Knowing.

There is an instant where you wanna cry. You want to scream. You want to yell from the bottom of your stomach and soul. And this is when you know you love or have loved somebody. When you look at someone. You see into their eyes. And you know. They are you. They are exactly who you are or were. And you love them you want nothing but to hold them. You want to shout in a carnal and cathartic agony until you feel that sense fulfilled. That sense that you have seen yourself. And can finally let go of yourself.

Another African Musing.

This will probably be a short post but it is a snippet from my notebook in Africa. This one goes out to Sylv, thanks for taking an interest and thanks for the request. 🙂

Cockatieled feathers and glistening emerald. It is amazing how abruptly differences in area cross my path. Walking down a sidewalk a bird plumed in a brilliant green lands in my way. I stop. Here is a spectacular meeting embodying the essence of cultural travel; my wonderment, his indifference. As I stand aghast at the fantastic color of this bird, it personifies nonchalance. That amazement at something that may appear so mundane is the beauty of travel and exploration. One man’s mundanity can be another’s fascination.

Reactions

Does psuedo-urgent news create a fatalistic society? I’m sitting here, enjoying a fine evening, and up comes the news with a new report on how people could all start dying. I’m sure that if I cared to finish watching it, it would go on to slowly reveal the minimal possibility of this latest danger. I don’t mean for this to be some depressing digression on the nature of dim broadcasts or nihilistic life views, I’m more bemusedly commenting on how I compare my own ‘Live now!’ mentality with the echoing news reports that I now recognize as coming in from all angles. I’ve developed over the years the idea, grim as it may be, that I should live life to its absolute capacity for the simple reason that life is full of chances. I could live to be ninety, I could be hit by a bus tomorrow. These are the headlines linking soda to cancer, and vague possibilities to real threats. What if people were told that we had years to live? What if people stepped back from all the negativity and realized exactly all the options out there in life? How restricted are we by the information placed before us, irrelevant or not? A lot of open-ended questions, that I don’t really need answered, but would like considered. Thoughts?

Man Alone with Himself

I have found, both in the past and recently, that there is little that can be more personally detrimental than when anyone is allotted too much time for their own thoughts. To sit and stew in one’s own perceptions and distortions, progressively spiraling out from reality is an absolute hell, one that is so sickening and perverse I can declare proudly that I would prefer to walk willingly into the jaws of Cerberus than endure this gluttony of thought undisturbed. But there is one relief, so absolute that it gives light and a vantage point salving retrospect to all internal suffering and insecurity, and that is when a person extends their hand. When anyone is willing to hold another’s burden for even a moment, or even do so much as to slightly defer their attention from it, is such an act of kindness bordering on flawless altruism… it’s beautiful…

Isolation

lately, due to having come down with a virus, I’ve kept myself at a distance. This has manifested itself in a few forms. The first would be what measures I impose, myself. The second is what actions are taken against me. The first is easy enough to define, I try to be careful, not get others sick. I peacefully and happily shy away from some scenarios that put things at risk. By far the more pressing matter is that which others impart to me. There are those that treat me the same, and others that see me as a fucking leper. And this has corrupted me. While in the beginning I used to turn away from romantic options with a bemused smile, now it’s with a self loathing and a stench of forced cowardice. As though the tail between my legs isn’t mine, and it’s out there for all to see. Now the idea has been corrupted; who am I protecting? Who am I saving? Am I stopping any kind of harm, or just being self-inflicting. Do I stand alone with a purpose anymore, or is it the latent presentation of some messiah complex? It seems to me to be a mix of all, if I were inclined to be honest. A noble cause, turned cynically self-sacrificing. A good idea made gauntly ignoble by a growing sense of grandeur. All of this I can tolerate, false pride is no sin in my eyes. The only fear that I truly can’t tolerate is the suspicion of underlying cowardice. Is my honest sense of duty toward my fellow man (ironically, specifically women), now stretching to cover my fear of connection? I’ve accepted the latter point’s existence, I’m wary of that connection to say the least, but that’s another matter for another rambling. Now I’m staring at the proverbial mental foreground, wondering where the line is, if it exists.

Musing/Rambling.

