WOULDN'T THAT BE BETTER WITH GRAVY ON?

So, have had an allotment for about 3 months.  It's going great guns!  Spinach, courgettes (oh, my lord, courgettes - I know everyone told me, but they really are a riotous force of nature), lettuce, curly kale, broccoli, potatoes.  Everything has sprung into action.  The green and french beans, and the beetroot, and the onions, and the peas, and the leeks have still to mature - but it's exciting watching them flourish and do their thing.

So much so, that I've taken on another one!  I've decided that I want to grow fruit too.  There's an empty plot next to ours but one row down.  Digging has begun and weeding has commenced.  And hopefully, by September we'll be in a position to mulch and feed and get ready for next Spring.

But I was a little (a lot!) taken aback tonight.  I cooked a plate of produce straight off the lottie - steamed potatoes and curly kale, stir-fried courgettes with chili.  I settled down and started to eat with relish.  Someone asked me 'Wouldn't that be better with gravy on it?'  

I am, literally, speechless.  (Well, I'm not, as you're about to find out.)

Let me repeat that - this is what they said:  "Wouldn't that be better with gravy on?"

Really?  They were asking, in all seriousness, whether this organic,'tended with love and patience', produce - no, not produce, but living plants, magical life - could be improved by the addition of a chemical, additive-laden, preservative-riddled, mass-produced, salty, sugary gloup?  

I seriously don't know how to respond to that - other than to say - that, right there:  THIS is what is the problem is.  This is why so many people work at jobs they hate and get into debt to buy things they don't need to impress people they don't even know - much less like.  Because when it comes down to it, THIS is never good enough, is it?  

Take something sublimely gorgeous and natural and add to it: Make a blue rose. Persuade a teenage girl that she'd look better if she fixed her teeth, wore make-up, dyed her hair, Mow the grass to make a lawn.  

It's never enough, it would seem.  We always want more. Bigger, better, brighter.  And in the end it all comes down to one question:

"Wouldn't that be better with gravy on?"

Would it?

What would happen if we didn't ask that question?  Or even more importantly, we asked ourselves why we want gravy? Asked ourselves if it might be ok, in fact, fantastic, if we left the gravy off.  Stopped even considering that gravy is necessary, desirable.

What then?

YOUR ONE WILD AND PRECIOUS LIFE

A quote:

"When I observe some of our behavior, it really looks to me as if human beings want to suffer. Judging from the way we act, we do not seem to be truly interested in being happy... We seem to want to keep the painful experience of anger alive and close, and keep kindness and happiness at bay. We act as if we treasure suffering, so whenever we find it, we don't want to let it go.

... We are operating on the mistaken assumption of who we are is really this angry, disturbed person. But we do not have to be that person... At any moment, we have the option of being different; we can be a person who is not angry or disturbed. Let yourself be that other person - a person who treasures true happiness, kindness and tranquility."- His Holiness 17th Karmapa, from The Heart of Noble,

I've encountered this quote, and several others, over the past few days which tie-in with the recurring theme of stories. Because we love a story; stories about ourselves, stories about our humanity, our culture, the world, the universe and life itself.    I'm beginning to see that the single defining ability which drives human behaviour is story-telling.  That's a bold statement, I know.  But it underlies and drives what we do, who we think we are and how we define everything.  We tell stories about HOW THINGS ARE.  

And stories are beautiful. They entertain, they inspire, they educate and inform, they thrill and scare, they allow us to visit new worlds, and to get to know people and foreign landscapes. They can take us forward into the future and deliver us back in time, and provide a narrative of the present.

Trouble is we don't always see stories as stories.  We fail to see that everything that we tell, print, sing, paint, draw, film, compose and think is a story.  It's a depiction.  It's the map - not the territory.  If you believed that a novel, or a film is real you would be shocked and surprised when it ended to discover that it was just a fantasy.  And who hasn't had the experience of not wanting to finish a novel because you want to go on being immersed in the story and the characters; because the story that you're reading is more exciting and absorbing than the life you're living?

And more and more I'm seeing that what we do is defined by the stories we believe.  If you change the story, you change change the experience of reality.

But it's not as easy as that, is it?

Wouldn't it be great to change the record?  When we're feeling pissed-off and dissatisfied, to metaphorically take off one record and put on another, stop watching one programme and watch another, put down one novel and pick up another much more inspiring, absorbing and exciting one.  

But we can't.  Can we?  We're stuck with this.  THIS story.  This narrative.  This version of events.

Or, are we?

Maybe you've heard about - and tried - positive thinking, meditation, CBT, NLP, counselling, self-help, self-development, hypnotherapy.  They're large and burgeoning movements.  And, at their heart they all have one goal - to make people happy.  Or happier.  When people have exhausted the other options that are supposed to deliver happiness - money, success, relationship, family - getting, growing, doing - when those don't produce the promised happiness, then people start looking at other options.  They try to find a better, alternative story.  They try to make themselves better, or to still their mind, to re-programme their behaviour, change their thoughts, investigate their past.  And these have a varying degrees of success.  But if one of them was the holy grail - if one of them really 'did it' then we'd all be doing it, wouldn't we?  It would very quickly be apparent that if one of these methods definitively worked and could make you happy, then it would spread like wild-fire.  So, like success and stuff and careers and money and the latest relationship - they work for a while for some people some of the time.  But they're not a guarantee.

Why not?  Are we really wedded to our anger and unhappiness?  Do we really not want kindness and happiness, as suggested by His Holiness 17th Karmapa?  It does seem like it's the dominant state - unhappiness.  If it weren't, we wouldn't spend so much of our lives looking for it!  But is it as easy as saying that we want suffering?  If we wanted it why would we seek to end it?  

