Giving thanks

today i give thanks for ...

the woman on flickr who takes self portraits every day and writes imaginative tales to go with them
the look of love in the eyes of my friends when i see them
the way drumming allows me to express otherwise unknowable pieces of me
murals on city walls
various friends i've never met
annie's alfredo macaroni & cheese with broccoli
that wonderful and frustrating thing called family
dancing
stretching
pushing the edges of my comfort to help me expand farther than i knew possible
those last 5 minutes in bed
the smell after a warm rain
the gut-wrenching agony of true loss
all the gadgets and gizmos i have available to play with
the multitudes of people who inspire me

i give thanks for patience, understanding, compassion and forgiveness
the remote and uninhabited places left in the world
mountains of snow and my feet strapped to a board (ha ha, when i first wrote that it said "bard")

i give thanks for grace and humility
i give thanks for hands-down, unapologetic living

i give thanks for ...
the mohawk i just gave myself
friends becoming parents and the little ones they bring into the world
puppies
power tools
the previous 2 items not being in the same place at the same time
self-love (no, not like that!) ... (okay, like that, too!)
how you can find out about almost anything on the internet
art so honest you can't look away
rumi, rilke, cummings, silverstein, and seuss
hot tubs
women who ride motorcycles and weld
chocolate cake
massage
doing things just because
me
you
yeah ... even you!


today i give thanks for life

jinx

okay, so i totally jinxed myself yesterday. as i was walking to my train, i thought to myself, "maybe i'm wrong, maybe i don't get sick everytime everyone around me is sick." - because it's been like 2-3 weeks that i've been surrounded by sick people, and i was feeling fine.

this is something called foreshadowing. i learned it in high school and it still comes back to bite me in the ass sometimes.

yup. i'm sick. rather, to put it in more positive terms (read: silly northern california language) ... i am not at full wellness. some people think that illness is just a frame of mind. me .. i like to think it's from germs i get from spending an hour and a half of my day crammed into a small space with 100+ other people.

so be it.

my throat hurts, my head hurts, my body hurts, but it will pass.

against my better judgment and my desire to stay away from most western medicine, i just took some tylenol pm and some sudafed.

i should be trippin' any minute now ... that should be fun until i pass out. :)

FOUND

so i sent this note into Found Magazine like, 2 years ago or longer. Back when Madhavi and I were still living together. I randomly did a Google search for my name just now and this came up as number two. strange.


No Brian

hello old friend

So it’s been awhile since I last blogged. I’ve been taking a break from the computer to give my arms a rest. My RSI (Repetitive Stress Injury) in my right arm has been flaring up lately and that’s a sign that my body wants a break. So I took a couple weeks off before starting my new job and spent a week in Hawaii and then some time at Harbin Hot Springs and camping at Bruinslair.

A lot of the vacation time was to examine this rut I feel I’d been in: uninspired, unmotivated, unhappy … no fun! I spent a lot of time reflecting on an aspect of my personality that I want to change – that part of me that will spend time focusing on the one or two things I’m not happy about despite all the other amazing things in my life. I’d have to say that in the past few weeks, this has all shifted a lot …

My new job is exciting. I’ve been given some good projects to work on so far and they’ve been happy with my work (meaning both internal consultants and clients). It already feels like some of the more senior folks I’m working with want to move me along pretty quickly into a consultant position (though this will still probably take about a year). Until then, I’ll be most certainly learning a LOT, which I am very grateful for. Feels good to use my brain again for work. I could go on for pages about the office dynamics and the ironies and challenges … but I won’t. Suffice it to say, I like the people I am working with and I feel little to no hesitation to speak my mind.

I feel the need to “catch up” on blogging, but I don’t want to do that. I want to get away from the ‘reporting’ blog style I’ve adapted and back into just exploring thoughts and creative storytelling … so look for more of that later.

There’s this woman on flickr whom I have a huge crush on who takes only photos of herself with a phone camera - mostly from odd angles and always catching some movement in time. She is a writer and composes these beautiful snippets of prose revealing glimpses of colorful tales. I think she lives in iowa.

That’s all I have to say for now.

classic

Mahna Mahna

who's the man?

i am.

got the job.
sucessfully negotiated a higher salary.
got an office.
and i have 24 days of freedom before i start working!!

so ... looking into trips to hawaii or central america (maybe mexico). any recommendations?
it has to be relatively cheap - i'll be using school loan money i haven't used yet, so the cheaper the better.

i won't have a real vacation for at least a year, so I think i should get away for 7-10 days while I can. maybe just a week followed by a week of camping when i return?

all that and other good things.

life, at this moment, is very enjoyable!!

anew

feels like life is turning a corner. things feel more certain, more grounded. i like that. i need that. the things i want in my life are beginning to appear.

two words: top candidate. i found out yesterday that i am the top candidate for the project mananger position at the consulting firm i have been interviewing with. this, as far as i'm concerned, means i'll be getting an offer next week after my final interview. this means i can finally FINALLY stop being so concerned about money all the time. not that i'll be raking in mass amounts of cash or anything, but i'll have a salary that actually pays the bills and leaves some room for paying off loans and saving. i like the firm a lot too. it feels good there. they have a great culture and work philosophy - at least for a consulting firm. i like the people. i like the location. so ... if all goes well ... i'll be employed full time starting in sept.

which means ...

regardless of the outcome, i'm quitting my internship next week. i hate it there. truly hate it. it's killing me and sucking out my soul as it happens. no more. 6 months has been long enough. i learned what i went to learn and there is nothing there for me now. good riddance.

so ...

assuming i get this job and i have 3 WEEKS to spare, i will decide next week (after an offer is made/accepted) if i want to hop on a plane and go somewhere to relax before heading into a new chapter of life. where would i go? i want to go to cuba, but there's not enough time to figure out the details. alaska? hawaii? bali? brazil? or do i stay here, go camping a lot, go to burning man and lay low?

aside from all that, there are some other things in my life that i am very excited about at the moment. these things are going to be left under wraps at the moment, selectively revealed. i like keeping some things to myself ... projects, collaborations, connections ... things that bring me both inspiration and joy. more to come.

one thing i need to do is change some lifestyle habits ... get off the computer more, stretch more, more awareness of eating slowly and intentionally. my RSI is bugging me lately and that is a good sign that i haven't been paying attention to my body. i'm looking forward to having some time off from work to be outside and get back in touch with myself - celebrating the good things in my life, right here, right now.

this is it.

update:

interview went very well, i believe. what i know now is that i am one of the top two candidates and i will find out today or tomorrow if i am the number one candidate after yesterday. if so, i will be called back for one final interview next tuesday to meet with one more SVP that i would be working with a lot. seems like that would be a formality as she would just have to meet me and say yea or nay, but if the other 4 have already chosen me as #1, then it seems likely the job would be mine.

so ... now i wait ...

for those of you i am about to rock ...

i salute you.*

today is my second interview for a job that i really want. i found out last night that my interview is essentially with 4 top dogs of the organization. i feel ready, confident, on top of my game. i generally do very well under pressure and in interviewing and public speaking. i was thinking last night that i can't remember any job that i actually got into the interview phase that i didn't end up getting an offer for. perhaps that's just really good selective memory.

when waking this morning, it occured to me that how i perform today may very well dictate my future. perform well (i.e. be myself) = a high probability that i'll get the job i want and start, for the first time in my life, moving toward a career (ewwww!). perform not so well (i.e. be unfocused, dispassionate, etc.) = a lower probability i would get the job and then have to do something that i don't at all want to do ... look for another job! (double ewwww!)

so i've decided i'm just going to get the job. more over, i'm going to be offered a good salary and i'll end up with 3 weeks or so before i have to start - during which time i'll dip in to my school loan money a bit and go travel somewhere.

so now that that is settled ...

actually, the advent of that occuring will be more relief than i can describe. there has been so much psychic energy tied up into 'job search' for so many months now, it will be a great relief to have that done with.

i am going to miss a summer full of 4 day weekends, however.

there's a bunch of other stuff i could blather on about and will soon. my RSI has been bugging me for the past week, so i'm limiting my computer use to let it chill out.

hot metal! oh, yeah!

what's hotter than a leather-clad angelina jolie wielding a riding crop?

hot metal, that's what.

really hot metal. like molten metal hot.

what's this got to do with anything?

i learned how to weld yesterday. it was ... hawt!

the best part? i still have all my fingers and toes!

i have some crazy friends who are building a cathedral on the playa this year for burning man. in exchange for some help, they've been teaching people how to weld. yesterday i was working on a few of the steel trusses that will make the arches in the center of the 40ft. structure. (see below)





welding is certainly both a skill and an artform. i'm actually pretty good at it for a first time welder and am interested to learn more and create my own thinga-ma-bob someday. hell, even using the plasma cutter to cut out designs in the burn barrels looked fun!

oh yeah, and women in welding gear? ..... hot!

dear blog

dear blog,

what can i say? life is good these days. there continues to be so much up in the air and i'm a little worried about finding a good job soon, but i know it will all come about as it should.

the past weekend was one of the best i can remember in recent months. it's hard to believe that just a few months ago i was wondering how i was going to make it to the next day and then noticing myself in a time where i wanted every second to last forever. it occurs to me that this is the type of thing i would write had i just fallen in love, but that's not it. in fact, it's probably better than that because the joy i'm feeling is intrinsic rather than a result of any other person coming into my life.

