Have patience and endure

Van Gogh's The Shepherdess

There are days when a poet speaks for you...like Maya Angelou:

"Out of the huts of history's shame

I rise.

Up from a past that's rooted in pain

I rise.

I'm a black ocean, leaping and wide,

Welling and swelling I bear in the tide.

Leaving behind nights of terror and fear

I rise.

Into a daybreak that's wondrously clear

I rise.

Bringing the gifts that my ancestors gave,

I am the dream and the hope of the slave.

I rise

I rise

I rise."

I should probably eat rice. A lot of it right now.

internal discourse & decision-making

Source

Today, I have arrived at the conclusion that it is possible to attain fulfillment inside one's mind.  In spite of the obligations that existing social constructs have laid out, the decision to exist freely inside your head serves as a liberating avenue towards true happiness. It would be nearly futile to depend on others in achieving a sense of self-worth. I know, you're probably silently berating me right now by thinking, "no man is an island..." or "man is a social animal..." Well, I am becoming exhausted with checking all the requirements and still not getting quite there--wherever that is where you get a stamp of approval, no not really approval, I don't care about that anymore...maybe a stamp of "that's enough." I agree with Whitney Houston when she sang, "...if I fail, if I succeed, at least I lived as I believe (well, this one is subject to debate on my part)...no matter what they take from me, they can't take away my dignity...learning to love yourself, it is the greatest love of all." It doesn't have to be completely selfish--you can live a reality that is centered on duty and doing things for others, but inside your mind--you are free to think of whatever will make you happy. Choose to be happy.

elective affinities

Elective Affinities by Rene Magritte

Yesterday, out of brain drain, I decided to take a short walk despite the horrid snow and bought a Rubik's cube and Yuval Noah Harari's "Sapiens." That's what happens when my mind gets fatigued--it craves even more self-inflicted torture.  Sapiens means wise in Latin.  So Homo sapiens literally translates to wise man. I'm only on page 9 of the book and I'm already captivated. Harari states "In Homo sapiens, the brain accounts for about 2-3 per cent of total body weight, but it consumes 25 per cent of the body's energy when the body is at rest."  I used to say our brain takes up about 20% of the stored energy in food that we consume...so it's apparently more than that. That's why I'm perennially exhausted. We're all perennially exhausted.  

I've been thinking--I've always been thinking. Thinking about things I should think about; yet, probably like most Homo sapiens, I wastefully think. It's a procrastinating kind of thinking. I'm not moving, but I'm thinking. I'm folding clothes and I'm thinking. I'm in the shower and I'm thinking. I'm walking home and I'm thinking. Imagine doing all those things with robotic wide eyes--being physically present but with your mind wandering. Somewhere unnecessary. Futile thinking. It's a bad habit.  I stand up as a distraction, do a bit of tippy toe action...pumping my gastrocnemius to aid the veins at my lower extremities. I breathe in deeply until I fill my inspiratory reserve volume then breathe out until I void my expiratory reserve volume. Anything to stop the superfluous thoughts. The thoughts aren't all that bad; most of the time the thoughts are nice. Nice thoughts, but just wasteful.

Harari also states, "The ability to create an imagined reality out of words enabled large numbers of strangers to cooperate effectively." And procrastinate gloriously. Like yours truly. I should get back to writing...oh wait, before I forget...so I rediscovered Adjustment Bureau last night and the last scene mentioned something related to free will...that we never know how to use it until we have to fight for it.  I tried to connect it to Disney's Moana theme where the song goes "Everything is by design...so maybe I can roll with mine...I'll be satisfied if I play along but the voice inside sings a different song, what is wrong with me?"

Odd connections, huh? A book, a science fiction movie, and a Disney film...oh and a surrealist work of art. Brain matter turning into mush, that's what it is.

Cheers.    

tipping point

I had been writing stoically lately and I am filled to the brim with desire to write the most nonsensical, unscientific, grammatically incorrect words I could possibly muster with my fingers...

Inebriated with the compounded infinitesimal sparks of the mundane hurly burly like the grass is so green but the sudden gusts of wind ruin my grin and smelling the flowers is probably a bad idea especially since pollen can be captured by the sputum of my postnasal drip and the guttural pleading of my silent intermittent exhalation is the impetus for my eyes to shut whereby a mascara-hardened eyelash provokes the sclerotic coat of my optic senses which then causes a sudden singing in my head by Bono: "everybody huuuurts sometimes..." Light up a match, turn on your pen light, lift up your mobile phone and wave it like you're in the middle of a random mosh pit at a concert you were dragged into going because all you really wanted was to be beneath a disheveled pile of fluffy pillows and a nice smelling comforter with earplugs

*haaah*

U2 didn't write Everybody Hurts---geez