Livin Your Best Life

First topic message reminder :

“Nature's first green is gold,
Her hardest hue to hold.
Her early leaf's a flower;
But only so an hour.
Then leaf subsides to leaf.
So Eden sank to grief,
So dawn goes down to day.
Nothing gold can stay.”

—Robert Frost

I love we are temporary.

We seem insignificant, but what we do echoes throughout eternity.

God does not make this beautiful, we do.

I am not scared.

This is beautiful.

The eternal is captured in the finite.

And we can be aware of this?!

Marvel at it!

Worship it!

Love it!

It is captured in amber, US, and we can look at it!

This is home.

This is us.

Everything we ever know happens here.

We are mostly seeing this all wrong.

Life is overwhelming.

It’s like looking into the sun.

It’s too much.

So we shrink it down.

To perceive it moment by moment.

I feel to miss the moments, is to miss it all.

Language cannot mitigate our fear.

What is your purpose?

Is that not what we ask?

We must not let fear overwhelm us.

Seeing this future?

Free will?

I think so.

So the complete course of time is finished and we are trapped by the arrow of time?

Dows this terrify you?

Of course it does!

It seems like hell for an eternal consciousness.

If we cannot see all of our existence, how to not fear?

Why the words if it is set?

Until performed, nothing counts.

Living this life, makes it real.

We know our ultimate future absolutely.

We will die and not exist again and it will hurt and there will be blood.

There will be anguish, but also beauty and love.

I choose existence and all that comes with it.

What would you do if you were not afraid?

The Dragon of Grandiosity

Imaging your life as more than it is.

There is something great in us that is not the I.

Embracing your power leads to destruction.

When the great power manifests in you, you will be tempted.



When you imagine yourself a god, the power begins to destroy you.

There is something inexplicable in going on even though we shall die.

Who understands this?

If

BY RUDYARD KIPLING

If you can keep your head when all about you  
   Are losing theirs and blaming it on you,  
If you can trust yourself when all men doubt you,
   But make allowance for their doubting too;  
If you can wait and not be tired by waiting,
   Or being lied about, don’t deal in lies,
Or being hated, don’t give way to hating,
   And yet don’t look too good, nor talk too wise:

If you can dream—and not make dreams your master;  
   If you can think—and not make thoughts your aim;  
If you can meet with Triumph and Disaster
   And treat those two impostors just the same;  
If you can bear to hear the truth you’ve spoken
   Twisted by knaves to make a trap for fools,
Or watch the things you gave your life to, broken,
   And stoop and build ’em up with worn-out tools:

If you can make one heap of all your winnings
   And risk it on one turn of pitch-and-toss,
And lose, and start again at your beginnings
   And never breathe a word about your loss;
If you can force your heart and nerve and sinew
   To serve your turn long after they are gone,  
And so hold on when there is nothing in you
   Except the Will which says to them: ‘Hold on!’

If you can talk with crowds and keep your virtue,  
   Or walk with Kings—nor lose the common touch,
If neither foes nor loving friends can hurt you,
   If all men count with you, but none too much;
If you can fill the unforgiving minute
   With sixty seconds’ worth of distance run,  
Yours is the Earth and everything that’s in it,  
   And—which is more—you’ll be a Man, my son!

What is it the great poets hint at?

The secret of my song, though near,
     None can see and none can hear

—Rumi

Whitman, Shakespeare, Rumi and many others,

The love we feel and fear is heard ringing in their words.

But they never tell their secret!

Words are meaningless until you give them meaning.

Today my wife drove awhile with an Uber driver.

She said he was like a little child.

He rattled off one conspiracy after another.

Lost in a sea of doubt and fear.

She spoke love to him.

His eyes opened just like that.

If love needs no words, how can one speak love?

Words from the heart are different than words from the mind.

This is the poet’s secret!

Strip one of their words, look at the life behind them, ignore those who have no quality, kindness and empathy.

Angry words are a misunderstanding of love.

Love is under Will.

Love doesn’t hide.

Love exposes.

“I was raw, then cooked, then burned”

Empathy is what makes one great.

God is a drug, hard to quit, let me tell you.

But love is the truth.

I have witnessed love.

I have felt it.

I have been loved deeply.

I am humbled by it.

