Category: Thinking, thinking

New Balance

Revelation!

I always notice myself and the things happening to my body – mind – spirit – energy – writing – relationships, and think, aha, revelation! They’re revelations to me but might be nothing to others. Others noticed their revelation long ago and shrugged it away, or quietly and simply absorbed it without scrawling to the world, revelation! But I always think, I’m onto something, and want to share it, because I am.

Revelations happen a lot when I’m on the upper end of my spectrum, and right now, all aspects seem to be approaching zenith, meaning, I’m happy, I’m noticing a lot and have huge energy reserves, and I have lots of patience, and voluminous, dramatic dreams. Really.

Today’s revelation came during calf dips. I liked doing these up and down movements while balancing on the edge of a stair and not using my hands to hold myself up. Oddly (perhaps others have insights about this and will say, no, not oddly), but oddly for me, I’m better at this if I used the twenty pound weights while doing this.

Anyway, while doing these today, I realized as I rose and dropped and adjusted my balance, that various small balance centers were in play and being felt. I loved learning that. It synchronized with a greater observation about how I set myself up to fail. I set myself up to fail by creating huge expectations and hopes for success. Then, naturally, I don’t achieve what I want as fast as I want it. But, aha – revelation – using small and separate adjustments made the exercise work more smoothly. Thus, I should set smaller goals, employ small adjustments and make small changes.

I did learn that a long time ago when editing and revising. Big changes are very dangerous and can spin wildly out of control. I use a lot of caution now while editing and revising, tasking myself to read the entire document and see it as a whole before attempting large changes. Then I don my critical reader hat and ask, if I was critiquing this for another writer, exactly how would I state my problems with that work?

Naturally, there’s a bifurcation of thought in me about making small changes. My desire for the big reach stretches along on my emotional and physical spectrums. Emotionally, that doesn’t surprise me. Success appeals to my emotional side. Failure is felt emotionally. Physically, physical conditioning has always been structured in me to try harder, go further, do more and stretch yourself, to achieve the best gains.

Over on the intellectual and spiritual sides, I’m much more measured, and very accepting of small steps and minute adjustments. While the emotional and physical spectrums do not accept any backward steps well, the spiritual and intellectual sides will counsel, even a backward step is a learning opportunity. It’s like my emotional/physical sides are petulant toddlers, and my spiritual side is a zen master, while the intellectual aspect is a patient mentor.

It’s great when they all work together. Today, they do, so I observe, recall and apply once again a simple lesson, take small steps to achieve balance, reach your goals, and realize your dreams, Michael. Fortunately, the writer in me seems able to embrace and be on all four spectrums somewhat evenly.

Time to write like crazy, one more time.

0

After Midnight

We’re gonna sip some red wine

and clean the counters till they shine

(because we can see the spots, in that light)

then we’ll giggle and slip outside

into the cool night’s soft sigh

to beam at the galaxies, satellites, and stars,

and wave at the planets,

while listening to far off cars

and catch the meteors streaking o’er the scene

while the cats yawn and purr

and wash at our feet

and we discuss, who’s out there’s,

watching us,

and what are they drinking,

after midnight?

0

A Beautiful Time

I had a beautiful time last night, thank you. I again attended a friend’s birthday. This friend is 90, vivacious, intelligent, artistic and fun. She is, like, another role model for when I’m 90, or better, for when I’m sixty. She enjoys life with a buoyant spirit. Her home is rich with art, especially her own. She presented me with a piece of art last year of a curled cat sleeping with the serene sweetness cats project, but with ears tilted and attuned, listening, announcing, I am asleep, and I am aware.

Also met some new folks and visited with some charming friends I’d not seen in a year, who came back for the bday celebs. In talking with one, Mo, about my science fiction writing (they should know not to ask me as a writer, what are you writing, because you’ll be informed, in depth), and how I play with concepts regarding technology granting virtual immortality through serial resurrections, she talked about how troubling she finds these ideas. Which I react with as, yea! Good. Tell me more.

“I don’t want to share my body or abilities to meet the challenge, I want to meet the challenge but nurturing, growing and developing what and who I am.” I love this humanistic point of view. I wanted to debate merits and points, but it was a birthday party.

