How is it that we get to tell someone else to leave
When someone else could be asking us to leave?
What’s with this, “I don’t like you,
so you’ll have to leave” business?
Particularly when there is as much
about us and our kind that we don’t like
As there is about you and your kind.
We have to commit ourselves to the work
of making room for one another,
And give ourselves to it every day for the rest of our life.
Negotiation and compromise, Kid.
Negotiation and compromise.
The future of civilization depends on it.
03/03/2016 — Peto Lake Rainbow — Banff National Park, Canadian Rockies, Alberta, September 2005Your future is more important than your past.
Your capacity for good is more important
than your propensity for stupid.
You are either on your side,
Or you are not.
Whose side are you on?
That’s the question we have to get right. We have to believe in ourselves
In spite of the lack of corroborating evidence
And regardless of the abundance
of grounds to condemn
and abandon. All of the hero’s journeys
Are about the long quest
past good reasons to quit
To the gold at the heart of the hero. Jesus believed in Jesus when no one else did.
That’s what set Jesus apart.
The alchemists believed they could make gold
Out of base metal.
That’s the work we are all engaged in.
The gold is there,
Waiting for those who believe it is so,
And take up the work of proving themselves right.
03/04/2016 — Campbell’s Nursery 03 — Campbell’s Greenhouse and Nursery, Charlotte, NC, March 3, 2016If you are going to be in love
with anything,
be in love with your life.
Too many of us are walking around
in lives we do not love.
If our life were a person,
It would have divorced us years ago.
It’s an escort accompanying us through our days
To give us the appearance of being alive,
But we both know it’s a sham,
And are waiting out the end
For the lack of anything better to do. It never occurs to us to find a life we love,
Or, if it does, we dismiss the idea as wild and radical,
And too much trouble at this point in the process.
But the truth is everything depends on our finding a life we love
And living it. Yet, we are afraid there is no life for us,
That we missed our chance way back when,
Or never had one,
And we have given up all hope in the matter,
Resigning ourselves to a regimen that feeds our bodies
But not our souls
All the way to the end of the line. While our life lives out its days locked away
Behind a door we refuse to open
For fear there won’t be anything there.
03/04/2016 — Pike’s Nursery 01 — The Koi Pond, Charlotte, North Carolina, March 3, 2016We are united across ages and cultures
By the experience of being alive.
The experience of war creates a family with members in all centuries.
As does the experience of child birth,
Of parenthood,
Of old age, decrepitude and death.
Of grief, loss, sadness and sorrow,
Of joy, celebration, awe and wonder. At the level of life experience we are one with all humanity.
Division enters the picture with ideology.
With the quest for power and domination.
Ideology fosters military conquest
Which expands the reach of ideology,
And the two form a partnership of division and destruction.
We need to stop talking about what we believe,
And start talking about what we know
Because we have experienced its truth in our life.
Stop killing people because they are evil and wrong,
And start honoring people because they are as we are
At the level of life experience.
03/05/2016 — Pike’s Nursery 02— Charlotte, North Carolina, March 3, 2016Stop being locked in place by fear and desire.
You are your most reliable resource
For getting you out of situations you get yourself into. Mindfulness leads the way.
Stop insisting on certain futures,
And open yourself to the full reality of what is happening
And what needs to happen in response. Be mindfully, compassionately, non-judgmentally aware
Of your internal response to the full reality of your situation.
Hold yourself gently, tenderly, kindly, in your awareness.
Be fully aware of you.
What are you refusing to take into account?
Failing to consider?
Be fully aware of you
Being fully aware of the reality of your situation. Practice holding yourself in your awareness.
Allow mindful, compassionate, non-judgmental awareness
To bring you to the point of on-going self-transparency
(Self-consciousness without the judgmental component).
You will be ready for anything.
03/06/2016 — Campbell’s Nursery 01— Charlotte, NC, March 3, 2016You can’t fake spontaneity.
Spontaneity is completely truthful.
A hiccup is an act whose time has come.
So is a sneeze.
The trick is to be spontaneously appropriate to the occasion.
A bit of Mary Poppins wisdom applies here:
“Anything can happen if you let it.” We are to live so as to be
Spontaneously appropriate to every occasion
To each situation
As it arises.
This means being so mindfully
(compassionately, non-judgmentally)
attuned to each occasion/situation
So completely aware of what is happening
And what needs to happen
That we see what needs to be done and do it
Without thinking about it. No planning,
plotting,
scheming,
conniving,
calculating,
manipulating,
designing,
crafting,
exploiting,
capitalizing
or cashing in. Only living in the moment
by being true to ourselves and the moment.
Being who we are
and what the moment needs of us
in every moment.
We cannot fake spontaneity, We can practice it.
Until it becomes spontaneous. We are to live to be spontaneously and appropriately
Responsive to each occasion/situation as it arises.
Just like Mary Poppins.
And Jesus of Nazareth.
03/07/2016 — Through the Trees 02 — Reelfoot Lake State Park, Hornbeck, Tennessee, November 3, 2015We are responsible for finding our own life and living it
And we cannot do it alone.
It takes a good enough environment all the way along the way.
Everything depends upon the context and circumstances of our life.
The world has to receive us well.
Or, well enough.
For us to have a chance.
Too many of us plop out of the womb
With no loving arms to welcome us
And no one to nurture and nourish us,
Soften the impact of the transition,
And help us find what we need to do what is ours to do.
We are on our own from the start,
Too concerned with surviving
To have a chance at thriving. Those who can, must.
Jesus did,
And the Buddha.
The list is long of those who took what they had
And made it work.
Who found their life and lived it,
With what help there was at hand.
We all have the opportunity
To do what can be done
With the resources available to us.
Life reaching for life.
03/07/2016 — Indian Land Sunrise 01— Indian Land, South Carolina, March 7, 2016You can set the time for going to bed,
But not for going to sleep.
You can decide what you will do to pay the bills,
But not what it will take to feed your soul. The important things are out of our hands.
In whose hands are WE is the question?
Whom do we trust with the deep matters of life and being?
There is much that we are unconscious of
And must rely on
To find our way to meaning, purpose and value. The Inner World is the source of vitality and direction.
Why we dismiss it and grant it no place in our life
Can only be explained in terms of abject,
prideful,
arrogant,
willful,
03/08/2016 — Pike Nursery 07 — Charlotte, North Carolina, March 3, 2016The way to make really good soup
Is to make a lot of bad soup mindfully.
Mistakes are the price of competence.
No one ever gained competence by watching the master do it.
Competence comes from doing it
Mindfully aware of what we are doing,
And unafraid of making mistakes.
The way the master does it is just the way the master does it,
And to do it exactly that way
Is to lose the grace, beauty and wonder
Of all the ways innovation,
creativity,
imagination,
invention
and playfulness
could open before us. The disciples must be like the master
In following no master,
And laughing their way to enlightenment.
Living to do everything by the book
And precisely right
All the way
Takes the life out of living
And the joy out of being alive.
03/08/2016 — Goodale 2015 40 B&W — Goodale State Park, Camden, South Carolina, November 11, 2015″One thing I can tell you is you got to be free!”
John Lennon was right about a lot of things.
This is at the top of that list. But freedom is betrayed and wasted
If it is not spent entirely in the service of self-determination.
We are free to be who we are. If we aren’t interested in pursuing the life that is ours to live
And living it,
We may as well be enslaved to some ruler’s dictates,
Or shackled in some dark dungeon
For all the good our “freedom” is doing us. The freedom to do as we please
Is just another form of bondage
To our own fears and desires
And offers no hope or meaning
In our frenzied quest for entertaining pleasures.
03/09/2016 — Campbell’s Nursery 07 — Charlotte, North Carolina, March 3, 2016We are responsible for separating ourselves
enough from the noise of life
To engage the silence necessary
for awareness and reflection to occur
In order to find the center—
Eliot’s “still point of the turning world”—
And live out of that foundation,
Letting our life fall into place around it. Knowing what is central to us, for us,
Is the knowing that only we can know.
No one can tell us what that is.
We find it, know it, for ourselves.
We keep waiting for someone to tell us
What is ours to do.
03/09/2016 — Campbell’s Nursery 05 — Charlotte, North Carolina, March 3, 2016The Christian church talks about worship
as though worship can be scripted, planned.
Nothing could be further from the truth. Worship is the spontaneous response of the worshiper
To an encounter with the Numen within or without.
You can have prayers of intercession,
confession,
praise,
thanksgiving
and petition,
three hymns,
a sermon,
an anthem
children’s handbells,
and an offering but.
All of it together doesn’t
equal the impact of a lone goose
or a flock,
winging their way through a cold morning fog
to an undisclosed destination,
as they have done for ages past counting,
and we stand bowed by tears of wonder
for no apparent reason.
You can’t package that,
or design it,
or turn it over to some team to produce,
once on Wednesday and three times on Sunday,
every week of the year.
03/10/2016 — Pike’s Nursery 05 — The Koi Pond, Charlotte, North Carolina, March 3, 2016Everything goes on the table.
All of the facts that make up our life
And how we feel about them—which is another set of facts.
Then we consider the table. This is the way things are
and this is the way we feel about it.
Now, what needs to be done about it?
What needs to happen in light of every other thing? It may take a while, but.
There is no more important task on the entire list of tasks
(Which is, by the way, also on the table).
In light of everything, what needs to happen? What we want to happen is just another fact on the table,
And, “Just ’cause we want it doesn’t mean it (needs to be) so.” Start looking at your life as a collection of facts
That needs to be prioritized
From the standpoint of a perspective
That takes all the facts into account,
Even itself.
And get to work.
Used in Short Talks on Contradiction, etc., 03/11/2016 — Trout Lily 2016 01— Andrew Jackson State Park, Lancaster County, South Carolina, March 10, 2016Before consciousness, there were no dichotomies.
No contradictions.
No polarities.
No opposites.
There was only the way things were. Planets crashed into planets.
Volcanoes erupted,
Mountain ranges appeared and disappeared,
Species’ appeared and disappeared…
No one cried, rejoiced, lamented, celebrated.
There was neither bad nor good,
Right nor wrong.
Then consciousness appeared
With its obvious evolutionary advantages,
And categories were created,
Changing everything. But they weren’t there before we were.
We made it all up,
Distinctions,
Preferences,
Ideals,
Ideologies,
And said God did it. The arbitrary became absolute just like that.
03/11/2016 — Indian Land Sunrise 02 — Indian Land, South Carolina, March 7, 2016Mindfulness is a full-time practice. Paying attention to the moment,
Compassionately and non-judgmentally,
Means being aware of what is happening within
And how we are reacting to it,
While being aware of what is happening
in our external environment
And how we are reacting to that.
While being aware of what needs to happen,
And what gifts we have that may be able to meet that need. This is far removed from having an agenda
That we are seeking to impose upon our world.
Or from seeing situations as things to exploit to our advantage.
Or from being afraid of everything
and how it might work to our disadvantage. Mindfulness engaged in with
non-judgmental compassion
Is far removed from how we live our life,
And from how life is lived around us.
Take up the practice and transform your world.
03/12/2016 — Crocus 2016 02 — Indian Land, South Carolina, March 11, 2016Think of Karma as momentum. We live a certain way over a period of time,
And build up momentum,
Creating an environment that supports that momentum,
That way of living,
And producing a complex of interrelated
Props, presumptions and expectations
Which fuels the process that sustains our way with life,
And keeps alternative possibilities from being entertained or explored. Momentum is the tendency of a body in motion to remain in motion,
And of a body at rest to remain at rest.
That’s karma for you.
Think of the Tea Party and Donald Trump.
Bad Karma.
Think of the Buddha, Jesus and Lao Tzu.
Good Karma.
Think of you.
While I think of me.
03/13/2016 — Pike Nursery 04 — Charlotte, North Carolina, March 3, 2016When something comes, something has to go.
When something goes, something has to come.
This is the Law of Compensation at work in our life. The challenge for us is to be conscious of the coming and going,
And to accommodate ourselves to the rearrangement of our life
To let come what’s coming
And to let go what’s going.
This is called putting ourselves in accord with our life. This is the Task of Life
Through all of the stages of life.
Other people will tell you it is something else,
But, it is this.
Adjustment and accommodation, Kid.
Adjustment and accommodation.
03/14/2016 — Trout Lily 2016 05 — Andrew Jackson State Park, Lancaster County, South Carolina, March 12, 2016We have to call time out from time to time
To reflect, recollect, regroup, recover and reorient ourselves. Too many people crashing my life with their agendas
And timetables does me in.
I have to escape, breathe, and remember who I am, what I’m about,
And find my way back to the path with my name on it. We ebb and flow on the path like the tides on the sea.
It is not one constant “Hallelujah, Now We Have It!” victory march.
There is a lot of breathing, remembering and finding the thread
(That would be Ariadne’s Thread)
Again, along the way.
03/14/2016 — Practice 01 — Playing with Crocuses Using layer masking in Photoshop to create a montage of crocuses, Indian Land, SC, March 14, 2016Our life is our responsibility.
No one can live it for us,
Or tell us how to live it.
And we pay a price to live it as it needs to be lived. Fathers and mothers pay a price to be the right kind of father and mother.
The same thing holds true for all the roles we play.
It isn’t easy often,
Or fun often,
But it is always necessary that we live it the way it needs to be lived
That we do it (our life) the way it needs to be done. We have to monitor our frustration level,
And our dejection level,
And our fatigue level,
And all the other levels,
And keep an eye on our fluctuating state of being
To avoid “flying off the handle,”
And knee-jerk-reacting our way through whatever
Has pushed our buttons one time too many. There is a life that needs us to live it
Past all that would keep us from living it.
Our commitment to the life that is ours to live
Brings us back to the center of what is important,
And grounds us in the work that is ours to do,
Again and again.
03/15/2016 — Goodale 2015 41 B&W — Goodale State Park, Camden, South Carolina, November 11, 2015We each have to live our own life,
Work our side of the street,
Do it the way we determine it needs to be done.
And the rest of us have to grant each of us
The freedom to find our life and live it.
We have to be accountable to the rest of us,
And to ourselves
We have to live in good faith with one another,
And with ourselves.
We have to be responsible for doing the work that needs us to do it. And if we are not?
Everyone suffers.
Our obligation to each other is to find our life and live it
And to assist each other in that endeavor.
To refuse to do it is anathema, an obscenity, a disgrace
Beyond measure.
When we abandon our destiny,
We give up all hope,
And drift alone through a Void of our own making So.
When we feel like our life isn’t worth it,
That our work isn’t working,
That it is too hard,
Or too unimportant,
Or too useless to continue,
We have to see that as another manifestation of the Cyclops
Standing in our path,
And get up and do the thing that needs us to do it.
This is the heroic part of the Hero’s Journey,
And is a recurring experience along the way.
03/15/2016 — Campbell’s Nursery 04 — Charlotte, North Carolina, March 3, 2016We are the Cyclops standing in our path
Whom we have to slay,
Again and again,
On our way to the treasure. And, we are the Phoenix,
Rising from our own ashes,
Again and again,
On the journey to the treasure. And, we are the treasure
Hidden among a myriad
Of dreams,
agendas,
goals,
hopes,
plans,
aspirations,
ambitions,
desires,
fears,
fantasies,
opportunities,
possibilities,
ideas,
objectives,
aims,
intentions,
purposes,
.. We are,
At once,
Our best hope,
And our worst enemy.
How we work things out
Tells the tale.
03/16/2016 — Woodlands Spring Panorama 01 — Indian Land, South Carolina, March 15, 2016We are, at once, the Sovereign Lord of our life
And its Liege Servant,
Sworn to loyalty and devotion everlasting. We say what our life is and what it is not.
And we are not free to say just anything
To be flip and casual,
Irreverent or unfaithful. Our relationship with our life
Is to be the Holiest of Holies,
Unrivaled and without parallel
In the sphere of human experience.
It is up to us
To see that it is so.
03/17/2016 — Trout Lily 2016 06 C — Andrew Jackson State Park, Lancaster County, SC, March 12, 2016Perspective shifts are the way to the truth and the life.
We see things one way
And then, something happens,
And we see things another way.
“I once was lost/But now am Found/Was blind/But now I see.” Nothing changes but the way we see things,
And that changes everything. If you want to do something about the way things are,
See your seeing. Nothing has the raw power of a perspective
That takes itself into account.
03/17/2016 — Gethsemane Gardens & Nursery Poster — Greensboro, NC, March 17, 2016We have to mine our experience
For the gold
For the “treasure hard to find”
Aware of the ease with which we
Discount, discard, dismiss
Our experiences, our gifts, our life
Thinking nothing good can come of any of it. That’s what they said of Nazareth,
And what the Nazarene warned against
With his words about the stone the builders reject,
And the pearl of great price. Our experiences, our gifts, and our life
Are where the treasure is to be found.
Joseph Campbell said
It is our reflection on our experience
That leads to new realizations.
We find the gold by sifting through our experience,
By experiencing our experience in light of ALL of our experience. We have to do the work of looking
If we hope to be able to see.
03/18/2016 — Carolina Jasmine 03 — Indian Land, South Carolina, March 17, 2016Really good advice abounds,
But,
The value of any advice lies in the meaning
It’s hearers ascribe to it. Interpretation and application are everything.
The current best advice I have ever heard
Comes from the Old Testament prophet Micah:
“Do justice. Love kindness. Walk humbly with your God.” I think we all have different Gods
That our highest value
and the way in which we devote ourselves to it
Are different for each of us.
The idea that God could be
homogenized,
pasteurized,
distilled,
and refined
into some Book of Doctrine’s definition
is the height of blasphemy and sacrilege. “The Spirit is like the wind that blows where it will.”
“The Tao that can be told is not the eternal Tao.” We are all responsible for walking humbly with our God
and being eternally faithful to the God that is God
by doing justice and loving kindness.
because that is as close to God
as even God can be.
03/19/2016 — Lake Crawford 13 HDR — Kings Mountain State Park, Blacksburg, South Carolina, December 13, 2015The cumulative weight of the life we have lived
Is readily apparent in the life we are living. Ben Howland, men’s basketball head coach at Mississippi State, said,
“One bad shot leads to more bad shots.”
That’s karma for you.
Our karma is good or bad,
with us or against us,
to the exact degree
that we are on the side of our destiny,
or working the other side of the street. Our karma shifts from bad to good
as we take up the practice
of aligning ourselves with our destiny
by putting ourselves
in accord with the life that is our life to live. We do that by applying ourselves to the process of:
Introspection
Reflection
Connection
Realization
Implementation
Repeated ad infinitum throughout the time left for living. The alternative is to keep taking bad shots.
03/19/2016 — Robert Frost’s line
“Good fences make good neighbors,”
Is an appropriation of the Old Testament commandment
(One that didn’t make the Top Ten,
But should have been Number One):
“Thou Shalt Not Remove Thy Neighbor’s Landmark!”
Which applies to all varieties of boundaries
And to all varieties of people. It is another of the ideas that we have discarded,
dismissed, The concept of a “good fence” is wasted on us.
We don’t have any fences,
and don’t know how to begin constructing them. We don’t know where we stop and our neighbor starts,
and allow everyone to know our business,
or let them tell us what our business should and shouldn’t be.
It’s easier to go with the flow,
Never mind that dead fish float with the current,
and live fish swim against it. We have to find our boundaries,
recover our landmarks,
erect our fences,
and build them solid and strong.
We have to know what is good for us and what is not,
what is right for us and what is not,
what our work is and what it is not,
what our side of the street is and what it is not,
what our business is and what it is not,
where we belong and where we do not,
who we are and who we are not,
and honor our boundaries
and demand that they be honored
by those who call themselves our neighbors,
or friends and family.
03/19/2016 — Rural Route — York County, South Carolina, March 7, 2016Mine is the Hermeneutic Task,
Seeing and saying and being Truth.
The word comes from Hermes (Mercury),
The Messenger of the Gods,
the God of Interpretation,
Meaning,
Understanding,
Right Seeing,
Right Saying,
Right Being. It all begins with,
And hinges upon,
Being transparent to oneself.
It is not easy.
I’ve never had a motive I fully understood,
and the more you know about anything,
the more you realize you don’t begin to know
all there is to know about it. So knowing means that you know you don’t know,
and will never get to the bottom of any of it,
but must press on
to discover what can be discovered
in the time left for living. Now, that’s a job worth having!
Knowing that you will never run out of work to do!
I’m set for life!
Beyond life!
Forever!
And there is not a moment to be wasted
in the work to see, say and be Truth,
the Whole Truth,
and Nothing But The Truth—
the work of being consciously human.
Used in Short Talks on Good and Bad Religion 03/20/2016 — Goodale 2016 42 B&W — Goodale State Park, Camden, South Carolina, November 11, 2016Tell me now—
Is the moon a white marble floating
On a black velvet sea,
Or not?
What is the truth, here?
Is it or isn’t it?
Yes or no?
Right or wrong? A culture that values
“The facts, just the facts, ma’am,”
Is hard pressed to find a place
For feelings and metaphors. If it isn’t factual,
It can’t be true.
Even where religion reigns,
Everything is “taken on faith”
To be factual no matter how far removed
From the laws of physics, logic and reason. To suggest that the ground of religion
is metaphor and imagination
is to commit the heresy of heresies,
and to keep company with Satan himself,
who is, of course, quite factual,
actual,
tangible and, hence, Well.
Is the moon a white marble
Floating on a black velvet sea,
Or not?
03/21/2016 — Campbell’s Nursery 06 — Charlotte, North Carolina, March 3, 2016What would you suffer any hardship to do? That.
03/18/2016 — Peach Orchard Spring 02 — Panorama Springs Farms Orchards, Fort Mill, South Carolina, March 21, 2016We have to come to terms again and again
with what we have done
and what has been done to us. It has to be done again and again
because it keeps coming around.
Something reminds us and we remember
because “the past is never past,”
nor ever completely forgotten. Corporate prayers of confession
and declarations of pardon do not suffice,
for the ritual is the one we must carry out on our own
each time the time comes around,
saying to ourselves,
“This is what I have done,
and what has been done to me.
I forgive us all!” The last line is the clincher. All the talk about God forgiving
and Christ forgiving,
misses the mark.
I cannot be forgiven until I forgive me.
And I cannot live with what has been done to me
until I forgive those who did it. I cannot begin to come to terms with any of it
until I carry out the requisite action from the heart—
And I have to do it again and again,
Because its time comes around again and again. The anguish,
the agony,
require repeated recognition,
acknowledgement,
and the words of forgiveness and grace.
For as many times as there are times. And there are many.
03/22/2016 — Carolina Jasmine 08 — Indian Land, South Carolina, March 17, 2016We can do what is hard,
Or we can do it the hard way.
We seek smooth and easy,
Soft and easy,
Quick and easy. All leading to the hard way. The important things are all difficult.
It is the difficulty that brings us forth. Joseph Campbell reminds us:
“It took the Cyclops to bring out the hero in Ulysses.”
Trials and ordeals, Kid. Trials and ordeals. The path to the Land of Promise,
and the Treasure Hard to Find,
winds through the heart of Gethsemane
and across the face of Golgotha. “What a slippery slope this is!”
“Like the Razor’s Edge!”
Yet, opt for smooth and easy
At your peril.
03/22/2016 — Lagoon’s End B&W — Hunting Island State Park, Hunting Island, South Carolina, December 6, 2014
Basketball players have to know
the spot on the floor that is their spot—
the place where they have
the most confidence in putting up their shot. The entire court belongs to Steph Curry.
He got range!
Some people are that way.
The rest of us have to be mindful
of where our place on the floor is—
of where we belong,
And where we have no business being
anywhere else. We have to know what is ours to do,
And what is ours to leave for someone else.
When and where would we say “Gimme the BALL!”
And be right about it?
What is our spot, our shot? Mexican cornbread is my spot.
My shot.
And pimento cheese.
Steph Curry has nothing on me there.
Where do you shine?
03/23/2016 — Indian Land Sunrise 03 Panorama Lancaster County, South Carolina, March 7, 2016Our life is a dialogue,
a collaboration,
between our brain’s left and right hemispheres.
Right is feeling.
Left is thinking.
It takes the unique partnership of both
to make it through the maze
Of choices,
possibilities,
opportunities,
responsibilities,
values,
limitations,
aspirations, etc.
that make up our life each day. We have to call meetings of the minds throughout the day.
Our feeling mind must commune with our thinking mind,
And vice versa.
Look at the world.
It’s a mess because our minds aren’t talking.
They are at war. The Middle East and Africa feel it and do it.
The US, Russia and parts of Europe think it and make it happen.
It’s a crazy way to run a world.
Or a life. Get your thinking and your feeling talking to each other.
Throughout each day.
Form the partnership.
Change the game.
03/23/2016 — Pike’s Nursery 10 — The Koi Pond, Charlotte, North Carolina, March 4, 2016Do not measure yourself by your outcomes.
Let your standard of success be
the degree to which you incarnate
your inner self
your inner woman, or man
in your life. Live to be who you are, and also are.
To do what you love.
To exhibit what you value.
To bring forth your heart and soul
and make them plain in what you do. To live like this
requires the spiritual practices of
mindfulness,
silence,
reflection,
realization,
self-transparency
and good faith with ourselves and others—
and asks us to be who all of the old masters were,
in living at one with the core of our being.
03/23/2016 — Pine Cones — Indian Land, South Carolina, March 13, 2016Everything comes up from the core,
from the bottomless well of life
at the center of ourselves
from what we refer to,
dismissively and disparagingly,
as our imagination. WE are the origin of all that is
of all that is meaningful,
at any rate.
We credit God with all the good ideas,
and ourselves with the bad ones,
because it seems as though we are asking for it
to say that we are the source of all that has meaning. We are the source of all that has meaning.
We ascribe meaning, find order, make sense, declare value.
And, if you say something is meaningful
that doesn’t resonate with me,
I’m likely to ignore it.
And if it doesn’t resonate with any of us,
we are likely to call you crazy,
and give you a wide berth. Meaning isn’t private, though it is highly personal,
and value is recognized across a broad bandwidth.
We get it,
because we are connected at the core.
There are common bonds among us.
We belong to one another,
and find meaning in the communities we create. We are a wonder to behold.
You would think we would
spend more time being spellbound.
03/24/2016 — Blurred Barred Owl — McDowell Nature Center and Preserve, Mecklenburg County Parks and Recreation, Charlotte, North Carolina, March 24, 2016We think with a magic stick
and a crystal ball
we could create a very good life.
You could look it up.
All of the fairy tales
and folks tales
and myths of lore
have people tromping around
in search of magic wands and spells,
wizards and witches,
genies and leprechauns
to give them a magical boost
into “the land of gentle breezes
where the peaceful waters flow.” Anything to take our minds off
the dreadful reality of life as it is! All of the old masters,
male and female,
knew that we change our circumstances
by changing our perspective,
and aligning ourselves
with the Self at the center of ourselves.
The Buddha did that,
the Christ did that,
Joan of Arc did that… “We are all we have.
We are all we need.”
The football rallying chant
needs to be interpreted on a personal level.
The “We” is the individual and his/her Deep Self.
When we establish the connection
with our Deep Self,
and live out of it,
magic happens.
That’s the only way it does.
03/25/2016 — McDowell Barred Owl 01 — McDowell Nature Center and Preserve, Mecklenburg County Parks and Recreation, Charlotte, North Carolina, March 24, 2016When you get the What in place,
the Why
and the How
will take care of themselves
(Along with the When and Where).
We think we have to get the Why
and the How (When and Where) in place first.
We want to know
Why we would do
everything before we do it.
And How
(When and Where).
Once we know Why and How (When and Where),
then we will consider What.
So we cast about,
lost and depressed,
miserable and forlorn,
because we are looking
ceaselessly for Why and How
(When and Where) —
and constantly tossing What aside.
Always asking What to prove itself.
Demanding that What justify its existence,
Demonstrate its worth and value. “Why should I do THAT?”
“How am I supposed to do THAT?”
(“When do I have time in my life for THAT?”)
(Where am I going to do THAT?”)
Are the wrong questions. We are looking for What you need to do
That is so compelling
You will ignore every Why and How
(When and Where)
In order to do it. It doesn’t matter Why.
However it takes
(Whenever you can)
(Wherever you are).
03/25/2016 — McDowell Barred Owl 01 Detail — McDowell Nature Center & Preserve, Mecklenburg County Parks & Recreation, Charlotte, NC, March 24, 2016Know what your work is and do it.
Your work is ongoing, unending.
You don’t get it done,
and you don’t retire.
Your work is your life.
Your life is your work.
As you live your life,
you do your work.
Your work is who you are,
what you are about.
It expresses you
And pulls you forth.
Your work
Is to find your work
and do it.
03/25/2016 — Bloodroot 2016 01 — McDowell Nature Center & Preserve, Mecklenburg County Parks & Recreation, Charlotte, NC, March 24, 2016The way you approach the natural world
determines whether it will reveal itself
or conceal itself. When I’m taking wildflower photos,
I have to point them out to many of the people
who walk the trails
and ask me what I’m doing “down on the ground.” “Being in nature”
is not “being with nature”
And not seeing a thing. Mindfulness leads the way
Everywhere we go.
The work is always to see what we look at,
And to look at every single thing. Not that I’m Mr. Never Miss Anything Ever.
A group of bird watchers
showed me the first Barred Owl I’d ever seen,
perched on a branch at eye level
15 feet off the path I walked. It was an epiphany,
and stays with me as a reminder
to see what I am seeing
and what I am not seeing.
We all need to be reminded.
And we all need to do it.
Every day.

One Minute Monologues 029

10/27/2015 — 12/16/2015

10/27/2015 — Receive it all with compassionate awareness—
including our automatic reaction to it all
(We hate it, we are terrified by it, we are panic stricken,
we are overjoyed, enraptured, etc.).

Receive our reaction to it along with it.
Receive IT ALL
With compassionate awareness:
”This too, this too…”

That’s it.

Just hold it all in compassionate awareness,
And wait for the shift to happen.
The shift will always happen.

That’s the way compassionate awareness works.
We hold it all in compassionate awareness,
and a shift will happen.
A perspective shift.

We will feel it in our body.

That’s the feeling of being put in accord with reality.
The only healthy way to be in relation to reality
is to be in accord with it.

Our body knows when you are in accord with reality,
and when we are out of accord with it.

Our body keeps score.
And will thank us
when we take up the practice
of receiving it all with compassionate awareness.

And we will feel it.
Every time.
10/28/2015

It’s amazing
the way being aware of one’s thinking/feeling
shifts, deepens, expands, enlarges, transforms
one’s thinking/feeling,
and alters one’s reality—
providing options and choices,
and creating futures,
that did not exist prior
to the advent
of compassionate awareness.

How it works
is beyond understanding
or explanation,
making it magical,
or, if you prefer, miraculous,
and an ever-present example
of Sheldon Kopp’s observation:
”Some things can be experienced, but not understood,
and some things can be understood, but not explained.”
10/26/2015

Sit with yourself.
Listen to yourself.

Not to the narratives that you spin without pause—
the ones about being not good enough,
not going fast enough,
not getting enough done,
not being happy enough,
or wealthy enough.

Listen past all of that
to what your Self is saying to you.

Sit with your Self
until you can separate your Self
from the things you always hear when you are quiet.

Listen past what you normally hear
until you can hear your Self who has never been heard.

Know you can be with your Self anywhere, any time.

That is a radical realization,
with radical implications for the rest of your life.

Live to see what you and your Self can create together
in the time left for living.
10/28/2015

It has taken everywhere we have been
to get us where we are.
So, stop your moaning and complaining and regretting
this place or that one.

They were all exactly what you needed
to be here, now.

It would be wrong to waste all that has gone into
getting you where you are
by not being here, now,
choosing instead to ruminate
and rummage around in your griefs and sorrows,
in your could-have-been’s
and your except-but-only’s.

If your could-have-been’s had been,
if your except-but-only’s had not been,
you still have the exact same problem you have right now:
Being. Here. Now.

So. Be. Here. Now.
Listen. Look. Attend. Hear. See. Be. Here. Now.

Receive well the moment
And all that is in the moment with you.
Bless the moment with your kind attention,
with your compassion
and your grace.

Befriend the moment.
It has been waiting all your life for you.
Celebrate with joy and wonder,
the time and place of your being,
of your life.

Of your being alive,
here and now.
10/29/2015 — Lake Chicot HDR 06 — Lake Chicot State Park, Ville Platte, Louisiana, October 27, 2015

Carl Jung was of the opinion that it is all about “individuation”—
his term for becoming who we are,
for being “one with our Self.”

The Old Testament said it is about “becoming who God is,”
or words to that effect.

It’s what Jesus had in mind when he said, “The Father and I are one.”
And, “Thy will, not mine, be done.”

It’s what Paul had in mind when he said,
“It is no longer I who live, but Christ who lives in me.”

Individuation is growing up into the Self we are.
It is becoming full partners with the Self within,
and living in ways that express, exhibit, make manifest—
the Biblical term is “incarnate”—
the Self within in all that we do in, and with, our life.

It is about getting out of the way—
with our will, our desires, our idea of what we want our life to do for us—
and allowing our Self to live through us,
no matter what that might mean for us
and our idea of success,
or our idea of “what life is all about.”

Life is all about becoming who we are—
living aligned, at-one, with the Self within.

Integrity means oneness with our Self within.
We are here to live with integrity of being with our Self,
so that “The Father, The Self within, and I are one.”

It is time we started figuring out how to do that,
don’t you think?
10/29/2015 — Lake Chicot HDR 01 Panorama—Canoe Launch, East Trailhead, Lake Chicot State Park, Ville Platte, Louisiana, October 27, 2015

There’s nothing to it.
Really.
Nothing. To. It.

We do nothing.
Okay, we sit.

That’s doing something.
Quietly.
That’s doing something else.
Enfolding all the thoughts and moods
that come with compassionate awareness.
When will it end!

Here. Now.

We sit quietly
and meet everything that comes
with compassionate awareness.

Work up to twice a day for twenty minutes each time.
You can do it walking.
Walk quietly
and meet everything that comes
with compassionate awareness.

Or, you can do it running.
Swimming.
Bicycle riding.
Horseback riding.
Eating.
Taking a shower.

You have no excuse for not doing nothing.
You can do it anywhere, any time.

There’s nothing to it.
10/30/15 — Lake Chicot HDR 11 — Lake Chicot State Park, Ville Platte, Louisiana, October 27, 2015

Nothing is too big to be contained in our compassionate awareness.
Not our depression.
Not our fear and anxiety.
Not our anger.
Not our hatred, jealously, envy, inferiority, insecurity…

Not our greed, dissatisfaction,
hunger and thirst for more of everything—
for something, we don’t know what—
anything to take our mind off of our reality.
Not our reality.

All of it fits nicely within our compassionate awareness,
and we don’t have to do anything
about any of it
beyond welcoming it into our attentive presence,
assuring it that it has a home with us,
and is safe with us,
and asking it to tell us all that it has to say.
xxx
10/30/15 — Cajun Cadillac Panorama B&W—Bayou des Glaises, Avoyelles Parish, Louisiana, October 29, 2015

Seeing things as they are

Means seeing that our interpretation of things is what we are seeing

The things we see reflect the seer seeing

Inviting us to see ourselves,

And wonder why we see the way we see

And not some other way instead.

The way things are appears to be different

To all those who view them—

They appear differently to us in different moods,

And at different times of the day.

The way things ARE is contingent upon the 10,000 things!

And, we see THAT when we see them as they “are.”

And, seeing THAT enables us to make inquiries

Regarding the why and wherefore of our seeing.

Why see it the way we see it now?

What is impacting our seeing?

Where did we learn to see as we do?

What does seeing things the way we see them

Enable us to get by with?

Prevent us from doing?

How are we inhibited, limited, stuck in place

By the way we see things?

How else might we see things?

How might our life work better if we saw things differently?

We cannot hope to see anything “as it is”

Until we can see our seeing,

And see what holds our seeing in place,

Keeping us from seeing anything other than the way we see things

All our life long.
10/30/15 — St. Augustine Catholic Church Panorama—Isle Brevelle, Louisiana, October 30, 2015

Nobody has any business pursuing a spiritual practice until after retirement.

We should look forward to retirement as the time for being spiritual,

And I don’t mean as in doctrine, dogma, ideology and theology.

I mean as in direct experience with That Which Can Be Known But Not Told or Said.

Before retirement the stress of life—

Job, house and car payments, bills, spouse/partner, kids, education (yours and your children’s), etc—

Bears too heavily upon us,

Creates too much distraction for us.

It will be hard enough for us to walk two paths at the same time in retirement,

Juggling those responsibilities and duties which, like goodness and mercy, shall follow us all the days of our life—

AND maintaining and deepening our practice.

It’s ridiculous to think that we could do a creditable job doing the Two Paths thing in our working life.

Look at all the gurus you know.

Do they have a full time job in addition to being a full time guru?

The Dalai Lama takes care of his own business,

And his people manage his affairs.

That’s the way to do it.

Anybody could be the Dalai Lama with someone to manage her, or his, affairs!

So don’t be hard on yourself for not being “more spiritual.”

Tune in as you are able,

And look forward to retirement as the time for awakening to the Holy AAAUUUUMMMMMmmmmmm……
Used in Short Talks on Good and Bad Religion — 10/31/15 — Lake Chicot HDR 08 — Lake Chicot State Park, Ville Platte, Louisiana, October 27, 2015

Physical reality puts us in touch with spiritual reality.

The threshold to awareness, realization, enlightenment and perception

Is our encounter with the limitations and restrictions of life as we live it.

Each moment in this world is a doorway, a portal, into the other world.

Religion doesn’t always see it that way.

Religion as we know it spends too much time denouncing,

Dismissing, discounting and denying the world of physical reality.

This world, according to that religion,

Is a “vale of tears,”

Filled with “pain and suffering,”

And is only something to be made up to us

In the world to come after we die.

That religion misses all this world has to offer

By focusing on the glories of the other world.

This world is all we need to clue into the other world

And open ourselves to it,

Bringing it into this world here and now.

We live here, now, as extensions of that world into this world.

We make the connection between worlds real,

And transform this reality with infusions of that reality,

By living here and now as though that reality is the Real Reality,

With grace, mercy, compassion and peace

Where greed, anger, hatred, fear, envy, revenge and vindictiveness would normally be.

We get to the other world through this one

By allowing physical limitations and restrictions

Show us everything we need to know about spiritual reality

And it’s experience and expression in the world of here and now.

Simply sit with this world as it is,

Receiving it with compassionate awareness,

And that world will open itself to you.
Used in Short Talks on Good and Bad Religion — 11/01/15 — Lake Chicot HDR 12 — Cabins—Lake Chicot State Park, Ville Platte, Louisiana, October 12, 2015

There are three statements that form the ground of all good religion world-wide across time:

1) The Bread of Affliction is the Bread of Life.

2) The Cup of Suffering is the Cup of Salvation.

3) The full scope of the Spiritual Journey is the distance from The Garden of Eden to the Garden of Gethsemane.

When we understand how these statements apply to us and our life,

And accommodate ourselves to their truth,

We will be the Buddha and the Christ, Abraham, Mohamed. Lao Tzu, Black Elk and all others of their ilk.
11/02/15 — Lake Chicot HDR 10 — Cabins—Lake Chicot State Park, Ville Platte, Louisiana, October 27, 2015

We know when we are in the flow, and when we are out of it—

When we are in harmony with the Way of Things, and when we are out of harmony.

Nothing gets us out of the flow, out of the Way, faster than:

A) Trying to use it for our personal benefit, gain, advantage, profit, or,

B) Trying to willfully, force it into being and into compliance with our desires.

Waking up is like going to sleep.

We cannot make it happen.

We cannot control it, will it, force it, direct it, manage it, own it, possess it.

It posses us.

The way of alliance with the Way, the Flow, is

”Thy will, not mine, be done.”

This is anathema to the culture of the world,

Where winning, forcing, commanding, commandeering, triumphing, owning, possessing, controlling

Are the only point and purpose of life.

Football, baseball, basketball, soccer, chess, and NASCAR,

And everything else

Is grounded on willing our way to victory, wealth, and glory everlasting.

And then comes along the Flow and the Way with their

”Not YOUR will, but MINE, be done,”

And we are left in the pitch darkness of the deepest night,

Trying to force ourselves to go to sleep.

The Way is not the way for this time and place.

And it is the only hope for this time and place.

There you are.
11/02/15 — Lake Chicot HDR 07 — Lake Chicot State Park, Ville Platte, Louisiana, October 27, 2015 — The yellow flowers along the shoreline are Nodding Beggartick.

Jon Kabat-Zinn is fond of saying, “In all of the languages of the East, the word for ‘mind’ and the work for ‘heart’ is the same word.”

Sometimes, he puts it this way, “All of the religions of the East have one word for ‘mind’ and ‘heart.’”

It point is that mindfulness is not possible without compassion.

We cannot ‘know’ without knowing with compassion—

Without lovingly knowing.

Seeing, hearing and understanding is possible only

By seeing, hearing, and understanding with compassion.

The quality of the What (we do)

Is contingent upon the quality of the

How (we do it)

And the

Why (we do it).

Compassion shapes, forms, limits and determines

The What, the How and the Why.

Those who live well

Live compassionately.

Those who live without compassion

Live poorly.

If you are going to be anything,

Be compassionate

Without being a patsy,

And your life will be a beautiful work of art.
11/03/15 — Black Bayou 05 — Black Bayou Lake National Wildlife Refuge, Monroe, Louisiana, November 02, 2015

Let your “Yes” be yes,

And let your “No” be know.

Mean what you say,

Do what you say you will do.

Live in good faith with yourself,

And with all others.

No duplicity.

No hidden agendas.

No posturing.

No pretending.

Being at one with yourself,

And transparent to yourself,

So that you are who you are

In each situation as it arises,

And “what they see is what they get.”

It doesn’t get more basic than that.
11/03/15 — Cotton in the Field 01 Panorama—Hwy 61 through the Mississippi Delta, November 3, 2015

Heaven is a perspective,

Not a place.

A point of view,

A way of seeing—

With grace and compassion,

Kindness and peace,

Generosity and good will.

No one can expect to “get to heaven,”

Without bringing heaven forth

In their relationships

With all people

Every day.

We create heaven

By the way we see those

Who share the moment with us.

We may not be God, but.

We are as close to God

As some have ever been
11/04/2015 — Reelfoot Lake HDR 01 — Reelfoot Lake State Park, Hornbeak, Tennessee, November 4, 2015

Driving 10.5 hours from South Carolina to Tennessee-almost-Kentucky to photograph Cypress Trees sounds crazy.

It is actually therapy.

A lot of things that are therapeutic are crazy.

What is really crazy is trying to be totally sane,

And never doing anything that sounds the least bit crazy.

Find the things that are therapeutic for you,

That help you “recover from the past and store up for the future.”

That serve you as an oasis in the desert,

And reconnect you with your heart and soul.

And, do them often,

No matter how crazy it might sound.
11/05/2015 — Reelfoot Lake 07 HDR—Reelfoot Lake State Park, Hornbeck, Tennessee, November 4, 2015

Honor the natural rhythms!

That’s the First Law of Harmony and Accord.

The tide comes in and the tide goes out.

Don’t mess with the tide.

Global warming is the result of profit making having a higher priority than the First Law of Harmony and Accord.

When “Profit At Any Price” becomes the operating principle governing existence,

Existence will hang by a thread.

Our place is to recognize the rhythms at work in our life,

And let our life fall into place around our rhythms.

If you are a morning person,

Don’t work the midnight to eight a.m. shift.

If you like rocking chairs,

Sit in rocking chairs.

Honor the rhythms!

Respect the consequences—

The consequences of honoring,

And of dishonoring,

The rhythms.

Paying the price of honoring the rhythms,

Results in a greater profit

Than paying the price of dishonoring them,

Though it won’t likely be a monetary gain.
11/05/2015 — Morton’s Overlook 01 HDR—Great Smoky Mountains National Park, Gatlinburg, Tennessee, November 5, 2015

What’s in there?

All the old stories about seeking hidden treasure

Are about discovering what’s in there.

YOU are the treasure hidden in the field!

The pearl of great price gathering dust in some pawn shop’s

Display case of costume jewelry.

YOU are the Philosopher’s Stone,

Capable of turning “nothing” into “finest gold,”

By discovering what’s in there

And allowing it to come to life

In you,

And through you into the world!

What’s in there?
11/06/2015 — Reelfoot Lake 04 HDR—Reelfoot Lake State Park, Hornbeck, Tennessee, November 4, 2015

We care about what we care about,

Whether we ought to care about it or not.

If we could just care about what we ought to care about,

And not care about what we have no business caring about,

The world would be a different world.

Racism and white supremacy have no place in any world.

The Confederate flag still flies in the State of Mississippi,

Tucked safely away in the corner of the “state flag.”

But, for too many Mississippians,

The state flag wouldn’t be worth flying without that symbol

Of racism and white supremacy—

Leaving the rest of us at a loss

About what to do when evil is seen as good,

And good as evil.

How do you wake people up to the discretancy

Between what they care about

And what they ought to care about?

How do you wake people up to the importance

Of caring about what they ought to care about,

And ought not care about what they ought not care about?

It keeps me awake,

Pondering it.
Used in Short Talks On Contradictions, etc., 11/07/2015 — Reelfoot Lake 05 HDR—Reelfoot Lake State Park, Hornbeck, Tennessee, November 4, 2015

Living at one with ourselves—

Transparent to ourselves

And aware of our ambivalence and contradictions—

Is the single most important way

Of having an impact for the good

On the conditions and circumstances of our life.

Changing the world—

To the extent that it can be changed—

Is as simple as being who we are

In each situation as it arises,

And letting the outcome be the outcome.
11/07/2015 — Reelfoot Lake 06 — Reelfoot Lake State Park, Hornbeck, Tennessee, November 4, 2015 (The white dots are White Pelicans)

We have to live firmly grounded in a defining ethic,

With clear boundaries,

And an unflinching, unshakable grasp

Of what is right and what is wrong.

We have to KNOW what is good and what is not good,

And live in ways that serve the good and oppose the not-good.

We have to KNOW what the rules are,

And abide by them.

The trick is that we impose them on ourselves.

Second-hand rules—

Those handed to us by external authorities—

Are worthless when it comes to providing

Eternal stability and foundation

Amid the heaving waves of the wine-dark sea.

We have to be grounded in our own sense of value,

And live out of it—be guided by it—in all that we do.

We are who we are

Because we say so,

Because WE KNOW who we are

And who we are not.

And you can see it in our life.
11/08/2015 — Reelfoot Lake 03 HDR—Reelfoot Lake State Park, Hornbeck, Tennessee, November 4, 2015

Joseph Campbell said “We know when we are on the beam, and when we are off it.”

We resonate with what is right for us, and are repelled by what is wrong.

How often do we override our sense of what is right, and ignore our sense of what is wrong!

Adam and Eve before the Forbidden Fruit, Jesus searching for his best future in the wilderness and in Gethsemane faced the choice of what to override and what to ignore.

So do we all, more often that we care to know.

At the core of each of us is the rock solid truth of who we are, and who we are not—of who we are to be, and of who we are to be not.

The foundation stone is a guide stone, a polestar, directing us to the life we are built to live, and away from the lives that drain us of life, and lead to the wasteland and the void.

We are born with an internal guidance system that knows with firm conviction when we are on the beam and when we are off it.

Why the lack of attention? Of consultation? Of awareness and alignment?

Why do we not spend time throughout the day, every day, in meditative openness to what we know?

Seeking to place ourselves in harmony with our Inner Guide?

Listening, searching, sensing what here, what now?

Why live not knowing? Not caring? Out of sync with the direction of our life’s true flow?
11/08/2015 — Reelfoot Lake 02 HDR—Reelfoot Lake State Park, Hornbeck, Tennessee, November 4, 2015

We have to know when to rein in our impulses and enthusiasms

And when to give them a hearty endorsement.

We have to know when to say Yes! and when to say No!

There are legitimate limits that must be recognized, respected, honored and observed.

We are not free to live any way we choose,

Any time we like.

We serve values and ends that are not ours to establish and remove,

But to acknowledge and serve.

There is a Good greater than our good—

Greater than our idea of good—

A Justice greater than our sense of justice

And our quick tendency to feel betrayed, neglected and denied.

We are part of a cause greater than we are.

Our life is to be an experience and an expression of more than words can say—

Of more than can be told, or said, or explained, or understood.

At the heart of each of us

Is the knowledge of a truth that is greater than we are.

As Captain Jack Sparrow would say,

“I have no say in the matter, Gibbs—It’s the pirate’s life for me. Savvy?”
11/09/2015 — Black Bayou 01 — Black Bayou Lake National Wildlife Refuge, Monroe, Louisiana, November 2, 2015

We have to work to be who we are,

Living our life the way our life needs us to live it.

We swim against the strong currents

Of home, church, society and culture to do that.

Everything about our life is arrainged

To make us be who we are not,

And to keep us from being who we are.

”You do what I tell you to do—

When I tell you to do it—

The way I tell you to do it!”

We hear it from the beginning,

And it replays throughout our life

To the very end.

It takes conscious, mindful, awareness,

Determination, and courage,

To step beyond the ways we are told to do it,

And do it the way we would do it—

The way we say it needs to be done—

In each situation as it arises,

All our life long.

Who do YOU say you are?

How do YOU say you are to go about being you?

Get behind the wheel of that baby,

Take it for a spin.

See who is the first to ask you

Who you think you are,

And to tell you to get back in line.
11/09/2015 — Reelfoot Lake 08 HDR—Reelfoot Lake State Park, Hornbeck, Tennessee, November 4, 2015

We look for it out there…

The land of promise,

The treasure hard to find,

Meaning, purpose, value,

Success, fortune and glory,

The Fountain of Youth,

The City of Gold,

The Northwest Passage,

The Holy Grail…

We carry with us what we seek,

Searching for what we have never lost but cannot find.

”The Tao is like a man riding his ox,

Looking for his ox.”

We seek “the face that was ours before we were born.”

The Inner Other who is our Invisible Twin.

The Self we are but a shadow of,

And once knew, but have forgotten.

We seek ourselves—our Self—

Who seeks us.

This story should have a happy ending.

Why won’t we allow that to happen?

What do we fear

That keeps us from opening ourselves

To what resides within?
11/10/2015 — Black Bayou 02 HDR—Black Bayou Lake National Wildlife Refuge, Monroe, Louisiana, November 2, 2015

There is the life we dream of living,

The life we settle for,

And the life that is our life to live.

We get all dour and depressed,

Mopey and moaning,

Because the life we settle for

Is a far cry from the life we dream of living,

In a “Poor me, poor me!” kind of way,

While the life that is our life to live—

The life that can be lived in any situation,

In every context and circumstance,

From penthouses to prisoner of war camps,

Stands waiting at the gate

For us to climb in the saddle

And do what can yet be done with it,

While the light still lasts,

In a “Let’s see what we can do with this day,” kind of way.
11/10/2015 — Bud Ogle Cabin 03 — Great Smoky Mountains National Park, Gatlinburg, TN, November 5, 2015

In a perfect world, we each would have exactly what we need from our environment to grow into who we are best equipped and suited to be.

We would have everything we need to be who we are.

We come into the world expecting certain things to be in place:

Parents, extended family, a social structure that is secure and dependable, with trustworthy and just rules to live by, nurturing, nourishing, relationships, resources and experiences for honing our skills and developing our ability to find our way in the world.

The less of this we find when we get here, the harder time we will have in putting together a life for ourselves, and helping others put one together for themselves.

Most of us need more help than we get.

We accommodate ourselves to the world we live in by taking stock, compensating for what is lacking in our life where that is possible, recognizing our handicaps and limitations, and doing what can be done with what we have to work with.

Seeing clearly how things are and accepting the fact they are how they are, and the implications that has for us and our life, squares us up with our circumstances, and gives us the best chance of finding the openings and making the most of our opportunities for growth and development.

In every life, there is a sense in which liabilities can have advantages and advantages can have liabilities. So, are we better off to have won at birth, or to have lost? Only time will tell, but having the heart for the task at hand will make all the difference.
11/11/2015 — Goodale 2015 01 — Goodale State Park, Camden, SC, November 11, 2015

We give up too easily, we quit too soon.

Instead of giving up and quitting,

We need to simply hand it over,

And let our heart take the lead.

If we gave our heart the controls to our life,

And willingly, in good faith, aligned ourselves

With our heart’s drift and direction,

No matter what that might mean

For our wishes, wants, desires, aims and ideas,

Resurrection would be instantaneous and everlasting,

As long as we didn’t say,

”Oh wow! I feel better now,” and take our life back.

Our role is to collaborate with our heart,

And make no unilateral decisions

About any matter, great or small.

Take a Heart Reading several times a day!

Checking-in with the Inner Consultant

Keeps things in harmony and balanced,

All along The Way.
11/12/2015 — Goodale 2015 07 — Goodale State Park, Camden, South Carolina, November 11, 2015

We have to live with our feet under us,

Grounded on the Foundation Stone,

Which is, of course, our “Heart of hearts.”

I use the term, “Heart,”

As a metaphor for that which is central to us,

Deepest, best and truest about us,

As in “The heart of the matter,”

Or “Getting to the heart of things.”

Our Heart is who we are,

Which includes who we also are.

Our Heart is ALL that we are,

Where we are One and at-one with ourselves.

When we live and act out of our Heart,

We are “Grounded on the Foundation Stone,”

And nothing can move us,

Because “We know whereof we speak.”

Finding our way to the Ground and Foundation of Our Life

Is the essential task—

The one to which we owe our full allegiance

and complete devotion.

If you think you have something more important to do,

You are wrong.
11/12/2015 — Chimney Tops—Great Smoky Mountains National Park, Gatlinburg, Tennessee, November 5, 2015

The trip to the Holy Grail, the Holy Land, the Land of Promise, Nirvana, Enlightenment, the Peace of God, Paradise, or wherever it is we think we are going works like this:

See, Hear, Do!

We put all the emphasis on seeing and hearing, on understanding, on getting it all figured out, on knowing what the answers are.

We memorize the Bible, and the Book of Confessions, and the Book of Doctrine, and the Catechisms Large and Small, and constantly talk about what we know,

Conveniently ignoring forever what we also know.

It is what we also know that matters.

What we also know is what we know unconsciously, just beyond the boundaries of our conscious awareness.

That is the real Holy Land.

If you want to live in the lap of God, open yourself to what you know but don’t know that you know.

We have to DO what we KNOW needs doing, but we are so busy talking, talking, talking about what we do know—all the doctrines and ideology positions that we are sure are the Gospel Truth—that we ignore, discount, dismiss, deny what we also know.

For instance, if, while reading this, you get a sense that you need to call your mother, or apologize to your child, stop reading this and call your mother, or apologize to your child.

Forget what you are doing and DO what you KNOW needs to be done!

This is the Law and the Gospel, and it is the only thing keeping you from the Elysian Fields and the Lap of God.
11/12/2015 — Oconoluftee 2015 02 — Great Smoky Mountains National Park, Cherokee, NC, November 5, 2015

Don’t take my injunction to “DO!” as an invitation to live impulsively.

You are your own guide here.

You have to sense the source of your directions.

You have to trust your own judgment.

”Does this need to be done?”

”Who am I trying to please with this action?”

”Who would be most pleased with me for doing this?”

”Who is guiding my boat on its path through the sea?

”Who is calling the shots?”

”Does this come from my deep sense of what needs doing—

Or from some external source that I have internalized?”

We have to live out of our own judgment.

We have to be our own authority for what we do and leave undone.

We have to live our own life.

We have to take care of our own business.

Impulsive, unreflective, living

Is dancing to someone else’s tune.

We have to sing our own song—

The song of our own heart.

Knowing where the line between Them and Us lies

Is essential knowing.
11/13/2015 — Goodale 2015 10 — Goodale State Park, Camden, South Carolina, November 11, 2015

What is important?

Your answer to that question,

Through each stage of life,

Is the Teller that tells the tale.

We are who we are

Because of what is important to us.

How important is what we declare to be important

Is the question.

Our life is a quest for true value—

For ideas, people, symbols, and things ert and inert

That are truly valuable.

We are looking for the treasure

Worthy of our allegiance and loyalty over time,

And settle, too often, for glass beads and silver mirrors.

Thus, the importance of knowing what is important.

How can we tell?

How do we know?

There is no substitute tool in the whole bag of tools

For attentive, compassionate, mindfulness—

For seeing what we look at,

For knowing what we know.

Eyes to see,

Ears to hear,

And hearts to understand,

See, hear and understand beneath the surface

And beyond the visible

Into the depths

And into the invisible.

Make sure your Seer, Hearer, Understander

Is operating on all levels

By becoming mindful of what you take to be

The whole thing.

Mistaking the sheen for the gold

Is a rookie mistake.

Our life needs more from us than that.
11/13/2015 — Black Bayou 06 — Black Bayou Lake Wildlife Refuge, Monroe, Louisiana, November 2, 2015

Just as “one book opens another,”

So one moment lived well opens into the next moment,

Carrying us, moment-to-moment, into all of our life.

We don’t have to think our life out,

We only have to open ourselves to what our life is asking of us,

And wait for the door to open in “this” moment,

With the Way leading to all moments flowing from this one.

It’s all very magical,

Leading us to think in terms of synchronicity,

Or the Grace of God.

All three terms—magic, synchronicity, and God’s Grace—

Mean the same thing: Unexpected gifts and direction.

We do not think our way into these gifts and directions.

They visit themselves upon us,

Unfold before us,

And bless us with wonder at the mystery of life—

An experience common to those

Who step into each moment

Looking for what needs what they have to offer,

And allow one moment to open to the next.
11/14/2015 — Goodale 2015 20 — Goodale State Park, Camden, South Carolina, November 11, 2015

Our life—both of them—

The one we are living,

And the one that is ours to live within the one we are living—

Demands a response from us.

We respond best to each life

From a perspective of quiet, mindful, compassion.

Ariadne’s Thread winds through both lives,

And we follow it—

Not by thinking our way forward

With reason and logic,

Plans, schemes, strategies and tactics,

And not by being cagey and clever—

By being present with what is happening

With compassion and awareness,

And waiting for the shift to happen,

The door to open,

The path to appear—

And acting when the time is right

To claim the prize,

Which is doing the right thing,

In the right way,

At the right time.

In each situation as it arises.

To live this way

Is to be one with the Tao,

And live the life that is ours to live

Within the life we are living.

May it be said so of us all!
11/14/2015 — Goodale 2015 06 Panorama—Goodale State Park, Camden, South Carolina, November 11, 2015

We are divided within.

It’s a left bran/right brain split,

With the left brain being the seat of conscious, willful, logic and reason—

Ego driven and goal oriented,

And the right brain being the home of all that is unconscious,

Including, heart, soul, and Self.

Ego and Self.

Two minds, one body, one life.

The way of the culture of the East

Has been to disappear the Ego.

Starve it out.

Ignore it.

Denounce it.

Renounce it.

Send it packing.

Chase it away with the sound of AAAAAUUUUUMMMMMM…

The culture of the West has taken a different tack:

Repress,

Or suppress,

All that is unconscious—

Give it no place to call home.

The result with both East and West

Has been war within throughout the eons.

How different would things be

If Ego and Self had been working together

All this time

To heal the breach,

Honor each others strengths

Strengthen each others weaknesses,

And live in the wonder of each others company

As one?

We should live to find out,

Starting now.
11/15/2015 — Goodale 2015 16 — Goodale State Park, Camden, South Carolina, November 11, 2015

The Quest is for wholeness,

And for meaning.

We cannot live on entertaining apps and gadgets.

There has to be an underlying ground and purpose to our life,

And sex isn’t it.

How many times can we fall in love

Before we wake up to the realization

That falling in love has nothing to do with the other person,

But everything to do with us?

It is ourselves we are seeking in the other!

Ourselves we see in the other!

Our Self seeking us in the other!

Those love letters you pen?

Those poems you write?

Notes from you to YOU!

YOU are there,

In the other!

All those qualities that attract you to the other?

Even the eyes—

What is it about those eyes?

Get to the bottom of it!

What the eyes represent to you

Are what you seek in YOU!

What the other person represents to you

Is what you seek in YOU!

Is what YOU seek to BE in your life.

If the other person can be of help to you in living your life,

And if you can be of help to the other person,

The two of you may want to enter a partnership

For LIFE—

For the LIFE that is trying to come forth in each one of YOU.

That way, you both could intentionally make the other conscious

Of the YOU trying to come forth in each of you

Throughout your life together.

That would be what marriage is all about.
11/16/2015 — Goodale 2015 20 — Goodale State Park, Camden, South Carolina, November 11, 2015

There are right ways to be a Mom or a Dad,

And wrong ways to be either.

Right ways to be their child,

And wrong ways.

All of the roles of our life have a right and wrong side to them.

The idea is to stay on the right side of all of them.

There is a problem with that, of course,

Being right all the time.

If you think that’s easy,

Or could be if you just tried hard enough,

I say, “Go ahead! Climb onto the back of that beast,

And tell them to open the chute!”

My bet is you won’t last the eight required seconds

Of Rodeo Time.

And that isn’t even the hardest part.

The hardest part is when the Right Side

Of one role,

Clashes head-on with the Right Side

Of another.

Once you are older, with children,

You have the role of the Right Mom, Right Dad,

With your children,

And the role of the Right Child

With your Mom and/or Dad.

All of our roles have the tendency to clash like that.

Makes it impossible to be on the right side of all of them.

The nature of the game forces us

To play some of our positions wrong.

Something else to be aware of,

And square up to,

And bear the pain of,

Consciously.

Living mindfully,

With compassion,

Trumps everything else,

When it comes to doing it right.

Getting that down

Will help you through a lot of tight spots.
11/16/2015 — Reelfoot Lake 10 HDR—Reelfoot Lake State Park, Hornbeck, Tennessee, November 4, 2015

It’s a mess, and I don’t have the solution.

My best advice is,

”Don’t let the fact that it is a mess stop you,

Or even slow you down.

Get in there and do your thing—

Live your own life,

Aligned—to the best of your ability to intuit and implement—

With your life’s idea for itself.

Your role is to be YOU—

To be true to your Self

(The Self at the heart and center of who YOU are)—

In every context, situation and circumstance.

Zone into YOU

And bring YOU forth to meet the day

Everyday.

Don’t worry about fixing the world.

Bring YOU forth to meet the world.

That’s the blessing the world needs most.”

If you can find better advice,

Take it.
11/17/2015 — Goodale 2015 03 — Goodale State Park, Camden, South Carolina, November 11, 2015

There is nothing to be

Beyond being who we are.

There is nothing to do

Beyond doing what we are uniquely suited to do.

All the planning, plotting, scheming, organizing, arranging, designing…

Could be replaced with seeing, hearing, and understanding.

But, we don’t trust the Inner Guides,

Or even know of their existence,

And think we are all alone with what to do about us.

So, we devise a life for ourselves

That doesn’t fit,

And wonder what is wrong

Without a clue.
11/17/2015 — Bud Ogle Cabin 05 — Great Smoky Mountains National Park, Gatlinburg, Tennessee, November 5, 2015

Loneliness is knowing there is no one but you.

If you get the flu, you make your own chicken soup.

If you throw up, you clean it up.

No one has your back.

Everything is up to you,

Depends on you,

Weighs heavily upon you.

Loneliness is the bane of the old and the young alike.

There is no agony or anguish like loneliness borne alone.

Alcohol and drugs numb the pain

But do nothing to relieve the reality,

Or change the fact

Of aloneness.

Yet, there is consolation.

Our Psyche does not leave us bereft.

There is a Gang of Invisible Friends in there—

A two-million-year-old-Self with a stake in our life;

Ancestors, who themselves faced loneliness, from ancient times;

The Wise Old Man or Woman;

The Hero, the Artist, the Creator, the Wild One, the Guide…

Walk among them, invite them along,

Take advantage of all they have to offer.

Relieve The Mood the next time it strikes

With an inner communion of those

Who are with you always

To comfort and to bless.
11/18/2015 — Goodale 2015 08 Panorama—Goodale State Park, Camden, South Carolina, November 11, 2015

When we bring ourselves forth

To meet the moment

The way the moment needs to be met,

We transform the moment,

And influence the way life is lived

Around us

Far more than we ever know,

Or can imagine,

Or believe.
11/19/2015 — Goodale 2015 05 — Goodale State Park, Camden, South Carolina, November 11, 2015

Whenever I get out of the way,

The Voice is there, waiting to talk.

The Voice knows exactly what I need to hear.

I gather, that is also exactly what The Voice needs to say.

I can only assume that something similar goes on with everyone.

I would like to work the experiment with each of you,

Getting you out of the way,

And seeing what happens then.

I’m going to have to trust you to conduct it on your own.

Get out of the way.

See what happens.

How would you go about doing that?

Getting out of the way, I mean.
11/19/2015 — Middle Prong of the Little Pigeon River 06 — Chimney’s Picnic Area, Great Smoky Mountains National Park, Gatlinburg, TN, November 5, 2015

I’m here to help you with your life,

But, there’s a catch.

You actually have to HAVE a life.

You can’t just be wishing you had a life,

Or dreaming of having a life,

Or trying to think up a life.

You can’t make up just any life,

Or pick one off the rack, and say, “This’ll do.”

You have to have a life that has you back—

That grabs you by the neck,

And throws you against the way,

And says, “I’m yours and you are mine!

And there is no getting away from me,

Or trying to hide!”

Of course, that doesn’t stop us from getting away,

And trying to hide.

But THAT’S the life I’m talking about.

The one that wants you but you don’t want—

For 10,000 reasons.

So, lets start with your discard pile.

What lives have you thrown away?

Dismissed, discounted, denied?

Which one, or ones, keep coming back,

Wondering if it’s time yet,

If it’s finally their turn now?

If I am going to be able to help you with your life,

You have to believe you have a life,

And if you aren’t gripped by one,

You have to believe that you could be gripped by one.

You have to be willing to give your life at least that much of a chance.

You have to be willing to bet the rest of your life

On a life you are not even sure you believe in.

That’s where it starts—

With you being willing to bet your life

On actually having a life,

And letting it have a chance at you.
11/19/2015 — Ginkgos 02 Panorama—Charlotte, NC, November 18, 2015

One of the spiritual laws discovered by Alchemy is

”The heart and the mind must be in harmony with the work.”

This applies across time and space as a bedrock requirement

For spiritual realization.

We must be one with what we do.

It isn’t our work if we are not one with it.

Heart and mind have to be in harmony with each other,

And with The Work,

Or there is no spiritual development.

We cannot become spiritual by talking and thinking and believing.

Our heart has to be in what we say, think and believe,

And it must take shape, be given form, in our work.

Heart and mind come to life in our work.

Who we are and what we do have to be in harmony.

One.

If our heart isn’t in it,

And our mind doesn’t buy it,

It isn’t our work,

And we are wasting our time—kidding ourselves—doing it.
11/20/2015 — Goodale 2015 12 Panorama—Goodale State Park, Camden, South Carolina, November 11, 2025

I’m here to help you with your life, but.

You have to help me help you.

You do that by being open

To the possibilities of life

In every situation of life,

In every context and circumstance of life,

And receiving everything

With mindful, compassionate awareness

(Without judgment, will, or opinion),

Seeing what needs to happen there,

And what you can do to assist its happening,

With the gifts that are yours to give.

That’s your role.

My role is to remind you of your role.

If you refuse to have anything to do with it,

That’s your business,

And I have no business

Meddling in your business.
11/20/2015 — Oktibbeha County 02 HDR Panorama—Oktibbeha County, Mississippi, November 20, 2015

Here is a book recommendation:

”Essentialism: The Disciplined Pursuit of Less,” by Greg McKeown.

You’ve heard me say,

”You have to know what is important,

And live as though it is.”

McKeown helps us determine what is important.

Living as though it is is still up to us.

Our life isn’t ours

As long as someone else is telling us what is important—

Which, of course, would be pleasing them.

McKeown’s book is about reclaiming our life,

And living it.

Which makes his book important

In my book.

And so, the recommendation.
11/2012015 — Reelfoot Lake 11 HDR Panorama—Reelfoot Lake State Park, Hornbeck, Tennessee, November 4, 2015

We are the final authority over our own life.

