A Tyranny Against the Wind

A Defense of Romanticism

I would begin to unwind if I could just find a reason. Ahh, my heart is so very put upon by delusions of the perfectly romantic. My heart is put upon by the absence of love. I do love myself, but that is only so much masturbation. I need to share my love with another, but not just any other. My beloved must be able to requite and in so many ways. To be saved from this put uponness, yes, I need to share my love with another. What great selfishness and cruelty is it that says we must love simply ourselves for happiness, and to need another to love is unhealthy??!! That is the sentiment of the impotent to love.

I would begin to unwind into some perfect tapestry if I could love you. Now, I am all knotted up in balls of despair over your absence, dear love of mine. And love has the singular right to possess. My love. It is the solitary privilege of the beloved, to be loved solely.
And I say to you bastards of love, those of you who no longer know what it is to sing to the night hopelessly, because you love so much, and those of you who condemn us “hopeless romantics” because we “love too much”; and to all the insensitive fucks who have written me off, to you, I say goodbye and good luck. Go live your petty lives of liking and caring, revel in your hatred. That would be good. No, you could not even do that; you lack the passion to hate. Hate, a preference to dislike for the true lovers and dreamers of true love. You feeble minded mockers of the romantic soul are like a pestering wind beating against my bedroom window at night when I try to sleep and dream of love. You feckless idlers who cannot decide, cannot commit to anything, you, the wind that blows away all of my romantic fibers and twists them into knots. I can joyfully say that I hate the wind of indecision, of middle-paths, and frozen minds, fickle hearts.
Ah, but at least the fickle hearts have some inclination to love….

And I would lay down and bask, in the silent passion of the lover’s night, I ask, who doesn’t want to find completion with another being? Who wants to die alone, let alone live that way?
I lay down and I ask. I lay down on the earth’s heaven ground and croon to the sky; at least you accept my love. Still, the hopeless romantic spirit in me waits countless eternities for you to croon back, “I love you, too.” And even if I didn’t hear these words, I would give myself to you to save you from suffering, and take away all your bad habits, strip away all your bullshit, chip away your porcelain veil…and free you. And in your letting me love you, I would begin to unwind.

But still, I suffer endless and tiresome retreats into the lonely passages of love. I am strung out on a romantic buzz with no one to share it with. I do ask, I do beg and plea, I do pray and wonder, desperately, like a naked beggar in city streets. Where, who, when, and how, love? I have standards that breach the heavens and this is why, I am certain, I suffer this despair. No one is equal to my capacity to love, when I do. And in this great feat, I am abandoned to life, loveless. So I cry and I moan, I write unyielding words, feverishly, as if to conjure the one true One –for one is all there is, in romantic love. I dance stunning solos for the setting sun and all hope of requition. Then I lay down and die a thousand deaths; I crawl into silent corners and retreat. I wonder who is there that is like this, out there, in the world. I dream. Ah, dream is the salvation of lovers. It offers a momentary relief from the cutthroat necessity to shed the brightest loving light onto the beloved, however unimbued with the ability or desire to reciprocate the feelings the beloved is.

Ah, the hopeless romantic rants. The hopeless romantic chants this tirade in hope of an answer from her love, whoever, wherever he may be. And in the twilight, finds her final repose. At least the sun loves the west, unwaveringly. And, watching the sun sink toward the body of the earth at the horizon, she finds some subtle relief in this, the singular salve of night: a glimmer of hope, even if only symbolic.
And hope is the mana of the hopeless romantic, hope, the worst thing to come out of Pandora’s Box. The hopeless romantic thrives on hope like air to a normal human being, and this is why the hopeless romantic is hopeless, or at least always almost to the point of running out, but a true and total junkie. The hopeless romantic is singularly astonishing in resourcefulness. Only the hopeless romantic can always find a glimmer of hope somewhere, somehow, someway. The hopeless romantic is a master rationalist, adroit at finding evidence for loving, of maintaining hope. Maybe, the hopeless romantic is more full of hope than any other, and thus, the most sublime, for hope represents belief in the possibility of a finer reality, attained.

But as for the search for “ideal” love, the “perfect”, it teaches hope.

The Spell

Crimson deeper speeding over the darkness
Crashing into oneness
Someone witness this
I can’t stand the idea that I’m here alone
Project my experience on the silver screen

I haven’t got time to feel like shit
Can’t you see I don’t like it
Kill myself a thousand times
And wonder why everyone wants me alive

God dam it

Who the fuck is anyone?

I would take something from anyone
I would take your shoes
And fall in love with your bleeding feet as you walk across the razor blade beam
If I knew it meant
Heaven
Nirvana
Salvation
Enlightenment
Peace
For all

One
Or
The many

Why don’t you know the truth
It isn’t something you have to prove
It’s just the way you feel
And what you think see breathe
And everything about the way that you wanna be

I can’t tell you anything
About the future
So what am I?