There's something very cynical and dismissive about the first part of  M'sieur His Holiness's statement.  For if we treasured suffering and didn't want to let it go, then we wouldn't seek to do so.  We'd just enjoy it, wallow in it and not try to find ways to be happy.

The second part of his statement suggests that all we have to do is let ourselves be happy,  kind and tranquil and let go of the suffering and unhappiness.  Well, good luck with that.  That's tantamount to waving the magic wand of wishful thinking.  Don't work, does it?  Would that it were that easy.

But, perhaps it is.

What if you didn't need to change anything - your thoughts, your reality, your success, your appearance, your financial situation - none of it.  It would all just keep going exactly as it is and exactly as it does.

What if, all you had to do was see that everything that is said, thought, believed, projected, written, painted, drawn, filmed, commented on, blogged, is a story.  

What if, you were believing a story that says you need to be happy.  That one day you WILL be happy.  

Now, I know that at first sight this sounds like what His Holiness is saying.  But this isn't just saying that you have to change what you think.  What I'm saying is that you need to see through all stories.  ALL stories - including the one that says - "I should be happy."

Because we do, don't we, we think we should be happy, and loved and useful, and happy, and have purpose and make a difference and be happy....

You get the picture.

Why?  Why do we think that?  We think it because we're told that is what is going to happen.  One day, we will be, and do, all these things.  Providing we play our part and work hard and be good and do as we're told and show respect and love well and be helpful..... then we will be happy.

And we do these things.

And... we're not happy.  And maybe we question why we're not happy.  And we're told 'ah, don't worry, just try a little harder, be a little better, do a little more.'

So, we do.

And still, we're not happy.

We've got the stuff, we've married the person, we've had the gorgeous children, we've given our all, we've done our duty, respected our elders... blah, blah.  And yet.... we're still not happy.

And then we don't where to go or what to do.  We've done what we were told to do.  We've followed the formula.  We've carried out the instructions.  So...it must be us.  We must be doing it wrong, because the alternative is too radical to consider - that maybe the story is not correct. It's got a fundamental flaw it.  It's a flaw that ignores reality.  It presents a picture that isn't representative.

Look, take the ubiquitous story of santa.  We tell little children, children that we say we love and cherish above all else, that the presents that we buy them for Christmas aren't bought because WE want them to be happy (as if that stuff COULD make them happy, but we've been playing our part to the tee and for quite a long time, so we've bought into the story too).  We tell them that some man is going to deliver presents to them and ALL the children all over the world... providing....  providing they are good.  So we abdicate the opportunity to let our children know that we give them presents because we think they'll give them pleasure, in order that we can control their behaviour with a threat of non-delivery of presents by some fat, old geezer.

It doesn't occur to us that if we told them that there is no such thing as santa clause, that if you get a present it's because people buy it for you because they care about you and want to give you pleasure.  It doesn't occur to us that if we were just honest then it might be a much more effective way of relating to our children.  And if we did this, then they might not be so inclined to display what we deem to be bad behaviour and so eliminate the need FOR a story about some creepy old bloke who squeezes down chinmeys.

See, the thing is, we set our kids up to be disappointed.  Because, at some point, we have to spill the beans.  And then,  there is a major mind-fuck disappointment coming up.  Except, we've told them that we are not liars, and yet we have to tell them now that we have been lying and THIS teaches them is that the way to get what you want, the way to control people's behaviour, is to lie.  

What kind of fucked-up message is it that we're giving them?  You'll only get stuff if you're good.  I don't love you enough to give you gifts.  I'm gonna let you believe in a lie.

Oi, oi, oi.

<deep breath>

It would be so less screwed-upif we didn't reward childrens' behaviour either with lies or stuff.  If we loved them for what and who they are.  Stopped buying them off.  Stopped trading their uniqueness for some kind of homogenous ideal of conformity that means that they behave against their nature in order to get things that they never knew they wanted in the first place.

We can't help it though.  We were collectively fed the same stories, and until we can see them as lies and believe that there can be an alternative, then we'll continue. We'll do the things we're taught, because we're taught that it's the best way, the right way - it's not done with malice aforethought.  It's done in a communal belief that it's 'The Way Things Are Done'.  And it IS the way things are done.  But is it the most effective way?  Is it a way that lets people be themselves and value what is valuable?  That their abilities and talents and energy and liveliness is what is really precious - that they don't have to get anything and attain anything in order to be themselves.  That they have something to give and contribute and enjoy without having to constantly chase after some state called happiness.  That happiness is just seeing that the stories that we tell are just that - stories.  

And when you see that it's all stories, what's left is reality.  Life.  This livingness.  This liveliness.  And the stories can continue, but if you don't take them to be the territory, but see them as a depiction, then you can explore that territory and enjoy it - the uphills and the potholes, the storms and dry-beds, the springs and the raging gorge. 

And it really is that simple.  Stop believing the lie that life is a story.  Life is this.  It's what is happening right now.  What you are, right now.  And when you see the story for what it is, that's where the pivot is.  The fulcrum.  Because then... then you're in free-fall - a free-fall of possibilities without constraints - because you're not bound by fiction anymore, but have the entire availability of potential.  Anything.  You can do anything.  You don't have to be in thrall to any story.  Because reality is not limited by fiction or belief but is woven from the ever-changing reality of dynamic living.  

And the narrative now comes from shifting, pulsing, morphing living reality and it's what you are.  It is fluid and responsive and inquisitive.  It reacts and queries because it recognises that there is nothing definite, no truth that stands immovable, no promise that cannot be broken.  This is shifting sands. And that is very good news because it means that you, nor anything, have to cling to certainty.  You never need be sure of anything.  You don't have to defend your position.  Because there is no certainty, no surety and no position.

All there is is the shifting sands of reality and there is no longer any absolute story to uphold and defend.  No beliefs to protect because the only basis they have is in fiction.

