Thought foam on the deep blue sea

The next few weeks are going to be short posts, most likely, because Finals Time! Not that I have tests I'm studying for, I just have a whole bunch of huge projects. Oooog. But they're good projects! I like them. I just don't know how I'll get them all done to my level of satisfaction in the allotted time.




Random happenings in my life:

I think I figured out where the mysterious cow thigh bone is from. (see this post if you don't know what I'm talking about.) Apparently one of my housemates had a classmate who had gotten the bone (I think someone gave it to them randomly/anonymously) so he must have dropped it off at the house, to pass on the weirdness. Much appreciated, I always like strange things happening in my day. I recently read novelty is scientifically shown to increase knowledge retention and motivation, so there you go.

In other news, as I was going for my morning jog through the cemetery I came across a lady's slipper. Lambskin with the fuzzy wool on the inside, dark brown, with a purple ribbon on it. lieing on the side of the path/road that went through the cemetery. Just one. Small. Either belonging to an adolescent or a small adult. More mysteries. Felt a little like a David Lynch movie.


I'm thinking about where I want to be, once I graduate. I've been on a long journey of learning, and though there is more to come, I feel like I'm about ready to find a home base and settle down. But where? I'm torn between Fairfield Iowa, where there is the highest concentration of very good long term friends, but little nature. New York, which has no nature, disgusting smells, too many people, and is just generally difficult, dirty, and depressing, BUT has another group of super awesome, high achieving, spiritually active friends. Where I am right now, which has beautiful nature, a nice community, but no friends. And some new mystery fantasy place where all my best friends are going to move to, surrounded by gorgeous nature and an awesome community.

The last option is just a fantasy, for now, and may never actually exist. And there are additional factors that I haven't even weighed in, like job availability and pay, and where my partner wants to live, if I end up with a life partner.

Probably the next step will become clear when it's time to take it, as it always has, so I'm not wasting too many brain cells on it. But it is on my mind. Mainly as I assess the area I'm in now and how it fits the criteria.

OK, definitely time to go. So much to do!

Much love, dear friends. If you happen to have found my magical fantasy location, let me know.

;-)

-I

Give me Anonymous Feedback! Yay!

I've created a google form so people can give me anonymous feedback! Please give it a shot. Don't hold back! (Don't be intentionally abusive either, but if that's what it takes, then I'd prefer that to nothing.) Now's your chance to let me know any areas I could use improvement on. They might not even be bad things, just things that are ok or even good, but that you'd like to see in even greater abundance.

Whatever you think would be most useful for me to know about myself, that I might not see clearly, because I'm too close to myself to see with proper perspective. Like a metaphorical piece of spinach in my teeth, or a fly zipper that's down.

Have at ye! The truth will set me free!

Here's the link (if you think of something else, there's no limit to how many of these you can submit.): https://goo.gl/forms/EemJgTiWgSMsf7sp2

Much love, dear friends, and thanks for helping me grow!
:D
Isaac

An Invitation

One thing that I miss, among the greatest joys and pleasures in my life, is a certain kind of conversation I used to have often when I was in college.

These conversations were usually had while walking, sometimes over the course of houres, usually one on one, but occasionally in small groups. They happened when I was with someone I felt I could be totally honest with, we both wanted to go deep, and the stars were aligned. We would speak truth, and listen with love, and something about the atmosphere allowed us to say things we had kept hidden from all the world. We would see each other deep down to the core, often things the other person did not even see themselves. Strengths and blind spots, triumphs and foibles.

And all this in a mood of softly loving acceptance and benevolence, though sometimes the truths were hard to hear. By the end of these conversations, we would both be changed, and that was the aim. To hold each other up, support our growth towards our dazzling final destination, and experience the pleasure of deep communion with another.

I miss these kinds of conversations. They were, are, one of my favorite things in life. If anyone would be interested in having one of them, I would be delighted. I may be a bit rusty, since I don't have them much these days (except with myself, I guess?), but I'd like to remedy that. Drop me a line, if you're so inclined.

The Vast Universe Within

Almost... school... break...

So this Saturday afternoon, one of my housemates heard the outer front door slamming in the wind, and went to close it properly, only to find a HUGE THIGH BONE wedged between outer and inner doors, keeping it from closing fully. His question to me the next day was, "So, anger any witches recently?"