I was also introduced to a Belgium IPA with tangerine tones that lit up my beer buds in a pleased way. Besides that, the food was delicious, all contributed by attendees. I met more of the party honoree’s family and friends and became re-acquainted with her son. We share a name but he’s so much more charming. I always enjoy our encounters.

Hope you all meet such wonderful people, and enjoy beautiful times. The world is wealthy with both.

3

Hillary’s Coverage

Heartbreaking, dispiriting, infuriating…these were my pissed off reactions to headline news of Hillary’s nomination.

Yes, I’m a Bernie but I’m not a DEB. The political cacophony ended part 1. Part 2 will begin after a short intermission. I can enumerate the madness of a Trump presidency, but if asked, I’ll put to others who do it better. As a progressive, Hillary is a middle of the road choice, but I accept her as the nominee best suited to my agenda and principles, and I’ll vote for her.

What triggered my reactions wasn’t about Trump vs Hillary, nor Republicans and Democrats, or Progressives battling Conservatives. This was about the media’s business as fucking usual, blind to their own fucking faults, and continuing as a catalyst to America’s mess. So many headlines touted Clinton as in, and displayed photos of Bill Clinton. Some barely bothered mentioning her name. As the hype that Hillary had shattered the glass ceiling was furthered, these neanderthalic publications displayed the man Clinton instead of the woman Clinton. I mean, damn it, really? Why?

As weighty discussions about Clinton vs Trump circulate, they’re asking, is Hillary warm enough, ignoring the frothing, shouting, threatening buffon opposing her without asking, is he fucking sane enough? Do they know they treat her differently or are they too deep into their shit to see it? And if it’s the latter, what does that announce about their professionalism, objectivity and just plain critical thinking?

These editors, publishers, and their instruments revealed much with their misguided headlines, and yeah –

I trust and respect them less, because there it is, their blind sexism in their front pages.

 

 

2

Reset

Tsk. I’d forgotten about the reset button.

I knew I had one. Every human has a reset button but I think most of us find using our reset button is like using ice cubes as charcoal briquettes. Speaking for myself, the biggest problem with my reset button is that it’s not clearly marked and easily reached. Be wonderlicious if my reset button was labeled to my navel’s left, “Press here to reset.” I’d even deal with it if I had to reach down on my bottom and thread a straightened paper clip into a tiny hole to find and press a minuscule button. But my reset button isn’t that easy.

Yet (sigh) a reset was indicated. The computers are freezing me out. I’m like a cave man, except I’m hairier, live in a house, don’t hunt, gather food at stores and markets, wear shoes, have electronic fun stuff and the electricity for them, and I don’t drive as well as a cave man. I’m reduced to not writing or writing in notebooks. I decided not to write in notebooks, except for notes, as the muses intended.

But it’s a painful withdrawal, not to sit and back space and click across a keyboard. Scenes bloom like red algae in my head. I tell myself, “Remember this to write later.” But my brain is an express lane. Only five items are permitted. Putting in notes to remember to write later bumps out my name, address and telephone number. Once they’re gone, matters like other people’s names and where I’m going have as much chance as an ice cube on a hot grill.

Took several days to remember the reset button. I owe it to Amazon. Entertaining myself, I watched a show, “All or Nothing,” about the Arizona Cardinals and their efforts to win the NFL championship. Someone made a big boo boo on the field and another player encouraged him, “Hey, that’s done. Reset.”

Yes, reset. Drop those past frustrations, errors and irritations like soiled underwear. Forgive and forget what I would normally be doing (writing) if my computer was here and working (sob). It’ll be back in two weeks, so reset.

Yes, reset. One lesson I once learned a dozen forty times is that vacuums don’t work for us as humans except when we can apply that technology to suck shit up. So I set to mind sucking that shit up and out. The other thing is that it’s not enough to proclaim that I’m resetting, dumping negative energy and going forward with a glowing positive aura. No,the things that provide me that delicious negative energy that I feast on must not only be rejected but needs to be replaced. See, that’s where the vacuum thingy comes in. Dumping the negative stuff creates a vacuum. See? Follow? Create a vision for going forward, I tells myself, as I’ve tolds myself eleven million and eleven times to the power of eleven before. That’ll bring in positive stuff to replace that negative stuff.

