The Dying

Have you died as of late? You should. Experience it. The Dying. It'll make you fly...

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Skeletons

"The dreams of better places decimate my view.
The weight of your embraces remind the world of you.
Outside the world's opposing, attempting to decree.
With allies decomposing the future that could be.

I have let the dream escape,
A sunken mass of things erased,
A list of names to leave behind,
A wound to heal that I'll create.

The message failed to translate,
The answers failing to convey,
The fiery truth and reason why the world I live in ends this way."

~ Benn Jordan (a.k.a. The Flashbulb)

Great Pumpkin Waltz

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Short Story - King of the Hill

An attempt at writing a short story. I started writing it long ago, abandoned it, and then completed it recently.  I am not personally satisfied by it, but then again, I am never satisfied by anything I do. Please excuse the over-cheesiness of this story.

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There once was a young woman who lived on top of a hill. She lived alone, with no one around for miles and miles, and she never made a sound. The hill was green with grass all over, and, on days when your sense of reality wasn’t particularly strong, you could see a castle over the hill, and a small cottage down below.  The legend said that one cannot see the castle or the house if the young woman was on the hill. The legend also said that she was always on the hill, and so nobody went there, because they thought it was haunted.

Yet he was able to see her.

He was a young man, still in his twenties. Upon looking at him, one wouldn’t notice anything special. He was a very normal-looking fellow, but minute traces of misery could always be observed on his face… as if he were punishing himself for a sin that he was yet to commit.

On quiet evenings, he’d go for a walk outside. And, since he lived alone, all of his evenings were quiet. He was eternally silent, forever contemplating. On a cool summer night, he decided to take a walk through the night, and then sit down to watch the sun rise at the end of his walk. As a child, he had always wanted to walk towards the sun, and, perhaps, maybe even reach it someday. And so, as soon as the night drew its blanket over the world, he set out on his journey, with only his silence and humbleness to protect him. Although he couldn’t see anything, he felt the presence of many a soul that night.

He marched through the darkness, with the occasional cool breeze flying through his hair every now and then, refreshing him. A few hours later, the silence was broken by the sound of birds chirping, right along with sunrise. The sun was just peeping shyly over the horizon; rising slowly, as if it were lifting itself up with such a great effort as there ever was. Its crisp, golden rays were gently caressing the Earth’s surface, spreading the warmth and hope simultaneously, and giving rise to life.

By that time, our friend had drifted away from his small town and off every road known to man, and he found himself treading along in a beautiful green meadow. On that day, he didn’t care about the sun rising nor the darkness disappearing. He had spotted, out of the corner of his eye, a hill at one of the farther ends of the meadow, breaking the infinite horizon. Slowly, he approached that hill, interested in seeing what he would find there. If only he had known…

He saw her. For an indefinite moment of indescribable depth, they stared into each other’s eyes; lost in each other’s wonder. For a moment, they imagined the infinite possibilities they could become together. He walked towards her and sat down next to her, and they lied on their backs, staring at the open sky. They smiled at each other as they painted the endless skies. They became moons and clouds and flying things. They floated with their imaginations into each other.

Together, they built their kingdom out of light and sound. She was a princess, he was a prince. They were not related by blood, but the bond between their selves was something never before known to man… unparalleled. They built their kingdom above the hill and all around – out of light and sound. Their kingdom existed, but it wasn’t real, and so nobody could ever discover it or ruin it. They spent their days lying on the side of the hill, looking at the meadow from which he had come. With their heads touching, they continued expanding their kingdom and isolating themselves from the world. They sat there in silence, imagining what could be. They gave each other thoughts and smiles.

Not a single word was uttered between them. The holy silence was never broken. It was beautiful.

Then, one day, on an early morning, they decided to walk down the other side of the hill, towards the rising sun. They departed, holding hands.

Poetry.

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Mapping Emotions, Hobbits, and Me

1) Ed Fairburn enjoys mapping emotions, (almost) literally. I like the idea. Now you can apply poetic descriptions to actual maps, such as when one says, "Her eyes are an infinite sea of regret and doubt." You can now have an actual sea as her eyes.

2) On a slightly related note, here's some Hobbit art, by J.R.R. Tolkien. Tolkien drew and painted more than 100 different illustrations for The Hobbit himself, and they were only recently discovered (right before the book's 75th anniversary). A book with the complete illustrations is available on Amazon. I'm waiting patiently for the film... :)

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3) The reason I am miserable right now is because, up to this point in my life, I haven't done anything useful. I have been living passively, producing little to nothing everyday, and feeling incomplete. I'm still waiting for the idea that will be the focus of my life. I want to leave something for others after I depart... something to change points of view fundamentally. I want to meet my idea.

Lingering in my head...

These are a few ideas, lines and thoughts lingering in my head, and I desperately needed to get them out...

- The underwhelming urge of forever,
Of finding infinity by the river;
A rose growing next to a flower,
A light glowing from its giver.

(Music and poetry are forever.)

- It is a song... a song of Chinese teapots and Bengal tigers; a song of lost wars and departed fighters, a song of the time when everything was better... but such a time never really was.