so what was this past weekend all about? it was the 7th annual campout event that the rhythm society has created. i co-lead the event with my partner in crime, shanti. we had a stellar team that allowed me to trust them so much that i was able to let go of being "on" all the time and, for the first time, was able to relax for most of the event and play and interact without the nagging feeling that i should be checking on something. i felt at peace.

in addition to that, it felt so good to have created an event where, everywhere you looked, there were people laughing and smiling and dancing and the air was just filled with joy and openness and freedom - freedom from stress, from worry, from tension. i met some amazing people and connected with others that i have known peripherally for a long time, but have never really spoken with at length.

i also got treated like a king a few times. thursday night i was given a shoulder and neck massage by one friend while being fed pie by another. saturday afternoon i was given an hour and half long massage during which a second massuese joined in. 4 hand massage? booyah!

it was also a very musical weekend for me. on friday, i played my drum kit along with a DJ for awhile. on saturday, i participated in a small, impromptu drum circle that drew a small crowd of dancers, poi spinners and hula-hoopers. later that night, i played my kit again with a small unpracticed band while the masses (200+ people) ate dinner on the lawn. and on sunday i DJ'd for the first time. that was the most fun of all ... playing music i love (really loud!) for dozens of naked people dancing and swimming and lounging around the pond. a few people even came up to me to tell me it was their favorite DJ set of the weekend. oh my!

the land up at camp and sons is blessed. i noticed that as soon as i arrived, i relaxed and felt an innate sense of peace and joy. they've done a lot to infuse the land with creativity, positivity and love. jane and walter are very generous and gracious hosts and i am thankful that we found them so many years ago and continue to return each year.

i think the best part of the weekend overall was how well i dealt with the parts of me that get down on myself about certain things. i was fairly easily able to cast those thoughts aside and just 'be'. that felt good.

well, as is usual, i tend to poop out on writing before all my thoughts are expressed and, well, you'll just have to deal. the weather has been outrageously gorgeous this past week and it's just too damn nice to sit inside and type at a computer ...

another

wow, what a couple of weeks it’s been since maine. Busy busy busy. I love it and it bothers me. I love how much I can accomplish when I am pressed to the wire with commitments. I tend to be so much more productive when I have less time to get things done. Generally, i excel like this when it has to do with planning and coordinating something because I'm so good at it – it’s less easy when things are unfamiliar to me, but I’m working on that. It bothers me because I tend to not do as well taking care of myself (taking time to slow down, relax, get outside, etc.), and I’m working on that too! Balance. It’s all about balance!

These past several weeks have been spent planning Jon’s bachelor’s party (where *do* you find 100 chickens and bulk honey for less than $500???) and the Rhythm Society 3-day campout event at camp and sons. I always forget the massive amount of tiny fires that surface when an event draws near. But I love it because I feel capable in handling them and dealing with it. My goal is to always treat the people I am working with with respect, trust and maintaining an environment of fun collaboration and inspiration toward creating something that others will enjoy and get something meaningful from.

I find when I start generating this kind of energy, more is drawn to me.

That’s what needs to happen in the dating realm, I think. I’ve been dating a lot over the past couple months, but haven’t really felt like anything is being created from that. I’ve had a lot of fun with the various women I’ve been out with and am looking forward to other potential dates. Dating is a new thing for me in my life; I’ve always been a relationship guy. So I am finding that it’s difficult to find ease around being in the space of dating and not getting wrapped up in stupid questions or games. I feel like I am doing fairly well with it all, and yet I am challenged by taking on the role of the pursuer. It's been nice to take a little break these past two weeks as i've been so busy with everything else. i find i want the companionship and intimacy, but not the hurdles to get there. not that i want to bypass the "getting to know you phase" - i like that - i just don't like the part before that when you're trying to figure out if you want to get into the "getting to know you phase."

and this is the part of the post where my desire to write has gone kaput ... before all things in my head have been said.

oh well. motivation - she is a fickle beast.

here again

i'm back at my apartment/flat after a very trying travel day (more on that later).

as we were flying into oakland this morning, i noticed a slight sinking feeling in my body. the faint questions arose, "what am i coming back to? what do i have to look forward to?"

this immediately spurred the thought, "did i leave something behind?" (as in, did some aspect of my life really "stop" when I left the bay area for maine that i am now returning to?)

a slight taste of melancholy in my mouth, i realized that there was something missing in my interpretation of coming back to SF ... coming home. my association created this missing feeling because my apartment is not my 'home', it is merely where i live.

home is where i am. this is a concept that i embraced when i've traveled around the world for months on end. it all begs the question (for me), "what is home and why does coming back to SF leave me feeling a little melancholy?"

it makes me aware of misplacing my attention on "what's to come" versus what's right here and now.

it's all something to consider.

***

the trip home was ... eventful. my first flight from portland to d.c. was fine. i had an hour+ layover in d.c., which was spent mostly on the computer. as i was walking toward the gate, however, i bumped into an aquaintance - a guy named gita whom i've had brief, though intimate, connections with. turns out we were on the same flight and, though full, there was an extra seat next to him in the second row of the exit aisle (which, by the way, are the best seats on a plane b/c not only do you have the extra leg room, but the seats tilt back as well - unlike when there is only one row).

having a friend to unexpectedly sit next to was helpful as we SAT ON THE TARMAC FOR 5.5 hours waiting out a fabulous lightning storm. the storm was so intense that we couldn't even go back to the gate b/c the airport was shut down and they weren't letting the ground crew out. we eventually did go back to the gate b/c they had to fix one of the bathrooms and refuel before taking off 6 hours behind schedule. sigh. a 12 hour flight from d.c. to sf.

it was great to hang out and talk with gita - he and i have a lot of similar learnings recently about ourselves and relationships, etc.

and now i am home after a little sleep getting back into the details of all the things i am juggling, wondering what's next and what's most important for me to really put my attention on. i feel tired and yet refreshed after the trip to maine with a new perspective on my life here in the big city.

firefly

moments like these are when you can really just sit back and appreciate the goodness of life.

kevin and i just got back from getting some ice cream in town, which we scooped into cups and went out on the back deck to eat in the darkness of a warm summer night. what made it especially especial was the firefly show in the woods just before the lake; the darkness erupting in short bursts of light from all directions and heights, some practically overhead.

there simply is no substitute for enjoying a moment like that with a good friend and having the chance to just relax and shoot the shit for awhile before heading to bed in a tent.

maine is in my heart. it always will be. i do so love it here.

a collection of thoughts; part 3

context of being:
it occurred to me many weeks ago the confinement of my own thoughts. i had been thinking about what it would be like to pack up all my stuff and/or sell most of it and then go live somewhere else and do something unrelated to who i've been in the past 33 years ... like, move to india and work as a hotel busboy or to open a small market in senegal. something radically different. the eruption of thoughts that ensued enabled me to see the rigid context i have been living in with regards to what's possible for me. it's refreshing to open up those restraints and see the much wider scope of possibility and recognize that those alternate lives do not happen because i am not choosing them rather than them not being possible.

it's beginning to feel like i am slowly reinvigorating creativity, openness, innocence and moving away from a set context of being. it's like my life has been moving in pre-set tracks that i willingly have followed and am once again recognizing that those tracks are imaginary and there are an infinite number of tracks to choose from. my all-too-linearly-developed mind had forgotten that.

maine day three (a take-home message):
seatbelts are wonderful. wear them. and get insurance while you're at it (health, dental, renters). i don't want to condone living in a fear mentality, but more so a 'prepared' mentality. hopefully you can say on your death bed, "well, that was a waste of money, i never needed any of my insurances!". trust me on this. we visited kevin's dad in the hospital today. he is one lucky muther. in talking with doctors around the country, he should be dead or paralyzed ... he's one of the lucky ones and we still don't know to what extent he will recover.

back to seatbelts ... have you ever seen someone in a halo? you know, the contraptions that keep your neck immobilized by screwing 6 screws into your skull and attaching it to your torso? it doesn't look pleasant. fortunately bill is one bad-ass man and is handling it fairly well. oh, and then there's the drugs. they help too.

job hunt:
the consulting firm i did some consulting with has a job opening in the department i want to work for. the job is a step below where i would want to be, but i could do the job well and it is customarily used as a stepping stone to being an organizational consultant. i'm thinking about taking it (not that it's been offered yet, but i know they'll want me (i'm more than qualified, they know i do great work and am interested in more). there's a lot of perks like good insurance and it's IN SAN FRANCISCO! that is a HUGE thing for me. i really don't want to commute to palo alto or freemont everyday ... and if it sucks, i can always get out. it beats being at the CPUC right now and i really like the people at the firm. so there are a lot of reasons to take it. reasons against: it's not a dream job ... but then, i don't know what is right now, so why not do something i enjoy and am good at, make some decent money and get a taste for the business?? things to think about: am i selling out and taking an easy route as opposed to waiting to find something that has a bigger "YES" attached to it. i'll apply and continue to think about it. right now the thought of having a decent job sounds great and like a good first step. there's something to be said for the way it kind of fell into my lap as well ... based on some work i did for them and then an online discussion with the hiring manager about maine (not knowing she was the hiring manager at the time). i'll keep you posted.

maine stay

it's been a wonderful first day with the callahan's. i arrived late last night after a day of travel. i left the portland airport at midnight for the last hour and a half drive to kevin & kelly's. the drive was fantastic ... though it was dark outside, i could tell i was in maine. i love this state. there were several moments last night when i would pass a evergreen-lined lake illuminated by a large orange moon just abouve the horizon. sheer beauty. i found a good radio station and cranked up the speakers in the rental car and made my way north with a smile on my face and joy in my heart.

today was spent doing what i could to help out around the house. it started with the obligatory trip to the local bakery where they make some kickass donuts. i mean ... donuts! in maine! does life get any better??? only with bacon. i think one of these days i'm going to open a store that only sells the things that i like: donuts, bacon, macaroni & cheese, peanut butter, jazz, funk, chill music, camping gear, drums, chocolate cake and snowboards. of course, there's room to expand. there would probably be an adult section. and a kids section. to edify the different sides of people. donuts and bacon would be the link in the middle. :)

the rest of the day was spent helping kelly around the house, playing with raelin, mowing the lawn, emptying and relocating a sandbox and a little chill time with kevin. oh, and i of course got to meet Liam who is now 5 weeks old!!

my two favorite moments of the day:

1. Raelin telling me as we are brushing our teeth, in a very matter-of-fact tone, "Liam had a blowout yesterday." (referring to his poop exploding out the sides of his diaper). (Raelin just turned 3, btw).

