Say it like it is

There is a difference between what you say and how you say it. Filtering what you say is a far simpler task than filtering how you say it. How you say things is a strong indicator of what you really think, how you feel, and who you are. To change that is not a simple matter of choice. It seems we are often more concerned with the surface and fail to address the core. We need to work on being rather than appearing to be.

Running on Empty

Haven't been writing much in here lately. New city, new year, new moon; same old gut wrenching internal conflict, uncertainty, confusion, loneliness, and fog. Still working on the practical side of things I understand mostly at a conceptual level. Implementation is meant to be a rough and difficult process.

I was thinking about all the connections and disconnections of my life and felt a combination of appreciation and longing. Simultaneously full and empty feelings. It's hard not to focus on the empty. It's hard not to give in to the empty. It's hard not to become attached to the empty. It's hard to accept the empty without believing that it needs to be filled with anything other than understanding.

I've got a backlog of things I want to express. Building your own metaphors, trying to find it is how you lost it in the first place, comfort zone horizons, and pride destroying your strengths. I'm going to try to get back to the book.

I've been playing with this little idea of life-cycles. At first I was thinking of them as ABCABCABC... I'm starting to think that it is more like ABCCBAABC... or something like that. Perhaps a different notation could be used like ABCC'B'A'A''B''C''. I'll have to elaborate later.

Enough jibber-jabber. Happy New Year everyone, lets make it one worth remembering.

Turn down the suck

Beach avenue. The view is fantastic. The weather is mild and the afternoon sun is delicious. Such is the city. Drove out to the UBC campus with a couple'a pil. I am meeting up with an old friend tomorrow. He teaches semiconductor stuff at SFU. His first name is the same as his last name. I also managed a lunch date with a girl I met on a plane a year ago for the thirty-first. She's married. I need a paycheck.

Crazy Talk

Here's to chance encounters. The thoughts of possibilities race on.

http://www.strout.net/python/poo/

Do you Poo?

Vancouver

I have arrived. Got a welcoming fit for a king. A king of skids at least. The next adventure begins here and now.

I Could Never

I was thinking about people who say that kind of thing. How the fuc& do they know what they would do? Imagine knowing your future self as well as they do.

Banff

I made it to the Rockies. Since my last post I stayed at a snore filled dorm room in Winnipeg, a big empty hostel in Regina, and then hooked up with an old friend from uni in Calgary. We went skiing at Sunshine on Friday and I lived the well paid lifestyle for the weekend. We even went and played some shinny hockey on Sunday night. I'm just a little sore. The hostel here in Banff is packed with young little party people. Well, on to Nelson. This leg of the drive should be interesting.

Thunder Bay

Just so y'all know, I'm currently driving across Canada from Montreal to Vancouver. I stayed in Sudbury two nights ago and made it to Thunder Bay yesterday. I have seen beautiful and rugged nature but also giant ore smelting smoke stacks and clear cut forest. The cities along the way at a glance look just like any other city in Ontario, too bad I'm not giving myself as much time as I should to explore the elements that make them unique. The snow last night made for some adventure. Before I left I saw this as one long journey but as I continue along I am beginning to see it as a series of smaller journeys. When it was snowing hard and I couldn't see very far ahead of the car I realized that this logic can be applied even further to a scale of meters. I just have to get to the next bend in the road. I just have to be ready for whatever bursts out of the dark and obscured abyss ahead of me. I just have to be.

Only a Part

Hope and fear. They are reactions. They are not meant to be eliminated but understood. Not by thinking about them, not by giving in to them, but by experiencing them. Live in their presence and feel them change. Let them guide you but not lead you. Live in between them without being blinded by them. They are a part of who you are but not all of who you are.