So where does that leave you?  What happens when you realise that the story is a fiction?   Well it means that you can stop being defined and restricted by an unhappy story.  You can immerse yourself in the endless possibilities.  The story doesn't have to be unhappy and morbid and depressing.  You see, if the story is just that - a fiction - then that leaves you in a position of being able to write a new one.  And this isn't just about saying - I'm going to pick up a different book with a different story, it's about seeing that however we define what is happening - whatever we say, however we describe it, is a story and so we have the option to write a different one.  We can see things as they are and narrate it differently.  this isn't about ignoring reality - it's not about re-framing it - it's about reacting to it and working with it. Seeing the bare-faced facts and using them to create a different story.  Taking the raw materials and using them to create something more inspiring, more sustainable, more robust, positive and resilient.  

You can't change reality, but you can re-write the narrative - tell a tale that is much more uplifting, creative and inspiring.

"Tell me, what is it that you plan to do with your one wild and precious life".  Mary Oliver.

What, indeed?

PASS IT ON.....

Read this book, if you please: http://www.ishmael.com/origins/story_of_b/

In my, not so humble but perfectly credible, opinion - it is brilliant.

And I'm aware that my last two posts have been to recommend the writings of others.  That's because they say what I can't and, even if I were able to, they do it so much more eloquently and clearly than I ever could.  So if I am unable to conceive and communicate the kind of vision they have, I can at least add my voice to it and pass it on.  Because every voice that gets added grows the message.

So, if you've a mind to, read it, understand what it's saying and pass it on to as many as you can.  

I think it's important - o.k?  And, yes, I fully realise that it's not important in an ultimate sense, because whether or not our species, in its present form, drives itself into extinction matters not a gnat's willy.  It matters not in a very real sense, in a species sense, in a world's sense, certainly not in a universal sense, and not even in a personal sense; not really.  Because there is nothing driving THIS.  It happens as it happens, it is what it is.  And that's not a new-age, airy-fairy pronouncement; it's a bare fact.  It is what it is, it does what it does and it happens how it happens.  

If you understand the messages of the writers that I've flagged, and feel inspired to add your voice then that too is just what's happening.  But, given the choice, and you are given a choice (even though you don't get to choose the choices you're given, natch), why not choose the vision and the message that frees you from the idea that you need to be saved, from the belief that what is happening is the only way it can happen.  

The only way change happens is by one person adding their voice and their intention and their action.  One at a time....

Do you care to add yours?  Of course, it's entirely up to you.

THE GREATEST STORY EVER TOLD

Are you sitting comfortably?  Then let’s begin.

Once upon a time, there was a man and a woman, and one day an urge overtook both of them and they fell rapaciously on each other, in a lustful frenzy; completely consumed by the irresistable compulsion to screw each others' brains out.  

Because they were caught up in the physical possession that had consumed them, they forgot that neither of them had taken precautions against pregnancy.

Which meant that nature took its course and one of the man's seed made its epic journey to impregnate the ripe and ready egg. As the sperm wriggled its way up through the inner chambers of the female, guided by a hormonal signal, it impregnated the ovum, fusion took place, and so began the process of the formation of a human being. 

The cells divided and divided and divided according to the DNA within the male sperm and the female egg, and those cells slowly differentiated into aspects of a human body - some became tissue cells, some muscle cells, some nerve cells, etc., etc., - until after about 3 months had passed, all the organs and limbs were formed, and continued to mature and develop in order to fulfil their function.

Now, many things happened during the 40 weeks or so following that mad, lustful episode, but the greatest of these was the day that the female's body secreted another hormone that triggered certain muscles to contract and squeeze, and expel the now fully-formed human baby out of the warm and safe environment that had nurtured it so successfully.

And a child was born.   

And was celebrated.  

And caused great joy.   

And massive exhaustion: Its parents were perplexed and confused by this squalling, gurgling ball of humanity.  They fed and tended the infant, and it grew and matured.  They tickled it, and it laughed.  They forgot to feed it, and it cried.  They shouted at it when it wouldn't sleep, and it screamed. 

But mostly they loved it.  And, as they had been taught by their parents, they urged it to crawl, and then to stand, and walk, and to copy the sounds they made. 

Then one day, the mother was holding the toddler and looking into a mirror and she pointed at the image of the child and said 'That's you'.  She pointed to the child's chest and said 'you', and pointed back again at the face in the mirror and said 'you'.  And the child looked and saw a face; separate from that next to it, and suddenly realised that it was a person separate from everything around it.  

The mother and the father continued to raise the child, and told it that it was 'their' child, and that it had a name and that whenever it did something it chose to do that.  So, when the child was given spinach to eat and didn't like the taste, father told it that it was being fussy and was naughty.  And when the infant was unable to fall asleep when its parents laid it in its bed, the mother scolded it for staying awake on purpose. 

Over time, the natural processes and reactions of the human being were assumed to be caused and controlled by that little person.  And it felt a feeling of pride when it seemed that it was able to do something right, and a sense of shame when it felt that it had done something wrong.  But the most significant thing that happened was that now there was a belief that this little person had, which was; that it was causing itself to happen; was controlling its actions and preferences and aversions and thoughts and feelings.

And so a second birth took place; the birth of the belief of self.

The person grew into adulthood, striving to be a better self, by working ON itself. It tried hard at school, worked diligently at work, was kind to friends, family and old people, and never kicked the dog.  

It earned money, bought a house, found a partner, and in its turn had some children, and tried to be a good parent and a good partner and a good child... but....

One day, standing outside smoking a guilty fag, it wondered 'how did I get here?  In this life? This wasn't what I planned'.  

It started looking for a reason why.  Looking for meaning to its existence, and came across someone who told it to meditate, to still the mind; find peace and enlightenment.  Because that was the ultimate meaning for a human being - to become enlightened, liberated. 

