timeheals

They told me what the Dream was and they told me how to attain it. The way they talked, it was as if it was a map that could be followed from Point A to Point B. Foolproof. They only told me, though. They never showed me. I wondered about that for a bit, but the answer came quick. You can’t show someone something you don’t have. Nevertheless, I wrote down the way and I stuffed the paper in my pocket for another day.

After a couple years and some careful consideration, the destination looked good, but I didn’t like the map. So I set it on fire and took off running through the streets, a general picture of the destination in my head and determination in my chest. I ran through traffic and dodged cars. I jumped fences, violated borders. I entertained the company of any path that seemed like a shortcut. I ran fast and I ran hard. My heart beat in my ears and my lungs burned in my throat. My eyes watered from the wind and my legs screamed for me to stop. But I had burned the map and intensity was the only way to make up the time lost to a poor sense of direction. I ran fast and I ran hard and I don’t remember a single thing about the trip. But eventually I ended up exactly where they said I was supposed to be.

I had achieved the American Dream. I walked around in that place for awhile. It was pretty empty and the people that did inhabit reminded me of the zombies I had seen on TV. Cycles. That’s all they had. Cycles and secondary experience. Everything looked the same. Their wasn’t much virtue aside from the firm belief in assumptions based on other assumptions. And when I looked really close, everything was built on quicksand.

I once had the American Dream. But I gave it back. My own dreams are way fucking brighter. So are yours. Don’t let anyone tell you otherwise.

These are not new ideas. Every human being alive or dead (and even a few zombies) knows everything I’m about to say intrinsically. This is just my spin on it. St. Francis once said (and it has been repeated millions of times by millions of people around the world) that:

I’ve contemplated these words for many years and found various and sundry ways to relate to them. But I think, on a frantic bike ride through South Glendale in the middle of a 109 degree afternoon (Fahrenheit not Celsius you commies) the Gods of Heat Stroke and Delirium bequeathed to me the most practical understanding I’ve ever had. The words are obviously a metaphor. St. Francis wasn’t a Heaven’s Gate type of character. Although one could make a pretty sound argument that he stood just a little bit that side of nutso.

Everybody knows that death is just some kind of veil that we can’t see beyond. No matter what your religious beliefs or ideology, everyone can agree that beyond death, there is something. And in this case, I even include nothing in the category of something. It doesn’t matter to me. And this isn’t meant to draw up that debate. Imagine that you’re standing before a house inside of which you’ve never been. The front door is closed. You have no idea what the inside looks like, but you know that there is something inside, even if it’s rubble, or an interior recently decorated by the design heroes from Trading Spaces, or stacks of newspapers held sturdy by cat shit mortar produced by an army of live-in cat shit mortar producing feline architects. I only paint that picture for you because I’ve been in houses like that. I don’t want to get off topic too much, but if you have relatives that have said good-bye to the world of reasonable use of space and have dedicated themselves wholeheartedly to collecting small mammals, garbage, and immobile, plantlike mystery organisms that seem to spontaneously erupt on the walls, floor, and ceiling, please intervene before they start having chest pain at 3 in the morning, for the sake of the people that have to come get them out of their house and take them to the hospital. No one wants to be crushed to death by an 1800 lb. stack of grocery store coupons from 1984… especially with that smell in their nose. Anyway, death is like that (the first thing, not the hoarders thing). It’s just a door you can’t see beyond because you haven’t tried to turn the knob and no one has invited you in… yet. Don’t worry. We all get to go inside someday. Most of us don’t even bother to look in the window next to the door to sneak a peek. The curtains are always open. But no one wants to be that weirdo whose head pops up from the bottom corner of the window with a stupid, searching look on their face.

Death is what most of us fear, correct?