- They condemned me. To life.

- What is justice? Justice is, in a way, the carrying out of righteous vengeance upon those who have sinned. But is that true justice? I'd say no. In my mind, true justice is when there is no need for vengeance, because nobody wrongs anybody else. In a way, justice is most useful when we need it the least, and the reverse is also true. In a way. I think.

- Go out today and get inspired.

- My grandfather has one of the best talents ever... a talent for appreciating. I do not mean appreciating as in being thankful for what he has (although he is that), but what I do mean is that he is able to appreciate all kinds of inspiration that are around him... he stands in awe of the magnificence of everything.

- The idea of choice, to me, is one of the greatest ideas that prove, to me, the existence of a creator. We cannot imagine a life without the idea of choice. We cannot, and do not, choose choice. We can choose or refuse to choose anything in life, but the refusal itself is a choice. Man could not have created this idea, because we are incapable of true creation. We are only able to continue from one step to the other, and can only hope to jump when we make unexpected connections.

- Our lives are collapsing probabilities. There is an infinite number of universes with infinite copies of you, but each and every one is different because of their choices. However, I'd say that not all of them are alive. Only you are truly alive, and based on each choice you make in this life, all of the other different possible outcomes based on your choice are collapsed. They are no longer probable. We keep collapsing probabilities of events until we reach a probability of one... then comes death.

- (We do not choose choice and can't imagine living without it. We do not choose death, and cannot imagine living without it. Yet, death is not a choice.)

- If we were able to travel freely in the fourth dimension, we'd be able to see a literal timeline of everyone's life. Similarly, we could see a timeline of the life of the universe. Now, is there anything to prevent our universe's timeline from intersecting with that of another universe? I'm not sure, but I'm really interested in the thought. Maybe it happened. Maybe it will. Maybe it won't. But the idea of it is just enthralling.

- (I just wanted you to know. You don't need to do anything about it or even react. You are now free to fly.)

- ...and so we spin and dance together, forever.

Visualizing eleven dimensions

Sometimes all we need is a different perspective.

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One-line stories...

Sometimes I get these very picturesque or thought-provoking ideas in my head that, I think, express a story of their own inside our heads. These ideas may just be a sentence or two, but they seem much bigger to me than that. They are not connected to each other. Here are a few original ones:

- He held a bottle of cold water in his hands. Or, as I saw it, he was holding a bottle full of grey mist and endless, wonderful possibilities.

- They came into existence pre-paired.

- There they stood, tall and proud, facing their own shame.

- He dreamed of escaping reality for long enough, but he never knew that he escaped it.

- "Does life ever stop being so surreal?", she asked.

- To him, she was as beautiful musical melody that he couldn't quite grasp, because it was dancing around inside him, eternally.

- Everyday, he would wake up to his alarm clock and go. One day, he didn't wake up to his alarm clock. Instead of going in his waking life, he departed in sleep.

- Only then did he realize that there's a difference between being miserable and being pessimistic. You can still hope even if you're miserable.

- She could only hope to believe in hope someday... but she knew she wouldn't. Not on her own.

- He saw a meteor falling, and it was as if it winked at him. He then disappeared.

- He drowned amidst the raging sea of thoughts and ideas in his head that others usually envied him for having.

- He was a stranger inside his own head. His thoughts weren't his, and neither were his emotions. He had always thought that if home was inside him, it would never change. However, he was gone for too long. Now, he was just moving in circles...

John Cleese on Creativity

This video is worth your time; very interesting. I hope you enjoy it.

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When Love Arrives

Less is More

Sometimes you just need to disconnect from the whole world and all of its technology to get in touch with the real world to start living. Only then will you truly understand that less is more. Meanwhile, other than the reading, I'll leave you with this (related lyrics):

God bless.

(:

Love Stories Unlike Yours

There are always the traditional love stories, and then there are the different ones. We should embrace the different ones for all they are, even if just imaginary. Experience love stories unlike yours, and embrace.

God bless.

(:

Darkness, Part 2: Outside...

"They say I made the moon.
Everything was in the dark,
No memories at all;
Just a tiny freezing wind in my back,
As I was sitting there,
Singing a song they had never heard before.
Suddenly, a voice told me,
"Keep on singing, little boy
And raise your arms in the big black sky
Raise your arms the highest you can,
So the whole universe will glow."

My first vision was a bush growing down the river,
And I couldn't stop crying...
Something was missing.
I realized I was in love with a voice.
I called it, again, and again,
But all I heard was the echo in the light."

~ M83 - Moon Child

Darkness, Part 1: Inside.

Please, take your shoes off.

It's cold in here... and it's dark.

The floor is slightly wet, and the air slightly humid.

It smells of gasoline.

Your soul is raining.

(Desolate.)

Everything reverberates and echoes and rings.

A creaky chain in the background.

A light bulb dying somewhere outside.

Sitting in a corner, head resting on knees.

Sweating, breathing heavily.

A soothing voice.

"Hush now, little child. Come out of your..."