What WE say goes with us.

What’s with this looking around to see if we are approved?

Acceptable?

Young children—before kindergarten—are completely free to be who they are.

Jesus said, “Unless you turn and become like children,

You will never enter the Kingdom of Heaven.”

He knew what he was talking about.

Living out of our own heart and soul,

Grounded in our own center,

Our own core of being,

On our own authority,

Is the foundational requirement

For life that is spilling over, pouring out.

Do it the way YOU would do it,

All your life long!
11/21/2015 — Goodale 2015 17 — Goodale State Park, Camden, South Carolina, November 11, 2015

It isn’t so difficult, finding our life and living it.

1) Understand that to be the most important thing.

2) Step away from the noise in your life and be quiet enough to listen to yourself think and feel yourself feel.

3) Reflect on: What is the one thing you wish you were doing that you are not doing?

4) Reflect on: Where do you find your deepest joy in your life?

5) Reflect on: What skills, gifts and abilities do you enjoy using the most?

6) What are your dreams, waking and sleeping, saying about your life as you are currently living it?

7) What choices do you need to make that you are putting off making?

8) What choices are you allowing someone else to make for you?

9) In light of the above, what do you need to do?

10) Do it!
11/23/2015 — Cypress Trees 01 — Goodale State Park, Camden, South Carolina, November 11, 2015

Anthony Stevens said, “In counting our blessings, we invariably overlook the shadow that they cast.”

Every asset is a liability, and every liability is an asset.

We think of blessings as nullifying negative aspects of our life.

Blessings trump, x-out, negate, disappear, etc. all things unwanted.

Grief, loss, sorrow, tragedy, heartbreak, devastation, agony, despair, and all things similar

Are dismissed and erased by “counting our blessings.”

“When I think of my son’s death, I look around and see all those people who have it so much worse than I do, and remember how blessed I truly am.”

The blessings do not cancel out the ache of the absence of those who were life itself for us.

Life is ONE:

Grief AND Delight.

Joy AND Sorrow.

Blessings AND Afflictions.

In living well, we have to take EVERYTHING into account,

And live in light of conflicting, oppositional, mutually exclusive and excluding realities.

The fact that “this” is true,

Does not discount or deny the fact that “that” is also true.

We live in the tension of the polarity between “this” and “that.”

We allow all of it to be so, because it is so.

And we live with one in light of the other,

Allowing “the other side” to deepen, enlarge, expand and mature us,

And enable us to live out of the wisdom created

Through the consideration of counter-balancing realities.

Life is the art of managing the tension between opposing poles,

And bearing consciously the pain of their contradictory nature.

Every time we say “Yes” to something,

We say “No” to something else.

And vice-versa.

We have to see what ALL we are doing,

And not-doing.

And then decide what to do.
11/23/2015 — Leaves of Fall 05 — Indian Land, South Carolina, November 18, 2015

Carl Jung felt that we must each, in our own way, learn the art of letting things happen, in their own way.

This is the Taoist principle of Wu-Wei, doing what needs to be done by doing nothing at all in an intentional, willful, forceful way, or “doing by not-doing.”

Letting things happen.

Seeing what path opens before us, and walking it to wherever it may lead.

Jung said, “Letting go of oneself becomes the key to opening the door to the way.”

We have to turn ourselves over to the psyche.

The left hemisphere has to recognize the central place of the right hemisphere, and place itself in accord with it.

The left hemisphere honors the right,

And collaborates with it—listens to it—aligns itself with it—

In the joint creation of a life worthy of us, a life worth living.

Jung said, “Consciousness is forever interfering, helping, correcting, negating, and never leaving the simple growth of the psychic process in peace.”

The left hemisphere no sooner says, “Okay. I’ll listen to my counterpart on the right side of our brain,” than it begins to edit, amend and put right, or dismiss, what comes forth.

The left hemisphere is the consummate One Who Knows Best And Must Be Pleased.

The right hemisphere is never more than the ragamuffin child who must always be overseen and put straight.

We have long since identified with the left hemisphere, so that as conscious egos, the way of the left hemisphere is the way of the culture, and the way of each of us.

It is asking a lot of us to “learn the art of letting things happen,”

To “Step back, stand aside, and see what opens before us,”

And, “Follow it out, wherever it leads.”

Perhaps, it is asking too much.

But, nothing less will do.

Our work is cut out for us, waiting on us to take it up.

We demur, and wait, ourselves, for something more like what we have in mind.
11/24/2015 — Reelfoot Lake 12 HDR – Reelfoot Lake State Park, Hornbeck, Tennessee, November 4, 2015

We are responsible for our own happiness, mood, state of mind and being.

We have to make our own peace with the way things are.

We don’t have to like any of it to live in accord with it.

From 1942 to 1944 Victor Frankl accommodated himself to Nazi Concentration Camps–one of which was Auschwitz.

He said, “Everything can be taken from a man but one thing: the last of the human freedoms—to choose one’s attitude in any given set of circumstances, to choose one’s own way.”

And, “Those who have a ‘why’ to live, can bear with almost any ‘how’.”

Our “why” is “what we are here for,” “what is ours to do,” “what we do that centers us, focuses us, grounds us, and makes our heart sing–even though it be breaking.”

I’ve recommended Simon Sinek’s Ted Talk before. Here’s the link again:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sioZd3AxmnE

Find your why! It will connect you immediately with your what!

With your why and your what in hand, you can handle any how and where!

If we spend all our time and energy trying to arrange our where and how to our liking,

We will be awash in despondency and lost in remorse and sorrow.

Do not allow your where and how to disconnect you from your why and what!

We have to find our life and live it, regardless of the context and circumstances of our life!
11/24/2015 — Goodale 2015 09 — Goodale State Park, Camden, South Carolina, November 11, 2015

Libido is only marginally concerned with sex.

Beyond sex, there is life.

Libido is Life Energy—the Fuel of Life.

Our level of libido is a measure of our interest and investment in our life.

It is an indicator of the degree to which we love the life we are living.

If sex is the only thing about our life that turns us on—

If sex is all we live for—

We have no life.

We don’t know why we are here,

Or what do do with the time that is our on the earth.

We are lost, aimless, without direction, meaning or purpose.

Here we are. Now what?

First, there must be hunger and thirst.

Libido has to come to our rescue—

And will, once we wake up enough to know

We have to seek the life that is ours to live,

With heart for the journey,

And an unshakable resolve

To serve the life that calls us,

With loyalty and allegiance forever.

This is the Knight’s quest for his adventure,

The Lady’s quest for her heart’s true desire.

It is our quest for our life.

It is the Hero’s Journey.

Libido’s true reason for being.

The Fuel for Life.
11/25/2015 — Black Bayou 11 HDR — Black Bayou Lake National Wildlife Refuge, Monroe, Louisiana, November 2, 2015

Knowing what’s what is all we need to know.

Knowing what’s what knows what’s what on every level at once.

When we know what’s what, we remember to breathe.

We remember to breathe consciously,

Slowly,

Deeply.

That changes everything.

It gives us time, clears space, provides perspective,

Enables us to know what we know,

Like how much of what we know is being filtered

Through our left hemisphere,

And how little is coming to us through our right hemisphere.

That, alone, transforms our response to the here and now

Of our living.

More Right!

Less Left!

Applying that mantra physiologically and not politically

Would put us in the middle of where we need to be.

Which is in the middle of all polarities and extremes.

The fulcrum.

The balance point.

The place of greatest influence.

“The still point of the turning world.”

Living there changes the world.

All worlds.
11/25/2015 — Through the Trees 01 — Reelfoot Lake State Park, Hornbeck, Tennessee, November 01, 2015

Our biggest problem is knowing who we are—

Knowing what is important to us on a level

Beyond what we think is important.

We think what we think is all there is to us.

We are, we think, who we say we are.

We have no idea who we also are.

This is our problem.

Knowing who we think we are is shallow water.

We contain unfathomable depths,

Of which we know nothing.

We are a mystery unto ourselves,

An adventure story waiting to be lived.

We look forward to Star Wars,

And ignore the world within waiting to be explored.

Our task is to open ourselves to the inner world,

And experience the truth of who we also are,

Of the unlived life waiting to be lived.

Starting is as easy as remembering tonight’s dreams,

And understanding what they have to say.
11/25/2015 — Goodale 2015 11 — Goodale State Park, Camden, SC, November 11, 2015

Listen to your life!

Your life will tell you all you need to know about living.

Living is the lesson.

Life is the teacher.

The key is interpretation.

We have to “get it.”

Observation is not the problem.

We can see what is happening with the best of them.

Understanding what is happening is the problem.

Perceiving what is happening is the problem.

Comprehending what is happening is the problem.

Our life swings from bad to good

On the pivot point of Right Interpretation.

Things are going poorly,

And we push, push, push to make them better.

Things are going well,

And we push, push, push to make them better.

Adam and Eve walked through Paradise

And had an idea for making it better.

Our life isn’t what we want it to be

And we focus on rearranging our life.

How about rearranging ourselves?

Why do we never think of that?

Sitting down with our idea of how our life should be,

And changing the way we think.

Why is it always bending our life to serve our will,

And never bending our will to serve our life?

What is our life asking of us?

What does our life want from us? With us?

We have to listen to our life to know,

With a heart devoted to understanding what we hear.
11/27/2015 — Ginkgos 2015 08 Panorama — Charlotte, NC, November 26, 2015

If we don’t grow up with the confidence

That we are grounded in loving presence,

Knowing that we are secure, valued and wanted,

We have to establish that for ourselves—

Consciously, deliberately, intentionally—

In order to provide ourselves with the foundation

Our parents failed to furnish.

This is not easy,

But.

It is essential.

We have to know what we hunger for—

We are driven to fit-in, belong, be loved, have a place

That is secure, certain and guaranteed—

And bear consciously the pain of its absence,

While we seek it’s confirmation.

Here’s the secret:

We will find what we seek

By knowing that we seek it,

And willing ourselves to live as though we have it

Before its reality is conferred upon us

By those who matter most to us.

We have to fake it ’till we make it.

We have to act the part.

We have to courageously pretend to be more whole than we are.

We have to dance with our fear.

We have to do it the way we would do it

If we knew we were secure, valued and wanted.

We have to become what we need.

We have to be what we seek.

Living transparent to ourselves,

And bearing consciously, compassionately, the pain of our parents’ negligence (or abuse).
11/27/2015 — Ginkgos 2015 13 B&W — Charlotte, NC, November 26, 2015

We have to step into our fear

And dance with our insecurity.

Joseph Campbell said, “The treasure we seek,

Lies in the cave we are most afraid to enter.”

The Land of Promise

Lies on the other side of our fear.

We can easily talk ourselves out of doing what needs us to do it.

We can come up with 10,000 excuses “like that,”

For not doing the thing that waits for us.

We do what is ours to do

By doing it.

It takes living with heart to find our heart.

Courage comes,

As the Lion in the Wizard of Oz discovered,

From acting courageously.

We don’t have to be courageous

To act courageously.

We only have to act courageously,

As though we are in a movie about our life,

And have to play the part that calls for courage.

Play the part the situation calls us to play,

As though we are in a movie

And it’s our role.

We act our way all the way to the Land of Promise,

To the Journey’s End.
11/28/2015 — Ginkgos 2015 14 B&W Panorama — Charlotte, NC, November 26, 2015

To be loved

Means to be listened to with understanding.

Anything else is posturing.
11/28/2015 — Ginkgo Magic 04 Panorama — Charlotte, NC, November 28, 2015

If you are going to aim for anything,

Aim to be a

Loving presence in the lives of others—

Dependably, reliably, consistently conveying

A constant source

Of stability, safety and security—

So as to reassure, console, comfort and encourage

All who come your way,

Amid the heaving waves

Of the wine-dark sea.
11/29/2015 — Reelfoot Lake 13 HDR — Reelfoot Lake State Park, Hornbeck, Tennessee, November 04, 2015

It takes time to square ourselves up with how things are

When the discrepancy is great between how they are

And how we wish they were.

Coming to terms with that discrepancy

Is life’s hardest task.

We don’t hurry through it,

Or breeze right past it

On our way to happier times.

We have to bear our own grief,

Carry our own sorrow,

And live with the weight of our own agony and anguish,

Through long days and nights

Of letting go what’s going,

And letting come what’s coming,

And allowing things to be as they are.

Denial is the only shortcut,

And saves us nothing in the long run,

Postponing the inevitable,

And preventing the accommodation

That puts us in right relationship with our life,

And allows us to reconcile ourselves to the disparity

Of contrary truths—

The truth of how things are and of how we want things to be—

And do what needs us to do it

Even yet, even now, even so.
11/29/2015 — Ginkgo Magic Panorama 01 — Charlotte, North Carolina, November 28, 2015

What would you be willing to go to hell for?

Knowing what you would go to hell for

Is the best way I know of assessing what is important.

If it is important enough to you to go to hell for it,

It’s important.

If you wouldn’t go to hell for anything

Because avoiding hell is the most important thing,

You have no foundation,

No ground,

No integrity.

You have sold out.

You have sold your soul for the price of getting to heaven

No. Matter. What.

You are only doing what someone else tells you to do,

And, you have missed the point.

The point is to live your life at one with your Self and your Life.

You, your Self and your Life have to be One.

Making for: Wholeness. Completion. Integrity.

That’s the point.

Where this kind of oneness of being exists,

THERE is heaven!

And only there.

Thus, the question:

What would be willing to go to hell for?

We have to be willing to go to hell

In order to get to heaven.
11/30/2015 — Reelfoot Lake 11 Panorama B — Reelfoot Lake State Park, Hornbeck, Tennessee, November 4, 2015

You cannot do what needs to be done,

And do what is supposed to be done,

In any situation that arises.

Who determines what needs to be done?

You do,

Out of your own personal authority,

In response to your read of the situation.

Who determines what is supposed to be done?

Those Who Know Best And Must Be Pleased

Out of their knowledge of policies and procedures

And the way it has always been done

In similar situations,

From the beginning of time.

Jesus said, “Why don’t you decide for yourselves what is right?”

But we don’t have the personal authority to determine what is right

In each situation as it arises,

So, we fall back on Ecclesiastical Authority,

And do it the way it is supposed to be done.

If Jesus had done it that way,

He would have never been crucified,

And we would have never heard of him.

To do it Jesus’ way

Is to do it OUR way.

If we dare.
11/30/2015 — Ginkgo Magic 06 Panorama — Charlotte, NC, November 28, 2015

We work it out with our innate capacities and interests,

Our enthusiasms and desires,

Our possibilities and our limitations

(You wouldn’t want me playing the piano at your wedding,

And that’s just one item on a very long list).

We take what comes with us into the world in one hand,

And we take what we find waiting on us—

The context and circumstances,

Terms and conditions,

Of life in the world—in the other hand,

And work to get the two hands together

Over the course of our life,

Seeing what we can do with all of it,

What we can make of it,

What it can make of us.

Our life is our art.

We are its gift to us.

We bring each other forth,

Delighting in the wonder of our creation.

May it be so said of us all!
11/30/2015 — OktibbIteha County 02 HDR Panorama — Starkville, Mississippi, November 20, 2015

Our role is to put ourselves in accord

With the context and circumstances of our life,

And align ourselves with the life

That is trying to come to life within us,

And through us—

Even now, even yet—

In a “Thy will, not mine be done,” kind of way.

It takes the right sort of listening

In the right sort of silence

To know what I’m talking about,

But, any sort of listening

In any sort of silence,

Is enough to know

This isn’t it.

The way to it

Is through the knowing

That comes from listening intently, intensely,

In the silence

For that which is on the other side of our awareness

Intently, and intensely hoping to commune with us

Along the pathway of instinct and intuition,

Dreams and fantasy,

And guide us to the life

That waits for us to live it,

Even now, even yet.

Make dates with the silence,

And listen as though your life depends on it.
12/01/2015 — Reelfoot Lake 14 HDR — Reelfoot Lake State Park, Hornbeck, Tennessee, November 4, 2015

I would like to do it all over again,

And do it like it ought to be done.

I got way too much in my way the first time.

I was all about what I liked and didn’t like,

What I wanted and didn’t want.

As if I knew what to like and not like,

Want and not want.

What did I know?

I only had the mood of the moment to guide me.

I have better guides at this point in my life.

I wish I had had them from the first.

It takes a lot of living

To know when you are getting in your own way,

And step aside,

Listening for the guidance of the Guides,

Taking everything into account,

And allowing All Things Considered

To wake us up

As to what needs to be said and done,

And what needs to be left unsaid, undone.

I would like to do it all over again,

Taking everything into account.

I hope I can do a better job

With that from this point forward.

May it be certainly so!
12/01/2015 — Ginkgos 2015 24 — Charlotte, NC, December 1, 2015

The life that waits for us to live it

Is a gentler, kinder life than the one

We are living and seek to live.

The life we need to seek to live

Needs far less than the life we live to live.

The life that needs us to live it

Seeks to bring us forth and make us known—

To ourselves and the world.

The life we seek to live is concerned only

With buying, spending, amassing and consuming—

And cares nothing

For self-reflection, examination and expression.

We live to not-know ourselves,

But to hide from ourselves in the 10,000 things and ways.

The difference between the two lives

Is considerable,

And worth considering.

Even if we choose not to live it,

At least, we would know what we were rejecting,

And be responsible for saying, “No!”
12/01/2015 — Leaves of Fall 08 — Andrew Jackson State Park, November 9, 2015

Carl Jung, from an early age,
was aware of having
an outer and inner personality
which he dubbed, #1 and #2.

#1 took care of managing the details of the day—
his conscious ego, rational, logical, reasonable, consistent, dependable—
choosing what clothes to wear and what to have for lunch, etc.

#2 was the two million year old man within,
the Deeper Self of his unconscious,
who oversaw,
and weaved together,
the threads of Jung’s larger life,
directing him toward nature,
philosophy,
reflection
and inquiry.

Jung realized that #1
had to put himself in accord
with #2, so that,
rather than “kick against the goads,”
#1 would consult #2 regarding
the general direction
and drift of the times,
and find ways of organizing
the details of life as it was being lived
to reflect and express the larger
meaning and purpose
that #2 would have Jung serve.

There may be a gift here
for each of us to decide
if it is something
we would do well
to open and explore.
12/02/2015 — Goodale 2015 15 — Goodale State Park, Camden, SC, November 11, 2015

We live in the most neurotic (i.e., crazy, mixed-up, spinning its wheels going nowhere, but not irrational) culture in the entire history of cultures, like a dog chasing its tail, getting more neurotic with each generation, and each year of each present generation

Because we will not stop, see what we are doing, bear consciously the pain of that realization, and do the work of waking up, coming to our senses, making our peace with how things are and how things also are, and doing what needs to be done—doing what is being asked of us—in each situation as it arises, with the gifts, interests, values and enthusiasms that lie latent and unacknowledged, unexpressed, within us,

Listening to, and serving, our instinct and intuition, in conjunction with our reason and logic—trusting ourselves to that marriage of opposites as we step into and engage all the other opposites at play in our lives, to reconcile, integrate, harmonize and make whole—

Trusting ourselves to, and allowing, this wonderful old process to bring us home to ourselves, each other and all others, in peace that passes all understanding, restores us to our soul, and all of us to our collective soul, and makes all things good.

We make life hell for ourselves and others, while being one slight perspective shift away from the glories of heaven and life everlasting, because we won’t do the work of waking up, growing up, and living as though we are—but keep waiting for someone else to go first, to create a mass movement that goes viral and makes it easy because everyone is doing it, and it is so much fun that we would be crazy not to.

Here’s a news flash for you: We would be crazy not to now.
12/02/2015 — Ginkgo Magic 02 — Charlotte, NC, November 28, 2015

There is nothing to equal

Establishing a relationship

With a Jungian analyst

And getting to work.

You can delay it,

Deny it,

Spend time with substitutes

Facsimiles,

Replacements,

And stand-ins,

But.

There is nothing to equal

Establishing a relationship

With a Jungian analyst

And getting to work
12/02/2015 — Bud Ogle Cabin 04 — Great Smoky Mountains National Park, Gatlinburg, Tennessee, November 5, 2015

There is a level to our lives that is beyond the apparent, routine and ordinary—

A level waiting to be discovered, explored, experienced, lived.

There is a side to us—a deeper “I”—waiting to come to life in our life,

Transforming our life—the one we are living—

And infusing us with life, libido, vitality, amazement and wonder,

That This could have been hiding in us all the while,

Waiting for us to discover “the treasure hard to find,”

And become who we have always been.

We make the discovery by becoming conscious—

Mindfully, compassionately, aware—

Of all that we know of us,

But don’t know that we know

Until we pay attention,

And understand that everything

Is just what it is,

And more than it is.

More than we could ever imagine.

And, it has been so all along.
12/03/2015 — Reelfoot Lake 15 HDR — Reelfoot Lake State Park, Hornbeck, Tennessee, November 4, 2015

We are at once bound and free,

And live out our lives within that tension,

Doing what we can to move from bondage to freedom,

Without allowing the insurmountably of our task

To dissuade us from its completion.

This is “the human predicament” in short form.

We cannot do what must be done,

And we can’t let that stop us.

No quitting! No giving up! No surrender! No lagging behind!

We live to alter our genetic makeup for the better

By being conscious of what we are up against

And of what is ours to do, nevertheless, even so,

And living to see what mindfulness can do

With where we have come from

And where we—as individuals and as a species—need to be going.

This is our work,

And the work needs workers.

Are you in or not?
12/03/2015 — Ginkgo Magic 03 Panorama — Charlotte, NC, November 28, 2015

It is the place of consciousness

To harmonize

The thinking brain and the feeling brain:

No dominance!

Collaboration!

We have to consciously think about what we are feeling,

And notice how it feels to think what we are thinking.

If we spend most of our time thinking,

We have to consciously ask ourselves,

Throughout the day,

“How do you feel about this?”

If we spend most of our time feeling,

We have to consciously ask ourselves,

“What do you think about this?”

Our dominant function

Has to consciously give way to our subordinate function,

Inviting input, guidance and direction

From “the other side,”

In order to approach our life choices and decisions

As One.
12/04/2015 — Goodale 2015 18 — Goodale State Park, Camden, South Carolina, November 11, 2015

There is one practice,

Which applied worldwide

Would produce immediate transformation,

Bring on Nirvana, peace, and goodness everlasting:

Knowing when to step back and stand aside,

And doing it.

When the situation calls for us

To step back and stand aside

We have to know it and do it.

Too many of us are Caspar Milquetoast—

Never knowing when to but always doing it.

And too many of us are Bluto the Terrible,

Never knowing when not to and never doing it.

And that’s why we have the world we have today.
12/04/2015 — Ginkgo Magic 05 Panorama — Charlotte, NC, November 28, 2015

The emotional value we ascribe to the facts that shape our life

Has everything to do with the meaning the fact has for us,

And nothing to do with the fact.

Some of us are stymied by facts

That others of us brush off in our pursuit of other facts

That others of us view with disdain.

The same fact creates different responses across a broad sampling of us.

We blame facts, hate facts, love facts, worship facts,

But the facts, themselves, depend on something

Beyond themselves to create their value in the lives of the people

Who blame them, hate them, love them, worship them.

Meaning is not lodged in any fact.

Freedom is a shift in perspective.
12/05/2015 — Reelfoot Lake 16 HDR — Reelfoot Lake State Park, Hornbeck, Tennessee, November 4, 2015

We are here for the blessing.

We are here to be blessed,

And to be a blessing.

The blessing is the encounter with grace—

With the grace of mercy

And the mercy of grace—

Experienced as “unmerited benevolence,”

As kindness, unexpected and undeserved.

Lagniappe, generosity.

The gift of time and caring presence.

With nature,

A sunrise counts,

Or an hour of stillness among the cypress trees.

It’s amazing what a calm presence

Can do for a troubled soul.

It is a blessing to be given,

And received.

Welcomed, relished, appreciated.

Look for the blessings

To give and receive.

We are here for the blessing.

Don’t leave a day unblessed.
12/05/2015 — Oktibbeha County 03 — Starkville, Mississippi, November 20, 2015

We are here to live our life—

The life we are capable of living,

The life that is ours to live,

The life that only we can live—

Amid the facts that define our living.

We live in the midst of things as they are

As those who know that things are more than they appear to be.

We live in the midst of things as they are

As those who know how things also are.

This is called walking two paths at the same time.

We can never take this world

Of ordinary, apparent, reality,

For the only world.

The other world exists just beyond

The visible facts of space and time,

Straining to break forth into this world

Through the lives of those

Who are open to more than words can say—

To more than logic and reason

Are capable of imagining and intuiting—

Who are “transparent to transcendence”

(To borrow a phrase from Karlfried Durckheim)

Incarnating the world beyond time

Into this here and this now

Simply by being who they are,

And also are.

12/06/2015 — Goodale 2015 19 — Goodale State Park, Camden, SC, November 11, 2015

The right mix of vulnerability and courage

Sends us on our way,

Aware of our possibilities and chances

Enough to neither be foolhardy nor cowardly

And able to do what needs to be done

In each situation as it arises

All along the way.

The right mix of all of our opposites and contraries

Is crucial for the journey.

Live from the center,

Visit the extremes only to offset the extremes,

And come back to the center:

“The still point of the turning world,”

And the fulcrum of the universe,

Levering all things into their proper relationship with each other

In the dynamic flow of time and place,

The dance of life.

12/06/2015 — Ginkgo Magic 07 — Charlotte, NC, November 28, 2015

The world can be too much for us to manage

From time to time.

The Holidays are anything but happy for a lot of us.

All the old griefs and sorrows come calling,

Sadness wells up, spills over, pours out.

We lose our way

And wander through the days in a daze,

At the mercy of forces quite beyond us.

Whenever, however, the world is too much for us to manage,

We have to find the center, the ground of our being,

And remind ourselves of who we are,

Where we live,

When we were born,

What year it is,

What odors are on the air we are breathing,

And what sounds surround us,

Connecting us to this here, this now.

Past all the sadness of the past,

We are here, now, breathing, hearing.

The center has need of us,

The ground of our being is calling our name.

There is a life beyond the life we have lived,

And are living—

A life that would make its home with us,

And call forth the gifts that are still ours to give.

We are being called through the sadness

To life beyond sadness

In this here, this now.

Why would I lie?
12/07/2015 — Reelfoot Lake 20 HDR — Reelfoot Lake State Park, Hornbeck, Tennessee, November 4, 2015

There is that which struggles for expression,

Strives to be known,

Endeavors to be incarnated

In the physical world

Of normal, apparent, reality.

Human beings stand on the threshold

Between worlds,

Alive to both worlds,

Citizens of each

Capable of communing with visible and invisible alike,

It is our unique and irreplaceable place

To bridge the worlds,

Bringing that world forth in this world

To the everlasting benefit of both.

We begin by recognizing the truth of our position,

And listening for what is trying to get our attention,

And enter this world through us

To make this world more like that one

By serving the old values like

Love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, gentleness,

Generosity, beauty, mercy…

And tending whatever is true, whatever is noble, whatever is right,

Whatever is pure, whatever is lovely, whatever is admirable,

Whatever is excellent, whatever is worthy of praise…

And bringing these things forth

In the life that is ours to live

Within the life we are living,

Using the gifts that are ours to give

For the true good of all.

This is not too difficult for any of us,

And it is essential for all of us,

To wake up and be who we are.
12/07/2015 — Leaves of Fall 10 — Indian Land, South Carolina, December 4, 2015

It starts with our family

(Because we know where we stand with them,

And we have to know where we stand

With those we would help,

I mean really help,

And not just offer a hand-out,

Or a bowl of soup in some soup kitchen)

When it comes to helping someone avoid desperation.

Desperation is the worst thing.

When you’re desperate,

You have lost all options,

Your back is to the wall,

Or the brink,

And you will do anything—

ANYTHING—

For something to eat,

Or a place to spend the night,

This night—

You’ll worry about tomorrow night tomorrow.

So, we help our family first,

If they can be helped.

That’s the thing.

People have to help us help them.

They have to be able,

And willing,

To help themselves.

They can’t just “really mean it this time”

When they say they will.

If your brother

Is an indolent drunk,

Or terminally into crack,

You have to be steadfast with the triage,

And look for someone else to help,

Someone who can help you help them.
Used in Short Talks On Contradiction, etc., 12/08/2015 — Goodale 2015 05 Panorama 02 — Goodale State Park, Camden, South Carolina, November 11, 2015

The longer our list

Of deal-breakers and non-negotiables—

The things we must have or won’t do—

The more our life has to go Our Way—

The less able we will be

To reconcile opposites,

Make peace with contradictions,

Integrate polarities,

Live in harmony with dichotomy and discord,

Stay married with kids,

And go home for the holidays.

And the more miserable will be our life,

And the lives of those who have to deal with us.

The shorter our list,

The more centered and grounded

Will be our life,

And the better it will be for everyone,

Worldwide.
12/08/2015 — Ginkgo Magic 01 Panorama Detail — Charlotte, NC, November 28, 2015

In order to live out of our own authority

We have to be grounded in what is central to us.

When we are centered in what is important to us,

We live out of the center of what is central to us—

Of central importance to us.

No one can give us that,

Or tell us what that is to be.

Only we know what is of central importance to us.

That is the foundation stone,

“The still point of the turning world,”

The point around which our life revolves,

The source of our life and being,

And no one can take that from us.

Centered on what is of central importance to us,

We are stable, secure, and immovable.

We are at one with who we are,

And live our life as one who is in charge of what we are doing,

Tending our business as one who knows what our business is,

Living out of our own authority.

Integrity is living in ways that are integral

With the center and ground of our being.
12/09/2015 — Reelfoot 17 HDR — Reelfoot Lake State Park, Hornbeck, Tennessee, November 4, 2015

Mindfulness leads the way

To the center of ourselves,

To what is of central importance to us,

Through all of the conflicts and contradictions,

Opposition, polarities and incompatibilities

That create the raging storms

Within and without,

Producing the heaving waves

Of the wine dark sea

We must traverse

On our way to “the still point of the turning world,”

Find “the face that was ours before we were born,”

Know the full truth of who we are and also are

(Which is who we ARE)

And become who we have always been.

Mindfulness leads the way

To recognizing and harmonizing

The strengths and influences

Of the two hemispheres of our brain

And becoming whole at last.
12/09/2015 — Bud Ogle Cabin 01 — Great Smoky Mountains National Park, Gatlinburg, Tennessee, November 5, 2015

Our life is the art of “letting it happen.”

To do that, we have to be mindful—

That word again—

Of what is happening,

Of what is working,

Of what is vibrant and vital

About us and what we are doing,

And consciously cultivate it,

Nurture it,

Nourish it,

Believe in it,

Trust it,

Follow where it leads,

And see where it goes.

We must (MUST) notice

When we are posed to dismiss something

That has life about it,

Something we are doing,

Because it doesn’t measure up to external standards

Of good and worthy.

It has life about it!

That is all it needs to infuse us with life,

Purpose, direction, meaning, wonder, spirit, zeal

And all of the rest of the spiritual pantheon

Of qualities, characteristics, gifts and experiences

That constitute the full scope of the spiritual journey.

To dismiss it would be like rejecting the services of our guide.

You wouldn’t want to do that,

Would you?
12/09/2015 — Ginkgos 2015 11 — Charlotte, NC, November 24, 2015

The spiritual journey is an inner path

To the Self at the center of us all.

We progress through interior encounters

With opposites, contradictions, incompatible differences,

Conflicts of interest and of values, polarities,

And mutually exclusive beliefs, viewpoints, positions, perspectives and outlooks.

We are what we hate.

The spiritual journey requires us

To come to terms with all this,

Make our peace with it,

And work it out—

Reconciling, integrating, honoring, recognizing, listening, seeing, understanding, accepting, forgiving, cooperating, collaborating, welcoming, befriending,

And growing up.

Mindfulness (that term again) leads the way.

Compassionate, non-judgmental awareness

Of all that is going on within us

Transforms how we respond

To all that is going on in the world external to us

And we live there as agents of

Grace, compassion and peace,

Exhibiting outwardly what is true inwardly,

And blessing all who come our way

With a sense of divine presence

As the Self in them recognizes the Self in us,

And all is well.
12/10/2015 — Goodale 2015 32 — Goodale State Park, Camden, South Carolina, November 4, 2015

Carl Jung formulated his Shadow hypothesis as a way of interpreting his observation of a “counter,” or “contrary,” unconscious personality at work within each of us.

Our Shadow is the polar opposite of our Persona, or our “public face”—who we think we are and show ourselves to be, the “ideal” us.

My Ideal Me is Lao Tzu—Mr. Laid Back, let things take their course, let things happen according to their own rhythm and timing, no pushing, no forcing, live from the center, mind your own business, and all will be well.

That makes my Shadow any member of the Tea Party, particularly Donald Trump and the Republican candidates running for President, trashing boundaries, sending anyone who is not like they are to internment camps or deserted islands so that they won’t have to deal with them. The consummate hustlers, con-artists, evangelical-convert-the-world-to-their-ideology-NOW-disciples-of-their-ideal-of-Christ…

And the meaning for me is that I have to become my Shadow in dealing with my Shadow. I have to be rude, nasty, ugly and mean—drawing hard lines and saying “NO! ISAIDNO!” I cannot allow my Shadow to “take its course”! I have to block its path!

And, therein, lies the goodness and the power of our Shadow.

It brings forth the Also-I, rounds out our personality, and makes us whole.

There are times and places where drawing hard lines and shouting “NO!” are quite appropriate and called for—times when Mr. Laid Back Lao Tzu has to stand aside in favor of telling the Tea Party, and Donald Trump, Et al., where to stop, turn around, and hie out to their deserted island of choice for as long as time shall last starting NOW!
12/10/2015 — Hay in the Field 01 Panorama— Rapides Parish, Louisiana, October 29, 2010

We find our life and live it

By living consciously—

By being mindfully (that word again) aware

Of what is happening on all levels of our experience,

To the full extent that we can be aware of what is happening.

That’s it.

The more aware we are,

The more we know of what we know,

Of what can be known.

The more we know,

The better we can evaluate our options, choices and decisions,

And the more likely our choices and decisions

Will direct us toward ends that are legitimately ours to serve,

And less toward ends that are none of our business.

Living well is a matter of knowing what’s what,

And doing what needs to be done about it.

If we aren’t living mindfully,

We aren’t living as well as we could be living,

And may be just going through the motions of life,

Pretending to be alive.
12/11/2015 — Goodale 2015 30 Panorama B&W — Goodale State Park, Camden, South Carolina, November 11, 2015

Sit with your life spread out before you, around you.

Where lie your inhibitions?

Your compulsions?

Your obsessions?

Your Dark Matter—

Things that would be obvious to others,

But are invisible to you?

How would you know a Dark Matter

When you see one?

By the effects it generates,

The strange disturbances it creates.

Where do things become strange in your life?

Where do you spend your time and energy (and money)?

What do you think about most often?

What do you do most frequently?

What does thinking about the things you think about

Keep you from thinking about?

What does doing the things you do

Keep you from doing?

What are the social things—and the job related things—

That other people do with ease,

That you cannot do at all?

What is being asked of you

That you cannot do?

What excuses do you make for not doing

The things you cannot do?

How do you dismiss, discount, deny, ignore

The things you need to do

That you cannot do?

Sit with those things.

Become curious about them.

Explore them.

Get to the bottom of them.

Notice when, were, resistance becomes overwhelming.

What are you resisting?

What is the source of the resistance,

The reluctance,

To see what is there?

In what ways do you hide

From what is to overpowering to consider?

Our life is the source of Life

To those with eyes to see,

And the courage and the will to keep looking,

And of Death,

To those who do not.
12/11/2015 — Ginkgos 2015 17 Panorama — Charlotte, NC, December 1, 2015

It comes down to, depends upon, revolves around, flows from,

Six things:

1) Seeing

2) Seeing things as they are AND as they also are, which is how they ARE

3) Seeing what things mean

4) Seeing the implications that has for us

5) Seeing what needs to be done about it in light of all things considered

6) Doing it

Get those six things down, and you have it made.

As much as you can have it made.

I’m still working on the first one.
12/12/2015 — Reelfoot Lake 18 HDR — Reelfoot Lake State Park, Hornbeck, Tennessee, November 4, 2015

Our capabilities far exceed our expressions.

And, therein, lies the problem.

Our potential is always frustrated

By our degree of satisfaction

With our actualization.

We think we are grown up enough

When we can drive

And buy beer.
12/12/2015 — Hay Under Cover 02 — Anne Springs Close Greenway, Dairy Barn Access, Fort Mill, SC, December 11, 2015

It can seem too hard.

“You mean I have to show up for work on time every day?”

It’s too much for some of us.

Being responsible for ourselves, for our life, for our care and feeding,

Is too much.

We pass.

Being conscious—mindfully aware (that term again)—

Of what we are doing

Is often too much for those of us

Who are making a game effort

At the showing up for work and being responsible part.

We pass.

On our life.

And settle for going through the motions.

Aimlessly, listlessly, meaninglessly.

What’s it going to take?

We have to throw ourselves into it wholeheartedly.

We have to give our entire being to the work of living our life—

Of being responsible and mindfully aware,

And making the adjustments necessary

To put ourselves in accord with our life,

With the life that needs us to live it,

Responsibly and consciously,

Every day for the rest of the time left for living.

Everything depends on it.

Everything.

If you are going to believe anything,

Believe that,

And act as though you do.
12/13/2015 — Goodale 2015 20 — Goodale State Park, Camden, South Carolina, November 11, 2015

The key to letting things happen

Is being cool with paradox and contradiction.

Is being cool.

Rigidity and inflexibility are antithetical to life.

Suppleness and resiliency are essential to life.

There will be a time when suppleness

Has to give way to rigidity,

And resiliency must become inflexible.

We dance with our life

As the music changes

And the beat goes on.
12/13/2015 — December Orchard 03 Panorama — Springs Farms Peach Orchard, Fort Mill, SC, December 11, 2013

Nothing can matter more than

Being who we are at the center,

At the vital core,

Of our Self—

The Tao,

The Christ,

The Buddha,

The God,

Within.

The Heart of Value,

Meaning,

and Life

Is ours to realize,

Serve,

And bring forth

In our life—

In the life we live

In the time left for living.

We cannot think it is about making money,

And living out our time

Enjoying the splendors of wealth and privilege.
12/13/2015 — Country Sunrise 01 — Indian Land, South Carolina, December 13, 2015

Greg McKeown, in his book, “Essentialsm: The Disciplined Pursuit of Less,” uses the acronym WIN as the short form of “What’s Important Now?”

Shortstops can be so consumed with their error on the last play that they continue the trend on the coming play.

What’s Important Now focuses us on the only time we have to work with: N.O.W.

Now is the focal point.

The fulcrum.

The pivot point.

Levering ourselves into position

To live our life as only we can—

By deciding What’s Important NOW?

And giving it our full, here comes that word again,

Mindful, compassionate, attention.

No matter what has gone on before,

Or what we are afraid will happen in the future,

HERE we are NOW!

NOW what?

What’s important NOW?

Answering the question

The way it begs to be answered

Is the key to all that follows.
12/14/2015 — Reelfoot Lake 19 HDR — Reelfoot Lake State Park, Hornbeck, Tennessee, November 4, 2015

The bedrock rule governing all knowledge is:

You Have To Know What I Mean

Before You Can Understand What I’m Saying.

It’s corollary is:

Truth Has To Be Experienced—

It Cannot Be Explained.

All knowledge hinges

On our willingness,

And our ability,

To reflect on our experience

In order to form new realizations.

A five-year-old child

Is only capable of knowing so much—

No matter how much we explain things.

When they are inhibited

From reflecting on their experience,

They never know more than what they are told.

They grow up to be members of the Tea Party,

And fundamentalist religion.

The more powerful they become,

The more their numbers grow

Through the simple practice

Of banning reflection on experience.
12/14/2015 — Bethany Church Cemetery 07 B&W — Bethany ARPC, Clover, South Carolina, December 13, 2015

When our life stops working

(And we know when it is working

And when it is not working.
.
Putting your jeans on before your shoes works.

Putting your shoes on before your jeans does not work)

The solution is not to try harder,

Forcing, pushing, shoving, kicking, screaming, yelling…

The solution is to listen deeply,

Look closely at what we are doing that isn’t working.

The problem will suggest its own remedy.

We have to step back

And reflect on what is happening

To see what needs to happen.

Then, it’s a matter

Of having the courage to do it.

And, courage comes

From acting courageously—

Whether you feel courageous or not.

The AA slogan applies:

“Fake it until you make it.”

That’s something that works every time.
12/15/2015 — Goodale 2015 23 Panorama — Goodale State Park, Camden, South Carolina, November 11, 2015

We all have a story to tell with the way we live our life.

Tevya had his story to tell,

Hester Prynne had her story to tell,

Zorba the Greek had has story…

You have yours, I have mine.

The worst thing is to die with our story untold.

We live to tell our story.

We live in the service of our story.

Or we live in the service of someone’s idea of our story,

Maybe our own.

Maybe we have our own idea for our story,

Which we like better than the story that is ours to tell.

Maybe we live to tell OUR story the way WE think it ought to go.

All of the tragedies, fictional and real, are about co-opting our story,

And forcing it down paths that are not our path to walk.

Thinking that we know what we are doing,

Or thinking it doesn’t matter what we do,

Sidetracks us into some story other than the one that is ours to tell.

Staying on track—

Staying on the beam—

Is staying true to our story—

True to ourselves,

Authentically aligned with the truth of our own being,

Grounded in the center of what is central to us,

Being who we are

Regardless of the nature and circumstances of our life.

And letting our story be told the way it needs to be told

By living our life the way it needs us to live it,

No matter what.
12/15/2015 — Ginkgos 2015 20 Panorama — Charlotte, NC, December 1, 2015

We have to come to terms with our life

Over the full course of our life.

We don’t ever get it down.

The work is on-going, unending.

We get the first grade down

And think we’re something.

It’s like that the entire way.

When we wake up to the eternal nature of The Deal.

We’re bummed out for decades.

“Why try, if we are never going to get it figured out?”

“What’s the point if it keeps getting harder?”

It isn’t that we have to come to terms with our life,

But that we have to come to terms with the process

Of coming to terms with our life again and again forever.

The idea saps us.

It wears us down.

The perennial dripping of one more damn thing.

We have to keep growing up

Whether we like it or not.

This is really what we need religion

And something like the church

(But completely unlike the church of our experience!)

For:

Growing up.

We need the right kind of help with that

All our life long.
12/16/2015 — Silhouettes 01 Panorama — Kings Mountain State Park, Blacksburg, South Carolina, December 14, 2015

I know a woman who cannot say “No.”

That isn’t quite right.

She says “No” twice a month

To prove she isn’t addicted to “Yes.”

You can imagine what a mess her life is in.

Actually, it isn’t.

She gets up early and works hard all day,

And takes little pink pills to keep going,

To keep it all going,

To keep it from becoming a mess.

The strain is undeniable.

How many holes can you plug in the dike

Before the flood comes?

The pre-flood strain

Is her life’s way of begging her

To say “No” in all of the important places,

So that she might say “Yes” to her Soul/Self

And nurture her relationship with the core of life and being,

And nourish her life in the source of life—

The ground of silence and solitude—

Relax, and breathe again,

In the presence of what is essential,

And too easily lost

Amid the clamor of all that claims to matter.
12/16/2015 — Lake Crawford 01 HDR — Kings Mountain State Park, Blacksburg, South Carolina, December 14, 2015

It takes an inordinate amount of courage

To say “No,” initially.

It becomes easier with practice and time,

And, it helps to remember how many times

We say “No,” in a day.

It also helps to rehearse different ways to say “No.”

“If I had more time and fewer children,

I would be happy to help you, but I’ll have to decline your offer.”

“If I were more like I ought to be than I am…”

“If I were a better person…”

“If I were more like the person my mother wants (wanted)

Me to be…”

“If it weren’t Monday (Or whatever day it is)…”

(And when the other person says, “What does it being Monday

Have to do with it?

Say, “Nothing. The important thing

Is that I can’t help you with that, but I wish you well.”)

In time, you will look forward to opportunities

To try out new ways of saying “No.”
12/16/2015 — Bethany Church Cemetery 01 B&W — Bethany ARPC, Clover, South Carolina, December 13, 2015

You have to believe in Grace

As the foundational operating principle in your life,

And in the universe.

Nothing has to be the way it is.

Everything is here by Grace.

This photograph is evidence of Grace at work in my life.

I’m there with a camera with the light and gravestones.

No way I could have planned that.

No way we can think up a life worth living.

Yet, one remains a possibility for us—

If we open ourselves to it

And wait, watching, for it to open itself to us.

There is a catch, of course.

We have to bear consciously the pain of our life as we live it.

The pain of our life not being what we need it to be.

The pain of being unable to arrange what we need our life to be

Because the way it is won’t allow us to do what we need to do

To have what we need our life to be.

We have to bear consciously, with compassion,

The pain of the way our life is—

Bearing in our body the cross

Of not having what we need,

With compassion for it all.

And wait for something to stir to life,

For Grace to appear

In some form, from some place, we can’t begin to imagine.

Bear the pain consciously

With compassion,

And wait for Grace to come bearing possibilities

You never could have thought up or created on your own.

Bear the pain consciously,

With compassion,

And believe in Grace

To grace you in ways you won’t believe.

One Minute Monologues 028

08/20/2015 — 10/26/2015

08/20/2015 — Tidal Pool 01 — Sunrise, Huntington Beach State Park, Murrell’s Inlet, SC, August 20, 2015

Can you be mindfully aware of each situation as it arises,

Without judgment, will or opinion–

Seeing what is happening,

And what needs to be done in response,

And offering what you have to give

For the good of the situation,

And doing it again in the next one that arises?

See the good,

Do it.

In order to see the good,

We have to look with open eyes–

That is with eyes not clouded

By judgment, will or opinion.

If you are going to practice something,

Practice seeing with open eyes.
08/21/2015 —Sunrise 03 — Tidal pool runoff, Huntington Beach State Park, Murrell’s Inlet, South Carolina, August 21, 2015

There are places that prevent you from being anywhere else.

Algebra was not one of those places for me.

School was not one of those places.

I cannot remember being engaged at school

The way I was engaged by the woods I walked through

On my way home from school.

The natural world nourishes my soul

In a way that formal education

(And formal religion, for that matter)

Could not—and cannot—do.

We take our peace where we find it.

No one can hand it to us,

Or tell us where it is to be found.

Our heart/soul knows what it is, where it is.

We only have to walk around

With our eyes open

Waiting for our heart to light up

When we wander into the presence

Of our soul’s true joy.

It is our place to find all the places,

And to return to them often.

This is the way of life, and being alive.

Some people light up with the slightest whiff

Of algebra.

There are many ways to life and peace.

Find yours.

Walk them
08/22/2015 — Sunrise 02 — Huntington Beach State Park, Murrell’s Inlet, SC, August 21, 2015

We find our life and live it.

Every day.

Our life changes with the tides,

Is different with the circumstances.

We do not wake up in exactly the same world

We went to sleep in.

Sometimes, our world is radically, unrecognizably, transformed.

We have to find our life, there, and live it.

Our life is a reflection, and extension, of our circumstances.

Our circumstances give us our life.

Life without circumstances, would be exactly what?

Our circumstances give our life shape and form and character.

Step into your circumstances!

Find your life again!

Live it!

How do we fit what we know of our life

Into THESE DAMN CIRCUMSTANCES???

That’s the test.

It’s called The Cyclops Exam.

It calls forth imagination, courage and creativity.

And, shapes and forms our life,

And produces character

Like you would never believe.

But.

We have to participate willingly–

We have to engage our circumstances

With the right spirit–

For the magic to happen,

And we birth ourselves

Again,

And again,

Forever.

Endlessly becoming who we are

Always.
08/23/2015 —Sunrise 04 — Huntington Beach State Park, Murrell’s Inlet, SC, August 21, 2015

The enemies are:

Laziness and Lethargy,

Arrogance and Greed,

Inflation and Deflation.

The allies are:

Imagination, Inventiveness and Creativity,

Reflection, Realization and Insight,

Patience, Resiliency and Courage.

Seeing how things are

Is knowing what needs to be done.

Then, there is only waiting for the time to be right

To act.

Nature spends very little time acting,

And a lot of time resting, playing, waiting, watching,

And is always doing what needs to be done.
08/23/2015 —Tidal Pool 02 — Huntington Beach State Park, Murrell’s Inlet, SC, August 20, 2015

There are people who are constitutionally prohibited from squaring up to the way things are,

And constitutionally compelled to live in a fantasy world where things are what they are supposed to be, to their way of thinking.

”Delta Dawn, what’s that flower you have on? Could it be a faded rose from days gone by? And did I hear you say, he was meeting you today, to take you to his mansion in the sky?”

Mark Twain observed that “people seldom fight a winning fight against themselves.”

But.

It helps to know what we are up against.

The First Spiritual Law states: We have to live transparent to ourselves.

Everything flows from there that can flow from there.

The Second Spiritual Law states: In order to live transparent to ourselves, we have to perceive and receive ourselves without judgment, will, or opinion, and allow compassionate, mindful, awareness to work its slow magic over the full course of our life.

The people who want to know what the rest of the spiritual laws are don’t fully appreciate what is required by the first two.
08/24/2015 — Sheldon Church Ruins, HDR 05 Panorama – Yemassee, SC, August 24, 2015

James Hollis said, “Divorce doesn’t end a marriage, and death doesn’t end a relationship.”

My father is as alive and influential in my life as he ever was.

So is yours.

The story of this old church “ended” years ago, but the beat goes on.

Nothing ends.

Books and movies run on and on–not just in terms of their impact on us,

But also, in terms of what remains to be said of their characters

And what they did with their lives–

Or what influence they continued to wield

In the lives of those who knew them–

After the author quit writing, or the credits rolled.

We speak of endings, happy or sad,

And of moving on,

Thinking we can leave home without carrying it with us.

Part of me will be eight years old forever,

And the other parts of me have to realize that

And make allowances,

Giving the eternally-eight-year-old room to work out his stuff

In the safe company of the rest of us,

Who think he is just great,

And know we couldn’t have done our part without him.

The past plays out in the present and future.

We have to make it conscious,

And play along like a good jazz ensemble

Picking up on what the sax man is doing,

Making him sound so sweet.
08/25/2015 — Harbor River Mooring HDR—St. Helena Island, SC, August 24, 2015

All it takes is growing up.

You can’t have a problem that growing up can’t handle.

Refusing to grow up is the problem.

THE problem.

And YOU are the solution,

Thinking, as you do, that you are grown up enough,

And you don’t deserve any more problems,

Trying to make whiskey your Mamma,

Taking care of you one more day,

Because those mean old problems won’t go away.

Or, is it ice cream?

Whatever it is that you are pretending is Mamma,

Isn’t your Mamma,

And you have to grow up.

Again.

The good news is that’s all there is to it.

Get that down and you have it made.
08/25/2015 —Land’s End HDR 01 Panorama—St. Helena Island, SC, August 24, 2015

I make my best decisions when I’m not trying to make a good decision,

When I’m not even thinking that a decision needs to be made,

Or, that I am making one.

It’s like I walk into a good choice without choosing.

All I’m conscious of is not choosing, not trying,

Just seeing what I do, as an interested observer of my own life.

It’s a strategy as old as Taoism,

Which merged with Buddhism,

To form Zen.

Wu-wei,

Doing by not-doing.

It has been a life-long strategy
That I didn’t contrive, but “fell into”

By virtue of being unable to come up with anything better.

I often say of my 40 years in the ministry

That I don’t know any one who accomplished as much

By doing as little.

I get out of bed and see what happens,

And spend much of my time

Being dumbfounded and amazed by it all.
08/26/2015 — Garden City Beach 05 — Garden City, SC, August 21, 2015

When we put ourselves in the service of our life,

As a vassal in homage to a king,

With an oath of fealty and liege,

Things change.

You are no longer in charge.

You are responsible for listening,

For sensing direction,

But not for directing.

Your life unfolds through you

Within the circumstances that limit and define you.

It is your place to align yourself with the life

That is trying to live itself through you.

It is a collaboration, a composition, a work of art–

As much as a painting, or a symphony, or a ballet

Is a work of art.

Your life produces you,

As much as you produce your life.

You are the poem

And the poet.

The dancer

And the dance.

Stop working to make something happen,

And start listening to what is trying to happen.

Allow yourself to be led.

Let yourself learn how to follow

The guidance of an invisible guide.
08/27/2015 — In the Marsh 02 — Beaufort, SC, August 26, 2015

If you have symptoms, you’re not listening.

If you don’t have symptoms,

Those around you are covered up in them,

Because you are not listening,

And they are not listening.

If neither you nor those around you have symptoms,

You and they are the next incarnation of the Buddha,

Of the Christ,

And live among us as Bodhisattvas,

And are the hope of humankind.

The symbol of the age

Is the three not-so-wise monkeys,

See-No-Evil, Hear-No-Evil, Speak-No-Evil,

With “evil” understood as

”That which I do not want to acknowledge, much less confront!”

We don’t want to see what we don’t want to see.

We don’t what to hear what we don’t want to hear.

We don’t want to say what we don’t want to see or hear.

And, we have symptoms that know no end,

And cannot be fixed.

It comes back to the refusal to grow up.

Growing up is seeing what needs to be seen,

Hearing what needs to be heard,

Saying what needs to be said,

And doing what needs to be done about it.

That is all that is standing between you

And Bodhisattvahood.
08/28/2015 — The Ole Swimming Hole Panorama—Edisto River, Colleton State Park, Walterboro, SC, August 26, 2015

When someone asks you, “What do you want to be when you grow up?”

Tell them you want to be awake,

Because being awake is the whole point of growing up

And everything falls into place around that.

And if they say, “I mean, what do you want to DO?”

Tell them you want to see how things are,

Which is Yin,

And how things also are,

Which is Yang,

And both together is how things REALLY are,

Which is Tao,

And at-one with Tao,

We DO, naturally, easily and spontaneously,

What needs to be done

About how things are

In each situation as it arises,

And no one can DO more than that.
08/28/2015 — Jenny Adams HDR Panorama—Harbor River, St. Helena Island, SC, August 25, 2015

Living in the service of a heart

That yearns to sing and dance

Is the point and purpose of being alive.

But.

We have to pay the bills it takes to live.

And, therein lies the problem.

How much for singing and dancing,

And how much for eating and sleeping?

Negotiation and Compromise, Kid!

Negotiation and Compromise!

It helps if we incur the right bills.

How do we know which are the right bills?

I was hoping someone would ask that question!

Observation and Reflection, Kid!

Observation and Reflection!
08/29/2015 — Storm Clouds at Sunrise 06 — Huntington Beach State Park, Murrell’s Inlet, SC, August 20, 2015

We live to make our little heart sing.

That is our primary loyalty,
,
Our chief concern,

Our overriding allegiance,

After survival.

We live to make our heart sing, but.

We have to be living for the singing to happen.

We have to eat and drink.

You know the routine:

Food, clothing, shelter, education, health insurance,

Dental care, tri-focals, and a retirement plan.

We have to take care of business.

Taking care of business,

On one hand,

Can mean neglecting what we take care of business to do,

On the other.

We are here to be sure it doesn’t.

To balance things out.

To remember why we are here.

And do the things that make our little heart sing.

How long has it been, by the way?
08/30/2015 — Hunting Island Panorama HDR 09 — Beach Erosion, Hunting Island State Park, Hunting Island, SC, August 25, 2015

On my best days,

I’m the Buddha,

And the Christ.

So are you.

We all are the Buddha, and the Christ, and Lao Tzu, and all the rest of the Holy Ones,

On our best day.

The Zen masters could say,

”If you meet the Buddha on the road,

Kill him!”

As a way of reminding their disciples

That THEY are the Buddha,

And THEY aren’t being the Buddha

If they concede that honor to someone else.

The key to being the Buddha, the Christ, etc.,

Is having a singing heart.

On our best days,

We are doing what makes our heart sing,

And bringing life to life all around us.

Joseph Campbell said,

”The influence of a vital person is vitalizing.”

The Buddha brings out the Buddha in everyone.

The Christ brings out the Christ.

They couldn’t keep it to themselves,

Even if they tried.

Especially, if they tried!
08/31/2015 — Sunrise 01 — Harbor River, Port Royal, SC, August 25, 2015

It is enough to see ourselves as we are,

And, as we also are–

Without judgment, will or opinion–

But with preference and direction,

Imagination, creativity, patience, resiliency, perseverance and courage.

It’s more than enough,

And all we will ever need.
08/31/2015 — Live Oak Lane—St. Helena Island, SC, August 25, 2015

We have to do our own work.

We are on our own when it comes to listening, seeing, understanding, waking up.

We are on our own when it comes to knowing what is important,

And giving ourselves to its service.

When I was in theological school,

They told me that Greek and Hebrew were important.

I knew Greek and Hebrew were not important,

But had to bow to Those Who Knew Best And Had To Be Pleased.

Jungian psychology was—and is—important,

And would have been a great help to me in the ministry,

But I had to get it on my own

Because Those Who Knew Best

Didn’t know what they were talking about.

We cannot trust others to know what is important.

We have to know what is important for ourselves

And live in its service.

And, if it turns out that we don’t know what we are talking about,

We have to change our mind about what is important,

And live in the service of what is important then.

No one can do the important things for us.

We have to do that work ourselves.

And we are fearful,

And somewhat lazy.

We have to do the work of working through that as well.
09/01/2015 — “Growing up will break your heart.

And there is no rational immunity against the experience–

No intellectual shortcuts through the agony.

Insight is no help.

We can’t realize our way through it.

The realizations come after we’ve popped out on the other side.

But, on this side of that realization, it’s hell–

Which we repeat throughout the lifelong process

Of growing up.”

I don’t remember who said that,

But she knew what she was talking about.

If it wasn’t MC Richards,

It could have been.
09/01/2015 — Tropical Forest—Hunting Island State Park, Hunting Island, SC, August 24, 2015

Our symptoms,

Our dreams,

Our problems and our response to them,

Other people and our response to them,

And their response to us,

Our job,

What we do in our spare time,

Our spouse or partner,

Our children,

Our pets…

All of our life

Is a mirror,

A message to us,

About us

And the distance between how we are living

And how we need to be living

To exhibit and express who we are,

And the gifts that are ours to share,

And the life that is ours to live.

The life we are living

Is indicative of the distance between it

And the life that is ours to live.

May those with eyes to see, see!

May those with ears to hear, hear!

That’s all there is to it.
09/02/2015 — Johnson Creek Mooring 02 Panorama HDR—St. Helena Island, SC, August 24, 2013

It will help if you take up the practice of having purpose, preference and direction

Without judgment, willfulness, or opinion.

Live your life like you are a kayaker in whitewater.

Kayakers don’t have time to form an opinion

About what the stream presents to them

In each Now of their journey.

They respond without willful insistence

To whatever the moment requires of them,

And then forget that moment

In order to deal with the next one that is already

Requiring their full attention.

People who live poorly

Have an opinion about every little thing.

Generally, a negative opinion,

Elaborately formed and loudly proclaimed.

”You won’t BELIEVE what just happened!”

They have no life,

They only have opinions,

And “feelings” that are always being “hurt.”

You don’t find them in kayaks on whitewater.

But they are in kayaks on whitewater,

And don’t know it.
09/02/2015 — Hunting Island Panorama 02 — Beach Erosion, Hunting Island State Park, Hunting Island, SC, August 24, 2015

Here’s what I like about the Buddha:

It is said that he died from eating bad pork.

How enlightened is that?

If you can’t tell bad pork when you see it, smell it, taste it,

How can you claim to be “the awakened one”?

Not even the Buddha is the Buddha.

And the Christ is not the Christ.

The Messiah is not the Messiah.

And, they all ARE who they are precisely because they are not!

It’s wonderful,

Because I’m not enlightened either.

I fit right in.

So do you.

We don’t have to be who we are not.

We only have to relax, and be who we are.
09/03/2015 — Bitter Weeds HDR—Fairfield County, SC, September 3, 2015

We live between our potential

And the possibilities for its realization.

We can too easily concede to impossibility,

And despair of ever finding a way

Of being who we have it within us to be.

We can push too hard,

In the service of grandiosity and inflation,

Where possibility does not exist.

We have to find the Middle Way,

Serving our Gift

Within the limits governing its expression.

We live to see what we can get by with,

Without taking it personally,

If it is less than we hoped for.
09/04/2015 — St. Simon’s Church—Peak, SC, September 3, 2015

We have to work it out.

We have to make it work.

We stand between our gifts—our potential–

And the context and circumstances of our life,

And have to get the two together.

We have to bring our gifts forth within our circumstances.

We have to realize our potential within our possibilities.

It is easier to go through the motions of living–

To follow the cow in front of us

From the barn to the pasture,

And back to the barn.

All our life long.

We have to do what is hard.

Every day for as long as we are alive.

Whether we want to or not.

Are in the mood for it or not.

Feel like it or not.

If we don’t do it, it won’t get done.

We are here to serve our gifts

And bring ourselves forth,

Birthing ourselves.

We are the Virgin and the Christ.

Bethlehem is everyday.

Golgotha is everyday.

And there is no one to do our work but us.
09/05/2015 — The Old Brick Church Cemetery 07 B&W—Fairfield County, SC

You have to marry your LIFE,

The LIFE which calls forth your GIFTS,

Makes your HEART sing,

Makes YOU whole,

And is THE WAY for you

Among the 10,000 ways.

The first task of life

Is to find your LIFE,

Fall in love with it,

And marry it,

Plighting your troth to it,

Pledging your allegiance,

Loyalty and fidelity to it,

And promising to do right by it

Through all the situations and circumstances of living

’Til death do you part.

Amen.

Get that down,

And you have it made.

Miss that step when it would have been “easy,”

And you will have to go back for it,

Encumbered by duties and responsibilities

That will have to be taken into account

Worked through,

And lived around.

But, that’s just how it is.

It will give you purpose, focus and direction,

And bring joy to your heart,

Which finally gets to sing.

It is never too late

To marry your LIFE.

Just a little awkward in places.
09/06/2015 — The Old Brick Church HDR Panorama 06 — Fairfield County, SC, September 4, 2015

We cannot buy vitality,

But we think money is more important,

And sell ourselves in the service

Of That Which Is Not Life

In the name of Really Living,

But the last time we lived

Was in the sixth grade

Playing hide-and-seek

With our brother.
09/07/2015 — Cypress Knees 02 — Cypress Swamp, Colleton State Park, Walterboro, SC, August 26, 2015

Carl Jung said he lived to ask, and answer to the extent that was possible, the “unasked questions of my ancestors.”

That is the case with each of us.

We are handed, at our birth, the unasked questions of our ancestors–

The experiences unreflected,

The assumptions unexamined,

The facts grossly misinterpreted and arrogantly, ignorantly, declared to be explained,

The lives unlived–

And the ghosts of all who have passed before us

Gather in the deliver room

Hoping that we will be the one

To deliver them

From the burden of having failed themselves

To summon the courage

To see things as they are.

May we live to relieve them of their shame

By looking until we see,

Listening until we hear,

Inquiring until we understand,

Taking nothing at face value,

But examining everything

And reflecting on every experience,

Until we have mined the gold

And become the Philosopher’s Stone.

Shining the light of consciousness

Into the deep darkness of being!
09/07/2015 — Hunting Island HDR 03 Panorama—Beach Erosion, Hunting Island State Park, Hunting Island, SC, August 24, 2015

Start with what you don’t want to hear.

Or, with what you don’t want to see.

Start with what you don’t what to know.

With what you don’t want to be the way it is.

When the way things are

Are not the way we want things to be,

We will find a million ways

To discount, dismiss, deny and ignore

The way things are

In favor of the way we want things to be.

When we look at our life,

We have to understand

That we have done it,

And are doing it,

To ourselves,

With what we allow,

And don’t allow,

Ourselves to know.
09/08/2015 — St. Simon’s Church 01– Peak, SC, September 3, 2015

Too often, we don’t know what to do

Because we don’t want to do what we know to do.

We are afraid.

We are comfortable amid a myriad of discomforts.

When the door opens, we demur, delay, abstain.

When the way appears before us,

We turn aside, make excuse,

Busy ourselves with what is not the way.

We don’t want what we pretend to want,

What we wish we wanted.

We lack the courage of our convictions,

And talk about “spiritual growth,”

But read another book

By our favorite guru, or the latest one,

Instead of doing what needs us to do it.

Maybe tomorrow.

Maybe later.

Or never.

But definitely not now.
09/08/2015 — Harbor River Mooring 04 HDR Panorama—Port Royal, SC, August 24, 2015

We can have purpose, preference and direction,

But we cannot have power and control.

Wherever, whenever, power and control are wielded,

Problems arise.

Try forcing your spouse, child, parent, etc.

To exercise, lose weight, read books or play the piano.

Tell me how well it works.

Forcing anything leads to resistance and resentment,

And sometimes, war.

The more controlling, the less everything vital and valuable.

Control your day, force your agenda, command your life

And pay the price.

Or, live with purpose, preference and direction,

And allow the day to follow its own course,

Negotiating, compromising, and taking no for an answer

As the situation requires.

Live in the service of what needs to happen

When everything is taken into account,

And with no kidding yourself about what needs to happen.

Kidding ourselves leads to all manner of complication

And grave difficulty.
09/09/2015 — Garden City Beach Panorama 01 — Garden City, SC, August 21, 2015

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.”

I would add, the second strongest influence and second greatest tragedy on family and children is the lived lives of the parents.

Children live as compensation for the lived and unlived lives of their parents,

And/or as the continuation of the lived lives.

We live to be who our parents were not, and/or to be who they were.

There is not a child in the world, past, present, or future, who escapes that burden.

None of us are free to live “our own life.”

We have the lives of our parents to shadow, haunt, direct and guide the life that we like to think “is our own.”

My mother’s recent death has put me to probing all the ways I live to compensate for, and continue, her life.

The ways, they are legion.

And when we pull my father into the picture,

There is hardly room enough for me anywhere.

I am my parents’ child

No matter how I might object and deny.

So, I bring them to life with me in my life,

Live consciously—so far as that is possible–

Of their on-going influence on me and my choices,

Values, purpose and direction.

And let it be with compassion and good humor,

Because it is so,

And I am living proof that it is.

So see me is to see my reaction to my experience

Of James and Katheryne,

Even now, after all these years.

We walk arm-in-arm into each day,

And make of it what we can.

Peace be with you, James,

And with you, Katheryne.

It is good to be with you both,

And to make of you what I can!
09/09/2015 — Huntington Beach Sunrise 10 — Huntington Beach State Park, Murrell’s Inlet, SC, August 21, 2015

The day has its own rhythm, its own flow.

It has its own agenda,

Its own terms of service.

The day will let us know what it has in mind for us,

What its need of us is.

In its own time.

In its own way.

We can make our plans,

Draw up our schedules of events,

Sharpen our focus,

Decide what is going to happen.

But.

The day has the last word.

It is enough that we come to the day

With purpose, preference and direction–

And allow the day to amend,

Or transform,

Those as the day deems necessary.

We live in service to the day.

The day the day does not live in service to us.

We don’t make the terms.

We abide by them.

Or not.

There is no peace for those

Who cannot make their peace

With the day.
09/10/2015 — Lake Shamokin 02 — Camden, SC, August 19, 2015

When we work out the right ratios

Among Reason and Logic,

Instinct and Intuition

In each situation as it arises,

And mix in the courage

To do what we know needs to be done,

And do it,

We have it made.

As much as you can have it made.
09/11/2015 — Past Prime 02 — Rountree Plantation Nursery, August 15, 2015

The Buddha was not a Buddhist,

The Christ was not a Christian,

The Prophet was not a Muslim.

Our work is to BE the Buddha, not a Buddhist,

To BE the Christ, not a Christian,

To BE the Prophet, not a Muslim.

The work is simple:

Grow up,

Live transparent to yourself,

See what you look at,

Do what needs to be done

In each situation as it arises

With the gifts that are yours to give.