Balance. From my perspective it is a well-known and very widely accepted fact that balance is one of the necessities of life. Yet, one particular balance has occurred to me lately, that which lies between the intellectual and the visceral. There needs to be moderation between these two individual factors.  The ‘visceral’ in this sense is classified as the real and the guttural, the enjoyments that are nothing more than a physical form of gratification or experience. There is no reason that these actions should carry a negative connotation, but there is the simple aspect that there is no cerebral depth. This is the side that is balanced by intellectual exercise. The mind allows for a comprehensive and ultimately yielding interpretation of the actual. Therefore, there appears to be a symbiotic relationship between these two. Both can exist separate from each other, yet, both are amplified by the other. Pure, immediate actions springing from truly instinctual drives can be ideal as the source of philosophic digression. Due to the occasionally surprising basis for such actions it is entirely possible to wonder at the action, choices, motives, or other factors concerning any experience. As such any experience, basic or visceral, has the ability to feed the curiosity of the mind. Yet, the balance between these is both key and interesting. If there is little first-hand experiences that is accrued, understanding and interpretation risks becoming ungrounded. Equally, there needs to be an adequate sense and understanding of occurrences in order for them to hold significance. Additionally through this exploration, these actions are set against a more purposeful background, removing the edge of their lack of productivity.

As this has been a wordy rambling of sorts, here is the realistic example of how this has come up. I have found that if I give in to my lethargy when I am allowed. I become entirely unproductive, hedonistically indulging every whim on the questionable basis “I’ve deserved this due to the semester’s work load”. While this may be true (I really don’t think I’m the most unbiased judge when asking whether I deserve a break) the real matter that my mind feels like it’s going to waste has been peeving me. So thus I decided to balance it all out with a specialized tangent concerning it. I’m not saying that the occasional bout of lethargy is a horrendous act, but moderation helps too. And in this thought process I have stumbled upon, but perhaps not entirely explored, how basic selfish acts can feed into personal development, in at least one sense.

Apology/Reflection/Rambling.

First and foremost I believe there should be an apology. I started this blog with the best of intentions however, as it does, life got in the way. As meager and insubstantial an excuse as that is, it is my rationalization behind my absence. Seeing as it is on my mind, lets kick things of again with ‘time’.

Time. We, or at least I, often sat that I never seem to have ‘time’ for the things we/I enjoy. It’s funny how the truest passions in life far too often take a back seat to meaningless, “more important”, things for the sustaining of one’s self. This came for me in the form of final exams as well as other work which, while important, should not wholly deter me from what I enjoy. I feel like a hypocrite, sitting here proclaiming my honest opinion that one should make more time for their interests or enjoyments, yet I fall victim to the seemingly pointless events. I would hate to think that this is a way of proving true passions; by seeing those that persist through the swamp of every day tedium.

On another side of things is the matter of immediately removing time. I can honestly say that I lived without it once and it was quite possibly the most entrancingly beautiful event. For two weeks I set aside my normal habit of wearing a watch and decided to avoid it all. I woke up when I did, ate whenever I got hungry, did what I felt like, slept when I got tired. It was fantastic. The only real problem with it all was that it completely eliminates the finite idea of planning and forms it into nothing but infinite plans. Instead of making plans for dinner around 6:00 as would be the usual, it was ‘later’. This kind of embodies that separation. While it is more than grand for reinforcing a personal will for ‘in the moment’ living, it abandons one solid system on which every thing and everyone else runs. I know the argument could and probably will be made that time as an overall continuum remains regardless of the presence of a watch, but I’m more addressing time as the conventional concept seen in every day life.

To tie these two ideas together (which I honestly wasn’t planning) perhaps it is not that passions take the back seat to tedium but to things that appear more instantaneous and important at one particular moment. At many moments in the last few weeks my academics have seemed more important than writing. I also saw writing as something that would always be there whenever I was free. Perhaps a passion is that which rises from one’s self at a point when nothing is going on, taking on the form of a true inner compass that generally leads one in an honest pursuit of interests. Hmm… anyway, to end on a note of wrapping up this idea with a realistic implementation of this belief, while writing is always there as an outlet for me, it should not be overlooked because of that fact. While it is there it is worthless if I don’t make some time for it. Ergo, make time for that which I love. Huh, kind of a roundabout way of reinforcing what should be common knowledge… I’m alright with that.