I am in awe of it.

But I am not its slave.

I work hard to be worthy of it.

Love is the greatest mystery.

I've been writing from some very deep stirrings.

I watch a lot of the Internet flow by.

I drink from pools of water all over.

Dune has been a favorite sci-fi series of mine.

I have been writing about how reason enters into mystery.

I have been writing about the inner fire of our will.

Sharing poetry that flows.

So yesterday all those themes came to a head when I saw the new Dune movie.

I was moved by a vision Paul had seeing a man he would kill tell him about life after his people had been betrayed and his father killed.

“The Mystery Of Life Isn't A Problem To Solve, But A Reality To Experience.” – Jamis

Paul hears Jamis in one of his visions where the Fremen explains how people “must move with the flow of the process” and “join it,” making sure that they “flow with it.” While he likely wasn’t referring to controlling aircraft, Paul uses his advice to get away from the storm and land safely in the desert. By simply going with the flow and experiencing “the mystery of life,” the young heir learns an important lesson about learning to let go.

So there is a scene in the movie where he stops trying to fly his aircraft in a sand storm and he closes his eyes and the flow takes him out of the storm.

That is what I have been doing.

This is exactly how it works.

This is exactly how you let go and let the mystery take you.

All the fools like Dan and his nonsense contacts wish they could flow.

They don't know this, by their own admission.

Just watch what they write.

Watch what they do and how they treat others.

Don't listen to or follow fools.

Listen to your own will.

It is speaking.

It is the best thing you have going for ya.

They could fly and embrace mystery, hold opposites in the same space, just their egos block them from flowing and flying.

Well, this goat has wings.

And I see everything as a sign.

And these were deep signs to go straight on and know I am in the storm, but I float upon it.

I am in awe of this life and how it speaks.

Everything echoes the deep.

Dreams are messages from the deep.

Oh how I have been dreaming.

I would listen to what your will is speaking to you.

I would learn to flow and train yourself to be ready.

You won't listen, that's fine.

Resist this all you like, who cares really

No could but you.

I am only writing to myself and echoing the wonder of being this now.

Love is naked.

Love is blind.

Stoics were deists and monotheistic. A stoic may also be an atheist, an agnostic or find accommodation with a religious faith. The intention here is not to claim sole rights to Stoic philosophy for Deism.

However, there does seem to be a natural compatibility between Deism and Stoicism. This can be detected, for instance, in the writings of the philosopher emperor Marcus Aurelius who would often opt for the largely undefined “Providence” when referring to what others might have called Deus, God.

How he considered this concept is illustrated thus:

“In the universe, respect the highest power, namely the creative force which directs and makes use of all things.”

Then he goes on to link that broadest of generalisations to the individual:

“In the same way, you must respect the highest power in yourself, for it is of the same creative kind.”

I concur, true living is aligning with your creativity, the same creativity that made all of this.

Easter, 1916

BY WILLIAM BUTLER YEATS

I have met them at close of day
Coming with vivid faces
From counter or desk among grey
Eighteenth-century houses.
I have passed with a nod of the head
Or polite meaningless words,
Or have lingered awhile and said
Polite meaningless words,
And thought before I had done
Of a mocking tale or a gibe
To please a companion
Around the fire at the club,
Being certain that they and I
But lived where motley is worn:
All changed, changed utterly:
A terrible beauty is born.

That woman's days were spent
In ignorant good-will,
Her nights in argument
Until her voice grew shrill.
What voice more sweet than hers
When, young and beautiful,
She rode to harriers?
This man had kept a school
And rode our wingèd horse;
This other his helper and friend
Was coming into his force;
He might have won fame in the end,
So sensitive his nature seemed,
So daring and sweet his thought.
This other man I had dreamed
A drunken, vainglorious lout.
He had done most bitter wrong
To some who are near my heart,
Yet I number him in the song;
He, too, has resigned his part
In the casual comedy;
He, too, has been changed in his turn,
Transformed utterly:
A terrible beauty is born.

Hearts with one purpose alone
Through summer and winter seem
Enchanted to a stone
To trouble the living stream.
The horse that comes from the road,
The rider, the birds that range
From cloud to tumbling cloud,
Minute by minute they change;
A shadow of cloud on the stream
Changes minute by minute;
A horse-hoof slides on the brim,
And a horse plashes within it;
The long-legged moor-hens dive,
And hens to moor-cocks call;
Minute by minute they live:
The stone's in the midst of all.

Too long a sacrifice
Can make a stone of the heart.
O when may it suffice?
That is Heaven's part, our part
To murmur name upon name,
As a mother names her child
When sleep at last has come
On limbs that had run wild.
What is it but nightfall?
No, no, not night but death;
Was it needless death after all?
For England may keep faith
For all that is done and said.
We know their dream; enough
To know they dreamed and are dead;
And what if excess of love
Bewildered them till they died?
I write it out in a verse—
MacDonagh and MacBride
And Connolly and Pearse
Now and in time to be,
Wherever green is worn,
Are changed, changed utterly:
A terrible beauty is born.

This is gold.



Dan and his friends, not gold.

One must be radical, not stupid.

This is gold.

Dan and his friends, not gold.

And talk we will, as usual.

Most chatter about nothing.

Me, I hold the

I know this, Dan and his friends are not the point here.

I and my friends are.

Dan and his friends, quake in our shadow, muppets every one.

They wish they knew.

Where we walk, the earth shakes and Eden opens.

We are the children of the dawn.

Dan has failed because he has turned his back on us.

I am for you.

I am



We shall stand together and face the sun.

I have seen it.

I live and breathe it.

We are not the future.

We are now now now

Rise with me!

We shall not fail!

Shin imposes logos, reason, upon the chaotic matter.

The pain of such causes us to become more conscious.

O the Heavenly Sophia, God’s Light.

The great lights are not in the sky.

They shine in thee.

When the original nature shines in you, Eden opens within your heart.

The golden light within is coincidentia oppositorum.

Such is the spiritual life of the Holy Fool.

The gobsmacked alchemist can only fall to their knees in awe of the spontaneous gnosis that rends all veils and resolves all dichotomies.

She increases the light within until we awaken to the monad, unlimited potential that brings life.

The grand musical chord.

When you hear it, you will feel it fill every cell.

We can only control ourselves, our reactivity and stone like thinking.

Sorry U, bad storms in my area and my dogs and yard been a handful.

Try to Zoom this week or next weekend.

Nothing to say really

96

Have I a body or have I none?

Am I who I am or am I not?

Pondering these questions,

I sit leaning against the cliff while the

           years go by,

Till the green grass grows between my feet

And the red dust settles on my head,

And the men of the world, thinking me dead,

Come with offerings of wine and fruit

           to lay by my corpse.

—Cold Mountain

Nothing to Nothing

Let’s be honest with each other about what we can know. I do not wish to take away anyone’s desire to live. These days, I am enjoying my life, not too painful. I am not one given to depression. I’m usually pretty peppy and optimistic. But let’s be honest, we don’t and can’t and hopefully won’t ever know what happens in the next moment.

This I feel is the gateway to Eden or Never Never Land, beyond time sort of speak.

We can step out of time in our minds. Pretty cool trick, to fool yourself into living moment to moment. It almost seems intelligence and awarensss is cruel, us being so limited. Just look at how childlike our culture is arguing over money and color and beliefs given how short life is. A waste of time to argue with others and I don’t care what anyone else does or believes really, as long as they aren’t hurting my short temporary life.

Do as you like.

It is interesting, I’ve been pondering we are up and down. Truthfully, nothing really matters in the end. We exist to reproduce. Social structures promote reproduction. It is the fire of life. It all equals 0 in the end, nothing to nothing, we are all dead. The earth will burn away in a billion years or so. It must be so comforting to believe you will continue as a personality, after death. I couldn’t fool myself anymore. Life is nakedly flaming in my face every moment. I ride a wave that will crash hard when it ends and so will I. You won’t of course go on as this personality emanating from your body, based on our experience. Truly though, no one could really say what happens to our energy, one way or another. This awareness is like a cold shower. Snaps you out of your silliness. Helps you focus. And yet we go on, pretending. It only matters what we do now, here. It means to us what it can given all will pass away, as well as our memory of ourselves and the time humanity existed. We might as well have fun and relax and enjoy ourselves I say. Be kind, rewind. All the energy wasted in the world over temporary meaningless things is comedy. Our minds and body make meaning for our awareness. Everyone so sure about what is impossible to know, yet we go on. A mystery. I’d rather live honestly about how limited I and we are and how much this terrifies us.

But don’t lose all hope, we make this meaningful together. I wish you your best life and wish you your best peaceful death. A pleasure to meet and know you, as we are just passing through time together, let’s make it count now.

I laugh at anyone insisting they care about more than their own life.

Bahahaha, no they don’t.

This means something to us now and us alone.

The invisible hand doesn’t matter or could matter to us if any is real.

It is best we don’t see any hand behind us, or surely we would not desire to live more as playthings.

Or you could decide to be the best plaything you can be.

You don’t have any other choice than to stop hoping and get on living freely.

Nothing to nothing.

Btw, Dan is delusional about Katechons and escape and monism and personalism and portals.

Those are not real.

No princess is controlling anything at all.

Now is your time, the rest is not your concern.

Don’t waste your moments like Dan and his delusional ignorant posse.

They know not love.

Love is now and you are a part of it.

The rest again, not our business or concern.

Our business is living our best lives today.

This is all anyone could ever say.

Seers are fools and liars.

The perennial philosophy of a knowable undifferentiated whole is death to humans.

There's a reason to resist the pull of perennial philosophy.

It forgets that truth, ultimately, lies beyond us.

To be human is to see through a glass darkly.

The only way to pursue truth is, therefore, to deploy a dialectical approach.

One "insight" must be challenged by another. My experience undermined by yours. Critique is of the essence.

Dialectic or dialectics (Greek: διαλεκτική, dialektikḗ; related to dialogue; German: Dialektik), also known as the dialectical method, is a discourse between two or more people holding different points of view about a subject but wishing to establish the truth through reasoned argumentation.

Dan has forgotten this.

He has closed himself off and no longer will hear the opinion and views of others.

This is a great weakness.

His views are greatly aged and brittle and easily refutable by your own life.

I mention this because I came to OMF to dialogue, not to find the truth.

I know no one knows any truth.

No one has or could know this all.

Meaning is made from the whole of human experience.

I am always talking to people with different views than myself.

I refine my view towards an open approach to knowing and living.

I seek how best to live with not knowing and each other.

There is no heaven or hell for me, there is only now.

We need to keep talking.

We are easily fooled and misled, by our limited mind most.

We need to find ways of engaging conflicting differences in an open spirit.

Journeying is all for we humans, the creature that seeks more.

But we must keep journeying.

For the perennial philosophy, treated as an arrival, is deadening to us.

No one has or ever will arrive.

The undiscovered country is known by no one living.

You can pretend, but that’s all you are doing being sure of any storyline.

No no no, we don’t talk.

We must keep up the appearance of conflict.

Acknowledgement ruins the illusion I have learned.

You are much more useful to me as a silent interlocutor.

These are my prayers for those that know.

For surely, I do not.

Holding hope and despair in the mind at the same time is life itself.

However one arrives at this state is not important, to exist in the middle is where we are human.

I do not seek to obliterate my or anyone else’s existence.

Who can know the mind of god?

But we can choose a golden life.

To live with grace and quality.

“Love is our true destiny. We do not find the meaning of life by ourselves alone. We find it with another.”

“Love seeks one thing only: the good of the one loved. It leaves all the other secondary effects to take care of themselves. Love, therefore, is its own reward.”

“I know nothing can change and I know there is no hope.”

“Hope then is a gift...but to meet it we have to descend to Nothingness.”

“On the surface I have my confusion. On a deeper level, desire and conflict. In the greatest depths, like a spring of pure water rising up in the flames of hell, is the smallness, the frailty of a hope that is, yet, never overwhelmed but continues strangely and inexplicably to nourish in the midst of apparent despair.”

—Thomas Merton

Despair is the development of a pride so great that it chooses a certitude rather than stay open to the possibilities.

What is this flame that cannot be extinguished?

A mystery.

Some call it god.

How could I if I am to be consistently unknowing?

How could I dare name it or claim it?

It is the driver of my life and knower of all that is me and yet I only know of its existence.

Perhaps knowing it is real is all of it.

If anything the two of you talk too much...