Throw out Doctrine,

Theology,

Ideology—

Live in ways that are true to your Deep Self

And aligned with the life that only you can live,

With nothing to gain

And nothing to lose,

Completely free to do what needs to be done

In each situation as it arises,

As you determine that to be

After taking everything into account

That can be taken into account.

This is the work of a True Human Being—

Which we are all called to be.

Spitting image

Of the Buddha, the Christ, the Prophet.
09/10/2015 — Past Prime 03 — Rountree Plantation Nursery, Charlotte, NC, August 15, 2015

Each of us comes packed with gifts

To bring forth in their time

And meet the challenges,

The trials and ordeals,

Of our life,

In each moment of our living.

We are equipped to deal with

Whatever comes our way,

In becoming who we are called to be

All along the way.

The stories of the species

Are about finding the very gift

That is needed in all of the tight places

To slay the giant,

Or the dragon,

Answer the riddle,

Find the treasure,

Win the day.

The stories remind us

Of what is so:

We have the gifts needed for the journey,

So, start walking!
09/10/2015 — Cypress Knees 01 — Cypress Swamp Trail, Colleton State Park, Walterboro, SC, August 26, 2015

When NASA sends satellites beyond the solar system, it plots their course near planets and moons with enough gravitational pull to draw them close, and boost their forward momentum to propel them on their journey into the great beyond.

Our life uses the right kind of people, places and experiences to do the same with us.

We, like the disciples with Jesus, are always ready to move in, set up house, and stay for the remainder of our days in the company of those who are such good places to be.

Our life needs us to move on, farther, deeper, into our own life and its journey into the great beyond.

The right kind of people draw us close, so that we gain momentum, find what we need, and speed off on our way.

There is no settling down on the spiritual journey.

We are all satellites with our own, personal, individual mission,

Helping one another gain momentum, find direction, and live their life.

Marriage is like the merger of solar systems.

If you have watched Cosmos, with Neil DeGrasse Tyson (And why would you not, if you haven’t???),

You know that in just a few more cosmic calendar years the Milky Way is going to merge with Andromeda for one fine dance in the heavens, and a light show that will last earth years beyond counting—boosting each other’s momentum, stirring things up, and sending one another on our way.

A marriage truly made in the heavens.

And, how marriage out to play out on earth,

With each partner helping the other with her, with his, own personal life throughout the time they are together in their joint life.

How many marriages do you know of where that is happening?

Where the partners even have an idea of their own personal life,

Much less, are actively involved in living their life?

You know how Paul the Apostle looked around and said,

”None are righteous, no, not one!”?

We can look around and say, “None are living their life! No! Not one!”

We begin to turn things around,

And build momentum toward the good,

By living our life, and helping others live theirs.

Just like the planets, the satellites, and the solar systems.
09/13/2015 — Light Show—Sunrise at Sand Beach, Port Royal, SC, August 25, 2015

It’s hard.

It’s hard in every developmental stage of life.

Leaning to talk, to walk, to pee and poop in the right place…

All the way to walkers, wheelchairs and feeding tubes.

It is all hard.

Life is hard.

Start there.

Don’t expect easy anywhere.

Look for what helps

To deal with the facts of each stage,

Without denying, escaping, or hiding

From any of it, ever.

We have what it takes

To meet life straight on.

We are uniquely equipped to come to terms with it all.

We only have to lay aside

Our wants, wishes, and desires

And see what is being asked of us,

And how creative we can be in adjusting ourselves

To new realities

All along the way.

Our inner resources are incredible.

Nothing can happen to us

That we haven’t met as a species

10,000 times before.

Relax into the archives

Of the cumulative experience of the species!

For everything that comes up in our life,

There is a gene for that!

We only have to trust ourselves

To life’s experience of life

To find what we need to deal with life.

Open yourself to ALL the possibilities!

See what comes to you

As an aid in handling what’s hard.
Used in Short Talks on Contradiction, etc., 09/14/2015 — Schweinitz’s Sunflower 01 — Latta Plantation Nature Preserve, Mecklenburg County Parks and Recreation, Huntersville, NC, September 13, 2015

Your demons are your contradictions.

You want everything to be smooth and easy,

And nothing is smooth and easy.

In order to make everything smooth and easy,

You have to deny that nothing is,

And live in a world of make believe

Where you can have what you want

Even if you have no business having it.

You spend your life wrestling to get things in place,

When it is not the nature of things to be in place.

You are swimming upstream or crosscurrent,

Against your very own self

And your very own life,

Willing everything into being,

Or caving in and capitulating

In depression and despair

To your demons

That you refuse to recognize

As the contradictory nature of things as they are,

And do the work of recognition and reconciliation,

Integrating your opposites

And squaring yourself with the oppositional nature of reality,

In becoming one with all things,

Laughing at the very idea of smooth and easy.
09/15/2015 — The Watchman and the Virgin—Zion National Park, Springdale, Utah, May 2010, near Zion Pizza and Noodle Co.

Any activity that absorbs you, centers and grounds you, focuses you and brings you back to the path, to the work that is yours to do.

Practitioners of Zen sit zazen, in meditation, rake sand, paint with sand, conduct tea ceremonies.

Children have coloring books, adults have Sudoku, cross word puzzles and pianos.

If you haven’t done a coloring book in a while, a mandala coloring book can be engrossing.

You are looking for a focal point of extreme concentration.

Something to pull you in and absorb you fully.

It’s a meditative practice.

And will shut out the world of mindless activity and anxiety,

Bring peace,

And restore the connection with your soul.

Once a day is not too often.

Intentional focus on one thing over time cures many ills.
09/16/2015 — Schweinitz’s Sunflower 03 — Latta Plantation Nature Preserve, Mecklenburg County Parks and Recreation, Huntersville, NC, September 13, 2015

Safety is the first thing.

We can’t be anything until we can be safe.

We have to trust ourselves to our environment,

To our life,

And to ourselves,

In order to risk ourselves in the service of our life.

We have to trust ourselves to risk ourselves.

Trust comes from knowing

We are safe with ourselves.

How safe are we with ourselves?

How kind are we to ourselves?

How nurturing and nourishing?

How gentle and tender?

If we don’t get that from within,

Where do we go to find it?

If it does not reside within,

How can we ever trust ourselves to it from external sources?

Who can make us safe

If we are not safe with ourselves?

What is a conscious ego good for

If not creating consciously a safe place

For a developing psyche to be?

Yet, we come down hard on ourselves

For having an ego at all!

To much so-called “spiritual literature”

Calls for the eradication of the ego,

As though without an ego, all our troubles disappear.

Who is it that eradicates the ego?

When we set ourselves against ego,

We set ourselves against us!

Safety is the goal,

Not internal witch hunts and juntas!

Befriend yourself.

Make Rumi’s “The Guest House”

Your foundational orientation.

Live to be safe with yourself on every level.

Safety first, you know.
09/16/2015 — National Cemetery Panorama—Beaufort, SC, August 27, 2015

Forgiveness is the only thing that can restore relationships that have been decimated unintentionally, accidentally, or with reasoned deliberation.

Those that have been destroyed with malicious intent are beyond the pale of forgiveness, because restoration of relationship is likely to be of no concern to the perpetrator of its demise.

At stake in the experience of forgiveness are the matters of guilt, accountability, repentance, penitence, and dedication to the care of relationship throughout the future.

Forgiveness does not occur in a vacuum, but within the bounds of a relationship that matters to those involved in its rupture and demise.

To speak of “forgiving Hitler,” for example, does nothing to restore relationship with Hitler, because Hitler is dead, and because he would care nothing for relationship with those who are doing the “forgiving” if he were alive.

We can talk of “consciously bearing the pain of Hitler’s guilt, and refusing to allow his guilt to consume us with hatred and desire for his eternal damnation,” as a way of freeing us from bondage to his “abomination of desolation,” but “forgiving Hitler” cannot be done apart from Hitler’s participation in the “sacramental restoration of relationship.”

”The sacramental restoration of relationship” honors the elements of guilt, repentance, penitence, forgiveness and dedication to the care of relationship throughout the future, and is grounded on all parties involved in the relationship consciously bearing the pain of guilt’s burden, and declaring their intent and determination to refuse to let that burden interfere with their relationship from this point on.

Just as marriage consecrates two people and sets them on a path sacred to each other, forgiveness consecrates all those involved in the rupture of relationship, and sets them on a path sacred to each other.

And, if someone doesn’t care enough about the relationship to forgive, or to be forgiven, forgiveness can’t do a thing to heal it, and it remains to those wounded to resolve to bear the burden of the pain of guilt alone for the sake of their future free from the grief of betrayal and treachery.
09/17/2015 — Hunting Island Beach Panorama 10 — Beach Erosion, Hunting Island State Park, Hunting Island, SC

The pilgrimage to Mecca is a sacrament to Muslim’s worldwide.

Those who are able, make their way annually to “the holiest of holy places,” year after year.

Muslim’s have no corner on holy places.

Make your list.

Make your pilgrimages.

Take up the practice of living sacramentally,

That is, living consciously in touch with the holiness

Of the places that are holy unto you–

Living consciously in touch with the holiness of life.

Life is sacramental–

”An outward, visible, sign of an inward, spiritual grace.”

We are graced by unspeakable holiness

In the births of our children,

In the new birth of spring,

In the colors of fall,

Mountain vistas,

Ocean rhythms

The wonder of love,

The wonder of life…

When we wake up,

We wake up to the wonder of life, living, being alive,

And live sacramentally–

Consciously aware of the holiness of life

Through our communion with holy places

All our life long.
09/18/2015 — Johnson Creek Mooring 02 — St. Helena Island, SC, August 24, 2015

We carry the emotional luggage of our ancestors.

It is difficult for us to be more awake, aware, alive and grown up

Than they were.

And I’m talking about ALL of our ancestors here,

All the way back to the paramecium.

It takes a long time for consciousness to develop,

And then it takes a long time for consciousness to mature.

Take Donald Trump and put him beside the Dalai Lama

For an example of the disparity of the maturity level

Of modern adults,

Then put the entire human population of the world on the scales

And they tip radically toward Donald Trump,

Which explains his following.

Maturity is sadly lacking in the species.

And we each suffer the immaturity of our ancestors,

Struggling to move beyond the legacy we have inherited in our genes

To respond appropriately to our environment

As emotionally mature human beings.

It is a struggle worthy of the best we can bring forth.

Make it a goal

To be more conscious—more transparent to yourself–

Than your parents were,

And more emotionally mature in dealing with what comes your way–

As a gift to generations yet unborn.
09/19/2015 — St. Simon’s Church HDR Panorama 04 — Peak, SC, September 3, 2015

Life as we live it is an endless series of diversions and distractions.

We live to be entertained.

The way we live keeps us from thinking about our life.

Thinking about our life depresses us

Because we don’t know what to do with ourselves,

So we lose ourselves in diversions

To make life bearable.

All this changes with courage and trust.

We have to trust that we actually have a life,

And have the courage to risk ourselves to it

In stepping out in complete darkness

As a way of seeing what is there.

Our life is an adventure waiting to be lived.

Waiting for us to make ourselves available to it–

To swear our allegiance and loyalty to it–

”Forsaking all others,

And being faithful to it,”

For as long as we shall live.

We have to live as though it is so

To know that it is.

Start with that commitment,

And wait,

Watching,

Listening,

Sensing,

Feeling.

Pay particular attention

To your dreams and symptoms,

And to the things that catch your eye,

That resonate with you,

That call your name.

Live to find your life,

And live it.

Make the search for your life

The center, ground and focus of your life,

And the entertaining pastimes

Will become a waste of time.
09/20/2015 — Harbor River Mooring 05 — Port Royal, SC, August 24, 2015

Bear consciously

The pain

Of the discrepancy

Between how things are

And how you want them to be.

It will make all the difference.
09/21/2015 — Watkins Glen 2015 01 — Watkins Glen State Park, Watkins Glen, NY, September 20, 2015

When our focus is on finding our life and living it,

All other considerations fall into place around that–

And some fall out of consideration altogether.

When our focus is on finding our life and living it,

Our values are reshuffled,

What is important is made apparent,

And what is not important

Is shown to be the empty pretender to High Value it is.

We cannot live the life worthy of us

And waste our time on trivial pursuits,

No matter how acclaimed and flashy.

Whether she loves me,

Or loves me not,

Will become clear in time.

What my life is asking of me here and now

Is my ultimate concern in each moment of my living.
09/22/2015 — Watkins Glen 02 Panorama—Rainbow Falls, Watkins Glen State Park, Watkins Glen, NY, September 20, 2015

We turn it around by giving it a different meaning,

By seeing it with a different perspective.

Abandonment can be understood

As an invitation to rely on our inner resources,

Develop self-reliance,

Independence,

Confidence,

And learn to trust the guides within–

Resonance, Intuition, Instinct and Wisdom.

Ascribing meaning is our superpower.

The way we see things is our magic wand.

We are never as lost and alone

As we are afraid we are,

Or will be.

The power of perspective

Is the gift of the gods.

Failing to use it is stupid.
09/23/2015 — Watkins Glen 2015 04 Panorama—Watkins Glen State Park, Watkins Glen, NY, September 20, 2015

Too often, all of us are subservient to compulsion, obsession and inhibition.

Too rarely, any of us are free to see what needs to be done

In the situation as it arises,

And do it.

The path to enlightenment

Is the path of reflection and realization–

The path from bondage

To freedom:

The freedom to see and to do.
09/23/2015 — Tupper Lake 2015 Sunset 01 Panorama—Tupper Lake, NY, September 22, 2015

We are on our own,

And we cannot do it alone.

We need each other

To be who we need each other to be,

In each stage of our development,

Throughout our life.

We need each other to be the right kind of company,

Offering the right kind of help,

In the right kind of way.

There are no rules to keep

In becoming and being the right kind of company,

Only general principals to observe and apply.

Offer what you need!

Become what you love!

See what you look at–

Without judgment, willfulness, or opinion.

We all need encouragement.

Learn how to be encouraging.

We all need to be balanced, grounded, centered, honored, respected, accepted, treated lovingly

(This is the important thing:

You don’t have to love me to treat me lovingly.

Treat me so lovingly that I can’t tell the difference

Between being loved and being treated lovingly).

We all need a quiet, safe, place

That helps us reflect on our experience

And form new realizations.

We can create a therapeutic space

Without being therapists or “doing therapy.”

Live therapeutically!

Should be a bumper sticker.

Inspire it!
09/25/2015 — Eagle Cliff Falls Panorama 02 — See the eagle in the cliff? Havana Glen, Montour Falls, NY, September 20, 2015

We have to seek out the counter-balancing perspectives and listen to them.

This is tricky because counter-balancing perspectives

Are much more than just opposing positions.

The Tea Party has an opposite position to practically all of mine,

But.

They are not counter-balancing.

And they are not true perspectives.

They are contrary and oppositional positions.

They espouse an ideological position,

Not a clear and well-considered perspective.

The Tea Party is against abortion,

It is not for children.

It is not for feeding children, sheltering children, educating children, keeping children healthy, and providing children with jobs and careers as they age.

The Tea Party has no ideas about those things.

It doesn’t care about them, or about children.

It has a position on abortion,

Not a perspective that takes the welfare of children into account.

Counter-balancing perspectives are wonderfully refreshing

When they come along,

Because they air-out issues,

And are not afraid to look at all sides,

Or, hesitant to admit they don’t know when they don’t know.

They are quick to ask questions they cannot answer,

And can tell you what they think,

Without trying to convince you they are right.

And they are good for enabling you to fill out your own perspective,

By listening to you without trying to prove that you are wrong.

What a world it would be,

If we could expand each other’s point of view,

Without championing one at the expense and exclusion of all others.

May we live so long as to see the day!
09/20/2015 — Bog River Falls 2015 05 Panorama—Tupper Lake, NY, September 24, 2015

Love Unreturned is our Body’s, our Life’s, way of getting our attention,

And showing us what it is like

To be spurned, ignored, rejected

By the one who holds the key

To your life everlasting.

We think it is the end of the world

For our love to be unreturned,

And contemplate suicide,

Because who could live out a miserable existence,

Cutoff for one’s True Love?

That’s what our Body/Life feels like

When we go off with eyes for something

Other than the Destiny/Life that is ours to live.

We are our Life’s Great Hope,

And we squander our chance at being alive,

Chasing after mirages and

Building castles in the air.

We do to ourselves

What our Unreturned Loves do to us.

If we were living our life,

We would be looking for someone

To partner with

In bringing forth the Life in each of us,

Instead of looking for Gods and Goddesses

To sweep us away.
09/20/2015 — Moss Glen Falls 02 — Stowe, VT, September 25, 2015

Our life is constantly speaking to us,

Trying to get our attention,

Hoping we will listen

And align ourselves with its need of us

In a “Thy will, not mine, be done,” kind of way.

Everything is a message to us

About the life we are living,

And the one we need to live.

Our body is our life’s trusted messenger,

Sensing, intuiting, instinctively knowing,

What needs to be done.

Our symptoms and our dreams

Declare without end

How things are in our life

And how they need to be.

White rabbits wink at us

In the events and circumstances of our life,

Whisk away,

But pause, looking back, to see if we are following.

Each day is a letter to us from our life,

Written again in hopes that we will read it

And begin living the life that is ours to live

In the time left for living.
09/20/2015 — Tupper Lake Sunset 04 — Tupper Lake, NY, September 22, 2015

Everything falls into place

Around finding our life and living it.

The quest for our life

Is the spiritual journey.

It is the distance from our head

To our heart.

We do not find our life by thinking about it.

We feel our way there.

We dance our way there.

When our heart begins to sing,

And our feet begin to dance,

We’ve found it.

Keep the rhythm going

And we have it made:

Enlightenment, Nirvana, Heaven, the Elysian Fields, the Promised Land, and Glory Land.

All for the low, low price of doing what we are here for

In the time left for living.
09/28/2015 — Eclipse Sequence—This is a series of photos I took of the full Luna eclipse in 2008, or was it 2006? But. I cannot imagine how one full Luna eclipse could be distinguished from another. Throw pictures of them all in a pile, and ask me to sort them out, and I wouldn’t know where to begin.

If our heart isn’t singing,

It is breaking.

We break our heart

When we refuse to do what it loves to do,

When we ignore it,

When we take it for granted,

When we treat it as though it is only a pump,

And fail to understand that our hear is the source of life,

And not just what sustains life.

Our heart sings when we find our work and do it.

Our heart leads the way to our work,

Waiting on us to follow it.

But, we have other ideas,

And put heart off

Until we have sown wild oats,

And chased wild geese,

And lived in pursuit of illusions of grandeur,

And fantasies of happy ever after.

And our heart is breaking,

Dying to sing.

Dying for us to wake up,

Turn our life over to our heart,

Find the life, the destiny, that is ours to live,

And live it.

With all our heart.
Used in Short Talks On Contradiction, etc., 09/28/2015 — Blackeyed Susans—New Hampshire roadside, September 27, 2015

Our work is to dance to the song our heart is singing,

AND pay the bills!

We walk two paths at the same time.

This is the nature of the spiritual journey.

We do what it takes to support ourselves and our family

While we are doing what it takes to serve our heart’s true joy.

This is heroic stuff.

The stuff of legend and fable.

Ulysses and the Cyclops.

David and Goliath.

Doing what cannot be done,

By reconciling contradictions,

Integrating polarities,

Making peace,

Creating wholeness,

Amazing ourselves.

If you are bored with your life,

Depressed and hopeless

Because of the lack of resources,

And the absence of meaning, purpose and direction,

Hand yourself over to your life.

Let it direct your living.

On two paths at the same time.

And be amazed.
09/29/2015 — Bartlett Falls Panorama 01 — Bristol, VT, September 27, 2015

What would be most helpful to you?

What kind of help do you need?

Being clear about what would be helpful

Enables us to be clear about what we are seeking,

And puts us on track to find what we need

To do what needs to be done.

We are responsible for seeking what we need,

And for finding what we seek.

We cannot sit back, prop up our feet,

And wait to be rescued.

We go in search for what would be helpful to us.

If we don’t ask for the Tabasco Sauce,

We can’t complain about the bland nature of the shrimp cocktail.
09/29/2015 — Watkins Glen 2015 09 Panorama—Watkins Glen State Park, Watkins Glen, NY, September 20, 2015

We can start anywhere.

We can start with:

”What needs to be done?”

”What needs us to do it?”

”What do I need to do?”

The questions are not to be answered,

But to be wondered about.

We are really asking:

”What ALL needs to be done?”

”What ALL needs me to do it?”

”What ALL do I need to do?”

We have to put it ALL on the table,

And walk around the table,

Considering the table.

Of all that is on the table:

”What all needs to be done NOW?”

”What all needs me to do it NOW?”

”What all do I need to do NOW?”

”NOW is the time to do what?”

Sit with the questions,

With what needs to be done,

And see what you rise up to do–

Spontaneously, effortlessly, without willing yourself to do it.

Simply watch and see what you do.
09/30/2015 — Chemung County Barn HDR 01 — Watkins Glen, NY, September 23, 2015

We can’t hear anything we aren’t ready to listen to.

We have to live our way

To the life that is waiting for us to live it.

No one can hand it to us before its time.

All those mistakes, bad choices and wrong turns

Are preparation.

We find what is right for us

By winding our way through a lot that is not right.

Reflection and Realization, Kid.

Reflection and Realization.

Death and Resurrection, Kid.

Death and Resurrection.

We pay a hefty price for eyes that see,

Ears that hear,

And a heart that understands.

But.

Once we begin to see,

Sign posts pointing the way are everywhere.

There is hope in all the emptiness, anguish and angst.

It’s grist for the mill, Kid.

Grist for the mill.

We are milling maturity and wisdom,

Compassion and grace.

We live our way to those things.

There are no shortcuts on the road to life.
10/01/2015 — Jenne Farm HDR 01 — Reading, VT, September 28, 2015

There is what we want to happen.

There is what we don’t want to happen.

There is what needs to happen.

And, there is what can happen.

The spiritual journey is learning to work out the ratios.

We spend too much time and energy

Wanting what we have no business having,

Willing what cannot be willed,

Forcing what cannot be forced,

Refusing to make our peace with the way things are,

Failing to put ourselves in accord with our life,

Rejecting obvious paths because they are contrary

To our desires,

Oblivious to what is being asked of us,

Living in denial,

Wondering what is wrong.
10/01/2015 — Iconic New England 01

Our work is a Good Work,

And we have to embrace it as such–

Marrying our work and plighting it our troth,

In sickness and in health,

As long as we shall life.

This is the missing element in all of human life.

We have no sense of Our Work.

We think we are here to enjoy ourselves

With entertaining pastimes,

And take the smooth and easy path through life.

We have no sense of belonging

To something greater than we are–

That needs us and our gifts

In its service for the true good of all.

We all are Adam and Eve,

Trading Paradise for a passing pleasure,

Or Esau,

Trading his birthright for a bowl of oatmeal.

We sell ourselves out for a brightly wrapped box of smoke,

And never understand that it is about Our Work.

Not what we do to pay the bills,

But what we pay the bills to do.

What are you doing with your life?

We have to be able to answer the question.

We have to spend our life

Finding the work that is ours to do with our life.

All the attractive options

Are manifestations of the Forbidden Fruit

Inviting us to leave the path,

Turn aside from the search,

Forget Our Work

And enjoy their ephemeral delights.

Their promise of splendor beyond compare

Conceals the one-eyed reality of the Cyclops

Luring another victim from life to empty wandering

In the wasteland of our discontent.

Only Our Work can save us.

Our life consists of finding Our Work and doing it.

Find it.

Do it.

With all your heart,

And complete devotion.

Your life depends on it.
10/02/2015 — Watkins Glen 2015 07 – Watkins Glen State Park, Watkins Glen, NY, September 20, 2015

We have to complete the developmental tasks of each stage of life.

We cannot move to the next stage until we have completed the developmental tasks of the present age.

Want to guess how many of us are still hung up in jr. high? High school?

Pay attention to your conversations through a day.

Somebody did somebody wrong.

Somebody is going to win another world series or super bowl.

Somebody is being politically stupid.

News. Weather. Sports. And woe is me, poor, poor me.

Look around you at all the things we have devised to keep us where we are, unthinking, unreflective, unaware:

Schedules, appointment calendars, computer games, TV shows…

No quiet times for listening, looking, seeing, hearing, wondering, imagining…

It is as though the culture—the world culture—has declared,

”To hell with developmental tasks!

They are too hard!

They hurt too much!

I’m not moving past where I am!”

Facing up to how things are and what needs to be done about them

Is too much for us.

Escape! Denial! Diversion! Distraction!

Dismiss, disregard, ignore everything that makes you uncomfortable.

God forbid that we should be uncomfortable.

Understand this:

The path to enlightenment, realization, awareness, maturity, wisdom, grace, compassion, peace and life pouring over, spilling out, blessing everyone

Winds through the heart of Gethsemane

And across the face of Golgotha.

Let me translate that for you:

We have to complete the developmental tasks of each stage of life.
10/02/2015 — Chemung County Barn HDR Panorama 01 B&W—Elmira, NY, September 23, 2015

No one can give us our work,

Any more than someone else can tell us what will make our heart sing.

We find our own way to the heart that sings,

And to the work that is ours to do.

The two are one.

Find one, and you find the other.

But do not think your work has to stay the same, unaltered, forever.

Just as “one book opens another,”

So what makes your heart sing

Will lead to what else makes your heart sing,

And your work expands, enlarges, deepens

Beyond anything you might imagine.

And, do not think your work is your ticket to fame and fortune,

Or even to a living wage.

You are not here to profit from your work

Beyond singing along with your heart.

Pay the bills with a good day job–

One that compliments your work, perhaps,

But certainly does not contradict, or deny, it.

Your gifts are uniquely suited to your work,

And are not to be exploited for your own pleasure.

You belong to your work.

It is enough that you believe in it,

And do it with all your heart,

The way it needs you to do it.

Let doing your work be your reward,

And be glad to be able to do it–

That is the key to fulfillment,

And life everlasting.
10/02/2015 — Fall Fern 01 — Tupper Lake, NY, September 22, 2015

An old truism asserts “Truth is reality.”

And, because reality is subject to perception and interpretation,

Truth is multifaceted, contradictory and ever changing.

The fluid nature of truth

Is reflected in several of the sayings of Jesus.

”I am the way, the truth and the life, and no one comes to the Father but by me”

Is the one we always hear quoted.

He also said, a few verses earlier, “No one comes to me unless the Father draws him (sic).”

Jesus also said, “If you are not with me, you are against me,”

And, “If you are not against me, you are with me.”

Which way is it?

Both ways.

All ways.

At the same time.

Our rational, logical, brain flips out over this,

But our intuitive, instinctive, creative, imaginative brain

Says, “Of course,” or, better, “Duh!”

The point here is that when we are confronted by

”The truth of reality,”

We have to step back and remember the power of

Perception and interpretation,

And see what else we can see about what stands before us

By walking around it,

Making inquiries,

Looking from all sides and angles.

Asking, “What ELSE is true about reality?”

Gives us a bit of leverage,

And shifts things into a more manageable position,

Opening doors, and providing options and choices

We didn’t notice on first glance.

Taking all things into consideration

Enables us to work with reality,

And transform the facts–

To the astonishment of those

Who only think they see “what’s there.”
10/03/2015 — Moss Glen Falls 03 — Stowe, VT, September 25, 2015

The concept that “Your religious liberty ends where my constitutional rights begin” is foundational for life together.

”Life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness.”

”Liberty and justice for all.”

”All men (people) are created equal.”

The constitution is a compilation of common agreements which bind us together in a republic governed (after Lincoln’s Gettysburg Address) “of the people, by the people, for the people.”

We are free to live our life in any way that does not restrict the freedom of others to live their life.

I work my side of the street, and you work yours.

I stay out of your business, and you stay out of mine.

We cooperate with each other in ways that honor our common interest—that serve the common good—and help each other define, and live, our own life.

I live my life, and help you live your life—to the extent you are interested in being helped, and find what I offer to be helpful.

And, the same goes for you, with me.

All of this is grounded upon the necessity of a good faith commitment on the part of each of us to find our life and live it, to find our work and do it.

Where that is lacking, nothing can be done for any of us.
10/03/2015 — Tupper Lake Sunset 03 — Tupper Lake, NY, September 22, 2015

We have to live with intensity,

With devotion, dedication, and determination.

We have to live with our heart in what we do.

We have to care about what we are doing with our life.

We have to live like we mean it.

What would it take for you to live like you mean it?

Instead of just getting by?

Just meeting the minimum daily requirements of being alive?

Just being upright, intact, 98.6 and breathing?

Just going though the motions?

What would it take for you to live believing in what you are doing?

For you to be owned by your life?

To belong to your life?

To love your life?

With all your heart, and soul, and mind, and body?

What would it take?
10/03/2015 — Iconic New England 03 — United Presbyterian Church, South Ryegate, VT, September 27, 2015

Start with what you love.

You don’t have to think about what you love,

And you will never find your way to your ground,

Your center,

Your foundation,

Your work,

Your LIFE,

By thinking about it.

Start with what you love.

With what engages you,

Enthralls you,

Captivates you,

Moves you,

Makes your heart sing,

And takes you out of time.

Work what you love into your life

On a regular basis.

Treat what you love as your best friend–

As your secret lover.

Make dates with it.

A rendezvous.

Bring it flowers and chocolates.

Let it fill your heart with joy and anticipation.

Follow it–

As your love for things expands–

With devoted allegiance–

Into all of life,

Transformed,

And transforming all the world.
10/04/2015 — NO—Swiftwater, NH, September 25, 2015

Things have a certain order about them.

We put on our socks and pants before we put on our shoes.

We hate the restraints order places on us.

We take shortcuts.

We run stop signs and lights.

We have it OUR way.

”Damn the shoreline! Full speed ahead!”

One of the developmental tasks in the early stages of life

Is understanding the fundamental importance of the order of things,

And submitting to the necessity of aligning ourselves

With the proper sequence required by the situation as it arises.

More often than not, where there are problems,

Someone is not happy with the queue,

Or the procedure,

And is looking for a quick trip to happy and content.

When we skip the developmental tasks

It’s hard on everyone.

Each of us has to bear the pain of the inconvenience

And agony of existence.

When personal pain is not properly borne,

Corporate pain is increased across the board, around the table.

The source of anguish, chaos, disruption and dismay

Is generally someone who is not grown up enough to honor

The necessary order of things and acquiesce to life as it is.

Pain unborne spills over onto others every time.
10/04/2015 — Tupper Lake Sunset 2015 01, Day 3 — Tupper Lake, NY, September 24, 2015

I’m amazed at how quiet I have to be to hear anything worth saying.

The connection is fragile and easily lost amid the noise of life.

Those who know, know the importance of maintaining the connection.

What is the quietest place in your life?

How often do you go there?

How long do you remain?

People want to know the answers to their questions,

But they are the answer to questions being asked of them,

Yet, they live too loudly to listen.

What can you say to those who cannot hear?

Who cannot turn off the noise in their life

To tune into their soul?

Some things we have to do for ourselves.
10/05/2015 — Iconic New England Collage—September 2015

Looking for our life is like looking for our shadow.

All we need is a little light of consciousness, shining on ourselves,

And there it is.

Notice the things that stir your soul,

That move your heart,

That catch your eye.

You have been living your life, off and on, all this time—

Or, almost living it.

It has always been “right there,”

Trying to get your attention.

But you’ve had your eye on other things

And didn’t see the things you weren’t seeing.

Now, it’s a matter of seeing what you are not seeing.

Once you develop that knack,

”Boom!” — as John Madden would say—

There you are!
10/05/2015 — Woodlawn Cemetery Panorama 08 — Elmira, NY, September 21, 2015 — Woodlawn Cemetery is the burial site of Mark Twain and his family (not pictured here), and is an amazing place from an aesthetic and historical standpoint. The stories that lie buried here…

If you aren’t having fun with your life,

At least some of the time,

In some of the scenes and situations you are in,

Your heart isn’t singing nearly enough.

If your heart isn’t singing,

It isn’t YOUR life that you are living.

Only YOU can do something about that!

Beginning right now, determine to find ways to have fun with your life,

Determine right now to find ways to let your heart sing.

This is the crucial, critical, determining factor

Regarding the quality and liveability

Of your life from this time forth.

Your have to reintroduce play into your life.

You have to play with your life.

Laugh, sing, and dance.

Your life isn’t going to change until you do.

It’s waiting on you to give it the go ahead.

You can’t be waiting on it to turn some corner and become fun.

Look. It’s like this.

You can look for what there is to not like about anything.

And you can look for what there is to like,

You have the power of perspective and interpretation going for you.

Swing for the fences!

Laugh all the way around the bases!

Then run them backwards, backwards!

And do a couple of somersaults between first base and home.
10/06/2015 — Bog River Falls 2015 Panorama 01 — Tupper Lake, NY, September 24, 2015

It’s such a strange, and undeniable, thing

That living our life–

The life that makes our heart sing–

Requires such courage.

Perhaps it is because no one else is doing it,

And the rest of them don’t understand its importance,

And think we are being uppity,

Thinking of ourselves like that,

When, of course, we should be thinking exclusively of them.

Whenever anyone accuses us of being selfish,

It is because we are doing something we want to do,

And not something they want us to do.

But we are being selfish.

Weird, but real.

Anyway, it takes courage to be who we are,

Doing what brings us to life

On one level,

While doing what it takes to pay the bills

One another.

It doesn’t leave much time for those

Who want us to do what they want us to do.
10/06/2015 — Covered Bridge Collage—Vermont and New Hampshire, September, 2015

”Invoked, or not invoked,

The God will be present.”

The Delphic Oracle spells it out for us.

We will confront the truth of our life,

Align ourselves with it,

And live in its service to the end

Or not.

Either way, the God will be present.

Will we be present with the God,

Who is present with us,

Is the question.
10/06/2015 — A Man and His Dog—Fish Creek Pond, Lake Clear, NY, September 24, 2015

Our work engages us in the recovery of the sacred.

What is sacred for you?

What is holy?

Sacrosanct?

To be revered, honored, cherished and held in high esteem?

My bet is that we have a very short list,

If we have one at all.

The culture is without a sense of the sacred.

It’s all fair game for the one-liners of SNL and late night comedy routines.

What will we not laugh at?

Not deride?

Ridicule?

Defame?

Denounce?

Where does that leave us?

When there is no holy ground to stand on,

We are in freefall,

Where even the laughter is empty.

Only our work can save us–

But.

Our work must become holy unto us

In order to connect us with all that is holy.

In seeking our work,

We are searching for a portal

To sacred ground of existence,

And must approach our task

As pilgrims—disciples—on the path

To a holy land of the heart,

Uniting all of us in the realization of the sacred incarnate in each one.
10/07/2015 — Chemung County Barn HDR 04 — Elmira, NY, September 23, 2015

We can’t agree about what is important.

That’s because what is important is different for each of us.

We perceive things differently,

Give weight to things differently.

We are different.

At the core.

Yet, we throw ourselves together in groups

And clusters,

And population centers

And act as though we are one.

And hate, expel, ostracize, castigate, despise and kill

Those who are not like we are.

Not even we are like we are.

To deny that and pretend we are one

Is to deny ourselves.

We are one in the sense that we are many.

We are one in that we are all different from the others.

We have differentness in common.

It goes down from there.

We have to stop pretending,

And start granting latitude.

Making allowances.

Blurring the lines,

Or erasing them.

You are not like they are.

Stop acting like it.

They are not like you are.

Stop thinking they should be.

Let differences stand,

Without standing in the way.

Understand “community”

And “like-minded-ness”

As being grounded upon the agreement

Of mutual respect for each other,

And a common commitment

To help the other find, and be, who they are,

In a “What is good for one is good for all” kind of way.
10/08/2015 — Falls Park Falls HDR 02 — Reedy River, Falls Park, Greenville, SC, October 8, 2015

The three traditional contact points

with the holy, sacred, numinous reality

that is often called “god” are

art (fine and practical), music and nature.

To these three, I would add good conversation.

Good conversation is hard to come by these days

because we don’t go in much for reflection.

All we have are opinions.

No reflection.

No examination.

No inquiry.

No thinking.

Certainly no creative, imaginative, thinking.

Only reactivity.

We know what we like,

and what we don’t like,

and that’s as far as it goes with us.

What more do you need?

That’s opinion for you.

Open and shut case for no thinking required.

The way of the world in the 21^st century.

We all have opinions.

And zero insight.

And some are of the opinion

that everyone should have guns.

That’s a recipe for shootouts on every corner.

That’s what not thinking will do for you.

We have to start thinking,

reflecting,

creatively,

imaginatively,

seeking new realizations,

cultivating insight,

courting enlightenment,

waking up.
10/09/2015 — Old Stone Bridge HDR 02 — Falls Park, Greenville, SC, October 8, 2015

Our life is there before us,

waiting for us to realize

what has always been so,

and become who we already are,

making that evident–

real-izing the inherent makeup of our being–

by the way we live.

We grow into ourselves,

and exhibit the wonder we are

by doing the things that are ours to do

the way only we can do them,

all our life long.

If you missed out on this basic structure

due to poor mentoring

and bad preaching,

you have a lot of living left to do,

getting you together with your life!

That’s the Hero’s Journey, you know.

Our life always needs us

to be its hero!
10/09/2015 — Early Morning Mist B&W—Tupper Lake, NY, September 23, 2015

We can look at anything

and see what to not like about it.

We can look at anything

and see what to like about it.

The difference between these ways of looking

is the difference that makes the difference.
10/10/2015 — Falls Park Spillway 01 — A retaining dam on the Reedy River running through downtown Greenville, SC, October 8, 2015

I posted this a year ago, and thanks to Annie Oakley for reminding me, here it comes again:

This is a paraphrase (because I don’t have permission to quote directly) of Carl Jung in a 1931 interview with Whit Burnett in the New York Sun, and found in “The Earth Has A Soul: C.G. Jung on Nature, Technology and Modern Life,” edited by Meredith Sabini and published by North Atlantic Books:

The people of the United States must find the wherewith all to say NO! to the abounding temptations of the culture: The quest for things, for uniformity, for multitasking, for being like everyone in the neighborhood, etc., and to sit still in quiet contemplation until the realization dawns that contentment, peace, satisfaction, fulfillment and happiness are not to be found in the things the culture would have them pursue, and that trying to be like everyone else in the service of success and an increasingly higher standard of living is to be out of accord with the deeper dictates of heart and soul, and to be increasingly far removed from the personality and type of life that the individual possesses but ignores in seeking what she, what he, thoughtlessly buys into as being the solid ground and goal of their lives. The conflict between how they are living and how they need to live to satisfy their inner self will, sooner or later, result in some form of emotional disturbance, if not physical sickness and death.
He goes on to say, again paraphrased:

No matter how we deny it and pretend it is not so, we all, at different times and places in our life, have a sense of things being not right somehow. We yearn to be rid of the hustle, noise, conflict and confusion of our life, and to simply live. This realization is expressed in countless ways in our dreams, which warn of the outcome of living out of synch with ourselves. Our dreams are our body’s way of revealing to us what is going on in our psyche/soul/mind—the body’s best effort in saying in symbolic ways that something is wrong, or more to the point, what specifically is wrong in the life of each individual person. The dream is our body’s way of calling our attention to its instinctive awareness of what is out of accord and what must be integrated, reconciled and realigned. If we do not heed these warnings, we pay the price in one way or another.
10/10/2015 — Spider Web 01 B&W—Tupper Lake, NY, September 22, 2015

Think of the number of stories

across all ages, nations and religions

about our getting in our way,

and then think about the number of stories

about our cooperating–

our living in accord–

with our way.

Which list is longer?

What is your story?

How will you write what remains to be written?
10/11/2015 — Price Lake 2015 01 — Julian Price Memorial Park, Blue Ridge Parkway, near Blowing Rock, NC, October 11, 2015

We can make any situation better, or worse,

by the quality of our perception of it,

the quality of our participation in it,

and the quality of our response to it.

When we take everything into account,

the path opens before us,

and it only requires a willing (not willful) heart

to do what needs us to do it

in each situation as it arises.

Seeing, hearing, understanding

is knowing, doing, being.
10/10/2015 — Upper Falls Panorama 03 — Linville Falls, Blue Ridge Parkway, NC

Listening is the work of the conscious mind/Ego,

reflecting on its experience

and forming new realizations,

which deepen its connection,

its alignment,

with the soul’s drift and joy.

The work of the conscious mind/Ego

is to place itself in accord

with the soul’s song

and to live in ways

that bring the song to life in our life,

so that we move to the rhythms of soul,

and exhibit the values of soul

and are the incarnation of soul

in each situation as it arises,

our whole life long.

We dance to the music of soul,

And our heart sings soul’s song.
10/11/2015 — Mallards Landing—Reedy River, Falls Park, Greenville, SC, October 8, 2015

“What are you doing that you believe in?”

“Why are you doing anything you don’t believe in?”

The two best questions!

# 3 is “What do you believe in?”

Ask someone what they believe in,

And they will get theological on you.

They don’t know what they believe in.

They know what they have been told to believe.

If you don’t believe in your work,

You have a job.

If your work doesn’t inspire you, consume you,

You have a job.

If you don’t live into each day

To better contribute to your body of work,

You don’t have a body of work.

You may as well be shopping each day,

Or lolling on the beach.

What are you doing that you believe in?

Why are you doing anything you don’t believe in?

Because it pays well?

If you are not using your paycheck

At least in part,

In the service of what you believe in,

You have sold out.

Money cannot buy you anything to substitute for

What you believe in.

And you can have that for nothing.

If you will wake up to what it is

And serve it with all your heart.

That’s your mission,

If you choose to accept it,

And, why would you not?
10/13/2015 — Still Green in the Foothills HDR Panorama—Blue Ridge Parkway near Grandfather Mountain, NC, October 11, 2015

It’s all about the work.

The key to life spilling over,

Pouring out,

Everlasting

Is finding our work and doing it–

Finding the things that make our heart sing and doing them.

Living in ways that call forth and make manifest

Who we are and what we are about.

Doing what we believe in,

What we know to be worth our time.

Doing what we are here to do, what is ours to do,

In the time left for living.

Everything hinges on finding our work and doing it.

So, why aren’t we looking?

What’s with killing another day

Doing things that are Not Us?

Spend the day in search of the things that are Indubitably You!
10/14/2015 — Blue Ridge 2015 HDR 02 — Blue Ridge Parkway near Grandfather Mountain, NC, October 11, 2015

We are what we need,

We need only to be who we are.

But. We can do that best

In a community of those

Who are being who they are.

Nothing is more important

Than keeping the right company.

There is a direct relationship

Between the people we run with

And the quality of our life.

How different can we be

From those who form our In Group?

We need a group/community

That encourages individuality,

Not one that inhibits and restricts it.

If you have to be like WE are,

WE aren’t a good place for you to be!
10/15/2015 — Middle Saluda River 01 — Jones Gap State Park, Cleveland, SC, October 15, 2015

What do you know of God that you didn’t get from someone else–

Including the Bible?

The Bible gets all the credit

For delivering God-As-God-Is

Straight from God to us.

That’s only what someone made up and spread around.

Where did the people who wrote the Bible come up with what they came up with?

Divine Revelation, right?

Which ceased to exist 2,000 years ago,

Conveniently timed to coincide with the rise of Ecclesiastical Authority.

God doesn’t have to go to the trouble of talking directly to us any more.

We have the Priests and Preachers to tell us what’s what.

And where do they get it?

The Bible, of course.

And why can’t we all get it there?

We might get it wrong and go to hell.

THEY know how to read Greek and Hebrew.

I’m here to tell you that everyone has equal access

To what has always been called God.

Intermediaries are not required.

The Reformed version of Christianity

Even had a doctrine called “The Priesthood of All Believers”

Until the implications dawned upon the Authorities

Who swept it into the dim regions,

And never spoke of it again.

Which leaves the question remaining to be answered–

By you:

What do you know of God that you didn’t get from some source other than yourself?
10/16/2015 — Footbridge Panorama—Jones Gap State Park, Cleveland, SC, October 15, 2015

When it comes to what you know about what has always been called God,

Don’t give me your opinions.

Opinion is always being displayed as knowledge.

Opinion is a cheap, cowardly, lazy surrogate for knowledge.

Opinion is easy, loud, and theatrical.

Opinion is ignorant, unthinking and incapable of reflection–

Particularly self-reflection.

Knowledge is lived experience.

People who know crab cakes

Grow up on the coast of Maryland.

If someone starts talking about “good crab cakes,”

Ask them where they grew up.

If someone starts talking about God,

Ask them what they lived through

That revealed that to them.

If they can only talk to you about “the Bible,”

It’s like the crab cake person talking to you about a recipe book.

We don’t know God by what we read or hear,

Only by what we live through,

By what we experience.

Anything else is opinion.

Or, worse, propaganda.

Evangelism is the propagandalism of the world.
10/16/2015 — Bog River Falls Abstract 01 — Tupper Lake, NY, September 2015

Make a pact with yourself to care more about the things you care about.

Spend more time doing the things you care about,

And less time doing the things you don’t care about.

Care about the things you care about

Consciously,

Deliberately,

Conscientiously.

Live with—and toward—the things you care about

In ways that everyone knows you care about them.

Let the things you care about

Become as important to you as they deserve to be.

Nothing will reshape your life for the good

Like caring about the things you care about.

And not caring about the things you don’t care about.

Square yourself up with the things you care about,

And don’t care about.

Your life will fall nicely into place around the things you care about.

Which is how it should be.
10/17/2015 — Middle Saluda River Cascade 02 — Jones Gap State Park, Cleveland, SC, October 15, 2015

We give our time and attention to our outer reality,

Our appearance,

Our pose,

Our image,

Our sex appeal,

Our popularity,

Our place in the lives of others,

Especially in His Life,

Or Her Life

(You know who I mean).

We’re all Out There,

Trying to fit in,

To belong.

If we tend to our inner reality,

Our outer reality will fall into place

Around our center, core, ground, and foundation

And all will be right with the world.

Our inner reality is the key:

Who we are,

What we are about,

What matters most,

What is of highest value,

What is ours to do in the time left for living

Our talisman, guide, North Star, and friend.

Our Self.

Where we belong.

What we belong to.

The governing source and goal of our life.

Why would we ignore that world

In favor of mirages and happy fantasies?
10/18/2015 — Middle Saluda River 02 — Jones Gap State Park, Cleveland, SC, October 15, 2015

Your life is your responsibility.

Which means you decide how well it’s going,

And whether you are “on the beam,” or off of it.

And, if you are off of it, you decide what to do to get back on it,

And stay there–

Which includes who to listen to

And when to stop listening to them.

You know that by listening to you.

If you were to listen to me,

The first thing I would tell you is:

Learn to listen to YOU.

Learn to distinguish among the you’s vying for your attention

And compliance.

We all have a lot of voices within.

Impulsive, compulsive, lazy, fearful, arrogant, prideful, willful, etc. voices.

We have to listen past all the voices claiming to know what they are doing,

To The Voice That Knows,

And listen to it.

All the others are pretenders to the title.

The first step is to listen past all of them

To The One Who Knows.

Nothing happens for the good

Until you can recognize the voice within of The One Who Knows

And listen to it.
Used in Short Talks on Good and Bad Religion — 10/18/2015 — Old Stone Bridge HDR 01 — Falls Park, Greenville, SC, October 8, 2015

We don’t need theology or doctrine,

Or some second-hand religion

Passed along to us by Those Who Know Best And Must Be Pleased.

We need only the truth of our own experience

To validate for us

The importance of compassion and kindness

In a “Do unto others as you would have them do unto you,

Whether or not they return the favor and do unto you

As you have done unto them” kind of way.

The truth of our own experience,

Reflected upon,

And interpreted in light of the experience of the species,

And the values at the heart of being human,

Is all we need to square us up

To how things are and what needs to be done about it

In each situation as it arises.

No religion that has ever been could do more for us,

Or as much.

Theology and doctrine are divisive.

Good religion is unifying

Like the encounter with awe, wonder, grace and beauty

In art, music and nature–

Like a cup of cold water on a hot day.

Who could argue about any of those things?
Used in Short Talks on Good and Bad Religion –10/19/2015 — Early Morning Mist 02 B&W—Tupper Lake, NY, September 22, 2015

No one needs to be told what to believe

In terms of doctrine and theology.

Everyone needs to be told what needs to be done

And given the freedom to figure out what works for themselves.

All approaches to the experience with spiritual reality

Are composed of the same elements.

The basics are:

Seeing (What you look at),

Hearing (What you listen to),

Understanding (How things are and how things also are),

Knowing (What is happening in each situation as it arises),

Doing (What needs to be done about it),

Being (In accord with your life and with the way of life–

Which includes bearing the pain of your experience).

The tools are:

Mindfulness Meditation (Jon Kabat-Zinn’s work is a great source for training),

Silence,

Living as an outlet of compassion and grace,

Reflection and Realization,

Practice (Discipline, Rituals, Routines),

Participation in the right kind of company (Communities of Innocence, I call them),

Diet and exercise.

We cannot read a book,

Attend a lecture,

Go on a retreat

And “be spiritual.”

“Being spiritual” is a practice, a regimen, a way of life.

Not a vocabulary or a set of beliefs.
10/20/2015 — Bog River Falls 2015 Panorama 02 — Tupper Lake, NY, September 23, 2015

You have to find your voice

And listen to it.

You have to find your heart’s song

And sing it.

You have to find your life

And live it.

The disciple has to become like the Master

In following no Master.

Only you know what is yours to do.

Only you know what catches your eye.

Only you know what does it for you.

The only guru worth following

Is the one who won’t have you

Chasing after her, or him–

Who tells you:

”Listen to me when I tell you:

’DON’T LISTEN TO ME!

LISTEN TO YOU!’”

Listen to you.

And, if it leads to a dead end,

Keep listening to you

To get you out of there

Having gotten what you need from there,

Which is learning that you have to listen to you,

No matter what.
10/20/2015 — Fish Creek Pond HDR—Near Clear Lake, NY, September 25, 2015

My mother died early in September, and her memorial service is slated to be held in a week. I am appropriately sad these days, as much over the life that was not as over the life that was.

I would love to know how her life would have been if my mother had had what she needed.

Of course, we can say that about ourselves, Terry Malloy, and everyone we know, but. This is my mother who has died, and I can excuse myself for deeply regretting what she missed because of all those in her life who, themselves, were operating with only deficits and deficiencies to work with.

We come into the world set and primed for certain environmental conditions, much like an acorn drops from the oak expecting sunlight, soil and water. The world that greets us is not always what we need. And, we walk with a limp, or worse, because of it.

Many, if not most, of us spend our life compensating for what did not meet us when we slipped from the womb. It helps if we know, consciously, that is what we are doing, and consciously search ways to work around what is missing in our life.

Lacking that much awareness, we live, like my mother, against the odds, and do what chance and timing provide us in creating the life we live.

I celebrate Katheryne’s resolve, courage, creativity and her heard-headed refusal to quit—and her life, which gave me and my siblings more of a life than we would have had if she had folded early-on, and left us as much to chance and timing as she was handed.

Here, then, is to Nancy Katheryne Hamilton Dollar—for all she did with what she had to work with, and who she became in spite of finding little more than deficit and deficiency in the environment that received her slip-sliding from the womb into its welcoming arms.
10/21/2015 — Gaffney Icon—Gaffney, SC, October 8, 2015

We can let our thoughts run away with us.

That isn’t the thing to do with thoughts.

We have them.

They can’t have us.

Hold us hostage,

R-u-n-n-o-f-t with us,

Over some cliff

Into some abyss

To torture us forever.

We can create entire scenarios of despair

All coming to the hopeless conclusion

That we will never have a chance

And it is pointless and futile to go on.

This is where compassionate awareness

Comes to our rescue.

Compassionate awareness receives what we are doing to ourselves

Without going along with us to the brink and over it.

As we become aware of what we are doing

We can wake up

And say, “Wait a minute.

”I’ve been here before.

”I know where this is going.

”And I’m not going along again.”

We stop our thoughts from running away with us

By being compassionately aware of them:

”I’m scaring myself again.

”It’s what I do best.

”I’m going to stop now, and count my breaths.”

Then we take a deep breath,

And count the next 20

Counting to five between one exhale and the next inhale.

That will put our thoughts in their place as fast as anything will.
10/22/2015 — Spanning the River—Middle Saluda River, Jones Gap State Park, Cleveland, SC, October 15, 2015

We are always having to pause and take stock

to see where our enthusiasm lies.

Enthusiasm for the task drifts away, over time,

to some other task.

We have to notice when it leaves,

and pick up the trail before it grows cold,

and we are left with a life

we have to pretend to be living,

but no longer have the heart for.

Where do your enthusiasms lie these days?

What are you doing to deepen their attachments,

and follow their lead?

Enthusiasm for life IS life!

When it goes,

we have to allow it to take us with it,

or wander the back roads forever wondering

whatever became of passion and bliss

after the fire burned out.
10/22/2015 — Linville Cove Viaduct Panorama 01 — Blue Ridge Parkway near Grandfather Mountain, NC, October 12, 2015

The optimal distance between people in relationship with each other is the point at which the “I’s” are supporting each other with their life and work, and no one has gone over into a “We,” where the boundaries separating individuals have dissolved and everyone is intent on being like everyone else—or, like they are “supposed to be” for the sake of the relationship.

This is true for couples, congregations and political parties.

”We” exist for the good of the “I’s” composing the “we.”

When the “I’s” exist for the good of the “We,” the optimum distance for relationship has been transgressed, and individuals are disappearing into the myth of the “We.”

The myth of the “We,” in its most outlandish and ridiculous form is in the idea that corporations are individuals.

Corporations are where individuals go to disappear.

Where individuals are eaten alive.

Where no one is responsible for anything because everything is done by the nebulous, and ostensibly non-existent, “We.”

Two or more healthy, well-defined, consciously, compassionately aware “I’s” are essential for every “We.”

No “We” can be healthier than the health of the least healthy “I” composing it.

A healthy “We” is an intentional collection of healthy “I’s” who come together for the mutual support of each others life and work, and for the good of the larger community beyond the “We” so established.

Healthy “I’s” are essential for the development of healthy “I’s.”

Whatever contributes to the health of an “I,” contributes to the health of more than one “I.”

The right kind of “We’s” produce the right kind of “I’s,” and vice versa.

And that’s how we “I’s” save the world.
10/23/2015 — Freedom Bridge at Falls Park Falls—Greenville, SC, October 8, 2015

We all are stupid in our own way.

It helps the whole when we are the only one impacted by our stupidity.

Some of us—too many of us—are stupid in ways that keep the world flame burning much lower than is good for any of us.

We each do our part in serving the good of ourselves and the whole

By taking up the practice of mindfulness meditation,

And practicing daily.

Simply being compassionately aware of everything happening and not happening

In the present moment

Without judgment, willfulness or opinion

Shifts the moment toward the good of all.

Compassionately seeing, hearing, knowing

What is happening and not happening

In each situation as it arises

Without judgment, willfulness or opinion

Changes everything.

But.

It takes doing it religiously over time

To know

That I know what I’m talking about.

It would be stupid

To be handed the solution to the mess we all are in

And not practice it.

Particularly when it asked no more of us

Than sitting with the moment

Once a day

And being fully, compassionately, aware

Of what is happening and not happening there

Without judgment, willfulness or opinion.

Wouldn’t it?
10/24/2015 — Fall Woods Road 01 — Indian Land, SC, October 23, 2015

We cannot wake up before the time for awakening is upon us.

Seeds sprout at sprouting time.

The grain is harvested at harvesting time.

It is the way of things.

”For everything there is a season,

And a time for every unfolding and coming forth under heaven.”

Nothing can be made to happen before its time.

But.

It’s time can be missed.

The opportune time can come by,

Looking for us,

And we can be busy tending other matters.

”I cannot come to the banquet,

Don’t trouble me now,

I have married a wife,

I have bought me a cow.

I have fields and commitments,

That cost a pretty sum,

Pray hold me excused.

I cannot come.” (Lyrics by the Medical Mission Sisters, “I Cannot Come To The Banquet”)

We can be so preoccupied with having Our Way

That we are never available to The Way,

No matter how many times it returns,

Calling our name.

Our Yossarian is never available

To the invitation of our life’s Orr.

And the dead are left to bury the dead,

While Life goes on without them.

And so, the need to take up the practice

Of looking and listening–

Of being mindfully attentive to the moment of our living–

So that we might see and hear

When the time for seeing and hearing comes upon us.
10/25/2015 — Fall Woods Panorama 01 — Indian Land, SC, October 23, 2015

The situation as it unfolds before us

Will bring us forth to meet it,

And if we refuse to come forth,

Our situations will increase in intensity and insistence,

Until we finally have no recourse but to come forth and meet them,

Or fold up and “die” in one of the 10,000 ways to “die”

Without officially, and finally, being dead.

Our life is the place of our coming forth,

And we WILL come forth,

Or not.

That being the case,

Why not learn all we can about coming forth,

About meeting our life,

About assisting what is bringing us forth,

And discovering how to be our life’s able assistant,

Its ready partner in collaboration with it

In the development and presentation of who we are

In all of our glory,

For our good,

And the good of the whole?

Why do it the hard way,

Or worse, fail to do it at all?
10/25/2015 — Leaves of Fall 01 — Indian Land, SC, October 22, 2015

Where do we go to find our peace,

Restore our balance,

Regain our equilibrium,

Recover our sense of direction,

Reconnect with heart and soul,

Remember our center,

Reestablish our foundation,

Revive our connection with the source and ground

Of life and being?

You might try sitting still,

And breathing,

Intentionally attending the moment

Of sitting and breathing,

With compassion for all that is there with you,

And without judgment, willfulness or opinion

For any of it.

Just sitting,

Just breathing,

With compassionate awareness

Of and for the moment.

What do you have to lose?
10/26/2015 — Price Lake 2015 02 — Julian Price Memorial Park, Blue Ridge Parkway, near Blowing Rock, NC, October 12, 2015

What is your relationship with reality?

Contentious?

Oppositional?

Compassionate?

Are you integrated with reality?

At one with reality?

At peace with reality?

At odds with reality?

In denial about reality?

How harmonious is your relationship with reality?

Upon what does your harmony with reality depend?

Things going your way, perhaps?

To what extent is reality an extension of you?

To what extent are you an extension of reality?

Where do you stop and reality start?

Upon what does the quality of your relationship with reality depend?

What can you do to improve the quality of your relationship with reality?

What keeps you from doing that?

One Minute Monologues 027

06/10/2015 — 08/19/2015

06/10/2015 — Lake Chicot Panorama 03 — Lake Chicot State Park, Ville Platte, Louisiana, March 22, 2015

Each stage of life comes replete with responses

To the situations that arise during that stage,

That are appropriate to the situation,

And appropriate to our stage in life.

It is our place to play the part we are asked to play,

In ways appropriate to the situation,

And appropriate to our stage in life.

It takes observation and reflection

To know what is being asked of us,

And how we need to respond.

No matter how long we live,

We never out-live the importance

Of working introspection, silence, solitude and reflection

into our life–

And living out the revelation/realization revealed to us

In the time and place of our living.
06/11/2015 — Water Lily Panorama 01 — Carolina Sandhills National Wildlife Refuge, McBee, South Carolina, June 4, 2015

There is no hurry.

It isn’t like we are going somewhere.

When we fully arrive,

And have complete understanding,

The only thing that can give us

Is the gift of being completely present in the present moment.

All there is to get, to have, to achieve, to acquire

Is here, now.

When you wake up, you wake up to where you are,

When you are,

How you are,

What is happening,

And what needs to be done about it.

You see what you look at.

You hear what you listen to.

You know what you know

On all levels of knowing,

That no one can tell you,

Because it is the full awareness

Of your own direct, personal, experience

That is the foundation of the kind of knowing

That transforms your life,

And turns you into a true human being.
06/11/2015 — Duck Pond Panorama 01 — Freedom Park, Mecklenburg County Parks & Recreation, Charlotte, NC, June 11, 2015

We can make things better than they would be without us.

And, we can make things worse than they would be without us.

Why don’t we go for the first option,

In each situation as it arises–

As a unilateral commitment to the good of the world?
06/12/2015 — Damselfly 01 – Indian Land, South Carolina, June 10, 2015

Immaturity is the refusal to adapt, adjust.

Maturity is the art of adaptation, adjustment.

There is always something else to place ourselves in accord with.

The Cyclops stands in our path

In myriad manifestations–

Each one asking us to grow up.

The spiritual journey is never any more difficult

Than doing what is hard,

Here and now.
06/13/2015 — Schwabacher Landing 2004 B&W—Grand Teton National Park, WY, September 2004

Solitude is not isolation.

Solitude is being where you are,

When you are,

How you are,

Who you are.

Solitude is oneness with the time and place of our living.

Solitude is our origin,

And our goal.

Seeing, hearing, understanding, knowing, doing, being

Are functions of solitude.

Experiencing our experience,

Reflecting on our experience,

Receiving new realizations, revelations,

Are possible only in solitude.

Silence is required to hear what is happening,

To see what you are looking at,

To know what you know.

For long eons of evolution,

There was nothing but silence and solitude.

Now, we can’t get away from the noise of life.

There is no sanctuary from the amplified disruptions,

Intrusions, violations of the boundaries setting us apart.

It’s madness everywhere we turn.

We take medication to sleep.

We live too loudly to listen

Even to our bodies.

What are you going to do?
06/14/2015 — Old Stone Cemetery 04 — Chester County, South Carolina, May 30, 2015

Do your thing with mindful awareness,

Seeing what you look at,

Hearing what you are saying,

And what is being said to you,

Knowing what you know.

That’s all there is to it.
06/10/2015 — Mountain Laurel 01 — Indian Land, South Carolina, May 17, 2015

We have to be able to separate ourselves from our life.

We cannot take any of it personally,

So that we are unable to differentiate between

Something happening,

And something happening to us,

And us.

Something happens that has implications for us–

It’s raining, say, and we wanted to work in the yard–

And you would think it is the worst thing that ever happened to us.

Our entire day is ruined.

This is not a mature reaction.

Maturity understands that

Distance is leverage,

And perspective is the lever.

If we can stand back from our life and what is happening there,

Observe it from a place of detached interest,

And see what is called for, what needs to happen in response,

And do it–

Without drama or emotional upheaval–

We will transform the world.

Our world, anyway.
06/16/2015 — Queen Anne’s Lace 02 Blended—Indian Land, South Carolina, June 14, 2015

What would it take for things to be “well with your soul”?

I would need a salt water marsh where I could take photographs of waterbirds, wading, swimming, flying,

And a way to share the photos and my reflections and realizations.

I’m close to being there, and actually am there several times a year.

What is your soul asking of you?

Where does it need for you to be?

What does it need for you to be doing?

When have you been most clearly aware of the connection

With your soul?

Where have things been well with it?

Your place is to carry your soul where it needs to go,

And do what it needs to do.

You are just along for the ride.

Once you understand your role,

And live to fulfill it,

Things will be well with both you and your soul.
06/18/2015 — Summer Flowers 01 — Tickseed Sunflowers, Indian Land, South Carolina, June 15, 2015

Look in all of your mirrors,

See who looks back at you from each one.

Start with the bed you wake up in.

What does the bed, and the bedroom, and the bathroom, and the house,

Say about you? What do they reveal of you?

Proceed from there throughout your day.

What do you wear?

How do you greet the first person you meet? The fifth?

Who do you show yourself to be in each scene of your day?

Who is the YOU that shines through in each of the roles you play?

Are there some YOU’s you don’t allow to shine through in some roles?

How many YOU’s do you keep in seclusion, unavailable to public viewing?

It is crucial that YOU are aware of all the you’s there are,

And that YOU work with them all,

Consciously, mindfully, compassionately, over time,

To integrate, reconcile, harmonize, choreograph into a whole

That is completely transparent to you,

So that all of you knows, and is comfortable with, all of you.

Don’t hide anything about yourself from yourself.

And no pretending to be not pretending!

Nothing happens for the good in your life

Until you integrate the whole,

And step as one into your day.

Each day.
06/18/2015 — Queen Anne’s Lace 03 Blended—Indian Land, South Carolina, June 14, 2015

I am appalled and aghast at the murder of nine good people in Charleston, SC, last night, and at the rampant, escalating hatred of black people by white people in this country.

White supremacy is an evil beyond evil. Apartheid is a sickness of the soul unto death. Those who wave the Confederate flag, and decorate themselves, and their vehicles, with one, have no heart, and their mind belongs to a movement with only hatred as a vital force.

I cannot imagine what it is like to be black and know you are hated to the point of your death, and the deaths of the loves of your life. And to look at the white people on the bus with you, or in the sidewalk crowd as you walk to work, or white visitors to your church with it’s “Everyone Welcome” sign on the front lawn, and wonder which of these bastards it will be with the gun blasting away. And to wonder that every day, your entire life long.

And white politicians who encourage the hatred by tut-tutting it instead of railing against it, and making it crystal clear that disparaging, belittling, insulting, reviling, maligning, ridiculing, making fun of, or in any even slight way disrespecting a black person will not be tolerated any time ever, are guilty of creating an environment, and a culture, of hatred—and must be challenged to become the kind of leaders who exhibit, by the quality of their life, their commitment to the cause of “liberty and justice for all.”

I do not know how to bring truth to bear upon those who have embraced a lie and call it God. I am as dumbfounded by it as Jesus was, who could only advise walking on to the next town, and leaving the dead to bury the dead. If they were content to bury their own dead, that would be one thing, but their life is consumed by their obsession with killing people innocent of everything but having black skin.

There is no protection against stupidity, no immunity against rampant, willful, idiocy. But we will not grant them the floor, and will call them out at the slightest racist slur. They cannot be allowed to think that everyone is as they are. Silence is encouragement, and is viewed as acceptance. We will be noisy in our objection to white supremacists and their despicable racist ways. In every time and place.

We good white people wonder why good Islamic people don’t oppose Islamic fundamentalism. Here is where we show them how, by opposing white supremacy at every turn—especially with those who are “only joking.”
06/19/2015 — Duck Pond Panorama 02 — Freedom Park, Mecklenburg County Parks & Recreation, Charlotte, NC, June 11, 2015

We have to understand that we get out of bed and go to work every day.

This is not some lark.

We are not on vacation except for the time we spend at our job.

Our WORK is 24/7/12 with NO vacation, and time off only for meditation, reflection, realization, and rededication.

We have to be alert to the situation as it unfolds before us,

Attending what is happening and what needs to happen in response,

Doing what needs to be done and getting ready for the next situation to unfold around us.

What is appropriate here, now?

What is missing here, now?

What is called for here, now?

What now? What next? Now what?

There is no time to waste not knowing, not seeing, not hearing, not understanding, not doing what needs to be done.

Our life needs us to live it the way it needs to be lived every moment.

Mindfulness leads the way.

We don’t think about it–

We apprehend it.
06/18/2015 — Pitcher Plant 08 — Carolina Sandhills National Wildlife Refuge, McBee, South Carolina, June 4, 2015

We have to work with the impact of our experience with life.

It helps to work with the impact of our experience with life,

In light of the life that is our life to live–

In light of the way life is to be lived.

Nature’s way is the way of least resistance.

Consciousness complicates the “natural” flow of life’s tendencies,

By finding things to take into account that introduce complexity

Into what appears to be the way of least resistance,

And makes it more tangled and thorny than it seemed at first glance.

”Kill all your enemies!” seems to be the course of least resistance to peace and security, but

When we work with the impact of our experience with life,

In light of the way that life is to be lived–

For instance, with liberty and justice for all–

That puts a different spin on things,

And we have to look for a path with a second, or third,

Degree of resistance to it,

But which is now less resistant than the first path.

We have to work with everything in this way–

Taking everything into account, and finding the response

That serves liberty, justice, kindness, compassion and peace,

And complicates things,

And slows things down,

And makes things better for all concerned.
06/20/2015 — Smith Creek Panorama 05 – Anna Ruby Falls, Unicoi State Park, Cattahoochee National Forest, Helen, Georgia, April 15, 2015

One of the things I hate about photography is how it disrupts the flow of my life.

I have to be there when the light is.