My only possibly answers were, (And I think this first one is unlikely) some Trump supporter was showing his displeasure with all the Hillary and Bernie posters that were up in the front of the house (put there by the landlord, I'm not complaining, but don't have time for that kind of stuff. Though I'd put a sign up for Bernie, and not just because that's my dad's name.)

Or, more likely, some of the neighborhood kids thought it would be funny.

Anyhoo, pics or it didn't happen:





In other news, I had a nice dream last night. Made me feel loved. Thanks subconscious!


And another unrelated topic: one of the books I'm reading for class is interesting. It's hitting on some philosophical and practical ideas for lasting change that I've discovered through other writers, but had forgotten about, and this book seems to tie them together nicely. Let's see if I can quickly dig up the titles... the one I'm reading now for class is called "Seven Languages for Transformation" By Kegan and Lahey.

And it's weaving together and clarifying concepts from Rober Fritz's work, including "The Path of Least Resistance" and Byron Katie's work, including "Loving What is"

There are several very powerful ideas in it, but the one I'm enjoying right now is that, for all the things in our life that we want, and are not doing anything about, there are competing commitments we are not aware of. Other things we also want, that are motivating us to do those unhelpful things, or avoid doing the helpful things. To give an inelegant example, maybe I want to lose weight so I can feel good about how I look. But I'm continuing to eat junk food. Well that might be because I also want to eat Nutella, cookies, gummy worms, whatever.

It's not just that I have weak willpower, or the environment is making me do it (though they certainly have an effect!) No, I want that junk food. And sometimes that desire overpowers my other desire. And it's important to recognize and own that. It starts taking the mystery out of why we behave the way we do. Hopefully it gives us a bit of understanding and compassion for ourselves. We're probably not being dumb or intentionally self-destructive. We are being driven by things we want, that happen to contradict other things we want. Of course I want gummy worms, they're delicious! That desire makes perfect sense.

We tend to forget or not think about these competing desires because they are politically incorrect most of the time. It's "ok" to want to eat healthy. It's "bad" to want to eat junk food. So we don't own that desire. We push it away and think of it as something "out there" that's forcing us to go against our true and good nature. But I think there is more power and certainly more honesty in accepting that it's a part of us.

It feels kinder. It makes me think of the "shadow work" that some of my friends have told me about. Integrating all the different parts of who you are. The light and the dark. I think it had a Jungian basis.

I don't know if this sounds permissive, but it's not about just being ok where you are and then staying the same. There are further steps that all the books talk about to change the static "new years resolution" style problems, (you know, "I resolve to change this" and then a month later its back to where it was).

But before you jump to trying to fix the offending behavior, if you want the change to stick, this (according to the book) is one of the steps you need to take first. It is a step of deeper awareness. There's another, even deeper awareness step that comes next, but for right now, I'm enjoying the feeling of owning a part of me I had forgotten existed. The book quotes one of my favorite Walt Whitman lines to describe this:

"Do I contradict myself? Very well then, I contradict myself. I am vast, I contain multitudes."


-I Out

Never surrender to despair. Love fiercely, my friends!

Yes. I feel sick to my stomach, my shoulders hunch and my draw my head in like a turtle trying to escape into its shell when I think about what has just happened. Yes, it feels much like the grief from the loss of a dear friend. Yes. A person full of hate, bigotry, and dishonesty has been elected presedent of the United States, and their party holds the majority in both Senate and House. Yes, a large part of me wants to hide away somewhere, curled up into a ball, waiting for it all to pass. Or better yet, wake up from this nightmare.

But no, dear friends. Dear more than 50% of the people who actually voted (not the electoral college votes.) Dear lovers of your fellow man and woman, nothing has changed in what we must do. Our job, as always, is to listen with courage and compassion to our hearts, our conscience, and do what we know is right. And not to stand by when we see injustice happening in front of us. Which may be happening more often these next 4 years.

In good times and bad, this is our job. It would have been easier with Hillary. And we would have been able to keep moving forwards. Now it seems we will have to struggle with all our might to keep the current from washing us too far backward.