2. Mowing the lawn. I *love* mowing the lawn and they have a lot of it. I find it very meditative, despite the sound of the engine. I love the smells, I love the gratification of mowing smaller and smaller patches of tall grass. I love the physical effort of pushing a mower up a hill. It's almost as good as using a chainsaw. Maybe better. Maybe. I love the symmetry of the grass when done. It reminds me of how fascinated I was with Zambonie's when I was a kid (the machine's that they use to clean the surface of the ice on ice rinks). Okay, I *still* want to drive a zambonie one day. And bigger tractors. And operate one of those large construction cranes and demolition balls. and ...

I'm writing this by the way from a tent in the yard. It's warm, the stars are out. Life is good.

And it feels especially good to be here with the callahans helping out in what ways I can. I am deeply grateful for all the people who contributed funds to helping me get out here. I couldn't have come without their help and I know how much I and Kevin and Kelly appreciate it. It looks to be a wonderful week.

girls are evil

just so there's no confusion. it's scientifically proven:

goin' to maine

on thursday i'm flying to maine to be with my friends k&k. i'm really looking forward to it. not just because i get to see them, play with 'r' and meet the new one, but because i get to help them.

[tangent]
i noticed recently that there is a part of me that feels bad admitting that i like to help people. the question is often asked, "do you think people need help?" and it's pretty much always asked in an hidden accusatory manner - as if people needing help is a bad thing. at least that's how it feels. i do think people need help ... sometimes. i know i do. i get that people react to being helped when they don't want it/need it because it can make you feel powerless, untrusted, and invaded. but that's not the kind of help i like giving, even if i do it sometimes without thinking. it's a fine line sometimes. and the difference, it seems, is in the intention behind why you help someone. is it because i just want to be helpful and contribute to their life? or is it because i think they can't do what it is they are trying to do or what i think they *should* be doing? the former = yea! the latter = yuk.
[/end tangent]

so k&k just had their second child a few weeks ago. since then, his parents came out to visit and his father suffered a stroke while driving alone, which lead to a car accident in which he broke vertebrae in his upper spine. from what i understand, everything is looking pretty good right now for a full or mostly-full recovery. and it will also be a long road. on top of all this 'k' runs his own business and lives 1.5 hours away from the hospital where his father is. i can't even begin to understand what the emotional overwhelm of their situation feels like. and so i'm heading out there to lend some support, help around the house, play with the kids, etc.

it's been a bit of a challenge to get everything taken care of so i can get out of here for a week. times like this illuminate for me just how complicated my life is with all its little parts. i love it and most of everything that i am doing, but it sure gets to be a lot. i tend to slightly over-commit b/c i like to be busy. i often get a lot more done when my schedule is tight than when i have too much free time ... so i'd almost rather have a lot to do or nothing at all.

my LIT project is flailing a bit. it's that damn indecision i am not comfortable with. it's interesting to notice just how often i try to distract myself from heading into unknown waters. in finding the discipline to sit in one place and brainstorm ideas for the project, i notice how quickly my mind wanders. so tricky, so tricky. i'm curious what it's all about. i'm curious about my lack of enthusiasm for my project - what does that mean? is it resistance or is it just a simple lack of interest in the project itself? hmmm ... certainly some fertile ground to explore.

more on that later ... much to do, much to do ...

the warrior

changes are happening in my life recently. this reluctant optimist over here started paying attention to his thought patterns. stopped listening to the ones that were stopping him so much, turned up the volume on the ones that sang the tune he wanted to hear. it's all just a story anyway, why not choose the one we want?

for most of my life i've felt pretty small and weak. makes no difference whether or not there is any truth to that image. but why not create one that i want? how about ... the warrior. the one who kicks ass in every area of his life. the one who is free. the one who stands up for his convictions.

i get more and more how much a game this all is. life. i used to hear that phrase and felt like it cheapened life b/c i didn't understand what it meant. i took "game" to mean 'trite', that life was a whim. but that's not what it means.

i've spent too much of my life thinking certain thoughts such as: i am not good enough, i am not smart enough, i am not good looking enough and finding evidence to support those thoughts. ignoring the fact that i could be having the exact opposite thoughts: i am good enough, i am smart enough, i am good looking and find as much evidence to support those thoughts. that's the game. it's all a story. every moment is new. there is no past, there is no future. all that is, is now. make it whatever you want it to be. so maybe life itself is not the game, but how we chose to live it is.

consciousness in every moment and every action/absence of action is a choice. free from the constraint of useless self-limitations. not free from fear, necessarily, or worry or doubt ... but free to make choices when confronted with any emotion or situation. a victim to nothing. responsible for every choice made or not made.

so why not play with archetypes?

kind-hearted warrior. vigilant. compassionate. unapologetic. present.

sure beats the hell out of thinking that i can't do something or i am not good enough. and thusfar, the experiment is working. things are appearing in my life that weren't available to me before. perhaps that's just a matter of me not looking, perhaps it's a metaphysical phenomenon ignited by thought patterns and energy, perhaps it's all just random. who knows? does it matter?

what matters to me is fun, joy, growth, love, and connection. and so that is the framework that i'm choosing to see my life through. i'll keep you posted.

Punk Rock Kickball, the fifth

Yesterday was our 5th annual punk rock kickball game.

There was the Dead Kennedys, beer for bases, beer in hair, tackling, wrestling, swearing, bloodshed and a little bit of kickball thrown in. It's one of the best days of the year and a damn good excuse to wear eyeliner.

See for yourself:

PRKBV

I was a little sad to see so few of the orignal gang around, but there were enough of the veterans to represent. People are already asking about next year.

stepping into leadership

life has been on the high speed lately. rather, it feels like i have a lot to do and yet i do still find space in my schedule for 'fuck off' time. sometimes it seems like i do that too much, other times it feels necessary. i often wonder what i would accomplish if i had less of it.

and wonder no more ...

i think i alluded to a project i am undertaking for the leadership training program. each person in the program committed to a 6 month project that would advance their leadership in some capacity, push their boundaries, challenge that part of them that feels that something is impossible, evoke their values, is outside the realm of what they are naturally good at, and is measurable. basically, there should be a mixture of excitement and "oh shit" when thinking about it - that's a good indication that we are on the right path - something we want and would otherwise likely avoid doing.

my project, in concrete terms, is to design, create and conduct a workshop of some sort. i don't know what it is going to be about yet. which leads me to the much deeper aspect of my project, because in essence, it is not about the workshop.

my project is about trusting myself and believing that I have something of value to offer the world. it is about tapping into that which inspires me, that which fuels me and that which i believe in ... and then offering that to others as something that will help them. it is about helping others, coming from that place that i know i have gifts in healing and where i want to contribute to others living the lives that they want. it may be about carving a niche for myself in the work i want to be doing - and at the very least exploring one path to get a better sense of what i want to do more specifically.

the challenge for me is not in the creation of the workshop so much as it is finding what it will be about. the workshop design will certainly be challenging and a lot of work and i know it will be confronting in a lot of ways. the crux of the project, however, is in getting through whatever barriers i have to seeing what i have to offer that is uniquely mine.

it actually pisses me off quite a bit. it seems so fucking simple in many ways and i can see how, for someone else, this would be ridiculously easy. to some extent i am very in touch with what inspires me and at the same time i haven't yet figured out how and why that would be something that i would create a workshop around - something that would be of value to others. to another extent, i get stuck thinking that whatever i create has to be better than what others have created to be of value. that's a huge hurdle for me. the mental dialogue is something like, "why would anyone chose to participate in a workshop i've created on (x), when that person has a workshop on (x) and they've been doing it for 20 years!"

and that is a major part of my project ... getting through the crap like that that stops me from doing things that i want to do.

it is about leaving the realm of 'follower' which i do so well.
it is about leaving the realm of 'leader' only when i feel like i really know what i am doing.

it is about stepping into being a leader in my life and in being that, stepping through the doubts and self-limiting thoughts that hold me back.