It trails off.

All is dark and growing.

Stand up.
Sit down.
Stand up.
Fall down.
Stand up?

I might be lying.
I might be dying.

Darkness.

Poem - I wanted to give you flowers...

I tried to capture the glory
I ended up writing a poem
I started by writing a story
But I went on living, thinking

And I always failed, trying,
Trying to paint you a painting
As I fell down while flying
I saw it all before fainting

(Read the poem once from top to bottom, and then from bottom to top. I think it makes more sense that way.)

Listening to colors

This is beyond. This man is truly blessed.

(He listens to color.)

Redemption.

"Let's start over again;
Why can't we start it over again?
Just let us start it over again...

And we'll be good;
This time we'll get it, get it right
It's our last chance to forgive ourselves..."

~ Matthew Bellamy

Day is Done

This song is the definition of finding beauty in misery. It's not overwhelming or overbearing, but much more gentle and subtle. It slowly gets to you when the day is done.

Broken love letter/poem...

He kills her.
He brings her back to life, and in the process, he changes.
(She gave him purpose.)

Whatever he was, she was always more.
(She gave him light.)

Whatever he will be, he owes it to her.
(She gave him color.)

He would always think of offering her flowers,
But never really could.
He wanted to give her a garden; more.

She would always think of giving him flowers,
Because she always would.
She would give him gardens; more.

(She gave him life.)

They both understood.

At the end of the day, the sun sets.
But sometimes, even after the day is gone,
The night can be even more beautiful.
Neither is ever forgotten.

Something faded;
The rest stayed true.

(The flower of eternity mourned its own life.)

El-Sett.

"Imagine a singer with the virtuosity of Joan Sutherland or Ella Fitzgerald, the public persona of Eleanor Roosevelt and the audience of Elvis and you have Umm Kulthum." ~ Virginia Danielson, Harvard Magazine

Please allow me to introduce you to the world of beauty that is Umm Kulthum. She is famously known in Egypt as "El-Sett" (translation: The Woman / The Lady). What Édith Piaf was to France is what Umm Kulthum was to the Arab world (and even beyond that).

(:

A Russian in Hell

I'm not sure if this is true or not, but it's still interesting either way. Worth pondering about.

(Click on the image to make it bigger/readable. If it's not big enough, check the original link.)

"Do not stand at my grave and weep."

"Do not stand at my grave and weep,
I am not there; I do not sleep.
I am a thousand winds that blow,
I am the diamond glints on snow,
I am the sun on ripened grain,
I am the gentle autumn rain.
When you awaken in the morning’s hush
I am the swift uplifting rush
Of quiet birds in circling flight.
I am the soft star-shine at night.
Do not stand at my grave and cry,
I am not there; I did not die."

~ Mary Elizabeth Frye

Michael Leunig - We Must Do With Scraps...

The following is a poem by the Australian cartoonist and poet, Michael Leunig. It is titled "We Must Do With Scraps...". I hope you enjoy it.

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"Little scraps of peace and quiet.
Hope, conversation, handshakes,
- all in dribs and drabs.

A few crumbs of fun
A tiny flake of beauty.
One teaspoon of enthusiasm.

Off-cuts of each other
A skerrick of community...
A bit of a kiss.

A snippet of eye contact.
A snippet of hospitality.
A snippet of patience.

A shred of honor.
A wisp of good humor.
A sample of compassion.

Leftovers, oddments, remnants of the glorious situation.
A fragment of God.
Not much really.
Sorry. Time's up."

~ Michael Leunig

Thought of You

(Together we dance through our existence, but never do we touch... and you never fade. The thought of you always takes me away.)

Some thoughts on the human nature

We are but the sum of our faults… our ability to create them, our ability to recognize them, and our ability to choose them. The faults we choose create in ourselves, and the faults that we choose to do, are what define us. Essentially, it’s a matter of exclusion and not inclusion. Humans are born with infinite possibilities, and by adopting more faults, specifically more of the useless faults, they limit their possibilities.

For example, compassion is said to be an important human trait. Our compassion makes us different from some other creatures… but does our compassion necessarily make us better people? The answer depends on the situation. However, taking a general and objective point of view, it is important to note that compassion can hinder our progress and increase our bias. And thus, a question is raised: are the things that make us human essentially good, or are they an obstacle? In other words, are the things that make us human actually worth being human for, or can we become something that is more abstract? Is the human nature the actual challenge that we should be trying to overcome?

(A god could not possibly be wrong, even if he wants to, because a god is the definition of right. If he can find it in his power to overcome his own limits, then he isn't a god anymore. Essentially, by being able to do wrong (and thus overcoming his own power), the god does not become more powerful, but more inferior. He has destroyed his own power in the process of overcoming it, because the task itself is not befitting to his nature, and not because it's essentially impossible.)

What makes us unique as humans is not just our intelligence or our emotions, but it is rather the combination of them in us. Other creatures, such as animals, have emotions like us, but not the same level of intelligence.

