Sun Cycles, We're All On The Same Ride

It's a silly notion, that somehow travelling around the sun a certain number of times makes you somehow more advanced than your peers... I imagine this came from older times where survival was difficult and not any part a given: when the environment would put pressures onto your sustainability and survival on a day-to-day basis, then making it from one year to the next would probably take a good deal of work. However, even that in itself implies some type of existence far richer than anything we are exposed to at the bare-minimum of survival nowadays: surviving against elements requires focus, reaction, learning, and a sort of hunter-gatherer dance of life and death. Even subsistence farming requires you to care for and nurture other living creatures, for your survival is based entirely on each one of theirs, but hopefully you could make it worth more than that in the process of the 'daily grind'. However, this archaic notion seems to have propagated into our modern paradigm, where the difficulties of the survival loop have finally been circumvented by population-wide efforts of food distribution and necessities being provided for. The fact that someone may have seemingly survived a number of years doesn't mean anything any longer, because literally any person still alive can do that, and our environment of survival has become a pretty homogeneous civil existence(well, anyone that I have ever met anyway). Honoring 'elders', especially those who are under the age of about ~60, is a waste of reverence in most cases, and I don't mean disrespect when I say that, but chances are, they lived, and are living the same life that you are living, and will live, give or take a few letters or symbols or faces, or a brand or two, maybe a different road or a slightly different location here and there. The setting changes, but the experience remains the same, and yet there they are, years beyond you, and nothing to teach you from avoiding their fate(although some will try to convince you that a few more dollars are waiting for you if you do X or Y). It's fascinating that there are hundreds of millions of other people living the exact same life, with a very similar array of feelings toward the components of this life(job, construct of marriage, closed family-units, etc) and none of them have  committed to trying to change it. I mean, some have, of course, but the fact that not enough have to make a dent on this style of life, in a positive way, leads me to believe a great majority of people lack confidence in their ability to create change, and I believe I have isolated the point of their doubt.
A lot of people I talk to about their original ideas don't seem to believe that 'others', or the part of our minds we reserve for the mass of people we have never met, don't see the world the same way they do. Or somehow, they don't have the same opinions of things, especially if they have developed to some complexity. There seems to be a certain doubt that our minds could possibly have the same opinionated direction, or that given the same net of information, we wouldn't draw similar opinions from it. It's like people assume that somehow, our needs are all selfishly different, and the things we desire and extrapolate from these needs are even more different... It's sad to assume you couldn't relate to someone you don't know, as that's the same as closing the door to every person you've never met before. Somehow, people forget that the same way they have friends, and they have connections that relate to those friends, other people, even strangers, have friends, and they connect to their friends in the same way. There seems to be an air of doubt that we are all in fact human, or perhaps doubt that there are things that ALL humans in fact do: they doubt that there is glue to our race. However, historically speaking, we are collaborative in nature, with the