Never saying anything about the realities that you experience
It’s just a fucking waste
Of something
That could be true

Why do you say
Nothing

It’s a pathetic fucking god dam waste of energy

Kill yourself and do the world a favor

Because if you are not in touch with what’s real
Then you are wasting a life
Die
Reincarnate
Come back as something better
Like a rain cloud or a daffodil or a cat
Or some kind of Buddha

Otherwise
GO TO HELL

I thought you had a connection to the truth
I thought you had a connection to the truth

Everyone was saying something
I can’t hear anything
No one is saying what they mean
No one is aware of how they are

It’s scary and lonely and fucking weird

Is this happening
Right now?
Where are we?
Do you know?
Does anyone?
What have they all said?
After you are dead you realize all this shit was just an illusion
And finally
You are free

But the passion of the body
Keeps us here

Pleasure induces

Pain repells

The taste of you reminds me that there is something deeper in me
That wants to heal

I could rejoice at the thought of us on the wild beach at night
stars crashing down
Our naked bodies melting
together in the heat of the burning stars’ flame
Perfect death

There is but only this:
You and the spell

THIS

i don't want the center of the stage
i don't want to be right or care about punctuation and grammar
i rave in the darkness with the rain
i dance naked in the fire and die inside this rampant madness
disintegrated wholly yet resurrected in desire

i can't see any reason not to be
splayed out with this intensity
i lay down on the road and beg you to run over me
i stand up and make a single motion
signaling this as the thing that matters:
drowning with the fervent certainty of hell
in our delicious ocean

the plants need watering and everything is cut down
i want the overgrowth and wildness and flooding mystery of passion
i'm blind and lost in this great season
open my eyes like a child at dawn
my heart is wild among the lush blooms
i follow the footsteps through the garden
strung out on treason

i can't even lay down or sit still or begin to think about anything
i want to thrash on the keyboard and bang drums with my bare hands
i want to roll in the mud and get dirty
i want to break everything and scream YES!
and go running in the sands that came from the degeneration of great mountains

until it all means something
and everything is nothing again

A Hole at the Center of the Galaxy

This morning, I opened up the latest issue of Time magazine and read that a team of German Astronomers has confirmed the existence of a giant black hole at the center of the Milky Way.

"How interesting, how cool, how.. scary!" I thought.

I immediately thought of all the reading I've been doing about the Mayan and Incan time prophecies for 2012. These prophesies suggest that the Earth will be at the center of the galaxy in 2012 and that there will be huge and life changing shifts on planet Earth at that time.

So, then, I thought... if the black hole is at the center of the galaxy, and Earth will be at the center of the galaxy in 2012, does that mean Earth will be in the black hole in 2012? What will happen if Earth is in a black hole? Will we live? Will we be conscious? What kinds of changes can we expect?

This is very stimulating information that I wish to explore and meditate upon.
The first thoughts and feelings that come to me about the prospect of Earth being at the center of the Galaxy with the Black Hole is of peace and joy, of glorious movement and deep transformation. I feel good about this. It feels like a wonderful thing!

So, over tea, while looking out at snow covered land, I pondered this. I stared at the sky, a pale blue in the dawn's light. My sight traced the lines of snow along the douglas fir branches across the way as my internal sight envisioned the galaxy, a gorgeous swatch of stars and dust and light and movement, with US, all the beings on Earth, dancing in the center of it in a climactic celebration of all that is.

My tea cup empty and my back stiff, I got up to heat more water and stretch. Then I made my way up to my office, an alcove with a nice western view of the fir trees and sky. I opened my gmail to see who might be communicating to me this day. And there, a letter from Alberto Villoldo, a shaman in the Incan tradition and founder of the Healing the Light Body School. Every month I receive a newsletter from him, and I always find the information he shares to be relevant and timely.
What a giant smile grew widely across my being as I saw the title of his newsletter:

THE HOLE AT THE CENTER OF THE GALAXY

So I read....
And I'd like to share it with you.
Here it is, in entirety, from his website at http://thefourwinds.com/newsletter/DEC2008/hole-alberto.html :

"The Hole at the Center of the Galaxy

Xibalba is the Mayan underworld, the "place of fear." The prophets and day-keepers of the Yucatan described this as the dark rift in the Milky Way. This is the place of our beginning and of our return. An according to lore, the gates of Xibalba would open before the great planetary alignment that would occur on December 21, 2012.

Recently I read an article entitled "Milky Way's Giant Black Hole Awoke from Slumber 300 Years Ago" authored by scientists Robert Naeye and Rob Gutro of the Goddard Space Flight Center. It seems that the gigantic black hole at the center of our galaxy, with a mass that is more than 4 million times that of our sun, has awakened from a long sleep, and begun to emit huge outbursts of radiation.