i also see where all this mental chatter is a load of bullshit and something i want to drop and just fucking 'be'. i am guilty of deconstructing things a lot, wanting to understand all the ways of being (ahem ... yes, i've studied a lot of psychology) ... and i love it and want to escape it at the same time.

given that ... all the stuff above is awesome and i love thinking about it and learning and growing.
and there's a big part of me that sees how it is all just a sliver of this game of life and that there is so much more outside of that slice of pie. it's just one that i am focusing on for the moment and i trust that it is serving me in some way.

you may now call me master

i'm done.

two years of hard work and giving up so many things that i love to do in order to focus on school ... weekends spent indoors studying, missed parties, a sabbatical from my mens group, lost connections with friends, savings account drain ... and on. and on.

people ask me how i feel about it and if i'm having some kind of graduation party. i haven't set up any kind of celebration. i feel proud of myself for staying with the program and creating the discipline i needed to finish at the top of my class. but i haven't looked at it as something to create a huge hubbub about.

there is one thing that i will reserve the right to brag about here in my blog ... my grades. in many ways, grades don't really matter so much in grad school ... you either get a degree or you don't. there's a part of me that wants to be modest about that, and i will be in my day to day life, but here in the semi-private forum, i'll toot my own horn for a second and share that i am graduating with a 4.0 gpa. if i hadn't worked my ass off for that grade, i wouldn't care so much ... but i did. and that feels good.

it's important to me b/c i wanted to know that i could apply myself and achieve something that i wasn't sure i could. my undergrad grades are decent, but i was very distracted in undergrad with more time spent in bands and the theater than on school.

so there's a lot of other stuff going on .. new projects and commitments, dating, looking for a dream job ... but that will all have to wait. i'm still catching up with the ever-constant list of "things that have to get done." i'm going camping this weekend and will use that as a re-charge time. i'm going to write some vision statements around some various projects i'm working on and spend some time meditating and getting clear on how i want to use my time and energy.

for now ... you can call me master.

[the stupid thing is that, when i was a kid, the cards that came in the mail were always addressed to: Master "jblog". I'm not sure when I lost that title, but it sure was a hell of a lot of work to get it back again.

And don't worry, even though I'm not a "doctor", I'm good at pretending. "oh nurse!"

new life

there's a new callahan in the world and that's a good thing. my friends K&K had a son over the weekend. their second child. i am so happy for them and bummed that we don't live closer to each other that i can go over there and meet this brand new adorable person face to face.

sounds like they are all doing very well and i am very happy for them!

results

i got the results of my comprehensive exams on friday. good news. i passed 4 of the 5 exams and have to go in to defend the last one. it's what i expected. i knew that the last hour of the 8 hour exam process wasn't my best and that the final exam didn't reflect my knowledge on the topic. turns out the same is true for the others as well ... everyone has to defend their answers on the final essay or two.

i think asking people to write 5 consecutive exams over the course of 8 hours - with only 30 minutes break for lunch - is a little unreasonable. i mean, it's probably nothing in comparison to ph.d exams or like, the bar, or something ... but still.

anyway, i'm happy. i know i'm going to pass now and that, in less than two weeks, i'll have my masters degree in hand and then i can go get drunk and figure out what the hell i want to do with my life! or at least that next weekend. i'm going camping for sure - gettin' the hell outta dodge - because ... i ... can!

in short:
fuck yeah!

wind rattles the windows

the wind rattles the windows as the severed cord outside my window taps against the glass. what happens in the absence of distraction? i have become a master of it. something calls me to unplug, settle, be ... and i am drawn back in to a web of uselessness and disguise. putting time, energy, focus on the banal. tuning in and then tuning out. time better spent would be ... what?

i spent time at the ocean today. the ever-present movement, sound, breeze, allows me to be more still. there are two paths: discovery or complacency. i walk both. one foot in each track. resigned and fighting it all the way. all i need now are flip-flops to complete the picture. do you want the red pill or the blue?








i seek truth. i seek my unobstructed path, but the nature of life is that it is obstructed. that is truth.

someone said recently that life is just a series of well-managed mistakes. in one sense i agree, in another sense i think it's ridiculous. the word mistake assumes that there was a right way. that's exactly the duality that i attempt to unlearn ... right/wrong, black/white, good/bad. i often see life as choosing one thing or another ... not both. so why not both?

i think the greatest struggle is how we try to bring union to the physical and the metaphysical. in the greater reality, they are one and the same. yet, our minds are limited and cannot truly comprehend that which is outside ourselves. experiencing it is one thing, making sense of it is a fun, but ultimately futile endeavor.

so as i sit pondering the task i have at hand for LIT - to choose a project that, over the next 6 months, will unleash my leadership, serve my values, and manifest some shift in possibility - i wonder which game to play and how i can play both. game one is simply to put all energy into depth, understanding, silence, stillness, connection, peace, harmony, balance, truth, god. game two is to be here now and play, forget understanding, have fun, do things, engage, bounce around, ricochet, act and react.

am i being obtuse? probably. why not?

i see two avenues that really are one, but feel like two. i want to engage in both. i want to live in the parameters of daily life as it is decreed by experience and never let go of knowing that there is so much more outside my linear existance.

aw, fuck it. i'm even confusing myself. i know what i mean, and words are just getting in the way of that.

to sum it all up: i need a haircut.

sunny skies

there is a direct correlation between my blogging and depression.
less depression = less blogging

i'm actually in favor of shifting that trend a bit because, like my journals, i'd hate to think that the written record of my life that is left behind when i go is nothing but tales of sorrow and woe. maybe some tales of "whoh!", but not woe.

so, yeah, been feeling better these past couple of weeks. lots of factors involved i'm sure. i can point to the fact that the sun has been out rather consistently, it's been warmer and the rain has ended, things between ami and i seem really good and i can really feel the love and connection that i was missing so terribly, the comprehensive exams are over, i just got a very short-term-but-well-paying contract job, i've been meeting new people and having good connections, i've been getting to the gym more often and am liking the results ...

there's still part of me that wants to tell you about the things that i feel are missing from my life and the things that i feel i want badly ... and, yes, there's still some of that sorrow ... but it is oh-so-just a piece of it all again and not that which is ruling my every waking moment.

one thing that is a bummer is the sleep issue. i'm going to see if i can get some prescription stuff tomorrow to give myself a couple solid 8 hour nights of sleep and see if that resets my system. it really feels like i've just developed a sleep habit that i can't break. we'll see how that goes ... my energy level seems to be okay on 5 hours a night for now.

LIT is pretty confronting right now. our homework this week is to create a very specific list of all the things in our lives that we have wanted and either not attempted to get or started to and then quit. yowza! not exactly sure where this is going, but i have a pretty good idea and i'll fill y'all in about it later.

and hey ... feel free to leave comments once and awhile ... i know i get about 15-20 hits a day, but not too many of you leave comments. i'm curious, from time to time, what you think.

alright .. getting back to the sunshine now.

congratulations: pending

i can't remember the last week of my life.

well, i can, but there isn't much to remember besides me and a stack of papers, books and binders.

i've gotten a few questions from friends about what it is i've been studying, so i'll elaborate here a little bit. the exam was 5 consecutive essays on 6 topic areas. we had about 1.5 hrs for each essay, but it was really a matter of how we chose to use the time. in a nutshell, all of the essays were situational tests where we had to describe the exisiting theories, issues, problems, as well as come up with a plan and recommendations for the implementation and evaluation of that plan. the topic areas were:

1. Selection
2. Performance Appraisal
3. Leadership and Decision Making
4. Organizational Culture, Climate and Justice
5. Training
6. Research Methods (this was integrated into the 5 essays)

i can't say it was fun. i was surprised at how fast time moves when you are concentrating. by the end of the day, however, my brain was fried. i'm not sure how i did on the last two exams ... we'll see. of course, i am so much more interested in the leadership and culture/justice work than any of the HR-related topics (yuk!), so i also think i probably performed better on those exams.

There are now three possibilities:
1. I pass and am done forever!
2. I fail and have to do a thesis to get my degree
3. I pass contingently and they have me come back and defend my answers and add any information they feel was missing.