So, yarp, here I go again, on another day, hitting the reset button like it’s my existence’s snooze button. Let’s do this.

But first, some coffee.

0

Chemicalize Me

Turn off the word corrections

process me with dna

gmo me in the mall

market me in the home

 

spin the spins that I hear

pour the sugar into my mouth

shoot me up with immortality

Skin me with spf

 

plop me down on a couch

arm me against death

warn me against settling

And point me toward a pokemon

 

give me some credit

I’m streaming 5G

dancing while I shop

 

winter is coming

And you know nothing,

can you hear me now?

0

I’m Fine

I’m fine

Just countin days till I die

Tryin to dredge up a will to survive

veggin on tv scenes

I’m fine

Wishin death would come

Permittin me to end this run

sleepin with my eyes open

I’m fine

Talkin to my machines

Because they’re the only ones who seem to seem

to care about what I say

 

So when you ask how r u? 🙂

I don’t care if you smile and walk away

Bcuz we both know what I’ll say

 

I’m fine

 

Words from the the spectrum’s dark side

0

Counting Waves

You know the words. You can write the cliches for me.

Talking about another, you note or say, “Oh, he/she is in one of those moods today.” Curl a little snark into your tone. We joke about women and their cycles, because that’s how many of us were socialized and conditioned. “Women’s cycles” are visible. They’re “emotional and irrational” when it’s “that time of month” or “they’re going through the change.”

Men’s cycles are more often ignored. But we talk about male bosses and spouses and how they seem angrier, more irritated, or conversely, they’re in a great mood. “Maybe now is the time to ask them for ____.” Fill in the blank of what’s been considered and rejected because of their mood, but now, it’s a possibility, because they’re cheerful today.

Or you notice it about yourself, but you don’t know why. You don’t know why you’re sad. You don’t know why you’re happy. You rationalize reasons, develop a logical explanation for why you must feel this way. We think we know ourselves best, but I know myself better. I have large, dark windows that I can’t see in. Monsters are back there….

Everything seems like it’s on a spectrum for me: energy, optimism, dreaming….

I dreamed many times and vividly last night.

I wrote with speed and intensity yesterday. And what I wrote? Honestly, I’m amazed that I’m so talented. What an imagination! I am fucking brilliant.

I’m optimistic, hopeful and cheerful. I look forward to visiting with friends. My body feels great.

I feel like I’m enjoying life more. Food and drinks taste better, and that sunlight, golden on those scattered soft gray and white clouds above the verdant tree filled mountains against an azure sky late yesterday afternoon, wasn’t that the most magnificent, inspiring sight? Did you see that soaring hawk?

But as I dreamed and awoke last night, considered the dreams and returned to sleep, I thought of how alike it was to being on beach at the ocean. Like waves, there’s a pattern to the dreams and the ocean’s movement, and there are high tides and low tides of dreaming. It’s not the first time I’ve thought this and written about it. Even now, it seems like deja vu. I dream; the dreams increase with strength, vividness, and impact as my cycle progresses through its spectrum. I wake up and write about it. Then the dreams peak and begin diminishing.

Ah, yes, you see that, how my mental acuity increases as well? I’m able to observe more clearly and understand myself better. I wonder, are Jeopardy contestants aware of this? Do their personal cycles affect their winning and losing? I really would like to study that, because, you see, I’m almost at the top.

During the rising mental, spiritual and physical energy cycles, I write, and the words come faster, clearer, more quickly and easily, and then I peak. I begin back down. Writing becomes a greater and greater challenge, until, down in the trough, it’s a slog to get to the coffee shop, sit in the chair and focus on the stories being told. My rituals and routines, and the tricks I’ve learned to encourage and engage my inner writer help them. But the stuff I write. Oh, God, help me, please. How could I ever believe I had any skills? I’m worthless, less than zero, with the creativity and talent of a gnat’s ass.