Black holes in space are so dense that not even light can escape from them, as they gobble up anything and everything in their path. But it appears that they also play an important role in the birth and formation of galaxies, and seem to be at the center of many of our nearby constellations. How did ancient astronomers know that this was the source of beginnings and endings? And why did they refer to it as the "place of fear"?

One of the meditation practices of shamans-in-training consists of finding your "star". To do this, you scan the night sky and find a distant sun that calls to you in some way. Then you sit quietly and gaze at the point of light, following instructions to direct your awareness along that beam of starlight back to its source. Even though it took millions of years for that light to reach the earth, the seers of old believed that the mind could travel instantaneously. Just like in dreams when we are able to journey to distant lands, or even visit relatives and friends from the past, the shaman's discipline allowed them to ride a beam of starlight to its source. Once you found your star, it would protect you and guide you throughout the rest of your days.

The lore of the shamans say that even as you can travel along a beam of light, then you can also travel along a beam of darkness, of the invisible starlight. We know that the black hole at the center of the galaxy has woken up from its long slumber and started to emit invisible radiation, massive outbursts of X-rays. Could the seers of old have made this fantastic journey to the center of the Milky Way, to the "place of fear"? As I was musing about this, I asked myself if even consciousness would be trapped in the immense gravitational pull of a black hole. How close could you come to the edge of infinity?

The galactic center is 26,000 light years away. On December 21, 2012, our solar system will come into perfect alignment with the center of the galaxy, an event that occurs only every 26,000 years, and that the Maya and other indigenous peoples of the Americas prophesied would be a time of tremendous upheaval, the end of one way of life and the birth of a new one. They foresaw the journey back through Xibalba and through the time of fear that many are experiencing today. And they left us a message of hope.

This is a time of birth, of beginnings, a moment in history fraught with opportunity. It is a time for courage, for purity, for integrity, and for holding forth our highest dreams and hopes. A time of the dawn of a new day.

Have a joyous holiday season, and join us on December 21, 2008 for a meditation, in ceremony or around a fire – a candle, a bonfire, or by your fireplace, to give thanks to Mother Earth for her bounty and to the Great Spirit, and to dream a new world into being.

In Peace, Alberto Villoldo PhD"

I hope you enjoyed this!
What do you think about the Earth being in the center of the galaxy in 2012 with the black hole that lives there?

In harmonic love and delighted joy,
Leila

Now we connect online... and it's socially acceptable behavior

But, I remember a time, years ago (sometime in the late 90s), when people in my life thought there was something wrong with me for talking to people online.

Now, communicating with people online is ubiquitous.
It's happening everywhere, all the time.
It is how businesses are run, it's how many people socialize and keep abreast of current events.
It's a way people share and commune and express and even create.

The way people can react with such fear and paranoia, with judgment and de-valuation is an interesting phenomenon that seems so common to the history of humanity.

Perhaps when we are ignorant of something, when we don't understand it, and it is strange and new, it can seem scary and threatening, so we react in fear.

I suppose this is why my roommates, family, boyfriend, and others thought that I had a problem, that the people I spoke to online were "not real". Yes, I kid you not, that is a term that was often used regarding the people I interacted with online. They were fake or imaginary.
Are you imaginary? I think you are very real.

This is why it struck me as so bizarre that the people in my life could not imagine another human being sitting at their computer typing back to me. They could not grok that we were talking, interacting, sharing, socializing, and being together through cyberspace.

There was a time when people thought that chatting at work was counterproductive, or "goofing off on the job", and now, how ironic that chat is actually conducive to greater work productivity when people can make a few taps with their fingers and accomplish incredible efficiency in their work. Instead of walking across the department, or flying to another area of the world for a meeting, instant chat is right here, waiting for us to leap into the acceleration of space and time with immediate information and energy exchange.

It's amazing!

I've longed appreciated the paradigmatic change that online socializing represents.
It brings people together who normally would never have met or had anything to do with one another. It's how I met my husband.

It helps bridge barriers to social connections, in that it allows people to overcome or completely bypass any fears based on insecurity about appearance.

Communicating online circumvents any inconvenience based on travel cost and time.

And isn't there something totally disarming and empowering (yes, I use those words together for effect) about sitting at home, free to say and express and share whatever you dare, whatever you deign, whatever you can muster that you might not normally achieve in an in person social setting.

Yes, I think that talking, interacting, and socializing online can help to encourage us to say what we think and feel and mean, to take the time to explore that, and to reach out to people in ways we might not if there were no internet.

And have you noticed that you can sense another person's vibe, mood, quality of being, way of being, personality, energy, essence, while interacting with them online? It's not just dry words on a screen. It's THAT person, and you can feel and experience them as them, and not as filtered through some cold, impersonal mechanism that I hear so many luddites labeling the internet as.