I am hoping for the first possibility, but I wouldn't be surprised if there is more that i have to do on the last 2 exams. i really don't know though. I am confident i didn't outright fail anything, i was too prepared for that.

anyway, the experience has killed my desire to write, so that's all for today. in another three weeks grad school will be over for good and then i'll ... well, i'll figure out what's next!

i'm excited and at the same time it hasn't sunk in at all yet.

frame of reference

up late.
can't sleep.

i was hanging out with my friend marie tonight from LIT
we got to talking about life and what we want

i've been cognizant these past few days of a perspective shift

i first became aware of it in regards to these exams i have coming up
my expression to others about them and studying had been focused entirely on how hard they are and how much work it is. there was some underlying need to be recognized for all that i am doing and some semi-conscious desire to prove something by that relating.
this isn't an unfamiliar pattern and one that i know i've picked up from others in my life as it seems pretty common to hear a lot of people talk about 'how bad they've got it'. there's some odd bonding around how 'shit ain't right'.

over the weekend, when i was talking to prudence, we talked about how language and other forms of communication create our reality ... and it occured to me that the way i was talking about these exams and studying, things like: "i don't know how i'm going to get ready for this," and "i can't believe how much work i have to do" (etc.) was not serving me at all.

so i decided to change my frame of reference, my perspective. at least internally. and i started telling myself how i was going to get the work done and i was going to do well on the exam.

it's made a difference. i feel more positive and sure of myself. it hasn't effected my motivation to study or my focus yet, but i think that that is possible.

since then, i've started to apply that to the rest of my life.

yes, i know, this is an age old concept - the power of positive thinking - but i'd like to take it one step further. and that is to create the life that i want by creating that possibility in my mind and in my language.

in talking with marie tonight, i had this thought about work. one of the things that i know i want is to be working alongside people who inspire me, who are inspired, and who i have fun with. in my life, these people are my friends and many of them are those in my communities. i also want to do work that i think is meaningful and making a positive impact in people's lives.

the thought was ... i am sure that there is an abundance of people in my communities who are talented, motivated, inspired and unhappy in their work. is it possible ... would it be what i truly want ... to find a group of these people with various skills and start a company? it sounds so exciting. the opportunity to work with people that i respect, admire and trust. people who i know are dedicated to creating the lives that they want for themselves. people who are willing to create a company that rests on the same values we all share around integrity, inspiration, social change, honesty, service, quality ... a place of intense accountability via love and support. an environment bursting with creativity and sweat. an atmosphere of fun, hard work and relaxation - knowing when to work and when to play and when to rest.

healthy, vibrant, successful. in our lives. in our work.

it's possible, yes.
is this what i want?
shall i make it happen?

the question is ... what would it be? what is the vision that would bind us together? that ... that i don't have at this point which is an obstacle. if this is something that is meant to be, then i believe by keeping these thoughts present, something will come forward. some indication of what is to be.

regardless of how it comes about, what i wrote about above encompasses a lot of what i want in a work environment. i am open to that looking a number of different ways and i am excited to get even more clear on what it is i want.

time to stop focusing so much on what i don't want and more so on what i do want. i think it's important to know what i don't want, but not to focus on it.

if our thoughts do indeed create our reality ... then it's time to focus forward and make room for that reality to unfold.

tick tock

i'm in the final days of my masters degree program in industrial/organizational psychology. i graduate in a month. but before then, i have the most challenging set of exams i've ever taken. they happen next tuesday and i'm not yet ready. the next several days will be the final push to synthesize, memorize, utilize and jazzercize 100 research papers and books on 6 major topic areas in the field of I/O Pscyhology.

it's been interesting to plow through piles and piles of research on various topics and a bit refreshing to see, now, how they all fit together in some degree. i'm not pleased with the fact that i have to "remember" who said what and when they said it b/c that's not a real-world application. in the real world, you can look that shit up ... the real test is whether or not i understand what the research says, what the limitations are and how to apply it.

if you don't see or hear from me very much in the next little while, think of me. i'll be studying. if you *do* hear from me or see me, i'm either procrastinating, taking a break or delusional. :)

in other news (briefly) ... i'm feeling much better this week in regards to my emotional state. much more positive, open, optimistic, well. things feel manageable again and i feel like i can really look at what's coming up for me in a peaceful and inquisitive manner - rather than just being held down by it.

alright ... getting back to work ... i'm pretty sure i'll write more in the next few days as i am brimming with all these thoughts and ideas around what's happening in LIT right now and self-openings and inspirations ...

until then ... whenever that may be ...

a collection of thoughts

i feel so blessed to be involved in the communities that i am involved with. rather, i am grateful to be in the presence of people i respect and admire, who inspire me and teach me, who accept me and reflect me. i had very interesting experiences this weekend. the days were long and uncomfortable - i struggled with intense feelings of loneliness and distraction, being off-centered and depressed (much more so on saturday than on sunday). this, of course, just added to my frustration at having a limited focus on the work i was trying to get done. i took a lot of walks, which were helpful.

the nights, however, were fantastic. friday night i danced with friends and was able to let go of everything and feel joy and lightness. saturday night was even better as i spent hours and hours just connecting with old friends and new ... feeling so free of everything that has been weighing me down lately. i had a clearing conversation with one friend, helped another friend work through some physical pain with my massage, and spent hours lying on cushions in front of the fire talking with various people. i especially enjoyed talking with this woman, prudence, who was a friend of a friend whom i had never met. not only did we have great and fun conversations, but it also wasn't laden with everything that i've been working through lately and it was so refreshing to let go of that for awhile.

we spoke a lot about language and spirituality and different forms of expression. one of the shifts i felt was when i let in the idea about how we can create our own realities. do you ever have the experience where you re-encounter ideas and concepts that you know and agree/disagree with at some level and, for whatever reason, they sink in to a deeper level of understanding? that’s what happened for me around this. it occurred to me how much ability i have to shape my physical, emotional, spiritual environment. having been plagued by so many negative thoughts lately has been oppressive. the challenge I find is creating positive thoughts to replace them.

i’ve also had some relieving talks with ahmi lately. we spoke thursday, friday and saturday last week – each time i felt closer and closer to her again. each time brought me relief in the pain i was feeling about the chasm that had broken between us. each time i felt the friendship that i knew was there and have been wanting so intensely. these experiences have allowed me to sink into another level of acceptance and raise up a level out of my rut. it is all feeling much better right now.

there are still emotional obstacles to face … a lot of them are my own demons. one of the things that is hard to deal with is thinking that as people in my community see ahmi out at parties being flirtatious or intimately engaged with other people, they will think I wasn't good enough. and again – there is that frustration with being so wrapped up into external validation and caring so much what others think of me.

another insight is that the loss i feel is partially because i had such intimate connections with someone that so many others desire. now that I’m not in that same dynamic with her and can see her exploring that with others, i feel less special. i feel seen by others as a failure and, again, not good enough. that wound is so fucking pervasive.



when i look in the mirror lately, i see someone who likes they have been through a war. i feel like i have been; the life in my eyes seems so distant. and it's great to say that there were times this weekend where I felt so happy and free of burden, that i almost forgot what it felt like. how fucking refreshing. something shifted. made room for me to have a fuller experience of who i am ... not just that part of me that needed or wanted to feel the pain.

It’s disconcerting to realize that there is something about depression that pulls me in. I notice where I refrain from commenting that I feel really good right now in case I feel bad again later. There is some association in my being that says if I am feeling good, people go away – they think I don’t need them. Whereas, when I am feeling blue, people check in on me, come to me without me having to reach out all the time. That is a big issue for me … feeling like I have to be the person to reach out to others in order to spend time with anyone. It seems that if I didn’t call anyone, I could easily be at home alone for weeks before anyone thought to invite me to do something.

That’s one of the many draws to wanting a relationship. Because there is someone who is my companion, who chooses me, who wants to spend time with me often.

It’s not that I think that people don’t want to spend time with me. It’s just been years since I’ve felt like I’m on people’s “A” list. It’s been years since I feel like I’ve had best friends that weren’t also my partner.

And when I am feeling down and let that be known, I notice that dynamic change. People call me or write me to see what’s happening, how I am doing.

I so don’t want to post this. This feels ugly and self-pitying. I’m not intending to write it in that tone, it’s more a matter of fact account of how I’ve felt. But I don’t like that that is how I feel. It makes it so much harder going through a transition like this with ami, to see her as one of those incredibly magnetic people who has the exact opposite issue … too many people want something from her. She struggles to make time for herself and everyone she wants to connect with.

There’s so much I could say about all this stuff coming up for me. It’s not the first time, that’s for sure. I feel like I need to find some acceptance and peace around the fact that, right now, I don’t have friends calling me everyday “just because” … and, even though I very much know that doesn’t mean that they don’t love me, I want to resolve what is behind all that for myself that makes me feel so alone.

I also cringe at thinking that those friends who read this will be motivated to reach out. I have this strange aversion to asking for things like this and feel terrible if people reach out, not because they want to, but because I want them to.

There’s something. Whatever part of me that wants validation from others wants it without asking for it. It all comes back to this deep desire to feel wanted. God, I want to fill whatever those holes are within me with my own self. i don’t want to depend on others for my feelings of self-worth.

Is that common? How much of that is just a part of being human? What part of that is healthy vs. unhealthy? Another realization is how quickly I jump on that notion of needing others and judge it as bad, like I should be able to do it all on my own. Maybe that’s the thought pattern that needs to relax a bit.

Mostly I can just trust what my instincts say – which is that there is a balance to it all. I can’t depend on others to validate me, but I can accept and ask for that at times for reminders and reflection. There’s some line between being contributed to and being dependent upon. I don’t think I’m all that dependent on others for this, but I also feel like there is some room for exploration around it all.

Once again, this has gone on much longer than anticipated. And I didn’t even get to talk about how much I want school to be OVER! I’ll leave that one for tomorrow or the next day. For now, back to creating my reality with positive thoughts, abundance, health, peace and a full-fucking-nights sleep!

path and purpose

This was read to us in our Leadership Training recently. It's a piece from The Teachings of Don Juan:

Anything is one of a million paths. Therefore you must always keep in mind that a path is only a path; if you feel you should not follow it, you must not stay with it under any conditions. To have such clarity you must lead a disciplined life. Only then will you know that any path is only a path and there is no affront, to oneself or to others, in dropping it if that is what your heart tells you to do. But your decision to keep on the path or to leave it must be free of fear or ambition. I warn you. Look at every path closely and deliberately. Try it as many times as you think necessary.

