Thursday, August 29, 2019

Byron


Optimism

Is grass supposed to smell like bleach?
Is air supposed to hurt your teeth?
Is sleep supposed to make you stiff and sore?
Are toddlers supposed to drink mountain dew 
out of a bottle?
Are dolphins supposed to die from plastic ingestion?
Why is the size of the allen wrench you need 
never the one you own?
Why would anyone make a toilet paper holder
that is tightened with an allen wrench?
Do rednecks really have to take their fucking shirt off 
for every picture?
Does the dogshit bag always have to have a hole in it?
Are children supposed to be separated from their parents
and held in concentration camps?
Must every car I buy get scratched 
within the first two weeks I own it?
Do my richest clients always have to be 
the slowest ones to pay me?
How many white supremacists does it take
to turn on a light bulb?
How many days 
will my girl leave her socks 
on the bathroom floor?
Will my grandmother still remember me 
when I see her next?
Are the hardest conversations 
always put off the longest
sometimes until its too late?
Must the ones we love the most 
live the farthest away?
Will the freshly peanut buttered toast 
always land face down
on the floor
in dog fur?
Will I wake up grumpy every morning 
for the rest of my life?
If I am being a little bitch 
and my internal observer is aware 
that I am being a little bitch
and I have the tools and comprehension 
to stop being a little bitch
but I still cant stop being a little bitch
Will I be a little bitch forever?
If my beloved says me she loves me
tells me every day that I am beautiful
and says she will never leave me
Does she really love me?
Will she never leave me?
If I keep trying to be gentle
and learn how to love her better
trying not to hurt her
Will I never hurt her?
When the tornado passes through
destroying everything in its path
Will the birds still land 
upon the twisted branches
and sing to us in the morning?
Yes, they will.

Wednesday, August 28, 2019

Pondering on pondering



I have read so many self-help books that I have lost count.   I have a library at home and I have become aware of almost every major spiritual guru in the new age contemporary field over the last decade or so.  I am always trying to listen to what the conversation of our collective consciousness is.  Ted talks, podcasts, graduation addresses, audio books, motivational speaking, standup comedy etc.  It’s my own personal crack.  I have been listening ever since I was a kid.  I read the book Seven Thousand Ways to Listen by Mark Nepo and I think I beat him.  I grew up without television, but my family listened to the radio instead. It was always tuned to the local college public radio station.  I remember one particular show called New Dimensions.  It was the first program airing interviews of contemporary existential theorists that I had ever heard, and I was hooked.  I would sit next to the radio and do my homework when it was on.  I recall a variety of speakers, none of whom I was familiar with at the time, including the likes of Joseph Campbell, Eckart Tolle, Marianne Williamson, Leo Buscaglia or James Baldwin.  My dad started calling me his little existentialist.  Contemplation and debate on many topics was a common occurrence around the dinner table, led by my father and grandfather, who of course were not on the radio, but thoroughly enjoyed the sounds of their own ponderings whenever possible.  My grandmother and aunts also did their very best to save my gay, bohemian soul with their scriptures, fire and brimstone.  They failed miserably, just for your information and by the time I went to college I had very little patience or tolerance for proselytization of any kind.  Still don’t, but ironically, I enjoy the musicality and poetry of it, I have developed a hypersensitive ear for it and it is quite possible I have also inherited some skills and tendencies.   Probably because I have continued listening throughout my life anyway.  Some of it has been extremely interesting, and I try to integrate what I feel may be helpful.  

One of the many ideas that I have heard, throughout the years consistently, is one that I have been wrestling with for the last few.  Credit is often given to Albert Einstein for being one of the first contemporary thinkers of the last century to pose the question “Is the universe friendly?”  Is the universe for you or against you?  Supposedly, the shift in point of view, from against to for, will make all the difference. Existentialist thinkers have told me, books have told me, doctors have told me, therapists have told me, psychic readers have told me, my horoscope has told me, my partners have told me, and my own heart has told me.   It remains the hardest philosophy for me to adopt. 

There is a lack of clarity within the language of the question that I take issue with, lately.  I want so badly to believe that the universe is for me, but the phrasing “is for me” supports the illusion that the universe is going to do something for me, bring something to me or save me somehow.  It’s the genie in the bottle all over again.  It is a dangerous concept.  It has tripped me up psychologically for years.  If I hold too tightly to the idea and if I take the words literally, it gives me permission to wait.   The idea of “surrender” is lovely, soothing and temporary…and it also gives me permission to wait.  

Another phrase, which is often stated in conjunction with the former, is that “it is up to you to take responsibility for yourself and your life” (Thank you Rob Bell).  This is also true; however, it sounds directly contradictory to the concept of waiting for the universe to do something for me.  It isn’t that I don’t understand intellectually the deeper metaphysical and practical combination of these concepts. “It is not either/or, it is both/and” (Thank you Richard Rohr).  However, the less evolved areas of my brain have struggled with the added emotional and psychological stress that can be created by the contradiction, oversimplification and misinterpretation of such statements.  