And so our choice is not in avoiding the wrong decisions and making the right ones, but rather in choosing the best collection of wrong decisions so that we can ultimately learn from them and choose the right collection of right decisions when the time comes. In essence, we are all wrong, but to varying degrees. We need to be the right type of wrong. That is how we can become.

Silence speaking..?

It happens that silence speaks as much as words do, and sometimes even more. It also happens that you can receive love letters from silence. I'd speak of this more, but I'd be ruining the silence. Immerse yourself.

Painting with words...

I wanted to paint with words... write random phrases that occur to me while I imagine a metal image, and try to connect all of the mental images together under a greater theme, as to form the painting. This is an attempt at it.

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A thousand shards of broken glass, a thousand broken reflections of the moon...

You are your own broken reflection.

For the sake of the simple idea of confusion, they laid a framework for what it could be but never defined it, as not to limit it.

Your head is a house, your eyes its windows. And nobody ever visits.

It was all wrong, because it was all perfect.

His sense of regret was killing his sense of guilt. Regret became the murderer. He was no more.

A traveler stopping by to look decides to settle there forever.

Up on the green hill they lived alone, in silence, forever.

The grass waltzed with the wind, slowly, elegantly. In its weakness lay its beauty.

Paint an emotion, paint motion. Paint the impossible with all your devotion.

Wasting away at the shores of his own soul, he decided to abandon the seas and deserts within himself, and go find a forest in someone else.

Between the grains of sand lay the infinite wisdom of the Earth.

Of all the people, he was chosen to not be.

A demented existence asking for forgiveness, forever held at bay by all.

At the same exact hour, every night, she would confide herself to the warm darkness of her own soul.

In the stars he saw her eyes, in the ocean her infinite love. And then he understood: he never deserved her. But he decided to try anyway.

A motive, purer than the best of diamonds, is still only a motive. Without the courage to act on it, it will remain a motive. And, if left for a time long enough, it would decay.

The sheet of glass fell, and was shattered into a thousand pieces. A thousand shards...

Poem - The Truth

The truth lies in the grass,
The truth is the green.

The truth lies in the clouds,
The truth is the sky.

The truth lies in the blue,
The truth is the sea.

The truth lies to itself,
About what it could be.

The truth lies in the sand,
The truth is the infinite.

The truth lies in your hand,
The truth is in your palm.

The truth is sunshine,
On a cold winter morning.

The truth is in the silence,
Of the eternal passage of time.

DreamNotionPaintDance

Good day. This will probably change your life. I recommend you take the chance, because it is truly beyond.

Here's to beyond, life-changing things.

(DreamNotionPaintDance)

(:

Poem - Stranger in a Shell

There once was a man
Who lived without a plan;
He went out to the sea,
To see what would be.

Everyday he would sell
A single empty shell
To a passing stranger
For nothing in return.

And so he did for long
Not because it's right, or because it's wrong;
And nobody ever asked
With what the man was tasked.

"Please remember me, remember
By the time when it's December,
For then I die, and will not be
Until next year, here by the sea."

(Summer is a man,
Summer is a shell,
And every year Summer
Goes back to hell.)

Awkward.

Hello. This is awkward. Awkward is good. Awkward is seen as bad because it is different. Awkward seems to be simple but turns out to be deep, and sometimes profound. I like awkward. Awkward is fun. I tried being awkward before, and I never stopped. It's as if being awkward is normal. Normal is boring, awkward is interesting. I met an awkward person yesterday, and I found his awkwardness very different from anything I've ever known. He talked and smiled and did everything a normal person does, but he was awkward. His awkwardness inspired my awkwardness, and in that small space in the vast infinity of time, our awkwardness still lingers. It's like our awkwardness was a part of a bigger wave of cosmic awkwardness. Planned awkwardness is awkward. It was nothing special, but the awkwardness made it interesting. Awkward comes, awkward goes, awkward has its highs and lows. I am awkward. Not everybody is awkward. I dislike it when I am awkward alone. Maybe someday I'll be with someone as awkward as I am. Maybe will grow even more awkward together. Maybe we're already growing awkward together. I like awkward.

(Sleep is awkward. Dream is awkward.)

House, M.D.

Today I'm going to share with you some quotes from Dr. Gregory House (portrayed by Hugh Laurie), from the T.V. show House, which I have recently started watching. I just finished watching season one yesterday, and most of the following quotes are from it, and all are spoken by Dr. House himself. I realize some of these quotes won't make much sense out of context, but they will still give you something to think about. While watching the show, not only did I find the show interesting, but I also related to Dr. House's ideas. He has a philosophical side, he's an asocial misanthrope, and he's cynical and narcissistic.

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"Everybody lies."

"Humanity is overrated."

"Reality is almost always wrong."

"There is not a thin line between love and hate. There is --- in fact --- a Great Wall of China with armed sentries posted every 20 feet between love and hate."

"The most successful marriages are based on lies."

"People like talking about people. Makes us feel superior. Makes us feel in control. And sometimes, for some people, knowing some things makes them care."