It tried the hardest it ever had; realised that love and money and work didn't bring happiness, but felt that this ultimate goal would.

So it meditated and practiced mindfulness and found that sometimes the thoughts quietened and there was a feeling of peace, and sometimes even bliss.  But then maybe the phone would ring and feelings of irritation would emerge, and it was right back to being a frustrated seeker.  The search became more and more desperate as it read more books, and watched endless DVD's and podcasts,and attended satsangs about this elusive goal of enlightenment.... and still couldn't get it.

Not once, though ... not once .. did it stop to consider that it was a lie.  That the idea it had - that it was a self, was just that... an idea.  That this idea was itself just a thought, a story.  Just like the story it told its children about the tooth fairy.
 

It never stopped to question why it put a £1 coin under a child's pillow in the middle of the night, and how this was creating the lie of the existence of a tooth fairy.  

How could it ever see that the whole of the society and culture that it lived in colluded in supporting the lie that there was a central character that lived a life.

It never stopped to consider how the belief had originated, because it didn't even know that it was a belief - it thought it was the truth.

BUT, life was being a kind Dame and one day it happened on someone who knew what was real and who loved to speak about it, and a conversation took place whereby this hapless human had the simple and obvious truth pointed out.

It went something like this:

"You don't need to see through a self.  Or find your self.  Or transcend your self.  Or dissolve your self.

Because: There is no self.   

There never was.

So you can't see through it, because it doesn't exist now, and it never has.  It was only ever an idea.


A thought that was produced by a brain that was given an instruction from other people that was constantly reinforced until it was a pervading belief.

But it was never true.  

It isn't now.

And it realised what liberation is - realising that there is no such thing as self.  Just seeing that whenever there is the thought of 'I', it is exactly and only that; a thought.

And it couldn't believe how simple it was.  How laughably obvious and easy.  That all there had ever been, and is, and would be, is life - alive and constantly changing with no need of being directed or controlled.

It saw, with absolute clarity, that all there is; is emptiness at the centre of where it thought it was.

Emptiness that is alive and free to be exactly as it is.

It thanked the person who had pointed out the fiction, and carried on being lived as it always had been, loving the aliveness and revelling in the fiction.

And it lived happily ever after.

Until it didn't!

I = God =/= anything

When we say "I did this", "I did that", what we are actually saying is "I am God".  We attribute life's existence to God and the functioning of our life to 'I'.  We effectively say that I control myself and my life.  I = God.  Where both "I" and "God" are non-existent. 

Neither can be proven.  There is an assumption that because this exists (whatever 'this' is) then it must have been caused or made or created by something or someone.  It is assumed that 'this' is an effect of something else.... It's extrapolating a causer of existence.  That there is this existing and it must be caused by 'something' even though that something can't be seen or proven to exist.  

And it's entirely logical, because if we take a look at anything - for instance  this screen that you're looking at now - we attribute it's existence to it being made by somebody; it was put together out of component parts by a person, who got their instructions from a design, that was put together by another person, that was created by someone else etc., etc.  Therefore, there's a deduction that anything existing does so as a result of a previous action, and the mind needs to solve the equation, the conundrum, and come up with a definitive answer that puts a stop to the never-ending cycle of cause and effect.  It sees it in linear terms, rather than as a cycle of creation and destruction.

So, there is this experience, and it's assumed that there must be a creator.  A generator; which try as we might, can't be found.  To return to the example of this computer screen, we can endlessly trace back it's existence but can never find it.  

Try it now.  Break it down into its component parts; all put together by a factory operative somewhere; take each of those parts - trace each back to its manufacture; to the plastic and the silicone and the metal; even so early on in the backward chain you can already see that there is no single cause of the result that appears to be this screen.  And so the same with this existence.  

It's precisely because there can be no trace back to one singular causative agent that the human brain, in its confusion of being unable to make the equation work,  manufactures  a cause and gives it a name, attributes, qualities and so ........ God is made in our own image. But made so that it can't be seen, known or proven.  The cause (or God)  has to be bigger, more powerful and more knowing than us.  Because, we deduce - if God created this, then that God must surely be bigger, better, more powerful and more intelligent than that which it created.  So God becomes a story of such fantastical proportions that its qualities can never be apprehended by the creation it made.  And therefore, God becomes unknowable, and if God can't be known, neither can it be proved.  Because in order to prove something it has to be evident... otherwise it's just a theory.  

I hear you say: "Ah, but you can see the evidence of God.  The entire creation is evidence of God's."  No, it isn't.  The entire creation is evidence of the entire creation.  It doesn't need a Creator.  It doesn't need God for it to exist.  Similarly it doesn't need a big bang or a potentiality.  It is evidence in itself.  It is only evidenced by it's existence.

And to get personal, the very same mechanism that creates the story of a creator is the same process that conjures this thing called 'I/Me/You/Self'.  

There is seeing, and hearing, and smelling, and thinking and tasting, and a cause is overlayed onto the experiencing: Ha! becomes part of the experiencing.  There is a surmisation that there is a causative agent that is doing the things that are experienced, and is also having the experience.  And this surmising is called 'I'.  And this 'I' is given the credit for doing it all.

But just like God, if this 'I''s existence is asked to be proven, the person can't come up with a definitive, knowable thing that can be incontravertibly proven to be the 'I'.  All sorts of theories about what "I" is, are put forward: The body, the brain, a spirit, an animating force, awareness, conscioussness, the soul.  And then at some point, when all the possibilities of what this 'I' is are exhausted - when that which is labelled "I" can't be found to be an actual thing, the person questions the very existence of an 'I' in the first place.  And sees that it does not, has never, nor will ever exist.  It sees that its own existence is not caused by an 'I'.  And on further looking it sees that the very seeing itself is not as the result of a definable, explainable, describable originator. 