This question is one that only a very old man asks. Does this path have a heart? All paths are the same: they lead nowhere. They are paths going through the bush, or into the bush. In my own life I could say I have traversed long long paths, but I am not anywhere. Does this path have a heart? If it does, the path is good; if it doesn't, it is of no use. Both paths lead nowhere; but one has a heart, the other doesn't. One makes for a joyful journey; as long as you follow it, you are one with it. The other will make you curse your life. One makes you strong; the other weakens you.

Before you embark on any path ask the question: Does this path have a heart? If the answer is no, you will know it, and then you must choose another path. The trouble is nobody asks the question; and when a man finally realizes that he has taken a path without a heart, the path is ready to kill him. At that point very few men can stop to deliberate, and leave the path. A path without a heart is never enjoyable. You have to work hard even to take it. On the other hand, a path with heart is easy; it does not make you work at liking it.

I have told you that to choose a path you must be free from fear and ambition. The desire to learn is not ambition. It is our lot as men to want to know.
The path without a heart will turn against men and destroy them. It does not take much to die, and to seek death is to seek nothing.

For me there is only the traveling on the paths that have a heart, on any path that may have a heart. There I travel, and the only worthwhile challenge for me is to traverse its full length. And there I travel--looking, looking, breathlessly.

relief

what began as an intent for a quick hello over IM with Ami yesterday turned into a four hour conversation. some of it was just talking and relating, most of it was processing, which is to be expected to some extent. the topic was mostly around the creation of friendship ... if and how that is possible and what allows that to happen. is it time apart? is it clarity of boundaries? what is a clean break?

i know i want her in my life as a close friend. i also know that i need to be clear on the distinctions of that (what i want in friendship, what she wants). it feels good to have had some time connecting and getting more clear and explicit about all of that.

she has a lack of trust in me being honest with myself right now. that's hard to hear and a great challenge at the same time. i feel very clear around that which i feel clear about. the question is ... am i lying to myself about anything? if so, what? is there anything i am hiding from?

what i feel right now is no need to rush into anything and also no need to hide from anything. one of her concerns is that she wants to not hold things back from her friends, which means, if we were friends, she would be telling me about all her exploration right now. she wonders if i can and should handle that. for me, it doesn't feel like it makes a difference. i know, generally, that she is open to and is exploring things with other people right now. i may not know the specifics, but does that make a difference? i don't claim that it wouldn't be hard at first to hear about stuff more specifically. but the value in going through that experience for me is in creating the reality that is. what i know about myself is that i function with honesty and "knowing" much better than leaving things up to my imagination.

and that's one of the things i will sit with and really explore what feels okay to me and what doesn't.

one of the things i've been wanting most is to be in communication with her, to relate. it feels really good to have had that last night. it helps alleviate a lot of the pain of wanting that so much and not having it.

my primary focus is still on my own healing. i haven't felt capable of that the past couple days, but today i feel more positive about it.

step 1.
address these feelings of loneliness so that when i spend time with people, it's not about filling some holes in me, but just spending time with them.
it's about getting back in touch with that place within me that knows i am whole, joyful, alive.

and the big question i have for myself is: is there any part of me that is holding onto the pain for unhealthy reasons? is there some reason that i want it around? am i inflating it at all for attention or sympathy?

i have to look deep to discover the answers to those questions. in what i have found thus far, it is all genuine. it is also a mixture of stuff that is more that just ami and i separating. it has stirred up a lot of other things that also need healing.

i don't really know how to do it, but i trust i'll find my way.

it occurs to me that because i have been using this space to write about the hardest things, that it may seem as if that is the totality of my experience. yet, like any of my journals, i tend to write about the hard stuff and leave out the good. more on this later ... i am having some insights on some other stuff now but need to get back to work.

nonsense

And some moments, when i push aside the veils of my worldly attachments to people and things ... and see and feel the constant state of change and impermanence, of connection and unity ... in those moments, i feel peace. lately, these moments only last a short while, but i appreciate them.

this is hard.

Siddhartha bent down, lifted a stone from the ground and held it in his hand. "This," he said, handling it, "is a stone, and within a certain length of time it will perhaps be soil and from the soil it will become a plant, animal or man. Previously I should have said: This stone is just a stone; it has no value, it belongs to the world of Maya, but perhaps because within the cycle of change it can also become man and spirit, it is also of importance. That is what I should have thought. But now I think: This stone is stone; it is also animal, God and Buddha. i do not respect and love it because it was one thing and will become something else, but because it has already long been everything and always is everything. I love it just because it is a stone, because today and now it appears to me a stone...But I will say no more about it. Words do not express thoughts very well. They always become a little different immediately they are expressed, a little distorted, a little foolish. And yet it also pleases me and seems right that what is of value and wisdom to one man seems nonsense to another."

struggling.

i want to sit here and write tales of healing and inspiration,
of feeling on top of the world,
of being alive and happy and building the life that i dream of.

i am glad to say, somedays i do feel that.

today is not one of those days.
some days are harder than others.
days go by and i start to feel like i am opening & healing,
and then another comes and crushes me. literally crushes me.

gaaaaaawwwwwwwwwdddddddddd damnit. ow! ow! ow! ow! ow! ow!
and even that expression makes light of the feelings i have right now.

i don't know how to do this. i really don't.
why does this hurt like it did when sarah and i split up? the circumstances are so different and yet ... the emotions are so similar. that feeling of my heart - gentle, tender, deep, full - being shredded and crushed?
why is it that a woman that i have loved for just a few months can have gotten in so deep?
i guess the heart knows no time.

i don't know how to not love her as deeply as i do.
i don't know how to not want her the way i do.
i don't know how to be with those feelings.
i don't know how to watch her be in this exploration with other men so soon.

i feel like a chump.

i wish i could fool myself into thinking that i want something else.
i mean, i do want something else, don't i?
do i really want to be in pain?
do i really want to think about her all the time?

no.
and yet ... i do.

if i am to trust in the universe that everything happens for a reason and that everything that happens is perfect,
why does this feel so wrong?
and why does it hurt like hell sometimes?
why does it sometimes feel okay and other times feel like i am being eviscerated?

fuck it.
really.
fuck it all.

i'm so tired of this.
i'm tired of feeling depressed.
i'm tired of feeling desperately alone when surrounded by friends.
i'm tired of being in love with a woman to whom i am just another guy.
i'm tired of waking up at 4am.


bitch bitch moan moan.
i know.
this is terribly inelegant and not the impression i want to leave the world with of me.
but, really, fuck it. this is who i am right now.

a man ... who feels broken and alone inside ... yet carries himself with as much strength and hope as he can.
who is trying desperately to let go of being some idiotic sense of perfect.
who is trying to learn who he is more and more.
who is trying to find his intrinsic source of joy and peace and live from it.
a man who is trying to be patient and have faith that better days will come and believe that he has any fucking control over that.
that he will get past this, over this ... without turning off his heart, without turning cold and bitter, without denying what is real.

so ... how do i do that?
how do i heal from this and at the same time accept that i am very much in love with this woman, that my heart is still very much attached, that my desire for connection and intimacy with her is strong ... how do i be with that and deal with the resulting pain of that attachment?

is the only solution to kill it?
i don't want to have to kill that love to be around her.

a friend was telling me today about what Nelson Mandela said was one of his greatest fears when he was imprisoned.
he said developing hatred toward his oppressors was one of those great fears.

likewise, i don't want to hate her. far from it. i love her. i love who she is at her essence.

i feel weak for not being able to just let go.
i feel strong for even being able to deal with all this in the first place.

part of me believes that the path is to increase my own self-love and that that is the source of healing.
and another part of me believes that i have a ton of self-love and that has nothing to do with all this.
another part of me strives for that perfect buddha state of being unattached and thus, without suffering.
and another recognizes that i am human, that i'm hurt and that there is nothing else to do but be with it.

i don't want to feel this way anymore.

i'm embarrassed to post this. but something Guy said tonight resonated with me. he was talking about living from one's essence and how we often resist that because it is a vulnerable place to come from. my fear is being vulnerable to any of you. my fear is of looking weak. my fear is having to convince you that i am a strong mutherfucker. my fear is that ami will see this and pull away even more.

and yet, as much as i am wary of exposing all this, i don't want to hide it either. i choose to be who i am right now, exposing my vulnerability, risking looking weak or pathetic ... and that is totally scary to me. i feel like i just want to post things that make it look like i have my shit together, like i am strong, like i am happy, like i am transforming, learning, growing. i am all that ... but not tonight.

i know that today is just a bump in the road and that it is likely that i will feel better again tomorrow.
this is cathartic for me and i don't want to hide it all (even though i really want to hide it all).

i who have died am alive again today

It was a really good weekend over all. I love my friends. :)

On Friday, Ems was in town so we got a posse together and celebrated. It started at The Drunken Boat in Berkeley where my friend Z is so kind to take care of people with their culinary needs. Within moments of me beginning to tell Luna about the recent events of my life that have me in a kind of a tailspin lately, Z came over and offered his opinion on a cure for my woes. the prescription was two simple words: strip club. And when I mentioned that's a luxury a broke college student doesn't have in his future, my three fabulous companions (Ems, Luna, and J) all jumped in to say that they were going to take me and buy me lap dances. And for those of you who don't know, when three beautiful women tell you that they want to take you to a strip club and buy you lap dances, life ain't that bad. It really kinda puts things in perspective. :)