What I have discovered through my own internal experience is that yes, the universe can be for me, but it is going to come from me, not come to me.  Nothing transformational is going to come from outside of me, so any magic I desire, any miracle I am hoping for is going to work through me.  And let me tell you, work is the operative word. When I am in a shit mood and it takes all frickin day to turn my thoughts around, pull my head out of my ass and open my heart back up, that’s a lot of psychological work.  Not to mention humility.  The kicker is “I never feel like doing it” (Thank you Mel Robbins).  The answer to that lack of desire that I always come up with is, “too frickin’ bad because that’s what taking responsibility means” (Thank you, Me).  My internal voice is not the most nurturing if you can’t tell.  “You do the work” (Thank you Iyanla Vanzant), so that the good and true can come through you.  I get to “ugly cry” (Thank you Oprah), my way through it so that “a greater vision, a bigger vision for yourself and of yourself can come through you” (Thank you Tony Robbins).  “It sucks because it’s hard” (Thank you Brene Brown), but I can do it.   I have to do it, if I want to, because I am the only one who is going to.   “You are the universe and your body, your mind, your heart and your spirit are your tools” (Thank you Michael Beckwith).


To respond to my own bitch, and be specific, this is where the work starts for me.  Slipping into and remaining within the trance of anger, sadness and depression is intoxicating.  It is literally the same neurological process as addiction.  Scientifically proven.  I am in no way discounting the difficulty of often lifelong addiction recovery, however, as many recovering addicts know, there are so many layers to the process.  If I think that I am “sober” because I  don’t ingest any chemicals from the outside, then I am mistaken because I am instead producing chemicals from the inside that I have created with the same kind of obsessive thinking that is physiologically interconnected to addiction.  The hard part is that I can’t just stop taking a substance.  “You must interrupt the ruminations” (Thank you Tara Brach).  I have to identify and halt and change the thoughts that generate the emotions and produce the substance.  “I can’t change is a deep habit” (Thank you Deepak Chopra).  

“The thoughts you repeat have created the neurological pattern, the path of neurons firing and wiring which releases the chemical, which produces familiar emotions, which then re-stimulates and reinforces the thoughts” (Thank you Dan Siegel).  It’s a loop.  A cycle.  It can be induced by personal trauma, generational trauma or genetic predisposition.   I am in no way discounting the Grand Canyon of the impact these life events can have or the Kilimanjaro’s they present.  The things that happen to me are not my fault.  I didn't do anything wrong.  “These factors are real, but not true” (Thank you Victor Frankl).  I can and have looked for all the events that created the thoughts in the first place, but ultimately it is my job to stop thinking the thoughts.  “Discipline” (Thank you Bruce Lee). Then I must knowingly and willingly go through withdrawal from the addiction to the chemical that I have recreated.  “Willpower”(Thank you God). 

Personally, I am addicted to control, anger, judgement, sarcasm, cynicism, self-loathing, worry, procrastination, my own personal brand of logic and storytelling.  I am sure the list is way longer, depending on who you ask, but you get the idea.   

“Very little grows on jagged rock.  Be ground.  
Be crumbled, so wildflowers will come up where you are.
You’ve been stony for too many years.
Try something different.
Surrender.”
(Thank you, Rumi)  

When I ‘surrender’ to acknowledging any one of my psychological addictions it feels like a scary freedom, the unknown and withdrawal.  I shake with DTs at the edge of a cliff every single time I address one.  I have observed from a very early age that most people are not aware of their own bullshit.  Therefor I have been trying to call myself out and own my shit, when I happen to be momentarily aware enough, throughout my whole life.  I work my way out of something just about every single day.  And frankly, I’m tired of it.  I’m tired of the work.  I am often frustrated. I keep expecting it to be cumulative. I read all about neuroplasticity this and neuroplasticity that.  Meditation, blah blah, yadda yadda.  However, I do all the blahs and the yaddas.  Whenever I can make myself.  There are no cures or fixes.  Yes, I know, I don’t need to be fixed, I just need to "accept myself", ppppbbbbbllllllllttt.  (Thank you, Buddha).  It’s a nice idea in the long run, but not very practical or helpful in the short term. “If you argue with reality you will lose 100% of the time” (Thank you Byron Katie).  In the good times I hold on to the tiniest grain of hope, or illusion, I can’t decide yet, that maybe my chemical balance will shift when I am not paying attention.  I know intellectually that it has shifted all along, but “in the midst of struggle it does not fucking feel that way” (Thank you Elizabeth Gilbert).  I do the work anyway, trying to let go of my expectations of results, trying to be a kinder, gentler person to myself and those around me.  I will probably work at it the rest of my life, or until I’m too old and grumpy.  I work at it to alleviate the sadness that comes with life, to release the grief I discover.  I work at it, so I might increase the love and joy in my heart.  So, I might stop poisoning my body with anger.  So, my partner doesn’t kick me out.  So, at the very least, the world isn’t a worse place.  Some days I do better than others.