"I choose to believe that the white light people sometimes see... they're all just chemical reactions that take place when the brain shuts down.... There's no conclusive science. My choice has no practical relevance to my life, I choose the outcome I find more comforting.... I find it more comforting to believe that this isn't simply a test."

"It's a basic truth of the human condition that everybody lies... the only variable is about what."

"If you can fake sincerity, you can fake pretty much anything."

"You want to know how two chemicals interact, do you ask them? No, they're going to lie through their lying little chemical teeth. Throw them in a beaker and apply heat."

"It's one of the great tragedies of life — something always changes."

"In this universe effect follows cause. I've complained about it but—"

"If you talk to God you're religious. If God talks to you, you're psychotic."

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I realize you may not agree with everything he says (I personally don't), but it's still interesting to think about it. If you have time, watch the show. Hugh Laurie is an excellent actor, and he fits Dr. House's character perfectly.

"Humanity is overrated." ~ Dr. House

"Hell is other people."

Jean-Paul Sartre once wrote, "Hell is other people." The quote seems to be very misanthropic on the surface, and it is so. However, there's a deeper connotation: If hell is other people, then one's self is not included. Therefore, Sartre seems to imply that one's self isn't hell, but all other human connections are hell. So, while the quote may seem misanthropic, I believe Sartre's original idea is this: Heaven is one's self. This may even serve as a prelude to the quote mentioned earlier. Oscar Wilde once wrote, "I am the only person in the world I should like to know thoroughly." Wilde's quote implies the same notion in many of his other writings. For example, he also wrote that "The only possible society is oneself." While not necessarily misanthropic, this quote points out that Wilde's nature is more of asocial (or antisocial). He didn't say he hated all humans (including himself), but that he prefers the company of himself over that of others. He can be alone without being lonely.

God bless.

(:

Rise.

If I could give only one word of advice in my dying moments, one word to live by, it would be this:

Rise.

It's such a beautiful word. We, as whatever we are, need to rise. Get up. We need to do more than just existing. Being is an option, but it is not enough to just be. You need to constantly rise to truly be. Transcend. Be something more than you are. Face the fear. Face the chaos. Face the pain. Face yourself and everything that is, and help them rise too. You do not rise alone. We all rise together, and it is so because we are all one, no matter how different we may seem.

So, in my dying moments, I will ask of you to rise. Be. I will not explain what you should do, because you will know in good time. In the meantime, prepare. Do not ask me how. You don't choose to be prepared, it happens. If you're not prepared enough, then it's not the moment yet for you to truly rise.

Be.

Rise.

Ode: Intimations of Immortality

"Our birth is but a sleep and a forgetting:

The Soul that rises with us, our life's Star,

Hath had elsewhere its setting,

And cometh from afar:

Not in entire forgetfulness,

And not in utter nakedness,

But trailing clouds of glory do we come."

~ William Wordsworth

( Lines 58 to 64 from Ode: Intimations of Immortality )

Slow explosions of beauty

I maintain my point of view that everything in nature is a slow explosion of beauty. Imagine an explosion in slow motion: the bomb  slowly grows in size as the pressure inside it increases, and then it bursts. Slowly, the debris will be scattered in all directions around. Now, of course in real life this means that harm is done, but in nature no harm is done. Think of anything... take a tree for example. It would seem as if the leaves on the tree were the debris spreading further from the center (the trunk) of the tree, until they fall down. How about a cloud? Imagine a cloud slowly and constantly expanding from the center, until it rains in the end. You could do the same with anything... from flowers in a garden to galaxies in space. Everything is a slow explosion of beauty. With people, it's also the same. We're born, and we keep growing on the outside and the inside (spreading further from the center of the explosion) and, at one point, we fall. The explosion is over. Make the most of your explosion before it is over.

This is probably why I like Explosions in the Sky. They are a post-rock band, and their music is beautiful (to me). Their music begins slowly, peacefully, and culminates in an explosion. Sometimes the explosion is noticeable, other times it seems as if the whole instrumental was the moment of the explosion, spread out over a lifetime. You don't feel it because you are in it.

You are my favorite explosion.

(:

God, creation and existence..?

Taking on the view that God is an all-powerful being, a paradox arises: How did God create creation (as a universal mechanism)? A similar question: If God exists, did he create existence (again, as a universal mechanism), or was it there before he was (meaning he didn't create it and therefore cannot be the true god?) While these questions cannot be answered with a definitive reply, a counter-argument exists: the problem with these questions is that, to form them, we have used our own faulty logic. We, for example, tend to think of Time in a linear manner, where one thing happens after the other. However, God, who created Time, may have made it so that it's not linear. A quick look at quantum physics also suggests that, in some theories, time is not linear, and that we can (theoretically) travel in it if we can access the higher dimensions of our physical universe. Since we can't yet, we can only move in one direction in time: forward. Another example of logic being at fault is the assumption that our view of time applies to God. View it as such: God always is. He's never in the past nor the future. He is always in the present. He is the present. Think of this as if we're living in one single moment of time that repeats itself infinitely, meaning that there is no past or future. They're just illusions, and all we truly have is the present. In the same manner, God is always the present if this view is true. Since we can't know, we shouldn't judge. We, as humans, should be free to question all authorities (but with limits, of course), but we should never definitively judge them if they're higher than us (in this case, them meaning God).