The photograph doesn’t wait for a time,

And is not found in a place,

That is convenient to me.

It asks me to lay my life aside in order to live my LIFE.

That is ridiculous.

Why can’t they be more compatible?

Why can’t my LIFE be as smooth and easy as I like my life to be?

Why does what I love to do require me to do what I hate to do?

Here’s the lesson:

We don’t love all there is to love about what we love.

We have to make sacrifices and concessions

In the service of what we love.

We can’t let what we don’t love keep us from doing what we love.

We have to grow up,

And do what needs to be done,

Whether we want to or not.

This applies to the things we love,

And to the things we do not love.

Growing up is the solution to all of our problems today.

And tomorrow.
06/20/2015 — In the Rain—Carolina Sandhills National Wildlife Refuge, McBee, South Carolina, June 4, 2015

When I get in the car and drive off the backroads into traffic, it makes all the difference if I drive without will or opinion.

I still drive with direction and preference, but without willfully insisting upon my rights, or imposing my desires—and without having any opinion of, or personal reaction to, what other drivers are doing.

It’s like driving through a rain storm, or heavy fog, or ice and snow.

We respond to the driving conditions without will or opinion.

We do what is called for by the situation as it arises without will or opinion.

And, when we arrive at your destination, and get out of our car,

We carry the perspective of living without will or opinion with us through the day.

Or better,

When we leave home each morning, we check our will and opinion at the door.

And when we come home in the evening, we tell them to visit us in our dreams,

Because there isn’t much of a place for them in our life.
06/21/2015 — Blackberry Foliage B&W Blended—Indian Land, SC, June 14, 2015

We’re always dreaming.

When we are walking along and slip over into a happy fantasy–

Even if we begin by seeing a girl playing catch with her father,

And are snatched back to playing sandlot baseball

Behind the TV station (KNOE) in Monroe, Louisiana

When we were in the 8^th grade

Things happen in our fantasy that never happened then and there,

And, before we get to the house, the fantasy has morphed

Thirteen times at its own direction

With us just immersed in the show.

The brain dreams constantly,

We’re just too distracted by the business at hand when awake

To notice.

We are always processing experience,

Turning things over,

Rehearsing, rehearsing, rehearsing,

Adjusting, adjusting, adjusting,

Getting over the past,

And preparing for the future,

Trying to get our legs under us,

And ready for what’s coming.

We help things along by paying attention,

And being conscious of themes played out over time.

Our selves are talking to us here.

The least we can do is listen

With compassionate awareness

To what is being said.
06/21/2015 — Water Vapor—Duke Power Hydroelectric Dam on Lake Wylie, and the Catawba River, Tega Cay, SC, June 14, 2015. This photo was taken at 98 degrees Fahrenheit, and 94% humidity. A normally blue sky was graced with the haze of humidity, a deep south delight. Not!

We can be mindful just by practicing being aware of what is happening within and without in each situation as it arises—without judgment or opinion.

We can relax simply by focusing on our breathing—and exhaling slower and longer than we inhale.

We can do more of what we like each day and less of what we don’t like.

We can spend time with things we enjoy.

We can indulge ourselves with music, art and nature.

We can remember to see what we look at and hear what we listen to.

We can ask the questions that beg to be asked, and say the things that cry out to be said.

We can listen to our body, particularly to our stomach, and learn to read its signals.

We can write down our dreams, and reflect on what they might be saying to us.

We can enjoy what is to be enjoyed about each day.

See how many of these things you can do in what remains of today,

And how many you can work into tomorrow.
06/22/2015 — Duck Pond Panorama 02 Detail—Freedom Park, Mecklenburg County Parks & Recreation, Charlotte, NC, June 11, 2015

We have to take the initiative and start living our life the way we feel our life needs to be lived.

Our life will take over from there,

But we have to start the process.

We cannot wait passively for our life to come ask us to dance.

We have to decide what is “it” for us–

And it may be what we wish were “it,”

What we want to be “it”

Or, even, what we are afraid might be “it.”

It doesn’t matter what “it” is that we feel is our work,

We just have to start in some direction,

And allow our work to lead us along the way,

Changing directions,

Opening doors we never knew existed,

Surprising us again and again with new ways

To think of, and live, our life.

But, nothing happens until we get up and go toward something,

And then get out of the way.
06/23/2015 — Trumpet Vine—Indian Land, South Carolina, June 14, 2015

When I was in the preaching business, I was paid to talk to people about God.

But.

They didn’t want me to tell them anything they hadn’t already heard.

I would try to work in something new.

”That’s not right!” they would protest.

”Tell it like it IS, Preacher!”

Made for interesting times.

They wanted to hear about the Christian God.

Or, at worst, the Judeo-Christian God.

They didn’t want to hear about God before God became a Jew.

Or, after God gave up on Christianity.

What did they think God was doing all that time waiting around for the Children of Abraham to make the scene?

Who was God talking to then?

They didn’t want to think about it.

They just wanted to be told again “the old, old (But no older than that!) story.

They were sure they would go to hell if they listened to anything else.

The bad preaching got to them first.
06/24/2015 — Lake Haigler Falls 2015 02 — Anne Springs Close Greenway, Lake Haigler Access, Fort Mill, SC, April 25, 2015

When we talk we have to talk about how it is with us and our work, the work we came to do.

We have to talk about how we are working with the conditions and circumstances of our life in order to accommodate ourselves to our working conditions so that we might do the work that is ours to do.

We are forever caught between our “situation” and Our Work.

Our “situation” is the field of action, Our Work is what we are to do on the field of action as we are also “taking care of business” with regard to our “sitz im leben,” our “setting in life.”

This is called Walking Two Paths At The Same Time.

We have to take care of business on two levels.

The baby needs to be changed and fed, the dog needs to get to the vet, we have a project report to make for our job, and duties and obligations to meet, all related to our setting in life.

And we have to live there in certain ways—in ways that take into account the gifts, art, genus that are ours to bring to life in our life—in ways that do the work that is ours to do in and around the demands of our setting in life.

We cannot relax this tension. We must bear consciously the pain of our twin responsibilities.

We cannot r-u-n-n-o-f-t and join the circus, or the circuit of like-minded-world-renouncing-communes, or conversations, where we repeat our mantras and wait for the world to end.

When we talk, we have to talk about our work and our setting in life and the difficulties we are having getting them together.

Our setting in life is the matrix within which we do our work.

It is necessarily difficult because the real work here is to grow up.

Our work will grow us up IF we do it within our life setting.

If we r-u-n-n-o-f-t to do our work, we abandon our work, and remain stuck repeating our mantras, our truisms, our trite, worn, sayings that have no meaning apart from our setting in life.

Our conversations are to keep our “feet to the fire” and help us do the work that is ours to do.

If they are helping us escape, deny, discount, discard either the work or our setting in life, they are doing harm, not helping us maintain the tension and work with what must be worked with on the two levels—not helping us “work it out.”
06/25/2015 — Pearson’s Falls 2015 05 — Saluda, NC, April 18, 2015

It takes being quiet to hear what is being said.

We are always talking to ourselves, but we are not always listening.

Our mind is on other things.

10,000 other things.

10,000 is the Taoist way of representing infinity.

We never run out of things to think about that aren’t what we need to be thinking about.

We need to be thinking about what we are saying to ourselves.

We have to be quiet for a long time to get past the noise in our life

That is jamming the signals and keeping us from knowing

What we need to know

To be doing what we need to be doing

With our life in the time left for living.

It takes a lot of listening to be able to hear.
06/25/2015 — Smith Creek Panorama 03 — Anna Ruby Falls, Unicoi State Park, Cattahoochee National Forest, Helen, Georgia, April 15, 2015

Our work is to align our conscious ego with our unconscious Psyche,

So that they collaborate as one in the unfolding of our life,

Within the terms and conditions of the time and place of our living.

Get that down, and you have it made.
06/26/2015 — Soque River 04 — Mark of the Potter, Clarksville, Georgia, April 14, 2015

Our conscious ego has to be mature enough to see itself—to be transparent to itself.

Nothing can happen until our conscious ego can be aware of itself.

Can see itself acting,

Hear itself speaking.

Feel itself feeling,

Observe itself wanting, hating, loving, resenting…emoting,

Know itself.

Once the conscious ego is capable of knowing itself,

It is capable of knowing its Other Self.

That’s when the fun begins.

Everything is waiting for the conscious ego to wake up to itself,

And to its Other Self,

And say, “Let’s do it!”
06/27/2015 — Lake Chico 02 Panorama—Lake Chicot State Park, Ville Platte, Louisiana, May 22, 2015

It’s the same work that has to be done every day:

Look, listen, see, hear, understand what is being asked of us.

Do it with compassion and grace.

Be who we are, and who we also are.

All of this without will or opinion.

Live with direction and preference,

Not will and opinion.

That’s the most important thing.

Repeat the process all day long,

Within the terms and conditions,

Nature and circumstances,

Of our life.

When you don’t know what to do,

Look, listen, see, hear.

Works every time.
06/28/2015 — Carolina Jasmine 2015 02 — Indian Land, South Carolina, April 6, 2015

Meditation is the process whereby we, as conscious ego, seek alignment with ourselves, as unconscious psyche/self.

We are seeking communion with the two million-year-old person (Carl Jung’s phrase) within.

It is our place to learn the language of our inner self,

And build a collaborative relationship with her, with him,

So that our life becomes an expression of who we are capable of being,

And we assume the roles of both mother and mid-wife,

Of sculptor and stone,

Birthing ourselves again and again

Throughout the time left for living.

Together with our invisible Other,

We craft a life,

And live the adventure of being alive.
06/29/2015 — Cypress Swamp Panorama B&W 06 — Natchitoches Parish, Louisiana, March 2015

Adjustment and accommodation, Kid. Adjustment and accommodation.

Life is the art of putting ourselves in accord with our life–

Both of them: The one we are living and the one that is ours to live.

We find ourselves saying, “Whhaatt? Not AGAIN!” all the time.

Our capacity for adjustment and accommodation

Is a measure of our maturity.

The people who cannot adjust and accommodate themselves to their life,

Do not live very well,

And do not enable others to live very well.

When life has to be This Way, NOT That Way,

It is going to be a long time to peace and contentment.

Life is the art of finding out what you can get by with.

Life is the art of finding out how much you can give up,

And still have a good time.

Life is the art of considering your possibilities,

Not your misfortunes.

Life is the art of seeing what you can do

With what you have to work with,

Today.
06/30/2015 — Lake Haigler Summer Panorama—Anne Springs Close Greenway, Lake Haigler Access, Fort Mill, SC, June 29, 2015

I live in the midst of a developing nation.

Development is everywhere.

I awaken to the sound of bulldozers, dump trucks and earth moving equipment

Clearing the land,

Making progress.

Actually, they are making a profit

At nature’s expense.

There are earthquakes where earthquakes were not

Because progress (Read: Profit) requires fossil fuel

And fracking is the cheapest, fastest way to feed the beast.

Of course, voices of protest have been raised over the course of time,

But if a profit can be made, a profit will be made,

And the economy grows lusty,

And calls for M O R E N O W ! ! !

The Sierra Club and Greenpeace can’t keep up.

The only break came when the housing bubble burst.

It takes a systemic shock to shut down rabid insanity

Because we, as a species, lack the self-reflection-and-restraint

Necessary for survival,

And it’s an all-or-nothing world.

But.

The ice caps are melting.

And the honey bees are disappearing.

Nature’s way of reclaiming lost ground,

And recovering from the failed experiment of homo sapiens.
06/30/2015 — Cypress Swamp Panorama 08 — Natchitoches Parish, Louisiana, March 2015

Just look.

Just listen.

Just see.

Just hear.

Just understand.

Just know.

Just do (what needs to be done in response to the above)

Just be (the best person you are capable of being with the qualities and characteristics, gifts and abilities you possess, within the nature and circumstances of your life).

And the world will be a better place,

Because of you.
06/30/2015 — Peaches 2015 04 — Anne Springs Close Greenway, Lake Haigler Access, Fort Mill, SC, June 29, 2015

We come into the world packed with all the help we need

To meet our life square-up and deliver the goods

(That would be what we have to offer)

In each situation as it arises

All our life long.

How many babies have you known who didn’t know their own mind,

And didn’t mind expressing it?

We begin to lose our confidence and self-assurance

All along the way,

Until, by the seventh grade, we are looking around to see

How it’s supposed to be done,

And doing it like everyone else is.

Too many of us never wake up

And find our way back to ourselves,

But die never having had an authentic thought in adulthood,

Or acted on a personal urge for self-expression.

And the help we need is always “right there,”

Waiting to be turned to,

And asked for assistance and direction.
07/01/2015 — Lake Haigler Summer Panorama 02 — Anne Springs Close Greenway, Lake Haigler Access, Fort Mill, SC, June 29, 2015

Introspection, reflection, solitude.

The watchwords for the second half (maybe the last third) of life.

Carl Jung said, “For a young person it is almost a sin . . . to be too much occupied with himself; but for the aging person it is a duty and a necessity.”

We have to reconcile ourselves to our life–

To the life we have lived and the one we are living,

And to the one we are called, even yet, to live.

We have to see how things have fit together,

And recognize the recurring imprint of grace at work throughout our life.

Making our peace with the way things are,

And living with gratitude for all that is and has been,

Opens us to the offerings of each day,

And to the wonder of life yet to be lived.
07/02/2015 — Lake Haigler Loop Trail 04 — Anne Springs Close Greenway, Lake Haigler Access, Fort Mill, SC, June 29, 2015

Lions come with a built-in pattern for being a lion in place.

And, they are born into a pride in which everyone there is doing it

The way lions do it.

No lion ever got confused about who it was or what it was supposed to do,

And never even dreamed about being an elephant or an antelope.

No lion ever had big ideas for itself and wanted to move to the city

And be in the zoo.

Lions live out their life, quite content to be a lion,

With no one ever asking it, “What do you want to be when you grow up?”

It’s different with human beings.

We can override every human thing about us

And live like we are pigs or parrots if we want to.

Overriding the patterns in place from the womb,

And imposing our idea of us on us,

Creates problems.

Can you imagine John Wayne

Trying to be Momma’s Little Darling

All his life long?

The people with the best chance in life

Are being who they are.

Not who they wish they were.

Where do you fall out along that continuum?

How close to the patterns do you live?
07/03/2015 — Sandhills Grasslands—Carolina Sandhills National Wildlife Refuge, McBee, South Carolina, June 7, 2015

There are three aspects of the spiritual journey,

Which is also the Road to Maturity and Grace:

There is who we are.

There is what we do.

There is how we feel about it.

The work of the journey and the Road

Is integrating these three things

So that they merge together and are one.

What we do is who we are,

And we are at peace with who we are and what we do.

Negotiation and compromise, Kid.

Negotiation and compromise.

And living transparent to ourselves,

In each situation as it arises.

We are the knight and the dragon and the treasure,

The sculptor, the chisel, and the marble.

The bard and the tale.
07/04/2015 — Peaches 2015 02 — Anne Springs Close Greenway, Lake Haigler Access, Fort Mill, SC, June 29, 2015

It starts with what you care about.

Your life begins there.

The Spiritual Journey, A.K.A. The Road To Maturity and Grace,

Starts there.

Nothing happens until you care about something.

It could be anything, but.

You have to care deeply about it.

You have to care deeply enough about it to do what you hate doing–

What is inconvenient, exasperating, and no fun–

To do what you care about.

If you don’t care about anything deeply enough to do anything to do it,

There is nothing I, or anyone else, can do for you.

We are all standing around,

Waiting for you to care about something deeply enough,

To sacrifice yourself in its service.

Until you are doing that,

We are wasting our time with you.

And none of us have enough of it to throw any of it away.

Neither, of course, do you.

So why are you wasting time not caring about anything enough

To die for it?

That kind of death is the path to resurrection and new life.

You are already dead–

Too dead to care about anything.

Caring about something enough to die in its service

Will raise you from the dead,

Like nothing else will.

But, you have to do it to know what I’m talking about.
07/05/2015 — Faires-Coltharp Cabin Panorama—Anne Springs Close Greenway, Dairy Barn Access, Fort Mill, South Carolina, April 30, 2015

Your reactions to the events and circumstances of your life

Are a mirror reflecting you to you

(And to everyone else).

What you do is you.

How you react is, too.

You are calling your attention to what needs attending

About you,

And you think it is the events and circumstances of your life

That need attention, alteration–

That your reactions are normal, reasonable and sound,

And it is your life that is out of round.

There is nothing wrong with you

That having more things go your way

Wouldn’t cure.

Your life keeps sending you messages,

You keep yelling at your life.

Everything waits for you to wake up–

For the shift in perspective

That changes everything.
07/06/2015 — Mingus Mill—Great Smoky Mountains National Park, Cherokee, NC

When we live in sync with ourselves,

integrated within and without,

It is a smooth fit and flow.

We are “in the groove,”

”On the beam,”

”At peace” with ourselves and our lot in life.

There is nothing to fight against,

So resistance disappears,

And we respond as needed

To each situation as it arises,

With an offering appropriate to the occasion.

What’s wrong with that for a way to live?
07/07/2015 — Yellow on Black—Sunflower Fields, Draper Wildlife Management Area, York County, South Carolina, July 4, 2015

Notice everything.

Notice what impresses you.

Let the things that impress you be things like sunrises and sunsets,

Moon rises and moon sets,

Cloud formations,

Rainbows,

Natural things.

Ask yourself, “What’s so impressive about

Celebrities,

Awards,

Prestigious affiliations,

And things money can buy?

What’s so impressive about money?”

Live to be impressed by things

Worthy of your attention.
07/07/2015 — Yellow on White—Sunflower Fields, Draper Wildlife Management Area, York County, South Carolina, July 4, 2015

We have to take our solace where we can find it, but.

I recommend art—including literature and poetry—music and nature

Over drugs, sex and alcohol.

If you have been lost in the latter,

Poke around a bit in the former.

See if you can find something there

That comes upon you as a blessing and a grace,

Soothing your soul,

Healing old wounds

(And helping you avoid new ones).

If your life isn’t working as is,

Look at where you are spending your money,

And where you are spending your time.

I’ll bet it isn’t in the areas of art, music and nature.
07/08/2015 — Sunflower 2015 04 — Sunflower Field, Draper Wildlife Management Area, York County, South Carolina, July 4, 2015

We need objective, expert witnesses, not only in the justice system (Why is it “criminal justice system” and not just “justice system”? Criminals aren’t the only ones in need of just and fair treatment), but throughout our life.

We need someone to witness what is happening in our life, to share our experience, to confirm or correct what we perceive to be happening.

We are thoroughly capable of responding appropriately to the situation IF we interpret what is occurring there correctly.

We need an expert, objective witness with whom we might consult in determining the correctness of our understanding of what is happening.

In the absence of such a helpful aid in time of trouble, we are on our own in the work to assess and evaluate what is going on and what needs to be done about it in each situation as it arises.

It takes me a while to see things as they are.

I don’t walk around being savvy, tuned-in and with it.

I get blindsided and react defensively, aggressively, personally, and rarely recover from one event before the next one is unfolding before me.

We need more time between situations.

Time to recover, reflect, reconsider and regain our perspective—which is the emotional/physical distance required to see what the deal is from all sides, and determine what response would be most fitting to the occasion.

We can’t do that “like that.”

And, that’s the “whole problem,” as I see it.

We are asked, no, required, to size things up and respond appropriately in no time at all.

That’s ridiculous. Ain’t no way.

It takes time to know what is going on and what to do about it.

You tell them I said so.
07/09/2015 — Yellow on Blue—Indian Land, South Carolina, July 8, 2014

Most of what passes for conversation is deigned to keep from having to say anything.

How much reflection goes into your conversations?

How much new ever comes out of them?

You may argue often,

But how much insight is gleaned?

How often do minds change?

Enlarge?

Expand?

Deepen?

How often do you follow worn paths to familiar destinations?

Like cows,

Going from the barn to the pasture,

And back to the barn?

Conversation is a cow path,

From nothing to nowhere and back,

Again and again,

Everyday.
07/10/2015 — Atlantic Dawn 02 — Cape Hatteras National Seashore, Ocracoke Island, NC, October, 2008

There are two of us,

The one we are conscious of,

And the one we are unconscious of.

The one we are conscious of

Is composed of the one I see and know,

And you see and know,

And the one you also see and know,

But I do not see and know.

And the one I see and know,

But you do not see and know.

The one we are not conscious of

Is composed of the one we can become conscious of

And the one that is there, and real, and impacts our life,

But is beyond our ability to know,

And the multitude of unconscious “contents”

That influence us and make life interesting.

We need to be told all of this early on,

And taught how to relate to all that we are,

And also are,

For the good of the whole,

Individually and collectively.

We have to know what we know,

And what can be known.

Everything depends on it.
07/10/2015 — Yellow on Blue with Green—Indian Land, South Carolina, July 8, 2015

Every man has to be the best man he can be,

And the best woman he can be.

Every woman has to be the best woman she can be,

And the best man she can be.

The ideal male has to be compensated by the ideal female.

The ideal female has to be compensated by the ideal male.

Each of us works to get the ratios right among

Reason, logic, practical, expedient, ambitious,

Aggressive, devoted, empathetic, compassionate, accepting,

Nurturing, understanding, receptive, open, imaginative,

And all the other characteristics that comprise the species.

We can be too much the man

And not enough the woman,

Too much the woman

And not enough the man.

We have to be balanced by our opposites,

And seek the middle ground between the extremes,

Bringing, Logos and Eros,

Animus and Anima,

To life with each of us,

Neglecting neither,

Honoring both
07/11/2015 — Sunflowers 2015 02 — Sunflower Fields, Draper Wildlife Management Area, York County, SC, July 4, 2015

We have to know what our place is,

Where we belong,

What our business is,

And is not,

Who our kind of people are,

And are not.

We have to work our side of the street,

And trust the others to work their side of the street,

And know where the line lies,

And honor the line.

When we blur the line,

Or erase it,

To earn the favor of those who won’t like us if we don’t,

Or to exploit our position,

And gain some advantage,

We lose the way,

And wander in a wasteland of our own making.

We have to know what our work is,

And do it.

Everything flows from there.

Everything stops flowing

When we neglect our work

In favor of some other consideration,

And blur the lines,

Or erase them.
07/12/2015 — Atlantic Storm 05 — Cape Hatteras National Seashore, Ocracoke Island, NC, October 2008

The National Park Service motto, “Your safety is your responsibility” applies across the board, around the table.

Your life is your responsibility.

That could be an AA motto.

We are on our own with the problem of finding and living our life.

Nobody can do it for us.

Nobody can tell us how to do it.

All the coaching and instruction in the world can’t tell us what we need to know in order to do what is ours to do.

The group, the community, can encourage us, and can lead by example, doing its own work, living their own life, but.

In the darkness at 2 AM, it’s just me and my life and the question of what am I going to do. What now? What next? Now what? I alone answer those questions.

And the group, the community, encourages me to trust myself to find my own way to the life that is mine alone to live. They cheer me on. We cheer each other on.

But, we do the work alone.

The books on mindfulness don’t enable us to be mindful. We take up the practice, we do the work, on our own.

The books on meditation don’t enable us to meditate.

The books on sobriety don’t enable us to be, and remain, sober.

The books on Spiritual Practice don’t enable us to reflect on our experience to the point of new realizations, or follow a healthy diet, or exercise regularly, or become transparent to ourselves…

We do the work on our own.

Talking about doing the work is not doing the work.

Reading another book about doing the work is not doing the work.

Are we doing the work is the only question.

If not, why not is the other only question
07/12/2015 — Baxter Creek Bridge 01 — Big Creek Campground, Great Smoky Mountains National Park, Waterville, NC, 2008

I’ve had enough of the stupidity of the deep south.

I know stupidity isn’t a regional thing, but

I’ve had enough of it in the deep south.

There doesn’t seem to be much of it in Vermont

And Oregon.

I wish the deep south were more like Vermont

And Oregon.

The Affordable Health Care Act is a good thing.

For everybody.

What’s with not seeing that?

Not understanding that?

Not being all for that?

Stupid willfulness is the only explanation.

And, that is only one example.

There are myriad more.

All built upon the premise

That “Ours Is The Right Way To See And Do Everything!”

Or, as it is sometimes stated: “Nobody Can Show Us Nothing!”

I can’t get far enough away from that.

Not even Vermont and Oregon

Are far enough away from that.
07/13/2015 — Sunflower 2015 03 — Sunflower Fields, Draper Wildlife Management Area, York County, South Carolina, July 4, 2015

Our life is an operating manual detailing how to live our life.

We discover everything we need to know about living by living.

But.

There is a catch.

We have to live mindfully, compassionately, aware of what is happening (within and without us),

And what we do in response,

And what happens next.

We have to experience our life,

And our response to our life.

We have to pay attention.

Without judgment, will or opinion.

Only preference and direction are allowed.

That’s it.

If you follow these instructions,

You will have everything you need

To live the life that needs you to live it,

And follow the thread with your name on it,

Through the circumstances of your living.
07/14/2015 — Sunflowers 2015 05 – Sunflower Fields, Draper Wildlife Management Area, York County, South Carolina, July 4, 2015

It begins with what we care about–

With caring about what we care about–

With allowing what we care about

To lead us into other things to care about.

Caring about the things we care about

Is the path of soul to soul by way of soul.

Soul is here to express its love

For the things it loves.

We block the expression of soul in our life

When we refuse to love what we love,

And do not care about the things we care about,

Because “it would hurt to much,”

Or because “it would be too hard.”

Or because of the ten thousand other reasons

To wall ourselves in

And not give a damn.
07/15/2015 — Black-Eyed Susans and Purple Cone Flowers—Blowing Rock, NC

Saying “YES!” to the way things are,

And working with them

To see what we can do with them

In the time left for living,

Transforms everything,

And opens us to possibilities

We never knew existed.

This is the “transcendent function” (Carl Jung)

Of imagination coming to life in our life,

And the power Perspective Shifts

To move mountains

And to create doorways

In the walls

Boxing us in.

We all are magicians in this way.

We all are the magic wand we wish we had.

Waiting for the jailer to let us out,

We become the jailer keeping us in,

Holding the key,

Wishing we had a key.
07/16/2015 — Dairy Barn HDR 03 — Anne Springs Close Greenway, Fort Mill, SC, Dairy Barn Access, June 4, 2015

The truth within us has to recognize,

Validate,

And resonate with

The truth outside of us.

We are actively engaged in the transmission of truth.

Truth doesn’t reside “out there,”

To be “proclaimed” by the gurus,

Masters,

And disciples of the gurus and masters.

Truth is as much “in here,”

Waiting to be awakened,

Deepened,

Expanded

By our engagement with what we find “out there.”

When the truth within meets the truth without,

Truth translates truth,

Truth transforms truth,

Truth merges with truth.

Inner is affirmed and enlarged by outer.

Outer is given shape and form,

Made tangible, practical, actual and real by inner.

And we complete one round

In the process of realization,

Recognition,

Enlightenment,

And make ready for the next.
07/17/2015 — Falls Park Panorama—Reedy River Falls Park, Greenville, SC, July 16, 2015

If we have a Father Complex,

We either hate our father,

Or adore him,

And live trying to please him,

Or displease him.

Our father is continuing to mess with our life,

After all these years.

How do we get over “dear old Dad”?

”Mindfulness leads the way.”

We make dear old Dad conscious–

We become conscious of how living here and now,

Is really living there and then,

And how Dad’s influence is still

Running, and ruining, our life–

And that to live contrary to Dad’s influence

Is still living under Dad’s influence.

The only way out from under Dad

Is to become consciously aware

Of our own heart and soul,

And to know what would be

Genuinely, authentically, US

Apart from Dad.

That’s all there is to it.

Becoming intently conscious

Of the way things are,

Transforms the way things are.

It works with our Poor Old Mother, too.
07/17/2015 — Greenhouse Orchid 09 — Campbell’s Greenhouse and Nursery, Charlotte, NC, April 21, 2015

Consciousness—mindfulness—without judgment, will, or opinion,

but with compassionate, gracious, acceptance,

Covers a multitude of ills.

If you want to change something,

Particularly about yourself,

Become conscious of it.

Know all there is to know about it.

Be curious about it.

Explore it.

Interview it.

Wonder what it is concealing,

And what it is revealing.

And, if you think you “know all about it,”

Ask yourself what you don’t know about it.

See how much you DON’T know.

Ask it to reveal itself to you,

And to reveal yourself to you in so doing.

The world will change before your eyes.
07/18/2015 — Reedy River Falls 03 — Greenville, SC, July 16, 2015

The difference between being self-conscious and being self-aware

Is the difference that makes the difference.

Being self-conscious is seeing yourself with judgment and opinion.

Being self-aware is seeing yourself without judgment or opinion.

It is not enough to see yourself.

Everything rides on “Then what?”
07/19/2015 — Heron Dance—Bog Garden, Greensboro, NC

”To Thine Own Self Be True.”

There is no better advice.

It all starts with being who we are.

But, we are a multiplicity of personalities, moods and dispositions!

Will the real “us” please stand up!

And, of course, they all stand up,

And come forward,

To claim us for their very own.

It’s a joke being true to “our own self.”

We wouldn’t know where to begin,

And have no idea of how to find our way

Back to “the face that was ours before we were born.”

But.

We know what we like and don’t like,

What’s right for us and wrong,

What’s good for us and bad,

Where we belong,

And where we have no business being.

Start there.

With what we know to be so about us.

Be true to that.

Notice when we override that

For the sake of “appearances,”

Or to keep things smooth and calm.

Notice how often we are in Override Mode.

Notice what we are doing

That is not true to ourselves.

See what happens.
07/19/2015 — Reedy River Falls 10 B&W—Falls Park, Greenville, SC, July 16, 2015

Focus and concentration, Kid. Focus and concentration.

We cannot live accidentally.

Intention and dedication, Kid. Intention and dedication.

Our work requires more effort

Than hitting a golf ball, or a baseball.

Attention and devotion, Kid. Attention and devotion.

Athletes practice.

Musicians practice.

Chess masters practice.

Ballet dancers practice.

Our work is our life.

Allegiance and fidelity, Kid. Allegiance and fidelity.

We cannot do what is ours to do–

We cannot live the life that is ours to live–

When nothing better is available,

When the mood hits us,

When we feel like it.

Fealty and liege, Kid. Fealty and liege.
07/19/2015 — Colors of Fall 07 — Bog Garden, Greensboro, NC, November 21, 2011

What do you do wholeheartedly?

How often do you do it?

How long has it been since you have done it?

Can you remember the last time you did something wholeheartedly?

We measure “vital signs” by checking our blood pressure, temperature and pulse rate.

That tells us that we are alive,

But it doesn’t tell us how fully, completely, alive we are.

We take our “vitality signs” by noting the number of things we do wholeheartedly,

How frequently we do them,

And how long it has been since the last time we did them.

We cannot be partially alive.

If our heart isn’t wholly in anything we do,

We are only pretending to be alive.

We may be 98.6 and breathing,

But we aren’t dancing,

We aren’t singing,

In the rain, or anywhere else.

Find what you can do wholeheartedly,

And do it.

Frequently.

Often.

Forever.
07/20/2015 — Reedy River Falls 01 — Falls Park, Greenville, SC, July 16, 2015

We find our life and live it amid the 10,000 distractions.

Sex, drugs, alcohol, wealth and prosperity

Present themselves to us as “really living,”

Purport to be “what life is all about,”

Rob us of our attention and focus,

And leave us wondering what happened

To all the bright dreams

In the wasteland of our discontent.

It doesn’t turn out as planned,

And, that’s what we get for thinking we have a better idea

For our life

Than our life’s idea for itself.

”Be Quiet And Listen!”

Should be the first lesson upon leaving the womb.

But, by then, we already are not listening,

And have to live a long time

In the wasteland of our own making

Before we know we don’t know as much as we think we know,

And are ready, finally,

To be quiet and listen—

Past all of the distractions—

To the faint beating

Of the heart of life and being.
07/20/2015 — Colors of Fall 02 — Bog Garden, Greensboro, NC, November 2011

Look closely at the meaningful things in your life.

Everything in your life is a mirror, reflecting you to you–

A threshold inviting you to step across into you–

Pathways to who you are, and who you are to become–

Particularly, the things most meaningful to you.

Make a list of the meaningful things in your life.

Explore them slowly, individually, imaginatively, over time.

Let them become living symbols of you.

What do they say about you?

How do they express, exhibit, you?

What can you see about yourself

Examining at the things that mean the most to you?

As you see more clearly who you are,

Work consciously to become who you are–

To bring you forth more fully into your life.

Live into the life you are living,

And become there,

Who you are,

Who you show yourself to be,

In the things that mean the most to you.
07/21/2015 — Reedy River Falls 04 — Falls Park, Greenville, SC, July 16, 2015

At each stage of life we have to decide

What to carry forward,

And what to leave behind–

What to keep,

And what to throw away.

Too many of us try to keep everything,

And never throw anything away.

And the mental age of the culture is,

What would you say,

12? 13?

How are we ever going to mature,

Individually and collectively,

If we never look at our life

And decide what is valuable,

And what is valueless?

If the kingdom of heaven

Is like fishermen culling the day’s haul,

Deciding for themselves what has value

And what does not,

Where does that put us?

When are we going to sit around our life,

And keep this,

And throw back that?
07/22/2015 — Reedy River Falls 02 — Falls Park, Greenville, SC, July 16, 2015

Sit and listen.

And evaluate what you hear.

Evaluating what you hear

Means listening deeper, further, additionally.

We’re always stopping too soon,

In a “I Get It-This-Ain’t-Getting-It-Done-Let’s-Go!” fashion.

Gotta get it done, you know.

Now.

It’s the American Way.

Nothing is wrong with sitting and listening,

And listening further.

If you aren’t listening yourself into a quandary,

You aren’t listening long enough.

You have to listen yourself to the other side.

When you can make equally strong cases for all sides,

THEN you are ready for the next step.

Sitting in the middle,

And waiting to see

What you decide

Needs to be done.

It takes time.

It is not the American Way.

It is counter-cultural as it gets.

Sitting and listening.
07/22/2015 — Colors of Fall 04 — Bog Garden, Greensboro, NC, November 21, 2011

Facts are to truth as words are to music.

There is how things are (yin),

and how things also are (yang),

and that is how things are (Tao).

Yin plus yang equals Tao.

We live on the boundary between yin and yang,

embracing contraries,

integrating opposites,

reconciling contradictions,

serving/producing Tao.

When we do not serve/produce Tao,

there is the way things are,

and there is the way we wish things were,

the way we want things to be.

When we serve the way we want things to be,

we produce a world we cannot live in,

and wonder, “Why?”
07/24/2015 — Horseshoe Falls 01 — Musgrove Mill State Historic Site, Clinton, SC, July 23, 2015

If we were going to create the church as it ought to be,

We would have to start of with the right kind of people.

It takes the church to make the church.

You can’t make chicken salad out of chicken poop,

As they like to say in the deep south,

Or, words to that effect.

In order to be the church,

The people who make up the church

Have to be busy being the church,

And I don’t mean singing in the choir,

Teaching Sunday School,

Attending Bible studies,

Witnessing to other people about Jesus,

And going on mission trips.

I mean working their own, individual, personal program.

You have to be working the program.

The program is

Seeing, Hearing, Understanding, Knowing, Doing, Being.

Start with seeing.

You have to practice seeing what you look at,

Particularly when you look in the mirror.

Not just once or twice a week,

When you think about it,

Or feel like it,

But, all of the time.

You’ve heard of “praying constantly”?

Well, seeing constantly is equally important.

While you are doing that,

You have to hear what is being said,

And hearing what you are saying.

You have to understand what’s what.

You have to know what the deal is on every level.

You have to do what needs to be done in response

To the situation as it arises,

And you have to be who you are

In ways appropriate to the occasion.

You don’t have a church

Until everyone there is working this program.

You will notice,

There is nothing here about theology and doctrine.

That isn’t an oversight.
07/24/2015 — William Henry Gist Family Cemetery—Rose Hill Plantation State Historic Site, Union County, South Carolina, July 23, 2015

William Henry Gist was the 68^th Governor of South Carolina, serving from 1858 to 1860. He was a leader of the succession movement in South Carolina, and was one of the signers of the Ordinance of Succession on December 20, 1860, which initiated the Civil War.

William Gist owned over 160 slaves at the start of the War, and represents well those whose life was a failure of justice, compassion, imagination and courage, and whose legacy was “willfully wrong and never in doubt.”

His mansion and family plot remain today as reminders of the airs evil can put on in pretending to be other than it is—and of the blanket of denial that wealth, privilege and aristocracy bring with them into the lives of all who serve them—calling all visitors to vigilance, self-awareness, self-examination, and reflection in being transparent to ourselves—and just, compassionate, courageous and imaginative in our relationships with all others, in every situation and circumstance of life.

We remember so that we will not repeat, so help us God.
07/25/2015 — Black-eyed Susans—Indian Land, South Carolina, July 23, 2015

We fight to free ourselves

From the presumptions, assumptions, inferences, conjectures, speculations, suppositions, deductions, judgments, opinions and conclusions

That form our perspective,

Force us to live in a world we generate from within,

And prevent us from seeing things as they are.

Compassionate, mindful, awareness

Transforms everything it perceives.

May we all live to be so free.
07/26/2015 — Yosemite Falls 02 B&W—Yosemite National Park, CA, April, 2006

Everybody is dealing with something,

Bearing some burden.

Each one of us is struggling

To come to terms with the way things are,

Making our peace with the truth of our life.

This is the work of maturity,

The singular task of the spiritual journey.

We are all growing up.

The more conscious we are of the process,

And of our place in it,

The better it is for everyone.

We do our part

When we put ourselves in accord with our life,

And live it as fully as it can be lived,

Anyway,

Nevertheless,

Even so.

I don’t mean lie down

And let it run over you.

I mean do what can be done

About what needs to be done

With the gifts that are yours to use–

I mean “get in there and do your thing”–

Every day for the rest of your life,

And let that be that.
07/26/2015 — Sunflower 2015 12 — Sunflower Fields, Draper Wildlife Management Area, York County, South Carolina, July 6, 2015

The white side of the south has a fascination with it’s “heritage.”

That’s like Christians being all pumped up and proud of the heritage of Adam and Eve.

Our southern, white, heritage is one of shame and disgrace.

It is a heritage of evil, dispassion, oppression, cruelty, bigotry, injustice, brutality, hatred, intolerance, discrimination, homophobia, xenophobia and racism.

We who are white and southern, have inherited attitudes, perspectives, proclivities, tendencies and demeanor that are consistent with privilege and entitlement, on the one hand, and with condescension, superiority, disdain and disparagement, on the other.

Our white, southern, ancestors were wrong to not only condone, but to also cherish, these qualities and characteristics that they so unashamedly passed along to us.

It is our place to right those wrongs.

To throw off the “heritage” of treating other human beings in ways other than honorable, respectful, compassionate, kind, just, merciful, and evidence of good faith and a deep desire to be helpful and encouraging across the board, around the table, to every human being without exception.

To do that consciously, deliberately, intentionally, dependably and constantly—in every situation as it arises.

And, in so doing, to create a heritage for our descendants they would be honored to maintain throughout the far and distant future.
07/26/2015 — Colors of Fall 05 — Bog Garden, Greensboro, NC, November 21, 2011

Every night our dreams show us how it is in our life,

As if to say, “This is how it is—what are you going to do about it?”

Every night, the same question:

”This is how it is.

What are you going to do about it?”

We grow up

By facing up to how it is with our life,

And doing what needs to be done about it.

Every night we get a mirror:

”This is how it is in your life.”

And a question:

”What are you going to do about it?”

Every day, we get another opportunity

To look in the mirror,

And work out our answer to the question.
07/27/2015 — Empty Tracks—Union County, South Carolina, July 24, 2015

The Dalai Lama is not best friends with a lot of people.

And, there are people within Buddhist splinter groups

Who are on his Bad List.

Differences to the point of division, discord, estrangement and alienation

Exist even within the hallowed halls of peace and compassion.

If there, then everywhere.

We all do better when not in someone’s company,

And when we are in the company of “our kind of people.”

Be glad there are those who receive you well

And enable you to breathe,

Find your center and your ground,

And live out of the truth of who you are,

And of who you are not.

And be wary of those who don’t.

That’s my take on irrefutable and irreconcilable differences.

I don’t know what the Dalai Lama would have to say about them.
07/27/2015 — Reedy River Falls 05 — Falls Park, Greenville, SC, July 16, 2015

A purpose beyond our purpose

Works like gravity and time

To fill the sea

Regardless of what civilizations rise and fall,

Or which country’s Conquistadors

Wreak chaos and havoc on which countries,

The Purpose is at work

Calling us back to the source and ground of our life,

To the Tao of Eden,

To the Eden of Tao,

To “the face that was ours before we were born.”

To what purpose?

As though there could be a purpose

Beyond knowing

And being

Who we are!
07/28/2015 — Sunflower 2015 01 — Sunflower Fields, Draper Wildlife Management Area, July 4, 2015

People who carry guns

Are afraid, easily intimidated and lack confidence and self-esteem, or

They are bullies who have to dominate, or

They are insecure and have to imagine

They are heroes looking for a chance to prove it

In order to belong and have a place, or

They enjoy hurting things

And inflicting pain or the threat of pain.

The west was won

By the wholesale slaughter of American Bison,

And the genocide of Native American tribes,

And by having guns handed over upon entering towns

And reclaimed upon leaving.

The right to bear arms

Did not apply to bars, restaurants, school houses, churches, movie theaters, air ports, hotels, train stations,

Or other places of social interaction.

Fear and insecurity create an atmosphere

Which fosters fear and insecurity,

And the circle is completely crazy.
07/28/2015 — Horseshoe Falls 04 — Musgrove Mill State Historic Site, Canton, SC, July 23, 2015

We all have been recipients of grace beyond comprehension,

And we all have been victims of failures of grace beyond mention.

Grace is what befell the Jewish man beaten and robbed and left to die in a ditch, when the person Jesus called the Good Samaritan—age old enemies of the Jews, then and now (The modern term for Samaritan is Palestinian)–came along, tended his wounds and paid for his recovery.

A failure of grace would have been the story without a Good Samaritan in it.

Our lives are filled with places without a Good Samaritan anywhere to be found.

People have their agendas, and their plans, and their timetables, and their Manuals of Operation, and things must be done by the book, or else, you know, so no exceptions can ever be made, and no exemptions can ever be granted, and if you are beaten and in a ditch, you will just have to make out the best you can.

We have to be open to the possibility of grace at work in our life.

The Samaritan could have passed on by. He had his business to attend and the man in the ditch was a Jew, of all things. But, the Samaritan was open to the possibility of grace at work in his life.

And, being open, he was moved by forces no one understands, to stop and tend the man in the ditch. And lives were changed forever.

May we be blessed by the presence of those who are open to the possibility of grace at work in their life!

And may we be those who are open to the possibility of grace at work in our life!

Manuals of Operation and officially sanctioned ways of doing things notwithstanding.
07/29/2015 — Cat Tails—Indian Land, SC, July 2015

We walk two paths at the same time.

We have responsibilities to the time and place,

The context and circumstances,

Of our living–

Family, extended family, job, pets, bills etc.–

And we have responsibilities to our deep Self,

And to the gifts that are ours to bring forth and serve

In expressing/exhibiting who we are

Through the way we live our life

In the time and place, context and circumstances, of our living.

The two paths are one path when walked mindfully.

The path of time and place is exactly what we need

To awaken ourselves to who we are and what we are about

In the deeper sense of Self and Gifts.

We serve Self and Gifts when we live conscious of them

In the time and place, context and circumstances, of our living.

We do not abandon one path for the sake of the other.

We bring both paths together in service to both

By the way we see and accept

What is true and what is also true,

Integrate the opposites,

And do the work of reconciliation,

Knowing how things are,

And being at peace with it,

Laughing, with a foot in each world.
07/29/2015 — Sunflowers 08 — Sunflower Fields, Draper Wildlife Management Area, York County, South Carolina, July 4, 2015

Fred Craddock said, “The message of the Messiah is, ‘There is no Messiah!’”

The Messiah is NOT the Messiah!

Our life is our responsibility.

We have to find our life and live it,

With none to help or point the way.

Well, not quite.

We have all the help we need to find the way–

IF we will but attend it!

IF we will but open ourselves to it!

IF we will but learn its language,

And spend the time necessary

On a regular basis

To listen!

All the help we need

Is as close as a heartbeat,

As near as our next breath.

But.

There is a catch.

We have to give up our way

In order to be guided to the way.

We have to hand over our quest

For the life we have in mind for ourselves

In order to live the life our Self has in mind for us.

It is a dilemma as old as the ages

From whence we come.

All are called,

But few have what it takes to heed the directions

And find the way

To the life that is theirs to live

In synch with the heart of life and being.
07/30/2015 — Iron Bridge — Tygre River, Union County, SC, July 23, 2015

There is us, and the life we are living, and the life that needs us to live it.

That’s it.

We have to be aware of it,

And get the ratios right–

How much for us,

How much for the life we are living,

How much for the life that is ours to live.

How much what?

Time and attention,

Devotion and loyalty,

Focus and concentration–

You know, that kind of thing…

We get to work at the points of conflict.

We generally don’t want anything to do with conflict,

So we dismiss, discount, deny and ignore it,

Thinking we can disappear it that way.

But.

Conflict denied becomes symptoms overnight,

And it goes downhill from there.

To disappear our symptoms,

We have to be intently, and intensely, aware of conflict—

Dig into it,

Explore it,

Examine it,

Know it fully.

Bear the pain,

And work it out.

Make it work.

One conflict at a time.

Our conflicts are the path

To reconciliation, integration, unification, wholeness and peace—

When walked with mindful, compassionate, awareness.

It will kill us to deal with our conflicts,

And it will bring us to life.

It’s like death and resurrection.

You’ll have to trust me in this.
07/20/2015 — Sunflowers 2015 09 — Sunflower Fields, Draper Wildlife Management Area, York County, South Carolina, July 4, 2015

The culture is killing us.

Mean Old Culture!

That we create, demand, insist on, worship, serve and adore.

The culture doesn’t force big screen TV’s on us.

Or mobile phones.

Or our addictions to action, plastic and noise.

The culture is us.

Is who we are.

Take the culture away from us

And we wouldn’t know what to do with ourselves.

We are killing ourselves

With a culture of our own creation.

That’s stupid.

We are the problem to which we seek solution.

We seek to be saved from ourselves.

That puts us in charge of our own salvation.

We are killing ourselves

And it is up to us to stop.

What is stopping us from stopping?

Momentum?

Karma?

Laziness?

It is easier to die by our own hand

Than to live the life that is the source of life

For ourselves and all living things.

We get out of bed each morning

With the choice

To live toward life that day,

Or toward death.

And we make the call.

Everyday.
Used in Short Talks on Good and Bad Religion — 08/01/2015 — Patchwork Dogwood Panorama—Great Smoky Mountains National Park, near Gatlinburg, TN, April 2008

We have to have something we are living to do—

Something we will work the job we are working

In order to pay the bills required

To do it.

We have to have something we care about,

That we are in love with,

That we can do with all our heart,

That we can’t get enough of.

Drinking beer and doing drugs don’t qualify.

Meth labs and crack babies

Are symptoms of a culture gone bad.

We don’t fix that with a new round of politicians.

We fix a broken culture

By being who the culture needs us to be.

It takes the right kind of people

To produce the right kind of culture.

We produce the right kind of people

By making over ourselves.

This is the new religion.

Becoming who we need to be

To live the life that needs us to live it.

It starts with listening to your dreams.

You can still get a hardback copy

Of Anthony Stevens’ book, Private Myths

For one penny plus $3.99 postage

From the Used Books on Amazon.

If you aren’t willing to do that, never mind.

I’m talking to the people who are.
08/02/2015 — Reedy River Falls 06 — Falls Park, Greenville, SC, July 16, 2015

We look for the payoff.

For the profit,

The benefit,

The advantage.

We look for what we are getting out of all this.

For compensation for all our troubles.

We are looking for wealth and privilege so we won’t have any more troubles.

The wealthy and privileged are looking for wealth and privilege.

So they won’t have any more troubles.

What is it with troubles?

We are all running from our troubles,

Running to Nirvana.

We know it’s out there somewhere.

We are sure we are only one major purchase away.

Or one lottery win away.

Or one mighty baptism in the Big Time away.

We want our life to pay off for us.

So we can be trouble-free.

Sit down.

Let me explain something to you.

Life is trouble.

Death is trouble-free.

Stop looking for relief,

And start looking for LIFE.

And, go to any amount of trouble to find it,

And live what is left of it,

While the light lasts.

Oh, here’s a hint:

It’s not Out There like a bucket list item.

It’s tucked away In Here,

Hoping you will find a way to express it Out There.

The life you seek is in you,

Waiting for you to live it.

Don’t pause to notice the trouble.
08/02/2015 — The Warehouse—Chester, SC, July 23, 2015

One of the surprising realizations upon entering retirement is that there isn’t enough time left.

Specifically, there isn’t enough time left to spend with me.

To listen to me.

To get to know the unknown aspects of me.

There isn’t enough time left for dreaming,

For reflecting,

For realizing,

For reflecting…

And there are too many people in my life,

And it is my responsibility to give myself silence.

Aloneness.

Solitude.

What I need is solitude.

The soft places had their place,

And filled a great need.

Now I need listening room.

Room in which I can listen to me,

Spend time with me,

Loving, attending, me.

It’s great.

The blog I’m putting together comes out of that.

The photo work I’m doing on the computer comes out of that.

And there is so much more to come.

I relish looking forward to it,

And I’m running out of time.

And when I’m thinking about what someone else

Wants me to think about,

I’m not thinking about what I want to think about,

Or reading what I need to read,

Or doing what I need to do,

So I don’t stop and chat with the neighbors.

I have my appointed rounds,

And I look forward to making them each day.

Gifts of the day, from the day, to me.

It’s good.

Creation continues.

And it continues to be very good.
08/03/2015 — Sunflowers 2015 10 — Sunflower Field, Draper Wildlife Management Area, York County, SC, July 4, 2015

What makes your heart sing?

How long is your list?

Live to lengthen it–

To find ALL the things that make your heart sing.

Live to let your heart sing as often as not,

Then, more often than not.

What would it be like

To be your heart and never sing?

A sad heart spills over

Into all of life.

So does a singing heart.

When you live to let your heart sing,

Your life sings along.
08/04/2015 — Red Sky at Night—Blue Ridge Parkway from Rough Ridge, near Grandfather Mountain

There are two things

That are interrelated,

And are the Two Most Important Things:

We have to be compassionately, mindfully, aware

To the point of being Transparent To Ourselves,

And to the point of Doing The Work That Is Ours To Do–

The Work That Makes Our Heart Sing.

A quick self-inventory

Will tell you

Whether you have reached the point

In your practice of compassionate, mindful, awareness

To be living in ways which honor

The Two Most Important Things,

Or, if you need to be more intentional and deliberate

In your practice.
08/04/2015 — Lake Wylie Hydro-electric Dam Panorama HDR B&W—Catawba River, Tega Cay, SC, August 3, 2015

If I could change one thing about my life,

I would have better memories–

Which, of course, would change everything,

Including parents and point of origin,

And then, at this point in that life,

I would probably want better memories,

And change all of that.

Ad, as they say, infinitum.

The whole karma thing

Is about arranging to have better memories,

And, eventually, coming up with a set of perfectly fine ones.

I understand the necessity

Of a lot of times around the block.

In his later years, Joseph Campbell said,

”I remember the damnedest things.”

The worst kind of things.

And he had a charming life,

A charmed life.

If Joe Campbell can’t out live his memories,

The rest of us don’t have a chance.

My advice is welcome them to the table,

And treat them well.

They could use the kindness and compassion

That were so completely lacking the first time around.
08/05/2015 — Patchwork Dogwood Panorama B&W—Great Smoky Mountains National Park near Gatlinburg, TN, April 2008

It’s ridiculous to think that Jesus actually said, “Make disciples of all nations.”

He didn’t “make disciples” of his own disciples.

He followed the AA guideline: Attraction Not Promotion.

That’s the way to do it.

Start living your life and see who gravitates to you.

Talk them into living their life and see who gravitates to them.

Gravitation is the glue that sticks “disciples” together.

And Jesus told his own disciples to grow up,

Start living their own life,

And stop looking to him for all the answers.

He said, “You’ll do things I never imagined!” or words to that effect.

”Disciples have to become like the master in following no master.”

That’s one of the 10,000 Spiritual Laws.

We don’t find the way by walking in someone else’s foot steps.

Throw away doctrine, theology and ideology.

Do what makes your heart sing.

That’s all the direction you will ever need.
08/05/2015 — Sunflowers 2015 13 — Sunflower Fields, Draper Wildlife Management Area, York County, South Carolina, July 4, 2015

Make an inventory of the things that mean the most to you.

Consider each one.

Does it enable you to live your life

Or escape from your life?

Is it a defense against life?

A substitute for life?

Does it connect you to life,

Or protect you from life?

What does each item represent for you?

Do for you?

Help you do?
08/06/2015 — Lake Wylie Hydro-electric Dam 01 — Catawba River, Tega Cay, SC, August 3, 2015

If you practice playing the piano,

You will play the piano better

Than if you don’t.

Same goes for tennis, golf, basketball, walking, running, and cartwheeling.

Same goes for living.

We have to practice living with our eyes open.

We don’t just climb out of bed each day and fall into our life.

We have to work at living our life as though it were a piano.

Living well is harder than playing the piano.

Takes more practice.

We spit more often that we practice living our life.

We spit more often that we are aware of how we are living our life.

If I ask my fourth-born granddaughter

What she needs to do to improve her time in the breast stroke,

She has a ready list of things she is working on,

From entering the water, to breathing, to turning, to touching at the end.

If I asked you what you need to do to improve the way you are living our life,

You would change the subject.

What do you call a blind deer?

No eye-deer.

We can’t live like a blind deer.

We have to have an eye-deer of what we are doing,

And what we need to do,

To be awake, aware and alive.

We have to practice living

Intentionally, deliberately, consistently.

Like we are playing a Rachmaninoff piano concerto.
08/07/2015 — Woods Pond Panorama 02 B&W—Carolina Sandhills National Wildlife Refuge, McBee, SC, August 6, 2015

”How do you get to be larger than life?”

”Answer the question:

’How good is the good you call good?’”

”What’s the answer?”

”Your life is the answer.

Some questions can’t be answered

With an explanation,

Or a definition,

Or a recipe.

’What is love?’

You have to live it to know it.

’What is Zen?’

’What, or who, is God?’

All the good questions have to be lived to their answers–

Insofar as they can be answered.”

”How good is the good YOU call good?”

”I’m still trying to get to the bottom of it.”

”Why don’t you ever answer a question?”

”I’m still trying to get to the bottom of all the good ones.

The not-so good ones aren’t worth my time.

Everybody is hung up on the not-so good questions.

Nobody is larger than life.”
Buddha on Black — Charlotte, NC, August 7, 2015

Life keeps throwing things at us

That we don’t like,

Don’t want,

And can make no sense of.

How we deal with it

Makes all the difference.
08/09/2015 — Thunder Storm Panorama — Carolina Sandhills National Wildlife Refuge, McBee, South Carolina, August 6, 2015

There is only one cure for vulnerability:

Making your peace with it.

Coming to terms with our vulnerability

Is the sine qua non of a rich, full life well-lived.

We hold ourselves back from life, trying to be safe, secure.

We wall ourselves in,

Kill our enemies before they kill us,

Wash our hands 42 times before getting out of bed…

We build our life around avoiding all,

And warding off all evil,

And being off limits to all untoward things.

The Buddha died from eating poorly cooked pork.

Jesus died from saying what needed to be said.

They both said:

“Come follow me and I’ll show you how to do it!”

And we say, “But will we be safe and secure?”

They laugh and walk on, arm in arm,

To whatever their life has in store for them,

Living all the way.
08/10/2015 — Low Water Bridge Panorama — Once was a logging road for hauling out pine logs and turpentine, exposed by the draw-down of Pool H, Carolina Sandhills National Wildlife Refuge, McBee, SC, August 6, 2015

It would be such a help if we wanted to do what needs to be done.

Or, even, if we could fake it really well.

We are stuck with not wanting to do what needs us to do it.

And that’s the problem of a lifetime.

How we work with it

Through long years of negotiation and compromise

Tells the tale.

The theme of the Road to Maturity

(AKA, The Spiritual Journey, The Hero’s Journey, The Spiritual Quest, and The Road Through Hell)

Is doing well what needs us to do it whether we want to or not.

To refuse to do that is called The Road To Hell,

Because it’s hell to pay either way.

Which one we choose for our life’s path

Is a mark of our character,

And a sign of grace at work in our life.

Or not.

Some people seem to have no character,

And no grace at work in their life.

Ponder that.

What must that be like?

That would put the rest of our problems to shame!
08/11/2015 — The Window — Indian Land, SC, August 10, 2015

All of the movies, plays, novels, history books, mythology, fairy tales and stories

stick with the same basic themes,

and no matter how it’s dressed up

as Guilt and Redemption, Lost and Found,

Death and Resurrection, Sickness and Health,

Good and Evil, and whatever others there may be,

it comes down to this:

Who will stand up and step forward,

and who will shrink back and turn away?

Who will go forth and meet their destiny,

and who will succumb to the empty hopelessness of their fate?

It is the question we are born to answer.

Will we ask the questions that beg to be asked,

and say the things that cry out to be said?

Or will we blame The Breaks,

and cry out with Terry Malloy, “I coulda had class,

I coulda been a contender, I coulda been somebody,

instead of a bum, which is what I am”?

We play to audiences unseen,

and answer the question a dozen times a day.

It is up to us to play our part consciously,

and know when we are stepping forward,

and when we are shrinking back
08/11/2015 — Sunflowers 2015 11 — Sunflower Fields, Draper Wildlife Management Area, York County, SC, July 4, 2015

What are you doing with your life?

I don’t want your long range goals.

I want to know what you are doing that needs you to do it,

That you know needs to be done,

Whether or not anyone else recognizes it.

I don’t want to know about your job.

I want to know what you do with the money you earn.

What do you use money to do?

What are you here to do?

Not, what are you paid to do?

Life is a function of living in the service of what you have to do.

If there is nothing you have to do,

And if you don’t know what to do with yourself if you aren’t at your job,

The way is plain before you:

You have to find what is yours to do, and do it.

If anyone asks you what you are doing with your life,

Tell them you are looking for what is yours to do–

And mean it.

Be diligent in the search

And dedicated to it.

The search for your life must become your life.

You are looking for what is worth your life.

You are not here to idle your time away,

Lolling by the pool,

Drifting into some movie,

Texting your way through another day.
08/12/2015 — After Papa Died 01 Panorama HDR — Union County, NC, August 11, 2015

The key to being what is needed in each situation as it arises

Is getting out of the way.

With you out of the way,

You are still a part of the situation,

And your needs rank as high as any need there,

But

Your needs rank no higher than any need there.

The key to being what the situation needs us to be

Is equal need across the situation.

No bias, no prejudice, no favoritism.

No judgment, no will, no opinion.

Seen objectively, what needs to happen in the situation?

This is the way things are.

What needs to be done about it?

What does the situation call for?

Money and power are leverage

Tilting situations in the direction of those

With money and power.

If we have money and power,

We get more of what we need,

And they get less of what they need.

That’s the name of the game.

Living to be what the situation needs us to be–

To offer what is called for by the situation

Out of the gifts we have to give–

Changes the game.
08/12/2015 — McLeod Peaches — McLeod Farms, McBee, SC, August 6, 2015

We will never figure it out

Or be able to work it to our advantage.

But, we can engage it as full participants

In the action,

And live in ways that serve the good of all

At the expense of none–

Regardless of whether that catches on,

Goes viral,

And renders all other ways of doing things

Obsolete overnight.
08/13/2015 — Daises — Pike Nursery, Charlotte, NC, August 7, 2015

We all come complete with an Archetypal Companion

Whose task is to steer us onto the right path

Through all of the stages of our lifelong development.

We each have a life that can be–

And is to be–

Lived out within the context and circumstances of our living,

as an expression of innate capacities,

Qualities and characteristics,

The unique blend of which makes us

The irreplaceable individual we are capable of being.

When we frustrate the inner design

By making choices incompatible with our life’s path,

We generate what has been called “bad karma,”

And live disorientated, aimless and empty,

Among symptoms that know no end.

It all goes so much better

When we go to the trouble of aligning ourselves

With ourselves,

And living in accord with our life,

Which our Archetypal Companion is more than willing

To help us do

With guiding dreams, nudges, notions and inclinations,

When we acknowledge her/his presence,

And place ourselves in the service of his/her direction.

We generally have to be at the end of our rope

To grasp for this one remaining straw,

Because it seems too ridiculous to consider

Until we have run out of rational options.
08/13/2015 — Charlotte Skyline 02 Panorama — Charlotte, NC, August 13, 2015

We are trying to squeeze into a life that doesn’t fit.

We aren’t built for civilization,

And the roles civilization requires us to play.

When is the last time you did something that was purely YOU?

That made your heart sing?

Those things exist,

But.

We have to work them in–

Consciously, deliberately, seek them out.

Or pay the price.

The price is complete loss of soul.

And heart.

We have to know

We are being squeezed into a life that doesn’t fit.

And compensate ourselves

For the anguish of that experience,

By immersing ourselves in what does fit,

And relishing the wonder of a singing heart.
08/15/2015 — Purple Cone Flowers 01 — Nursery Photos, Rountree Plantation Nursery, Charlotte, NC, August 13, 2015

You will be amazed at how smoothly your life will flow

Once you stop caring about the unimportant things.
08/16/2015 — Past Prime 01 — Nursery Flowers, Rountree Plantation Nursery, Charlotte, NC

We are always rushing to judgment,

Jumping to conclusions,

Hatching explanations that will neatly mesh

What is happening with our expectations,

And keep things in place,

And unexamined,

In our life.

Heaven forbid that we should have to do something

We don’t want to do,

Like revise our understanding of the rules

That govern our existence.

We like the idea that thinking positively,

And believing the right beliefs,

Are all we have to do to arrange the universe

To our satisfaction,

And that somewhere, upstairs, perhaps,

There is a man behind a curtain,

Turning dials, pushing buttons, flipping switches, pulling levers,

And arranging circumstances

To our complete satisfaction and everlasting joy.

It is just a matter of waiting for it all to be revealed to us.

Until then, we will be pleased by our anticipation,

If not by our experience.

We are so glad this is the way it is,

Because growing up is not what we have in mind.
08/16/2015 — Succulent Display 02 — Nursery Photos, Rountree Plantation Nursery, Charlotte, NC, August 13, 2015

If I were going to stand in some line for superpowers,

I would ask for self-transparency,

And the knack of going about my business

Without needing to call attention to myself–

My way of being unseen.

Visible to myself.

Invisible to others.

If that caught on

It would be a different world.

Just being visible to ourselves would change the game.
08/16/2015 — Veins 02 — Nursery Photos, Rountree Plantation Nursery, Charlotte, NC, August 13, 2015

Every night before getting in the shower,

I take a moment to mark the passing of time

And reflect on the end of another day,

As a way of keeping myself mindful of,

And squaring myself with,

The fact that I am–

As we all are–

Living toward the last one.

Some nights are heavy with sadness,

And some simply recognize

That “none of us are promised tomorrow,

Or even the rest of today.”

Whatever the mood, the ritual is important

As a way of being conscious

Of living my way toward dying.

I hand over another day

(And soon, another year),

And reflect on how much of the day has been mine,

Serving ends that I cherish,

And doing what is important to me–

As a way of remembering that tomorrow is coming,

And I need to be ready for it,

Aware of it,

For as long as tomorrows last.
08/17/2015 — Charlotte Skyline Panorama 01 B&W — Charlotte, NC, August 13, 2015

It’s like golf.

Your life, I’m talking about.

It’s you and the ball and 18 holes.

Your role is clear:

Get the ball in the holes with as few whacks as possible.

The people who can do that

Are better golfers than the people who can’t do it.

Do do it well,

You have to get everything else off the course

But you and the ball and the 18 holes.

When I say “off the course,”

I mean “out of your head.”

Your work is to clear your head of everything

But you and the ball and this hole right here, right now.

Or, it’s like photography.

Your work is to clear away everything

Standing between you and the camera and this scene,

Right here, right now.

You get together with your life

Like it is a golf ball

Or a camera

And live it,

Like it needs to be lived,

Right here, right now
08/18/2015 — Greenhouse Panorama 01 — Nursery Photos, Rountree Plantation Nursery, Charlotte, NC, August 13, 2015

Romance is denial in that it takes our mind off our life,

And enables us to think our true love

Is the solution to all of our problems.

It must be so,

Because just thinking about our true love

Makes our problems go away.

That’s what denial does for us.

Think of Honey,

Or pop a top,

And, POOF, no problems.

As we grow up, we recognize

That WE are the solution to all of our problems today,

And tomorrow.

Shelton Kopp said,

“We solve our own problems every day

For the rest of our life.”

Jesus said, “Who made me your Keeper?

Work out your own problems!

Who do you think solves mine?”

Or words to that effect.

Denial just delays the inevitable.
08/18/2015 — After Papa Died 03 — Union County, NC, August 11, 2015

The Dalai Lama doesn’t watch TV.

Tells you something about the Dalai Lama,

And something about TV.

The relationship between TV and our life is exactly what?

If it isn’t helping you live your life,

It’s keeping you from living your life.

That rule applies to everything about our life.

The rule has meaning

Only to those who are living their life.

Without a life,

Nothing can help us live it.

Our first order of business

Is knowing what our business is,

And tending it.

Finding our life and living it

Is the highest priority.

The Dalai Lama understands that.

And does it.

It’s an idea whose time has come.
08/18/2015 — Fern Panorama 01 — Carolina Sandhills National Wildlife Refuge, McBee, SC, August 6, 2015

We have to care about what we care about.

To fail, or refuse, to do so is commit high treason

Against ourselves.

We have to be strong in our own behalf

Our entire life long.

Denying our heart’s true song,

And rejecting its plea to sing along,

Is the unpardonable sin,

And no amount of remorse and sorrow

Will ease the grief of abject disloyalty

To soul’s deep drift.
08/19/2015 — Atlantic Storm 01 — Huntington Beach State Park, Murrell’s Inlet, SC, August 19, 2015

There is what we cannot do,

And, there is what we cannot help doing.

We all live with these restrictions.

Our life is lived between the limits

Of what we cannot do and what we cannot help doing.

These limits are generally the gifts of our parents unto us.

PTSD actually stands for:

Parentally Triggered Stress Disorder.

It is experienced as what we cannot do

And what we cannot help doing.

Our place is to become conscious of our limits,

And live to reduce the things we cannot do

And cannot help doing,

Counteracting the parental influence,

And parenting ourselves the way we should have been parented

By those who needed to be parented

The way they should have been parented.
08/20/2015 —

One Minute Monologues 026

04/24/2015 — 06/10/2015

04/24/2015 — Union Pacific 6831 01 — Natchitoches Parish, Louisiana, March 23, 2015

Everybody wants to “make a difference”

And “be happy.”

Make a difference doing what?

Be happy doing what?

What do you want TO DO with your life?

What is yours TO DO with your life

Whether you want to or not?

That’s the question that is yours to answer

In the time left for living.

And, in case you have misgivings,

Once you start doing it,

Wanting to do it will fall into place,

And you won’t be able to imagine living without doing it.

But, you’ll have to take my word for it.

Sometimes, wanting follows doing.
04/25/2015 — Lake Martin Sunset 2015 03 — St. Martin Parish, Breaux Bridge, Louisiana, March 24, 2015

How many people do you know who are enjoying their life?

Who are glad to be where they are?

Content with themselves and what they are doing?

At peace with their universe and the way things are?

Would you be one of those people?

If not, what is keeping you from being one of those people?

Take a regular reading of the emotional climate

In which you “live, and move, and have your being.”

Rate its level of negativity and toxicity

On an imaginary “Death To My Soul Scale.”

Consider how your emotional environment

Is impacting your attitude and your life.