We then spent several hours drinking wine, eating, hot tubbing, picture-taking, connection-having, fun-making, bribe-collecting, innuendo-slinging, and tickle-fighting over at the barton house with the addition of other fine friends. the cavorting was so merry, that in the end, despite much anticipation, we decided not to break ourselves away from the comfort and warmth of home in order to head to the city for a strip club. so, instead, a new prescription was given. this time it was also two simple words: rain check.

truthfully, a night with friends like that is WAY better than a strip club, which means that (a) there's something wrong with me, (b) i'm getting older, or (c) friends are better than hot, scantily clad women (unless of course, your friends ARE hot, scantily clad women).

that night i got home way to late and woke up way too early to get the first day of my men's group retreat. so saturday was spent out in nature with 15 other men. it's all confidential-n-shit, so I can't tell you what we did specifically, but I can say that it involved lots of stuff i wouldn't write about anyway. ;)

there was an extended moment on the beach that afternoon when i was walking alone for awhile where everything just slipped away ... all my concerns, troubles, aches, pains, sorrow, anxiety, fear, ego ... and i just was. me, walking on the beach, totally present, totally me, totally joyful and alive, in the moment. i felt big, i felt possibility, i felt peace, i felt inspired, i felt solid. i felt free of all attachments.

i guess it's fair to say it was a spiritual moment, though it wasn't characterized with the feeling of being one with everything (that's a more common theme in moments that i recognize as spiritual). it surprises me how moments like that can just come along when i am out in nature, just walking along by myself, experiencing life.

it reminded me of this e.e. cummings poem:

i thank You God for most this amazing
day:for the leaping greenly spirits of trees
and a blue true dream of sky;and for everything
which is natural which is infinite which is yes

(i who have died am alive again today,
and this is the sun's birthday;this is the birth
day of life and love and wings:and of the gay
great happening illimitably earth)

how should tasting touching hearing seeing
breathing any-lifted from the no
of all nothing-human merely being
doubt unimaginably You?

(now the ears of my ears awake and
now the eyes of my eyes are opened)

~ ee


so that's that. good weekend. finding more and more value bringing more of myself to the table in my relationships. there is part of me that is longing for some discontinuous change in my life, yet i am still very much appreciating the more gradual and predictable path i am on.

jason is god

Assignment: Go to googlism.com and enter your name.
Then, read all about yourself!


jason is god
jason is that which is
jason is a therapeutic super protector
jason is not ... jason is not stupid
jason is one of new york city area's most respected
jason is possessed
jason is still here
jason is a new man
jason is a buttmuffin
jason is a sick bastard
jason is also short
jason is very correct
jason is awesome cock
jason is that which is those who are not he
jason is so happy and insane
jason is a go
jason is hostile he goes to bed every night
jason is propelled by seven dc electric thrusters that provide about 300 newtons
jason is a remotely operated vehicle
jason is currently in serious but stable condition
jason is best by 7/27/2035
jason is not likely to attack downfield
jason is helpful in advising you on the strengths and weaknesses of the offers you are getting
jason is already preparing for next year's awards
jason is one of the most muscular on the circuit as well
jason is 9 jason is 2
jason is not too bad
jason is hot
jason is going later this year
jason is currently working on his follow up to 1999's can you still feel?
jason is my boyfriend
jason is a certified master trainer for obedience and behavior modification
jason is an overemotional and extremely biased artfag social climber with a short temper and a bad habit of anthropomorphisizing household appliances
jason is the son of peaches and jesus
jason is the devil
jason is you've heard what the guys say "nathan is"
jason is back to his old tricks in an entirely new setting
jason is suddenly caught in the glare of a dozen spotlights
jason is kept under lock and key
jason is awake
jason is the total package
jason is coming over right now

Amplification

Returning to SF from my spring break has unfortunately amplified the heartache I've been dealing with. It's frustrating and aggravating to still be in the throes of this emotional journey. I know it hasn't been that long and that broken hearts aren't known for rapid healing ... sigh ... I just ... I just hate it.

So many thoughts and feelings about all this - all the time.

Some moments I feel total love and compassion for her, really understanding where she is and what she is trying to do for herself. Other moments I am so angry that she has pulled herself away so drastically ... that the choice to end our physical intimacy wasn't supposed to end our connection and friendship. Still other moments, I get pissed at myself for being so hooked into this one human being and at the same time "getting" that this is all part of what happens when you fall madly in love with someone and then "lose" them. And then there's the jealousy and the longing. There's the missing someone who was becoming one of my best friends in the world. There's the frustration at the not knowing how to be around her and not knowing what she is thinking/feeling about all this. There's the just wanting to be connected again and not knowing why that isn't happening. There's the resistance to reaching out - not willing to put myself at risk for any more rejection. There's the faith an patience that this is not a permanent phase and that things will come around. There's the resignation and bitterness that says, "Fuck you world, I don't want any of it anymore." There's the fear of this sadness pushing other people away even more. There's the appreciation of learning all that I am learning about myself. There is the mixed emotional states that come with knowing that I just want to feel wanted. And then it comes back full circle to just having total love and compassion for her, for myself, for everything.

I also get angry at myself for being so affected by all of this. She is just one woman. Why am I so fucking hung up on her? I know, I know because I'm in love with her. I can feel how the healing process is starting to harden me against her and I hate that.

I just don't know what to do. She isn't really reaching out to me and I feel like it would just be futile for me to reach out to her. I don't get it. I have to trust that behind all this distance, she is still the woman that I fell in love with and who, until recently, told me again and again how much she loved me ... how much I didn't even know how much she loved me. The woman i had the ability to open again and again just by being me. It feels as if that has all changed, and yet I resist believing that.

I guess the key is to just continue being and have patience for this transition period to play out. Perhaps we'll be close again, perhaps not. I would consider it a great loss if we aren't able to be involved in each others lives in a deep and intimate way. Right now, I just have to wait for her to be ready to want to connect again. I'm done with chasing.

I'm trying, I really am trying to balance all of these feelings. I know that everything I am feeling right now comes from this place of love. The fact that I feel unable to express that pisses me off, saddens me, and confuses me. And so I write about it here when I just can't sit with it anymore. I make it public to be honest about who I am right now. I go through parts of the day when I feel so numb and apathetic and then I notice that the numbness is just a desensitization of the overwhelm of emotion. I feel like i should be able to "just get over it," but it's not that simple. fuckin' hell.

i want a birds-eye view of it all so i can just understand what this is all about. why are things the way they are right now? is this the way it is supposed to be? is this the way it has to be? is this what she wants? is this what i need? is the love still there? is the friendship still there? am i supposed to just surrender to it all or am i supposed to be taking emotional risks to create what i want?

i don't know. i just don't know. i know what i want, and i don't know what to do about that - or if i am supposed to do anything.

I wish I was the moon tonight

new york has been great. so good to see old friends and pick up as if we saw each other last week instead of 9 years ago. and there is something refreshing about the attitude the people in this city have, there's an abrasiveness about it that is both comforting and annoying. there is certainly nothing like nyc in the world that i've ever experienced. it feels as if the city has become more cosmopolitan, however. the abundance of young, beautiful people with 'attitude' is plainly obvious. not that i am complaining at looking at beautiful people, but the "i'm too cool for even myself-ness" about many of them is both alluring and obnoxious. in others, there is a tangible honesty in just being who they are. one thing is for sure, there are lots of people in this city and i haven't yet tired of observing them all.

on friday night we went to see Neko Case at webster hall in the village. girls got a voice. it was a great show and i was very impressed with the sound at the venue, its not often you can see a show these days in a smallish venue where the voice and band are crystal clear and mixed perfectly. her voice seems to convey a distinct personality, one that is lonely and pained yet strong willed and defiant. it made me a little sad to listen to her - mostly because i was introduced to her music via ami singing to me in the car. there's still a lot of heartache there for me.

saturday night i decided to head down to the south street seaport museum to see "Bodies: The Exhibition." i'd heard about this exhibit for awhile and was going to go see it in san francisco until i found out that the one in san francisco was a different show called 'the universe within' and that it didn't hold a candle to the one here in NY. the wait was well worth it. amazing. the exhibit begins gently with the skeletal system. the bodies have been plasticized and displayed in various forms, either whole bodies or segments of. from skeletons, you move into the muscular system and are able to view multiple layers of muscle and tendon throughout the body. from there, the nervous system - where they have somehow been able to remove the entire nervous system from the body and lay it out in a case. the same for the vascular system, where there are full body exhibits of just veins and arteries as well as highlights of various body segments. and on to the organs, the reproductive system ...

it's a profound experience and i'm not sure that i can really describe how it has impacted me. to see, so clearly, the utter complexity and delicacy of our bodies and yet to know how resilient we are. having the opportunity to take this knowledge and be able to visualize it, to see how masterfully we are put together, how all of our systems are physically related in three dimensions, to see the effects on the body of disease and aging, the various forms of human development in utero ... it's a wonder we are able to survive the way we do. i highly recommend checking it out and add the disclaimer that it may make you a little nauseous at first.

in other news, i got up at the butt-crack of dawn this morning and went to the airport for my 9am flight ... only to learn that my 9am flight is tomorrow morning. whoops. but at least that left me with this beautiful, sunny extra day in NY. i spent a lot of it just walking around, checking people out, clearing my head for the final push for my graduate school career. i feel like i have been gone for so long in many respects, and yet so much of what was going on for me when i left is still so present.

i look forward to my bed. i look forward to reconnecting with friends. i look forward to getting my head back into LIT and putting into practice all that i am learning right now.