Belief in God is just a belief in a bigger 'I'.  It says that as there is an 'I' then that 'I' must have been created by something and that something must be more than what I am - so it conjures up an originator.  Questioning God or questioning 'I' is the same process - it's looking for the proof of something that is only a belief.  And when the proof can't be found, it's seen that there is no origin - no begin point. Only an assumption that there is a beginning point which set off a whole chain of events that can explain the what, how and why of existence, of life.

But take the belief of an Originating Doer out of the picture and what is left?  

Well, have a look - what is left?

"If you want to make applie pie, first create the universe."  Carl Sagan.

Tell me what you want...

I was reading a blog today called: http://freshnessfactorfivethousand.blogspot.com by the inspiring and inspired singer/songwriter Jason Mraz.  The strapline for the blog is: "Fuck the Should.  Do the Want."

I think out of all the words in the English language, 'should' is the one I hate the most (apart from Inland Revenue, which is actually two, so probably doesn't count!)

'Should' is far from reality.  It says "what you need to do isn't happening, and it isn't what you want to do, but IF you do it things will be tidier. However, the only satisfaction you'll get is to tick something off on your 'to do' list." 

Eurgh - it's a smug, self-satisfied little word.

And if you listen to the conversations going on around you, and read newspapers and magazines, you'll encounter it a lot.  It's most often used in relation to other people.  As in "They SHOULD  do this" or "They SHOULD do that".  It's a real 'pointy-finger' word.  It lives in splendour in the Daily Mail.  In fact, I think that the editorial of the Daily Mail is probably based upon 'what should be happening.'  Or at least it .... should be... arf, arf.

Not only does it imply odious responsibility and life-draining burdens, it introduces the mysterious and omnipresent entity - 'They'.  Those unidentifiable experts who reign supreme in matters of the weather, child-rearing, fashion, diets, drinking habits, moral obligations... just about everything really.

But what really offends me about the word 'should', and all that it implies, is that it denies what is happening now.  It denies THIS experience.  It's a great big fat NO - and it doesn't even have the honesty to say 'Fuck Off'.  It's censorious, denying, limiting, restricting and very, very mean-minded.  It says that if you're having F.U.N. and doing what you want, then you bloody well shouldn't be!  

It's the teacher with a mouth like a cat's arse, it's the sour-faced shop assistant, it's the sign at the public swimming pool that says "No running, No jumping, No petting, NO FUCKING FUN!"

But the ridiculous thing about not doing what you want, only what you should ... is that eventually what you want will turn into what you should.  And on a very obvious level what you want IS what you should be doing, because it's what you're doing..... so it's the only thing that you could possibly BE doing.

Ooooh, it's the word at the very heart of human misery:  You should be content.  You should be good. You should try harder (that's got to be the most repeated comment on school reports).   It fences off the glorious extremes of human experience: misery, failure, anger, lasciviousness (I like THAT word), excess, rage, apathy, lust, abandonment, hysteria, hilarity, intoxication ... you get the picture. 

It engenders notions of dishonour, impropriety, disgrace - it's the creeping, red-cheeked, prickling sensation of shame.  Its purpose is to stop people from relishing the reality of the present experience, seeking something that isn't happening; the ultimate ignorance; i.e. ignoring what you really, really want.

Last word is: Do what you want, because that's what you SHOULD be doing..... wanna know why?  Because it's what you are doing!  And you can't argue with reality.  And if you do, then you bloody well shouldn't! ;-)

In the words of those camped up divas, The Spice Girls - "Yo, tell me what you want, what you really, really want!

So, "Fuck the Should, Do the Want."  What a philosophy!

Weaveworld

I was reading a blog this morning (Raptitude.com, which is worth a read, IMO) and in it  the writer said "We are always looking to transcend the human condition."

How?  How can humans transcend the human condition... because any transcendence would be a human condition!  Humans transcending being human.  There is no transcendence.  If you're human, you can only BE human.  The experience is of being human.  Human Being.  Being Human.

So, what is this 'human being'?  What is it made of?  What is its substance?

Imagine a tapestry.  A deeply woven, colourful, sumptuous, richly tactile tapestry.  This tapestry depicts the story of a person.  All its woes and triumphs, sadness and joy.  And imagine that you look at this tapestry starting at the beginning as it tells the tale of a baby being born, growing, crying, playing,... into toddlerhood, childhood, adolescence, adulthood; being woven by the thread, constantly changing - the colours; bland beige, ruby red, verdant green, inky black.  Now imagine that the tapestry is alive, that it's not you moving along looking at the story it depicts, but that you stand there and the tapestry weaves itself in front of your eyes - you see the weaving as it happens.

Imagine further ... that you are the character in that tapestry, that you are being woven by the thread itself.  You're not watching the life of the character as it happens, you ARE the thread as it morphs - you are the warp and weft, the colour and the texture; what the tapestry is made of is what you are made of and you are being woven as the story that the tapestry is depicting.

The weaving of the tapestry is real; each colour and thread , as it is being woven; the intricacies, richness, texture and colour - and the story that it weaves is real whilst it's being woven, but the thread weaves on.

The three scenarios I have asked you to imagine (moving along the tapestry, having the tapestry weave in front of you and being the tapestry character as it is woven) are what I think people are trying to do when they talk about transcendence or being 'awareness' or the 'witness'.  As though you can somehow step outside the story of what you are.  If you stepped outside that story; if you transcended it, witnessed it, detached from it .... then that would be "the story of 'stepping outside, transcending, witnessing, detaching."  There's no getting out of it.

And why would you want to?  Transcendence is just another experience and it can only ever be experienced by this character that is being woven by life.  Bliss is just another experience.  Any state of transcendence or bliss or 'abiding as non-dual awareness' can only ever be experienced AS the movement that is the character, the person, the human.