Where would you go to find a different emotional environment–

One that is better for you and your mental, emotional, health?

Go there often.

Relish it consciously.

Soak it up.

Bring back the laughter and the joy.
04/25/2015 — Lake Haigler in the Rain—Anne Springs Close Greenway, Fort Mill, South Carolina, April 25, 2015

Make listening time.

Work silence and solitude into your life.

Call it meditation, quiet time, or time out.

How much? How much can you get by with?

Start with that much.

Regularly. Daily.

Sit quietly.

No music. No reading. No list making.

Listening. Watching. Open. Receptive.

What pops up?

Reflect. Explore. Wonder.

See what occurs to you,

What connections you make,

Where it goes.

Don’t try to make anything happen,

Or think something is supposed to happen.

You are listening. Watching.

Attending the inner you.

Regularly. Daily.

That’s all.

Oh, if it becomes painful

With memories, fear, doubt, shame…

Bear the pain.

It’s only pain.

What? You’ve never borne pain before?

What? You think the way forward is pain free?

Welcome whatever comes when you sit quietly.

Make room for all of it.

Read Rumi’s “The Guest House.”

Listen. Watch. Welcome it all.
04/25/2015 — Vicksburg Sunset 02 — Mississippi River, March 16, 2015

One of nature’s recurring lessons is

Give it your all

With total emotional investment in the effort you make in the service of the good,

And no emotional attachment whatsoever in the outcome.

Grieve your losses and get back in the game.

Sound harsh?

Spend some time with the ecosystem of a small woods pond.

Then put yourself into your life

Like a mother duck with a dozen ducklings

Among turtles, owls and hawks.
04/26/2015 — Lake Haigler Falls 2015 01 — Anne Springs Close Greenway, Fort Mill, South Carolina, April 25, 2015

Talking is 90% listening.

I’m sorry you’re getting short-changed here, but.

What can I say?

Listen more than you speak.

When you start preaching, stop.

Look.

Listen.

It is the path to understanding.
04/26/2015 — Kisatchie Falls Panorama 02 – Natchitoches Parish, Kisatchie, Louisiana, March 18, 2015

The two tools you will need on the spiritual journey,

Which is the path to maturity and grace,

Are mindfulness and courage.

Mindfulness is conscious awareness of all things capable of being apprehended.

Mindfulness implies being transparent to ourselves,

Which implies living in good faith with ourselves–

Not kidding ourselves,

Not lying to ourselves,

Not refusing to look at ourselves,

Not denying the truth about ourselves

(Or anything else).

We cannot be mindful and pretend things are not what they are.

Mindfulness requires us to face the truth straight up,

To look it in the eye

And see how it is,

And see all the things that can be done about it,

And see which are important and needful.

Then we’ll need the courage to do what needs to be done.

Before we know it,

We will be spilling over with maturity and grace,

And people will be coming from across the sea

To bask in our aura.

Or, they will ask us to leave town

Because they can’t bear the truth

Our presence demands that they recognize.

The Promised Land isn’t all peaches and cream.
04/26/2015 — Old Sautee Store Panorama 02 B&W – Sautee-Nacoochee, Georgia, April 14, 2015

Libido is passion for life,

Life energy,

And cannot be limited to the sexual sphere.

The Buddha under the Bo Tree,

And Jesus in the wilderness,

Resisted temptation

On the basis of a love for that which claimed them at the core–

In a “Thy will, not mine, be done” kind of way.

That’s what your life will do for you when it says,

“You’re mine,” in a way that cannot be denied or resisted.

It is a “magnificent obsession/possession,”

And will not likely be what we do to pay the bills,

But what we pay the bills to do.

May we all be so carried away

In the service of our soul’s true joy,

And not die without having lived!
04/27/2015 — Boggs Creek Panorama 02 — Chattahoochee-Oconee National Forest, along Hwy. 19 between Dahlonega & Blairsville, GA, April 13, 2015

Our character is formed and shaped by our circumstances the way a stream is formed and shaped by it’s bed.

We, in turn, form and shape our circumstances the way a stream forms and shapes its bed.

We are all finding our way to who we are the way a stream finds its way to the sea.

The key is to BE who we are, and not just let our circumstances hand us who we turn out to be.

We enter consciously the struggle, the conflict, the work, the agone/agony of becoming ourselves,

Or, we just take the course of least resistance all the way to the grave.

We are brought forth by our wrestling with ourselves as much as with our circumstances.

WE are the Cyclops standing in our way,

And have to come to terms with all sides of ourselves

In coordinating and directing our drift to the specific character we are capable of becoming.

We don’t just pop out of some woman’s womb

In a Here I Am! kind of way.

We birth ourselves bit by bit throughout our life,

Adjusting this, transforming that, embracing this, rejecting that,

Through experience, reflection and realization,

Until the “I” we are stands up and says,

”Give me the ball”

In a game-changing shift toward the “Me” we can be proud to be.
04/27/2015 — Soque River 02 — Mark of the Potter, Clarksville, Georgia, April 14, 2015

Your practice is what brings forth your gift, your genius, your daemon, the manifestation of God within you.

Your work serves your gift, your genius, your daemon, the manifestation of God within you.

Your life is to be the expression of your gift, your genius, your daemon, the manifestation of God within you.

If none of this is happening, why not?
04/27/2015 — Cormorant Migration B&W—Pamlico Sound, Cape Hatteras National Seashore, Ocracoke Island, NC, October 2013

It takes a ridiculous amount of concentration

To hit a curve ball.

Or throw one for strikes.

Or stay on the path.

This is the meaning of Jesus’ observation,

”Straight is the way and narrow is the gate that leads to life,

And those who walk it are few.

But Broad is the way and wide is the gate that leads to death,

And those who walk it are many.”

The path is a tightrope walk between skyscrapers.

You have to think about what you are doing.

And what is yours to do,

And not do.

You can’t just slop along,

Texting.
04/28/2015 — Greenhouse Daisies 01 — Gerber Daises, Wilson’s Nursery, Rock Hill, SC, April 27, 2015, An iPhone Photo

As I get older, my physician and my acupuncturist are increasingly concerned about my energy level.

”How’s your energy level?” they both ask.

A better question would be, “What are you most interested in these days?”

Energy flows from interest.

Follows interest.

Is strictly dependent upon interest.

You know depressed people?

Consumed with worry, anxiety, fear, grief, despair, anger…

Incapable of being interested in anything.

You know schizophrenic people?

Awash in other worlds,

Not interested in any of them.

What sparks your interest?

Do. Not. Put. It. Aside.

Be interested in what interests you.

One interest leads to another.

No interests leads nowhere.
04/29/2015 — Greenhouse Orchid 04 – Campbell’s Greenhouse and Nursery, 209 McDonald Ave., Charlotte, North Carolina 28203, (704) 331-9659 – One of the hidden wonders in Charlotte, this is worth a walk-through even if you don’t need a plant. Tell them I said so. April 21, 2015.

You have to draw your own lines.

And you have to mean it when you do.

Lines are lines.

They are not requests.

Certainly not pleas.

Or suggestions.

They are “Damnit, I said No! This is where it stops! Now!”

End of the line lines.

Everything rides on your being able to draw lines like that

When and where they need to be drawn

Through-out your life.

I observe a 13 or more hour fast every day.

I eat nothing after 7 PM or before 8 AM.

That’s my practice.

And it is a line.

My practice also involves time in a day

For silence and solitude,

Reflection and meditation,

With a strong preference for writing and photography as well.

My practice is lines around me and my life.

There are other lines as well.

My lines clarify me to me,

As well as to others.

They say, “This is who I am, whether it is okay with you, or not okay with you.”

You have to draw your own lines,

And refuse to allow other people to erase them.

Make drawing lines a part of your practice.

You can’t have a practice without drawing lines.

Or a Self.
04/28/2015 — Wild Ginger Blooms – McDowell Nature Preserve, Mecklenburg County Parks & Recreation, Charlotte, NC, April 3, 2015

There is a saying, “When God shuts a door, he (sic) opens a window.”

There is another saying, “There is more than one way to peel an apple.”

They say the same thing,

And point to the way life works when life is lived attuned to the way things are and what can be done about it.

It’s the way life works for those who live in accord with what is happening and what needs to happen in response.

“This” means “that.”

“What can we do about being unable to do “this”?

“What can we do?”

“What now?”

“Now what?”

Reflection and realization, Kid. Reflection and realization.

Imagination and creativity, Kid. Imagination and creativity.

Adjustment and accommodation, Kid. Adjustment and accommodation.

We have to develop our capacity for seeing what is possible

When everything seems to be impossible.

The end of some line is the beginning of another

For those who can see around corners

And beyond their present circumstances.

For those who trust there is more to them than meets the eye.

For those who are eager to see what they can do with nothing.

It all started with nothing, you know.

Look around.

Everything you see is where once nothing was.

Everything.

Nothing doesn’t mean nothing.

Never has.

Never will.

Stop your whining.

Start your imagining.

Your creating.

Your looking.

Your seeing.

Your listening.

Your hearing.

You are creating a new world for yourself.

What’s with the whining?
04/29/2015 — Sweet Shrub 2015 01 — McDowell Nature Preserve, Mecklenburg County Parks & Recreation, Charlotte, NC, April 16, 2015

Our part is to do our thing–

Offering what we have to give

In ways that are fitting in the time and place of our living–

And to see it through,

Play it out,

No matter how it’s going,

No matter what.

We have to do our thing–

Bringing forth our gift, our genius, our daemon,

The manifestation of the God within us,

Within the time and place of our living

Whether we feel like it or not,

Whether we are in the mood for it or not,

Whether we want to or not

Because everything hinges on it.

If you are going to believe anything,

Don’t believe nothing you do matters,

Believe everything hinges on what you do and how you do it,

Throughout the time left for living–

And live as though it does.

And have a little chocolate from time to time

To keep your courage up.
04/30/2015 — Toccoa Falls Detail 01 — Tocco Falls, Georgia, April 14, 2015

Abraham Heschel said, “We apprehend more than we comprehend.

I don’t know who said, “The only questions worth asking are those that cannot be answered.”

Sheldon Kopp said, “Some things can be experienced, but not understood, and some things can be understood, but not explained.”

We live to see where our life wants to go (Is trying to go. Is going), and take it there.

We live, when we are fully alive, in the borderland between consciousness and unconsciousness–

between what we know and what we do not know–

and seek to make conscious what is unconscious.

We live, when we are fully alive, between knowing what we know and knowing that there is 10,000 (The Tao figure for infinity) times more than that which we do not know–

and set about doing the work of knowing what we don’t know.

There is no explaining you to you, or telling you what to do with yourself and your life.

Everything is a mystery to be lived, explored, experienced, apprehended, marginally understood, never explained.

Your task, your work, is to honor the mystery of life and being–

of YOUR life and being, and that of all that is–

probing it, experiencing it, exploring it, participating in it, deepening it, expanding it, swimming in it, relishing it, loving it, being one with it.

If you are going to understand anything (at the start),

understand that you live symbolically–

that there is no factual, concrete, absolute, firm and final reality,

but that it is all a threshold to a deeper, fuller, more vibrant and alive level of reality.

Everything means something else,

Generally about you.

Your lover is a doorway to you.

So. Is. Everything. Else.

The things that mean something to you,

either positively or negatively,

are more YOU than the things that are invisible to you.

Check them out (the things that mean something to you)

for their YOU-potential.

The things that are invisible to you may be more YOU

than the things that are visible to you.

They will become visible in time.

There is more to you than you can imagine.

Live so as to let you show you who you are.

Live to see where your life is trying to go,

and take it there.

Don’t think you know anything.

Play like a rookie.

If you want to enter the kingdom of heaven,

Turn and become like a child,

Not knowing,

Wondering.

Used in Short Talks On Contradiction, etc., 04/30/2015 — Graham Cabin Door 01 — Billy Graham’s paternal grandfather’s home, Anne Springs Close Greenway, Fort Mill, South Carolina, April 30, 2015

Too many of us fail to enter the struggle

Of reconciling the disparity

Between how things are and how we want them to be.

We do not work to consciously harmonize that contradiction,

To integrate that polarity.

With us, how we want things to be is our only reality–

And when that Other, Denied, Rejected and Ignored, Reality

Rises up to plant a big, juicy, wet one right on the kisser,

We are appalled, outraged, undone.

And, you wouldn’t believe the drama.

It is as though we had been hurled into the middle of some soap opera.

Oh, the remonstrating, protesting and denouncing!

As though we did not understand wearing hose or a tie to work

Was expected of those employed by the First National Bank.

We live in our world

And expect the Other World to make the necessary adjustments

And bend itself to our preferences.

Of course, we will have nothing to do with the concept of growing up

And putting ourselves in accord with the way things work.

Thus, the stand off,

And the reason things remain as they do,

Our whole life long.
05/01/2015 — Smith Creek Cascades 03 — Anna Ruby Falls, Unicoi State Park, Cattahoochee National Forest, Helen, Georgia, April 15, 2015

There is a sense in which our work is the same for us all:

Seeing, hearing, understanding, expressing–

What is to be seen, heard, understood and expressed.

This general work takes specific form with each of us.

I see with a camera.

I hear by writing and reading.

I understand by experiencing my life, reflecting on my experience, and coming to new realizations,

I express this by interpreting it

And sharing what I see, hear, understand with whomever is interested

Through writing and conversation.

The work of seeing, hearing, understanding and expressing

Flows through, in and around, over and under,

All of life.

What we do and what is done to us form the framework

Of seeing, hearing, understanding and expressing–

Of experiencing, reflecting and realizing–

Of waking up and growing up

And being who we are.

What happens to us and what we do about it

Gives shape and direction to our work,

But we live to see, hear, understand and express

What is to be seen, heard, understood and expressed.
05/01/2015 — Catesby’s Trillium 03 – Anne Springs Close Greenway, Fort Mill, SC, April 18, 2015

My friend Chris pours himself into creating collages, clipping images and words from newspapers and magazines and pasting them in an arrangement that pleases him and says…What?

What’s beyond words? What can be experienced but not explained?

We are, with our work, experiencing, exploring, and expressing our connection with the invisible world.

His work with collages is stirring me to explore collages with photographs.

It’s a great exercise in focus, concentration and imagination.

My first piece has started out with an orange-merging-into-red background because that is a very satisfying place to start.

I’ve taken a picture of the window in our bathroom and added that to the background.

I’m looking for an interesting door to photograph for the collection,

and a potted plant.

That’s all I envision to this point,

but I am always on the lookout for the right door and plant,

and anything else that may come up as belonging there.

He has opened up a new world for exploration.

We are not “just making collages” here.

We are looking and listening here.

Seeing and hearing.

A collage done properly is a connection to the Invisible World.

As is everything else.

I wish they had told me THIS in Sunday School!
05/01/2015 — Evening Primrose 2015 01 Blended – Latta Plantation Nature Preserve, Mecklenburg County Parks & Recreation, Huntersville, NC, May 01, 2015

We are crafting a life here,

Around the work,

The character,

The gifts,

The genius,

The daemon,

The manifestation of the God within,

We are called to bring forth–to birth–

In the life we are living.

We can’t be lolling around,

Wondering where we might go shopping today,

Hoping somebody calls us for lunch.

We have to sense where our life is going,

And take it there!

What’s this looking for something to do?

We HAVE something to do!

Something that no one but us CAN do!

Get out of the stands and into the game!

Step into your life–

And LIVE it!
05/02/2015 — Blue Columbine 2015 01 Blended – Latta Plantation Nature Preserve, Mecklenburg County Parks & Recreation, Huntersville, NC, May 01, 2015

If you are not living your life,

You are escaping your life,

Denying your life,

Dismissing your life,

Discounting your life,

Ignoring your life,

Substituting another life for your life,

Wondering why you are dissatisfied

And empty.

And where all your symptoms came from.

Duh.
05/02/2015 — Bull Thistle 2015 01 Blended—Latta Plantation Nature Preserve, Mecklenburg County Parks & Recreation, Huntersville, NC, May 01, 2015

This is important. Listen up.

Or, as Jesus would say, “Those who have ears to hear, let them hear!”

If you are not living with tension, create some!

If you are not taking seriously the idea that you have a life to live apart from the life you are living,

Create tension in your life by taking seriously the idea that you have another life that you must bring to life in the life you are living.

If you are taking seriously the idea that you have a life to live apart from the life you are living, and are working to identify it and bring it forth in the life you are living,

Create tension by not taking that too seriously—certainly not so seriously that you can’t lighten up and have a good time with the life you are living.

It’s like this:

You can’t ignore the life that you must also live, and

You cannot hate, despise, reject the life you are living in puritanical devotion to the life you must also live.

Not too little and not too much.

You have to integrate your lives by doing right by both of them–

By taking each of them with equal seriousness.

You cannot be all one way or the other.

You become whole, not by disappearing your opposites and whisking away your conflicts,

But by recognizing, reconciling, integrating

and living in the tension created by all of your polarities.

Living in the tension created by your opposites is the path to wholeness.

So, if you aren’t aware of any tension in your life,

Create some by living in ways that are the opposite of the way you think you should be living.
05/03/2015 — Dandelions Panorama 2015 01 — Lancaster County, South Carolina, May 2, 2015

Everybody is looking for something to believe in.

Or should be.

Something to focus us, center us, ground us.

Something to consolidate us.

Something we can crystallize around.

Oh, we believe in God, and Jesus, and Love, but.

Our life is as disjointed, fragmented and directionless as any life.

We need a Lodestar.

An Organizing Principle on which to form our life.

Money does it for a lot of people.

And when money doesn’t work,

Some of those people turn to beer.

We flounder without something to believe in

With all our heart and soul, mind and body.

And, it’s right there all the while.

We are what we seek.

We only have to believe in ourselves.

In our depth, and capacity, and capabilities…

We are the source of miracle and magic.

Infinite and eternal.

The world has never seen anything like us.

And we hide it under a basket,

And treat it as though it is nothing.

We despise ourselves.

We are ashamed of ourselves.

We think nothing of ourselves.

Less than nothing.

And we are disgusted to hear that we have a work to do

That needs us to do it.

We laugh it off

And go looking for something to believe in.
05/03/2015 — Used in Short Talks on Good and Bad Religion — View From Marshall Park HDR 01 – Charlotte, NC, Skyline, Mecklenburg County Parks & Recreation, May 3, 2015

There are a number of ways of doing it right–

Just like there are a number of ways of washing the dishes.

If you come out with a clean dish,

What is it to someone else how you got there?

Religion that puts you in accord with the sorrows and woes of this world

And puts you in touch with the firm reality of the invisible world,

And enables you to live in this world in synch with that world,

Nails it,

And there are any number of ways for religion to do that.

Any religion.

Yea for those that do.

Boo for those that don’t.
05/04/2015 — Dairy Barn Panorama 2015 01 – Anne Springs Close Greenway, Fort Mill, SC, May 1, 2015

The natural, plant-and-animal, world lives to fulfill some unknown, unconscious, “natural” purpose.

No one there knows what she, or he, is doing.

No one there has a plan, much less a “life plan,” or an agenda, or a conscious purpose, or motive, or goal.

They don’t know what a calendar is, or a clock.

They operate on internal time, cosmic time.

They “eat when hungry, rest when tired.”

Everybody there is responding to instinctive, intuitive, rhythmic urges, pushes and pulls.

We evolve toward a better, more efficient, less energy-consuming/depleting, idea.

The rivers seek a straighter path to the sea.

Yet, what do we do with all this energy we don’t spend, say, looking for food all the time?

Now, that’s one Nature didn’t, doesn’t, know how to answer.

There isn’t a plant or animal in the natural world that wonders “Now what am I going to do with myself?”

They all just lie around waiting for some compulsion to come along and send them flying south for the winter.

Consciousness evolved to save us from that kind of “hand to mouth” existence, but.

We don’t know what to do with all this time on our hands.

Once we take care of food, clothing and shelter,

What do we do with the rest of our life?

What purpose do we serve beyond our physical needs?

Toward what end do we live?

What do we do with ourselves?

Now what?

It isn’t very efficient to not know.
05/04/2015 — Dairy Barn HDR 04 — Anne Springs Close Greenway, Fort Mill, SC, May 4, 2015

In order to be who you are, you have to do things that are not like you at all.

You are more than you think you are,

And it takes the That Is Not Me

To round you out

And bring forth the ME

In all of us.

So, get out of character from time to time.

Stop taking yourself so seriously–

The self you take yourself to be–

And give The Other You a chance to shine.

You don’t know what you are capable of.

You keep the Not Me under a rock,

Locked away in the basement,

Or the attic.

Chained in the dungeon.

Refusing to be the person you are capable of being,

Because that is not like you at all.

Funny,

How we want to “grow”

Without changing,

With nothing being different.

We are hilarious.

Ridiculous.

Growing up entails embracing all facets of ourselves,

And rejoicing together in who all we are.

So. Get out of character from time to time.

Be who you also are.
05/05/2015 — Graham Cabin Door 02 – Billy Graham’s paternal grandfather’s home, Anne Springs Close Greenway, Fort Mill, South Carolina, May 4, 2015

All of Jesus’ parables were reports of dreams he’d had the night before.

“A sower went out to sow…” “A man had a vineyard…” “A man gave a feast…”

Jesus would wake up and say, “Ain’t that the way it is, though?”

And he would tell the people what he had dreamed, as though it were real, because it was.

Our dreams tell us what is real about our life.

Our dreams are parables of our life.

Listening to your dreams is like listening to Jesus,

Who listened to his dreams.

We all talk (to ourselves) in our sleep.

Wake up to what you are saying to yourself in your sleep.
05/05/2015 — Pitcher Plant Flower 01 Blended – Carolina Sandhills National Wildlife Refuge, McBee, SC, May 5, 2015

It isn’t a matter of figuring it out so much as playing along.

What else are we going to do?

Master the game?

That’s a good one!

If you get up with photography on your mind and it’s raining,

You take rainy day pictures,

Or read,

Or cook…

You play along.

You for sure don’t fight it.

Resistance is futile.

Resistance has its place, but this isn’t it.

The Dalai Lama said, regarding the Chinese occupation of Tibet:

“If, in any situation, there is no solution,

“there is no point in being anxious.

”If the forces at work have their own momentum,

”and what’s going on now is the product of what went before,

”and this generation is not in control of all those forces,

”then this process will continue.”

The rain is going to continue.

We can grow up about it.

And play along.
05/06/2015 — Pond H Panorama 01 — Carolina Sandhills National Wildlife Refuge, McBee, SC, May 5, 2015

Our life has its own rhythm, direction and flow.

We can trust it to know what it is doing.

But we impose an artificial life on top of it,

And bury it beneath layers of Shoulds, Oughts, Musts,

Wants, Don’t Wants, Regrets, Fears, Ambitions,

Envys, Jealousies, Hatreds, Resentments…

And, before you know it, we are being blindfolded,

Spun about,

And thrown into one role after another

With parts to play, and lines to recite forever

Mother, Father, Sister, Brother, Son, Daughter…

Adrift in lives beyond counting,

Lost to the life at the bottom of the pile

With its own rhythm, direction and flow,

Wondering where we are,

And when we are going to show up,

To take it where it wants to go.
05/06/2015 — Through the Window—Schoolhouse window, Andrew Jackson State Park, Lancaster County, South Carolina, May 3, 2015

Carl Jung said, “Take your dream in hand and carry it with you through the day. Walk around it. Poke around in it. Turn it over. Stir it up. Examine it from every angle. See what it has to say to you. Don’t let it go until you have gotten the good out of it!” (Or words to that effect)

Every night, our dreams give us a picture of how it is in our life—of how we are in our life.

You won’t stray far from the truth if you look at your dreams as compensating for some quality of being on your part, off-setting the real-time you with a caricature suggesting that you are too much that way, or too little.

A Sunday School teacher might dream that she is a prostitute—not because she is too much that way, but too little. Too prim, too proper, to “untouchable,” too far from a warm, caring, human being.

And that she is unconscious of her sensuous/sensual side, and needs to be more open to, and a part, of the physical, natural, aspects of life.

Look closely at your dreams each day. Write them down. Reflect on them. See where it goes.
05/06/2015 — Pitcher Plants 02 Blended — Carolina Sandhills National Wildlife Refuge, McBee, SC, May 5, 2015

The role of the unconscious in our life is to wake us up to the reality of the unconscious, and to align us with its drift, direction, flow and truth.

It strives to get our attention,

And to have us live mindfully aware of its partnership

In the joint, collaborative, production of a life worth living.

Carl Jung said, “Just as conscious contents can vanish into the unconscious, other contents can also arise from it.”

Slips of the tongue, flashes of memory, moods out of nowhere, unbidden fantasies, slipping into reverie and woolgathering,

Are all ways the unconscious has of saying, “Hello.”

Take every intrusion of the unconscious as an invitation

To explore the connection with what is happening

And what has happened,

And what needs to happen.

Read between the lines.

If the unconscious could speak, what would it be saying

With this sudden shanghaiing of consciousness?

Wander among the possibilities.

See what occurs to you.

Read the moment as a message in a bottle from your soul.
05/07/2015 — Dwarf Crested Iris 05 — McDowell Nature Preserve, Mecklenburg County Parks & Recreation, Charlotte, NC, April 18, 2015

How could it be better for you?

Seriously.

Make a thorough list.

How many things on the list require magic to happen?

How many things are under your direct control?

Concentrate on those things.

Rank order them in terms of their importance to you.

What can you do in the service of the Number One Item?

Well?

What are you waiting for?

When do you start?
05/07/2015 — Cypress Swamp Panorama 01 — Natchitoches Parish, Louisiana, March 19, 2015

It’s called the Hero’s Journey for a reason.

Only those who have what it takes to go up against the Cyclops again and again need apply.

It’s called work for a reason.

Awareness means paying attention.

Seeing means seeing everything.

Hearing means listening to everything.

You can’t do that in your spare time.

Growing up is a full time commitment.

Here’s one for you:

Who are your top file real life men?

Your top five fictional men?

Your top five real life women?

Your top five fictional women?

What do you like about them?

What do you admire about their character and qualities?

Live to be them in those ways.

This is work–

Requiring concentration, focus and practice, practice, practice.

Do it.

The next time you find yourself in a Situation,

Play it like one of your Top Twenty People would play it.

Be that person then and there.

Do it like they would do it.

You are growing up by embodying,

Incarnating,

What you admire about the people you admire,

Who are, in some sense, more grown up than you,

Because who admires immaturity and fluff?
05/01/2015 — Piedmont Prairie Detail 01 — Latta Plantation Nature Preserve, Mecklenburg County Parks & Recreation, Huntersville, NC, May 7, 2015

The path to the empty tomb winds through the Garden of Gethsemane and across the face of Golgotha.

We aren’t talking about Jesus here,

We are talking about you.

Let me rephrase it for you:

The path to your soul–

Which is also the path to your life,

So, we could say “the path to your life,”

Or, applying this strictly to you,

We could say, “The path to YOUR empty tomb”

(Metaphorically speaking)–

Winds through the heart of your conflicts,

Incongruities, Ambivalences, Discordances, Opposites,

Polarities, Dichotomies, Antithesises, and Antagonisms.

That is to say, the things you most want to avoid dealing with.

You get to life by “dying” through facing the truth of your contraries,

And reconciling what can be reconciled,

And integrating what can be integrating,

And bearing the pain of opposites that simply must be recognized

And borne–

And we want nothing to do with THAT path!

WE are looking for the path to LIFE!

Not DEATH!

And so we say, “Jesus died FOR me,

So that I won’t have to!”

We are so funny.

Hilarious.

And the joke is on us.
05/08/2015 — Curlyheads 02 – Latta Plantation Nature Preserve, Mecklenburg County Parks & Recreation, Huntersville, NC, May 7, 2015

Jesus said, “Eat what is set before you,”

And, “Pick up your own cross and carry it every day.”

These two phrases mean the same thing:

Do what you need to do.

Do what needs you to do it.

Face what must be faced.

Dance with what your life brings to greet you every day.

Don’t be running and hiding from the things you don’t like,

From the things you don’t want to deal with.

Trials and ordeals, Kid, trials and ordeals.

Escapes and addictions are no ways to deal with your trials and ordeals.

Get in there and do what needs to be done every day.

That’s what Jesus said do.

And that’s what Jesus did.

You wouldn’t spit on Jesus, would you?
05/09/2015 — Golden Groundsel 01 Blended – Latta Plantation Nature Preserve, Mecklenburg County Parks & Recreation, Huntersville, NC, May 7, 2015

What keeps us going has to be the love for the game.

We do it because we love it–

Because we love doing it–

Because we love the whole experience–

Not because of any profit we are garnering,

Or any payoff we are anticipating.

This. Is. It.

If there is another level to life after this,

That will have its own level of experience

To love and live out.

For now: This. Is. It.

We have to do it because we love it.

If we don’t love it, we have to do it differently–

With our eyes open.

With our heart in the game.

We get our heart in the game

By aligning ourselves with our heart’s true love,

And doing the work that is ours to do.

We cannot love a life someone hands us off the rack

And tells us to live.

We cannot play any game and love it.

We have to play the one we are built for.

Michael Jordan couldn’t play baseball.

Fred Astaire couldn’t pour concrete.

If you want to love what you’re doing,

You have to do what you love–

AND what you are built to do.
05/10/2015 — Dairy Barn Panorama 03 — Anne Springs Close Greenway, Fort Mill, SC, May 4, 2015

We think we are running out of time as we get older, and have to get it right because there is less time to recover from our mistakes.

There is no time to waste in putting off what must be done,

Or in avoiding what remains to be done, but.

The process remains the same throughout our life:

Learn as you go, Kid. Learn as you go.

We have to be as careful with our life in our twenties as in our seventies.

We have to be as awake at any point in our life as at any other.

Our life needs us to live it at every point.

We cannot wait until we are 80 to begin wondering how to live our life—how to get the most out of what remains to be lived.

Our task is to field the hard ground balls that come our way in every day.

In every stage of our life,

We put on our uniform, pick up our glove, take the field and catch what is hit to us,

And hit what is thrown to us—curve balls or blazing fast balls, sliders or knuckle-balls.

We have to be prepared to life OUR life in any circumstance of life.

We have what we need: Eyes to see, ears to hear, a heart to understand.

So, get in there and do your thing,

And make adjustments as needed to meet each situation as it arises.

All it takes is being mindfully aware of what is happening,

And what needs to happen,

And what we need to do about it.
05/20/2015 — Country Cemetery Panorama 01 – Lancaster County, South Carolina, May 10, 2015

What is meaningful to you?

That’s where you are to start digging.

Why would you walk past where you find meaning

And look somewhere else for the treasure?

Why not trust your own sense of value?

I don’t mean what’s easy.

I mean what is valuable.

I mean what is meaningful.

Why don’t you take yourself back from what appears to be the easy way out,

And hand yourself over to what is meaningful?

And live in its service from now on?
05/11/2015 — Evening Primrose 2015 02 – Latta Plantation Nature Preserve, Mecklenburg County Parks & Recreation, Huntersville, NC, May 7, 2015

Growing up is another term for the spiritual journey.

It has nothing to do with concepts, ideas, beliefs, teachings, sutras, doctrines, dogmas or thinking.

It has everything to do with realization.

With seeing, hearing, understanding.

No one can explain the things you have to understand.

Understand?

We live our way into understanding.

Into knowing how to hit a curve ball, say,

Or a blazing fast one.

Some people never figure it out, but.

It isn’t because they haven’t been told enough what to do.

Growing up is that way.

How many people do you know who have grown up

By being told to “Grow up, for god’s sake!”?

We grow up by seeing, hearing, understanding, realizing

How things are and how things also are–

Which is how things are–

And putting ourselves in accord with how things are.

That’s the Hero’s Journey along the path

To Nirvana, The Land of Promise, and the Holy Grail.

People who spend their lives

Trying to put their life in accord with their wants, wishes and desires

End up in the wasteland,

Bitter and burned out.

That’s one way to do it.

Or, do it not.
05/12/2015 — Honeysuckle 01 — Indian Land, Lancaster County, South Carolina, May 10, 2015

Be clear about what you love.

”I love you” is a bit vague.

What is it exactly, precisely, about the “you” that is loved?

What would/do “you” bring to life in relationship with “me”?

What are the qualities,

The characteristics,

that are loved?

”I love your eyes,” won’t do.

What is it about “your eyes”?

What do “your eyes” imply, suggest, reveal, disclose?

What is seen in “your eyes” that isn’t present in other eyes?

What attracts you to the beloved?

Get to the bottom of it.

Do not wander lost in a romantic fog.

Then, work to become what you love.

Bring forth in yourself what attracts you to someone else.

Allow him/her to deepen, expand, enlarge, and bring you forth.

Understand the nature of the gift.

Do right by it.

Do the work love requires.

Be what you love.
05/12/2015 — Graham Cabin Door 03 – Billy Graham’s paternal grandfather’s home, Anne Springs Close Greenway, Fort Mill, South Carolina, May 4, 2015

Take how things are in one hand,

And take how you want things to be in the other hand.

How you get the two hands together

Makes all the difference.
05/13/2015 — Country Cemetery Panorama 03 – Lancaster County, South Carolina, May 10, 2015

Sin is not immorality.

Sin is stupidity.

Sin is being wrong about what is important.

Willfully, arrogantly, wrong.

Sin may manifest itself as immorality, but.

As one of the 10,000 Spiritual Laws states:

Morality is the best-dressed form of sin.

The Tea Party, for instance,

Conceals its gross stupidity

Behind a great, impenetrable, wall

Of pronounced and impeccable morality.

No one is more morally pure,

Or willfully ignorant of what matters most,

Than the Tea Party.

Not even the Pharisees,

Who were the Tea Party equivalent of their day.
05/14/2015 — Horse Nettle 01 – Carolina Sandhills National Wildlife Refuge, McBee, SC, May 14, 2015

Our life is trying to gift us,

And we want no part of it.

We know what we want,

And what our life wants of us is not it.

So, we spit on our life and its desire for us,

And go off to live out our own idea of how life should be.

How’s it working, do you think?

You’re spending all of your time trying to get away

From all the roles you hate about the life you are living–

Am I right?

You’re the child of aging parents,

The parent of an eternal child

(Or the spouse of one).

You are the owner of pets that wait to be waited on.

Of a mortgage that has no end.

Working a job that claims your complete allegiance

And all of your time…

And, like that, all the way down the list.

What do you think about to keep from thinking about

The things on the list?

What do you do to escape?

There are only two ready and reliable forms of escape:

Addiction and symptoms.

Both take your mind off your life–

For a while.

There is another alternative.

LIVE YOUR OTHER LIFE!

Focus your attention on finding and living the life that is yours to live.

No kidding.

You will be amazed at how your other life

Parallels the life you are living,

Except with a boost.

It will provide you the energy you need–

The enthusiasm you need–

To take care of the things on The List.

And it will put the sparkle back in your eye,

And the skip in your step,

And the song in your heart.

Take it for a spin around the block.

You will never be the same.
05/15/2015 — Pool H Panorama 02 — Carolina Sandhills National Wildlife Refuge, McBee, SC, May 5, 2015

When people seek to “find themselves,”

Go in search of themselves,

They are looking for their life–

For the life that is truly their life to live–

For where they belong–

For what they belong to.

They are looking for their heart,

For their soul.

Our heart is restless

Until our heart finds

What our heart seeks to be

And to do.
05/15/2015 — Goose Family 01 — Carolina Sandhills National Wildlife Refuge, McBee, SC, May 14, 2015

Abraham left home and went in search of the Promised Land.

Jesus said, “Who is my mother? Who are my sisters and my brothers? Those who seek the will of God and do it!”

Jesus and Abraham (And Moses and all the prophets) were on the same page.

”The will of God” has nothing to do with some invisible Deity, like The Man Upstairs (There is no man, there are no stairs), willing us to “Get right with God,” and “walk the straight and narrow,” and be all moral, pure and perfect.

”The will of God” is a metaphor for “the drift of heart and soul.”

It is the heart/soul, the Heart-Soul, seeking to find its own life and do it.

It is the Heart-Soul seeking to find and do the things that are unique to it,

The things that express—and through expression, expand, deepen, enlarge, develop—who it is and what it is about.

Heart-Soul seeks expression and expansion through us,

Through the life we are living.

We live to be who we are,

To do what is ours—our Heart-Soul’s—to do.

Our home is with those who understand this

And are doing it themselves.

Our family are those who live in the service of their Heart-Soul,

And help us live in the service of ours.

We leave home to find home.

We leave our family of origin to find our sisters and brothers,

Who are with us in seeking to become who they are

In the time left for living.

Get it?

Go!
05/15/2015 — Whirling Butterfly 01 — Carolina Sandhills National Wildlife Refuge, McBee, SC, May 14, 2015

Here’s my take on prayer:

Prayer is what we feel, not what we say.

Prayer is beyond words, a felt communion with experience, with life.

Prayer is integrity, a way of being, a way of being in the world–

A way of being at one with the world–

Of recognizing our oneness with the world.

And, of recognizing our helplessness, vulnerability, gratitude, thanksgiving, dependence, pathos, sadness, joy, etc–

On a feeling level,

With no words involved.

Prayer is knowing,

More than thinking or talking.

Prayer is an attitude—

A good faith connection with all living things—

A frame of mind.

Prayer is the spirit with which we go about our life.

Prayer is the word for being right with our life.

Prayer is the word for the direct experience of being alive.

”Sighs too deep for words.”

When we try to put it into words,

We break the spell,

And can’t get it back

With an entire dictionary at hand.
05/16/2015 — Dairy Barn HDR 02 – Anne Springs Close Greenway, Fort Mill, SC, May 4, 2015

The phrase, “the wrath of God,” is completely ridiculous.

What? GOD has no choice?

Just before wrath, what was there?

Just before the alcoholic’s realization, “I need a drink,” what was there?

What happened in the interval?

Before, there was no wrath, no need of a drink,

Then, there was wrath, or need of a drink.

What instigated the shift?

What was it God, or the alcoholic,

Couldn’t handle?

What exactly was the experience just before wrath,

Or, “I need a drink”?

I’m glad you hung around for the answer.

Here it comes.

A complex was engaged.

If God has wrath,

God has complexes.

Something struck a nerve with God,

And with the alcoholic.

This phrase “struck a nerve”

Is another way of saying, “engaged a complex.”

We cannot attribute human characteristics to God

Without giving God the whole bundle.

If we don’t want God having complexes,

We can’t give God wrath.

If God has wrath,

God has things God can’t handle,

Just like all the alcoholics there ever were.

God is an alcoholic

Whose drug of choice is lakes of molten lava

And all the joys of hell

For those who stir up God’s wrath–

Who dare to engage God’s complexes.

It’s ridiculous.

We have to start over.

With a better script writer.
05/16/2015 — Country Cemetery Panorama 03 – Lancaster County, South Carolina, May 16, 2015

We have to play with our life, and dance.

Our life’s work is to come forth in our life

As a joyous, exuberant, inquisitive, playful, vibrant, exploring, instinctual, intuitive, mindfully aware child.

Zen was created when Buddhism came to China and met Taoism,

And said the search for truth was like a man riding his ox in search of his ox,

And that if you make too much of anything, you lose the whole point of it.

See what you look at!

Ask questions that cannot be answered!

Do what needs to be done!

Laugh your way through each day!

Let the situation show you what is required!

Pull the rope–don’t push it!

Zen and your life are like water–If you want to know water,

Drink it, swim in it, bathe in it, sail on it or drown in it–

But don’t talk about it.

Those who know water don’t need to talk about it.

Those who talk about it don’t know it.
05/17/2015 — View from Marshall Park 02 – Mecklenburg County Parks & Recreation, Charlotte, NC, May 3, 2015

You are up to you.

I am up to me.

We can grow up,

But.

We cannot grow anyone else up.

We can be responsible,

But.

We cannot make someone else be responsible.

We can straighten ourselves up,

And do what is right by ourselves and others,

But.

We cannot straighten anyone else up,

Or get them to do what is right by themselves and others.

Relationships require a joint,

Good-faith,

Commitment to maturation.

If one person is growing up

And the other person is happy to be infantile

And taken care of,

It is not going to be much of a relationship.

If you ain’t growing up,

You are stagnating,

And beginning to decompose.

Smell like it, too.
05/17/2015 — Curlyheads 01 – Latta Plantation Nature Preserve, Mecklenburg County Parks & Recreation, Huntersville, NC, May 7, 2015 – Try looking this flower/plant up on some on-line flower ID site. There are flowers by the metric ton on-line, most of them are the same flower. There are flowers by the tens-of-metric tons that no one goes to the trouble of naming and displaying. You’d have to be a botanist to know all you need to know about flowers. Or live next door to one–but that relationship wouldn’t likely last long.

We talk about religious liberty and freedom of speech.

It’s a joke, all this talk about freedom and liberty.

Did you read about the hacker-dumb-ass-guy-passenger who took over the computer system of a plane in flight?

He hijacked the controls of the plane, hijacking the plane.

“HaHaHa. Look what I can do. I’m so brilliant. Nobody is smarter than I am.”

Well, now every terrorist cell in the world is hot into how to do it.

And you aren’t going to be able to take a laptop, or a computer tablet, or a smart phone onto a flight.

How free is that?

Our freedom and our liberty are being disappeared before our eyes

In the name of safety and security.

We are giving up freedom to avoid being terrorized and hijacked.

Is it working for you?

Do you rest easy at night?

Sleep well?

All safe and secure?

Freedom and liberty depend upon the good-faith civility of everybody else.

Throw one dumb-ass-don’t-give-a-damn-er into the crowd

And it all goes to hell.

Rumi said it well:

“If you are not here with us in good faith, you’re doing terrible damage.”

Rumi may as well have added: “Damage that will last for generations.

And you don’t care.

And we can’t make you.”

It’s called vulnerability.

We cannot be free until we can be vulnerable.

If you are going to practice something, practice that.
05/17/2015 — Live Oaks with New Leaves—Avery Island, Louisiana, March 26, 2015

I am well into my 71^st year, and that may cloud my vision on every level, but.

It seems to me that the world is going over to the sociopaths and the psychopaths–

To the people who don’t give a damn about anything

Except seeing you dead,

Who will hand over their own life

In order to kill you and/or those like you.

Now, that’s an enemy for you.

Try loving that kind of enemy.

That kind of enemy makes a travesty of love–

And of every other value valued by the species.

That kind of enemy doesn’t care about a thing,

But the deaths of everyone in the world,

Including themselves.

Try to mutually co-exist with an enemy like that.

You cannot think they are just like you,

Only with more disadvantages and childhood trauma.

Civilization did not spawn them.

They were enemies of civilization from the start.

”Let’s burn it down,” is their idea of a good time.

Do not think they are really good people at heart,

With a chip on their shoulder.

We are back in the Old West

With Billy the Kid

And Cole Younger

Riding into town.

Things are, as they say,

Getting interesting.
05/18/2015 — Tombstones 06 – Country cemetery, Lancaster County, South Carolina, May 16, 2015

Growing up is about putting yourself into accord with how things are.

Stress (and suffering) is the gap between how things are and how we want things to be.

No gap, no stress (no suffering).

How you deal with the gap tells the tale.

Speaking of gaps,

What about the gap between who you are and who you need to be?

Between the way you live your life and the way you need to live it?

Between how you want things to be in your life and how they need to be?

Our life can be out of alignment with how we want it to be,

And we can be out of alignment with how our life wants us to be.

Start saying, “Yes!” to whatever your circumstances may be,

And see what you can do with them.

Stop trying to hang onto life as it was–

Stop trying to force it to be what you want it to be–

And see what you can do with life as it is.

Your life is trying to make something of you–

Live to see what it is.

Don’t die not knowing.

Say “Yes!” to your life,

And see where it goes.
05/18/2015 — Cypress Swamp 08 — Lake Martin, St. Martin Parish, Breaux Bridge, Louisiana, March 27, 2015

You have to believe in your own life—and live it.

You have to believe in your gift, your art, your genius—and serve it.

I say this all the time,

Because it is the only thing worth saying,

The only thing worth hearing,

The only thing worth doing.

Everything hangs on it.

Every. Single. Thing.

Why would you not believe in your own life?

Why would you discount, dismiss, overlook, ignore

Your gift, art, genius?

Why would you think it’s about money, success, fame and glory?

Those are pretenders to the title.

They have no life about them,

And no life to offer.

They are imitation, bogus, sham, artificial, pseudo, phony, wannabe, faux, substitutes for life.

You have more life in a fingernail clipping

Than they have in the full box of smoke.

I wish I could get you to believe that.

And live as though it is so.

Because it is.
05/19/2015 — Purple and Gold Panorama—Ragweed and Vetch, Carolina Sandhills National Wildlife Refuge, McBee, SC, May 14, 2015

In the work to find your work,

You can start anywhere.

You have to start somewhere?

What is your best guess about what your work is?

About what your gift is?

About what your art, your genius, is?

Start there.

Perfect your art–

Perfect as much as you know—or think you know—of your art.

See where it goes.

It will go to practice and discipline straight away.

We have to practice our art,

And we have to be disciplined to practice anything.

We can’t just pull our art out of the basket

When we feel like it.

Our art demands to be done in season and out of season.

There is no “out of season” for our art.

Practice your art—as much as you know of your art—constantly.

Always be doing what is yours to do,

What is yours that you must do.

Start with what you think it may be.

Practice it regularly.

Your gift will take over from there.

Allow yourself to be directed

By forces you do not command, control, or understand.

That’s all there is to it.
05/19/2015 — Country Cemetery Panorama 10 — Lancaster County, South Carolina, May 16, 3015

My ideal relationship is one in which both people are consciously working to grow up–

And consciously working to assist each other in the work of growing up.

And talk about their experience with the trials and ordeals of growing up on a regular basis.

My experience of relationships is that both people are trying to get what they want with the approval of the other,

Or at the expense of the other.

We take turns, or fight it out, or control and manipulate our way to ends that are pleasing to us.

Marriages are said to be “happy” when one person disappears into the other, smiling all the way.

Count the number of equally mature, mutually helpful and mutually independent married people you know.

It is takes more than one elbow, I’ll be amazed.
05/20/2015 — Fern Frond 01 – Carolina Sandhills National Wildlife Refuge, McBee, SC, May 14, 2015

Something can be wrong in a way that makes it right.

Picasso went a long way doing things wrong.

His horses and his houses don’t look a thing like horses or houses.

Henri Matisse did something similar.

And Claude Monet.

The list is long of people who did wrong right.

Don’t let the will of the people be your standard.

The people only know how things are supposed to be.

They know good and right only in terms that are popular at the time.

They are clueless about also-good and also-right.

You can’t let the masses override your heart.

You follow your own lodestar.

You set your own standards.

You find what is good and right for you and serve it.

That’s the way Jesus did it.

And the Buddha.

And Gandhi.

Be wrong in the right way.

All along the way.
05/2/2015 — The Dairy Barn HDR 01 — Anne Springs Close Greenway, Fort Mill, SC, May 4, 2015

Jesus said, “Let the children come to me.”

And, “Unless you turn and become like children, you will never enter the kingdom of heaven.”

That’s because the one task of childhood is growing up.

We are to be like children and give ourselves to the task of growing up in each stage of our life.

I live in a community of mostly older people,

Most of whom have not wasted any time growing up,

And have no intention of beginning now.

People seem to think that growing up is automatic with aging.

When you turn 21, you’re an adult, and grown up.

Not!

Growing up is the conscious work of the spiritual journey.

Growing up is the Hero’s Journey.

It is coming to terms, at every stage of life–

In each situation as it arises all our life long–

With the gap between how things are

And how we want them to be.

I live in a neighborhood of old people who whine and complain

Because their grass is too short or too long,

And they want somebody to fix it for them.

They want their Mommy!

They wander in an infantile, childish, world,

And have no capacity to be child-LIKE,

Hard at work at the task of growing up.
05/21/2015 — Fleabane 01 Blended—Indian Land, SC, May 16, 2015

We find our heart, our foundation, our direction—we know what is important—by being still, quiet, open, aware, listening, looking, on a regular basis.

We have to Check In from time to time.

Get our bearings.

Remember who we are and what we are about.

Because the world is a crazy place–

A crazy-making place–

And we have to counteract the signals jamming our signals

By stepping back, stepping out, seeking stillness and solitude,

In order to reflect, take stock, breathe, remember,

And ground ourselves in what is important,

Regain our balance

Reorient ourselves

Find our way back to the path

And be who we are

In an environment that would prefer for us

To take our place and do as we are told.
05/21/2015 — Canada Geese 02 — Bog Garden, Greensboro, NC, March 9, 2015

Our lives are too much ruled by stress and anxiety.

How do we work to offset stress,

And override anxiety?

I recommend being conscious of it–

Not peripherally aware of it,

But particularly, especially, intentionally conscious of it.

KNOW when you are stressed, anxious.

Take a mental step back from the situation,

And breathe.

I also recommend a bevy of all the recommended

Stress/anxiety relievers:

Mindfulness, meditation, yoga and exercise,

And, where possible, staying away from stress and anxiety producing circumstances.

I have a long list of places I can’t be,

Of people I cannot be around.

And, I’m a lot better off honoring the list,

Than I am dishonoring it.
05/22/2015 — Duck Weed on Silver Creek 01 — Midnight, Mississippi, March 17, 2015

Dark times are coming,

Thanks to the willful, arrogant ignorance

Of the Republican Party and Evangelical Christianity

(And where DOES that line lie?).

During dark ages, good people take cover,

And live to keep the light alive.

It is not enough to survive physically.

We have to serve our soul’s need

For the experience and expression of life and beauty.

Live to create pockets of life and beauty

Among the madness,

And keep the light alive.
05/22/2015 — Old Sautee Store Panorama 01 BW—Sautee-Nacoochee, Georgia, April 14, 2015

What do you need to hear in order to live your best possible life in the time left for living?

Tell yourself that, and get with the living of your life.

What do you need to believe is so in order to live your best possible life?

Believe it is so! And get with the living!

Live as though what you need to be so is so.

And get with the living of your life!

Our life is up to us.

If we are ever going to live it as it can best be lived,

It is going to be because we decide to live it as it can best be lived,

And do it–

Day in and day out for the rest of our life.

What are we waiting for?

For it to be easy?

To feel like doing it?

To WANT to?

Feeling follows action.

Start walking.

Let wanting to catch up if it can.

Meanwhile, you have a life to live

That isn’t going to be lived,

Unless YOU live it.

Override the objections,

And get with the living of your life!
05/23/2015 — Perfoliate Bellwort 2015 02– McDowell Nature Preserve, Mecklenburg County Parks & Recreation, Charlotte, NC, April 20, 2015

Our heart’s true love is not always our heart’s TRUE love.

We can fool ourselves about what our heart loves.

Cocaine, for instance, or beer, or sugar–

Ice cream, say, after 10 PM. Or before.

The list is long of the wrong things we love and can’t live without.

Adam and Eve loved the Forbidden Fruit.

When you are caught up in a compulsion it feels just like True Love.

Takes a while to get it figured out.

What works and what doesn’t.

What is obvious to everyone else

Takes a long time dawning on us

When we are in the grip of a compulsion.

There ought to be a way to avoid the embarrassment,

Pain, destruction, devastation.

”Live and learn, Kid. Live and learn.”

What we learn is

If it looks like a duck, and walks like a duck, and sounds like a duck,

It may not be a duck.
05/24/2015 — Wintergreen 02 — Indian Land, SC, May 22, 2015

Sex without intimacy, tenderness and affection is

A welcome escape from intimacy, tenderness and affection,

Which are entirely dependent upon truthfulness,

And cannot be faked nearly so easily as sex without them can be.

We have sex to keep from being intimate, tender, affectionate–

To keep from being truthful–

To keep from being real–

Because Jack Nicholson nails us

In his role as Col. Nathan P. Jessup

With, “You can’t handle the truth!”

Which only invites the stinging comeback,

”Neither can you Colonel. Neither can you.”
05/25/2015 — Cypress Swamp 04 — Lake Martin, St. Martin Parish, Breaux Bridge, Louisiana, March 27, 2015

When did things change for you?

When did you give up,

Check out,

And start going through the motions–

Maybe with a chip on your shoulder,

And a pebble in your shoe?

Hobbling along with a “This is the best I’m gonna do,

So don’t expect anything more from me,” attitude?

When did you decide, “If this is the way life is going to be,

Then I’ll show life!”

And begin the slow slide to here, now?

How long has it been since you were 100% invested in your life?

What happened, back then,

Just before you said “To hell with it,”

And quit?

Trip back there with me,

And consider who you were then,

And write yourself a letter.

Take your time.

Do a thorough job.

Say everything you have to say,

Everything you needed to hear,

Feeling, acknowledging, everything you felt then,

And feel now.

Bearing all that had to be borne,

And still must be borne–

With full conscious awareness.

Reflect deeply on your experience.

See what new realizations dawn.

And what your future holds.
05/25/2015 —
Lake Chicot 02 — Ville Platte, Louisiana, March 22, 2015

If you don’t believe in something enough to go to hell for believing in it, you don’t believe in anything very much, do you?

Don’t talk to me about your faith until you are ready to go straight to hell for what you believe.
05/25/2015 — Greenhouse Coleus 01 – Pike’s Nursery, Charlotte, NC, April 28 2015

We have to face the pain of our conflicts, of our defeats and disappointments, of our failures and losses, of our setbacks and betrayals, shocks and whams—

We have to bear the full realization of the remorse and agony that weave through our life—

And reconcile what can be reconciled,

And reconcile ourselves to what cannot be,

Living consciously in the tension of mutually exclusive polarities,

As though it is done every day by everyone

(Because it is),

And refusing to let the truth of all of this

Keep us from being who our life needs us to be

In the time and place of our living.

Our life isn’t what it could have been or ought to be, but.

We are here to see to it that our present and future

Are all they can be with us doing our part

In each situation as it arises all our life long—

Without hiding from the truth of the pain we carry.

And, all the people said, “AMEN! MAY IT BE SO!”
05/25/2015 — Pine Cone 01 Blended—Indian Land, South Carolina, May 25, 2015

Practice saying Yes! to your life.

Embrace everything that comes your way–

Which means embracing what must be done

To do what needs to be done with everything that comes your way.

Embrace the pain, anguish, agony and trouble

Required to deal with the things that come your way.

And deal with it the way it needs to be dealt with.

And say Yes! to the next thing that comes your way.

And, when you meet an elephant coming toward you down the path,

Say Yes! to what that means for you

And get off the path!
05/26/2015 — Wintergreen Blossom 02 Blended—Indian Land, South Carolina, May 25, 2015

Recovery is slow, so take your time.

Don’t try to hurry the process.

Don’t think you ought to be back to normal by now.

Devastation is the end of normal.

Now, it is normal to wonder if things will ever be back to normal.

Make a pact with yourself to wait it out.

See how long it takes to hear yourself laughing again.

It will be longer than you want it to be,

But not as long as you are afraid it will be.

In the meantime, be as stunned, overwhelmed and traumatized as you are,

And give recovery as much time as it needs

To do its work.
05/26/2015 — Tombstones 03 — Country Cemetery, Lancaster County, South Carolina, May 16, 2015

An AA slogan says, “All we ever wanted was smooth and easy.”

We will sacrifice everything for “smooth and easy.”

Another term for what we seek is “Momma.”

We all are looking for Momma to smooth our way,

Remove what is difficult and make it easy for us.

The Return to Mother is the opposite of the Hero’s Journey.

The Return to Mother is the regressive journey

Of the Eternal Child

Who refuses to grow up,

And deal responsibly, appropriately and maturely

With life’s daily deliveries.

What is Heroic about each of us

Is our willingness to stand up, step forward,

And do what needs to be done–

What needs us to do it–

The way it needs to be done,

When it needs to be done,

As often as it needs to be done,

All our life long.

We become who we are in meeting what meets us in life,

And responding to it in ways

That are proper and fitting to the occasion.

In seeking the safety of Momma’s lap,

And the eternal lethargy of smooth and easy,

We languish in the Netherworld,

Never quite getting around to completing our birth

In the land of the living,

But abort ourselves aborning

By hiding in some faux-mother equivalent,

And refusing to do right by ourselves and our life.
05/27 /2015 — Great Blue Heron—Bog Garden, Greensboro, NC, 2013

What are you trying to do with your life?

What is keeping you from doing it?

What are you doing about the obstruction?

What’s the problem?

The obstruction and how you are dealing with it

Is more important in your work to grow up

Than the end result you seek.

The obstruction is the treasure.

You think one thing,

It’s another.

What is the obstruction requiring of you?

You are seeking to be rid of it,

Yet, it is bringing you forth in ways you would never bring you forth.

The barrier is a portkey.

Every wall is a door.

Eyes that see see something different

From eyes that don’t see.

See?
05/28/2015 — Piedmont Prairie Detail 01 — Latta Plantation Nature Preserve, Mecklenburg County Parks & Recreation, Huntersville, NC, May 7, 2015

“The instrument chooses the musician,”

Much like “the wand chooses the wizard.”

Our tools are us.

They deepen us, enlarge us, expand us, show us us, introduce us to us, are the path to us…

What we seek is in the tools—in the instruments—that will not let us go.

A tin whistle in the hands of someone determined to get the most out of a tin whistle would be, for that person, what a basketball is for Steph Curry or Lebron James.

There is no end to the path of seeking to get the best out of something–

And, having no specific destination of our own in mind,

Trusting it to take us where it needs us to go.

Our instrument/tool of choice is as magical as any wand could be,

In the hands of those who know how to get out of the way,

And let the instrument/tool show us what we can do–

If we cooperate with it from the heart.

When we begin to think our instrument/tool

Is ours to do with as we will,

And begin to use it to our advantage, advancement, benefit, and boon,

It goes all to hell,

And we wake up in some gutter,

Wondering what happened.

We have to keep the right perspective:

”Thy will, not mine, be done.”

I just carry the camera.

It alone knows where we are going.
05/28/2015 — Spider Lilies Panorama 02 — Rocky shoals of the Catawba River, Landsford Canal State Park, Catawba, SC, May 28, 2015 — Spider Lilies bloom each year between May 15 and June 15 over a quarter mile stretch of the Catawba River. Canoeists, kayakers, and bank sitters, gape and stare, and break into song at the sight—and gather the next year to do it again.

The invisible world is the unconscious world is the spiritual world.

Primal peoples have always understood the visible world to be grounded upon the invisible world.

We think the physical universe is the only universe.

We have a re-think coming.

It starts with simple awareness/mindfulness of every time the invisible world “breaks into” the visible world

With dreams and visions, hunches and intuitions, knowing that has no rational explanation (I knew when it was time to move to South Carolina, for example. I knew it was time beyond explaining, justifying, defending or excusing), serendipitous coincidences, the mysterious timing of events and circumstances, and all things woo-whoo, woo-whoo.

Begin to treat the invisible/unconscious/spiritual world seriously.

Listen to your Heart/Soul/Body/Mind.

Consult your Heart/Soul/Body/Mind.

Entertain the possibility that you have a Deep Self who knows more than you do,

And has a sense of your life that you don’t have.

Imagine ways of establishing, deepening and maintaining a relationship with your Deep Self–

Who also has a relationship with the invisible/unconscious/spiritual world that goes back to the very beginning.

Or do you have something better to do?
05/29/2015 — Cypress Swamp Panorama 03 — Natchitoches Parish, Louisiana, March 18, 2015

Where do we think we are going?

Where are we trying to get before we die?

What are we after?

More money?

How much will it take?

Then what?

What will more money do for us?

What’s the point of money?

All money can do is pay the bills.

What bills are worth paying?

We are running up bills on the way to where?

Doing what?

Showing off?

”Lookatme!Lookatme!HEY!LookatME!”?

Allow me to explain:

The only things worth having are an enlarged perspective.

An understanding heart.

A helping hand.

The courage to face what must be faced

And to do what needs to be done about it.

In each situation that comes along.

Money cannot buy those things for us, but.

Seeing through money to the heart of the matter,

And knowing what’s what,

And living with compassion for the whole bowl of spaghetti

Can.
05/29/2015 — Spider Lilies 06 Panorama—Rocky shoals of the Catawba River, Landsford Canal State Park, Catawba, SC, May 29, 2015 — Spider Lilies bloom each year between May 15 and June 15 over a quarter mile stretch of the Catawba River. Canoeists, kayakers, and bank sitters, gape and stare, and break into song at the sight—and gather the next year to do it again.

The Mother is the Dragon the Hero has to slay to claim “the treasure hard to obtain,” which is His, or Her, own Deep Self.

(The Mother in this scenario can as easily be The Father. The point is that we have to tear ourselves away from dependence upon the source of safe, soft, smooth and easy, in order to claim our right to our own life [our birthright] and live aligned with our life’s [our Deep Self’s] will for us throughout our life.)

Fear and Lethargy, says James Hollis, are twin demons standing in our way, keeping us “in our place,” and refusing to allow us to take our rightful place in the service of our own life.

What is the Mother/Father equivalent in your own life, keeping you from “the treasure hard to attain,” that is your own life?

Make the challenge conscious. Understand that we live mythologically—not logically, rationally. All of the old stories are OUR stories. They are about US, and the eternal questions of whether we will be who we are, or not, of whether we will live OUR life, or not, greet us each day in the Dragon’s, the Demon’s, the Cyclops’ present-day manifestation.
05/30/2015 — Working on the Railroad—Catawba River Trestle, SC Hwy 75, Catawba, SC, May 28, 2015

We grow up by doing what we don’t want to do over time, but.

There’s a catch:

We have to WANT to do what we don’t want to do,

In a “Thy will, not mine, be done,” kind of way.

We have to do what we don’t want to do willingly–

Not begrudgingly,

Not resentfully,

Not hopelessly,

Forlornly,

Remorsefully.

Our heart has to be in doing what we don’t want to do.

We have to do it as though it were the very thing we most want to do.

We have to do it the way it ought to be done–

As though it were our idea all along.

This is called embracing our fate

In order to serve our destiny.

It’s the key that turns the lock

That opens the door

To the Treasure Hard To Attain.

It’s the secret to life spilling over,

Running over,

Flowing forth

Always and forever–

Which, of course, no one ever understands,

Believes,

Or buys into.
05/30/2015 — Red Barn White Fence Panorama 01 – Chester County, South Carolina, May 30, 2015

Carl Jung said, “There is no coming to consciousness without pain.”

No one wakes up with everything going their way.

There is no awakening, no realization, no awareness when everything is just right in your life.

Yet, that’s what we strive for.

We want everything to be the way we want everything to be.

We want everything to be smooth and easy.

We want harmony around the table, across the board.

Serenity Now!

And, we want nothing to do with the pain of conflict,

Disruption,

Opposition,

Hostility,

And the baby refusing to be a laughing little bundle of joy.

We will pass on consciousness, thank you!

Serenity Now!

The Hero’s Journey doesn’t have a chance with us.

We are packing up and moving in with Momma.

And let her take care of the baby.

Sorry to be the one to tell you, but.

Joseph Campbell said, “The Treasure Hard To Find

Lies in the cave you most don’t want to enter.”

That would be the cave housing the pain of your life

That you don’t want to face and deal with.

Starting with the baby.
05/31/2015 — Slow Water Paddling – Rocky Shoals Spider Lilies, Catawba River, Landsford Canal State Park, Catawba, SC, May 28, 2015

There is no difference between a spiritual experience and a psychological experience.

The two are one.

Spiritual is “of the soul.”

“Psychological” is a word derived from the Greek word, “psyche,” or “soul.”

“Spiritual” and “Psychological” both speak of “soul.”

Neither know what they are talking about.

Both know they are talking about something that is real, and important, and is worth taking our time to experience and explore, but.

Neither offer much in the way of practical advice when it comes to experiencing and exploring “soul.”

They both offer doctrines and beliefs,

But neither offers much in the way of specific practices for experiencing and exploring our “soul.”

Neither talks very much about the “numen,” or “numinous reality,”

And how to access it, encounter it, experience and explore it.

Falling in love is an example of an experience with physical, emotional, spiritual/psychological implications.

Falling in love is an encounter with the numen, with numinous reality.

Things in the world of physical reality move us on an emotional/spiritual/psychological level.

We need to explore those experiences through a combination of conversation, introversion, reflection and research.

We are wasting our time by not exploring our experience on every level,

Deepening our conscious, mindful, awareness,

And knowing all that we can know about what is going on

In the interplay between physical, emotional and spiritual/psychological reality.
05/31/2015 — Old Stone Cemetery 01 Panorama — Chester County, South Carolina, May 30, 2015 — With tombstones from 1777 to 1914, the Old Stone Cemetery is a silent reminder of the fact that nothing— not even cemeteries— is exempt from the Law of Age and Death. With enough time, nothing is left of anything. So. Live. Now.

”So. Live. Now.” could be our Psyche’s, our Soul’s, our Deep Self’s, simple message to us all.

We come into the world as a bundle of libido—life energy—dying to be expended before we die.

Expended in the simple effort to meet our life straight on,

And do our best with what confronts us in each day!

And we dodge all that can be dodged,

And escape the rest, frittering life away on trivial pursuits,

Looking for smooth and easy,

Avoiding life’s pain and troubles

(And denying what cannot be avoided),

While it waits, panics, seethes and schemes to find ways of expressing itself while there is yet time.

Time is life’s only hope.

Time is all life has.

If time isn’t spent living—in the fullest sense of the word—time is lost, never to be regained.

The unpardonable sin is life unlived.

Carl Jung said, “It is the sole purpose of the libido to strive forever forward—to lead a life that willingly accepts all dangers and ultimate decay.”

And, if we refuse to cooperate with life’s purpose to be lived, hold back, hide from the terrors of the night, and refuse to sail into the heaving waves of the wine-dark sea, having nothing to do with the dreaded responsibilities and duties incumbent upon those who would find their own way and pay the price–

If we say no to life, life says no to us, and we die dreaming of life we never lived, because we didn’t have the courage to meet the day’s demands, and take our lumps, and rack up our losses—laughing and loving it all, every bit, every day—LIFE, just as it is!

Here, NOW!

Or never.
06/01/2015 — Landsford Canal Kayakers HDR — Landsford Canal State Park, Chester County, South Carolina, May 30, 2015

“It’s as plain as the nose on your face,” is a Deep South phrase meaning “Open your eyes! See it for yourself!!”

The old Zen masters would say “Zen is like a man sitting on his ox, looking for his ox.” What could be more stupid than to not know you were sitting on what you were looking for?

But, here we are, living life, looking for life.

When all we have to do is wake up, and there it is, exactly where it has always been, right there.

We are all just a perspective shift away from seeing, hearing, understanding, knowing, doing, being, and having it made.

So, what’s the hold up?

We don’t know.

We don’t know what we don’t know.

We don’t know that we don’t know.

We are in too much of a hurry.

We want somebody to explain it to us–

To tell us what we need to know.

But, if we don’t know what they are talking about,

We will never understand what they are saying.

The first step is taking the next step mindfully.

If you can do that, it’s mindfulness all the way!
06/01/2015 — Landsford Canal Kayakers 02 – Catawba River, Landsford Canal State Park, Chester County, South Carolina, May 30, 2015

Our life is built on our choices.

Our choices flow from our options and are limited by our resources,

And are directed by what is meaningful.

What is meaningful is the key that opens the door to our life.

If you are going to be mindful of anything,

Be mindful of what is meaningful to you.

If you are going to be curious about anything,

Be curious about what is meaningful to you.

Where does meaning come from for you?

What does meaning mean to you?

What is meaningful about what is meaningful for you?

How long does a thing’s meaning last for you?

Upon what does a thing’s meaning depend for you?

What is the most meaningful thing for you?

How often do you do what is meaningful for you?

To what extent does what is meaningful for you depend upon someone else?

To what extent do you refuse to do what is meaningful for you because of someone else?

If you are going to reflect on anything, reflect on what is meaningful to you.
06/01/2015 — Portrait — Barred Owl, The Bog Garden, Greensboro, NC, 2013

Carl Jung talked about “the two million year old man” who dwells within us. He could have as easily spoken of the “two million year old woman.” He also said, “There is, within each of us, another, whom we do not know.” Our work is to know, and to collaborate with, the two million year old “other” in forming and living the life that is ours to live.