But why do we, as humans, sometimes refuse the answers? Why do we refute the existence of God? Well, again, the problem is us being faulty beings. Man is too arrogant to believe. Overcoming this arrogance is the key to belief, even if it has nothing to do with religion. Once you accept that some greater entity than you exists, you will believe.

God bless.

(:

Other forms of existence..?

Choice, chance, power, illusion, creation... what are these? Ideas? Quite possible. But then, thinking again, they're different from most ideas. They seem to be closer to ideals than ideas, but they're neither this nor that. As far as ideas go, they follow the definition of them being elaborate mental constructs, but what kind of mental constructs (and whose) are they? As far as ideals go, the aforementioned forms of existence can be found in almost all situations and forms of existence, but they are not goals that can be developed but never fulfilled. So, neither the former nor the latter choice is a description of what they are. However, whatever they are, they point to an important idea: that there is a creator. Consider this: can you, as a human, create? Can you imagine something that isn't like anything you have ever seen? Here's an example: if I told you to imagine a creature, you'd automatically assume that it either has a body or doesn't. Why can't there be a third choice? If we were truly able to create, the choices would be infinite. However, since we are not creators, we can only mix and match between the things we know to make something new. It's impossible for humans to create, and thus Man cannot be God. It is only God who could have created the elaborate mechanisms of  things such as chance, choice, and power. It also only Him, the true creator, who could have created creation. This is very similar to this thought: what was there before there was Time? We don't know. We can't know. This simply re-enforces the idea that God is there, and that he is the one and true creator.

Since I am still in the first stages of thought as to what the forms of existence I listed earlier are, I will be visiting this topic later once I've developed this train of thought more. I'm thinking at the moment that they are the pillars of the house of existence, but I will need to work on this mental construct further in order to understand more. In the meantime, if you have any thoughts or suggestions, please feel free to share them in the comments.

God bless.

(:

Layers of existence: The Flammarion engraving

In a follow-up to my last post about the layers of existence, I wanted to share a piece of art that's related to the idea I'm presenting. The art piece is the Flammarion engraving (the artist is unknown), which you can see below.

The following text is from Wikipedia:

"The Flammarion engraving is a wood engraving by an unknown artist, so named because its first documented appearance is in Camille Flammarion's 1888 book L'atmosphère: météorologie populaire ("The Atmosphere: Popular Meteorology"). The engraving has often, but erroneously, been referred to as a woodcut. It has been used to represent a supposedly medieval cosmology, including a flat earth bounded by a solid and opaque sky, or firmament, and also as a metaphorical illustration of either the scientific or the mystical quests for knowledge."

We may take the picture to represent the man crossing the border from the physical existence to the ideal existence, with the emotional existence being always inside him in both realms.

God bless.

(:

Layers of existence..?

In the wake of my dreams, I like to contemplate existence whenever I can. Consider this view: existence is layered. The layers are as follows: the physical, the emotional, the ideal, and the Truth. None of these layers ever exists without the others, but it is possible for one layer to have dominion over the others for a certain aspect of existence. Now, let us consider the premises upon which we will develop this argument:

1) Everything is. Everything exists in some form, even if it isn't real. (Example: dreams.)
2) Nothing is something. The non-existence of something means that its opposite exists, and vice versa.
3) The layers of existence dictate everything that happens, even if they don't want to. Everything is a sign.

The first layer of existence is the physical layer. This is the layer which we come in contact with most of the time. It's anything that you can touch, smell, see, hear or taste. This is the easiest layer to interpret, because it requires nothing special to interact with it.
The second layer of existence is the emotional, which isn't physically accessible, but the emotions we feel arise out of interactions with the physical world. These emotions are what make living creatures different from the non-living. Emotions such as happiness, grief, melancholy, and so forth are what you'd usually find in the second layer. In this layer, discrepancies start to appear: some people are more emotional than others. This may refer to the range of emotions they know, or the extent to which they can dive into a certain emotion, or both. Different people are at different levels, and that is a byproduct of how they grow up.
The third layer of existence is the ideal. This layer includes anything that you can find in the noumenal realm. This layer contains all of the ideas and ideals. Ideas are, as I can best put it, mental constructs. However, I should note that they're not necessarily human mental constructs. Ideas are beings in a different form from us humans, but they lack conscience. They are alive, but without their conscience they can't act on their own behalf and thus need instruments to be expressed, and we as humans are instruments of theirs. The hive mind, the collective consciousness of the universe, is where ideas are. In this layer of existence you can also find ideals, like love, courage, and the likes. Sometimes people mistake them for emotions, but they are ideals. The difference is that ideals are the ultimate, limitless good that we could use to build a utopia. Emotions aren't that.
The fourth, final, and top layer of existence is the Truth.

Collectively, the Truth is the source of everything else that is. We could violate the Truth, but we can never deviate from the course before us. It's not ours to create. It's the Truth's.