I know this week’s optimism and cheerfulness will crest. I will begin a slow descent into gloom. I will crave isolation. Small irritations are imagined to be major insults. I become a more aggressive driver, and a more bitter person. I’ll hunger for and reward myself with the junk foods, desserts and fried foods that I deny myself when I’m ‘up.’ Then I’ll bottom out, silent, weary, angry, self-loathing, and begin to arise back from the depths. I drink coffee but derive little energy from it. Even reading sucks. My needs and responses are wildest at the bottom. I’m more emotional, needier. I want to shop and buy new things, as a salve for how terribly I’m suffering, but I want to do it without others bothering me.

I know, too, how my cycles affect my world perceptions. When I’m rising, I’m more open. I post and comment more. More cheerful, I have greater self-confidence. When I’m in the pit, I disappear. I don’t check Facebook and don’t post, because it’s all the same jokes, I tell myself, the same crap, the same garbage from the same people, and the news? When I finally bottom out, I have a sense that the world is a terrible place of killing and brutality, our leaders are shits, and we, the common, the less than 1%, have no chance. I am resentful and hostile.

Being in the depths is miserable. I feel lifeless, a sawdust man, without purpose, direction or hope. Down in the trough, it’s hard to see my way through an hour. Food tastes terrible, and taxes are way too high. Everything costs too much then, and it’s all junk.

I wonder, how many people kill one another or themselves because they’ve descended into their pit. How many cops are more fearful and frightened, more ready to kill because of their state? How many others are more willing to take up a knife or gun and seek vengeance and make others pay because of where they are in their cycles and spectrums?

Now, climbing toward the peak, I’m on top of the world. The view is magnificent, and I believe that we can work together, change the world, and solve all the problems.

We just need to hurry, before I start down again.

 

 

0

New Fav Expression

I came in to order my coffee. It wasn’t necessary, as all the baristas know my drink. Meghan had been serving me over a year. “You give me deja vu everyday,” she said, laughing. “You know that, don’t you? You give me deja vu everyday.”

“What a cool statement,” I said. “You give me deja vu everyday.” It’s my new favorite statement. I think there’s a story in it, but then, I see and hear stories everywhere. Somewhere, maybe in another dimension, or a dream world (or is this the dream world?), or a future past or past future, I’m writing those other stories. If you want to get Far Out, maybe I’m writing your story. I am the writing god, writing the stories of our existence, unaware that it’s going on, because someone else is writing my story.

0

Just Write

Just write, I told myself. The aliens hadn’t yet arrived in my head, but I can’t wait for the aliens. I need to write. If you’re not writing, you’re standing still, (with the caveats, naturally, that if you’re editing, polishing, rewriting, etc., you are still engaged in the writing process, so you’re technically still writing).

These aren’t things I say out loud. Friends and relatives probably don’t know that my increased quiet is because I’m dreaming about aliens, trying to entice them out of the air and into my head (kind of like the old Billy Ocean song, “Get out of my dreams, and into my car.” I had asked my wife and others what aliens they like in books, films and games, or who were their favorite aliens. Great conversation fodder. The baristas, twenty year old women, were into it, and the barista today created an alien on my mocha. She then brought the alien topic up for her co-worker, who didn’t work yesterday when I asked, re-invigorating the conversation.

I derived beautiful thoughts from all these words. Yet the aliens remained nebulous, refusing to get into my car. Just write, I told myself, and they will come. Okay, so what will I write? I was picking up the scenes already created. They’re wonderful stepping stones, and although I wasn’t quite to the scene that arose to be written today, I shrugged. Okay, that’s what I’ll write, and then I’ll write the bridge to it from where I’m at later. No Big Deal. I write like this all the time, seeing what is to be and writing it because I want to, and then returning to bridge the pieces together.

So what happens in the novel today? This happens, and then that happens, and then, boom, there it is, writing stuff about aliens and plot exploding into me, firing off flares and tracers that illuminated what is to be.

Beautiful. Yeah, here I go, just write like crazy, one more time. Let the rest worry itself.

0

Blog at WordPress.com.

Up ↑