trend of evolving societies occurring for literally all of document-able human history, from tribes to civilizations to the rise of nations, people have come together, unified, and attempted to stand up for what they believe. The issues arise when they experience the different: perhaps a different color of skin, a different language, a different view of the divine, or a different view of society, and another unified factor takes a stand: fear. All cognitive beings on this planet experience fear: fear as a defense mechanism to keep us from acting without knowing, fear as a mechanism of survival, but fear also as a restrictive entity for us to experience or attempt something new: perhaps attempting to communicate with someone from another place, or attempt to speak another language, or just try some new type of anything. We are afraid of somehow being mislead by those things we consider external to us: sources of information, people, instincts, and senses(people can externalize and doubt literally everything that is a part of them). So sad that some would actually doubt their innate senses, given any amount of input or tweaking. They doubt alternate states of mind, they doubt the 'reality' of their own experience, and how sad and draining it must be to sign one-self to this, for societies sake(a society that does not serve, no less).
However, in these times, it is important to remember that we are unified through nature. We are all brought in to this world the same way. We all have a mother and a father. We all have a need to survive. We all had a childhood, and we all felt love at some point, for that was our creation. We all feel pleasure, we all have access to emotions(although some suppress this, it is part of your experience, and it is meant to be felt, for a reason, always). We all have means of learning, from birth, throughout life. We all have the capability to conquer challenges, and we all have the capacity for change, for we ourselves have changed before and can again, or we would not be here. For these reasons, the human spirit remains a connecting force between people, and a sound reason in itself for faith in the progress of the species and the capacity for understanding between all people: we have foundation, and with foundation, connection can be built. We are learning always, for if we weren't, there would be no difference between today and the next day, and the one after. Individuals have the choice to learn or not, and that choice is simply a matter of paying attention, being cognitive, giving respect to the moment you are in. This is universal, to all species, to all creatures. The heart and the mind are our greatest teachers, when treated with respect.
[[Also, personal side note, what I have gathered from many people, is that the way you view strangers as a mass(aka the way you view 'the rest of society') and your perception of how they act, is often actually the way you treat strangers initially, and they simply respond to fit the mold you have provided for them(a self-fulfilling prophesy in a way). While there are some exceptions to this(~5% of people :P) most strangers will respond to this in this way with repeatable accuracy. Obviously, test it for yourself, if you don't believe me, but I believe this is a quality innate to the mind.
Therefore, if you have a problem trusting the rest of the world, if you believe strangers are greedy and lonely and selfish and rude, I would say the problem more than likely lies within, as I know many many people who would not fit this mold, many many people who are innately good, many many people who simply want to get along with everyone and are simply looking for signs to be comfortable around you, and when given such a sign, are more than comfortable to be friends.]]
That's all today, you are your own master, you control your own destiny, and you guide your own journey, every step of the way, Love and Light :)