I firmly believe that St. Francis’s words were meant for the living (and those few undead lucky enough to comprehend the idiosyncrasies of human existence). And so all this talk about death to the self… pretty morbid, right? Wrong sucker. It is one of the most essential lessons we could possibly take to heart. It’s about living. That’s why there’s the second part. The promise of some great reward if we just challenge death. It has been said that past the point of exhaustion, we find freedom. How many have ever hit the wall and pushed and pushed, dug deeper to find something, anything to keep us going? Very few. Be honest with yourself. But it is just like the door to death. We don’t know what’s on the other side. St. Francis’s words are that window next to the door. Beyond exhaustion, freedom. There comes a point where the pain stops and something miraculous begins to happen. Growth. You find that you are made of more than you ever imagined. You discover that you are limitless. You turn to see that you didn’t just open that door, you kicked it clean off the hinges. It will remain open and you may now pass freely.

But getting to that point is no picnic. Every step you take toward and through exhaustion becomes exponentially heavier. The weight of the entire world is pressing upon you. Everything you’ve been told you couldn’t do, everything you’ve convinced yourself was unpleasant or painful, every paradigm of negativity in your mind will be pushing you to stop. But somehow, you must have a reason to go on. There must be something, just one thing that drives you to choose death over defeat (don’t worry, you probably won’t actually die). Because once you’ve sincerely decided in favor of death over defeat, the only possible outcome is for that door to get kicked in. If you persevere, someday you’ll find yourself unstoppable, discover that what you truly are radiates outward eternally. I have only seen one thing in this world powerful enough to motivate that kind of change. Well two things. But they go hand in hand. Love and compassion. And it’s probably because love and a competitive nature are only separated by a very fine line. One of them is obviously a higher ideal. Guess which one? Learning to love makes you a stronger competitor, when necessary. Whereas learning to compete doesn’t make you adept at loving. When you face this metaphorical death, or we’ll call it the “Monster of Your Dissenting Mind” or we can just call it a bit of profound discomfort, it does you no good to hate it and try to compete with it, to beat it for selfish reasons. You have to learn to love it and be motivated by something greater than yourself to overcome, be it family, service to others, or the reward of a double chocolate chip, vanilla ice cream pizookie at the end of the day. You have to learn to recognize the discomfort and associate with the end result. That growth. That completeness. The actual purpose of your existence (mystery solved). You have to be waiting, prepared, weapons in hand for when that Monster comes rearing its ugly head, you have to revel in its appearance, and then for it’s own good and with love in your heart, you have to subdue it. And I think that’s what St. Francis was talking about. In my own simpler, more practical language:

There are hundreds and thousands of people out there who will tell you that any discomfort you feel, any fright, any pain, is repaid ten fold if you just resolve to carry it for only as long as is absolutely necessary on your way to where you’re going. It’s a pretty simple concept, but not easy to do. Take stock of everything inside of you. Be brutally honest about the components that make you who you are. Identify anything that is unnecessary or worthless. Then trim it away like a butcher does rotted meat. Or if you want a more flower metaphor, chip away at the stone, the was sculptor does to reveal the composition of beauty that was always living inside that lifeless block of rock. I like the rotted meat thing better. It takes a tremendous amount of artistry and precision to do this well. But human beings have an intrinsic capacity for change. We just seem to forget. Often.

This one is specifically dedicated to my family. You’re all being put on notice. Something’s gotta change soon. There isn’t one among us that doesn’t have something big we need to tackle, address, repair, or change. Figure out what it is, and get to work. Otherwise we just perpetuate the patterns of the past indefinitely. How boring! And I’m not just pointing fingers. I include myself in all of this.

A number of years ago I made the acquaintance of a gentlemen who later married and infiltrated my sister’s uterus to make this thing. He’s now 1 year old:

Searching through my computer I found a message I pinned to my front door for a couple weeks before the arrival of Stave (phonetic spelling).  It served its purpose.  No one was injured.  It is reprinted here in its entirety for your enjoyment.  Much of the humor is topical, so try and transport yourself back to a simpler time, a happier time, 2007.