Indeed, I think there is something profoundly "spiritual" about online socializing because it takes away a lot of the physicality and even psychological reference points and allows you to connect, in perhaps a more pure and refined way, with others. Even though you are sitting "alone" at your keyboard and monitor, you are in reality "WITH" the person on the other end of your online interaction, sharing a social engagement that is just as real as meeting for a movie or coffee or a drink.

....

Giving Thanks and Being Grateful

I am thankful for so many things.

Often times I forget this.

Isn't that weird?

Often times, I notice that I notice what I'm not thankful for.

Why do we send so much negative energy out into the world? Just the mere act of thinking about something we don't like, of judging and place a valuation on a thing that exists is a damnation, a blasphemy of existence, yes, a sin.

I've been studying the Science of Mind with Amy Aspell and two other amazing women. In this workshop, I'm re-learning about the fact that our thoughts create reality.

It's true.

Long ago, while sitting on the rocky shores of Baker Beach in San Francisco, alone, in the fog and wind and cold mists, as I spied the tips of the Golden Gate Bridge, peaking out from the moody depths of grey, I scrawled in the sand with some driftwood:

THE POWER OF THOUGHT
THINK IT - MAKE IT
THINK IT - BREAK IT
THE POWER OF THOUGHT
CONCENTRATE - CREATE

I was 17 at the time that I wrote this.
I hadn't read it anywhere.
I was staring at nature's majesty and heard this message come in with the crashing waves.
It felt so powerful. It was so novel to me, that I had to write it in the sand.
I then sat there and watched as the tide slowly came in and the water rushed up and washed away my message.
But I never forgot the words.
What I forgot, and remember, and forget, and remember is the truth of them...
We do have the power to create reality with our thoughts... And time and time again I hear affirmations and reminders of this all around me...

In this workshop I'm reminded about the power of the Law of Attraction, which has been popularized in the book, The Secret, by Rhonda Byrne.

The most important message that I am receiving in my life at this time is that I have the power to create my own experience of life.
This makes me think of Aristotle's line that you can judge the character of a person, not by what happens to the person, but by how the person deal with what happens to him or her...
I've always been struck by this. I first read that line long ago while studying Philosophy at Berkeley and other universities around the world. I read the Nicomachean Ethics and Aristotle's ideas about happiness and the meaning of life.
I had a fantastic professor who advised that anyone interested in this should read Heidegger, who is "a long series of footnotes on Aristotle."


I highly recommend reading Heidegger's Being and Time and Aristotles Nicomachean Ethics.. It's good bedtime reading.. something to chomp off and digest in your subconscious while sleeping...

But now... as we are experiencing a Holiday in the United States that seems to have been founded on genocide and acculturation, I find that I'm keenly aware of experiencing gratitude.

I'm thankful for the fact that I'm not living in a war zone, that I don't have AIDS, that I'm able to hear Beethoven's illustrious 9th Symphony and watch movies and sunsets and crashing waves on jagged shorelines.

I'm thankful that I have a loving husband who is gentle and funny and oh so kind.

I'm thankful that I have a roof over my head, a warm bed, a computer with internet connection and fingers to type with.

I'm thankful that Jesus Christ died for my sins... that he came to show us the secret of RESURRECTION and eternal life....

I'm thankful for all the mystics and sages who have pulled back the curtain on life's secrets to help us all become more conscious.

I'm thankful for all the people in the world who are doing what they can do end suffering, raise consciousness, and create a better reality for all of us.

May we be part of this good.
May we be inspired to recognize the beauty in the world and reflect that beauty in all we do.
May we act from wisdom and compassion, like the great Bodhisatvas.
May we align ourselves with Right Action, Right Mind, Right Thought, Right Feeling.
May we be peaceful, kind, loving, and aware.

At this time, may we all realize how connected we are to one another. May we all participate together in dreaming the most amazingly beautiful and peaceful reality into being.
At this time, may we all join in prayer for the GOOD OF ALL.

I am grateful for you reading this.
I am grateful for this.
I am grateful.
I AM.

I've been Facebooking

I've been very active on Facebook lately. Check me out, there. It's a nice way and place to interact with others in a non-linear time-frame.
You can post information about yourself, what you are doing, share thoughts, notes, photos and check out what people you know are up to without needing to interact at the same time.

Facebook represents a new paradigm of communicating and sharing and being in community.

Check it out, sign up, it's free.... and fun!

Be Vigilant and Attentive!!!

"We must be vigilant and attentive without engaging the world with drama. Now is the time to heal ourselves and our culture, to reevaluate and reexamine all belief structures, to cull what needs to be shifted and to allow ourselves to be renewed and reborn..." -Alberto Villoldo