Imagine how tedious it would be to be 'forever blissful'; to be stuck as a character in one colour, one hue, one tone. Isn't it the very fact that the entire richness of living is felt and experienced that makes the character and the story it lives so engrossing and deep, knowing that whatever the thread of life weaves us into, it will never keep us static.

When I was trying to hit on the metaphor I wanted for this post, I was reminded of the book 'Weaveworld' by Clive Barker, one of my favourite books and so I'll end with a quote from it, which I think sums it all up very nicely:

"Nothing ever begins.
There is no first moment; no single word or place from which this or any story springs.
The threads can always be traced back to some earlier tale, and the tales that preceded that; though as the narrator's voice recedes the connections will seem to grow more tenuous, for each age will want the tale told as if it were of its own making."
— Clive Barker (Weaveworld)

Alive and Kicking Off

Walking through town yesterday, there was an altercation outside a coffee shop.  A girl sitting with friends was shouting at another one standing (both app. 18 years old).  As I got nearer the standing female started threatening: "I'm gonna kick your fucking head in.  Come on, come round the corner and I'll smash your fucking head right in."

I wondered why she felt it neccesary to go round the corner to kick her head in; I would have thought it would have been a lot easier to just do it there and then, as the girl whose head she wished to kick in was sitting down and a prone target!

As I passed by, I looked at the face of the seated girl who was shouting back, and I could see the terror in her eyes.  Her mouth was shouting and her eyes were afraid.  And I don't blame her.  The threatening ... aherm.. 'lady', for want of a better word, was built like the proverbial brick shit-house and had it been me, I'd have been UNDER the table snivelling like a right woos.

This was a dramatic little scenario and when I walked back that way a little later, the aggressor had gone and there was just the girl still sitting with a couple of friends.

Are you disappointed?  Did you hope that I was going to carry on with an account about a bitch fight?  Sorry.

What was fascinating was watching the action play out.  The posturing and reactions of the two girls.  Attacking and retreating.  Snarling threats, but failing to carry them out.  A friend trying to pull back the aggressor and two young children looking bewildered and scared at their mum's behaviour.

And then the passers-by (myself included), watching with interest, not getting involved, but being slightly amused by this 'show' of aggression and threatened violence. 

And within this little scenario was a large gamut of human emotion: fear, aggression, amusement, horror, enjoyment, shock, disgust.  And it was all whipped up due to a perceived threat or insult by one or other, or both of those girls. A threat to their sense of self, which escalated into a need to inflict violence, to prove that that sense of self is so important that it might be worth kicking in someone's head over. And in lots of instances there isn't just a threat; the action gets carried out, and results in injury or death.  Humans will protect their sense of individual self to the death. At which point, paradoxically, that sense of self  that they are defending and protecting disappears anyway. 

It's amazing the lengths that people will go to to protect something that is only a feeling and a thought.  Amazing that someone else's perception of them is so important that they will risk annihilation, either of themselves or the other.  All because the sense of self has been riduculed or insulted. 

There's not many things more ridiculous than reacting to an insult about something that doesn't actually exist.  A bit like an actor kicking off because someone insulted his pretend character.  And I think that's why a lot of the onlookers were mildly amused.  They could see that it was just a little drama playing out with nothing real behind it.  A lot of noise and fury.

Just another pleasant afternoon in an English town shopping centre.

Suffering Soccotash

There's much made of suffering.

The Buddhists say that 'Life is Suffering'.

Whooooo.  Life is suffering.  That's some pretty he-ye-vi shit.

And they say that the cause of suffering is attachment.  Attachment to an outcome, or to a wish that things could be or should have been different; or that they be different than what they are,  for ME.

Fair enough - wanting what isn't happening, or regretting what didn't happen, seems an unhappy state of affairs.

But all too often, suffering is treated as though it's a condition or a state... something that continues.  People are said 'to suffer':   'I am Suffering'  'Suffering from',   'He/She is a slave to their suffering'.

If you look at what suffering is though - it always turns out to be a thought.

I'm not denying or denigrating people's experience of life - their pain, or circumstances - just that we seem to fixate on suffering as being some distinct condition.  There can be circumstances, physical sensations,  and then this whole other condition which is identified as suffering.  How long does suffering last, though?  And what EXACTLY is it?  What do we really mean when we say 'suffer'.  The same set of circumstances can sometimes feel like suffering, sometimes feel neutral and sometimes feel enjoyable, depending on the context.

For instance: A headache.

Scenario 1: You've just woken up and you have a headache.  You're laying there with nothing to focus on but the pain in the head.  The thought emerges "why have I got this headache, how long will it go on for, how am I going to get through the day feeling like this....." etc. etc.  The focus on how awful it is and will be.

Scenario 2: You're out with friends, having a laugh, drinking, chatting and a headache comes on.  But you're having a great time, everyone's in a good mood and the banter is great, so you barely notice that the headache is there.  It gets subsumed in the swirl of everything else that's going on.

Scenario 3:  You've been very ill with a severe infection.  High temperature, feverish, shaking, sick.  After a couple of days the infection clears and you wake up and you don't feel sick and feverish anymore, all that's left is a headache.  And you feel relief that the illness is over and that the headache is all that's left of the illness as it fades away, and in comparison that feels great.

So, it depends on the context - the only thing that really changes is the thought about it.  Furthermore, there's no control over what thought emerges;  for instance in Scenario 2, the headache occurs and the thought could just as easily say:  'oh, why me, not now, I won't be able to have such a good time'.

So suffering is entirely one thought and entirely random.   Does the thought actually make the headache anything other than a headache?  And what is the thought itself? The thought is as much an experience as the sensation of the headache.  It's all alive.  A thought that says 'this is awful' ' is just as much life as a thought that says 'this is great'.