God bless.

(:

A small thought on skipping stones and dreams..

His hopes he held high, even if not for too long. It’s just like skipping stones; the hope that you get that the stone will skip over the water one more time without falling into the water. You hold your hope strong, as if it helps the stone stay where it is in its current state: skipping freely; not fearing the peril of drowning. Even if it drowned, it would drown in joy. So you hold your hopes stronger, and, who knows? Maybe that’s what keeps it up. Maybe the stone only stops skipping when your heart knows that this is enough for it…

It’s just like that moment before you go to sleep, when you give up on all of your inhibitions; not because you’re tired, but because something that is buried deep within you is calling on you, and you are answering back unconsciously. And when you do, when you connect with this higher form of being within yourself, you are transported somewhere else. (It may be an illusion, a dream, but can you really tell the difference when in it? Why do we have to live in this world and not the dream world, anyways? If it's about finding joy, then why not live in the dream world?) The dream ends when you start doubting it.. the skipping stone falls when you doubt it.

God bless.

(:

A Few Thoughts on Love?

Love is:

The beginning and the end,
When two hearts ascend;

When absence is presence,
When everything is its essence;

When two souls entwine,
With a passion divine.



Love is forgiveness, joy, timelessness, eternity, fragility,  poetry, profundity. Love is in everything and nothing. Love is the most powerful spell, but never an illusion. If an illusion, then it is not Love. It ceases to be when you doubt it, and it is not if it doesn't have you. Love is the joy of silence and loneliness. It is the key to understanding the beauty in all that is. Love is not the answer to life, but it's as close as anything may come. Love is how mortals can live forever.

(Forgiveness, affection, radiance, implicitness, divinity, admiration.)




God bless. (:

Poem - We.

I've heard of this sound,
That sits all around,
In silence inspiring
Me.

I've heard of this rose,
In poetry and in prose,
That lets all the Love
Be.

I've heard of this child,
Who runs in the wild,
Setting all that is Good
Free.

I've heard of this place,
That none could embrace,
Light holding us in a
Spree.

I've dreamt of this lake,
Where everything was awake
With Love, and there was
She.

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God bless.

(:

Poem - A Smile, A Silence

A smile...
A smile that is more than what is,
A smile that is all that was,
A smile that is what could be.

(A smile that is what will be.)

A silence....
A silence that is what we were,
A silence that is what we are,
A silence that is what we could be.

(A silence that is what we will be).

What is life but a silence and a smile,
With the hopes of a better tomorrow?
What is love but the forgiveness of a child,
With no inhibitions or sorrow?

'tis death we fondly dream of,
And together we shall find the reasons,
Behind this life we live, a love,
Not just a change of seasons.

(:

Mogwai - Take Me Somewhere Nice

A song by the post-rock band, Mogwai. Enjoy.

"Ghosts in the photograph
never lied to me.

I'd be all of that
I'd be all of that.

A false memory
would be everything.
A denial my eliminent.

What was that for?
What was that for?

What would you do
if you saw spaceships
over Glasgow?
Would you fear them?

Every aircraft,
every camera,
is a wish that
wasn't granted.

What was that for?
What was that for?

Try to be bad.
Try to be bad."

Mother Nature

Hush, listen to the call of Mother Nature..
Peace, prosperity, passion...
The essence of Nature of is the nature of Essence.
Mother Nature only wishes to teach you a lesson.

Listen to the Voiceless

Anis Mojgani - Shake the Dust

"This is for the fat girls.

This is for the little brothers.

This is for the school-yard wimps, this is for the childhood bullies who tormented them.

This is for the former prom queen, this is for the milk-crate ball players.

This is for the nighttime cereal eaters and for the retired, elderly Wal-Mart store front door greeters. Shake the dust.

This is for the benches and the people sitting upon them,

for the bus drivers driving a million broken hymns,

for the men who have to hold down three jobs simply to hold up their children,

for the nighttime schoolers and the midnight bike riders who are trying to fly. Shake the dust.

This is for the two-year-olds who cannot be understood because they speak half-English and half-god. Shake the dust.

For the girls with the brothers who are going crazy,

for those gym class wall flowers and the twelve-year-olds afraid of taking public showers,

for the kid who’s always late to class because he forgets the combination to his lockers,

for the girl who loves somebody else. Shake the dust.

This is for the hard men, the hard men who want to love but know that it won’t come.

For the ones who are forgotten, the ones the amendments do not stand up for.

For the ones who are told to speak only when you are spoken to and then are never spoken to. Speak every time you stand so you do not forget yourself.

Do not let a moment go by that doesn’t remind you that your heart beats 900 times a day and that there are enough gallons of blood to make you an ocean.

Do not settle for letting these waves settle and the dust to collect in your veins.

This is for the celibate pedophile who keeps on struggling,

for the poetry teachers and for the people who go on vacations alone.

For the sweat that drips off of Mick Jaggers’ singing lips and for the shaking skirt on Tina Turner’s shaking hips, for the heavens and for the hells through which Tina has lived.