Be Offended, See How Far It Gets You

Every day, I get a feeling that time would easily leave us behind, and it's just everyone's collective audacity that prevents us from taking the gravity of this implication into account: there could easily have been a human race to rise and fall before our time. There could easily have been separate human races on our sister planets Mars and Venus, definitely not within our lifetimes, but there withstands the possibility nonetheless. Proof of parallel humanities does exist(pyramids/water formations on Mars), and it doesn't take too much to draw the connection that there could have been a race on Mars long ago(when it WAS habitable), that could have taken and upset the environment of the planet over many, many years(as we are doing today on our own), and upset the biosphere to such a degree that the planet could no longer sustain surface life. The degree of self-importance of our race is unparalleled to anything in our scope of awareness, to the point that many people choose to forget that something was here before us. Many even choose to forget that there is STILL something surrounding us, sustaining us, that is MUCH larger than us, and has been around for MUCH longer than us. We have one day a year in our WORK calendar to appreciate the planet Earth, and that is about as much thought as some people give to the gigantic contiguous solid sphere that is beneath our feet every single second of every day of our entire lives. They are the ones who take a lot of life for granted, I feel. If appreciation were anything more than a feeling, they would know they are missing out on a whole dimension of thought and life, but I suppose they aren't ready to grow up yet.
To me, the expansion of perception forcibly mirrors the attachment to nature and the acknowledgement of our true caregivers in this physical domain. Even if you refuse to acknowledge the abstract entities that are Mother Nature, or Earth, you can't ignore the distinct pattern that nature has followed to progress to where it is today, and how this pattern continues still(despite any attempts to claim it or control it). It exists in all beings that we are surrounded by, in all living things, and despite modern commercialism, in us as well, which is why, despite our advances against nature in all possible facets, it still finds a way to coexist with us. Despite our rejection of it, despite attempts to proclaim we are something external to it, something different than it, it still integrates us into its grand scheme. It still tolerates us as a parent would love a child, even a rebellious or deviant one: unconditionally.
Acknowledgement of the planet on a larger scale gives indication of just how much power it moves around on a regular basis: volcanic eruptions that could wipe out half the life on the planet, hurricanes that sweep across continents, earthquakes that completely shift the GROUND as we know it, and the whole thing never ever stops spinning. Unending 'barrage' from solar flares, an ozone layer in constant replenishment, a pleasant lack of storms covering its surface(some form of electrical stability, a rare feature in planets with an atmosphere, in case you hadn't looked around), and there is fresh, clean water moving around everywhere, like the blood of our great planet. We take it in daily, similar to the blood cells of our own body taking in oxygen, we take in the sustenance of our great Mother Earth's being and it allows us to keep living comfortably. Not a bad gig, this.
So it has all that power, and like the young, angsty teenage race of creatures that we are(I mean, we're just a few years ahead of walking on two feet, mind you), we reject it, and some of us even go so far as to hate it. But it still tries, and it still sustains us, despite how much we hurt it, and despite how much we injure and oppress our younger sibling races and species(ever seen a factory farm?), it still believes we can learn, testament to the fact that we are still here. No viruses or bacteria have come to wipe us out(though many have come close). I'd be lying if I said there weren't tests, those we can be sure of, but none that we didn't have a chance at passing. Some of these diseases, we were able to get past by some sort of genetic disposition, which until just recently, we had no knowledge of, so that was some sort of something we facilitated somehow without our immediate knowledge... or it let us live. Either way, we've been causing trouble for a while now, and it hasn't been until just recently that it seems we are going to come to a conclusive point.
Many calendars are ending. Many 'doomsdays' are approaching, or have passed just recently. Does it mean the world is ending? Maybe for us, anyway, but probably not. In the weighing of all that is good and all that is bad, many ideologies believe this is the end of our time, but more positive ideologies and spiritual practices believe we are reaching a pivotal point of evolution once again. Perhaps we are supposed to step into our next successive species now or we will be left behind by our environment, as Darwin predicts. Some more esoteric practices believe we need to raise our vibration out of the physical, because the physical body of the Earth is something it does not wish to maintain any longer, and has only done so for this long to allow us to grow to this point and make the leap with it into a higher energy form, perhaps as we are it's Prodigal Son in a sense. Perhaps its something totally different, but all arrows point to one thing: SOMETHING is going to happen. Something very soon. Looking around the world gives a weird sense of discordance and disharmony in a lot of ways, but we are also becoming interconnected as a species in a way we never have before. Perhaps its up to us to decide what happens next.

The Pattern, Do you see it? Do you need to?