"How will you know if you found me at last
'Cause i'll be the one, be the one, be the one
With my heart in my lap
I'm so tired, I'm so tired
I wish I was the moon tonight" ~neko case

all about my mother

tuesday i spent most of the morning going through some boxes of my stuff that have been stored here with my mom for the past 5+ years. it was a fun little trip down memory lane and i found a lot of the things i've been wondering about for some time. things like:

-the entire set (minus one) of the Empire Strikes Back collectors cards that i got piece by piece as a kid
-two bags of marbles i used to play/compete with in 4th grade on the playground in maine
-my high school yearbook
-notebooks from high school and college with many unfinished letters to lovers and women i was interested in
-lists of cassette mixes i used to make for friends (i used to make a LOT of mix tapes!)
-a print out of all the saved emails from when i first started emailing back in college, including a lot of correspondence with Chrissy, my girlfriend of 3 years back in school
-photos i took, printed and mounted in high school (most of them are *horrible*)
-tapes of old bands
-and a whole lotta junk!

i wish i had the time to read all the old short stories i used to write as there are tons of them, but that will have to wait for another day. i had forgotten how much creative writing i used to do. loads and loads of it ... notebooks filled with story ideas and brief synopsis' of stories yet to be written.

in the afternoon, i decided it was time to talk to mom some more about our relationship. i felt a lot of resistance getting into it and felt where i stood at the line between choosing to say something versus choosing to go sit behind a pile of stuff and ignore it all.

i choose to say something.

i'll start by saying that what i feel now (several hours later) is like the door has been cracked open and the ground feels very fragile. kind of like walking on hard-packed snow that collapses underneath you once in awhile and you never know when that is going to occur.

but i'd have to say it was a really good day. i aired a lot of the places where i feel like i haven't wanted to open up to her and some of the reasons behind all that. she resisted getting into it a lot at first, not wanting to expose her pain, not wanting to cry, but i kept asking questions and encouraging her to tell me how she felt and what she thought. sadness begat anger. anger begat softening. softening begat understanding.

i feel like we have a long way to go and i look forward to talking more about it tomorrow. for now, it feels good to be able to share with her, very honestly, the judgments i've had, the anger, the disappointment, the frustration ... and it's felt good to hear some of that from her.

we acknowledged that, since i began high school, we haven't really connected much and almost not at all since the divorce and my going off to college. i didn't mark the divorce as such a turning point in my life and it's hard to tell if that was more or less influential than me going off to school and living on my own for the first time. it's interesting to consider the reasons are for why our relationship is the way it is, and at the same time it doesn't really matter much - examining the past is interesting, but moving forward is what is important.

what matters is uncovering what feelings are there now and discovering where i want the relationship to be. i know that we are very different people and there have been a lot of things i have resented about her over the past 15 years. i also see where i have a lot of room to accept her for who she is, give myself the chance to get to know who she is, and not think that our relationship has to look or feel any particular way. i can see how a piece of my unconscious thought-pattern has been something like, "well, if you are not my mom who looks like a-b-c, then there's nothing there for me." perhaps that's too extreme, but something along those lines seems to land for me.

so, there's more to come and i'll write of it then. i feel a lot of mixed feelings about it all. on one hand i feel accepting of everything that has occurred and see it as what needed to happen at the time and then there is also seeing how that's not how i want to be anymore. with all of this comes the more full understanding of how much i've hurt her by being closed and unwilling to share my life with her ... co-creating the reality that she has been a mother without a son in some respects. and i can't even fully imagine what that feels like as a parent.

i still feel that some of my motivation is coming from a place of feeling like I "should" be doing this - that is, I should be open to her. i'm confused about that and it bothers me to some extent that i don't feel compelled to repair this relationship from a place of deep love. not that that is not the reason ... it may very well be, but i don't *feel* it right now. in all honesty, at this very moment, i am in this because i have some intangible belief that it will be good for me in some way .... and .... because i want to be good to my mother.


i'm not expecting any particular outcome. i see an opening and that feels great. i feel some mutual understanding and that feels great. and i still feel a lot of the disappointment, frustration and annoyances that i have felt for a long time. what is different right now is that i am not holding on to that stuff. it comes and it goes. the promise i have around this is to let go of the rigidity of how i've seen her and be more open to who she is ... all while expressing myself clearly and being honest with her about what i think and feel.

so for now ... that's where i am ... looking forward to what's next.

01:02:03 04/05/06

one surefire way to get away from your heart break (for a little while anyway) is to go to a friend’s jewish wedding, eat amazing food, drink a lot, and dance with said friend’s young, hot jewish (and non-jewish) friends. i need to marry a jewish woman. not just because i tend to be very attracted to them, but because they have the most fun weddings i’ve ever been to. this one makes three and the amount of life they give to their celebrations is inspiring ... at least in my experience.

seattle was great. i got to spend some time with some old friends from SF, reconnect with some friends i met in belize, and met some awesome new peeps ta boot. new photos are up on my site for those of you who know where to look for them.

yesterday was a lot of traveling, but i didn't mind so much. i do so love my time alone. one reason i love southwest airlines ... they don't take anything too seriously. my flight into chicago was very choppy. in the last 20 minutes it felt like the plane was fishtailing the whole way in. in the seconds leading up to and during the landing, one of the flight attendants starting singing this tune over the loud speaker (to the tune of gilligan's island):

Just sit right back and you'll hear a tale,
a tale of a fateful trip.
That started out of sea-at-tle,
aboard this tiny airship.
The weather started getting rough,
the tiny ship was tossed.
If not for the courage of the fearless crew,
your cookies would be tossed, your cookies would be tossed.

And then he sang to some made-up melody:
I love you and you love me
You'll thank me for my hospitality
If you marry me, you can fly for free!

And then, when I was landing in Albany, i realized that i hadn't put any conscious thought into what it was going to be like to see my mother for the first time in almost 4 years. i was on the plane as we taxied to the gate and i just realized that i had no idea what to expect and knew that i was ready to start breaking down some big walls that have been up for a long, long time.

i remember walking toward the baggage claim where i was going to meet her feeling closed and dreading the next two days - all i could feel was how much i didn't want to be here. and then i stopped. and took a moment. and reflected back on some reading i've been doing lately in the book "The Art of Possibility". in that moment i realized i wasn't giving my mother any room to be anything other than what i had created her to be in my head over the years and decided to push that aside.

the first several moments were fine. as expected - talking about travel, the weather, food. but within what seemed like moments on the drive home, we started talking about her and my father's divorce, the specifics about the night they told my sister and i, the events leading up to that, what she was feeling about the decision before and after, how she feels about my father now .... i learned some things i never knew about the situation. i learned that she thought that i blamed her and that's why i've been so distant all these years (it makes me cry just to write that).

i asked about my reaction the night they told us. i don't remember much aside from sitting on the couch and other details like where they sat, where my sister sat and her reaction. i just remember going out and walking into the fields behind my house afterwards and sitting outside under the sky, tearless. my mother said that, in the moment, i was furious. i wouldn't let them speak. i didn't want to hear it. i recoiled into the corner of the couch telling them to shut up. and then i got up and left.

i don't remember crying about it or feeling anything about it for a couple years. one day in college it struck me that i hadn't ever felt it and i cried for a few minutes and that was it. i asked my mom what i was like after i walked out that night and she said i never said anything about it or showed any emotion ... nothing. i internalized it all and dealt with it that way.

then she asked me about ami. she didn't know what's been going on this past month. last she heard, i was madly in love and high as a kite. it was hard to visit all that and yet, not at all. i'm usually so guarded with my mom. last night i just let it all out - gave her the whole story, talked about everything i've been going through and what i've been learning, what i feel good about, what hurts like hell, what i want. and yet, i still see where i could offer more of myself in relating all that and plan to go there over these next few days.

i told her i feel like we have a lot to talk about and i don't readily know what any of that is. but i want to find out.

when we finally got home (to the house where my grandparents used to live and where i spent enough time as a child that it feels like a home i know) it was very surreal. i haven't been here in 5-6-7 years and last time i was here my grandfather was still alive. this place reminds me more of him than my grandmother, but i have so many memories of the both of them and our family in this house.

what struck me right away was that it smells exactly the same. smell is such a powerful sense. it evokes so many memories in such a unique way. the second thing i noticed is how small the place feels. almost like a doll house.

i'm staying in my grandparent's bedroom. it's weird. i pretty much never went into their room when they were alive except to wake them up from a nap or something. it's such an indescribable feeling for that to be my room for this visit and to just be *in* that space for extended periods of time.

today ... well, today is another long post to write about and i'll probably write about it later. it's late ... i just celebrated the "once in a thousand years" occurance of it being 01:02:03 o'clock on 04/05/06. i love stupid shit like that.

it's a bummer to miss my leadership training tonight and i welcome the mini-break from life back in SF.