This is for the tired and for the dreamers and for those families who’ll never be like the Cleavers with perfectly made dinners and sons like Wally and the Beaver.

This is for the biggots,

this is for the sexists,

this is for the killers.

This is for the big house, pen-sentenced cats becoming redeemers and for the springtime that always shows up after the winters.

This? This is for you.

Make sure that by the time fisherman returns you are gone.

Because just like the days, I burn both ends and every time I write, every time I open my eyes I am cutting out a part of myself to give to you.

So shake the dust and take me with you when you do for none of this has never been for me.

All that pushes and pulls, pushes and pulls for you.

So grab this world by its clothespins and shake it out again and again and jump on top and take it for a spin and when you hop off shake it again for this is yours.

Make my words worth it, make this not just another poem that I write, not just another poem like just another night that sits heavy above us all.

Walk into it, breathe it in, let is crash through the halls of your arms at the millions of years of millions of poets coursing like blood pumping and pushing making you live, shaking the dust.

So when the world knocks at your front door, clutch the knob and open on up, running forward into its widespread greeting arms with your hands before you, fingertips trembling though they may be."

~ written by Anis Mojgani

God bless.

(:

Between being asleep and awake..

Every night, when you go to sleep, something magical happens. That transition between being awake and being asleep... that moment of nothingness...

(That moment of nothingness... what is it? How does it happen? And why? Could I live there? Is this what a coma is like? Is this just to give us a taste of what being nothing felt like?)

That moment right before you actually sleep, when you close your eyes and stop thinking, and are ready to slip into the dream world... that is magical. That moment when you are at peace with yourself; when you forget your worries and forgive life... that moment of belief in the existence of something greater, a purpose perhaps.. a purpose that gives you the will to live until the next day. You only die when you fulfill this purpose or completely give up on life. And in that moment, you feel a glimpse of light in your heart, and the light of God is shed unto you just for a moment. Then you are asleep, and it is gone.

I believe in magical moments.

God bless.

(:

Having power... or the lack of it?

This world of ours is full of dangers of all sorts: physical, psychological, mental, and so forth. These dangers will, in some way or another, place the person (or people) upon which this danger is inflicted in pain. But the danger is not in the pain itself, or the consequences of that pain. It's a far more grave matter than just pain. It's the destruction of a small idea that carries within it much more than meets the eye.

Imagine the following scenario: a man is held at gunpoint by another man. The man with the gun is now inflicting emotional pain on the unarmed man because of the unjust power he has over him. Then, at the moment he fires the gun, something completely different happens. It's not about the unarmed man.. it's not about him being wounded or dying. It's about a very deep change inside the man with the gun. He's now lost a part of him that he will never be able to get back again. The pain that he will be in now is far greater than that of the other man.. the other man will either be healed or be dead with time. But the other man will live in death, praying for salvation and forgiveness, or descending into self-anarchy by giving way to himself by killing more people. It's that loss of power of his self that automatically comes with the power he gains from the gun. Power is too dangerous a thing to possess.

So, in a sense, this is a universal law. Once a man allows a source of power from outside of himself to take over him, he loses the power of control over himself because it's now been externalized. That power may cause addiction, and with that corruption is almost certain to come. The real problem starts occurring when those who are in power are the same people who have no control over themselves and only lust for power, and that is exactly what we're facing today. Look at the world right today: new scientific discoveries are made by the day, companies are innovating and making money, and new cities are built everywhere. But is this good? We're not looking at the other side... moral corruption, in all its forms, is tearing the world apart. Look at all the extremists who belong to no religious or ethnic groups, look at all the great gap that is constantly growing between the poor and the rich, and how each considers the other to be his enemy. Look at all the corrupt ideas that people are being fed. It's not a matter of how much we can create, or how elaborate our tools are, but a matter of how good our hearts are. Without our good hearts, we are nothing. What are we without a good will and a strong heart?

And thusly, this raises an important question: should the people who are in power today be in power, or have they lost their good wills in their pursuit of more power? The lust for power is what has corrupted the hearts of men all throughout history. What the world needs is not a revolution of men, but a revolution of hearts. If each free man, woman and child could simply refuse to be a slave for those who are in greater power, we will win. Not because we're greater in number, but because we're living for this idea that can't be destroyed. The idea lives even if we die. The reason for why we'll win is because we are the ones running the machine. We are inside it, and sadly most people accept it. If we choose to stop running, the machine will collapse and then we can start anew.

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+ Related quotes:

- "I'm not afraid of what you have just done, but of what you've just become." -- Miakel Åkerfeldt, from the song 'Weakness' by the band Opeth

- "Ideas are bulletproof." -- Andy Wachowski and Larry Wachowski, as V, from the film 'V for Vendetta'

- "Let's start over again. Why can't we start it over again? Just let us start it over again... and we'll be good. This time we'll get it right. It's our last chance to forgive ourselves." -- Matt Bellamy, from the song 'Exogenesis: Symphony, Pt. 3 (Redemption)' by the band Muse.

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God bless.

(: