Prepared

The Watchers (CAI, year after year)

To say I walked into the world unprepared

would assume there was a way to prepare me

to prevent me from mistaking me

for human

from expecting me to be like them, and 

- the true blind side -

expecting them to be like me;

that there might have been a way for me 

to hide; 

to spare me 

from reducing me to please;

from pulling my skin to pieces trying to make it fit better

for the ease and comfort of literally

anyone else but me;

that I could have been more ready to face them

to face me, even thrive if I'd gone in expecting

knowing and prepared, to be

an alien in human skin

playing to stay alive,

trying to have some fun

a million to one.

(Listen to Happy Rhodes: One Alien )

Stepping carefully

 

Watch where you step!

In the field my giant feet wreak havoc

each step trampling more unseen life than I can count

be accountable to

accountable for

more than I could ever pay

back.

So I give more care in how I go

place heel to toe, nice and slow

apologizing as I go

giving everyone plenty of time

to get out of my way.

And, hey, isn’t that just how I live?

I’d sure love to play 

in your meadows

running roughshod with the glee of being me

with you

but I’d trample your tender wings before you even had a chance to fly

so I try to be careful

I try.

In case you wondered what the hell they're thinking

People are animals with a temperament to match so we shouldn't be surprised that they behave in ways we don't like. However, there is the expectation of those engaged in the "civil societies" of humanity that we learn, develop, grow, strengthen, and exercise a certain level of self-control, of restraint, to maintain peaceful co-existence. Some people really resent that expectation. They see any request about learning or strengthening or growing their self-discipline as a direct attack on their humanity and their preference that they be allowed to react and behave just as they feel, authentically, in line with their temperaments. It feels like an attack on self to be asked to hold oneself in check. They already resent that they are expected to be polite to the bumbling cashier, not shout at the annoying children, choose more careful words when addressing some people, put aside their distaste for others and act like everyone is equal. When they do begrudgingly try to conform to the constrictions of "civil society" they are told it's not enough, more is required, ongoing learning and developing and growth and exercise, more restraint across more categories. They feel overwhelmed, attacked, unvalued, and afraid, because if they can't live up to the required level of "civility" that keeps shifting and moving further from comfort, they may face social consequences, and we are trapped in the social systems in which we live without alternative, with those systems increasingly controlling and starving us. So they go on the attack. They demand their right to be just as they are, human in temperament, and act just how they feel, and be accepted without any work or modification on their part to accommodate people whom, when they are truly honest about it, they don't really care about and in fact, disdain for needing "special treatment" and resent for highlighting yet another way that civil society can demand a constriction and a growth. So they forget, in all that, who they really are, what love looks and feel like in their hearts, and empathy is banished unless it applies to them and their own. And from that context they believe and act in the only ways that make sense in that context, and cling to that context because it encompasses their identity, now, and is required to allow them to feel okay. 

But people do better when they are not in scarcity and fear. That is what needs to be tackled first. 

Right Here

All Lines to Light (CAI 2023)

So much of love is proximity

would you love me

if I were closer
if I were right there
would you care to know
me deeply truly madly as I am?
Would you see what no one sees and
BAM!
be mine?
Or pass me by as too familiar
not quite special
close to home?

Is it me or opportunity that keeps us so unknown when we both contain the multitudes of being in our bones and it's calling calling calling us to join hands and walk home

together?
What if I were right there?
Would you love me then?
Here I am. 

The Universal desperately wants to know itself through life. That's the purpose of life. As me, as you, as them, as grass, as molecules, as bacteria, as dogs. Desperate isn't the right word - passionately? encompassingly? yearningly? The Universal is being itself. We are cells in that body. 

The Universal takes joy in knowing itself by being. 

The Universal takes joy in knowing itself by being
from Midjourney

Earth is a tender morsel, a tiny delight that fills the mouth.

god knows

(Inside - from Midjourney AI)

You are meat and bone and sinew, tenuous

tenacious glued parts and pieces

receiving direction

from god knows where

Spending time

 

Time contains a life (CAI with Midjourney AI)

Time is the only currency of our lives

one of the only things we spend 

without knowing how much we have. 

Ordinary Magic (A Maverick Missive)

Lacey Decorations (CAI)

 He asks me, 

is this world's ordinary not extraordinary enough

for you?

how would one miracle more be a cure for your incessant longing?

it's true,

but in that sneery way he has of always being right

so right away I turn away

unwilling to quite accept his flayed refrain

its insult contained in the idea that I could 

- like taking some kind of potion -

that I should

twist my heart and mind and notions

refine myself until I feel

- actually feel - 

complete and joyously ecstatic, 

bearing witness

to only ordinary magic. 

Life's funny that way

All is light (CAI 2019)

 We live in a system that has co-opted all of the world's resources into the game of capitalism, to the harm of the planet and the unwellness of the majority of the world's living, conscious creatures. Shifting that system towards wellness requires significant re-thinking of the relationships among governments, service organizations, for-profit organizations, citizens, and resources. The people in charge have no incentive to rethink those relationships, except one: self-interest. And so they do think constantly about reshaping those relationships, to the further detriment of Earth and all life here, while we just live our lives, not wanting to think about all those hard things, while they dismantle the bits of progress that have been made and put a stop to any movement in the right directions, while actively changing our systems to suit the top 1% regardless of the harm to anyone else. The majority of people being harmed would fight tooth and nail to keep it this way. That is the nature of the planet on which I stand. That is the nature of the creatures I live among. It's baffling, and it's terrifying. Everything is made of energy. None of this exists. 

The taste of love

We serve our love with the flavour of our maturity. 

Some of us taste like blue cheese 

Maturity (CAI)

Futile flailing

As above so below (CAI a long time ago)

When I read The Time Traveller's Wife (which I hated, btw), the thing that struck me about all those miscarriages is that she kept trying. I had one miscarriage and it devastated me in a visceral way. It kept me from letitng myself feel ready to love another pregnancy until it was at a point where it might live on its own. I was lucky, my next two pregnancies produced two amazing humans that I am honoured to be raising. But if I'd had another one, I think there's no way I'd keep trying. I would reconcile myself to a childless life before going through that again. 

But I may be wrong, based on how I live my life. Because when it comes to my creative birth, all I have are a series of miscarriages - projects began with love, holding such promise and my heart, but unable to make it past the first trimester because of money (mostly), time (also mostly) and energy (see time and money). I had a stillbirth project, nurtured and loved over a dozen years, taken to the brink of birth, only to die off due to lack of oxygen. Or, money, time, and energy. Or, Covid. I grieve.

Now I have a new project struggling in the first trimester, and I can't help but notice, I'm exactly where I've been for 15 years. I changed every single thing about my life, but somehow all the fundamentals are exactly the same, and I am in precisely the same place even though it looks completely different. No closer. Further off, because I don't have the joy or hope of a new project, just the drudge-dread feeling that I've been here too many times and I know how this story peters off and lets me down. My hope starts sounding hollow to myself. I can't even bring myself to talk with people about my project with excitement; in fact, I sound a little dejected, as though I'm embarrassed to be seen with it, as though it's already failed. Like what I'm trying to do is too big and also, no one will even get it, and anyway, I will probably never finish it or even get it past prototype. So. 

And the weird thing is, I am still fucking writing it. 

Silent Agreement

Community (CAI 2021)

In relationship, chosen or imposed, we encounter difficulties and irritation with other people. Some personalities simply don't work well together, and for the most part, we choose to build relationships with people where that isn't the case. But we all have plenty of relationships, between work, neighbourhoods, and family, where our lives are entwined with people who have personalities that we find difficult, or who don't like us. 

When difficulties and irritation arise, there are two groups of responses - to address, or to ignore. 

If we choose to address, we risk conflict, so we often choose to ignore. 

If we ignore, we are responsible to LET IT GO. If we ignore and do not let it go, but instead add it to the Pile of Resentments, the pile will grow until it is too big to ignore. It is an important step of maturity to learn to Let It Go. For real. Truly. Not pretending to, not being the bigger person but secretly holding the resentment, not telling yourself you've let it go when really, you're still holding on. It involves self reflection. It involves employing empathy and compassion. It involves curiosity about the other person and caring about them. It's work. Work we do when we are in relationship with someone.

When we are stuck entwined with people we aren't well matched to, where it's hard to get along, we can assume a silent agreement between us, to use the years we will be entwined to better know each other so we can find more parts to respect and like; to use a thought-filter that gives the person affection and compassion; to actively look to build empathy for that person's experience; to give that person space to be themselves even when it's uncomfortable; to recognize where we're imposing expectations on that person and creating our own disappointment; and on, and on. Relationship happens over a long period of time. We will have many opportunities to practice these things, stumbling together with the trust that we are building relationship. Many chances of difficulty or irritation are bound to arise. We are bound to each other, so we must face them together. 

If our silent agreement is in place, the decision to address or ignore is made in that context. I may ignore a lot of things, and let them go as best I can, over time, and try to keep my resentment pile from growing. I may address important things, so that we can talk about what I'm feeling and what might help, risking offense, risking conflict, because the relationship is important enough to be worth working through conflict, with the silently agreed-to goal of mutual understanding and the silently-agreed rules.  I can actively try not to blame them, to look more fairly at my own part, be willing to deal with that. 

But what I can't do, what a relationship can't withstand, is Ignoring AND Holding On. Because that is a breach of the silent agreement. That is a failure to apply the rules of mutual understanding to the situation. It's a failure to keep the resentment pile from growing, and it will lead to Big C Conflict instead of the small conflict that could have prevented it, because the Conflict will contain all our resentment, everything we failed to Let Go because we failed to do our own work in the relationship by working on our own thinking. 

I think the silence of the agreement is the first part of the issue.

 

This wokening snowflake has boundaries and won't be gaslighted.

I’ve been horrified to see how the quickly the bully culture co-opts and destroys language before it can be useful in people’s growth and healing. The victims finally have a language and the bullies don’t like it. 

When I was growing up I didn’t have the words for how I was bullied - gaslighting! Now I have a word that captures the sinking feeling of being shown how wrong your very instincts must be, again, to feel that you’re being harmed in any way when the person you admire, even love, is telling you that it’s all in your head, that what you remember didn’t happen, that what you know isn’t true. Gaslighting. That’s a thing, it’s not my imagination, there’s a word for that! What a relief, to have a way to name it quickly, that nebulous, slippery set of symptoms that don’t quite add up to something you can prove and put a stop to. Thank you. Now I can see it, name it, recognize it, consider it and not dismiss my inner knowing. 

Think about all the insults - Snowflake! Liberal! Woke! 

Like considering yourself unique and special is laughable. Like being open minded to new ideas is despicable. Like paying attention to the experiences of other people means you’re not authentic. 

We had those words, finally, a way to shorthand very important, key learnings on a journey of personal growth, and they have turned them to insults, actions to be avoided. While we, ever the victims, put our heads down and tried to avoid their fists.

The bullies are doing to our language what they do to everything we love about ourselves. They belittle and sneer. They turn our words into weapons of shame, just like they do our differences, because they are bullies. They use whatever weakness they see to get an upper hand, feel strong, and sway the stupid, following sidekicks to do the same. Whatever reasons, whatever work they’ve done in their lives to grow up so this manifests in more socially acceptable ways (such as controlling a conversation, talking over someone, belittling their experience, teasing them about their stutter or appearance, laughing when they make a mistake, telling people not to be so sensitive and it’s just a joke), at the end of they day they have a bullying personality. So they will bully. They will look for weakness and poke at it, and they will look for strength and try to take it, turn it to weakness, weaponize it against us. To feel in control. For whatever fucked up reasons have fucked up their minds, hearts, and spirits that has NOTHING TO DO WITH US. For these reasons they don’t even know, they have successfully been stealing the words we use to describe how their behaviour affects us. Ooooh, whiny snowflake, did someone step on your BOUNDARIES and then try to GASLIGHT YOU? Boo hooooo hoooooo. They are silencing our voices, or worse, getting us to pre-emptively silence ourselves. They are undermining our ability to describe our experience. 

Anyone who sneers at another person who is trying to describe their experience is an asshole. Even if we love them. So don’t mind if I don’t let them decide what words I use to describe my experience.

Reaching for the pot from the fry pan

CAI & CDG, sometime ago

My guardian, my pimp, you left me here to navigate this plane alone, and I may never forgive you. 

I already have. You never left. 

Far enough to let me breathe becomes too far to keep me whole. Oscillation drags us down.

What is left? Left to do, now, what can be done, what will doing do, now? Left is right. Can we right what's left now?

When will you lift the heavy you use to hold me down? You say, that is death. You may be right. I may be left here yet. I've waited for the time and the time passed without coming. I've waited for the means but that means I'm always waiting. 

What do I want, anyway? A quite life, to waste away the days breathing life and playing? Yes. Yes. Yes. And loving and making. Not doing. Not doing and taking and doing some more. But don't we all? Want that? Doesn't everyone want peace?

Why should I have heaven while others live here in hell? How can I make my peace while the world burns?

Listen to Happy Rhodes. https://youtu.be/kCu5rPSQdDE

(Open Letter) to Joan Cusack

 Thank you for being a touchstone at every point in my life. You appear in more of my favourite movies than any other actor. You consistently choose films and characters that offer insight and range; you are completely your characters and completely yourself. You work with your brother which leads me to think you have genuine affection, which warms my heart and gives me hope. You seem like a person who cares deeply and also doesn't give two fucks, which attracts me like honey. I would know your voice anywhere, I pick it out all the time, and it's like a little gift, a reminder that you're out there, in the world, existing and creating beauty and curiosity around you just by existing, every time you unexpectedly show up. I even kind of remember you in movies that you weren't in, but should have been. I can reimagine every movie I've ever seen, and every movie I ever will see, with you in it. You always belong. I love that you're real. 

Misted

Sometimes I catch the mirror

or it catches me; I stop

arrested by the sight of me, my beauty

a surprise

always a surprise to see.

I face me, head on

eye to eye

clear blue shining life crinkles warm with love for me

and I wonder: can anyone else see what I see? 

or is this beauty just for me?

hidden in plain sight, a missed surprise

a mist between my beauty and their eyes.  

(it's no coincidence that mist and missed are the same word)

An Open Letter to Catherine Keener

 A Wind in the Door (CAI)

Dear Ms. Keener,

Do you realize that you may be the coolest person alive?

with warm regards,

CAI

 

Doing anything is hard

Horizon (CAI 2021)

Doing anything is hard

like

anything at all.

When anyone does anything

like

anyone at all

they should be honoured

proud

we should celebrate that something

anything at all

actually

got 

done

when

we 

make 

it

so

hard

to 

do

anything

at

all.

Divvying up the pie (last slice)

The entire world economy is currently worth $87.55 trillion dollars. There are only 87.5 trillions in our entire world economy. Please note: 

Jeff Bezos is the richest man in the world with a net worth of $107.1 billion. will be the first billionaire to become a trillionaire in 2026 at the age of 62. 

Xu Jiayin will be the second billionaire to turn a trillionaire in 2027 at the age of 68. 

Jack Ma, will be the third man to hit one trillion Dollars net worth in 2030, at the age of 65. 

Ma Huateng, also known as the Pony Ma, will become a trillionaire by the time he’s 61 years old in 2033. 

Mukesh Ambani, is expected to hit one trillion by 2033 by which time he will be 75 years old. 

Bernard Arnault will probably become a trillionaire by 2032 at 84 years old. 

Mark Zuckerberg will be the youngest person to make a trillion at the age of 51 years in 2036. 

Steve Ballmer, former CEO of Microsoft, is also set to hit a trillion in 2040 when he will be 83 years old. 

Michael Dell will have made his first trillion by 2043 by when he will be 78 years old. 

Larry Page and Sergey Brin are both set to hit $1 trillion by 2051 at the age of 77 years.

That's 11. Of 87.5. Owned by 11 guys in our lifetime. In their lifetime. And forever after tied in inheritance, never again part of the world economy the rest of us share. We're down to the last pass on the Monopoly Board and there are only about a dozen people on Earth who will win if we keep letting the systems run us. 

(source: Business Insider India, October 3, 2019, "Here’s how long it will take the world’s richest billionaires to become trillionaires.")

Disposable

Unfinished & Tangled: A self portrait (CAI 2020)

I am not disposable. 

But maybe I am. I guess I am.

I haven't earned the right to know where I stand

to trust where I stand

I haven't earned the true esteem of a friend

When people look at me they see

what? not much. Not much here to see, to be

If I try to share what's here, I impose

If I don't, I withhold

and it's not very interesting, anyway

Never enough, always too much

Alone, in the end, 

alone again

even among friends

still 

alone. 

Crow's taunt

(strange bird created by CD Good)

On our first day here, we saw a fox

large and orange and confident, trotting, just off 

in the distance, and I thought, 

we are closer to nature

we will have to watch the pets, I thought

but in the silence since

no animal has crossed my line of sight

all is quiet, day and night

save one, rare crow who sometimes shows his wings

flying off, he sings a croaking taunt my way 

saying, see, you are alone

even here

you are alone

Hope can be too demanding

 

Long View

I understand that hope can ask too much

how comforting to sink back, let the rush

float away, spend the days

not caring

I see 

I see it's not just easier; sometimes it saves your life

to forget to try, just wait to die

confine yourself to basics.

When effort falls flat what inspires more effort?

When trying draws judgement but not support, when doing sucks dry your precious stores

When experience tells us the prize will cost more

than it's worth

Abandoning hope can be a warm blanket safe haven 

a kind of birth

Free, finally, from the strain of striving suck me dry try try try

treadmill hamster-wheel life of strife hanging on by broken nails

the carrot always miles 

away

I see why, today, you might decide despair is a better friend

and in the end

I can't dissuade you, even though I see 

I see

there's something always lost in translation

I can't shake your ambition free; it's hard enough to do it

for me.

But I implore you,

Do. And I will too.

Gash

A gash in the sky

The wound of belonging
knicked open clumsily

gashed open suddenly

a gift reversed, transaction gone wrong

then the burst

head roaring outrage chest fire lava bubbles skin hot stomach

punch

knife pierce right through the eyes

I sigh

because here it is again

not overcome, not won against

not vanquished 

not gone, just scabbed over

raw red, throbbing, vulnerable, waiting 

to be ripped open

and I wanted to be zenner than that. 

Purgatorial oppositions

The Grey Zone (CAI 2020)

I enjoy meat. I hate eating dead animals. I love sugar and cheese. I hate being overweight. 

What a funny pergatorial planet, where everything is available but all of it bad for you, except what's good for you but unappealing. That's just its nature. I mustn't let it bother me so. 

Integrity's balance doesn't mean the oppositions are balanced equally, and it also doesn't have to mean choosing to exclusion. Integrity can sway, swing, lean in a direction. It must, to offset and create movement. Otherwise we just teeter in place until we fall. 

Freeloading

Freeloaders

 I get tired when people warn that you can't guarantee a base level income because people will get used to "sucking at the teat" and won't work. I believe they believe that, but it doesn't matter because they are hypocrites. Those with significant means have been sucking at the teat of other people's desperation, need, skill, talent, and knowledge for all of capitalism's reign. They just don't want to share it. The whole point of the entire miserable, exacting, system is to improve the quality of life. Create stability and prosperity. Allow for the pursuit of one's purpose or, dare we, happiness. That's why we, as a society, agreed to it all in the first place. Lots of us never agreed. Now, finally, automation is here, but instead of increasing our pay and decreasing our hours, you're just dumping us wholesale or finding all new ways to exploit us. No, un uh, that's not how this works. Social benefit commensurate to profit. As the common resource owners controlled by a government of resource stewards, we stand entitled to dividends through wealth taxes and limitations on corporate profits, returned to us as cash to do with as we see fit. If we want to work hard for the system, we will, because humans are work and play animals. They work when they find work they want to do, or work that matters to them that needs doing. If we want to earn enough for a "better life" however we define it, we can. But if we're going to build an entire economy based on exploitation with the promise that we are working towards equitable opportunity for all, Canada and then, beyond, at least some of those profits need to create the kind of stability that lets humans feel peaceful enough to avoid intoxicants, seek education and purpose, take care of each other and themselves, and participate without fear that failure to accept exploitative practices could put all of that in jeopardy. It's only a pipedream because the people in charge choose to make it so, and the vast majority don't question the systems or choose to push governments to provide a minimum standard, because they think that the "freeloaders" will suck at the teat. And around we go. You'd think that it's about time some of the freeloading went around, that hard working people got more than just hard work, fear and promises. But time is funny, because it never does seem to be time, and suddenly we live in the world of opposite, where people refuse to accept it when what's good for them is also good for everyone, and that it goes both ways. The species is doomed to repeat the same tragic patterns, every generation in its own way. In a system designed to funnel most of the resources out of the system and into a special, VIP space where a few have everything and more, while the rest struggle and devolve, we have come improbably far, an improbably high number of times in human history, and that is a hope I hold tight. 

One thing today in this direction, check in on myself for where I limit my imagination of what's possible on Earth by what has been built by evil men. 

Is that all I can do? Probably not, but it's one thing. 

The same Sky

The same sky

a few degrees of rotation

a world of story different

what to expect, what to enjoy, what to fear

actionable morals of alternate moralities

a small head-twist apart

a shift of the eye

across the same sky

and I still don't know which way to turn

 

Try, try again

Do you understand the extent of what you've done?

What makes you think? What makes you so?

Taking another go!

at a meaningful life.

True self

 The sun doesn't "come out" - it's always there. Just like the true self. 

Another day another proof

What makes it most laughable, of course,
is that sex with demons won't affect your body
at all
but your spirit
on the other hand
may enjoy
the change of pace.

Hard days come

Destructive Doing

Some days are harder than others.
Most days I just look away from it
the fear
the truth

that my efforts are worse than waste
because they cost more than nothing would have cost
took more than nothing would have taken
and gave nothing back that I wanted

just pain and futility and more certainty that whatever I try
next
will end the say way
in nothing

and I can try to see it from another angle
I can tell myself another story and turn my cheek but it doesn't matter
because the ends are the ends
the means remain unjustified
and I'm not even sure what I'm doing here
in the end
after all

anyway

I can't remember what I was thinking
to have tried and tried again
I reach back to myself and find only an empty
sad naiveté
a story full of plot holes and pointless, endless dialogue
saying nothing at all.

I can't even feel sorry for her, that me
she invites my disdain more than my pity
why did she ever think
anything she did might matter?
how much delusion did she eat for breakfast every day?
spoonfuls, bowlfuls
of sugar-coated sand.

Don't try to reassure me
I mean, what's the point?
But you won't. Anyway.
Because there's no reassurance to explain away the facts
there's no story that makes it all fine with me.

It's not fine with me.
The good bits and pieces don't counteract my failure.

The idea it was a choice
is the farce
that deflates all attempts, in any case.

I'm not even allowed to feel what I feel
while there's something to cling to, some consolation to grasp
to invalidate this knowing and let you feel comfortable saying that
I'm wrong
even though, I think on some level you know,
I'm not wrong at all.

Blame

How long has Hope made me wait in line
for a turn that was never mine to take?
how many times has she beguiled my mind
to build another house of cards to break?
caressed my heart, relaxed my guard
led me down the garden path again
to trip and tumble over cliffs of pain?
Now she scratches at my door
crying, my dear, I'm sorry
you must admit,
you have only yourself to blame.

Distortion

The Grief of Loss of What I Never Had (CAI2019)

Overblown and underwhelming
what comes through me, into reality
bears little resemblance
filtered by pretentious words and inadequate skill
into bits and pieces too heavy for the wind to carry
too heavy to float
sinking to the bottom, mired and drowned
but even so, still, too light to hold meaning down.
My silly gifts revert to impositions of confusion
suspicion, a twist of discomfort that forgets its name.
Again, and again.
Better, maybe, better to be still
swallow the bitter pill and let it
gag the truth before it spills through my clumsy hands.

Unseeing is believing

Standalone (CAI2020)

Maybe I was made for this
to stand in plain sight and never be
seen

Winded

Gut Punch (CAI 2020)

A prize I didn't know existed 

until I didn't win

that sucker-punched gut exposed,  

wind

blown 

right out 

of

me.

Needed

overwhelmed
washed over
lost
in the sea
it's me, it's me
that's missing
who will notice I'm not there
why should they care,
anyway
as long as they get what they need

The point

Is there a point in writing words that no one reads?

Gratitude (a prayer)

Reality (CAI2020)

Thank you, Mother, for the lesson they can't ignore
A warning, clear and stern
with no wiggle room for doubt
thank you for the lightness of the sentence
a lesson, not a punishment,
not yet
thank you for sending us home
for tearing so many holes, all at once
so we have no choice but to stop
take stock
and rebuild
Father, please protect us
keep us well and safe and warm
loved and sheltered from the storm
a wish for all
a wish for life
May I fortify my best
may I pass this test of my humanity
flying with the colours
being with the memory
of now.

Yes

Ballot Cast (2019 CAI)

it's already happened
it's happening now.
it makes me tired just to look at it,
but still, in the end,
I vote yes.

Indefinite, not infinite (Maverick Missives)

Indefinite Wisdome (CAI 2019)

The concept of Maximum holds the key.

The limits.

Unlimitless requires an infinite environment

so

of course Spirit pursues it!

But in a body, it’s destructive

Because Earth is not an infinite environment

Earth is an indefinite environment

And that is a totally different animal.

Earth has a limit. 

Nothing is created or destroyed, only changed

Nothing much comes in. Very little goes out.

We can do this, indefinitely

But not limitlessly. 

Limits create the definition

that allows indefinition to continue.

Wake up!

Fabulous Women

Too Subtle (CAI 2019)

As I prepare to attend an International Women's Day Conference where there are many speakers I find interesting and admire, I have a confession to make: I secretly hate inspirational talks.

I know it’s a bit perverse and I’m probably jealous of the amazing people, but I have a habit of letting inspirational talks shame me. They highlight my inadequacy. I am not inspirational like them. All my promise, all my potential, everything I’ve done to learn and grow and figure out life’s challenges, all my failures that I call learning experiences; all I know and long to share with the world, is not much, after all. Not polished. Not finished. Not interesting. Not coherent. Not enough.

Maybe we could organize a conference of the women no one ever asks to speak, because their stories seem suspiciously common. Because they are not accomplished enough, not fabulous enough, haven’t managed to come out the other side of their challenges and put together a tidy TED-inspired story of how they grew and what they know and what they did that was so important. 

Maybe I’d rather hear mumbled, uncertain snippets from women who are still mired and mucking around. Women who have accomplished staying alive today and doing all the things that needed doing to keep their lives afloat and take care of the people they care about, despite a bevy of personal challenges. I want to hear how they find ways to be sane and loving, when the world is so terrible. I want to see how they grab and protect moments of creative inspiration despite a life filled with chores. I want to hear how they sometimes manage to break through the resentment of having all the work and none of the glory. I want to understand how they keep believing in themselves even when no one else believes in them, when the world tells them there’s nothing in them to believe in, anyway, and that situation has not changed despite their best efforts. I’d like to understand how they manage their chronic pain and constant, underlying anxiety. How they get back in touch with their bodies and learn to love them, or fail to do so despite years of trying. I want to know how they cope with never finishing anything they start, but plugging away at it anyway, or how they reconcile themselves to give it up. I would like to understand, too, how they feel about the Inspirational Women being Fabulous until common efforts begin to feel pointless, since they can’t be held up like a polished diamond for admiration. Are they inspired?

Maybe, instead of seeking inspiration in the exceptional, what I really crave is to feel inspired to hold myself, exactly as I am, as special and important. To feel that I’m not alone. To admire other messy, “unaccomplished” women who are scraping together their own purpose amidst a life dedicated to others, in a world designed to keep us from knowing our true godliness. 

I think I want to believe that I’m not a failure because no one cares about my experiences. I want to feel like I’m one of many on a journey that is important, somehow, even if I never come out the other side. I deeply wish to believe that my lack of audience reach doesn’t mean I’m a waste.

But, I suspect that craving for consolation doesn’t deserve respect.  Let alone a whole conference.

And, anyway, no one would come.

And also, I would not speak there. 

I am not so jealous of the Fabulous Women because they get to speak and be heard. I am jealous because they get to be so brave and motivated that they can do it. I can't remember the last time I felt that way, like I could tackle something like wrapping my knowledge into an interesting present for the world and delivering it with gusto. I can't remember the last time that the thought of doing something really interesting and probably very useful didn't feel like an invitation to failure, an imposition on energy, something I probably can't get done before life drags me backwards three steps. When I see the Fabulous Women and I know, they are actually fabulous, it makes me notice what I am, now. Where I am, now. What I can be, now. And I'm not satisfied. The best I can do is not good enough for me. I should be able to step up, and in. Life keeps sending me setbacks like curve balls I really should have seen coming, and I'm not sure I have the disposition for it. When I go somewhere to get inspired by the people who overcame that, I feel tired. Too tired to even admire what they do. 

I am of diminished capacity. I am limited in body and mind in ways that make my spirit lose interest altogether. I may never understand the most fundamental things that everyone else seems to get. And I have no way to help anyone else with anything they are experiencing, because following the disjointed path of my breadcrumbs would try the patience of a saint. It has. And that will likely be the only way to get what I had to give, in the end. It wasn't what I hoped for. 

But maybe today will be different. Maybe today, the inspiration will spark instead of snuff. Maybe today I will walk away with energy I didn't have before. So I go.

Because hope is the only path to peace that feels compelling.