If suffering is only one thought, where does that leave Sufferers? If someone who believes themself to be suffering is told 'it's just a thought' then this pulls the rug out from under their enjoyment.  Yes.  Enjoyment.   People do really love to suffer.  It confirms they're alive and living.  It's got juiciness and high drama and intensity.  They don't feel alive unless they're suffering.  They're just as much adrenalin junkies as extreme sports enthusiasts - it's almost like trying to live on the edge the whole time - to really feel that extreme of living.  And to have it taken away by seeing that it's just a thought.... well, there's no fun in that.

Suffering is only a thought that says 'I am suffering' and furthermore the 'I' in that suffering thought is only a thought itself!  So the whole premise of  suffering being attachment is moot - since there isn't any attachment and nothing that suffering could be attached to.  If you see that suffering is just a thought and you see that the 'I' is just a thought then there's no place for suffering.  Just the enjoyment of it.  Ha!

So.....   Life is Suffering?  How about Suffering is Life?

 

That's You, That Is

I was discussing with someone a book they had been reading about how everyone is a product of their DNA programming.  They said it had made them more understanding towards people in general because it meant that no-one could help being the way they are.  Fair comment.

They  continued that this also explained why women can't read maps.  To whit I responded (and just look how I walked right into this one.... ) "Well, I can read maps".  They replied (cue fanfare ...):

"And that just proves another point outlined in this book.  That all women are self-centred."

Touche.

Actually, I think that my assertion that I can read maps doesn't actually prove that ALL women are self-centred... just... that I think I can read maps.  But I get his point.  That we relate everything to ourselves.  We put ourselves at the centre and then appraise, judge, compare and contrast whatever is happening or being said in direct relation to how we think it impacts us personally.

What he and the author of the book (also male) was saying is that it is only women that are self-centred.  For now, I 'm going to leave aside the misogynistic claims of the author and the person with whom I was having the discussion, through gritted teeth admittedly, and assert that all humans are self-centred.  It IS the way we're wired.

And we can't help it.  We live in a culture and a society that promotes and applauds personal success.  The survival of the fittest, slimmest, sleekest, richest.  It's the way we've evolved.  The human mechanism is propagated to ensure its survival as a species and to do that it puts itself at the centre and then each one of the members of the human race puts themselves at the centre of the species.  And entirely logically too, because it is impossible to experience life from any other viewpoint but this one.  You literally cannot be an other-self centre.  You can only be this one.  You can assume what it might be like to experience life as another person, but even if they explain what their experience is, you can't know with certainty that what you think they mean is what they actually mean.

So as a practical and survivalist mechanism, it's a useful one.

But... and there's always a but..... that mechanism to survive is becoming increasingly destructive In My Opinion (see, you can't get away from it). The functioning, being necessarily selfish, seeks to exalt itself above all others - and not just in obvious ways, but in every way.  Everything that this agency of self-centredness does is referrant to itself.  Even acts of charity, it could be argued, make the giver look good, both in their and other's eyes.  In comparison to others we want to be better, kinder, cleverer, thinner, richer, ..... ad nauseum.  We want to be the best, in some way, even if it's by being the best victim!

It's like a virus that's gone awry, run amok.

I grant that there are many who see that the human species is destructive, nihilistic and aggressive in the extreme due to its need to be right at any cost.  Due, essentially, to it's utter self-centredness.

And here's the ludicrousness of it all; if you look to find this 'self-centre' it's obvious that it doesn't actually exist.  The programme/mechanism/functioning/process does, but not an actual 'thing' that can be identified and found.

So where does that leave us?  Where does that leave you and me? If what you think you are is just a functioning of DNA programming, designed to ensure the overall survival of the species by advancing each member to compete against all other members, then does seeing that it IS just a functioning mean you see through the futility and destructiveness of trying to compete as an autonomous individual self?

I think it depends... not just on DNA, but on the particular culture, upbringing, influences, parenting, schooling - in other words the entire environment within which we all live.  All those things that dynamically impact and make up each person and their characteristics and personality.

In an absolute sense, it doesn't matter.  But in terms of the whole experience as living as a species, I'd say it does.

But I can't help it, I'm made that way, apparently.

It's my life

People say that.

It's my life.  "I'm really happy with the way my life is going at the moment."  Particularly celebrities.  They like to portray this sense of control and satisfaction with how things are shaping up.

Like "my life" is something that is had.  A package.

So ... imagine you can go into the Life Store and buy a life.  I want the one with the cute dog and the kewl kids and the loving, attentive, sexy partner... oooh and add in a big house and 3 holidays a year, couple of high-end cars, a dash of charidee work. Hey - I already have that! (this manifesting stuff works huh, only took 25 years!)

Yeah, like.

If any of us 'had'  a 'life, then wouldn't we be able to dictate what happened in it?  Wouldn't you get up in the morning on the dot of 6.00, eat tofu flakes and yoghurt tea, and listen to vegetarian music.  Exercise for an hour, walk to work at a company that contributes to the well-being of the planet, interact meaningfully with your colleagues whilst giving your all in a self-deprecating but intelligent and meaningful way.  For lunch you'd all share a bowl of mung beans and sprouting shoots around the water cooler, leased from a company that donates 10% of its profits to a project that supplies wells in drought countries.  Then after an intense, but significantly contributive, day, you'll lightly jog home, meditate for an hour, before steaming some organic-delivered-by-a-local-co-0perative vegetables, drink some recycled hemp tea , before dropping off to sleep after sending some positive vibes and non-invasive and non-effort reiki to unfortunate friends.

(It's likely though, that Vivality woul'd lay in bed til 12, get up, scratch, eat a bacon sandwich, surf the internet, go to the theatre with friends, have a gourmet meal cooked by someone else, be driven home after 2 bottles of wine and some chasers, watch some crap tv, surf the internet some more and pass out at about 3.00 a.m.  Rinse, wash and repeat. But that's an entirely alternative reality!)