Take heart from the courage of others. This is not the worst humans have had to endure. Think of the people who ran the underground railroad. Think of those who hid minorities from the Nazis. Think of the people who had to live during the mad emperors of Rome like Nero and Caligula, lead poisoned, insane, inbread, literal murderers. Heck, think about the people who have to live in North Korea, right now. There are many situations worse than ours.

Are you upset? Angry, sad, terrified? That's understandable. But we are not helpless. We can't change the world by ourselves, but we don't need to. All we need to do is stand up, dust off, come together as brother and sister, and do what is right, one day, one step at a time. Don't give up, don't give way to despair, or hatred, and don't loose faith. If we each make the decision to do this (or something like it.) Then we change the whole world.

And even if not enough people join in, then still, on our deathbed, we can look back without regrets.

You don't have to do this alone. Don't try to go it alone. There are others eager to stand by your side on the path of love and light. Now especially we need to support each other. Together we are strong. It's something love has that hatred never will. Reach out to friends, family. We need to support each other so we can support everyone else.

Have the courage to change what you can, and the wisdom to know and accept what you can't.
The Bhagavad-Gita: You have control over action alone, never over its fruits.

So don't act only to get the results. Otherwise, when you don't get the results, you'll get depressed and quit. Act because it's the right thing to do. Because it's what love and truth would do. Then the results will come, and you will be able to persevere even when things seem darkest.

And things are not hopeless. Back to the Bhagavad-Gita, and the Mahabharat: the heroes of the story were humiliated and had their hard earned wealth and well-governed kingdom stolen from them through cheating. They wouldn't break their code of honor and thus were forced into gambling away their kingdom in an obviously rigged game. Then they were sent away to live like penniless hermits in the forest for 12 years, while the totally corrupt Duryodhana (the main antagonist) enjoyed an opulent lifestyle off his ill-gotten gains.

In their exile, the hero's were tormented by confusion as to why they, who always did what was right and good, should be suffering so much. The wise people who they talked to told them not to worry: righteousness always wins in the end. They would wind up even better off than they had started, and the bad guys were not gonna last very long at all. The ill-gotten gains would soon turn to misery and blood. And in fact there was a larger purpose behind all of it, whereby the whole collection of corrupt warrior-kings would be gotten rid of. And it came to pass just as they said.


Don't give up or give in to despair or rage or passivity.

Keep laughing and loving.

Look out for each other.

Do what's right, and speak out against what's wrong.

Roll out of bed each the morning, put on your shoes, and keep going, one day at a time.

Truth will win in the end, and Dharma (right action/righteousness) will protect those who protect it.

But that sometimes means getting up and loving fiercly when all you want to do is stay in bed feeling nauseous and watching Netflix.

This too shall pass.
We are not these bodies we wear like clothes, but the Sons and Daughters of Immortality.

In Courage, Faith, Determination, and Love,
Isaac

Brief snippets (with pictures!)

I no longer have any hope of "catching up" with my homework load. Though I do try to quickly read over old homework assignments that I've missed, I won't get to most of them, and there's more and more every week, and even just the ones for the week are more than I can reasonably do.

All that said, it should come as no surprise that this week is going to be a light entry.

In one of my adventures around the local, wonderful park, I discovered it's home to a massive an abundant supply of wintergreen. So prolific in fact that there are even lots of wintergreen berries. In my opinion one of the tastiest foods on earth. (A lot like a wintergreen lifesaver, but wilder, less sweet.) here's a picture of a particularly prolific plant:


It's rare to even see one berry on a plant, but so many... I was a good caretaker though, and left most of the berries for the birds, so they can spread the wintergreen even further.


In other news, the house I'm in is really old. So old the windows have started melting. When the sun filters through them, and the Venetian blinds, and maybe the waving tree branches, it creates beautiful patterns of light on my wall. I'm going to try and share some movies I took of it. I think it would me nice to watch on a loop with some meditative music in the background:

Finally, a newspaper clipping, I just thought the picture was hilarious. Found it in the hallway of Antioch, in the environmental science wing:

Good night, sleep tight, hopefully there are no bedbugs to bite.

Love to all of you, my friends. Take care of yourselves and do things that make your heart happy.

-I