As a means to liberate

I just got my hair cut for the first time in about four months. The woman who cut it asked me what I did which spawned a discussion regarding various things from eating habbits to extinction of species. When I talked about 200 species ceasing to exist on the planet each day she replied with survival of the fittest. When I mentioned our cultures self-centered imperative to destroy its competition she replied with human nature. When I told her that I am spending some time to understand the problem and figure out how I should live my life she told me that she didn't believe there was a problem. That's the problem! Forget George Bush, forget corporations, forget capitalism, forget facism, forget fundamentalism, forget despotism. These all promote ignorance as a means to control. Well the battle needs to be fought at the individual level. Promote knowledge. Promote understanding. Promote learning. Promote growth.

Phased Relations

Considering my new addition of the moon phase thing over there -> I figured I would add this little diagram to get people thinking about those very phases. Voila:

A Couple from GNN

Seed Imperialism?
Corporate Organics?

Understanding Understanding

Are you driven by a desire to remain what you are or to become something more? If you come across opinions or ideas that are contrary to your own are you interested or threatened? Do you feel that arguing against something is the best way to understand it? Do you treat a persons opinion as something new and unique or as an instance of a categorization you have previously considered? Do you treat each encounter as an opportunity to learn or as an opportunity to be right? Are you even aware of how fixed minded you are? Are you afraid to consider the alternatives to decisions you have made in the past? What is learning? What is growth? Do you regret or learn from your mistakes? Do you interrogate in order to classify in your own categories or do you encourage the expression of ideas using their native forms? Do you know how to listen? Do you feel that you have to agree or disagree with everything you hear? Do you ever agree with someone and then state your opinion as if it were identical to theirs? If you've got it all figured out then please by all means continue.

And this

The New Renaissance

Read this

The oil we eat

Sold on Buying it

The term buy is often used synonymously for terms like believe, accept, support, or condone however we rarely seem to realize that the act of buying is also the act of believing, accepting, supporting, and condoning the product we buy, the companies involved in its manufacture and transportation, and the means by which it is made and sold to us.

The term sell is often used synonymously for terms like convince, coerce, manipulate, or indoctrinate however we rarely seem to realize that sales and marketing are tools used to control our opinion. We may acknowledge the manufacturing of need but refuse to admit that we ourselves might be victims of it.

The checkout line and the voters booth are the same thing.
Corporate marketing and political propaganda are the same thing.

All I am suggesting is that we think for ourselves. It's not easy to do when so many of our thoughts were put there by someone else.

If you think that this is just a negative way of looking at the world then I give you this; a glass of poison which is either half full or half empty will kill you all the same.

I saw an interesting quote in the Montreal Gazette today from a song by Les Cowboys Fringants which implies that we live in "un univers ou l'verbe avoir a pris l'dessus sur le verbe être."

Stupid Wisdom

An incident that happened in my father's driveway this morning has made me want to share a little something with y'all. My little brother accidentally backed his mother's car into my car where his intension was to simply start it for her. He evidently didn't know what he was doing. He's not stupid for not knowing how to operate a motor vehicle, he's stupid for not knowing that he didn't know.

Stupidity. It ain't about not knowing anything other than what you don't know. A corollary to this is wisdom being knowing the limitations of your knowledge. Infinite stupidity is thus knowing nothing and believing that you know everything while infinite wisdom is knowing that you know nothing (except that you know nothing (except that you know nothing (except ...))).

Don't take my word for it. I have found that stupidity is best understood by experiencing it.

Choosing to Remember

Last night I was thinking that there is one thing that I certainly know how to do and that is to forget. I'm quite good at it. Forgetting seems less to do with not being able to remember but more with not remembering to remember. Taking it a step further it might be more accurate to say it is a subconscious choice not to remember. Choosing to forget. I forget loss, I forget failure, I forget acting against my values, and I forget personal implication. Sometimes forgetting is more of a rewriting of history. Sometimes the forgetting is so efficient that it happens in real time. Sometimes a choice to forget in the past continues into the present. Sometimes a choice to forget in a previous generation continues into the present. Sometimes entire systems of justification, manipulation, and illusion are built by inducing mass-forgetting. Have I forgotten anything?

How 'bout yours?

My truth is not complicated. It does not require elaborate explanation, detailed description, or incomprehensible schematics. These are tools of deception that often draw attention away from experience and good judgement.