Neither is wrong.  Or right.

Point being... You never choose 'a' life.

For two simple reasons.

It ain't your life.

And there ain't you to choose it.

There's just life.

Cue vegetarian music......   http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OipXkb6fOFc

Reality Impact

Yesterday I knocked someone over whilst driving my car - (as opposed to using a baseball bat or a battering ram!)

Miraculously, she was fine.  Or as far as I know, she may have got home last night and died of delayed shock, but since I've had no call from the police, I'm guessing that all she's doing is rubbing arnica on some bruises.

Aside from the fact that the actual event itself was dramatic, unexpected and totally random, it led to several insights into reality from my point of view: Vivality.

So this is what happened:

Sitting in the left hand lane at a crossroads, waiting for the traffic light to turn green so that I can drive over the junction.  A car is next to me on my right, but several feet in front, waiting to turn right.  The traffic light turns amber and then green. There's the sound of a car horn, and I pull away from the lights. Then, BHAM!, out of nowhere somebody hits the right side of the car bonnet, flips right over the front of the bonnet and ricochets off the left front side landing on its back in front of my car.  Whilst the body is boogying with the bonnet, I slam on the brakes and think  'I've killed her', a feeling of physical alarm (nerves firing) a profound sense of horror and shouting 'Fuck, No!'

All this happened in the space of probably 3-4 seconds.

I pull on the hand brake and unbuckle my seat belt, and the woman starts to move and get up.  I think:  'No, don't move', and then realise that she isn't dead.  But then fear that even though she's moving doesn't mean that she isn't seriously injured or about to die.  I get out of the car and move towards her.  She looks confused and distressed and I ask her if she is o.k.  She replies ' yes' and apologises, looking straight into my eyes, and continues by saying 'It was my fault'.  I reply something along the lines of 'Don't worry, I'm so sorry, are you sure you're ok?'.  Then a couple of other people join us, one leads her on to the pavement and a man says to me 'do you want to pull your car over'.  I get in turn left, park and put on the hazard lights.  I get out again and go over to her.  A man is talking into his mobile phone, I'm not aware of what he's saying.  I ask if she's ok, again.  She says yes and a lady with her tells me that she's her next door neighbour and she'll take her into the coffee shop we're standing outside and tells me not to worry, she seems fine but she needs to get in somewhere warm.  They go into the coffee shop and not knowing what else to do, I get back into my car and just sit there.  A woman gets out of the car parked in front of me and walks up to my car door and asks if I'm o.k.  At which point I start shaking and crying - gone into reactive shock.  The woman advises me to wait until I'm calm before driving away.  She leaves and then a man approaches my car, asking 'is she alright? She just stepped out in front of me.'  I realise it's the driver of the car who had been on my right at the traffic lights and that it must have been him sounding his horn as the woman stepped out in front of him. As I drive a low, 2 seater, his car would have concealed that there was someone crossing in front of him, which is why I didn't see her.  I tell him she was fine and he leaves.  After a minute or so, I drive to my original destination.

Then starts the interesting bit (and I'll explain why the 'accident' wasn't interesting in a while, so bear with me): The thoughts start.

They come thick and fast for the next 10 minutes:

'oh my god, I can't believe that happened' 'thank fuck she was alright' 'what if she hadn't been alright' 'imagine if i'd killed her' i could go to prison, i couldn't live with having killed someone' 'it was her fault' 'i didn't do anything wrong' 'did i do anything wrong' 'did i pull away too quickly' 'should i have stayed and made sure she was alright' 'is that ambulance there been called to see her' 'how can i just carry on driving'.  And some imagining of me telling people about it, and their reaction - all in the form of thought images.

And on and on and frickin' on.

And meanwhile the driving to the destination is happening completely on automatic.

(Just to say that I did phone the police when I reached my destination and they confirmed that an ambulance had been called and had checked her out and she WAS fine.)

Then the day continues on it's way.

So .....  that's what happened in Vivality.

In REALITY, what happened is this:

Woman standing at traffic lights, legs start walking and woman crosses in front of car.  Car horn sounds, woman carries on walking.  Another car accelerates and moves forward.  Woman walks into car as it's moving forward and momentum carries the body over the bonnet of the car and onto the road ahead, whilst body in the car applies brakes of car.  Car stops.  Woman in road moves and stands up, woman in car gets out and walks towards other woman, there is talking, and walking to pavement.

That's all that actually happened.  And that's why it's not interesting.  It's just what happened.

And as part of that happening there were thoughts,  which conceptualise the actual continuous happening and chunk it into AN EVENT.

And not just an event, but an event that happened to 'me' and to 'her'.

'Me' and 'her' also a part of the continous flow - tagged by thought only.

Thoughts that added speculation, drama, causality.

Vivality speculation:  'oh my god, I've killed her'
Reality: She wasn't dead.

Vivality speculation: 'What if I'd killed her?'.
Reality: She wasn't dead.

Vivality drama: 'If' I'd killed her, I might go to prison, I couldn't live with it'.
Reality: She wasn't dead, I wasn't going to prison, I was living with it.

Vivality causality: 'It was her fault'
Reality: She no more decided to walk in front of a moving car than I decided to knock someone over.

And whilst those thoughts were part of the continuous happening they did not in any way describe the reality of that stream of action.

The action happened entirely spontaneously, in a continous flow.  There was no cause.  There was no effect.

In fact, nothing happened at all.  There was no static event - but the thoughts tagged and described it, somehow setting it down as a permanent picture, like a mini-film; complete with sound effects, commentary, dramatisation - a little soap-opera.  A complete figment of thought.

And even though the thoughts didn't describe the reality, they were (and are right at this moment) no more than an uncaused flow of continous reality.

The CONTENT of thoughts is Vivality (or Johnality or Sueality - insert appropriate name).

THAT they are is reality.