We are all one. This phrase means so much, and so little at the same time. The unity across humanity is astounding, especially in the modern times, when most difference can be ironed out by social pressures and the excessive perceived energy required to individualize yourself in any way. After you grow tired of trying  to be the best(like nobody EVER was), you begin to wonder, 'what can I do to just make things better?' When you start engaging yourself in the expansion of perception, you really have to make a few leaps, involved in the liberation of fear and guilt. If we are truly all one, there is no fear involved in the risks in life, because even if it goes so badly, if it something you truly wanted to do, for yourself, then the outcome should not define the experience, and you should proceed without fear, because regardless of what happens, the etheric part of your self brought you there to a challenge that you have always wanted to conquer, and if you fail, you still tried, and if you succeed, then you tried without fear, because you know your limits innately, and you know what you can do if you truly listen to yourself, life is just a matter of proving to yourself every step along the way. Increasing your energy can also be through increasing the energy of others, since we are all one, any change you invoke in others multidimensionally should come back to you in some way or another in your life or lifestyle(we call this karma). Since this other person is a part of you, past incarnation or future prospect, being the bigger person and doing something nice out of your own goodness should change their worldview, and consequently can release tension within yourself. This is the root of the selfless nature involved in transcendence.
I see many people who are 'waking up' in different aspects of their lives, and beginning to draw their own connections between things, which is wonderful, but many of these people still are forgetting fundamental property of awakening: they did not do it on their own, and anyone who helped them get there did not shove their own progress in their face as some sort of superior trait. We are all on the journey, and despite what you may believe, the part of you that feeds your soul desires this awakening moreso than anything, because it is incredibly serving to always be able to see the truth in the scenarios you are involved in: the more you learn, the more control over the actual course of your life you gain. All of your 'unseen' deeds compound externally as 'luck' sometimes, and other times, as a faith that others find in you. Liberating the fearful mind of its problems is a method of raising vibration and expansion of all people, and once you become sensitive, and once you become aware, you will begin to see the pattern to it all, and WE ARE ONE takes on a very personal meaning. After you observe the propagation of positivity through faith for a certain time, you learn the consequences(or results, if you will) of it in your life through impartial self-observation. Soon, the extra energy you used to impart into your daily as some sort of faithful propagation of self-oriented positive karma becomes a more complete selfless channeling of goodness and wholeness, for when you see yourself in the eyes of others, you can truly see how we are all one.
If this still has not rung a bell in at least a few memories across your lifetime, think of this: what if there were an infinite number of people on the planet, but only a very finite number of souls channeling through these people, and the relations of these souls is homogeneous across every implementation of these souls throughout the planet(so like, say 100 people, only 10 souls, each one is simultaneously inhabiting and living 10 separate lives). Although you may never meet another body that you inhabit, or perhaps may only see them in passing, the way you interact with the other souls holds true for all the iterations of your self in all the social circles that the two souls would interact within. So say you are a child in one lifetime and you become jealous of your friend because he has cooler sunglasses or something, and you end up insulting him(from his perspective for no reason at all) and hurting his feelings. Now say at the same time, in the next(simultaneous) lifetime, your soul inhabits the body of the leader of America, and his soul inhabits the body of the leader of China. Suddenly, some sort of regular diplomatic procedure may not feel right from him, or before he even meets you, he just has a bad feeling about you, and for some reason you feel like you have to work a lot harder just to gain his trust, all agendas aside. Have you ever met someone and just felt some degree of distrust to them, without them even doing anything? Does it ever turn out that it was just all in your head, and they are actually a really great person, and your lack of trust was just some misunderstanding? If you truly trust the people of the world(as we aim to do), then this mistrust is not the soul maintaining prejudice(as the mind does), but rather remembering a defensive instinct toward a certain energy. Once we know we can trust one another again, removing these defenses allows the energy of life to flow between ourselves once again.
Rather than in that example, with 10 separate souls interacting with each other in every possible social scenario possible, the truth remains that we are ONE, so seeing part of yourself in every person you walk past is no coincidence: we all have the same needs, biologically and psychologically speaking, and we all feel the same emotions throughout our lives. To know ones'self is to know the world, and to realize that which would ALWAYS make your day better, is to know how to be the light in the lives of every person you meet.
The best way to help those that you love is to help even those you may not feel close enough to love, because it may be that someone else is helping the one you love in that moment as well. After all, everything is connected, a fractal within a fractal. Be the light in someone's day, and when things seem dark, never lose faith. :) Namaste.

Critical Analysis

Funny how this subject in school, the one I had the most difficulty with, is the thing I spend most of my time doing nowadays. The essence of most things is in the details, and often not the "fine" details, but the rough ones. Like the off-stroke of a paintbrush that grazed slightly outside the lines that let you know something about the painter itself rather than just the painting or the painted. It's the details that blur the lines between subject and object that remind us of the ultimate unity of all things and the absolute omni-purpose that they carry. Was the woman beautiful because she wanted to be beautiful or beautiful because she wanted you to remark on her beauty?
Simply the things that simultaneously keep me up at night and finally allow me to sleep without a care in the world.

Peace of Mind

Going down the path of the great river of life, and finding the path of least resistance, is surely the way we were meant to live. If we are in tune with our desires, it only makes sense that the path we are least opposed to, and most attracted toward, is the one that fulfills our happiness, and supplies us with the more energy than it could possibly demand, not because it was meant to be that way by some divine guidance, but because we desired it to be so in our souls. The lives we live and the current conditions we live within are not very significant on the overall to our true potential, a runner could always run as far as he possibly could, but whether or not it would be easy is simply a matter of mental preparation: am I ok with doing what I need to do to accomplish this? Are all the conditions ideal? Whether they are right or not is trivial, as long as you maintain focus(aka, don't be bothered by trivial detail or resistance), your outcome will be exactly as you expect it to be: a healthy respect for the universe and the unwritten laws that govern it will bring intent through thoughtless action into reality without fail. I'm tired of acknowledging the resistances that others try to put into my life because they don't take the time to find the value in one another. Once you find a respect for your common man, and have adopted the universal love factor, everyone gets to start with a clean slate, but you have got to remember to color that slate with impressions and feelings, so you can get your universe to accurately include those around you to your personal journey. All of us share this playground simultaneously, a great joining of non-parallel rivers, meant to carry us all toward our own intended state of being, as a large composite of all of our collective futures overlaid on one another, and experienced simultaneously. When you love somebody, you share in eachother's current, and it makes you aware of the realities of others and your own. Love everybody as a piece of the wonderful masterpiece that is your own imagined future: have a place for everyone! This world is highly imperfect, and it will continue to be that way due to the complicated constructs we have built to dam the river of change. When you find those who could one day move the valves that you could not reach yourself, love them for it. Whether you are there the day they play their part or not, you can not know, so love them as much as you can for every moment they are available to you now, and hopefully they will love themselves enough to fulfill their own destinies, develop their true talent, and pioneer further into whatever field they choose to pursue. We have to explore this universe as a team and as a family, because the masterpiece that we are all painting together will be worth it, for our generation to marvel upon in our time, for the next generation to live within and inherit in their time, and for each generation thereafter to do with what they desire. The adults of our history did not have the insight available to us that we have today. That is why it is our job to change the world, and set a precedence. It's our job to be the first ones to do something: we can see the difference we want in the world(physically manifested unhappiness), so lets make the picture clean and clear, because quite frankly I'm tired of seeing it any other way.

Dancing to Your Own Beat

There are a lot of beats going on, all around us, all the time. Whether or not you acknowledge them is up to you, but in the eyes of the energetic children that we are, the more things we can experience at once, the better. I always considered perception to be the most important things that I should focus on in every moment, because of how guiding the concept of insight can be, but I often fall into the universe around me and lose sight of the most important thing: myself. An old Buddhist principle of changing the world involves regarding 'your body as a temple', but it calls upon the reflective nature of life, and how our feelings are really just reflections of the current state of affairs in the universe and reflection is how we learn to anticipate the unknown since it is truly just a response to our own internal condition. I haven't done a very good job of regarding my body as a temple lately. Falling to addictions, even non-physical ones, sets a predictability to your lifestyle that prevents true development, and honestly just eats away time in your information-gathering rampage through this physical dimension. Conscious action and thought are probably the most important style of meditation, where you integrate your peace of mind into your active lifestyle, and the universe responds to your internal condition(calm, peaceful, positive) and responds accordingly. I have to admit, I have been in a bit of a paranoid and spiteful spiral lately, and it has put me in a bit of a close-minded place. My bad. Honestly, this is really just me assuring myself that I am actually aware of this habit and intend to break it as soon as I can, starting off with a trip to the gym(a good way to start a positive change, in my experience). There are other parts of my life that I have been ignoring, despite my positive outlook on them, and I think they might get out of perspective soon. I'm afraid of hurting people again, but a quote by Alexis Carrel made me think slightly otherwise on the topic. "Man cannot remake himself  without suffering for he is both The marble And the sculptor." In my mind, I know that the only way I can help  some people is to expose them to the suffering they have set themselves up for due to some unhealthy thought patterns and self-doubt, but I hate to think of myself as a part of that process at all, since suffering is so often taken as pain, and I hate to think I would intentionally hurt anyone around me. I thought it was necessary in a time before, with a girl, and I feel bad about it ever since then, but it just doesn't seem like words would be adequate to circumvent a conversation involving the heart. I really need to stop getting so intricately involved with people... It isn't fair, with how dynamically I try to live my life. I feel like I can only help those who are close to me, so I try to pull someone in close, but when it comes to helping them, I only know how to autopilot a feeling of love. With no conscious action in my relationships, they have been taken over by neglect, and developed abnormally. I hate the idea of having to break down the illusions of a relationship to let the real feelings blossom, but I haven't enough experience on the subject to know. I need to dance to my own beat for a while, so I can figure out where I want to move with my life. I hate to think of it as pushing anyone away, but maybe that is the best way. I'll be more careful this time, though. Regardless of what I decide or what happens, I will be more careful. If only there was some wording of honesty that pleases the heart and the mind. This, by no means, means I am ready to move on just yet. The thought is present though, which means it is almost an inevitable event, meaning some part of my life is in unrest and has fallen static in that state. I hate getting myself in these situations. They say "that's just life", but does it always have to be??

My Current View on Western Religion

I mentioned in my last post that I had completely turned away from Western ideologies in my quest for spirituality, but as a man of the world, I must make amends to that. The religions of the west, and when I use this phrase, I am referring mostly to Christianity because I know it the most, but my views are also applicable to Judaism and Islam, I'm sure, as they are all very similar constructs. I love Jesus, and I love his teachings, but the problems with Western approaches to spirituality was best summarized by Ghandi: "I like your Christ, I do not like your Christians. Your Christians are so unlike your Christ."
The problem with Christianity is it is a control system. Christ said for us to love one another and in any time of doubt, just pray to God and your prayers will be answered. The lie that Christianity is built upon is that God is not listening to us simple heathens, and instead our prayers have to be sent through some bullshit network of conduit 'greater-than-thou' Christians that have endowed their lives to the priesthood and climbed the social ladders of the church to become... closer to god somehow..? That doesn't sound like anything God would set up, and it wasn't. The modern day Catholic church especially is a control structure, built on laws, just like a government, meant to control people's lives, thoughts, and actions through fear, shame, and doubt. The teachings distance us from God, tell us that anything we enjoy is a sin or at the very least must be taken with an abundance of gratitude to the church(oh yeah that's their phrase: the church), make us one of the masses(oh god, the masses...) and always ask for the one thing the modern church is built upon anyway: money. The Vatican is sick. If all the money that went into developing that city of gold actually  went where the godfearing christians that 'sacrificed' it intended, people around the world would be suffering A WHOLE LOT LESS. Not to mention its a gratification system, where all the people within it feel guilty for pleasing themselves(a primal, often material, karmic form of joy), and must gratify themselves within the church every week, and suddenly they are back in the keen eye of salvation. It forms a construct that feeds the ego, even if it is a religious ego, and makes the practitioners feel superior to others, especially those who are not part of their religion, and therefore have to be 'saved' from their eternally damned lives. The whole thing is a bunch of shit, and none of the Christians I know actually know anything about the true love that Jesus taught, and are actually crafted into very judgemental beings that are much more likely to fixate on the differences(straight, gay, christian, jew, muslim, white, black, american, mexican) than the truth: we are ALL children of God. He said so himself. He loves all of us. He wants us all to love eachother equally and righteously.
If I need anything more to prove my argument that our modern constructs of religion are loads of heaping shit, look at what the Crusades were: christians going on a 'HOLY WAR'(WTF???), killing ALL who opposed them(basically anyone who didn't convert), because the Pope at the time claimed it was the 'will of God'. Ya, ok. That's like saying God willed the pre-Holocaust Holocaust. That's like claiming that Hitler was God. It all falls into the same basket of bullshit that we threw money into every Sunday for a 'greater good' that we were never allowed to see. I just don't buy that.