The two million year old “other” is our most valuable resource in finding our way through the morass of obstacles, options, choices and possibilities in living our life within the circumstances and conditions of our living.

Our place is to recognize the reality of this “other” within, open ourselves to him, to her, and develop our capacity to read and interpret the language he, or she, speaks in guiding our living.

That language includes, but is not limited to, dreams, daydreams, fantasies, active imagination, nudges, urges, inspirations, realizations, ideas, hunches, yearnings, inklings and notions. We have to be mindful of everything, because anything can be an opening to the unknown.
06/02/2015 — Diversion Weir – Catawba River, Landsford Canal State Park, Chester County, South Carolina, May 30, 2015 – Landsford Canal was a significant investment and well-constructed idea that went bust, like so many “good ideas” do by not taking everything into account that could be taken into account. For instance, high water on the river would be needed for this diversion weir to divert river water into the canal, with it’s locks to lift cargo boat traffic up and down to avoid the rocky shoals along the fall line of the river, insuring commercial success for the canal. Boat traffic on the river occurred during the summer and early fall when crops needed to get to market. High water on the river occurred during the winter and spring. Which gets us to:

You have to listen to EVERYTHING you are capable of hearing!

Mindfulness leads the way only when you take EVERYTHING into account–

Even the things you don’t want to hear.

YOU are the only thing standing between you and the VOID!

You cannot just listen to you when you are hearing what you want to be told.

You cannot dismiss, discount, ignore what you are ALSO saying,

And say, “But, I always listen to myself!”

Always listen to EVERYTHING you are saying, sensing, intuiting!

Your instinct is your only defense!

Your only weapon,

Your only guide!

You can pay attention to ALL you are telling yourself,

Or you can pay the price.

Your instinct speaks through your stomach.

Your interest, sense of meaning and desire speak through your heart.

Listen to your heart

AND listen to your stomach.

When all is well and they are in sync, GO!

When your stomach doesn’t care, and your heart isn’t in it, DON’T GO!

When your heart is cheering you on, and your stomach is in a knot, DON’T GO!

When your head is giving you all the wonderful reasons to go

And your stomach is in a knot,

And your heart isn’t in it,

DON’T GO!

Am I being clear here?

If the canal builder had listened to me,

There wouldn’t be a canal at Land’s Ford on the Catawba River.

Are YOU listening?

To YOU?
06/02/2015 — Landsford Canal Lock 01 — Landsford Canal State Park, Chester County, SC, May 29, 2015

I have a quick and easy immediate improvement for every marriage and life partnership, and the experience of parenthood , if embraced and applied:

I wish I had had me for a father,

And, I wish I had me for a wife.

Now, for this to work, my wife has to be working toward the same end.

She has to be living so that she wishes she had had her for a mother,

And, so that she wishes she had her for a husband.

We have to be living together in a good faith relationship toward those same ends.

Poof, like that, a marriage to die for.

Of course, there is a catch.

We aren’t always successful in actually doing what we say we are going to do.

And, neither will you be, but.

Don’t let that stop you.

Live like you need to to be able to wish you had you for a father, or mother, a husband, or a wife, or a life partner.

The improvement will be immediate and lasting, with your other’s joint commitment and participation.
06/03/2015 — Landsford Canal 02 — Landsford Canal State Park, Chester County, SC, May 29, 2015

We are all created to live in a certain way that we are not living.

And, of course, we have problems because of that.

When you are off center, out of sync, and your life has no rhythm

About it, you know it.

You feel it.

We all have to find ways to get our groove back.

To get back in the groove.

To be one with who we are and who we are built to be.

We need to get back to the home we never had

And start all over

With a different environment

And better places to be,

And people who are being who they are built to be all around us.

The trip back, or forward, to that kind of place,

And those people,

Begins with, you know the word by now, mindfulness.

How, exactly, is this place not like the place we need to be?

How, exactly, are these people not like those?

What, exactly, is the distance from who we are

To who we need to be?

We get from here to there by listening, looking, seeing, hearing,

Understand, knowing–

In a heart, stomach, kind of way–

What is happening that is not right,

And what needs to happen that would be right.

Make you and your life as it is and your life as it needs to be

The focus of reflection, examination, meditation, mindfulness,

And see what realizations occur.

Nobody can do this for you.

And you have a lot more to do than this, but.

Nothing better to do.

And you know it.

So?

It’s up to you.
06/03/2015 — Landsford Canal Lock Walls 01 — Landsford Canal State Park, Chester County, South Carolina, May 29, 2015

Being mindful is seeing, hearing, feeling, perceiving, understanding, knowing what is happening internally and externally in each situation as it arises–without judgment or opinion.

To know what is happening is to know what needs to happen in response.

It is also to know what we are capable of doing,

And what is capable of being done (what is possible) within the situation.

Then it is a a matter of having the courage to do what can be done that we are capable of doing.

It is possible to practice introspection and solitude in the middle of a crowded elevator.

Don’t think you need the ocean or the woods to be mindfully aware of your surroundings and your inner response to them.

Your life is your practice, wherever you are.

Open yourself to every here and now, and notice what is going on.
06/03/2015 — Landsford Canal Lock Walls 02 — Landsford Canal State Park, Chester County, South Carolina, May 29, 2015

We can think that our life is our to do with as we please–

That it is ours to conceive, imagine, plan, implement, establish, produce, achieve, retire from and be proud of.

We can think that.

And, we can think that our life is the most mystical, mysterious, spiritual event we can ever hope to encounter or experience.

We can think that our life has a life of its own,

And that we are privileged to be the means of its expression.

If we choose the latter perspective, our role ceases to be that of planner, designer, architect,

And becomes that of listener, seer, diviner, dowser, explorer.

We do not live our life so much as collaborate with it in its unfolding.

How is our life trying to be lived?

What is the equivalent for us that light and water would be for an oak tree, or a pine?

What does our life seek for nourishment and nurture?

What can we do to assist our life in feeling at home in the time and place of our living?

How can we better align ourselves with our life’s will for itself and its own expression?

How might we go about initiating, deepening and continuing

A dialogue with our life regarding its needs and interests,

And how we might best assist it in the time left for living?
06/04/2015 — Landsford Canal Lock Walls Detail 01 — Landsford Canal State Park, Chester County, South Carolina, May 29, 2015

If there is something we cannot allow to happen in our waking life,

We won’t be able to keep it from happening in our nighttime dreams.

If we are always pushing ahead in “real” life,

We’ll be driving a car down a steep mountain with no breaks in our dreaming life.

If we are always striving to cover all our bases and be completely prepared for every contingency in “real” life,

We will be naked, in a college class, taking an exam for which we are not prepared in our dreaming life.

Dreams are great that way.

Showing us who we are by forcing us to see who we cannot allow ourselves to be.

Our dreams at night compensate for our excesses and deficiencies during the day.

Calling us to the center.

Asking us to be more of a Genera Practitioner,

And less of a Specialist,

In our life.
06/04/2015 — Landsford Canal Lock Wall Detail 02 — Landsford Canal State Park, Chester County, SC, May 29, 2015

I’m nearing the middle of my 71st year,

And even if I live another 25 or 30 years,

I’m not going to have enough time.

I don’t have time to waste on entertaining pastimes.

On frivolous conversations.

On trivial pursuits.

On distracting pleasures.

Neither do you.

We have bigger fish to fry.

We have business to attend.

We have a life to live.

We have a 2 million year-old-self to get to know,

And live to express–

Within the context and circumstances of the 21st century.

We have no time to fool around,

Wondering what to do this weekend,

And hoping it doesn’t rain.
06/04/2015 — Queen Anne’s Lace 01 Blended — Chester County, South Carolina, May 30, 2015

You have to grow up into your own life,

And I have to grow up into mine.

We have different things that we REALLY don’t want to do,

But, it is the same process that faces each of us.

We have to square ourselves up

To the discrepancy between how things are

And how we want things to be,

Stand up and do what needs to be done.

And do it all again with the next thing that we don’t want to do,

That needs to be done.

Everything rides on our doing it just this way.

Time after time after time.

Everything.
06/05/2015 — Pitcher Plant 07 — Carolina Sandhills National Wildlife Refuge, McBee, South Carolina, June 4, 2015

There are things that cannot be said.

Things we have no business trying to say.

Things that are beyond words,

Beyond explanation,

Beyond understanding.

You do things that need to happen,

But you can’t say why you did them.

You don’t know why you did them.

We are prompted by another world–

And act in this world in ways that are commensurate with that world.

We are not in control of our own actions,

Or, better not be.

People who are in tight control of their own actions,

Are, of all people, most to be pitied.
06/06/2015 — Lily Pads in the Rain — Carolina Sandhills National Wildlife Refuge, McBee, South Carolina, June 4, 2015

One of the basic realizations is the connection between what happens, and how we respond to it, and what happens next.

People who do not grasp that connection

Freak me out.
06/06/2015 — Butterfly Weed Panorama — Landsford Canal State Park, Chester County, South Carolina, May 29, 2015

You can’t hurry your adventure along,

Or expect to “get to the finish line without running the race.”

We do each day what needs to be done that day.

Adolescence took forever.

Both for us,

And, then again, for our children.

Do not live ahead,

Or live looking ahead.

“Let the day’s own trouble be sufficient for the day.”

Aim to be what the day needs you to be,

And allow the journey to unfold in a way

That is only apparent when it is viewed backward,

To your surprise and astonishment

At having been on a journey at all.
06/06/2015 — Pitcher Plant 10 — Carolina Sandhills National Wildlife Refuge, McBee, South Carolina, June 4, 2015

You have to do the work.

No body can do it for you,

Or tell you how to do it.

Waking up,

Standing up,

Squaring up to how things are

And what needs to be done about it

And doing it with the gifts, talent, art, genus

That lie latent within you

Waiting on some situation to develop in your life

That will call them forth

To shine like lights in the darkness

As blessing and grace upon all who witness the occasion

Or hear about it.
06/07/2015 — Catawba Canoe — Catawba River, Landsford Canal State Park, Chester County, South Carolina, May 30, 2015

We participate in the evolution of the Psyche by being conscious of what was then and what is now.

The Psyche can only be what it was.

It evolved over long eons of the same old same old.

Yesterday was today and tomorrow in the really old days.

Nothing changed ever.

Well. The ice age changed things.

And the end of the dinosaurs.

The Psyche got a boost when the atmosphere settled down

And life had something to count on.

The Psyche likes to have things it can count on.

Enter the Industrial Age.

Don’t even think about the Space Age.

Ages don’t last as long as they used to.

The Stone Age, now THAT was an AGE!

So, the Psyche is slow to catch up.

Slower and slower as things speed up.

Look around. You can see that things aren’t so good with this setup.

Consciousness needs to get it’s work clothes on,

And get down to business,

Being awake to the discrepancy between how things were and how things are.

“That was then, this is now,” is dismissive.

It has to become a conscious source of realization.

We have to know WHAT was then and WHAT is now,

And how things have changed, and are changing,

And sit with that knowing so that we understand

What the problem Is between then and now,

And how the Psyche might be reeling trying to deal with now

As though it were then.

To do that, of course, you have to begin to be aware of Psyche.

Better get your work clothes on.
Used in Short Talks On Contradiction, etc., 06/07/2015 — Graham Cabin Panorama 01 — Anne Springs Close Greenway, Fort Mill, SC, April 4, 2015

Our conscious ego likes to think it is the only one in the house,

And has free rein to will what it wants

And live in the service of its wanting, willing, ways.

A will that is bound to its wants is hardly free.

The will’s freedom consists of the single choice to will what it does not want,

To place itself in the service of wants other than its own,

In a “Thy will, not mine, be done” kind of way.

Our conscious ego’s freedom lies in its ability to sacrifice itself

In the service of a will other than its own.

This would be the will of the two million-year-old self within.

When our conscious ego lives in the service of our psyche,

Working out in our life the conflicts and contradictions

Between the two worlds of psychic and physical reality–

When we live to place ourselves in accord with both worlds,

And bear in our body the agony of the tension that implies–

All is well, and there is peace at last,

Albeit with a price:

The price of “Thy will, not mine, be done”!

Which is nothing like the price we pay,

In ignoring all conflict and doing it our way alone,

With our normal, “Damn the shoreline! Full speed ahead!”

Approach to (Ha, ha) happiness ever after.
06/08/2015 — Water Lily 2015 01 — Carolina Sandhills National Wildlife Refuge, McBee, South Carolina, June 4, 2015

Introversion and solitude deepen awareness,

Enhance mindfulness,

And open the way to the Way of seeing, hearing, understanding,

Knowing, doing, and being.

The noise of life safely ensconces us in a cocoon of living

That keeps us forever from having to be awake, aware, or alive,

And leads us without thinking from the last thing to the next thing,

World without end, or even a break in the action, Amen!

You have to make your own breaks in the action.

And withdraw from the swirl of life–

Another term for “the heaving waves of the wine dark sea,”–

In order to take stock

Recollect,

Reorient,

And reform our life around a core that is OUR core,

And not someone else’s idea of the life we should be living.
06/08/2015 — Pitcher Plant 13 Blended — Carolina Sandhills National Wildlife Refuge, McBee, South Carolina, June 4, 2015

Waking people up to what they are doing,

And to what they need to be doing instead,

Is the task of the life we are living–

So that we might begin living the life that is ours to live.

Carl Jung said, “A person is ill, and that person’s illness

Is Nature’s way of healing her, of healing him”

(Or words to that effect).

Our symptoms come to wake us up,

So that we might realize what we are doing,

And what we need to be doing instead.

Waking up heals us,

Whether we are cured or not.
06/09/2015 — Red Barn White Fence Panorama 02 — Chester County, South Carolina, May 30, 2015

Our life is our life.

Reconciling ourselves with this life that we are living just as it is,

Is the first step on the spiritual journey.

The facts are not to be denied, resisted, hated, regretted, mourned, grieved, borne with depression and despair.

The facts are to be recognized and accepted for what they are,

In a this is how it is, and this is what can be done about it, and that’s that,

Kind of way.

We start with what we have done with our life,

And what our life has done to us,

Up to this point.

And, then we listen to see what needs us to do it.

We don’t think anything.

We don’t try to figure anything out:

“Maybe if I do this, maybe if I do that…”

Mindfulness, solitude, silence are the keys to what follows.

We sit, or stroll, listening, waiting, watching,

Open to all (ALL) possibilities,

Determined not to miss any door that opens.

And eager, excited, expectant,

As we look forward to seeing what it’s all leading to,

Where it is going,

With us as its faithful servant,

Enjoying, at last, the ride.
06/09/2015 — Boneyard Beach 12 BW — Botany Bay Historical Preserve, Edisto Island, South Carolina, January 2013

On one hand, there is no time to waste,

On another hand, nothing can happen before its time.

And on another hand, going fast slows things down,

And you can only speed things up by slowing things down.

Paying attention to the time that is at hand

Is the best way to spend the time,

Any time.

Just being awake, aware, and alive to the moment we are living.

Seeing, hearing, experiencing, knowing

What is happening here and now,

And what needs to be done about it.

Maybe nothing is happening,

And nothing needs to be done about it.

So we sit, watching and waiting.

Intent on knowing when a door opens

And whether we need to walk through—

And what business we need to take care of,

And what business we need to leave alone.
06/09/2015 — Like the Sign Says — Rapides Parish, Louisiana, March 22, 2015

Our stories take a turn toward a bad ending

When defiant insistence meets defiant insistence,

Or cowardly compliance.

When good faith interest in the common good

Meets good faith interest in the common good

Things take a turn toward happy every after.

Understanding this basic law of human interaction

Would go a long way toward transforming the world.

You would think.
06/10/2015 — Vicksburg Sunset HDR 06 — Vicksburg, Mississippi, March 16, 2015

God is the Stream of Life

Flowing through us,

Around us,

Within us,

Calling us to wake up

And live in accord

With the Stream of Life.

One Minute Monologues 025

03/12/2015 — 04/22/2015

03/12/2015 — Scott Creek Sunset 03 — Edisto Beach State Park, Edisto Island, SC, January 29, 2015

You find your life and live it by finding and doing what has life for you.

If it brings you to life, DO IT!

If it once brought you to life, but you put it aside because it was interfering with your life, pick it back up.

See what happens, where it leads.

In addition to giving yourself to the things that bring you to life,

Immerse yourself in art, music and nature.

Art, music and nature are the language of soul—ARE soul.

You can’t get closer to soul than art, music and nature.

If you can’t “do” art or “play” music,

Allow yourself to be stopped by art, by music.

And wander around in nature, allowing yourself to be stopped by what you find there.

“Aesthetic arrest” James Joyce called it.

Seeing, hearing, is knowing, feeling, being alive and swept up in the wonder of living.

Relish that experience.

Deepen, expand, enlarge it.

Come alive to the LIFE that is all around you,

Waiting for you to come to life in its presence

So that it might baptize you in its waters

And restore your soul,

And lead you along the way of life everlasting.
03/12/2015 — Large Flowered Trillium — Blue Ridge Parkway near Little Switzerland, NC, May 2008

You are in charge of your life.

That means you are in charge of handing yourself over to your life.

It means handing over your control of your life.

It means noticing how much time you spend arranging your life according to your ideas for your life—

Working to make this happen and to keep that from happening,

Manipulating, controlling, directing, choreographing, managing, forcing what you think ought to, and ought not to, happen—

And how much time you spend assisting, nourishing, nurturing what needs to happen,

Tending, cultivating, guarding, protecting what is trying to happen.

How much of what you call living is spent in the flow of your life,

Toward what, you do not know,

And how much is spent trying to direct the flow of your life toward ends and outcomes that are attractive to you?

Your life has a life of its own,

And it is your place to align yourself with your life’s life,

And take it where it wants to go.

You are in charge of your life,

AND you are just along for the ride.

Your responsibility consists of giving yourself over to your life,

And getting out of the way.
03/12/2015 — Trout Lily Panorama 01 — Andrew Jackson State Park, Lancaster, SC, March 12, 2015

Nobody—you could look this up—ever grew up apart from trials and ordeals.

Carl Jung said, “No one comes to consciousness without pain.”

We have to be booted out of one way of looking at things into another.

Nobody every volunteers for a change in perspective.

We live our way into maturity, acceptance, peace and grace.

The single indispensable element in the process of maturation is compassion.

Without compassion, no one ever grows up, it doesn’t matter how many trials and ordeals they go through.

There is nothing magical about trials and ordeals.

They can send you into depression and a sour disposition in spite of heavy doses of medication,

As easily as they can enlarge your perspective, transform your attitude and grow you up.

Compassion is the key.

If we could increase the compassion quotient of the species,

What a wonderful world it would be.
03/12/2015 — Cane River Pier — Natchitoches Parish, Louisiana, July 2004

There are no shortcuts, crib sheets, Cliff Notes, fast tracks, accelerated courses, or any way around living through all it takes to wake up.

Talking about waking up isn’t waking up.

There is no substitute for stepping into your life and dealing straight up with everything that comes your way.

There is no path to enlightenment, understanding, realization and awakening that does not involve doing what is hard.

You know every thing you have been through?

That’s the only way you could be where you are.

You know where you need to be?

Get your dancing shoes on.

You’re going to a party.

With the Cyclops.

He loves to dance.
03/13/2015 — Emerald Lake 01 — Yoho National Park, British Columbia, Canadian Rockies, September 2009

We just tough it out. Or go through the motions. Or cave in. Or quit.

Those are ridiculous options.

We need the way to LIFE and we get Netflix.

The next best thing.

Look around.

Everything you see is “the next best thing.”

You don’t see LIFE anywhere.

That’s because it’s inside you.

On its knees.

Praying that you will open the door and let it out.

You are what you seek.

You are looking in the wrong places.

Sit down. Shut up. And listen.

To all of the voices.

Just listen.

Until you hear the one speaking the language of your soul.

You remember your soul, don’t you?

We all start out with soul,

But we lose the connection early on,

And spend the rest of our life finding our way back to where we started.

Life is play.

How long since you played?

Your soul wants to play with you.

You are listening for the voice of play and laughter.

What could be the most fun you can imagine having?

Go there, and listen.
03/13/2015 — Elk 02 — Jasper National Park, Alberta, Canadian Rockies, September 2009

When things are right with us, we feel it.

We sense it, we know it.

And when things are not right with us, we feel it, sense it, know it.

We know, when we stop to know what we know,

When things are “a little off,”

When things are “not quite right,”

When “something is missing,

Or “out of harmony,”

Or “a bit off center” with us.

We know when we are “in the flow,” “on the beam,”

And when we are out of it, off of it.

That’s all we need to know.

When we are off track, get back on track.

Let your Knower guide you.

Follow your “feeler,” your “sensor,” your “knower,”

From being “out of the flow,” and “off center,”

To being “in the flow,” and “centered” in, “grounded” in what is LIFE for you.

It all goes so much better for you when you are there,

And so much worse for you when you are not there.

Be there. Live there.

As much as possible.

That. Is. All. There. Is. To. It.
03/13/2015 — Flyover — Canada Goose, Bog Garden, Greensboro, NC, March 9, 2015

We take what we need from each other and move on.

We have to remember to move on.

The disciples prefer the company of the master,

To doing their own work.

“Tell us once more what ‘enlightenment’ is,” they say.

Talk, talk, talk keeps them from doing anything.

Oh, they have the chores and rituals of monastic life to keep them busy,

But. They don’t have to deal with life on their own.

“Tell us again what Zen is, we can feel ourselves almost comprehending the matter.”

Talking about the doctrines, studying the scriptures, reciting the catechisms

Keep the pupils from the experiences that would transform them into teachers.

Truth is not in the books, lectures, discussions, sutras, sermons…

Truth is found in the lived experience of day-to-day life,

On our own,

Far from the comforting presence of the master.

Discomfort is the teacher.

Living our own life is the lesson.

Life is the teacher.

Living is the lesson.
03/14/2015 — Forsythia 01 — Andrew Jackson State Park, Lancaster County, SC, March 12, 2015

If you are not working with your dreams, you are missing the best part of you.

Your dreams are symbolic of you. If other people you actually know, or situations that are actual situations, appear in your dreams, the dream situation does not depict the reality of those people or situations.

Your mail delivery person is NOT having an affair with your husband or wife.

The people and situations in your dreams represent your own tendency, potential, for viewing or responding to them, or the way you actually view or respond to them.

Your dreams are about YOU, saying, “This is who and how you are,” or, “This is how it is in your life right now.”

A dream is a nocturnal snapshot, or mirror, of your current life—unless it stirs something deep emotionally within you (an horrific nightmare, say), when it is probably not about you at all, but a view of a larger, perhaps impending situation, with collective implications for your society, culture or world. It would represent something that a lot of people are facing—homelessness, poverty, oppression, war…

Your dreams are hints and guides showing you how it is with you and suggesting that you need to take what you dream into account as you wake up and step into your life.

Your dreams generally compensate for your actual attitude and behavior, and could be encouraging to you if, for example, your actual fear during the day is inhibiting your ability to live appropriately.

But, if you are living arrogantly and insensitively, your dreams will take a different tone, perhaps casting you as a drug dealer, or a prostitute.

So, play the opposite game with your dreams, and consider that the dream is saying the opposite of how things actually are in your life to call you to see “the other side” of your daytime personality.

Don’t miss what your dreams are offering you as balancing and guiding your waking life, and getting you back in synch with who you need to be.

You get what you need for your life every night in your dreams (And if you don’t remember your dreams, or even remember that you dreamed, take it as a sign that you are close to perfection and don’t need to be counter-balanced by the invisible world).

So wake up, pay attention, receive the gift!
03/14/2015 — Beach Still Life 02 — Outer Banks, Cape Hatteras National Seashore, Ocracoke Island, NC, October 2008

In light of the video below, The Incredible Power of Concentration—Miyoko Shida:

I’m balancing my feather,

And you are balancing yours.

Don’t try to help me with mine.

I won’t try to help you with yours.

For sure, don’t create turbulence for me,

Cutting on fans,

Spraying me with water from some garden hose.

I’m balancing my feather.

You balance yours.

It is enough that we know what each other is doing,

And what we are doing,

And do it.
03/14/2015 — Pyramid Mountain 04 — Athabasca River, Canadian Rockies, Jasper National Park, Alberta, September 2009

In light of the video below, The Incredible Power of Concentration—Miyoko Shida:

The Cleveland Cavaliers have a catch-phrase that guides them through their life: Stay With It!

One of AA’s motto’s is: Work The Program!

Be centered in what is important, grounded in what is important, focused on what is important, concentrating on what is important, at-one with what is important:

No. Matter. What.

No matter what is happening, or not happening, or how you feel.

You balance your feather!

You live your life!

You do your work!

You do your best in each situation as it arises and don’t kid yourself about what your best is.

You (in the words of Joseph Campbell) “get in there and do your thing, and don’t worry about the outcome!”
03/15/2015 — Trout Lily 06 — Andrew Jackson State Park, Lancaster County, SC, March 12, 2015

Mindfulness is necessary in the work to build a relationship with your life.

You have to watch what you are doing to know what you are doing.

There is nothing like attentive, compassionate, presence—you being present in your own life—

To get you where you are going.

We all love attentive, compassionate, presence when it is directed to us.

It is a rare experience, and we seek it out, and don’t want to leave it.

Attentive, compassionate, presence is requisite for intimacy.

And intimacy is requisite for awareness,

And awareness is requisite for seeing, hearing, understanding, knowing, doing, being.

Life flows from attentive, compassionate, presence.

And we know that instinctively, and are drawn to it, seeking life—

Seeking the security required to find and live our own life—

But we don’t know consciously what we are seeking,

We are simply starving for attentive, compassionate, presence,

And are drawn to it from far away.

What attracts us is striving to come forth from within us

(That is one of the 10,000 spiritual laws—the laws of spiritual development, of maturation, of growing up and being who we are,

Which is the spiritual task, the spiritual journey, the Hero’s Journey,

The journey to the Land of Promise, etc. that awaits each one of us).

We have to become an attentive, compassionate, presence to ourselves—

And as we practice it with ourselves,

It spills over and graces all of our relationships.

As we become gently, mindfully, present with ourselves,

We become that way with others.

And life comes to life within and without,

And the desert becomes a swamp, teeming with life,

And the wasteland becomes the Promised Land,

Where everyone finds what they seek and become who they are.
03/15/2015 — Scott Creek Sunset 05 — Edisto Beach State Park, Edisto Island, SC, January 29, 2015

No unexamined assumptions!

No untested hypotheses!

No unanalysed inferences!

Make these three rules with no exceptions allowed—

And vigorously uphold the high standard you have pledged to maintain!

Live to bring mindfulness to bear upon each assumption, hypothesis, inference as you make it.

Inspect each one for its degree of validity with all things fairly considered,

And the quality of good faith in your effort at seeing the validity of what you are saying.

That, alone, will make more difference than you can imagine

In the quality of your life,

And in the caliber of your impact upon life around you.
03/16/2015 — Vicksburg Sunset 01 — I-20 Bridge, Mississippi River, Vicksburg, Mississippi, March 16, 2015

Heart seems to me to be the Spirit with which we do things—

The enthusiasm, dedication, determination, willfulness, good faith effort that we make in the service of what is important.

How completely we are into what we do.

Soul, or Psyche, seems to me to be our connection with the unconscious (because we are not conscious of it), invisible world

Body is our collection of physical and psychological senses which orient us in relation to the physical and psychic worlds.

Head, or Mind is our logical, rational way of figuring out what to do about what we sense/feel/intuit/know needs to be done.

When we have Heart, Soul, Body and Mind aligned and working in sync, we are at one with all that is holy and divine.

We can all say, “The Father and I are one,” and be right about it.

And, if they say we are true human beings, they will be right about it.
03/17/2015 — American Buddha — Southern Cemeteries, 2015

Being transparent to ourselves means knowing how we feel about our life.

Not knowing how we feel about our life,

Or denying that we feel the way we feel,

Or immersing ourselves in the behaviors of denial

(Generally referred to as “addiction”),

And not knowing—or caring—how we feel,

Or pretending that we feel some way other than the way we feel,

And refusing ever to sit down with ourselves and feel what we feel,

And know what we know,

And decide what that means for us,

And what we are going to do about it,

Is the single thing keeping us from aligning ourselves with the life that is right for us,

And working it into the life we are living,

So that the life that is wrong for us has to make room for the life that is right for us,

And the life that is right for us begins to redeem and transform the life that is wrong for us,

And we become the savior we seek in all the wrong places,

In all the wrong ways.
03/18/2015 — How Many Hopes — Southern Cemeteries, 2015 — “How many hopes like buried here.” Engraved on the tombstone of Anna Smith Bridgforth, January 28, 1873 – December 6, 1894

We hate in others what we cannot face in ourselves.

We love in others what we cannot see in ourselves.

Strong emotion in an indicator of something not recognized in ourselves.

The other people in your life will show you you—

If you have the courage to look.

The people who are always trying to clean up society?

The Prohibitionists, the Teetotalers, the Abstainers?

And their modern-day equivalents?

A threat to every living thing—

Because they do not see the Enemy in themselves.
Used in Short Talks On Contradiction, etc., 03/18/2015 — Kisatchie Falls 01 — Kisatchie Bayou, Kisatchie, Louisiana, March 18, 2015

Contradictions run through the heart of life.

God is conflicted and torn between justice and love,

And, if you buy into Orthodox Christian theology,

Jesus paid the price of God’s inability to find a way out of the corner he painted himself into.

In the deep south, we would say to God, “Well. You did it to your own self! Don’t be asking us to be responsible for your shortsightedness! You should have seen this coming, what with omniscience, and omnivision and all.”

My point is the contradiction is the heart of reality, both visible and invisible.

And it is the gift of consciousness to be aware of it—

To bring it to light, and reconcile what can be reconciled and to manage what cannot be reconciled.

This is bearing our cross, and coming to terms with how things are and with how things also are, and squaring ourselves up to the facts that will not be squared up with each other.

This is the work of growing up. It is the work of spiritual development. It is the work of psychological maturation. It is the work of wholeness.

And it doesn’t get the press it deserves.

It is the most important thing.
03/19/2015 — Cypress Swamp Panorama 02 — Natchitoches Parish, Louisiana, March 19, 2015

We have to live out of our own personal authority in determining what is good for us, and what is bad,

What is right for us, and what is wrong,

What is now for us, and what is not yet, or never.

What is life for us, and what is death.

No one can hand us our life.

We alone know where life is to be found.

We have to trust ourselves to us,

And do what we know needs doing.
03/20/2015 — Kisatchie Panorama 02 — Red Dirt District, Kisatchie National Forest, Natchitoches Parish, Louisiana, March 18, 2015

We have to foster our own relationship with whatever we choose to call it, because no name suffices—

The Tao that can be named is not the eternal Tao.

If we don’t want to take the time, make the effort, and go to the trouble of fostering our own relationship with Transcendent Presence, we make a joke of it.

“Just tell us what to believe, Preacher!

Just tell us what to think!

Just tell us what to do!

(But don’t make it too objectionable,

And make sure it doesn’t interfere with our life!)

Because we don’t want to get it wrong,

And end up in the Bad Place for eternity!”

Save me from those who would have me save them!

Children in a room filled with toys have no trouble figuring out how to play,

And it would be a violation of all that is good and right

For adults to give them instruction in the matter:

You play with this toy like this, not like that,

And be sure not to play with those toys over there—they are Bad Toys!

(What is it exactly that makes Bad Words bad?)

We don’t have to be told how to pray

Any more than children have to be told how to play.

We are quite capable of figuring out our relationship with Transcendent Reality

All by ourselves.

All it takes is paying attention, being mindfully aware of all connects us

With the Source and Ground of Life and Being.
03/20/2015 — Trout Lily 08 — Andrew Jackson State Park, Lancaster County, SC, March 12, 2015

I don’t know what you are going to tell those inner accusers when they ask you (again) why you didn’t do better with the options, resources and prospects that were yours to work with,

But, I tell mine, “I was, am, and will be, finding my way!”

It isn’t as though I am deliberately screwing up,

Misreading the signs,

Shooting myself in the foot,

Wandering off the path,

Being stupid…

It’s that I’m still figuring it out—

How things are and what to do about it.

This is not easy.

And I wonder why my Inner Accusers wait for me to miss a cue to pounce.

Why don’t they come forth with timely suggestions and directions BEFORE I miss the turn?

“You would have a lot less to complain about,”

I tell them, again,

“If you would speak up ahead of time,

Instead of waiting until after the fact

To voice your opinions of my decisions and choices!”

Shuts them up for a while.
03/20/2015 — Valley Hill — Westbound US Hwy 82 meets the Mississippi Delta approaching Lefore County and Greenwood, Mississippi, March 16, 2015

What are you doing to nurture and nourish your life?

To foster and enhance your relationship with your life?

To be mindful of your life

And of what your life is asking of you

In each situation as it arises?

Lao-tzu said, “The Tao adjusts excess and deficiency

So there is perfect harmony.”

It is our place to cooperate with the Tao,

And maintain the harmony of our own life,

Keeping excess and deficiency

Within an acceptable range of balance and harmony.

How much time and attention for you,

And how much for everything else?
03/21/2015 — Vicksburg Sunset 05 — I-20 bridge and Old US 80 bridge and railroad trestle, Vicksburg, Mississippi, March 16, 2015

We are here to grow up.

And, we do that by not running from our life.

We grow up by coming to terms with, facing, squaring up to and dealing with the trials and ordeals of life in space and time.

There is no other path to the treasure.

The trials and ordeals foster realizations that transform perspective and perception in ways that are referred to as “growing up.”

Growing up is a way of seeing that produces a way of living that is recognized as being grown up.

The trials and ordeals that result in one person’s maturation, result in another person’s flight into escape and denial.

Living separates those who have what it takes to come to life and be alive from those who do not.

Will there be life after birth is the question we all live to answer.
03/12/2015 — Yazoo River Delta Farmland Panorama — Midnight, Mississippi, March 16, 2015

A sense of the transcendent source of life and being

Is experienced as an encounter with the numinous, holy, sacred, invisible world beyond words, space and time,

Through such thresholds as music, art, literature and nature.

It can be as varied as planting tomatoes

And translating the works of Aristotle from Greek texts.

It has been described as a moment of “aesthetic arrest” by James Joyce,

Wherein we are stopped by awe, wonder, beauty and held entranced,

Not knowing how long we have been enthralled

By the engagement with more than can be explained or understood.

This is the ground of true religion,

And has nothing to do with doctrine or dogma, theology or beliefs,

But exists as a connection between the worlds of conscious, logical, physical, rational reality

And unconscious (because we are not conscious of it), invisible, irrational reality.

If you are going to go in search of something,

Go in search of places that serve as thresholds to a reality beyond reality.
03/21/2015 — Never Had A Flat Tire — Vintage John Deere Tractor, the first one owned by Tay (Octavia M.) Parker, Tay Parker Place, Midnight, Mississippi, March 16, 2015

Kindle a flame.

Keep it burning.

Dark times are a Tea Party away.

Mississippi Governor Phil Bryant and his appointees on the State College Board have decided to not renew the contract of Ole Miss Chancellor Dan Jones, who has worked successfully to remove vestiges of the Old South Confederacy from the image of the University.

A glance at every Tea Party controlled state reveals regression.

If you aren’t progressing, you are regressing.

Let’s all gather around the book burning barrel, and raise our hymns of praise to the God of Regressive Religion and Politics!

No, let’s not.

Let’s realize what we are up against. Register to vote. Vote every time we get the opportunity (Increasingly restricted though they be), and Do Not Vote Republican!

If you’re a RE-publican, you are RE-gressive.

Should be a bumper sticker.

Kindle a flame.

Keep it burning.
03/22/2015 — Lake Chicot 01 — Lake Chicot State Park, Ville Platte, Louisiana, March 22, 2015

If we look and listen,

We hear and see us everywhere.

Everything is a message about us, to us.

What we see and how we see it—

How we react to the experience of our context—

Tells us all we need to know about us,

In order to change what needs to be changed and do what needs to be done.

It is as though we are living in a dream,

And the dream is trying to tell us what we need to know about ourselves

So that we might get our feet under us,

And live grounded in what is important,

Toward what is important.

We have to interpret the dream

And put ourselves in accord with it,

In order to be who we are,

And live as our life needs us to live it.

All we need to know is “right there’

For those who have eyes to see, ears to hear, and a heart that understands.

We have to learn to read our life as a message from us to us about us.

It takes reflection on our experience to form new realizations

And shape our life according to our life’s idea of itself.

When we serve our life’s need of us

Things go better for us than when we try to wrestle our life

Into alignment with our idea for it.
Used in Short Talks On Contradictions, etc., 03/23/2015 — Kisatchie Falls Panorama 01 — Kisatchie Bayou, Natchitoches Parish, Kisatchie, Louisiana, March 18, 2015

Disparity makes us whole.

It is wrong to try to erase our contradictions, our discordances—

To hide them (or hide from them), deny them, pretend them away.

Pull them into the light.

Acknowledge their existence.

Honor them for the part they play in making you who you are

(And forcing your to recognize who you also are),

And become aware of the strengths

That each brings to life in your life.

We are oppositional to the core.

Wholeness is polarity, recognized and embraced—

And allowed to work its magic

In helping us find the way of life

Through life, into life, for all of life,

To our everlasting astonishment and admiration.
03/24/2015 — Little Eva Plantation Panorama — Pecan Orchard, Natchitoches Parish, Cloutierville, Louisiana, March 23, 2015

We have to be strong in our own cause.

We are in charge of finding and living our own life—

Of taking care of our own business.

We can expect very little in the way of assistance and cooperation,

And very much in the way of resistance and opposition.

We prove ourselves to be worthy of assistance

By being undaunted by resistance.

Those of us who quit over hangnails and stumped toes

Don’t begin to have what it takes to manage

“The heaving waves of the wine dark sea.”

We have to guard our own borders

And draw our own lines,

And be strong in our own cause.
03/24/2015 — Cypress Swamp Panorama 05 B&W — Natchitoches Parish, Louisiana, March 19, 2015

Our life takes shape around what is important to us.

If your life isn’t working as it is—

If you don’t feel at-one and at-peace with your life as it is—

You change your life by changing what is important to you.

Look at your list of “Non-Negotiables,”

The things you aren’t changing for anything ever no matter what.

That’s the list that is hanging you up.

You are stuck in the life you are living because of the things you won’t change about it.

Your life as it is currently is working out to your advantage.

You get to whine, moan and complain about things being the way they are,

And you don’t have to do anything to make anything different

About the way you are living.

That’s a deal worth dying for.
03/24/2015 — Lake Martin Sunset 02 2015 — Breaux Bridge, St. Martin Parish, Louisiana, March 24, 2015

How’s this for a political platform?

Those we can help have to help.

Those who need help have to be helped.

Whatever it takes to put that into effect is what we elect politicians to do.

Government exists to help the people.

Of the people, by the people, for the people.

This was before corporations were people.

And the Right To Life folks have to understand

That Right To Life extends beyond birth to ALL of life—

That babies and their mothers have a right to a full life,

Including proper nutrition from birth through childhood and youth and adulthood,

So that no one is without available food,

And that affordable child care and health care are part of every child’s future,

And part of every family’s foundation.

Government starts with this basic premise,

And this basic promise to all citizens,

Inclusive and without exception.

I don’t see anything debatable about this,

Or why anyone would want to argue with it.
03/26/2015 — Fishing Pier Panorama B&W — Hayes Coulee, Avery Island, Louisiana, March 25, 2015

Good in the extremes becomes evil.

Take a good person and have him, have her, become proud of his, of her, goodness.

Pride becomes inflation, becomes arrogance, becomes evil.

I won’t say that evil becomes good, but I will say that

Evil produces good in opposition to evil,

And that some of the effects of evil’s impact are good.

The idea of Absolute Good and Absolute Evil is a fiction

That we are often asked to embrace as truth.

Perhaps, we should think instead

Of the blessings and grace of both good and evil.

We are blessed by our experience with grace

In the unfolding of our life.

Do not think in terms of “good” and “evil,”

But in terms of blessings and grace.

We are blessed by the grace of evolving realization

Through our reflection on our encounters with “good” and “evil.”

We grow up in ways we could never have otherwise managed

By our brush with “good” and with “evil.”

Growing up is the ideal

We grow up when we come to terms with life as it is,

When we enlist ourselves in the service of what is important,

And work to bring into being what needs to happen

In each situation as it arises.

Both “good” and “evil” enable us to grow up in this way,

Sometimes “evil” produces better results than “good.”

Life is strange that way—

And countless others.

We are blessed by the grace of our experience

As we open ourselves to our experience,

And reflect on it in ways that take everything into account.

This kind of reflection is the heart of life and being,

And is waiting to bless all who practice it

With the grace of realization,

Which is also called Enlightenment.
03/26/2015 — Egret Ballet 01 — Great White Egret, Avery Island Egret Rookery, Avery Island, Louisiana, March 25, 2015

The compassionate acceptance of everything—

Including our dispasionate refusal to accept anything—

Is the foundation of life and peace,

And the source of the transformation of the world.

Everything that has happened to us

Is exactly what we need to be who we are.

And is exactly what we need to bring to life the good

That is capable of coming to life in us and through us into the world.

We are the artist.

Our art is our life.

We shape and form the gift we are to offer to the time and place of our living.

We come not to receive, to get, to have, acquire, attain, achieve,

But to give ourselves in the service of values worthy of us:

Grace, mercy, kindness, peace and good faith with all living things.

We bring our art into being with the compassionate acceptance of everything.
03/27/2015 — Egret Ballet 04 — Great White Egret, Avery Island Egret Rookery, Avery Island, Louisiana, March 25, 2015

We feed the horse that carries us to meet our fate

Or to serve our destiny.

Our outcomes—and those generated by forces quite beyond us—

Are the cooperative consequence between horse and rider.

Some horse and some rider.

Alcoholism and drug addiction are not accidental.

Both evil and beneficence have long histories

Of precedent and intention.

We do not live in a vacuum.

Our antecedents precede us,

And carry us to destinations we acquiesce to in advance

With indifference, disinterest

And absent-minded neglect of our own purpose and direction.

Who is guiding our boat on its path through the sea?

Why aren’t we in the wheelhouse?

Exerting conscious influence over our life

By the way we hold the reins?
03/27/2015 — D U C D B? — Hovering Carpenter Bee, Lake Martin Rookery boardwalk, Breaux Bridge, St. Martin Parish, Louisiana, March 25, 2015

You have to live out of your own personal authority—

Out of your own sense of what is relevant and meaningful to you—

Out of your own feel for what is valid and vital, good and right for you.

When you catch yourself wandering without direction or purpose,

Stop and listen within.

The guidance you seek is there—

You simply have to make yourself available to it.

Where is the noise coming from in your life?

What is drowning out, jamming, overriding, the signals from within?

Your place is to listen to the You That Knows—

NOT to the You That Wants.

Learning to distinguish between those two You’s,

And following the lead of the You That Knows,

Will set you on track,

And center you in the path with your name on it.

The going may not be smooth and easy,

But it will be exactly what you need to become who you are,

And live as a blessing and a grace upon all who come your way.
03/27/2015 — Cypress Swamp 10 Panorama — Lake Martin, Breaux Bridge, St. Martin Parish, Louisiana, March 24, 2015

It is a popular self-help-spirituality notion to boo the ego.

Bad ol’ ego is the root of all our problems,

And if we just get rid of the ego, everything will be fine.

This is called the Doctrine of the Evil Ego.

“Ban the Ego and Be Well!”

The ego is though of as “illusion.”

Well. Who is it that is thinking the ego is “illusion”?

Get rid of the ego and who is there to think at all?

The conscious ego is all there is to connect us with conscious reality.

To get rid of the ego is to blink out of consciousness,

And to cease to exist as a conscious, willing, being.

Who is there to be enlightened if there is no ego?

Who is there to change the baby and feed the dog?

Getting rid of the ego is not going to help us in any way.

Waking the ego up is the path to take.

Whom does the ego serve, is the question.

The awakened ego can very well enlist itself in the service of mind, body, heart and soul—

In the service of the good of our entire being.

We can be one with that which is good for us,

With that which is right for us,

With that which is who we are and what we are to be about.

An ego that is in full accord with highest good of mind-body-heart-soul

Is my idea of a True Human Being,

And well worth having around.
03/28/2015 — S! I C D B! D U? — Hovering Carpenter Bee, Lake Martin Rookery boardwalk, Breaux Bridge, St. Martin Parish, Louisiana, March 24, 2015

The most important thing is self-reflection, self-realization.

The two are one.

Self-reflection fails if it does not result in self-realization.

Then it is like looking in the mirror and not seeing what is there.

Self-reflection/realization is the essential act of being and becoming who we are.

Self-reflection/realization is a solitary pursuit.

The gurus can’t make a buck off of you if you are into self-reflection/realization.

They have to block your way to the truth of who you are by telling you who you are—

And who you are supposed to be.

You are nothing if you aren’t paying to listen to some guru tell you The Truth,

And explain to you the doctrines and sutras of their religion/philosophy/theology,

And make you as they are.

Where do you think the first guru got it?

Self-reflection/realization.

That’s enlightenment.

Realization.

Awakening.

So.

Go for a walk with yourself,

Or, go sit down with yourself,

And reflect on who you are and what you are about and how it is with you and what you are doing about it because of it,

Until realization dawns

And there you are.

Now what?

B. U.

C?
03/28/2015 — Great Egret in Flight 01 — Lake Martin, Breaux Bridge, St. Martin Parish, Louisiana, March 24, 2015

Each of us has a nature that is peculiar to us, and partially shared by those who are similar to us.

It goes better for us when we live in ways that are consonant to our nature,

And it goes less well for us when we live in ways that contrast with our nature.

If our job requires us to be an extravert,

And we tend naturally toward introversion,

We will be wise to factor in quiet time after hours

To nourish and nurture that part of us which is tortured without mercy during the workday.

Now that I am retired, I play the introvert card with abandon,

Refusing to wear a watch, answer the phone, or return calls until it suits my fancy, as they probably still say in the deep south.

I have a lot of catching up to do, and enjoy being slow about it.
03/29/2015 — Cypress Swamp Panorama 13 B&W — Lake Martin, Breaux Bridge, St. Martin Parish, Louisiana, March 24, 2015

The solution to all of your problems—and the origin of all of your Real Problems—with life is to find what you can do with passion, and do it with all your heart.

When Jesus said, “Pick up your own cross every day, and follow me,” he was saying, “Don’t be surprised if it is hard to live your own life—do what is hard in the service of your life, as you see me doing that.”

When Jesus died on the cross, it was as though he was saying, “Do not let anything keep you from living with integrity—that is living aligned with the life that is yours to live—living the life you can live with passion and purpose. Remember me when you think it is unbearable and that you must quit in the service of what needs you to do it, and do what is hard No Matter What!”

When Jesus said, “Those who seek to save their life will lose it, and those who lose their life for my sake and the gospel’s will find it,” he was saying, “There are 10,000 ways to die. Make sure all of your deaths are all in the service of your life—the life that needs you to live it. And understand the gospel to be: Do what is hard in the service of what needs to be done, with the gifts that are yours to give, and let the outcome be the outcome, because the way to life is doing what is hard in the service of life.”

Jesus said and did what all those who know what he is talking about and doing have said and done.

Yet, Jesus is preached by those who do not understand what he was talking about or what he was doing.

And so, the mess that passes for religion and for life.

But the solution to all of your problems—and the origin of all of your Real Problems—with life is to find what you can do with passion, and do it with all your heart. No matter if it is hard. No matter what.
03/29/2015 — Cypress Swamp 02 — Lake Martin, Breaux Bridge, St. Martin Parish, Louisiana, March 24, 2015

Ideally, your life will take shape around your general disposition.

If you force yourself to “be who you are not,” and live in ways that are out of accord with the natural drift of your interests and spirit, you will be symptomatic and no fun to be around (even though you may be the center of all the parties you can squeeze into a weekend, or week).

What do you enjoy and detest? How do you like to spend your money and your time.

Plop yourself down in a shopping center with every store imaginable tucked into a ten acre plot, and which stores will you browse through and which will you avoid entirely?

Or walk into the magazine section of a book store. Which magazines do you gravitate to, and which do you walk past without pause?

Are you a morning person or a night person? Beach person or mountain person? Pet person or non-pet person?

Do you thrive in a group of people, or do better with one-on-one conversation, or prefer the quiet pleasure of your own company?

What are your tendencies and proclivities?

Choose your beliefs according to how well they work with your disposition. No belief is authoritative and absolutely without question True Belief. All belief is opinion all decked out in its finest attire. So, choose beliefs that fit you well.

If the spiel of orthodox fundamentalism strikes a cord with you, go with it, no matter who looks askance at the idea.

If it feels better to believe in life after death, or the joys of heaven and the everlasting agonies of hell, than to believe death is just cutting out the light, have at it.

Or have at it the other way, if that has a calming effect on your soul.

You are in charge of listening to your body—it got here first, you know. You came along some time later. Let your body and your body’s disposition guide you in your living. You could pick worse guides, and they are aplenty.
03/30/2015 — Rosette Spoonbill Collage — Along the approach to Rip van Winkle Gardens, New Iberia, Louisiana, March 25, 2015

As long as you have your wits about you, it is never too late to start living the life that is your life to live.

It is never too late to start living mindfully aware and true to yourself—

Transparent to yourself and

In accord with both inner and outer realities.

You only have to bear the pain of realization

In order to receive the grace of realization,

And, “Get in there and do your thing,

(With compassion for “the whole catastrophe”)

Without worrying about the outcome.”
03/30/2015 — Kisatchie Falls Panorama 03 — Kisatchie Bayou, Natchitoches Parish, Kisatchie, Louisiana, March 18, 2015

We laugh or cry in the presence of truth.

We generally say of truth that it is beautiful.

The beauty of truth, the truth of beauty: One thing.

What do we call it? Truth? Beauty?

The experience is what we know and can’t say.

Truth or Beauty as a word is far removed from the impact of the experience.

We laugh or cry in response to the experience,

But we rarely ever laugh or cry in response to the word “Truth,” or “Beauty.”

The experience of Truth/Beauty, Beauty/Truth is an experience with the ineffable, the inexpressible, the numinous, the divine.

It is an encounter with as much of God as we can encounter.

Beauty is God is Truth.

God is Truth is Beauty.

Truth is Beauty is God.

The words do not contain the experience, but point to it,

As if to say, “Oh, you know, THAT!”

THAT which brings forth laughter and tears.

You know, THAT.

You know?
03/30/2015 — Trout Lily 12 — Andrew Jackson State Park, Lancaster County, South Carolina, March 30, 2015

The path we follow is Nature’s path.

It isn’t something we make up,

Some goal we set for ourselves.

“I think I’ll be a ballerina. No! A chef! No! A professional bowler!”

We can’t be just anything, or something different every year.

Our compass is an internal gyroscope

Tuned to the Lodestar with our name on it from before we were born.

An acorn grows into an oak.

What’s your seed?

There you are.

Live against the grain and you won’t like it, or last long.

Put yourself in accord with your inner drift of soul

And you will reap benefits that have nothing to do with salary levels

Or signing bonuses.

If you wonder if a particular direction is right for you,

Sit quietly for a while, listening to your body.

Your stomach knows the things

Your mind is trying to figure out.

Used in Short Talks on Contradiction, etc., 03/31/2015 — Rue Anenome 2015 01 — McDowell Nature Preserve, Mecklenburg County, Charlotte, North Carolina, March 30, 2015

We have to work our life into our life.

We have to honor the life that is ours to live AND live the life we are living.

We live with a foot in each world,

Walk two paths at the same time.

It’s the original form of multitasking.

We have to fit who we are into who the life we are living requires us to be.

I looked out the window a lot when I was in school,

But I was in school,

And I knew I needed to be outside with the woods and streams,

Lakes and ponds,

And I knew staying in school was the path that served my path—

Even as it denied access to it.

Our contradictions are not always antagonistic.

Perpendicular paths may form a circle of wholeness.

We have to work it out,

Doing this with that in mind,

Never losing sight of the Lodestar,

Never cutting ourselves off from the center of life and being,

We do what sustains our life on two levels.

We stay in school and look out the window a lot.
Used in Short Talks On Politics, 03/31/2015 — Bayou Boeuf Panorama — Lecompte, Louisiana, March 22, 2015

When Jesus said, “Inasmuch as you have done it to the least of my brothers and sisters, you have done it unto me,” and “Inasmuch as you have not done it to the least of my brothers and sisters, you have not done it unto me,”

He sets aside the idea of religion in any way freeing us from our responsibility to be helpful to those who need our help—no matter who they are or what we think of them.

Those who can help have to help.

Those who need help have to be helped.

No one can be free from the obligation to be helpful.

No appeal to “religious freedom” can remove us from the requirement of a cup of cold water to those who are thirsty,

From the burden of coming “not to be served, but to serve” regardless of how inconvenient or distasteful that might be.

Or from the call to “love one another,” to “love your neighbor as yourself,” to “do unto others as you would have them do unto you.”

What kind of religion is it that frees us from the fundamental concern for the well-being of other human beings?
04/01/2015 — Round-Lobed Hepatica Panorama — Andrew Jackson State Park, Lancaster County, South Carolina, March 12, 2015

We all have concerns, and we all appear to be unconcerned about them.

The commercials so people happily going about their lives, unconcerned about their concerns.

We seem to think that the idea is to live unconcerned about our life, enjoying ourselves, and looking for the next party or the next wonderful thing to buy.

I think we are here to deal responsibly and appropriately with our concerns.

Life is a full-time concern.

What are your concerns?

How are you facing them?

Dealing with them?

Caring about them?

What help do you need in facing, dealing with, and caring about them?

Where do you find the help you need in managing/living your life?

Where do you go to talk about your life,

What you are concerned about,

Afraid of?

People talk all of the time and say nothing of anything important about themselves and their life.

There is no place in our life to be concerned about our life.

Diversion, distraction, escape and denial are our primary concerns.

Netflix and a working remote are all we need.

03/31/2015 — Cypress Panorama 13 — Lake Martin, Breaux Bridge, St. Martin Parish, Louisiana, March 24, 2015

Where had you rather be?

What had you rather be doing?

The answers to those questions open the door to who you are.

When you find the place where you don’t want to be anywhere else,

Doing anything else,

You are at the center of who you are,

Grounded upon your Foundation Stone,

Anchored in your Self/Soul,

Doing the work that is yours to do,

In the service of your own business.

There you are.

Go there often.

Do that.

See where it goes.
04/01/2015 — Forsythia 02 — Andrew Jackson State Park, Lancaster County, South Carolina, March 30, 2015

Compassion is a way of knowing that surpasses all other forms.

Via compassion, we know another, ourselves, all sentient beings.

Without compassion, we think we know.

With compassion, we know.

Compassion cannot be faked.

Scam artists can tell you what you want to hear,

But they have no sense of YOU beyond your general similarity with others of your ilk.

How YOU stand apart from the rest, they have no idea.

And they don’t begin to hear you, see you, understand you, know you.

And they certainly don’t care about you.

How often in your life have you been cradled in the eyes of compassion?

Heard with a heart that understands?

We usually remember where we have found compassion.

Have we learned to practice it, is the question.

To be a source of it?

To grace the world with compassionate presence?

The world is dying for it, you know.

Why would the world be different from the rest of us?

Live to bring compassion to life in your life.

And know the time and place of your living—yourself and your neighbors—

Like these things cannot be know any other way.
04/02/2015 — Cypress Swamp 03 B&W — Lake Martin, Breaux Bridge, St. Martin Parish, Louisiana, March 24, 2015

My doctor and acupuncturist are always asking, “How’s your energy level?”

I’m always responding, “I have plenty of energy for the things I like to do and none at all for the things I don’t like to do.”

There is where we belong,

And, there is where we have no business being.

What is your business? What is not your business?

Where do you belong? Where are you out of place?

Of course the catch is that what we have to do to pay the bills works against what we pay the bills to do.

We do what we don’t like to do in order to do what we like to do.

This is the essential conflict.

And we have to make our peace with it.

One way of life kills us and the other way of life restores us to life.

Think of the way of life that is killing you as the sacrifice you make

To live the way of life that enlivens you and is your soul’s true joy.

Walk two paths at the same time.

Consciously, deliberately, willfully, mindfully.

And, when you don’t have to do what you don’t like to do—

Don’t do it!
04/02/2015 — Bluits 2015 01 — McDowell Nature Preserve, Mecklenburg County Parks & Recreation, Charlotte, NC, April 2, 2014

There should be a rule:

We have to face our own ghosts

And call out our own demons.

No running, escaping, hiding, pretending, ignoring, dismissing, discounting, denying.

How much of our life has been spent under the burden ghosts and demons

Unacknowledged, unnamed?

Enough!

Who are they?

Drag them out in the open

Look them in the eye

And tell them how it is:

“No more overt operations!

My eyes are on you all and I will know when you are making my life hell—

And I will call a stop to it!”

We will never out live our past,

So we must out-grow it.

Face it. Square up to it. Acknowledge it. Accept the fact of it. What happened (or failed to happen) happened )or failed to happen).

Now what?

In what ways is that going to continue to impact your life from this point forward?

In what ways is it NOT going to haunt you, inhibit you, harass you or harm you ever again?
04/03/2015 — Bloodroot 2015 01 — McDowell Nature Preserve, Mecklenburg County Parks & Recreation, Charlotte, NC, April 2, 2014

Wealth is a waste.

Money is only good for a grubstake in the service of creativity and imagination—

Which I take to be the essence of spirituality.

Spirituality apart from creativity and imagination is as much of a waste as wealth apart from creativity and imagination is.

Yet, think of how impoverished both wealth and spirituality are in the world as it is.

You don’t look to wealth or to what passes for spirituality/religion to provide creativity and imagination.

Spirituality is all bound up with rules, doctrines, disciplines that pass along The Way exactly as it was received 10,000 years ago, unaltered and unchanging.

True Belief is Old Belief.

It’s the way they did it way back then.

Wealth is concerned only with producing more wealth and maintaining the wealth that has been produced.

Both wealth and spirituality are closed circles, maintaining themselves, without point or purpose over time.

In this way, they become like dragons guarding the treasure. Dragons never do anything with the treasure—what’s a dragon going to do with jewels and gold or virgins?

The dragon is just there to make sure nothing ever becomes of the treasure it guards.

That’s wealth and spirituality for you.

Creativity and imagination are in the hands of the artists, and artisans, musicians, writers, poets, and stand-up comedians (the court jesters) of every age—

Who dry up and shrivel away once they become wealthy or hailed as the spiritual artist and master of the age, and everybody starts doing art the way Whomever does art.
04/03/2015 — Rue Anemone 2015 02 — McDowell Nature Preserve, Mecklenburg County Parks & Recreation, Charlotte, NC, April 2, 2015

Ah, where would we be without our conflicts and concerns!

Ours is the on-going, eternal, never-ending task

Of making our peace with our life,

And no matter what our future holds,

We’ll have to make our peace with it,

On and on, song without end, amen.

Once we make our peace with having to make our peace—i

Instead of thinking, “This song should be over by now,”—

The quicker we get down to the business of making our peace

With whatever is the present source of conflict and concern,

And let nature take its course,

Through the trials and ordeals of our days.

We are forever growing up, it seems,

So we give ourselves over to it,

And are carried along by the currents of our life,

Like a cork on the water, enjoying what can be enjoyed of the ride,

And letting what cannot be enjoyed go without regret

When the time appointed for its leaving arrives

(Which sometimes cannot come soon enough!).

04/01/2015 —
04/01/2015 —
04/04/2015 — Peach Blossoms 2015 01 — Springs Farms Orchard, Fort Mill, South Carolina, April 2, 2015

Carl Jung said, “Aging is not a process of inexorable decline, but a time for the progressive refinement of what is essential.”

As we get older, we have time for fewer things.

We have to decide what is important—what is essential—and what is not.

“How important is this to me?” is a filter everything must pass through.

We cannot do it all.

The choices we make regarding how we will spend our time

Are “the bard that tells the tale”

About who we understand ourselves to be,

And what we understand ourselves to be about.

We are about “the progressive refinement of what is essential.”

We are getting down to the heart of the matter.

We have a wealth of life experience to guide is away

From what is apparently important to what is actually important.

We have to decide, consciously, for ourselves what matters most to us,

And spend what remains of our life in the service of those things,

Continuing to progressively refine our idea of what is important

About the things we think are important

Until we find the gold,

The Grail, the Philosopher’s Stone,

At the end of the Quest.
04/0w/2015 — Dogwood Branch 2015 01 B&W — Indian Land, South Carolina, April 4, 2015

We have to develop, and live out of, our relationship with the Self within—

The Person at the heart of our soul,

The center of our psyche.

You would think they would tell us about this early on,

And help us with the process.

If anything, they hand us theology and doctrine

And tell us to believe what they tell us.

How much of what they told you to believe has been helpful?

How much of it has been borne out in your experience?

I’ll speak for myself:

The way they told me things were

Is not the way things are.

We spend much of our life unlearning the things we were taught,

And figuring out on our own

How to find and live the life that is our life to live.

Which starts with developing, and living out of, our relationship with the Self within.
04/05/2015 — Peach Blossoms 2015 02 — Springs Farms Orchard, Fort Mill, South Carolina, April 2, 2015

They don’t tell you that life can beat you to death,

Beat you to wishing you were dead,

Beat you beyond caring whether you live or die.

They don’t tell you anything that enables you to live

With life running over you with 18 wheelers and locomotives,

And smashing you with one disappointment,

One loss,

One devastating tragedy,

One heartbreaking catastrophe

After another.

They don’t tell you that living can take the life right out of you,

And what to do about it when it does.

All they say with their bright, cheery, smiles,

Is that God loves you,

And to prove it, he sent Jesus to die in your place

So he could get over being rejected by Adam and Eve

(Never mind what that has to do with you, and don’t push them

About that because it gets really sketchy there)

And welcome you to heaven when you die

(Which can’t come soon enough

With all the things that are worse than death that keep coming your way).

I have a different take.

Jesus didn’t die to save you from your sins so you wouldn’t have to die

(What’s that all about? Of course, we die!)

Jesus died as an audio-visual aid,

A living symbol,

Saying throughout the ages,

“This is how it is. Don’t think it won’t happen to you. How you take it makes all the difference.”

Jesus did not sacrifice himself on the cross to pay any ransom.

Jesus sacrificed himself on the cross

Because self-sacrifice is the nature of life in this world.

Self-sacrifice is the victory of life over death,

Not just for Jesus, but for each one of us as well.

We all give ourselves up for the sake of those who need us—

For the sake of That Which Needs Us.

And receive ourselves back,

To give ourselves up again and again

Throughout our life

In a “Pick up your own cross every day and follow me” kind of way.

In a “Those who seek to save their life will lose it, and those who lose their life for my sake—because they understand my death to be their death, and theirs, mine—will find it” kind of way.

When life kills us, we die, and are raised from the dead as a testimony

To all who witness our living and dying and living again

Declaring: “This is how it works!

We die as a self-sacrifice in the service of LIFE!

We give ourselves to That Which Needs Us—

And do not let the savage nature of That Which Meets Us

Slow us down!

This is how to do it! Come on! Follow me!”
04/05/2015 — Wisteria 2015 02 — Indian Land, South Carolina, April 4, 2015

Given three wishes, spend the first one wishing to know how to best use the two remaining.

We have to get over thinking we know what is best,

What needs to be done,

What to wish for.

There is a reason magic wands do not exist.

Rearranging the world according to someone’s provincial, subjective, mood-of-the-moment idea of how the world ought to be

Gives us a world that needs to be rearranged again.

Quickly.

It is better that we step into this world just as it is,

And live here, now,

In ways that serve the best we can imagine

In each situation as it arises—

And allow our experience to enlarge, expand, deepen, transform

Our idea of what needs to be done,

So that we change as much as we wish the world would change,

And become who we need to be

Over the course of our life

In the world just as it is.
04/01/2015 — Chickweed 2015 01 — McDowell Nature Preserve, Mecklenburg County Parks & Recreation, Charlotte, NC, April 2, 2015

Here is essential conflict:

My wife has always been faster than I am (except when it comes to walking through nurserys and shoe stores),

And, is always saying to me, “Come on! I don’t want to miss anything!”

And, I am always replying to her, “Slow down! I don’t want to miss anything.”

Nobody is wrong. Everybody is right. What are you going to do?

Well, what I do is walk at my natural pace,

And, what she does is walk at her natural pace,

And we haven’t lost each other yet.

You have to be true to your own nature AND negotiate the conflicts that arise along the way.

Negotiation and compromise, Kid. Negotiation and compromise.
04/06/2015 — Carolina Jasmine 2015 01 — Indian Land, South Carolina, April 6, 2015

Wisdom sees what it looks at and knows what to do about it,

And when to do it,

And how to do it.

And does it.

We live our way to wisdom by living with our eyes open,

And reflecting on our experience

To form new realizations–

By trusting ourselves

To know what our business is and what it isn’t,

And what works,

And what doesn’t work.

Wisdom understands that life is more about enjoyment

Than achievement,

And enjoys being alive

Through all of life’s comings and goings,

Laughing without teeth,

Dancing without music

Or wine.
04/07/2015 — Dogwood Branch 2015 02 — Andrew Jackson State Park, Lancaster County, South Carolina, April 6, 2015

The Zen story, “The Lost Horse Returns,” exemplifies how luck is either “bad” or “good” depending upon our perspective at the time something happens. Given more time, our view of what is good luck or bad changes.

A young boy forgets to secure the gate to the corral one evening and the family’s lone work horse escapes during the night.

The neighbors upon hearing of it all lament, “What a shame! What terrible luck.” And the father replies, “Time will tell.”

That afternoon, their horse returns leading two mares and a colt with them.

The neighbors proclaim “What good fortune,” The father says “Time will tell.”

The son, trying to rid the colt, is thrown and breaks a leg. “Bad luck,” say the neighbors. “Time will tell,” says the father.

A group of men come through the village conscripting young men to serve in the army. They pass on the boy with the broken leg. “Good luck,” say the neighbors. “Time will tell,” says the father.

And so it goes.

The moral seems to be, “Just do your work, and luck will take care of itself.” Time will tell how good, or bad, our luck is. Our place is to see to it that our work is good, no matter what.
04/07/2015 — Country Dogwood Panorama 03 — Andrew Jackson State Park, Lancaster County, South Carolina, April 6, 2015

I care about the things I care about,

And I’m not interested in the things I don’t care about.

I’m quite contented with leaving it to others to care about those things.

I don’t spend time with the things that drain me, deplete me, exhaust me–

Like cocktail parties,

And board games.

If you wanted to get up a game of charades, I’d have to leave the room,

Maybe the house.

But, if you wanted to talk about what you care about–what you are interested in–

I would be happy to be a part of that conversation.

What are your primary concerns? Interests? Passions?

I would stay in the room for that.

But not for some TV show. Any TV show.

Or talk about news, sports and weather.

And I would be interested in pursuing how our interests and aversions

Speak to us about us.

What can we find out about ourselves by looking at what repels us, fascinates us, attracts us?

Where are we hiding in what we love and hate?

In what absorbs us, or captivates us?

How are we trying to reveal ourselves to ourselves,

While we play charades to keep from guessing who we really are?
04/08/2015 — Peach Blossoms 2015 04 — Springs Farms Orchard, Fort Mill, South Carolina, April 2, 2015

Republican opposition to the nuclear arms treaty with Iran is grounded solely on the Religious Right’s (Evangelical Christianity’s) understanding of Armageddon and the Apocalypse, and the need for a nuclear war in the Middle East to usher in the End Times they think are predicted in the Book of Revelation.

We aren’t dealing with rationality here,

But with religious zeal and holy war “christian” jihad fervency.

These people cannot be talked out of their position–

They can only be recognized for what they represent

And voted out of office.

You have to register to vote–

And talk everyone you know into registering to vote.

Vote in every election great and small

(Do not miss a single opportunity)

And do not vote for a Republican in any of them.

The Republican Party, thanks to the Tea Party influence,

Has been captured by Evangelical Christianity and the Religious Right,

And it is up to You, and You, and You, and Me

To see to it that they do not capture the entire country (and destroy the world) as well.

