Beauty and Truth: All You Ever Need To Know

Beauty is in the eye of the beholder. This saying has been traced back to the 3^rd century BC, with many writers including Shakespeare restating it in their works. Its current form is attributed to Margaret Wolfe Hungerford from her novel Molly Brown published in 1878.

I believe that not only beauty, but truth are found in the eye of the beholder. We simply can't see things in anyway, but the way we see them. 

My world is colored uniquely by the way I've experienced the world, and what I've made those experiences mean about, and to me. It's a circular construct that continually evolves. My truth ain't growing no moss.

Be a Queen! (Bee) or I Am One with the Cannoli

Someone told me once that if I felt huge resistance ( fear ) to taking a particular path, I might as well start walking down it now, or I would simply have to face it later.

Damn them.

THE JOURNEY:

Nothing scares me more than to imagine, a life lived alone. Living without companionship, intimacy, love, family or friends. It might appear to some, that is exactly where I am putting myself. Alone, in plain sight. Maybe...

I've started down this path a few times before in my life, every time going a little further, but in the end always turning back. Why? 

Umm...cuz I got scared maybe?

On this journey, there is no one but myself to talk to, listen to, or reason with. ( I know I made all of these rules up, but somehow they were important for me to learn, to own. ) There are only my opinions, my voice, my actions, and my wants and desires.  I am the one responsible for, loving and respecting who I am.  Yeah I know, cue “I've Gotta Be Me”.

Trust me I've had HUGE resistance to the idea that I'm all I've got. Are you kidding me? Look at the evidence. I'm pretty sure that a fourth grader could build a convincing case that I am a disaster in progress!

OH, OH, HE THINKS HE'S GOD

I Stand on the Side of Love. Join me.

There’s no bad reason to love someone. Do you love people only because they love you back?

Enjoy this beautiful piece at Thinking Too Hard.

The End of Fear

I woke from a dream, knowing that I was born in the presence of pure love. Clear that I was that presence. That I was, I am, at my core, pure love.

I am pure love. You are pure love.

We are pure love.

Though born knowing, I opened my eyes, saw my parents and decided that love was coming from them, not seeing it was a reflection....forgetting what I knew with certainty, a brief moment before.

Every Day a Little Death

People tend to be uncomfortable with endings, because every ending is a little death. That's why in many languages, the word for "good-bye" means "see you again".

Whenever an experience comes to an end -- a gathering of friends, a vacation, your children leaving home -- you die a little death. a "form" that appeared in your consciousness as that experience dissolves. Often this leaves behind a feeling of emptiness that most people try hard not to feel, not to face.


If you can learn to accept and even welcome the ending in your life, you may find that the feeling of emptiness that initially felt uncomfortable turns into a sense of inner spaciousness that is deeply peaceful.

By learning to die daily in this way, you open yourself to Life.

Eckhart Tolle, Stillness Speaks (New World Library, Novato, California and Namaste Publishing, Vancouver, Canada 2003), 106-107. 

It Isn't All About Me?

In conversation today with a lovely new old friend, I learned the impact that my father's death had on a mutual friend, who lived up the street from me.  In my own myopic view of the world I've never considered how other people were effected.  It is after all, all about me.

If you asked me the date that my father died I would hesitate, struggling to do the math in my head before I came up with the right year and maybe month.  The day... I could guess. 

My friend up the street has the date down cold, it was his father's birthday, and in the storm that injured my parents, he watched giant trees topple like twigs as the roof was blown off of his home.  Quite a memorable evening I imagine.  The next morning he heard that my father had been killed.

He remembers my father taking him and me to a Fathers and Sons function at school the year before; when his father couldn't get off work.  I don't remember this at all.  He does.  I envy him that memory, even if it isn't necessarily a happy one for him.

On the other hand, I now know I was with my dad and my friend when I learned about the birds and the bees.  That makes me smile.  Thank you for sharing your memory with me.

I wonder who else in my life has been profoundly impacted by a shared experience, that I've only considered from my point of view?

Light more light.

Namaste.

Peace

Know when you find peace in a place, you brought it with you.

Paraphrased from Montenegro by Starling Lawrence.

I Am Your Brother

Currently I have no job, no income, no home – (housed temporarily with angels) no credit and growing debt. Health insurance lapsed three years ago. I eat courtesy of the Food Stamp Program. Family has sent me a small check for to many months now, to cover car and phone expenses.

I am 54 years old, a college graduate with extensive work experience at an executive level.

I am your brother.

My situation has gotten progressively worse since I started looking for a new gig in early 2008. Resumes are submitted with no response, save an automated email acknowledgment. Applications for hourly jobs, mysteriously go unanswered and unacknowledged. Phone calls to my network reveal others sharing similar experiences.

Viktor Frankl wrote in Man's Search For Meaning¹ that, "everything can be taken from a man but one thing: the last of human freedoms -- to choose one's attitude in any given set of circumstances, to choose one's own way."

In my recent experience this passage rings deeply true. While my circumstances are in no way as dire or profoundly evil as those that Mr. Frankl endured, they are as challenging as I've ever faced.

And.... I am happy, healthy and hopeful.

Welcome 2011

It seems that I get to learn some lessons over and over. "Happy New Year!, now go away." So the car was packed and new shelter miraculously appeared.

The circumstances are what they are. They - will think what they think.

What I've rediscovered, relearned, is just how powerful I am when my head finally gets out of my hearts way. When I choose to hear, to listen, to acknowledge what my heart expresses as true: the world around me changes. Sometimes dramatically.

Fear is the only damper on a singing heart. I just have to remember to keep breathing, love and be grateful for where/who I am, and know that my heart is leading the way.

Easier said than done? Some times...but in the next breath, the world will change.

Wishing you all peace, love and joy in this New Year.