We are all that stands between them and the brink of total disaster.

I wouldn’t kid you about this.

If you are ever going to listen to me about anything,

Listen to me here. And now.
04/08/2015 — Carolina Jasmine 2015 04 — Indian Land, South Carolina, April 7, 2015

Personal growth always means growing up.

We grow up through the pain of changing the way we see things,

Think about things,

Do things.

We grow up by doing things we don’t want to do, don’t like, and have nothing good to say about.

Being happy, contented, and having everything going our way is not conducive to growing up.

We have to be confronted with a problem that only growing up will solve.

We never run out of such problems.

We grow up forever.

Another term for growing up, in addition to personal growth, is coming to consciousness.

Realization, awareness, understanding, enlightenment are all synonyms for growing up.

We once thought like that, and now we think like this,

And the transition period was where we grew up a bit.

Where we came to consciousness,

Realized a thing or two,

And changed the way we looked at things.

All because we hit a problem that wouldn’t budge,

So we had to–

Budge that is.

Another term for growing up.
04/09/2015 — Bloodroot 2015 03 — McDowell Nature Preserve, Mecklenburg County Parks & Recreation, Charlotte, NC, April 2, 2015

I love learning and I hate being taught.

Being taught entails someone teaching me what they want me to know.

Learning entails seeking out those who know what I want to know and asking questions.

It is pointless for me to be taught things I have no use for–

For which I have no application.

I’ve been taught tons of Photoshop and Lightroom techniques

Which I vaguely remember “learning”

But cannot begin to utilize when an occasional need appears.

It is a wast of time for me to watch Instructional Videos

That do not address my here-and-now needs.

It’s better to be able to find what I need when I need it.

I so doing, I pick up some things (like keyboard shortcuts) I can use every day and didn’t know existed.

So, there is carryover from particular to general,

But it starts with me seeking particular answers to peculiar questions.

If we are not seeking answers to questions that are pertinent to our situation,

We will be ignorant corks floating on the sea of knowledge all our life long.
04/08/2015 — Wisteria 2015 03 — Rural North Carolina, April 9, 2015

The Christian church needs to be more like Alcoholics Anonymous,

With people gathering, not around the need to be free of their addiction,

But around the need to find the life that is theirs to live and live it as it is meant to be lived,

Within the life they are living.

It would be a simple matter to come up with twelve or fifteen steps

Around the themes of silence, reflection upon experience, new realizations, kindness and compassion, respect for all living things, transparency to oneself, the language of the unconscious, the mirror of strong emotion, the guidance of the body,

The essential place of integrity as living aligned with that which is central to us,

The primacy of living in good faith with ourselves and one another.

The regular practice of experiencing beauty in art, music, literature and nature.

The ethical imperative of living as a neighbor to all people,

Of honoring the Golden Rule

And of loving that which has always been experienced as God, self and one another.

And whatever else that might be helpful in living the life of a true human being–

Which would emerge organically, from the bottom up and from the inside out,

And not be forced upon anyone via commandments and ordinances,

Restrictions and obligations.

No theology. No doctrine.

Simply the quest for what works in living in accord with the inevitables of life and of the life that is ours to live.

What’s Christian about that?

It is what was Christian about Jesus!
04/10/2015 — Wisteria 2015 Panorama 01 — Rural North Carolina Piedmont, April 9, 2015

To get to truth,

You have to throw away all you think you know about truth.

Not that all you think you know about truth is wrong,

But enough of it is wrong

To keep you from realizing what you need to realize

About the truth you already know,

And from realizing what you need to realize

About the truth you have never considered.

We have to put all of it aside

In order to be open to all of it.

You cannot come to truth

Thinking you know anything of truth.

You particularly cannot come to truth

Thinking you know all you need to know of truth.

The more you think you know,

The less you know that is worth knowing.

Which puts all authorities, experts and consultants

In their place,

And underscores the significance of Jesus’ statement,

“Unless you turn and become like children,

You will never enter the kingdom of heaven.”
04/10/2015 — Wild Geranium 2015 01 — McDowell Nature Preserve, Mecklenburg County Parks & Recreation, Charlotte, NC, April 10, 2015

We have to help people help us,

And they, following suit, have to help us help them.

Try to help someone who isn’t helping you help them.

Call me up when you are about to.

I want to watch.

People aren’t as interested in being helped as you would think.

Being helped means being changed a good bit of the time.

It means taking some responsibility most of the time.

It means accepting and agreeing to live on terms other than your own all of the time.

That’s the part I’m most interested in observing.

I can’t wait to see how you do.
04/11/2015 — Foam Flower 2015 01 — McDowell Nature Preserve, Mecklenburg County Parks & Recreation, Charlotte, NC, April 10, 2015

Insight and realization, Kid. Insight and realization.

New ideas are the stuff of L I F E.

If you are stuck in the eddy of seeing what you have always seen

And thinking what you have always thought about it,

And never pushing beyond what you have been told,

You have to sit quietly with your life in your lap

Until a question occurs to you that you have never considered.

Don’t look for answers.

Look for better questions.

Let your questions generate questions.

Good questions are answers to previous questions.

Work up to the Best Questions in the history of questions.

By then, you will have encountered insight and realization

Beyond imagining,

And will be wise beyond your years,

All because you have asked some really good questions.
04/11/2015 — Rue Anemone 2015 05 — McDowell Nature Preserve, Mecklenburg County Parks & Recreation, Charlotte, NC, April 10, 2015

It all comes out of the struggle, don’t you know?

We would be nothing without the struggle. The Struggle.

What would there be to pull you forth,

Call you out,

Force the best from you,

If sliding by could do it?

Athletes would not develop past the “getting by” stage

If they weren’t contending with other athletes for the prize.

It is the struggle–The Struggle–that gives us ourselves.

We whine and complain about having to go forth again today,

Every day,

To meet The Struggle of job, or job search,

Of relationships

Of parenthood,

Of childhood,

Of life.

Yet, in going forth each day, we come forth,

We shine,

We show ourselves to be who we are

In the work that is ours to do

And in the effort we make to do it,

To meet The Struggle

And give it our best–

Without kidding ourselves about what our best is.

Our life is The Struggle.

Let’s live to be worthy of it,

And to come forth in it,

And shine,

Shall we?
04/11/2015 — Peach Blossoms 2015 03 — Spring Farms Orchard, Fort Mill, South Carolina, April 2, 2015

It’s about The Work.

It all comes down to The Work,

And flows from The Work,

And revolves around The Work.

Who you are cannot be separated from The Work that is yours to do–

That is you doing/living your life.

This is not typically what you do to pay the bills.

It is what you pay the bills to do.

Ah, but, you don’t know what your work is, perhaps.

We are separated from our work soon after birth,

And handed all manner of diversions, distractions

That take our mind off who we are and what is ours to do,

But it is there, yet,

Waiting, hoping, praying

That we don’t die before we turn and become who we are,

Doing what is ours to do,

Living the life that is ours to live.

So, we either take up our work and do it,

Or we take up our search for our work and find it,

And then take it up and do it.

My work is looking/listening/seeing/hearing.

And so the photography and the writing,

And the reading and the questioning and the seeking, seeking, seeking.

Your work is waiting for you to know it for what it is,

Embrace it, love it, serve it

With all your heart and soul and mind and strength

Through all the moments that flow from this one,

For ever and ever.

Amen. May it be so. Amen.
04/12/2015 — Flame Azalea 2015 01 — McDowell Nature Preserve, Mecklenburg County Parks & Recreation, Charlotte, NC, April 10, 2015

I cannot imagine a scenario in which I would volunteer to be a house guest, or to host one.

I’ve been that way from the start.

Our character is remarkably consistent that way.

Carl Jung said, “We are who we always have been, and who we always will be.”

Psychotherapy can help us past the stuck places,

Where we cannot do the things that truly need to be done,

And need US to do them,

But there are other things we never have any business doing,

And psychotherapy can help us recognize those things,

And stay away from them.

We have to come to terms with ourselves–

With who we are and who we are not–

And make our peace with that,

And let it be because it is,

And live what remains to be lived of our life

In light of that.

Our soul would relish that

And be glad.
04/13/2015 — Bootlegger’s Last Run Panorama – Amicalola Falls Panorama 01 – Amicalola Falls State Park (which also boasts the Trailhead to Springer Mountain, the southern end of the Appalachian Trail), Dawsonville, Georgia, April 13, 2015

You take your circumstances in one hand,

And your character, values, nature, tendencies, proclivities and temperament in the other hand,

And you fit them together in a life that honors what is in both hands.

Throughout the time left for living.

That. Is. All. There. Is. To. It.

Why would I lie?
04/14/2015 — Amicalola Falls Panorama 01 – Amicalola Falls State Park (which also boasts the Trailhead to Springer Mountain, the southern end of the Appalachian Trail), Dawsonville, Georgia, April 13, 2015

You have to know what your business is

And what it isn’t.

Your business is your life.

Your life is minding your business,

Tending your business,

Taking care of your business.

Everything else about your life supports and sustains your business.

You live to do your business.

That is living with integrity,

And having things ordered properly,

And your priorities nicely arranged.

If that is not how it is with you,

Your first order of business

Is to get your business front and center in your life.

Start with knowing what your business is,

And what it isn’t.

Things will come together in time

Around that central focus:

Is.

Isn’t.
04/15/2015 — Spring Barn Panorama 01 – White County, GA, April 14, 2015

Live out of your own sense of how your life needs to be lived–

Always with an eye on what is happening

Without and within,

And what you think needs to be done about it–

How you think you need to respond to it–

Regardless of what anyone else thinks,

Including God.

What do YOU think is the question.

What are YOU going to do is the other question.

Live to know what you know,

And to do what you know needs to be done–

And let all your outcomes instruct you

In the art of knowing what you know

And doing what needs to be done about it

All your life long.
04/15/2015 — Amicalola Path Panorama – Amicalola Falls State Park (which also boasts the Trailhead to Springer Mountain, the southern end of the Appalachian Trail), Dawsonville, Georgia, April 13, 2015

You know what resonates with you

And what does not,

Where you belong

And where you have no business being.

Know what you know.

Know when you are overriding what you know,

And when you are dismissing what you know.

When you are discounting what you know.

When you are denying what you know.

When you are conflicted over what you know

And what you also know.

But, know what you know,

And decide what to do about it,

In light of all things considered.

That is being consciously, mindfully, responsible

For who we are, what we do, and how we live.

If we all lived that way,

It would be a better world overnight.
04/16/2015 — Flame Azalea 03 – Amicalola Falls State Park (which also boasts the Trailhead to Springer Mountain, the southern end of the Appalachian Trail), Dawsonville, Georgia, April 13, 2015

I have my work to do,

My business to tend,

My life to live,

And, you have yours.

If I can do what is mine to do

In ways that help you do what is yours to do,

Fine.

If you can do what is yours to do

In ways that help me do what is mine to do,

Fine.

If we do what is ours to do

In ways that are of no help whatsoever to the other,

Fine.

It is enough that we do what is ours to do

And, in so doing, help those who can be helped,

Without trying to be helpful

In ways that would be harmful

To what someone needs to be doing.

Ours is the old song’s refrain:

“Take what you can use,

(In the work that is yours to do)

And leave the rest behind.”
04/16/2015 — Spring Barn Panorama 02 – White County, GA, April 14, 2015

The voice of change and transformation has always had an audience,

Though not, necessarily, a large one,

And it is generally a tough gig,

Transitioning from one way

Of hearing, seeing, thinking, doing and being to another.

But the Word is a living Word,

And new ideas have a way of outliving the opposition—

Stout and determined and armed with atrocities though it be.

The antecedents of every new age

Are tucked away in the present age

Waiting for the time of their coronation

To be at hand.
04/16/2015 — Anna Ruby Falls Panorama 01 – Unicoi State Park, Cattahoochee National Forest, Helen, Georgia, April 13, 2015

Who you are shows through.

“Truth will out,” they say,

Which is a strange way of saying

Truth will be apparent over time,

No matter how we try to conceal it,

Deny it,

And pretend it is not so.

And people pick up on the discrepancy

Between who we are and who we are pretending to be.

They get a funny feeling that something is not right somehow–

Off center,

Out of sync,

Off key,

Not what it appears to be.

And they will spend more time out of your company

Than in it,

Because they are uncomfortable around you

Without knowing why.

On the other hand,

If you are who you are,

In tune and in sync with yourself,

People will enjoy being around you

For no apparent reason,

And dogs will follow you home,

Even if you don’t like dogs.
04/16/2015 — Catesby’s Trillium 2015 01 — McDowell Nature Preserve, Mecklenburg County Parks & Recreation, Charlotte, NC, April 16, 2015

Your life is your gift.

As in your gift to you from the murky depths of the unconscious–

Because we are not conscious of it–

Origin of life,

And, as in your gift to all living beings–

What you offer to them to lighten their load

And help them along the way.

Receive your gift,

And offer it,

Mindfully aware of it

As a blessing and a grace

Upon you and all others–

Intent on living so that it is exactly that.
04/17/2015 — Spring Barn Panorama 03 – White County, GA, April 14, 2015

Can you do what it hard

And necessary?

Will you?

All of our tests are tests for everyone associated with us,

Even in the most remote kind of way.

We are all either

Having what it takes

To do what needs to be done

In the situation as it arises,

Or not.

What we do,

Or do not,

Has implications for everyone,

Now and in generations yet to be born.

If you are going to do something not,

Do not live lightly.

Live in the light,

Cognizant of what you are doing,

And doing not.
04/17/2015 — Pearson’s Falls 2015 03 – Near Tryon and Saluda, NC, April 17, 2015

There is the unforeseeable, and there is the unforeseen.

Living mindfully enables us to see what we are

Overlooking,

Ignoring,

Dismissing,

Discounting,

Denying–

And saves us from avoidable grief, agony, anguish and suffering.
04/17/2015 — Yellow Trillium 2015 01 — Pearson’s Glen, near Tryon and Saluda, NC, April 17, 2015

We suffer from misplaced loyalty and allegiance.

We plight our troth to the wrong thees.

Our life is our rightful love.

The life that is ours to live.

The life lived around the character that is ours to cultivate,

The nature that is ours to develop

With conscious awareness of who we are

And how that needs to be expressed

Within the time and place of our living.

We are to be true to ourselves

In ways that are appropriate to the occasion,

And, compassionate, gracious and kind–

And, strong in the service of a good beyond our good.

If we think something else is more important,

We need to go sit quietly

And sort things out.
04/17/2015 — Wake Robin 2015 01 — Pearson’s Glen, near Tryon and Saluda, NC, April 17, 2015

The task of maturation and the goal of the spiritual journey (Maturation IS the spiritual journey, and vice versa)–the way to the Land of Promise–

Is waking up to the truth of how things are and how things need to be–

To the truth of who and how we are,

And of who and how we need to be,

And undertaking the work of transitioning from one way of doing/being to the other way of doing/being.

This is called “repentance,”

And there is no avoiding it on the part of those who would grow up

And be whole.
04/18/2015 — Columbine 2015 01 – McDowell Nature Preserve, Mecklenburg County Parks & Recreation, Charlotte, NC, April 16, 2015

If you aren’t taking it to nature

And seeing what nature can do with it,

You only have yourself to blame.

All those conflicts you’re walking around with?

All those things you can’t do anything about?

Go walk slowly through some aspect of the natural world.

Sit by a waterfall,

Or a stream,

Or the ocean.

Water is good for quenching thirst on more than one level.

Do not run from your conflicts.

Take them to nature.
04/19/2015 — Dwarf Crested Iris 2015 01 — McDowell Nature Preserve, Mecklenburg County Parks & Recreation, Charlotte, NC, April 18, 2015

Knowing the truth is knowing the truth about ourselves,

Is knowing the truth of the way things are

And the way things need to be.

Knowing the truth

Is a divine imperative

To do something about it.

Jesus said, “Those who hear these words of mine

DO something about them!”

Or words to that effect.

We can’t just “know the truth.”

The truth sets us free from bondage to the way things are,

And puts us in motion,

Doing what needs to be done about the way things are,

Breaking the chains of oppression,

Injustice,

Discrimination,

Bigotry,

Intolerance,

Racism,

Sexism,

Homophobia,

And honoring all people for the wonders they are.

So don’t be bragging about “knowing the truth,”

If you aren’t doing something about it

In a way that sets us all free

To do something about it in our own way!
04/19/2015 — Peach Blossoms 05 — Springs Farms Orchard, Fort Mill, South Carolina, April 2, 2015

We say we want help with our life,

And believe it.

That’s what makes alcoholics and addicts so convincing

When they say they want to be sober.

They believe it themselves.

We all believe we want help with our life.

But.

What we want is escape.

Deliverance.

We want to tag out

And let someone else be us

While we go off into the bliss of being responsible

For not one thing.

Sheldon Kopp said,

“We have to solve our own problems every day for the rest of our life.”

That’s putting it to us.

We don’t want help with solving our own problems.

We want to be rid of problems.

We want someone else to solve our problems for us.

That’s the hidden joke behind all self-help groups and books.

Self-help is a smoke screen.

We aren’t interested in self-help.

We are interested in self-deception.

Saying we want help when we want out is deception.

We want out.

Our life waits for us to wake up,

Realize it is up to us,

Summon the courage to step into the life that is waiting for us,

And live it as it needs to be lived,

Solving our own problems as they arise

Every day for what remains of the time left for living.
04/19/2015 — Spring Fern 2015 01 — McDowell Nature Preserve, Mecklenburg County Parks & Recreation, Charlotte, NC, April 18, 2015

Knowing the truth puts us on the path of setting things right–

Of “getting right with God,”

So to speak.

Of putting ourselves in accord with the way things are,

Aligning ourselves with how things need to be,

And living in the tension

Between how things are and how things need to be–

Striving to bring forth the Ought To Be within the Is.

This is the work of integrity, harmony and wholeness.

It is the task of true human beings in every age,

And become true human beings through the work of reconciliation.
04/20/2015 — Toccoa Falls 01 — Toccoa Falls, Georgia, April 15, 2015

Your conflicts are your salvation.

You are saved when you wake up

To how things are

And who you are

And what is important

And what needs to be done about it

And do it.

Your conflicts save you

By forcing realization and awareness on you

Perhaps, against your will.

But, what do you know?

Your conflicts are here to show you

There is more to know than you think–

There is more to it all than meets the eye–

And, you have to keep looking if you are going to see.

And seeing is the point–

Seeing, hearing, knowing, doing, being–

Growing up and being who you are,

Where you are, when you are, how you are–

Being you, here and now,

Doing what is yours to do

(Which is always more than you have in mind,

Or want to have anything to do with)

About what needs to be done.

And your conflicts are the threshold to all of it.

It is the conscious struggle with your conflicts

That open the door to new realizations

And realization is the path to the Land of Promise.

Don’t let a conflict go

Until you have gotten the good out of it,

And thanked it for its time.
04/20/2015 — Dogwood Branch 2015 04 — Andrew Jackson State Park, Lancaster County, South Carolina, April 6, 2015

I have a long list of things I enjoy,

And I indulge myself often.

I had more fun in my younger days,

Going faster and farther,

Doing more,

Relishing sugar in all of its myriad manifestations.

All of which has been relegated to the class of distant memory,

Soon, no doubt, to be lost altogether.

But, I am enjoying more as an older person.

I enjoy practically everything

That isn’t forced on me

As obligation, duty, responsibility.

And, can even enjoy those things as intrusions

That make their absence a cherished delight.
04/21/2015 — Violet Wood Sorrel 2015 01 — McDowell Nature Preserve, Mecklenburg County Parks & Recreation, Charlotte, NC, April 18, 2015

A “gathering of sojourners,”

Or a “community of innocence”

(Innocent in the sense of having nothing

At stake in one another,

And nothing to gain from one another,

Beyond the mutual benefit of

Help for the journey)

Coming together around the uniting focus

Of each person finding her, finding his, own life and living it

Would be a welcome aid in the work that is ours to do.

I imagine a covenant of agreement

Wherein we would commit ourselves

In good faith

To the practice of being transparent to ourselves

Through dreamwork,

Reflection on our experience,

Exploration of personally meaningful symbols,

Examination of our individual tendency for projection

And of our emotional responses to our environment—

All with the goal

Of seeing, hearing, knowing and understanding

What we are saying to ourselves

About what is happening in our life,

What needs to happen in our life,

And what we need to do about it,

In order to be who we are,

And live the life that is ours to live

In the time left for living.

If you can put together a community like that,

You will have something

We all could use in our own life.
04/21/2015 — Greenhouse Orchids 02 Panorama — Campbell’s Greenhouse and Nursery, 209 McDonald Ave., Charlotte, North Carolina 28203, (704) 331-9659 — One of the hidden wonders in Charlotte, this is worth a walk-through even if you don’t need a plant. Tell them I said so.

Your life will turn on you. Turn with it.

Dance.

Your life leads. You follow.

You start out with a plan, a war comes along.

The stock market crashes.

The bottom drops out of the housing market.

The unforeseeable stops by for a visit.

Everybody has a plan until they step out the door.

From then on, it’s “Now what?” to the end of the line.

Trust your life to know what it’s doing,

And look for the openings.

See what you can you do with what you meet

On the other side of the door.

Bring your imagination into play.

Enough already of despair and hopeless resignation!

Where’s the creativity and the quest to know what you’re made of?

Get in there and do your thing with compassion for all of life,

And bear the pain of all your conflicts consciously,

And magic will happen.

You will be amazed.

You owe it to yourself to find out if I’m right.
04/22/2015 — Greenhouse Orchids 03 Blended – Campbell’s Greenhouse and Nursery, 209 McDonald Ave., Charlotte, North Carolina 28203, (704) 331-9659 – One of the hidden wonders in Charlotte, this is worth a walk-through even if you don’t need a plant. Tell them I said so.

We have to read each situation as it arises

And will what is right for that situation,

And enlist ourselves heart, mind, body and soul

In the service of our will-to-good,

Regardless of the implications for us personally

(Although sometimes what needs to be done

Will be done in the service of what is good for us personally).

Each situation is better off in some ways than in others,

And it is our place to make things right–

Insofar as that is possible–

Using the gifts that are ours to give

In the service of what is fitting and appropriate

To the situation,

All things considered.

What is right here and now?

What is called for here and now?

That is all we need to know,

And do.
04/22/2015 — Fleabane Daisy 2015 01 Blended — McDowell Nature Preserve, Mecklenburg County Parks & Recreation, Charlotte, NC, April 18, 2015

The magic happens only when our will for our life

Is aligned with our life’s will for our life.

We have to hold in highest esteem

Our life and what needs to be done in service to our life.

We “Forsake all others”

And “Plight Thee our troth”

In a holy marriage to the life that is our life to live,

Living in each situation as it arises

In ways that serve our life

With loyalty and allegiance

Above and beyond all other interests and concerns.

This is the courtly love of the troubadours,

And the knights with their ladies,

And the ladies with their knights,

Properly understood.

It is taking our life

As The Bride of Christ

And living in its service

At whatever cost,

No matter what,

For as long as life as possible–

And love lived like this never ends.
04/22/2015 — Bloodroot 2015 02 — McDowell Nature Preserve, Mecklenburg County Parks & Recreation, Charlotte, NC, April 2, 2015

The watchword for living well is

Awareness Awareness Awareness.

Seeing/Hearing is Knowing is Understanding is Doing is Being.

Mindful awareness is the solution to all of your problems

With knowing what your life is and how you need to live it.

Whenever you catch yourself wondering what to do,

Become mindfully aware of your situation as a whole.

The path will open before you.

I’m not saying you will want to have anything to do with it.

Not knowing what to do is often used as an excuse

For not doing what we don’t want to do.

Mindful awareness takes all things into account,

Leaving us without excuse.
04/22/2015 — Greenhouse Orchids 12 — Campbell’s Greenhouse and Nursery, 209 McDonald Ave., Charlotte, North Carolina 28203, (704) 331-9659 — One of the hidden wonders in Charlotte, this is worth a walk-through even if you don’t need a plant. Tell them I said so.

We have to grow ourselves up.

This is the spiritual journey.

It isn’t knowing the teachings of the masters that does it,

But doing what is hard.

Doing what needs to be done.

Doing what needs us to do it.

Being the right kind of mother or father, for instance,

Or the right kind of son or daughter.

The right kind of brother or sister.

The right kind of person in the role our life is asking us to play.

It’s John Wayne or Betty White playing John Wayne or Betty White

The way only John Wayne or Betty White could play those parts.

It’s you playing you the way only you can play you

In the improvisational situations that crop up throughout your day.

We have to grow up in order to be ourselves the way we need to be ourselves in all of the situations that come our way.

No pouting, whining, moaning, complaining, not showing up allowed!

And we have to be the one who sees to it that we show up

And do the right thing in the right way.

That will grow you up like nothing else will.

Certainly not memorizing the books of the Bible in order.
04/23/2015 — Dwarf Crested Iris 2015 02 – McDowell Nature Preserve, Mecklenburg County Parks & Recreation, Charlotte, NC, April 18, 2015

You have to wrestle with your own alligators.

Your life is an alligator come to eat you alive,

And will do it in a minute if you let it.

Don’t be thinking that your life is some soft, friendly, cushy

Loll by the pool.

There are alligators in the pool, and sharks, hoping for a chance at you.

Your life is not some walk through the park,

Some stroll through the meadows of spring.

Some lap dog eager to do your bidding.

You have to live your life like you mean it,

Like you are the Boss of your life come to show it a thing or two

About how living is done.

You have to climb onto your life and tell them to open the chute.

You are here to ride the thing through all eternity,

Not just some eight seconds on some stop watch.

If you can’t stay with it longer than eight seconds, why bother?

Just roll over and go back to sleep.

Don’t be looking for soft and easy

Laughing with a beer in hand looking for good times to roll with.

You are here to roll with the punches,

And to manage the rolling waves of the wine dark sea.

Your attitude has to be that of Homer,

Who said through 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!”

Homer was a blind poet

Who knew life was a Cyclops come to eat him alive.
04/23/2015 — White Violets 2015 01 — Unicoi State Park, Cattahoochee National Forest, Helen, Georgia, April 13, 2015

No one can save you but you.

You save yourself by waking up, growing up, squaring up with how things are and how things need to be, getting up and doing what needs to be done about it.

Every day for the rest of your life.

You have to find your own life and live it.

You keep thinking it should be easy.

And fun.

It is hard and not much fun, but.

Every minute is to be enjoyed–

As a jolt that wakes you up, if nothing else.

You keep painting yourself into corners.

The corners are there to wake you up.

What you are doing isn’t working.

The corner reminds you of that.

You have to stop painting when you reach a corner–

And reflect on how you got there.

And stop doing that.
04/23/2015 — Greenhouse Orchids 15 — April 21, 2015, Campbell’s Greenhouse and Nursery, 209 McDonald Ave., Charlotte, North Carolina 28203, (704) 331-9659 – One of the hidden wonders in Charlotte, this is worth a walk-through even if you don’t need a plant. Tell them I said so.

Let your life live you.

Your life knows what it likes,

What it needs.

You don’t have to think any of it up.

Just listen.

Just pay attention.

Your life is constantly trying to catch your eye.

You are so the servant of your agenda–

Of your idea for your life–

That you dismiss, discount, ignore

The signals you are sending yourself.

Call time out from time to time,

Sit down

Become mindful

Of what has been happening,

Of what you have been missing.

Filter it for the gold.

Every day the gold washes through your life,

But you aren’t panning for it.

You have eyes for other things.

Pan the gold.

Let your life live you.
04/24/2015 — Trout Lily 13 Blended — Andrew Jackson State Park, Lancaster County, South Carolina, March 30, 2015

Everybody wants it done the way they want it done.

Nobody wants to reflect on what needs to be done and how they need to do it.

Parents dictate to children.

Children dictate to parents.

Husbands dictate to wives, wives to husbands, partners to partners.

The news of the day is about someone pushing their way onto someone else

And someone else pushing back.

Push, shove, dictate, force, compel, berate, lambast…

Drones and suicide bombers are delivering explosives as I write–

Blowing up what they hate in the name of what they love.

The hatred is apparent and real.

The love is pretense and charade.

Nobody owns their hatred,

Everybody professes their love.

“I don’t hate gays,” they say,

But the gays can’t tell the difference.

You may as well hate me if I can’t tell that you don’t by the way you treat me.

Everybody is kidding themselves.

No one is transparent to themselves–

Radically honest with themselves.

No one lives in good faith with themselves.

Everyone hates everybody–

Including themselves.

To change the world

We have to start with ourselves.
04/22/2015 — Rosette Spoonbills in Flight — Rip van Winkle Gardens, New Iberia, Louisiana, March 25, 2015

We go to war to force our way on others,

Or to keep others from forcing their way on us.

Anybody can see there has to be a better way.

Why are we blowing each other up?

What’s the good of thinking if we can’t think up something better than what we have?

We think up better ways to kill people.

What are we thinking?

Any thinking person can see this is stupid.

What are we living to do?

Have our way and keep from having someone else’s way forced on us?

Past that, what are we living to do?

What do we have to do that is so important we will kill everyone who stands in our way?

What. Are. We. Living. To. Do. ?

You can see, if you think about it, that we aren’t living to do one damn thing.

We’re just killing people who aren’t doing it our way.

But, if they were all dead, we wouldn’t be doing anything.

We. Wouldn’t. Be. Doing. Anything.

Which means, we are just here to kill people.

That’s all we do.

Kill one another.

Killing and avoiding being killed absorbs our life,

Supports our economy,

Keeps the world running.
Where is it going?

What are we doing?

This is stupid.
04/24/2015 — Cypress Swamp 02 B&W — Lake Martin, St. Martin Parish, Breaux Bridge, Louisiana, March 24, 2015

What are you doing with your life?

With the time that is yours for living?

What are you living to do?

Life is not a spectator sport.

You are not here to observe, take notes, drink beer, make jokes.

What is the most meaningful thing you do?

The most meaningful thing you have done?

The thing that means most to you?

How often in a week do you do what is meaningful to you?

How long do you do it?

What can you do to increase the frequency and duration?

We are alive to the extent that we are meaningfully engaged with our life–

To the extent that we are immersed in meaningful work

(Which is not necessarily what we are paid to do,

But what we live to do).

If you don’t know what that might be,

You have the time left for living to find it,

And do it.
04/22/2015 — Duck Weed on Silver Creek 02 — Midnight, Mississippi, March 17, 2015

The Quest is for our life

And the courage to live it.

To do what is ours to do

The way only we can do it.

We have to understand that we have a gift,

A genius, a daemon, a holy spirit, within

Which begs expression.

Carl Jung said, “There is within each of us

Another whom we don’t know.”

Our invisible twin desires to be known,

To be brought forth,

In the life that is common to both of us.

We are the conscious, thinking, evaluating,

Logical, reasoning part of the equation,

And our invisible other

Is the sensing, feeling, knowing, guiding, creating, imagining part.

Together, we are a True Human Being

With a world to transform.

One Minute Monologues 024

01/25/2015 — 03/11/2015

01/25/2015 — Mill Pond Trail 04 — Anne Springs Close Greenway, Fort Mill, SC, November 13, 2014

We cannot live any old way and have a life worth living.

We have to consciously, consistently, live toward the best we can imagine,

Expecting the best of ourselves,

Intentional and deliberate about showing others,

And finding out for ourselves what we can do,

Through all of the reasons to lay it aside and “grab the gusto,”

Or just sleep in and not worry about it,

Because we are funny that way—

Determined to give it our best effort,

And see where it goes.
01/25/2015 — Young Buck 03 — James River, Richmond, VA, November 6, 2014

Your focus is to live grounded upon the Foundation Stone,

The Philosopher’s Stone,

The unifying, integrating, intention

That forms the core of your heart and soul.

Your charge is to live out of that which is most YOU,

Toward that which is most YOU—

So as to bring YOU forth in your life,

And be who YOU are

As a blessing and a grace upon all who come your way,

Rippling through them to all sentient beings everywhere.
01/25/2015 — Charlotte 01 — A portion of downtown (Okay, they say, “Uptown.” Why, I do not know) Charlotte, NC from Marshall Park, January 25, 2015

You make a splash by being you.

The way you carry yourself.

The way you interact with others.

The way you help people feel.

The mindset you carry with you into your life.

The mood you create.

You step into your life and create ripples.

You are a wave machine.

You make tidal waves.

Tsunami’s.

Washing over the world.

Making all things new.

Leaving life in your wake

You’re hosing ‘em down with living water.

Just by the way you walk,

And talk,

And treat the people in your life.

Look at you!
01/26/2015 — Young Andrew Jackson 02 BW — Andrew Jackson State Park, Lancaster County, SC, January 24, 2015 — Lancaster County is the birthplace of Andrew Jackson, born March 15, 1767, and became the 7th US President.

Our heart might be in it at the beginning—whatever “it” may be.

But then, we come upon drudgery, and opposition, and a lack of cooperation.

It stops being fun.

It isn’t easy.

We have to call upon courage and resolve, determination and resiliency, to see us through.

And those horses have been let out to pasture,

And are nowhere around when we need them.

We discover that heart is the easiest thing to lose,

And the hardest thing to find.

So it is said, “Those who put their hand to the plow and look back are not fit for the kingdom of heaven.”

Why pour the foundation if we aren’t going to build the building?

Can we do it, is the question.

Will we do it, is the other question.

We can know all about what needs to be done, and how to do it.

The theory and the blueprint for success are not the problem.

Toughing it out is the problem.

Doing the work is the problem.

Living with heart through all the tedium, detours, delays, and dead ends is the problem.

We are the solution to the problem.

Will we see it through,

Or cut our losses and go back to the house?
01/26/2015 — Common Tern 07 — Huntington Beach State Park, Murrell’s Inlet, SC, January 17, 2015

The will to do and to be is difficult to sustain over the long haul.

We are worn down by the weight of time and circumstance.

All of us are.

And all of us must find the source of our own rejuvenation,

And make the pilgrimage to it often.

Where do you go to “recover from the past and store up for the future”?

What does it take to revitalize your heart and soul?

The experience of beauty in art, music and nature does it for many.

Touching the earth, and being touched by it, in Hugh Prather’s sense of the term,

Is restorative and enlivening for those who return regularly to receive it’s blessings.

The grace of symbols and ritual can carry us beyond the apparent finality of the facts that define our existence—

And, in transcending the obvious end of hope and courage,

We know there is more to it than meets the eye,

Take heart, and join forces with the Force Beyond All Thought And Reason,

And do what needs us to do it, the way it needs to be done—

Which we could not have done

Without our return to the source of life and being.

May we return often, and be of good courage, and strong hearts,

For the long haul.
Used in Short Talks On Good And Bad Religion — 01/27/2015 — Beach Erosion 14 — Hunting Island State Park, Hunting Island, SC, December 6, 2014

All of the symbols of the Christian church—and of any church—are beautifully, wonderfully appropriate for every age, but. They have to be reinterpreted for each age.

The current symbols of the Christian church were partially updated in 1643 by the Westminster Divines as the Westminster Confession of Faith, and are no more appropriate for today than a medical textbook of that period would be.

Each age must find its own way to God with symbols and metaphors and myths that are appropriate to the age.

We do that by reinterpreting the symbols, metaphors and myths of previous ages—by re-imagining them in light of our present experience and world-view.

There was no Garden of Eden in an actual literal sense, but. The Garden of Eden remains vibrant and valid through all ages as the launch pad of spiritual life and understanding.

No one approaches the need for a Spiritual (Hero’s) Journey, or the search for the Land of Promise (another metaphor that has to be updated and reinterpreted), except from the standpoint of the loss of the blissful state of innocence where everything was in place and made sense.

It is only when we wake up to the realization that the way we have been told things are is not how things are, that we begin the Agone, the Agony, of finding our way to a unifying vision that holds it all together, makes sense to us, and fills us with vitality and enthusiasm for our life.

Every Biblical metaphor, every symbol of that Old Time Religion, has to be reformed, rethought, reimagined, reshaped, reformulated and reclaimed in order to serve us as food for our soul, and sustenance for the journey.

And every one of those metaphors, of those symbols, has the power to do that—to be exactly what we need to be who we need to be in the life we are living, “from this time forth, and forever more.”

As we do the work of bringing them to life, they return the favor and bring us to life, and it becomes “a new world Goldie,” for everyone.
01/30/2015 — Scott Creek Sunset Panorama 03 — Edisto Beach State Park, Edisto Island, SC, January 29, 2015

The trick is to live knowingly.

When we live knowingly, we live transparent to ourselves.

When we live transparent to ourselves, we live “transparent to transcendence” (A phrase Joseph Campbell attributed to Karlfried Graf Durkheim).

When we live transparent to transcendence, we are as good as God, as one with God as Jesus was.

And that would be something.
01/31/2015 — The Ghost Trees of Graveyard Beach at Sunrise 02 — Botany Bay Plantation Heritage Preserve and Wildlife Management Area, Edisto Island, SC, January 28, 2015

Live knowingly.

Knowing what you are doing doesn’t mean knowing how to do it, or how it is to be done, or what you are supposed to be doing, or how you are supposed to be doing it.

It means knowing that you are doing what you are doing, and that you are doing it the way you are doing it, and why you are doing it the way you are doing it, and what is happening as you are doing it.

It means seeing yourself in action, doing what you are doing, and being aware of everything in the field of the action surrounding what you are doing, internally and externally.

If you know that much, you will transform your life, and the world.

You can’t know what you are doing without changing things—without things changing.
01/31/2015 — Sheldon Church Ruins HDR 03 — Yemassee, SC, January 27, 2015

Jesus said, “Father forgive them, they know not what they do.”

And, to a man working on the Sabbath, he said, “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.”

Jesus said, “When you give to the needy, don’t do it to be seen. Do it in secret so that no one knows—let it be so secret that your left hand doesn’t know what your right hand is doing.”

In other words, do what you do knowingly—and, knowingly, take no notice of it. Know what you are doing and don’t make anything of it. Just. Do. It.

If you know what you are doing, in the sense of knowing what is happening as you do it, internally and externally, in the field of action surrounding you and what you are doing—you will be hiding nothing from yourself and making nothing of yourself.

You will just be doing what you are doing, being who you are, and that will be that.

This is mindfulness in action. Mindfulness in every day life. All it takes to transform the world.
02/01/2015 — Edisto Beach Sunrise 07 — Edisto Beach State Park, Edisto Island, SC, January 29, 2015

At every stage in our life—

At every transition point—

We are an egg waiting to hatch.

We hate waiting for anything.

DON’T JUST DO SOMETHING—STAND THERE!!!

They all say that when you just stand there.

Just standing—or sitting—there is not permitted.

Is anathema.

Is a scandalous outrage.

Is the desolating sacrilege.

The unforgivable sin.

You can do anything but nothing.

Chicks spend a lot of time doing nothing,

Waiting to hatch.

Waiting to know what to do.

Waiting to know when to do it.

Waiting for clarity and direction.

At every stage in our life—

At every transition point—

We are an egg waiting to hatch.
02/01/2015 — The Grove HDR 01 — The Ernest F. Hollings ACE Basin National Wildlife Refuge, Adams Run, SC, January 29, 2015

There are a lot of people who cannot hear what I have to say.

But.

I keep talking.

That’s what I do.

It’s my work.

Saying what I have to say.

And, I repeat myself a lot.

Trying to say better, or differently, or just again,

What I have to say.

I believe in it.

I’m talking about life, mine and yours.

I’m talking about living.

About being alive.

About living our life as a full, whole, true human being.

If you’d rather do something else, okay.

A lot of people had rather do something else.

I have to say it nonetheless.

That’s the way it is with our work—our life.

It’s our work—our life.

And we have to do it, live it, no matter what.

In one way or another,

We all say, along with each other and Captain Jack Sparrow,

“I have no say in the matter, Gibbs—It’s the pirate’s life for me. Savvy?”
02/02/2015 — The Ghost Trees of Graveyard Beach at Sunrise 03 — Botany Bay Plantation Heritage Preserve and Wildlife Management Area, Edisto Island, SC, January 28, 2015

In the grip of strong emotion. we do the damnedest things.

Remember your first marriage? And your second?

We are slow learners when it comes to strong emotion.

“How can something so wrong feel so right?”

The lemming’s rush to the sea

Is just another mass movement gone awry.

It’s what mass movements do best.

The anti-vaccine movement is the latest in a long line.

Emotion disguises itself as thinking—

Parades around as Rational and Logical,

As Absolute Truth,

Innocently shrugging off the devastation in its wake.

We smoothly justify anything we feel strongly about.

It’s the emotional high that does it.

We will do anything to ride that wave—

To be gripped by that conviction.

There is no better antidote to the uncertainty and insecurity,

To the fear, agony and angst, of life on the edge of the Void.

It feels just like being alive.
02/02/2015 — Scott Creek Panorama 03 — Edisto Beach State Park, Edisto Island, SC, January 29, 2015

I have to play the introvert card more often these days.

People, either too many or too long, disrupt the inner harmony and disturb the quiet waters of my soul—

Something the extroverts in my world cannot comprehend.

So, I leave them to make sense of it as well as they can,

And find a quiet corner,

In which to sit for a while.

I cannot tend internal affairs and keep up my end of the conversation

About the drama surrounding politicians, movie stars, family members and neighbors—

None of whom I can impact in any way,

So why bother with the latest of who has done what to whom and what might happen next?

But, that’s where all the world goes to have its social needs met.

When I die and go to hell, God is going to put me on a Carnival Cruise Ship through the universe for eternity.
02/03/2015 — 02/03/2015 — Edisto Beach Sunrise 02 — Edisto Beach State Park, Edisto Island, SC, January 29, 2015

May you rise to every occasion,

And do what is asked of you by each situation that arises,

In ways that bring forth who you are

As a blessing and a grace

Upon the occasion and the situation.

If you go into your occasions and situations

Doing what is expected,

You are not seeing what is being asked of you—

You are merely a functionary fulfilling a role.

If you go into your occasions and situations

Looking to exploit them to your advantage

You are not seeing what is being asked of you—

You “on the make,”

“On the prowl,”

Scouring the landscape for your next kill.

Your occasions and situations are not there

For your dutiful service,

Or for your good pleasure.

They are there to grow you up and bring you forth—

To reveal you to you,

To show you who you are and what you have to give.

To bless you and grace you with you.

Often, against your will.
02/03/2105 — The Ghost Trees of Boneyard Beach 06 — Botany Bay Plantation Heritage Preserve and Wildlife Management Area, Edisto Island, SC, January 28, 2015

You are being forced to do something that is—to live in ways that are—killing you.

Don’t tell me you are not.

All of us are.

Our life is killing us.

Look around. Everyone you see is living a life that is killing them.

It’s how things are.

We have to wake up to it and come to terms with it, or die.

There are 10,000 ways to die.

Each one is some form of addiction, diversion, distraction, despair, and/or denial.

The only alternative is awareness, reconciliation and transcendence.

We have to do what is killing us mindfully, knowingly.

We have to embrace it as Jesus embraced the cross,

And willingly, even joyfully, accept the circumstances and conditions of our life—

Participating fully in the experience of living our life on its terms,

And doing everything that is required of us exactly as it ought to be done—

Knowing what we are doing, embracing it and loving it because it is our lot,

Because it is how things are,

Because, “This, too. This, too,” is our life,

And cannot be rejected because it is part of the whole—

“The whole catastrophe” of life, living, and being alive.

Those who know the secret of doing what kills them

Live through dying—live through death—to resurrection,

And life and peace eternal and everlasting,

Beginning here and now in this life that they are living exactly as it is.

This is the shift in perspective that is at the core of all Bodhisattvas,

And it lifts us to a level of living that is beyond anything having our way in the world has to offer.
Used in Short Talks On Contradictions, etc., 02/03/2015 — The Old Sheldon Church Ruins HDR 07 — Yemassee, SC, January 27, 2015

What does thinking about sex keep you from thinking about?

What do imaginary lovers help you avoid facing about your actual life?

What quandaries, contradictions, dead-ends, fixes, messes, plights, predicaments and difficulties do you

switch off when you switch on a tryst with the hunk or the babe?

It’s your life you are escaping.

Your life that is calling you to live it by facing what must be faced, dealing with what must be dealt with,

oing what must be done and growing up.

If you are going to imagine something, imagine that!

Your life is the Cyclops, and you are Ulysses.

You don’t get anywhere saying, “Oh, but this is too hard!”

Or, “I know I need to grow up, but…”

There is no but.

There is your life that needs you to live it—

By doing what is hard,

And facing what must be faced,

Deciding what needs to be done about it

And doing it

About all of the things you want to run from, and hide where you can’t be found.
02/04/2015 — Edisto Eagle 02 — Edisto Beach State Park, Edisto Island, SC, January 29, 2015

Carl Jung said, “What is not brought to consciousness, comes to us as fate.”

FDR said, “The only thing we have to fear is fear itself.”

When we live unconscious of how our fear is driving us, we create something to Really be afraid of.

It was Hitler’s fear of the Jews that led to the destruction of Germany, not the Jews Hitler feared, and thus hated.

The anti-vaccine crowd is afraid of imagined monsters, but, rather than deal with their fear, they are creating the Real possibility of an epidemic that is certainly something to be afraid of.

Alcoholics are created as much by the people who cover for them and squelch their fear of what might happen to them if the alcoholic is ever found out, as by their unquenchable thirst for a place to hide from their own fear.

Unconscious fear, greed, despair and laziness—the unwillingness to face, confront and deal with all that is unconscious—drive us and create Real Life situations that force us to meet our demons, which, by then, are Truly demonic.

Moral: Face the fact of unconscious reality, and deal with it early-on. You will reduce the level of corporate pain by bearing consciously your personal pain, and the world will benefit greatly from your courage.
02/04/2015 — ACE Basin Collage — The Ernest F. Hollings ACE Basin National Wildlife Refuge, Adams Run, SC, January 29, 2015

When you are standing grounded on the Foundation Stone, no one can knock you off.

The Japanese word for this position—this connection with the heart of Being—is Hara.

“Hara” in Japanese means “belly.”

It is the body’s center of gravity—the fulcrum, the pivot point, “the still point of the turning world.”

Grounded at that point, we are one with the Way for us and all of creation.

And we cannot be moved.

Find your center of gravity—your connection with the Foundation Stone.

What is it that is so YOU that no one can knock you off of it?

That no one can laugh you off of it?

That no one can shame you off of it?

It is so YOU that you cannot imagine life apart from it—would not consider it—will not budge?

This is one of your grounding realizations.

What is another one? What are the other ones? The places you are so YOU nothing can budge you?

Practice realizing your YOU-NESS in those places, around those things.

Develop your sense of being anchored to YOU there—

Of being one with the ground of Being.

Live out of that sense of groundedness as you go through your day.

Be grounded in YOU.
02/04/2015 — The Village of Edisto Beach, SC Panorama — Scott Creek, Edisto Beach State Park, Edisto Island, SC

When our first granddaughter was 4 years old, she called my wife EZ. My sister-in-law took it upon herself to correct Katy, and teach her the proper way to address her grandmother.

“This is Grannie,” she said, “Can you say ‘Grannie’?”

Katy said, “Grannie.”

“That’s RIGHT!”, said the sister-in-law. “Grannie! This is Grannie!” (pointing to my wife).

“Now, who is this?” she asked, pointing again to my wife.

“You say ‘Grannie,’ said Katy, “but I say EZ.”

That’s living out of your own authority.

When your center of gravity is zeroed in on the Foundation Stone,

Nothing can bump you off.

Your task is to find what is Truly YOU,

And say what YOU say,

And do what YOU do,

Within the terms and conditions,

Context and circumstances of your life,

And nothing can touch you, in the sense of destroying your foundation, or causing you to lose your way.
02/05/2015 — The Grove 05 — The Ernest F. Hollings ACE Basin National Wildlife Refuge, Adams Run, SC, January 29, 2015

Listen to your stomach,

Not to your heart.

Your heart can be taken in by glass beads and silver mirrors,

Or by the forbidden fruit on the Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil.

The heart is open to the serpent’s logic:

How can something this good be bad?

Not only that, but also, heart is the easiest thing to lose,

And the hardest thing to find.

Heart is all exuberance and enthusiasm at the start,

But let things drag out,

Let the going get tough.

The people thought the trek to the Promised Land was going to be a lark,

But at the first sign of inconvenience, they are ready to head back to Egypt.

The heart, above all things, is deceitful and easily corrupted.

Not so, the stomach.

“Gut feelings” are to be trusted in all situations great and small.

Check things out with your stomach before launching some crusade,

Or marrying some dark haired doozy your heart just flipped over.

Follow your stomach into war, or out of the job interview.

Your stomach aces stuff your heart doesn’t grasp,

And has the heart for things your heart can’t stomach.

Listen to your stomach.

Your stomach knows.
02/06/2015 — The Ghost Trees of Graveyard Beach Sunrise 01 — Botany Bay Plantation Heritage Preserve and Wildlife Management Area, Edisto Island, SC, January 28, 2015

Get your life under you!

If we were riding horses, we couldn’t go anywhere until we got our horse under us.

Here’s one for you: We are riding horses.

We have to get in the saddle.

And commune with our horse.

Remember the book/movie “The Horse Whisperer”?

We all have to become horse whisperers where our life is concerned.

Our life is our horse.

Try telling a horse what to do.

Try bossin’ a horse.

Try willing a horse to do your will.

Milton Erickson tells a story about taking a lost horse home.

A horse showed up at his family’s farm one day, and Milton’s father told him to take the horse home.

The horse was a strange one. Milton had no idea where the horse belonged.

Milton got his horse under him, and kept the horse from eating grass.

The horse took himself home.

Your life is your horse, and you have no idea where home is, what the goal is, even where the path is.

Your horse knows.

Get your horse under you,

And start listening to your horse.
02/06/2015 — Scott Creek Sunset Panorama 02 — Edisto Beach State Park, Edisto Island, SC, January 29, 2015

We are not tourists on some Orient Express,

On some Carnival Cruise Line tour of the world,

Talking about what we like and don’t like along the way.

We are heroes on a mission to live our life and transform the world.

You cannot deny that how you live your life transforms your world.

You have the power to redeem and save,

To destroy and discard.

How you live makes all the difference—

To you and to the people impacted by your life.

And you have no way of knowing who all is, and is not, impacted by your life.

We are all Jimmy Stewart in “It’s A Wonderful Life.”

We all face the options he faced,

To spit on our life and give up on the thing,

Or to take it as it is and do what we can with it—

Being exactly what our life needs us to be whether it appears to be doing any good or not.

There are 10,000 ways to run from your life,

But, if you live it, you’re going to have to learn to hit a curve ball.
02/06/2015 — The Old Sheldon Church Ruins HDR 01 — Yemassee, SC, January 27, 2015

God is not a fact.

Theologians during the Middle Ages came up with the formula:

“God is a circle whose center is everywhere, and whose circumference is nowhere.”

How factual is that?

God is a symbol for more that can be said, or thought, or comprehended, or grasped, or imagined.

God is a metaphor of Transcendent Being itself.

Whatever that is.

We do not know.

We are unconscious of it.

It is The Unconscious.

God is the source of light which dwells in deep darkness—

As the Good Book might say—

As near as our next breath (or our last one),

And as distant as the boundaries of our soul,

About which Heraclitus said,

“You would not find out the boundaries of the soul, even by traveling every path: so deep a measure does it have.”

Nor could you find a God worthy of the title who could be defined, explained, clarified and made plain.
02/07/2015 — Coot Scoot — Bear Island Wildlife Management Area, part of the ACE Basin National Estuarine Research Reserve, near Bennett’s Point, SC, January 29, 2015

John Redhead said, “God has no grandchildren.”

And Thelma Foster said, “Each generation has to find its own way to God.”

Each of us has to find our work and do it, and find our way to God, working out for ourselves who God is and how we and God are one in each situation as it arises.

We had rather the preacher’s do the work for us.

“Just tell us what to believe, Preacher!”

“But be sure to leave the way, turn aside from the path, and tell us no more of the holy one of Israel!”

Who is always out before us in the wilderness (or in Galilee, which is another kind of wilderness), waiting for us to catch up and apply ourselves to the task of finding our work and doing it—or, in the terminology of the Bible, of finding our way to the Land of Promise.

And we want nothing of it.

“Just tell us what to believe!”

We don’t believe anything someone hasn’t told us to believe.

We wouldn’t think of living our way into our own beliefs.

How lazy is that?
02/07/2015 — Birds of a Feather — Edisto Island, SC, January 29, 2015

Insight is realization gained through reflection on experience.

It is the experience of experience.

It is the probing, inquiring, exploration, investigation of experience.

We have to think about what happened, what is happening,

And think about our thinking about what happened, what is happening,

And make connections with what has happened before,

And what we have thought before,

And been told before,

And how that stacks up against what is happening now.

No unexamined assumptions, or presumptions, or inferences allowed!

It is in making new connections, transforming or discarding old connections, that we see things differently and change the way we live.

It is how we think about our experience that opens us to experience and makes all things new.
02/07/2015 — Edisto Beach Sunrise 04 — Edisto Beach State Park, Edisto Island, SC, January 29, 2015

We are better observers of reality than we are interpreters of reality.

Something happens, or doesn’t happen, and we are all over it with conclusions, judgments and verdicts about the worthless state of our affairs, and the complete non-existent status of our prospects.

“It’s all useless, hopeless, pointless, futile, absurd, and coming to a very bad end!”

So why wait, we think, let’s just end it now!

No one ever in the entire history of the universe has been in greater need of a perspective transplant than we are much of the time.

We have to evaluate our experience from a standpoint different from what it means to our wants and desires that our life is going the way it is.

What we want and desire is a skewed way of determining what something means.

The table is tilted. The deck is stacked. Against us. The house—that would be us—is going to lose much more often than not.

We have to start with a different assumption.

Here’s one: We aren’t here to have our way and get what we want—we are here to find our life and live it.

And our life has nothing to do with what we want. It has entirely to do with what is being asked of us—with what is ours to do.

Now, it doesn’t matter what happens or doesn’t happen—it matters what we do about it, in response to it.

It matters how we dance with what happens or doesn’t happen so as to rise to the occasion and bring forth the character, gift, genius, art, daemon, that is ours to unfurl in each situation as it arises, in doing right by the situation and the highest good of all concerned.

It isn’t a question of what happens or doesn’t happen.

It is a question of what we need to live our life—the life that is our life to live—within the life we are living, and meeting well all that is happening, or not happening there.

What do we need to meet the day well, and offer what is needed to the situations that come our way?
02/08/2015 — Scott Creek Sunset Panorama 04 — Edisto Beach State Park, Edisto Island, SC, January 29, 2015

We think there is a recipe.

We think if we can just find the right ingredient,

And add it in the right amount

At the right time,

We can tweak the recipe just enough to make all things grand.

There is no recipe for grand.

For escaping the grind of living our life as it is each day.

There is only coming to terms with the way things have been,

And with the way things are,

And of finding the way of living today the way today needs to be lived,

And letting that be that.

There is only waking up to how things are,

And doing what you can think to do about them,

In light of what needs to happen,

While living in good faith with yourself and with all sentient beings.

And letting that be grand,

Seeing that it is beautiful too, just as it comes.
Used in Short Talks On Contradiction, etc., 02/08/2015 — Blue Ridge Moon — Julian Price Memorial Park, Price Lake and Grandfather Mountain, Blue Ridge Parkway near Blowing Rock, NC, April 2007

How frequently do you have fresh realizations?

Realizations are the products of reflection on experience.

If we aren’t pondering, examining, exploring, questioning, thinking about, looking at—and into—our experiences, convictions, assumptions, inferences and suppositions, we aren’t creating new realizations.

We are going through the motions of living without being alive.

Look at everything until you see it, and then look for what else there is to see about it!

All conclusions are tentative!

The Foundation Stone is, itself, rooted in a world that is, itself, whirling about the Sun that is, itself, whizzing through the galaxy, that is, itself, blazing through the universe,

Which makes stability a nice, comforting, aspiration tucked safely away in its own little castle in the air.

Turn everything over again, looking endlessly for new realizations.

Find a nice pair of contradictions, and refuse to leave them alone until they share the realizations they have to offer.

Relish conundrums for the realizations that hide under their wings.

Pray for encounters with mutually exclusive truths.

Your life is lived from one realization to another.

They are the steppingstones to life,

Way stations on the path to the Promised Land.
02/08/2015 — Balcony House Ladder 02 — Mesa Verde National Park, Mesa Verde, CO, September 2007

We have to find our horse and ride it for the rest of our life.

Our horse is my metaphor for our LIFE—the life that is ours to live—

The life that only we can live.

Everything else in our life serves as the supporting cast to our LIFE.

All of our responsibilities, duties, obligations, wounds, traumas, memories, etc.,

Have a place—a role to play—in preparing us for our LIFE

And bringing it forth into the time and place of our living.

Your life has been preparing you to live your LIFE all your life long.

Get into the saddle and RIDE!
02/08/2015 — Fall Leaves 2008 — Greensboro, NC, November 2008

Living your life will save your life.

It’s the only thing that can.

When you are at the end of your rope,

With nowhere to turn,

Turn to your life.

Not the life you have been living.

Look where that got you.

The life that is your life to live—

The life that only you can live—

The life that has been waiting for you to get to this point,

So you can get your other life out of your system

And get yourself lined up with the life that has been yours from the start.

Turn to that life,

And say, “Okay. I’m all yours. Let’s go.”

The only catch is that you have to mean it.

Like you have never meant anything else. Ever.

And then what, you say?

Wait. Watch. Listen. Look.

For something to shift.

For the door to open.

When it does, walk through.

It may not look like much.

It’s testing your will and your spirit,

To see if you have what it takes,

Because it will ask hard things of you,

And you have to have a willing, willful, spirit

To keep faith with your LIFE.

If you’ll throw in with it for the duration,

Your LIFE will save your life.

It’s the only thing that can.
02/09/2015 — The Ghost Trees of Boneyard Beach 07 — Botany Bay Plantation Heritage Preserve and Wildlife Management Area, Edisto Island, SC, January 28, 2015

Joseph Campbell wrote a book titled, “The Hero with a Thousand Faces,” that would be me and you, and it’s a lot more than a thousand faces.

He also wrote a four volume work called “The Masks of God.” That would be “the very present help in time of trouble” that helps all of us heroes along the way. There are more than a thousand masks of God, too.

Jesus called God, “Father.” Carl Jung referred to God as “the ten million year old man (or woman)” inside each of us. The Greeks and Romans, and the Hindus, come closer to the God behind the masks with their pantheons. They never met a God in other cultures they couldn’t fit into their compilation of the Masks of God.

God is help for the journey, and IS the journey, just as WE are the journey, underscoring the truth that Jesus invited us to embrace: The Father and I (and you, and you, and you over there) are one!”

You’ll never begin to understand what I’m saying by thinking about it.

You will not have a clue until you take up the journey, start out on the path, thinking, maybe, you are going to some far off Promised Land, when you are actually going home. To you. To God.

But that, too, won’t make much sense until you pick up your walking stick and hie out along the way that is your way home to you. To God.

Abraham, you know, had to leave home to find home. So do we all. Discovering, as we will, as Carl Jung said, “We are who we always have been, and who we will be.”

And throughout the way, we will be led by invisible hands, guiding us along the strangest possible path, into the company of people you would never peg as the right kind of people, to the very heart of ourselves, which is the very heart of God, and there we are.

It will be good to see you. What a time we will have! All along the way!
02/09/2015 — Glade Creek Mill 01, Babcock State Park near Fayetteville, WV, October 2007

Jesus called God “Father,” and Carl Jung said God was the “Two million year old man” within. And Friedrich Nietzsche said “God is dead.” Who is right?

Jesus said what Jesus had to say. Carl Jung said what Carl Jung had to say. Friedrich Nietzsche said what Friedrich Nietzsche had to say…

What do YOU say, is the question.

If you say, “What Jesus said is the TRUTH!”, I’ll ask you what leads you to believe what Jesus said was the TRUTH—that is, more truthful than anything anybody else has ever said, or will ever say, or could ever say?

And after some hemming and hawing, you’re likely to say, “I take it on faith!” At which point, I will ask you, “Why do you take that on faith and not something else instead?”

And we’ll go round and round, but come out at the point where someone you know, or know of, told you Jesus said the TRUTH, and WAS the TRUTH because he said he was,” and they said it in such a convincing way that you took it for the truth and have believed it ever since, and have been confirmed and validated in your choice of what to take on faith from that point on.

Fine. Jesus said what he had to say, and whomever told you that what Jesus said was the TRUTH said what he, or she, had to say, and you now say about all that what you have to say.

And what YOU say is what matters most.

Your word is the only word that matters. What YOU say goes, for you. So, it’s to your lifelong advantage to weigh carefully what you say and leave unsaid, and not just take someone’s word for something that you haven’t thought through on your own.

What you “take on faith” is your business. We all have to say what matters to us—and live as though it does. We all have to say what WE have to say.

What do YOU say, is the question. Never mind what somebody else might say. It is what YOU say matters that matters.
02/09/2015 — Glade Creek Mill, 02 — Babcock State Park near Fayetteville, WV, October 2008

We are all millers, and “everything is grist for the mill.”

We are milling our life here.

We are milling maturity, realization/insight, compassion and grace.

We are milling enlightenment and understanding.

We are milling character and integrity.

And the rule we live by is: “Whatever it takes!”

Whatever it takes to wake up—

To realize who we are and what we are about—

To see what is happening,

And know what needs to be done about it,

And get up and do the thing,

With the gifts, art, genius, knack, ability, flair, faculty and aptitude

That set us apart and make us us.

It took being where we have been to be where we are,

So no whining, no moaning and complaining

About bad breaks and rotten starts, and disastrous turns of events!

Our life has been preparing us to live it!

We have exactly what it takes to step into our future,

And be there what is needed there.

So gather yourself for the journey that begins in this moment,

And look forward to the adventure of a lifetime!
02/09/2015 — Mud Stones 03 — Zabriskie Point, Death Valley National Park, California/Nevada, February 2007

Bill Hamilton tells of going to visit his friend Alan Stacell and finding him bringing paintings on stretched canvas out of his storage shed, loading them in the back of his pickup to haul to the dump—to make room to store his newest work.

He told Bill, “I paint like a dog wags its tail.”

And he wasn’t into keeping and selling what he painted.

Alan understood the nature of the work that is ours to do.

We aren’t in it for what we might get out of it.

We do it because we have to—not because we want to—because we cannot Not do it,

Anymore than a dog can Not wag its tail.

What do you do because you have to? Because you cannot Not do it? Working in the yard, maybe, cooking, maybe, riding horses, maybe…

The list of possibilities is a long one.

As you look for your work, you are looking for something you have to do.

Like a dog wags its tail.
02/10/2015 — Edisto Beach Sunrise 08 — Edisto Beach State Park, Edisto Island, SC, January 29, 2015

I’m looking for invisible religion. It’s hard to find. I can’t get past people waving it in my face. They want me to know they are religious, because I would never guess if they didn’t tell me.

I’m looking for invisible religion. Until I find it, I’ll have to content myself with practicing it.

My idea is to forgo all of the trappings of religion, and content myself with practicing good faith presence—

Which would be the same thing as being transparently present—

In the lives of others.

And having little to do with those who don’t return the favor.

Finding good faith is likely to be as difficult as finding invisible religion.

The two are the same.
02/10/2015 — Spruce Tree House Ladder — Mesa Verde National Park, Mesa Verde, CO, September 2007

There are 10,000 possible ways to live our life—and 10,000 is just a symbol for infinity. We have an endless array of options. At least to start with. We have fewer as time goes by, because our physical abilities begin to decline, but, even then, we have thousands of ways to live our life.

What are we going to do with the time that is ours to live?

Find the thing that is yours to do, is my suggestion. And do it!

Find the thing you have to do—the thing that won’t leave you alone. The thing you must do.

I stop the car and turn around to get the picture.

And if I’m in the house, I get my camera, get in the car and go out looking for the picture.

Or, if I’m on the way to take a nap, and think of something that needs to be written, I delay the nap and go write the thing.

You have to be seized by something, by the thing that is yours to do.

You have to be grabbed by it, compelled to do it. You have to be obsessed with the thing. Possessed. Haunted. Hounded.

You have to find the thing that won’t leave you alone until you do it, and then won’t leave you alone until you do it again, and again.

You can’t just play bridge, or golf, or bingo until you die. You can’t just pass the time.

You are here to burn yourself alive—to ignite and be ablaze in the service of your work.

You can’t be dragging though another day of not knowing what to do with yourself, day after day, hoping maybe the undertaker will come for you today. That isn’t what “It’s a good day to die” means!

Live so that there is nothing left to bury when you die! Burn yourself up!

And, if you don’t know where to start finding something you can do with all your “heart and mind and soul and strength,” sit still and see what comes up in your imagination. Follow it, and see where it goes.

Or imagine that you are in a place you enjoy being, and see what meets you there and what happens.

Or, before you go to sleep tonight, ask your dreamer for a guiding dream, and see what comes.

Don’t try to think of something. You can’t think this up. This is the kind of mythological thing, the kind of mystery, that cannot come from you. It has to come upon you. You just have to place yourself in liege to it and allow it to carry you away.
02/01/2015 — Green River Mesa — Green River Canyon, Canyonlands National Park, Moab, UT, September 2007

People think they can dial up an adventure.

They buy a rucksack and go hitchhiking across Europe.

Big whoopee.

That’s no adventure. That’s avoiding your responsibilities and thinking how cool you are.

Read all the stories. No adventure starts out with somebody buying a rucksack and going in search of an adventure.

Adventures come out of nowhere and nail someone who has something else in mind.

Luke Skywalker says, “Not me. I got a life.”

Moses says, “Not me. Take Aaron.”

Adventure is the last thing on a hero’s mind.

Even Indiana Jones isn’t after adventure. He’s after treasure: “Fortune and glory, Kid. Fortune and glory.” Adventure tracks him down.

That’s the way it is with adventure. It looks you up, and says, “Let’s go.”

The people with the rucksacks hitchhiking across Europe looking for adventure, miss the adventure that is looking for them back home at the place they used to work.
02/11/2015 — The Ghost Trees of Boneyard Beach 08 — Botany Bay Plantation Heritage Preserve and Wildlife Management Area, Edisto Island, SC, January 28, 2015

There are lulls even on the Journey.

“Action packed” is only in the movies.

In real time, we move into doldrums and the dog days of summer,

Even in the winter,

And have to remember that we don’t run the show,

Just like at the movies.

In the whirling mist of the adventure of our LIFE,

We have to wait for instruction,

For inspiration,

For revelation,

For direction,

For The Time To Act—

For there is a time to act and a time to refrain from all action.

A time to sit and rest,

A time to cook dinner,

A time to go for a walk,

While we wait to be grabbed again,

To be seized with incentive,

And hurled again into That Which Needs Us To Do It.

The time between the times of our visitation

Has its place.

We spend that time “recovering from the past,

And storing up for the future (Robert Ruark).”
02/11/2015 — The Grove HDR Panorama 01 — The Ernest F. Hollings ACE Basin National Wildlife Refuge, Adams Run, SC, January 29, 2015

Alan Watts once asked Joseph Campbell, “Joe, what form does your Yoga take?” Campbell replied, “I underline passages.”

Some Yogis are cut out for all the positions.

Some are cut out for underlining passages.

Jesus said, to a man he saw working on the Sabbath, “If you know what you are doing, then you are blessed—but if you do not know what you are doing, you are accursed and a transgressor of the Law” (Luke 6:5, Codex Bezea).

We have to know what we are cut out for, and be right about it, and do it.

Nobody can hand us our Yoga and tell us to do it.

We find it for ourselves.

And we know it when we see it, but.

We can’t just grab this, or that.

We can’t just settle for any old life.

Pick one off the sales rack, put it on and wear it right out of the store.

We have to know what we are doing.

Which means, we have to pay attention to what we are doing.

Does the life we are living fit us?

Is it right for us?

What life would be right for us?

Not some lazy, sitting on the beach and drinking beer life—

Not some escape from life, some way of avoiding life,

But of living it to the fullest?

What would you be doing to live your life to the fullest—

Putting all that you are into it,

So that it was the fullest possible expression of YOU?

What would you be doing to exhibit your loves, interest, gifts,

And be YOU to the hilt?

How can you begin to work that into the life you are living?
02/12/2015 — Kisatchie Falls 2009 – Kisatchie Creek, near, well, Kisatchie, LA, July 26, 2009

My sister Ellen says “No one is where they are.”

Everyone is somewhere else.

In check-out lines, they are talking to their friends at the beach.

At the beach, they are back with their friends in check-out lines.

How can we hope to live well without being mindfully present in the moment,

in the time and place, of our living?

We are never “here, now.”

We are always relieving ourselves of the present moment

in favor of different company,

another time,

another place.

“Anywhere but here, now!”
02/12/2015 — Norfolk Southern 9026 02 — Steele Creek Trestle, Anne Springs Close Greenway, Fort Mill, SC, February 12, 2015

If you’re talking, you’re not listening.

Listen more, talk less.

Give up preaching/lecturing/giving your personal testimony about the value of doing it your way.

Be quiet for long stretches of time.

Listen.

Look.

See.

Hear.

Do only what needs to be done.

The world will shift toward the good overnight.
02/13/2015 — Edisto Beach Sunrise 06 — Edisto Beach State Park, Edisto Island, SC, January 29, 2015

Willpower gets all the press, but Awareness is the key.

You don’t have to will yourself thin.

You have to be aware of what you are doing.

Sit with eating, and see it for what it is.

Rigidity is the enemy.

Flexibility is the friend.

All of our symptoms are rigid systems of living unconsciously.

Compulsive is rigid, is unconscious.

Obsessive is rigid, is unconscious.

Flexibility is fluid and conscious.

We move from rigid to flexible by way of awareness, not will.

Once we see how things are, we adjust ourselves appropriately, automatically.

“Oh, NO we don’t! I KNOW when I am gorging!”

When is the last time you talked with gorging? Listened? Understood.

Knowing what you are doing in the sense of “I KNOW when I am gorging!” is knowing THAT you are doing something.

There is more to be known.

Gorging the rigid, automatic, unconscious response to what?

Make what you don’t know known.

Explore what you think you know in order to discover all you don’t know about it.

Get to know all you don’t know.

Be sure you understand what it is trying to do for you—

How it is attempting to help.

All of our internal enemies—including rigidity in all forms—are trying to help.

They are just offering the wrong kind of help in the wrong kind of way.

Make what is unconscious conscious.

Transform rigidity into flexibility throughout your life.

With awareness. Not willpower.
02/13/2015 — Beech Trees HDR — Greensboro, NC, October 2009

The best way to be human is in service of the gifts, genius, art, daemon, aptitude, interests, knacks, talents, loves, abilities that came with us into the world.

What’s your thing? Do it!

What are you built for? Do it!

What is your heart’s true love? Do it!

Where is your life found? Do it!

If you don’t know the answers to these questions, meditate on them until enlightenment awakens you to YOU.
02/14/2015 — Oregon Inlet Sunset — Herbert C. Bonner Bridge, Cape Hatteras National Seashore, Nags Head, NC, October 24, 2010

Life is motion. When living things are still, it’s because they are waiting for something, watching for something, like dinner.

A cat, for instance, can be very still with a bird in sight.

They can be still when they are sleeping.

A dog, for instance, can be still for hours.

Otherwise, they are in motion.

We think the idea is to freeze our life in place—

To get things just like we like them, and yell, “FREEZE!!!”

We like things nice and rigid.

The more inflexible and unbending, the better.

We want it done the way it has always been done.

We want it done the way God wants it done.

We put up the Ten Commandments all around town.

Get everybody in line and freeze them in place.

That’s our idea of really living.

No worries, no pain.

So what if we are mostly dead?

Life calls us away from the comfort of safety and security,

And knowing what you are supposed to do in every single moment of your life.

“Wing it, Baby!”

Like a bird in the air.

All your life long.

A still bird is dinner for the cat.
02/14/2015 — Edisto Beach Sunrise 10 — Edisto Beach State Park, Edisto, Island, SC, January 29, 2015

We are here to offer ourselves to the world—

To bring ourselves forth and BE who we are, who we are capable of being.

We do that by following our interests and doing what we love,

By being alert to what has life for us and what doesn’t—and staying with what does.

By sitting with things until we see what we are looking at,

And hearing what is being said to us—

Looking beyond the apparent to the real—

So that we know what we know,

And live in ways that are appropriate to the occasion.

Why hold anything back?

Why not live like it is our only shot at life?

At seeing what we are made of,

And showing ourselves what we can do?

Why die not knowing what we could have done?
02/15/2015 — False Hellebore 2009 — Blue Ridge Parkway near Meadows of Dan, VA, April 30, 2009

We have to hear what we are saying to ourselves, and do what needs to be done about it.

We ignore, dismiss, discount, deny what we tell ourselves on a regular basis.

And, it’s killing us.

We are killing ourselves by living as though we do not exist.

We make ourselves invisible to us by refusing to see ourselves jumping up and down, waving frantically, placing stop signs and red flags in our path and holding up flashing neon arrows pointing to The Way.

We think we know what we have to say.

And we think we can’t do anything about it.

We don’t want to listen because we are so hellbent on doing it our way,

Or so helpless to do it any other way.

It takes courage, imagination and faith in ourselves to listen to ourselves and do what needs to be done about what we have to say.

Courage comes from living courageously.

Imagination comes from sitting quietly with The Situation and playing with the possibilities.

Faith in ourselves comes from believing there is more to us than meets the eye, and trusting ourselves to what we do not know.

There isn’t a better way to live the life left for living.
02/15/2015 — Price Lake Sunset — Julian Price Memorial Park, Blue Ridge Parkway near Blowing Rock, NC, June 2008

We think it’s about being reasonably happy and contented, with plenty of pastimes and entertainments, and enough friends to keep us company.

Ask anybody what life is about and they will tell you it’s about having enough money to live on and be able to enjoy your life until you die.

Nowhere in this wildly popular scenario is any mention of responsibility to an Inner Other Whom We Do Not Know.

There is no idea of having an actual, specific, particular life to live that we have to discover and endeavor to approximate if not actualize in and with the life we are living.

We think our life is up to us, and we have complete freedom to design and live it with, well, reckless abandon—being “anything we want to be.” Doing “anything we want to do.”

You think Sisyphus had a tough job. How about mine? Convincing you that you have an Inner Other with a specific life in mind for you, and that it is your task to bring your life into alignment with the life that is yours to live. Sisyphus wouldn’t consider trading.

He would just laugh and ask me, “How’s it going?” I’d have to admit it’s a hard sell.

Telling people they have innate qualities, values, character, temperament, perspective, etc., that are theirs to incarnate and bring to life in the way they live.

That they are here to give shape and form to their particular ratio of human traits and attributes,

And bring them forth in specific ways in a specific life.

I’m generally interrupted in mid-sentence with, “Have you seen my skateboard? I keep forgetting where I left it.” Or something equally relevant.
02/16/2015 — Crabtree Falls Panorama — Blue Ridge Parkway near Little Switzerland, NC, May 2008

We have to do the work—live the work—of communing with the Invisible Other Within and consciously incarnating the invisible world, the values, qualities and character exhibiting who we Really Are, in the visible world of normal, apparent, reality.

We have to bring ourselves forth to meet the world every day—intentionally, with mindful, compassionate attention to both the inner and the outer worlds.

We have to work it all out. We have to make it work.

We—our conscious self—are the contact point between worlds, and have to make the connection come alive, with sparks, and fire, and “What was that?” by the way we live with a foot in each world.

It takes thinking and it takes doing. We have to practice doing what we know needs to be done: Listening to the inner world via dreams and fantasies, slips of the tongue, wrong turns, mistakes, insight, symbols, etc.

We have to be always looking for ways to make our gifts, genius, daemon, art real in the outer world, bringing ourselves forth into the light of day, and being who we are.

This is the work that cannot be put off until a more propitious and favorable time.

At the same time, we have to be aware of “the times,” and that what is called for here isn’t called for there, and living so as to be and do what is appropriate in each situation as it arises—and true to ourselves across all situations.

Attention, awareness, mindfulness and compassion are always in season, and we have to be attentive, aware, mindful and compassionate through all circumstances, in every situation: What here? What now?

We can’t just think about doing the work—though we must think about it—we have to do it.

The work of being who we are, where we are, how we are, when we are—in each here-and-now of our life is not to be neglected or delayed
02/16/2015 — Repair Work — Deer Isle, ME, October 2009

To see what needs to happen in a situation, we have to see the entire situation.

And, we have to be committed to serving motion, movement and flow—

Not rigid, static, unbending, immobile policies, procedures, positions and practices.

That would be maintaining the status quo at all costs.

We cannot do that.

We cannot go into a situation thinking, before we know anything about the situation, that it is our place to keep things in place and to prevent anything from happening.

To see what needs to happen in a situation, we have to see the entire situation, and be strong in the service of helping happen what needs to happen.

The attitude of Alabama’s Chief Justice is NOT the kind of attitude that situations need.

We have to read the times, and know when they are a-changing—

And, more than that, know when they need to be changed even before anyone else catches on,

And serve the need for change in ways that help it become apparent to all that the times need a-changing.

We have to be so sensitive, so alert, to each situation as it arises that we see what is going to be necessary before anyone sees the necessity of what we see.

This is the place of prophets who are, by definition, ahead of their times.

Whoever heard of a prophet who was behind the times?

We are to see what needs to be done, and live in its service, and let the world wake up to the truth that was true long before it became obvious to anyone.

Seeing what is happening, and what needs to happen, is the kind of vision we work for and serve, taking up the legacy of the prophets of lore, and changing the world.
02/17/2015 — The Ghost Trees of Boneyard Beach 04 — Botany Bay Plantation Heritage Preserve and Wildlife Management Area, Edisto Island, SC, January 28, 2015

Seeing, hearing, understanding and knowing how things are

Lead to doing what needs to be done about them

And being who we are.

Being is realized, exhibited, incarnated and expressed in doing.

We don’t know who we are until we see ourselves revealed in what we are doing.

Doing brings us forth—often against our will.

We think we are what we have done in the past—generally, the far distant past.

“That isn’t me,” we say, as though we know what all is me and what all is not me, and dare not offend any gods by besmudging ourselves with the Not Me in the least little way.

No one ever became Me except through experimentation with Not Me. Lots of endless, on-going, experimentation.

We lead ourselves to Me by trusting ourselves to do what needs to be done even if that entails a brush with Not Me, and risking a rendezvous that transforms the way we think of ourselves.

The people who are rigidly encased in Me and refuse all escapades with Not Me are dead long before they die—citizens of Zombie Nation, going through the motions of living without being alive.

Doing expands being, enlarges and deepens being, and wakes us up to who we Also Are.

None of which we will into place.

All of which we allow and encourage simply by Seeing, Hearing, Understanding, and Knowing what is happening and what needs to be done about it.

Awareness is the ground of doing and being.

Only those who don’t see are safe from the requirements of life.
02/17/2015 — The Grove HDR Panorama 07 — The Ernest F. Hollings ACE Basin National Wildlife Refuge, Adams Run, SC, January 29, 2015 — The Big House now serves as the office of the refuge.

We have a numinous core, but we can be distracted—consumed—by the 10,000 things. This, you might say, is the heart of the problem.

We have divided allegiances.

On the one hand, we want to be at peace with ourselves,

And on the other hand, we want everything else as well.

What’s it going to be?

It has all devolved into the current mess of our own making.

We want spiritual oneness with the heart of the universe,

And we want all our little heart desires.

Show of hands here: Anybody ever heard of making a choice?

We give up this to get that.

We can be spiritually attuned to the numinous core of life, but.

That means living aligned with—serving and exhibiting—qualities, character and values at odds with what passes for “the good life.”

That would be the life hawked by the culture of capitalism, commercialism and consumerism.

Name me a legitimate prophet, master or guru with a big screen TV.

Jesus is ROTFL. NO! Throwing up. NO! Crying. All the churches these days have big screen TV’s.

The life you are living is interfering with the life that is waiting to be lived.

We can be spiritually aligned with our numinous core and still pay the bills, but.

They will be different bills.

When we change our mind about what is important, everything changes.

What’s it going to be?

Don’t tell me—let me guess.

We are going to say this is important and live as though that is.
02/18/2015 — Otter Point Morning — Acadia National Park, Bar Harbor, ME, September 2009

My best advice to us at this point in the day:

Get on top of your game!

Realize who you are, where you are, when you are, how you are, why you are, what you are and what’s going on around you at all times!

Know what is happening and what you are doing about it, and what needs to be done about it!

Don’t miss anything!

Pay attention!

Be awake! Aware! Alive!

To the moment you are living and the time that is at hand!

What you need to know is plain before you in each situation as it arises! Don’t walk past it unknowing!

What you do about it is your business.
Used in Short Talks On Good And Bad Religion — 02/08/2015 — Alligator Pond B&W — The Ernest F. Hollings ACE Basin National Wildlife Refuge, Adams Run, SC, January 29, 2015

Good hands you spirituality without any theology, dogma and doctrine attached.

Good religion hands you spirituality straight from the heart—

From the heart of good religion straight to your heart—

Without any of the embellishments, improvements, alterations and enhancements

That bad religion is so proficient in producing and providing.

I wish we had another word for “spirituality,”

Because that is so encumbered with theological augmentation

That you can’t possibly be a spiritual person without “good theology,”

As though what we think is more important than what we know.

Spirituality is knowing that can’t be thought, told, defined or explained as in:

“The Tao that can be said is not the eternal Tao.”

Spirituality is our connection with the Invisible World—

With the Unconscious World.

It is unconscious because we are not conscious of it—

Because it is more than can be made conscious,

Except through symbols and metaphors.

We have to talk about the unconscious world of Spirit,

Of Spiritual Reality,

With symbols and metaphors because we cannot say directly

What we know to be so,

Because what we know cannot be said.

So we talk about “the wellspring of living water,”

But it isn’t an actual well,

Or actual water,

And how can water be alive, anyway?

The entire vocabulary of spiritual discourse is such

That you have to know what I mean

Before you can understand what I’m saying,

And without the experience of the Invisible World,

There is nothing that can be said

To enable you to understand

What I’m talking about.
02/18/2015 — Scott Creek Silhouette Panorama — Edisto Beach State Park, Edisto Island, January 28, 2015

Carl Jung said that we have to feed the Inner Person—

That, unfed, She, He, begins to rumble and stir around,

Looking for something to eat,

And creates all manner of trouble in the outer world of normal, apparent, reality.

We feed the Inner Person by consciously participating in the Mystery of Symbol and Metaphor.

Systematic Theology has exorcised Mystery from its rich trove of symbols and metaphors

By carefully explaining and defining each one.

The Cross is no Mystery.

It is where Jesus died to save us from our sins.

Nothing more to say.

And so it is with every last symbol in the church’s possession.

The Bread, the Wine, the Water of Baptism…

Our place is to recover the symbols and the Mystery at the heart of each one.

And to participate consciously and wondrously

In their Resurrection from the Dead.

They all mean more than they have ever been said to mean—

But to explore the world of “more than words can say”

We have to abandon Good Theology

And swim in the waters of pre-theology,

Which, of course, would be Paganism from the theologians point of view.

True Belief, from mine.
02/18/2015 — Mud Stones 01 — Zabriskie Point, Death Valley National Park, California/Nevada, February 2007

How many stop signs do you generally run through before the crash?

How many crashes do you think it will take to get you to start heeding stop signs?

Our guides are present and reliable, but.

We. Have. To. Read. The. Signs.
02/19/2015 — The Ghost Trees of Boneyard Beach 16 — Botany Bay Plantation Heritage Preserve and Wildlife Management Area, Edisto Island, SC, January 28, 2015

What is your idea of optimal living? Better have a clear one to guide you to what you are doing here, and to direct your choices about how to live your life.

Here’s mine. We’ll call her Marion. She lived just off a gravel road in the rural deep south. She was in her late fifties, early sixties. She had been in the Peace Corps, had worked as an activist, had a PhD, had been a therapist, and left it all to come live in a barely standard wooden frame house in the deep south.

Her life consisted mostly of piddling around, cooking, doing chores, growing vegetables. She made pottery and sold some. Fed the birds. Weeded her garden. She was the local therapist and helped people more as drop-bys than as having a scheduled appointment. She took a fee if it were offered, but it might come in the form of eggs or tomatoes or squash.

She was completely who she was, centered and grounded upon the foundation of values that had proven themselves to be valuable to her through the course of her life. What she believed to be important and how she lived were one thing.

She was present and aware without being pushy or willful. She lived her life and let life be lived about her without trying to interfere or insert herself into life in any way. She was quite content to let the world go the way of the world, while she went the way of Marion.

She enjoyed what was to be enjoyed about every day. Grieved what was to be grieved. Mourned what was to be mourned. Rejoiced in what was to be rejoiced in. Did what was needed to be done. Participated in life to the extent she felt like her participation was called for, and lived as one appropriately engaged with her life and her world, responding to each moment in a way that was proper for the moment.

She had a life that would bore most people, and would appeal to very few, and it was just right for her. Quiet, compassionate, reflective, present, secluded-but-engaged.

It’s a life I have been living toward, without consciously intending it, all my life. Now, I am consciously intending it.

Find the people who are doing it the way you think it ought to be done, and see how much like them you already are.
02/19/2015 — Steele Creek Trestle Panorama 02 — Anne Springs Close Greenway, Fort Mill, SC, February 12, 2015

When I am doing what is legitimately My Thing,

And you are doing what is legitimately Your Thing,

We are doing the same thing.

The sameness of the thing will be the unifying factor uniting all things,

In one of those miraculous kind of ways.

The sameness of the thing may well be at first imperceptible.

It may appear that the two things are poles apart and mutually exclusive.

They come closer together the closer we look,

And as we talk about Our Things, we will immediately find ourselves saying, “Me, too!” “That’s right!”

The same with me!”

And the fact that you are riding horses and I’m writing these little snippets will recede into the distant background,

And what will be the same One is the two of us who are doing our thing.

A note on legitimacy.

Our thing is legitimately our thing when it is no one else’s idea.

When we aren’t doing it to be like someone else,

Or to be liked by someone else,

Or to make someone else happy,

Or to get something other than doing it from it.

It is our thing when it springs from us like a sprout from an acorn.

It is our thing when it grabs us by the nape of our neck and hurls us into its service, against our will and better judgment.

It is our thing when it charms us with its spell and steals our heart as true love at first sight.

It is our thing when we wake up to its claim upon us, and spend our life in liege to its service.

If you have something like this going for something, it is Your Thing.

Do it.
02/20/2015 — Edisto Beach Sunrise 12 — Edisto Beach State Park, Edisto Island, January 29, 2015

We have to make our peace with our life each day.

We make our peace with the day each day.

Each day brings some other inconvenience, some additional wrinkle, something else to adjust to, to work around and fit into our life.

We don’t get it smoothed out and in place just like we like it.

We constantly work with “the whole catastrophe,” with the gestalt, the overall “situation” of our life, fitting ourselves into it anew each day.

That is part of the work of being alive.

Being alive today is different than being alive yesterday.

Today asks new things of us.

Or, old things come back around, to be dealt with again.

Growing up requires us to take it all in stride,

To take what the day brings and do what needs to be done about it, as though for the first time.

We are not to be surprised, shocked, undone, overwhelmed that this is how it is,

Because this is how it is.

It’s like breathing.

We have to breathe all the damn time.

One breath after another, every day, why doesn’t it leave us alone?

Breathing, breathing, breathing, always breathing, why don’t we get a break from breathing?

All the inconveniences and disruptions are part of the framework, like breathing is.

Accept it, because it isn’t going away, make your peace with it, step into it, and do what you can with it today.

Tomorrow is coming with it’s own armload of inconveniences and disruptions.

You have to get over, and deal with, today’s today.
02/20/2015 — Scott Creek Sunset 01 — Edisto Beach State Park, Edisto Island, SC, January 29, 2015

The Unconscious is geared to helping us express who we are.

We realize who we are in the act of expressing who we are—

Not by thinking about it.

My fifth grade teacher told my mother in one of those parent-teacher conferences,

“Jimmy spends a lot of time looking out the window.”

I still do.

What we do shows us who we are—

Not what we say we will do,

And not who we say we are.

The Unconscious’ only mission is to bring us forth,

By having us do the things that bring us forth.

The Unconscious only wants us to be who we ARE,

Not who we pretend to be,

Not who we wish we were,

Not who we say we are,

Now who we will ourselves to be,

But who we ARE.

The Unconscious is with us to birth us into being.

We cannot use the so-called “power of the Unconscious”

For any other purpose.

We can align ourselves with the Unconscious

Or oppose it all the way to the grave.

Carl Jung said, “We count for something only because of the essential we embody, and if we do not embody that, life is wasted.”

The Unconscious is with us to see that we do not waste our life

But we can trump the Unconscious by willfully serving our own ends.

To live our life or waste our life is our call to make.
02/21/2015 — Edisto Beach Sunrise 01 — Edisto Beach State Park, Edisto Island, SC, January 29, 2015

Our life is wasted if it doesn’t wake us up.

Our life is wasted if it isn’t waking us up.

Awake is not a steady, static, state of being.

Awake is the path of awareness

That winds through the heart of Gethsemane

And across the face of Golgotha

To the empty tomb.

May all of our tombs be empty!

The path there is the one that tells that tale!

How awake were we on the path carrying each of us to the tomb?

That question is the cross we carry,

That each must answer for herself, for himself,

All along the way.

If you think you are awake, take up Sudoku.

That will wake you up to how much you are missing

That is right before your eyes.

There is nothing to Sudoku if you see what’s there.

Same with being alive, with being awake.

The two are one.

We are alive to the extent that we are awake,

And awake to the extent that we are alive.

A lot of people wake up just enough to be hopeless and despondent.

How awake is that?

But you can’t wake them up any more than you can wake up those who are sound asleep.

“We SEE!” they say, “And it is SOOOO HOPELESS!”

Everything is a doorway, a threshold, to seeing something else, something more.

Hopelessness is just another doorway, just another threshold.

Keep looking. Keep listening.

There is always more than meets the eye.

Any eye.
02/21/2015 — Two Rocks B&W — Jordan Pond, Acadia National Park, Bar Harbor, Maine, September 2004

Art and literature, music and nature

Are how we experience and express numinous reality.

If you are empty, burned-out, dejected and depressed,

And can’t remember the last time you were alive,

You have to reconnect with the numinous

Through art, literature, music and nature.

It will help if you are quiet, mindful and reflective

Throughout, and following, the experience.

It is also essential that you return regularly

To participate in the wonder and beauty of the experience

In what remains of the time left for living.

Throw in good food and good conversation

And you’ll be rolling in life abundant in no time.
02/21/2015 — Cypress Fire — Down East North Carolina, November 2004

Here is an example of how I work with my dreams. This is from last night:

A group of us are concerned about launching an undersea rescue operation to release an undetermined number of people encased in a large bubble somewhere under water.

There is a plan to send a navy submarine to penetrate the bubble and save the people, but we don’t know how many people there are, or what impact on the bubble the submarine’s penetration would have—and the whole affair seems absurd to me.

We don’t know if the people want to be saved, or how they got there, or if they prefer life in the bubble to life on the surface. I’m for leaving them to their fate, no matter what that might be.

Upon Reflection (after awakening): The sea is the unconscious and the bubble is consciousness doing its part to make the unconscious conscious.

I can imagine the people in the bubble with their faces pressed into the surface of the separating membrane, straining to see what they can of the contents of the unconscious as they swim in and out of view.

They enlarge the bubble by the work they are doing to be attentive to, aware of, and engaged with the unconscious contents—to the extent that they are able to do that.

We, on the surface, are surface consciousness with our theories and intellectual understanding being limited to perceived threats and dangers, talking about sending a military vehicle on a rescue mission—an arc of salvation to save those who don’t need saving.

What would happen, I wonder, if we, individually, began to swim out to see, diving underwater in search of the bubble?

Would we find that we have our own individual, personal, bubble that would keep us breathing while we made our way to the larger, corporate bubble of consciousness?

We won’t know by thinking about it. We have to take the plunge to find out.

I do this king of thing each morning with the dreams of the previous night, some times pondering the dream throughout the day to see what occurs to me. Writing it down soon after awakening makes it possible to remember it and return to it during the day.
02/22/2015 — Sunrise at Schwabacher Landing — Grand Teton National Park, Jackson, Wyoming, September 2004

We commune with our life and live it.

Our life is not something we think up.

Our life is like an idea.

We do not think up our ideas.

An idea is not the result of a rational, logical process.

We don’t list all the possibilities of ideas,

And then make a list of all the pros and cons of each one,

And decide by a process of elimination

Which idea is the best idea to have.

An idea comes to us from beyond us.

We are had by our ideas.

An idea possesses us, blessing us, graces us, transforms us.

That’s the way it is with our life.

Our life is an idea with our name on it—

That claims us for its own,

And enlists us in its service for our lifetime.

We make ourselves available to our life

By realizing it isn’t what the culture tells us it is,

And looking at possibilities we have rejected, dismissed, discarded

Because they weren’t going to provide us with wealth and security

And the admiration of our friends.

What are we fighting to keep from doing?

What do we know that it is and hope that it isn’t because someone wouldn’t like it if it is?

We have to commune with our life and live it.

Pay the fare, and ride the ride.
02/22/2015 — The Ghost Trees of Boneyard Beach 13 — Botany Bay Plantation Heritage Preserve and Wildlife Management Area, Edisto Island, SC, January 28, 2015

I’m developing a routine that is conducive to my life. To the life that is my life to live.

You’ll probably have to wait until the kids are out on their own and you’re retired from the world of necessity, obligation and duty before you will be able to do something similar.

And, if the world of necessity, obligation and duty follows you into retirement, it’s your own fault, and your place to do something about it.

Not that necessity, obligation and duty don’t encroach, but they sure don’t run, and ruin, every day.

The Japanese of lore held that spiritual development was the task of old age, with youth and middle age reserved for family and career.

It remains a good model to follow—giving old age a purpose beyond golf and bingo, drinking heavily and sleeping late.

Old age has its own business to tend, its own work to do: Living here and now in ways that enable us to enjoy the moment,

And bringing ourselves forth to meet the challenges, trials and ordeals of the last part of our life,

No longer are we consumed by the responsibilities of life in the working world—now our LIFE is our responsibility, and we have to live it in the way it needs to be lived so as to express who we are, and to do what is ours yet to do.

How shall we live to serve our LIFE in the second half of life? That’s our problem to work out for ourselves, and we have to be about it with intensity and intention, because we are running out of time.

We have to develop a routine that takes our life into account, and is more than just filling up empty hours.

I recommend working into each day time for meditation, silence, recollection and reflection—in order to foster new realizations that transform our perspective and provide shape, substance and form to the life that we have yet to live.

And, while you cannot devote yourself full time to this kind of work until you retire, you can honor it with gestures in its direction—small segments of time devoted to focusing yourself on the life that upholds, sustains and waits beyond this life, as true love might keep you going to the happy reunion at last.
02/23/2015 — Scott Creek Sunset 02 — Edisto Beach State Park, Edisto Island, SC, January 29, 2015

In developing a routine conducive to your life—to the life that is your life to live, and not the one you just fell into—

You have to develop your sensitivity to what is your life and what is not.

It’s the Hot/Cold game of childhood:

Now you’re getting warmer, oops, now you are getting colder, oh, you are freezing to death now, now you are on fire…

You feel it. You know it. Nobody can talk you out of it.

“I’m freezing to death here on the beach in 90 degree weather.”

“I’m blazing away here on the ski slopes in 28 degree weather.”

Or something like that, in times and places appropriate to you.

You know where you are fully alive and where you are quite dead.

Tune into that,

And know when you are on the beam, and when you are off of it.

And, develop a routine for living that is conducive to life on the beam.

You won’t get much cooperation.

You will get a lot of opposition and resistance.

From within and from without.

Jesus said it: “Straight is the way and narrow is the gate that leads to life, and those who find it are few. Broad is the way and wide is the gate that leads to destruction, and those who find it are many.”

It is easy to be dead. It is difficult to be alive.

You are your own salvation and your own damnation.

You are the key to life or death—to living in ways that bring you to life or to living in ways that are death all dressed up like the Life of the Party.

You develop and serve the routine that leads to being alive or that leads to being mostly dead.

What you say goes.
02/24/2015 — Black Birch B&W— Rocky Knob, Blue Ridge Parkway, Vernon, VA, March 2005

Our life is the most direct route to God.

Our life is the ONLY route to God.

Our life is the ONLY way to LIFE.

God and LIFE are one entity.

You can’t get to God except by way of your LIFE,

And you can’t get to your LIFE except by way of God.

You can’t get to God, or think of God, using the terms and concepts of Orthodox Christian Doctrine.

Or any doctrine,

Of any religion.

Here’s what Carl Jung has to say about God:

“The Absolute, the Eternal, is transcendental. It is something we cannot grasp at all, for we are not yet eternal, and, consequently, can say nothing about eternity, our consciousness being what it is.”

“We can only form an opinion about it (the eternal), with the help of the unconscious.”

Our idea of God is an opinion based on our experience with unconscious (because it is beyond consciousness), numinous (because we sense it to be holy/divine and beyond words) reality.

And, we live our way there IF we live with our eyes open.

“Asking, seeking, knocking,” to use Jesus’ expression.

Those who don’t ask, seek or knock—who don’t have eyes to see, ears to hear, or hearts that are capable of understanding, and minds that are capable of knowing more than they have been told—are simply sitting around, waiting for a miracle.

They are “Waiting for Godot.”

Our life—our LIFE—is where we experience as much of God as can be experienced on this side of eternity.

If we are going to know God, here and now, we are going to have to be alive to our life—the life that is LIFE for us—and live it to the fullest, doing our best by it—and not kidding ourselves about what our best is—every day throughout the time left for living.
02/24/2015 — The Ghost Trees of Boneyard Beach 09 — Botany Bay Plantation Heritage Preserve and Wildlife Management Area, Edisto Island, SC, January 28, 2015

I think Mindfulness Meditation (Check out Jon-Kabat Zinn’s books on Mindfulness Meditation and Mindfulness Based Stress Reduction) offers the best process for finding your life and living it.

Mindfulness is a way of being aware of what is happening and what needs to be done about it—and what your part is, or could be, in doing what the situation calls for.

“The Situation” could be anything from a leaking roof, to how you pay the bills, to whom you marry and whether you have children. It covers everything.

You cannot think your way through these things. You have to live your way through them, trusting yourself to know what to do after you have thought yourself into a cul-de-sac and can find no exit—in a “I’ll know what to do when I find myself doing it” kind of way.

Thinking has its place. Reason, logic and intellectual consideration play an important part in the process of finding and living our life. Good judgment, like mindfulness, takes everything into account. Every. Thing.

And allows what needs to happen to percolate up from the depths of unconscious knowledge as the right fit for this here and this now.

We cannot wait for a problem to begin meditating. We prepare the way for the life that needs us to live it by doing the things that nurture it into being: Meditation, working with dreams and symbols, and practicing mindfulness.
02/25/2015 — Zabriske Point Panorama 01 — Death Valley National Park, California, April 2006

There is no protection, immunity or indemnity.

We are on our own, alone, and up against the Powers and Principalities at work in the world,

Represented by members of our own family (The Aunt, The Brother, and The Sister-In-Law, etc. — You know the ones I mean, unless they are you, and then you have no idea what I’m talking about, which is an indication that you need to re-examine your interaction with family members and all other people).

Simply put, we are all victims, or potential victims, of all that is mean, heartless, ruthless, cruel and evil at work in our world.

We need help. And, wouldn’t you know it, like that, help is at hand. But. It asks hard things of you.

God is a very present help in time of trouble.

Now, you need to read back over a few of these recent posts to find the one where I talk about God, so that we are clear about what I mean when I use the word. It isn’t what they told you in Sunday school. But.

“Invoked or not invoked, the God is always present.”

In order to enjoy the full protection, for what that is worth, of the God who is always present, we have answer the question:

How do we live so that our relationship with the God, and with ourselves, is exhibited and expressed—made plain—by the quality of our relationship with all other sentient beings?

We answer the question by the degree of good faith and integrity of being that we exhibit and express in our relationship with all sentient beings.

We have to live in good faith with ourselves and all sentient beings,

And we have to live with integrity of being—transparent to ourselves and to all sentient beings.

As we do that, the God is with us for good in all things—

And our best line of defense is sensing early on and staying far away from the people and places that lack good faith and integrity of being.

If we hang out with the wrong people and/or in the wrong places, not even the full presence and protection of the God is going to keep bad things from happening to us.

We will, as they say in the deep south, “have done it to our own selves” by running the stop signs, and red lights, and through the road closed barriers to our own sorrow and remorse.

The National Park Service motto is fitting for every life situation:

Your Safety Is Your Responsibility.

The more we live with good faith and integrity of being, the better able we are to sense that in other people—and to sense the absence of it in other people.

We are to hang with those who have it and avoid those who don’t.

And, if you choose to ignore the truth of what I’m saying here, and live like you want to, it is only a matter of time until “you will have done it to your own self.” Again.
02/05/2015 — Mesquite Dunes and Grapevine Mountains 11 — Death Valley National Park, California, April, 2006 Sit down. I’m sure you are not ready for this.

We sometimes wonder what God would have us do in a particular situation, what God has in mind for our life, what it would take to make God happy.

Here it comes. Straight from God to me to you.

When you are living transparent to yourself, at one with who you are, exhibiting on the outside who you are on the inside, with full integrity of being and in good faith with yourself and all living things, you are, ahem, God.

You are doing you better than God could do you.

In Jesus’ terminology, the Father and you are one.

Then your life is coming right out of you in response to the time and place of your living.

You are spontaneously being you doing what you need to do in the dance with what is happening now.

You don’t have to get it from God.

It would disrupt your flow if you called time out and had a prayerful chat with God.

God doesn’t want to talk to you.

That would be like some ice skater in the Olympics stopping her routine to go talk with her coach about the next jump. What???

It’s YOUR life! YOU do it just exactly the way YOU would do it if it were you doing it.

It IS YOU doing it!

Don’t worry about what God would like or not like.

You focus exclusively on getting you into your life, being fully who you are, so that body, mind, heart and soul are one and you are all synched up and aligned inner with outer, and you are doing what is truly you without a hitch in your stride.

You get you down and do it the way you would do it, and God is going to be just fine.

That’s the way Jesus did it.

And the way Jesus did it is the way to do it.

Get in there and be YOU.

Ride the bull the way YOU would ride it, ‘til the bell rings.
02/26/2015 — Edisto Beach Sunrise 11 — Edisto Beach State Park, Edisto Island, SC, January 29, 2015

We are always waking up.

Our life is always circling back around,

Looking to see what we are ready for now.Looking to see how much we can take,

What we can see,

Now.

We live our life—the one that is ours to live—in stages,

A little at a time.

We never are fully-blown-at-our-prime-who-we-are.

We are always more-or-less-who-we-are-in-the-process-of-becoming.

Yet, we are always hiding in there—in the life we are living—somewhere,

And, if you know what to look for,

You can see us through all that is Not Us

In an “Oh, THERE you are, Peter!” kind of way.

But we would never win an Oscar

For the closeness of our approximation

Of the me we are striving to be.
02/26/2015 — Cathedral Rock Panorama — Yosemite National Park, California, April 2006

Check me out on this.

Run your own experiment.

Here’s the theory that has been so far borne out in my life,

But that’s a small population sample,

And I have no idea if what I’m saying applies to anyone but me:

Knowing how things are and what is happening—

Insofar as that can be known—Both internally and externally,

Leads automatically, spontaneously,

To doing what needs to be done in response.

All we have to do is get out of the way,

And allow the right response to flow from us to the situation as a hole.

The less we think about what to do, the better.

Thinking about what we ought to do to achieve some correct outcome

Interferes with our ability to simply see what is going on

On all levels.

It’s the right seeing that leads to right action.

Knowing is doing—

If we don’t get in the way with our idea of how things ought to be done,

Or what outcome needs to be THE outcome.

Be aware of everything you can be aware of—

Internally and externally—

And get out of the way in terms of imposing your preferences on the situation.

Be aware of your preferences along with everything else,

And see what you do,

And how things turn out.

It’s an experiment with life,

And a way of connecting with—

And trusting yourself to—

The Other World of invisible, intangible, unconscious

(Because we are not conscious of it)

Reality
02/27/2015 — Once a Pier — Botany Bay Plantation Heritage Preserve and Wildlife Management Area, Edisto Island, SC, January 28, 2015

Carl Jung said, “Only the symbolic life can express the need of the soul … And because people have no such thing, they can never step out of the mill.”

We have to understand that “the mill” supports us in living “the symbolic life.”

We settle for too little

We work at “the mill” to make money to pay for food, clothing and shelter—and our entertainments and pastimes—

And think about retirement, which consists of nothing but entertainments and pastimes—

Ignoring “the symbolic life” altogether.

We put aside the essential,

And live in the service of the non-essential,

And our life becomes a mechanism for denying the emptiness of our living.

We have to recover our original purpose,

Find and live “the symbolic life”

With all our heart, soul, mind and strength—

With all our heart and soul, body and mind—

As though everything depends upon our living symbolically,

Alive to the symbols that uphold, sustain, direct and guide us,

Because it does.
Used in Short Talks On Contradictions, etc., 02/28/2015 — Cypress Morning — Down East North Carolina, November 2004

We live between doing what is “right,” that is, what is expected of us,

And doing what is Right for us—what is instrumental to us and “food for our soul.”

We have responsibilities to the external world and to the internal world,

And it is our place as conscious human beings to make it right with both worlds—

To live in the space between worlds

And bear consciously the pain of the tension of the contradictions, contraries, discordances and dichotomies between the worlds,

And make peace—

Working things out, reconciling, integrating, aligning, synchronizing, creating harmony and good will—

Between incompatible aims, interests and desires.

That’s a task worthy of the title Mission Impossible.

And, it’s great!

It is who we are, what we do, making peace between the worlds,

And bearing in our bodies the pain of the cross of contradictions.

We all have a life that cannot be lived,

And, yet, we have to live it—a life that is at odds with itself.

And we need help doing that—being conscious, aware, mindful of that—

We need help remembering “This can’t be done!”

And we need help doing it.

The kind of help that helps is to acknowledge the absurdity,

and to know that we belong to the world of our soul,

and are only living in the world of normal, apparent reality, with its rules and structures.

We live out of one world, with our heart in that world, belonging to that world,

And we live in the other world—

and we have to know where we belong.

We have to be grounded in the invisible world

as we do what is necessary to pay the bills in the visible world.

But the visible world does not own our soul—

it does not own us.

We are of the other world, in this world.

And have to remember that, and work it out.
02/28/2015 — Dorys — Rockport Harbor, Maine, September, 2004

Do not force your way upon the world,

Or willfully pursue your good at the expense of the true good of others,

But live in the service of that which is trying to come forth

In the times and places of our living

As blessing and grace upon all who live there with us.
02/28/2015 — Edisto Beach Sunrise 05 — Edisto Beach State Park, Edisto Island, SC, January 29, 2015

You can’t coach heart.

You can’t give heart to someone who doesn’t have it.

But, you can lose heart just like that.

Heart is the easiest thing to lose,

And the hardest thing to find.

Heart and soul are inseparable,

And loss of soul is right up there with death itself

For being the end of life on every level except the 98.6 and breathing one.

Without heart and soul we are as good as dead.

You would think there would be more in the way of instruction

Regarding the care and feeding of heart and soul.

What nourishes heart?

What nurtures soul?

That should be the stuff of graduate degrees,

At the very least, a class required of all entering freshmen.

Instead, there is nothing.

We are all left to our own devices,

With a heart and soul already thinking about wandering off

In search of a more considerate host

Dedicated to their well-being.
03/01/2015 —Pamlico Sky — Pamlico Sound, Cape Hatteras National Seashore, Ocracoke Island, NC, October 2006

We have this idea that if everything would just go our way, we would be fine.

Our way never includes anything that would require us to grow up.

Or change our mind.

Or see things differently.

We can be wrong about every single thing and still be “fine” with everything going our way.

And everybody thinks that way.

Which means we are always running into people who have a different idea about the way things should go.

It’s a hot item these days just to kill those people.

It isn’t as though you are actually killing someone.

They are all Nobodies with ways like theirs!

It doesn’t hurt to kill people like that.

The world would be better off without them in it.

OUR world would be.

So we X them out.

That’s the CIA Solution.

Except that in the Kremlin it has a different name.

And it’s called the ISIS Solution in the Middle East.

It’s been around for a long time,

And it doesn’t work, but everyone believes in it.

Just kill the people who aren’t doing it your way,

And soon, only your way will remain.

I’m here to talk you into stepping back from your way.

I’m here to talk you into seeing how Not Your Way

Is trying to get you to see, hear, think, BE different.

It isn’t like you have always thought it is.

Wake up.

Change your ways.

Accommodate yourself to your life.

Waking up means growing up.

It means being friends with the opposition.

So that no one is X-ed out,

And everyone enjoys the company of everyone.

And everyone is waking up,

And growing up.

And loving being alive.

03/01/2015 — Eclipse Sequence — Greensboro, NC, 2008

An idea has to hit us between the eyes for it to be worth anything.

We have to feel it.

We have to be moved by it.

If we have to be talked into it, it is no good.

Every doctrine formulated by every religion in the world falls into the category of an idea we have to be talked into.

Revivals are where you go to be talked into ideas that miss everyone by a wide margin and would not move us at all if it weren’t for the people yelling at us.

Give me an idea that has merits of its own, which are immediately obvious, strike a cord and inspire us to action.

“Anybody feel like pie and ice cream?”

There’s an idea whose time has come!

03/02/2015 — The Ghost Trees of Boneyard Beach 10 — Botany Bay Plantation Heritage Preserve and Wildlife Management Area, Edisto Island, SC, January 28, 2015

Immortality has been an intriguing concept from the start.

A lot of people have put a lot of stock in living forever.

And have tried to find the secret of the Fountain of Youth through the ages.

But.

All of the people who have wanted to live forever have wanted to live on their terms.

Forever on some terms would be unbearable.

Hell, for example, is not what the seekers of life unending have in mind.

Life is no good without the accompanying stipulations.

Adam and Eve thought the Forbidden Fruit would be a good thing to add to the list.

Everybody has their own ideas.

Some people think in terms of sex forever.

“What would life be without that?”

Whatever constitutes “that” for us is the heart of the matter.

It isn’t so much life forever as it is “that” forever.

What is your “that”?

What is it that life without would be hell, or just not worth the trouble?

There is your meditative focal point for the day, or several.

Ponder “that” if you will.

See what is at the heart of the matter for you,

And what you think of “that” as your core.
03/02/2015 — Zen Sun — Wayna Bald, Nantahala National Forest, near Franklin, NC, October 2004

I can’t find anything in my experience more sacred than conversation.

But, don’t think that is commonplace.

We spend a lot of time talking.

Very little conversing.

Conversation is where I listen as you talk about you,

And you listen as I talk about me—

And neither of us butts in to change the flow of the conversation,

Or to co-opt it entirely in an “I know just what you mean, let me tell you about MY mother-in-law (foot surgery, root canal, etc.) kind of way.

Conversation is listening as much as talking.

Where do you go to be heard, these days?

If we were talking, I would like to know what is working in your life right now,

And what is not working.

Where your deepest joy is found

And your greatest fear/dread/anxiety.

What do you know to be true that no one has told you?

In what ways have things turned out to be different than what you expected them to be?

Than what you have been told they would be?

What would have helped to know early-on about how things are?

What are the conflicts that you are working to reconcile, integrate, accept?

What are your gifts that you are living to bring forth in your life?

And all the other questions, and all the questions that come as follow-ups to all the questions.

We could talk a long time.

Every time.

Without ever once mentioning the weather,

Or Those People over there. And there.
03/03/2015 — Medicine Lake Bed — Jasper National Park, Alberta, Canada, September 2007

You know how John Wayne was always John Wayne, no matter the movie?

And Cary Grant? And Jimmy Stewart? And Audrey Hepburn? And Bette Davis? And Katharine Hepburn?

That’s the idea.

You have to be YOU, no matter the movie!

You have to get so into YOU, into YOUR character and qualities—

Into your ESSENCE—

Into the Essential You,

That you are YOU no matter what.

Win the lottery as YOU.

Lose your job as YOU.

No matter what happens, or fails to happen,

There YOU are!

Play your part, your role, the way only YOU can do it

In every scene that comes your way in a day.

Be the YOU at work that you are on the beach.

Be YOU everywhere you go.

Sink into, and live out of, the solid core of YOU

Through all of the times and occasions of your life.

Get YOU down.

Do YOU all over town.

There is nothing more to it than that.
03/04/2015 — Moraine Lake Panorama — Banff National Park, Alberta, Canada, September 2009

You are the focal point of your life.

Your life revolves around you.

You—your tastes and interests,

Your aptitudes and abilities,

Your gifts and genius,

Your knacks and proclivities,

Your enthusiasm, heart and soul—

Are the organizing principle of your life.

Your life takes shape around you—

Assumes the form that is YOU.

Your life does that with your conscious participation and will

Or with your unconscious absence of willing collaboration on your part in its production.

Your place is to willingly align yourself, inner with outer, with the life you are living,

So that the YOU visible and apparent in your life

Is the same YOU invisible and seeking expression within your heart and soul.

YOU are comprised of the Who, the What, the How, the Where and the When.

It is your place in your role as your conscious, willing, self,

To coordinate, choreograph and orchestrate

The production of YOU in your life.

You integrate the Who, the What, the How, the Where and the When.

And bring YOU forth in your life every day.

And, if you are not doing that, it’s time you started.
03/04/2015 — Hatteras Sunset — Along the Outer Banks, Cape Hatteras National Seashore, Ocracoke Island, NC, October 2004

You are going to live on separate tracks—

What you do to pay the bills is not likely going to be what you pay the bills to do.

This is called walking two paths at the same time.

The key is to do that consciously, willingly, deliberately and intentionally.

Changing diapers is not likely to be the way you would prefer to come forth in your life, but.

When the baby needs to be changed, change the baby.

This is also called walking two paths at the same time.

And you do come forth in your life by the way you do what you do to pay the bills,

And the way you change diapers.

There is You and there is Not-You,

And you, your life, is a swirling blend of both worlds.

Swirl consciously, willingly, deliberately and intentionally.

“Now I am being ME!”

“Now I am being NOT-ME!”

Know who you are—and who you are not—at all times, in all places.

Willingly, willfully, even joyfully, participate in your life in all of its shades and variations of You and Not-You.

This is called being you even when you are not being you.
03/01/2015 — 03/01/2015 — Yellowstone Canyon — Canyon Village, Yellowstone National Park, Wyoming, September 2005

When the dichotomy is too great among the Who, the What and the How in the When and the Where of your existence, you have a problem.

Your primary role in your life is to oversee, integrate and align

The Who, the What, and the How within the When and the Where of your living.

You coordinate who you are with what you are doing and how you are doing it within the time and place of your living.

You do that consciously, mindfully, compassionately, deliberately and intentionally.

When you accept your role and play it well, things go well.

When you do not accept your role and refuse to play it,

Or when you do not play it well,

Things go less well.

So …

How are things going?
03/04/2015 — Edisto Beach Sunrise 14 — Edisto Beach State Park, Edisto Island, SC, January 29, 2015

Our life is not ours to do with as we will.

It is not as though the whole world is filled with possibilities at our disposal.

Our life exists as a potential independent of us—

As a potential expression of who we are at the core of our being—

At the foundation—

Of who we are essentially,

In our essence,

The essence of who we are.

Our life exists as a potential expression of who we are capable of becoming,

Of what we are capable of doing.

But the master mechanic says, “I think I’ll be a surgeon,”

And the landscape artist says, “I think I will paint houses,”

And the ballet dancer says, “I’m going to be a bull fighter.”

All close, but no cigar.

And most are not even close.

Yet, WE are the one who has to get who our life needs us to be

Together with our life.
03/05/2015 — Trains 07 — Morant’s Curve, Banff National Park, Canadian Rockies, Alberta, Canada, September 2009

Once a mother (father) always a mother (father), but.

You have to ease up on the mothering (fathering) over time.

You have to push the babies out of the nest and tell them to go find their life.

You have to model what you mean by finding and living YOUR life.

Your children are not your life.

You are not their keeper.

Like every other role we play,

Mothering (fathering) is a dance with pace and timing.

It is not fixed, static, rigid and unbending.

You have to grow up if you expect your children to grow up.

If you don’t expect anyone to grow up,

You’re interfering with the natural process,

Damming the river,

Stopping the flow of life,

Creating lasting problems for a lot of people.

And there is nothing that can be done for you,

So, you can quit reading this now,

And I will talk to the people who know what I’m saying.

You have to grow up if you expect your children to grow up.

You have to find and live your life,

And refuse to let them get in your way.

They have had their time with you,

And now it is your time with you.

Tell them good-bye and become a different kind of mother (father),

Mothering (fathering) yourself in the right kind of way,

Growing up and living your life over what remains of your life.
03/01/2015 — The Ghost Trees of Boneyard Beach 15 — Botany Bay Plantation Heritage Preserve and Wildlife Management Area, Edisto Island, SC, January 28, 2015

I am in your life to help you live your life.

You are in my life to help me live my life.

That is the limit of our responsibility to the other,

And the only reason we have for being with the other.

If we are not helping each other live our respective life.

We are helping each other escape our life.

We are kidding ourselves and each other,

And wasting our time,

Which is all that is left for us to do

If we are not living our life and have no intention of ever living our life.

Intending to NOT live our life ever

Is a complete waste of life, yours, mine and everyone’s.

Our first obligation to ourselves and each other

Is a good-faith assessment of our intentions,

And a frank declaration of them to the other.

Are you here to grow up, find and live your life no matter what?

Not to talk endlessly about it,

But to do it, by doing what it takes to do it, beginning now?

If yes, then what needs to change about your life?

What can you do beginning now to live in the service of that change?

Knowing that change means change?
03/05/2015 — Beaver Pond — Bass Lake, Moses H. Cone Memorial Park, Blue Ridge Parkway, Blowing Rock, NC, May 2009

If we are depressed, we are trapped.

We are stuck with mutually exclusive options.

Awash in conflict and contradiction.

Unable to do anything because everything depends on that not being done.

And nothing can happen until something else happens first.

Damned if we do and damned if we don’t.

No exit.

Our depression is something trying to happen.

It’s the only acceptable response available to us in our situation.

We cannot allow ourselves to be down on being down.

Anyone would be down dealing with what we are dealing with.

Fear on every side.

No place to turn.

Nowhere to go.

We have to admit, that’s depressing.

The way is the way of being depressed.

Consciously, deliberately, courageously bearing the pain of our place in life—

And NOT taking our own life!

Our place, sorry to say, is not to escape the agony,

But to embrace it and bear it consciously, mindfully, intentionally.

ANYONE would be depressed being where we are,

And we can’t be anywhere else because of the 10,000 things keeping us where we are.

So, we square up to them.

Each one.

Every one.

Of the things preventing anything from happening to shift our circumstances and lighten our load.

We can’t do anything because of what?

List all of the things standing in the way.

Spend time with each one of them.

Getting to know our jailers.

And all—ALL—of the things keeping the things in place that are keeping things in place.

We can’t just FEEL it. We have to KNOW it. ALL of it.

Quick—and this is the most important part—what is your reaction to this idea?

What is the source of your resistance to doing this one thing that can be done,

because you aren’t doing anything but getting to know things fully, as they are?

Why not do that?

Because it won’t do any good?

So?

Not going it won’t do any good either.

So do it.

The one thing you can do.

Do it.

Get to know all of the reasons you can’t do anything.

Not just list them. KNOW them. All about them. Understand them. Have compassion for them.

Have compassion for all of the things keeping things in place.

That’s doing something without doing anything.

We can’t possibly be threatening to the stability of the situation

that is keeping us from doing anything by regarding it with compassion.

Now, you think I’m crazy don’t you?

Anything to keep things as they are.
03/05/2015 — Alligator Pond — The Ernest F. Hollings ACE Basin National Wildlife Refuge, Adams Run, SC, January 29, 2015

Let’s say you are on a basketball team with a losing record toward the end of the season, and the team has completely lost heart.

There is no chance of post season play.

No chance of a winning record.

Who are we kidding?

Why try?

Why play with heart?

What good would it do?

Just play it out and get it over with.

How do you restore heart when heart is lost?

How do you get a basketball team back on the beam?

Back playing its best basketball?

When the importance, or even the likelihood, of winning isn’t there?

We have to play it out the way it needs to be played out—

The way it needs us to play it out—

No matter what.

We are back to my foundational hypothesis:

It is all useless, hopeless, pointless, futile and absurd—

And coming to a very bad end.

And how we live in the meantime makes all the difference.

Why wouldn’t you believe that how you live makes all the difference—and live as though it does?

Why would you prefer to believe that how you live makes no difference at all—and live as though it doesn’t?

Back to the basketball team.

Forget restoring the team’s heart.

Forget getting the team back to life.

Get your own heart in your game, in your part of the game, in playing your part well.

Dribble, pass, guard, shoot and rebound to the absolute best of your ability—

And don’t kid yourself about it being the best you can do.

That’s your work.

Your work is to do your job the way it needs to be done no matter what.

“Get in there and do your thing, and don’t worry about the outcome” (Joseph Campbell).
Used in Short Talks On Contradiction, etc., 03/06/2015 — Athabaska Valley — Jasper National Park, Alberta, Canada, September 2009

The trick is to be conscious of all that is unconscious.

That’s the best trick in the entire book of tricks.

And, since all that is unconscious is beyond knowing,

We will never pull it off, but.

That’s what we are about: Becoming conscious of all that is unconscious.

I suggest we start with dichotomies, anomalies, contradictions—

The things that don’t add up,

That don’t square up,

That don’t feel right.

Children and dogs (and cats) are good about sensing these things.

Adults say one thing, and children (the dog, the cat) sense something is wrong with this picture.

Adults say, “I love you,” when they are physically abusing the child (the dog, the cat).

Adults see no disconnect.

Children (the dog, the cat) are bludgeoned by the contradiction.

Adults get by through ignoring all that is unconscious,

Pretending theirs is the only world,

Even as they move between worlds.

One world has nothing to do with the other worlds.

But they come down hard on children for having invisible friends.

Invisible friends are more trustworthy than the kind who live in the adult world.

But, adults are so out of it, they can’t begin to understand the place of invisible friends.

If we are going to become aware of all that is unconscious,

We are going to have to “turn and become like children.”

And open ourselves to all we don’t know

Because we wouldn’t know what to do with it if we did.
03/06/2015 — Charlotte Panorama 02 — View from Marshall Park, Charlotte, NC, January 25, 2015

My hypothesis (or one of the many)

is that our life needs to be a collaboration among all the sides of us

we think of as being who we are,

and all the sides of us we also are.

We are influenced by an unknowable number of Also I’s.

We need (according to the hypothesis)

to know as many as possible over the course of our life,

and invite them to the table (The Round Table, of course)

to discuss, contemplate, decide how we are going to live our life.

This means we have to live a well-considered life,

And not just whiz around the room like nuclear powered ping-pong balls.

It means we have to slow down and pay attention—

Looking, listening, seeing, hearing, knowing, understanding on all levels, visible and invisible.

We have to live (according to the hypothesis)

conscious of what is normally unconscious,

making the unconscious conscious,

Taking the unconscious (what we are not conscious of) into account,

And being aware of not being aware,

and becoming aware of more than we are generally aware of.

Reconciling contradictions, integrating opposites, honoring polarities,

And living in ways that take all of it into account.

That would change things, for sure.

Maybe for the better.
03/07/2015 — Jasper Wetlands Panorama — Canadian Rockies, Jasper National Park, Alberta, Canada, October 2009

The more people you have in your life,

The more you have to fight for your life.

The more people you have in your life,

The more difficult it is to live your life.

“Oh, But! People ARE my life!”

People are NOT your life!

People are escapes from your life!

Distractions from your life!

Substitutes for a life of your own!

People can be YOUR life only to the extent

That it is a deliberately reciprocal arrangement

And YOU are THEIR life,

And you all are intent on living your own, personal, life.

You and your life partner have to be living

So as to say the other one is getting the best deal—

And you both have to be right about it.

Children are a different matter.

With children, someone is going to be squeezed.

There are too many people, too close together,

With too many competing needs, interests and desires.

With children, you have to make sure that you are the one

Who is squeezed.

But not squeezed out.

Even with children, you have to work out how much of you for them,

And how much of you for you.

And you have to be squeezed consciously, deliberately, voluntarily.

It has to be a realized sacrifice that you are making,

Setting yourself aside for their sake

FOR THE TIME BEING!

After high school, you begin to get yourself back.

You may have to take yourself back.

After college, you are yours and they are their own responsibility.

Make sure they know that early on,

And remind them of it often.
03/07/2015 — Castle Mountain 01 — Canadian Rockies, Banff National Park, Alberta, Canada, September 2009

Here’s the thing about self-sacrifice—

It has to be conscious, deliberate, intentional, willing, willful, and voluntary.

You lay your life down, AND

(And this is the part that is never discussed, recognized, realized)

You take your life up.

It is self-sacrifice on both ends.

It applies to your marriage, to parenthood, to your job, and to all that your life impels you to do.

Let’s take your children as an example of what is required of you.

When you have children, you hand yourself over to your children

Until they are at the age of being responsible for themselves, then they have to take themselves over.

They sacrifice themselves, then, to take care of themselves, and so it is passed.

But, you also have to sacrifice yourself again, then, and get out of their way so that they can, must, have to, sacrifice themselves.

You pick your life back up when it is time,

And go your way, and let them have their life, and let them go their way.

It’s like sending them off to day care or pre-school or kindergarten.

It’s like dying all over again,

For you and for them.

Self-sacrifice is always like dying.

It is a real sacrifice.

And it has to be done with full realization, willingly, willfully, voluntarily.

We are always sacrificing ourselves to our life—

To what our life is requiring of us in the time and place of our living.

It is the nature of growing up that it requires us to die again and again.

We like to think it ends with our actual, physical, death.

We are probably wrong about that.
03/07/2015 — Sleepy Elk Sequence — Canadian Rockies, Jasper National Park, Alberta, Canada, October 2009

We make amends by making changes.

We redeem our past by the way we live in our future.

I look at old photographs

And think, “I should go back there and take it like I should have taken it then.”

But the time for taking it was then, when the clouds were right,

And the light was right, and the wind was right,

And the only thing wrong was the shutter speed.

Waiting for all that to be right again just for the sake of that photo

Would not be worth the trouble.

I’ll redeem that one with the next one similar to it that I take.

And every one after that one.

Let your past transform your future.

It’s the only thing that can.
03/08/2015 — Adrift — Penobscot Bay, Deer Isle, Maine, October 2009

As I devote myself to creating a routine conducive to living my life, I am increasingly taken by the regimen of holy orders through time, around the world, in all religions and spiritual practices.

We cannot live any way at all and be alive to that which is striving to come to life in us.

Without a steady routine, we are at the mercy of whim and chance, and have no basis for living out of a foundation that grounds us and an orientation that directs us.

Our physical routine is a centering, focusing, aid to living centered and focused afloat on the crashing waves of the wine dark sea.

I recommend, for starters a 12 to 14 hour fast each day. That simply means, don’t eat after 7 PM or before 8 AM—and adjust the hours to fit what your schedule may require/allow.

Our routines have to fit our schedules.

“Routine” sounds rigid, inflexible, unbending, but routine has to take “schedule” into account.

We have to fit our LIFE into our life, our routine into our schedule.

We have to regulate what can be regulated upon the heaving waves of the wine dark sea.

Start with a daily fast.

Work in time for quiet reflection.

Work in additional time for meditation—count your breaths for rounds of ten or twenty inhales and exhales, or whatever the waves permit.

Read something meaningful.

Write down your dreams and revelations/realizations.

Take a walk—short or long, but walk for exercise and not to go to the bathroom—each day.

Fold in the things that are grounding, centering, focusing, directing for you.

Do this regularly, religiously, every day.

And listen for what is trying to come to LIFE in your life.
03/08/2015 — For Rent — Lake Louise, Canadian Rockies, Banff National Park, Alberta, Canada, September 2009

Your life is your witness.

Your life says all that is to be said about you,

Pro or con, Yea or Nay, for you or against you—

Not from the standpoint of how you measure up against social, cultural, and religious norms and standards,

But how you measure up against yourself.

Your Self—

The Who it is yours to exhibit and express,

Become and to be.

Your are not yours to make up and drape with costumes of your own design.

You are yours to wake-up to, realize, acknowledge, incarnate and serve.

We live to realize and reveal who we are through the life we live.
03/08/2015 — The Oak at Springer’s Point — Teach’s Hole, Cape Hatteras National Seashore, Ocracoke Island, Outer Banks, NC, October 2009

I don’t know how to break this to you.

You aren’t going to like it:

You have to start doing what’s hard.

I know, I know:

“My whole life is HARD!

Easy is nowhere to be found!

If you knew how hard my life is, you would change your tune!”

You have to start volunteering to do what is hard,

And stop whining, moaning, complaining, griping about it.

Do what is hard consciously, deliberately, intentionally, willingly, willfully, voluntarily, sacrificially!

Because it is going to deepen you, expand you, enlarge you, raise you from the dead, and help to grow you up.

If the dishes need washing, go wash the dishes.

You get the idea.

Opening your arms to what is hard,

Welcoming what is hard into your life,

Embracing what is hard,

Dancing with what is hard,

Doing what is hard,

Puts you in right relationship with what is hard,

And understands what is hard as the threshold to being fully alive.

Jesus said, “If you want to become my disciple, pick up your own cross every day, and carry it like I carried mine.”

He meant, “Do what is hard the way it needs you to do it.”

It is the path to realization, understanding, enlightenment, wonder and LIFE.
03/10/2015 — Mallard Hen Landing — Bog Garden, Greensboro, NC, March 09, 2015

Growing up is hard.

We have to come to terms with everything.

Square ourselves up to how things are,

And how things also are–

See what we look at,

Know what we know,

Rise to every occasion,

Stand up and do what needs us to do it

The way it needs to be done.

If we aren’t living our life in this fashion,

We are escaping our life.

Andy Dufresne said, “Get busy living or get busy dying.”

If we aren’t living, we are dying.

Pretending to be alive and well.

When we grow up, we stop pretending,

And step into our life just as it is,

Such as it is,

And live it exactly as it needs to be lived,

As it needs us to live it,

As we need to live it–

And, like that, our life becomes our LIFE,

All because we began to live it the way our LIFE would have us live it.

The only things that changed were our attitude

And our way of living.
03/10/2015 — Big Creek Fall 2004 A — Great Smoky Mountains National Park, TN/NC, November 2004

My ideal form of government would be a small group of people of compassion and good will, who liked and cared about each other, and who were non-religions

(Because religious people are incapable of good judgment and sound decision, and the more religious they are the more toxic they are for themselves and others, and the more incapable they are of seeing what they look at, understanding what they are dealing with, and being free to do what needs to be done in each situation as it arises),

And free of ambition and greed, and therefore incapable of corruption, and beyond exploiting circumstances for their own personal good or ideology,

And completely capable of seeing things as they are,

And listening to all sides with a stake in each situation that comes along,

And issuing judgments based on their best sense of what needs to happen in the service of the true good of those concerned.

I wonder why Congress can’t be like this.
03/10/2015 — Cypress Light — Down East North Carolina, November 2004

What are the meaningful aspects of your life?

How does your life revolve around them?

Flow from them?

How often do you engage in doing the things that are meaningful to you?

How would I know they were meaningful to you by looking at your life?

When is the last time you did something that was meaningful to you?

What can you do to work time spent with what is meaningful on a daily basis?

When will you start?
03/11/2015 — Goose Landing — Bog Garden, Greensboro, NC, March 9, 2015

Religious people have an agenda—THE Agenda—God’s Agenda,

And live to impose it upon all the world.

The Tea Party is composed of those who at heart are religious fanatics who Know Best And Must Be Pleased,

And are engaged in a holy war

Against the Infidel in their own country

And around the world.

Jihadists in business suits

Justifying all means necessary in the service of their end,

Which is clearly in sight and well-within their grasp.

Comes to mind Paul Simon’s song:

“The nearer your destination/The more you’re slip-sliding away.”

We all are within reach of a wider, broader, world—

A slight perspective shift away from seeing, hearing and understanding—

In the service of agendas and ends not worthy of us,

Certain that our way is The Way,

Lost in a wasteland of our own making,

Sitting on our ox looking for our ox.
03/11/2015 — The Ghost Trees of Boneyard Beach 14 — Botany Bay Plantation Heritage Preserve and Wildlife Management Area, Edisto Island, SC, January 28, 2015

You have to find your own life and live it

Within the life you are living.

The life you are living is the container—

The crucible—

Of your other life, your LIFE, the life that is yours to live,

The life that only you can live.

The life you are living is your fate—

The life that met you at birth:

When and where you were born, your genetic, sexual, racial makeup,

Who your parents were,

What your resources have been and are,

And your prospects,

The life you go to sleep in every night and wake up to each morning.

The LIFE that is yours to live is your destiny,

The adventure that has been waiting for you to be ready,

The calling that is perfectly suited for your character and qualities,

Your gifts and proclivities:

YOU are waiting for you to show up and say, “Let’s go.”

Your mission is to bring forth your destiny within your fate,

By finding what you can do with all your heart, and doing it,

And riding that ride the rest of the way.
03/11/2015 — Canada Geese 01 — Bog Garden, Greensboro, NC, March 9, 2015

You find your LIFE, your destiny, by finding what is meaningful to you and doing it.

When you incorporate meaning into your life by doing what is meaningful to you—

By giving yourself to what has meaning for you—

And not letting yourself by knocked off that horse

By those who laugh and make jokes about “that old nag,”

And wonder why you aren’t spending your time on something important—

Not letting them shame you, or ridicule you, or shun you

Into being as they are,

Into being who they think you ought to be,

But living your own life in your own way,

With your rhythm, and your sense of timing and direction, and sense of flow, and sense of meaning,

Doing what is important to you because why would anybody do what is unimportant to them?

Then your life will lead you straight away to your LIFE,

And you will discover that you have been living your LIFE all along,

Realizing your destiny by doing what is meaningful to you

Whether anyone else sees its value and congratulates you on your choice.

You are the one—the only one—who knows what is YOU,

And what is NOT YOU.

It’s your life. Live it like it is. Smiling, like you know a secret

They don’t know.

You do.

They don’t.
03/11/2015 — Hatteras Morning — Cape Hatteras National Seashore, Outer Banks, Ocracoke Island, NC, October 2004

No one ever wondered–you could Google this–about the meaning of life who was doing what was meaningful with her, or his, own life.

The question of the meaning of life doesn’t mean anything to someone whose life is meaningful.

Ask a kid who is skateboarding or playing soccer what the meaning of life is and she will be polite but care nothing for your question.

It just doesn’t matter, because something else does.

If it’s a problem for you it’s because your life is empty and you aren’t doing what has meaning for you.

You solve the problem of the meaning of life the instant you begin living your life in a way that is meaningful.

If nothing means anything to you, spend some time remembering the last thing that had meaning for you.

Wander around in your memory of that thing.

See what begins to stir to life within you.

Let the last meaningful thing point the way to the next meaningful thing.

And cooperate with the process!

Don’t resist the movement with some sour, wet-blanket, you can’t make me happy so don’t even try response to the last meaningful thing.

Be a sport here. Be gracious and kind, generous and compassionate.

To yourself.

Let yourself show you where meaning is yet to be found,

Even given all your losses, defeats, sorrows and grief.

Meaning will live again in your life if you let it.

Let it, won’t you?

One Minute Monologues 033

May 15, 2016 – June 29, 2016

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March 26, 2016 – May 15, 2016

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12/17/2015 – 01/27/2016

One Minute Monologues 031

January 28, 2016 – March 25, 2016

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