A conversation of Conscience

For whenever people of the nations that do not have law do by nature the things of the law,  these people,  although not having law,  are a law to themselves.

In some aspects, they are.  But what is the higher purpose, living by the law of True Nature or living by the law of man? 

They are the very ones who demonstrate the matter of the law to be written "in their hearts" (within) while their conscience is bearing witness with them, and between their own thoughts they are being 'accused' or even 'excused'.
So a conscience can either excuse actions or accuse actions.

You describe the sublime relationship here, whether or not you chose to.  We all have the "law" (as you put it) written in our hearts.  It is our True Nature not associated with any one religion or faith but in the unity of each of them.  In order for that "law" to be manifested physically it has to have a bridge from the spirit to the physical world...and that bridge is what we can call "conscience" if we like.

However, our conscience has a man-made component that is both egoic and counter to this higher vision of self we are all born with.  That is the first voice you hear in all matters, the one that judges, the one that blames, the one that believes it is right and that others are wrong.  It is NOT the voice that seeks a higher purpose, it is the voice that ensures we do NOT achieve it.  It is, in the figurative sense, the voice Eve heard in the Garden and the voice Adam listened to as he ate the apple.  It is the voice the separates us from our higher selves - that part of us that is of the Absolute - that part of us called Being (or God).

No, if we wish to be our True Natures and to find and attain that higher vision of our selves we first must stop listening to the voice of ego.  Instead, we must find our conscience.  Again, this takes much practice and focus...which is usually too much work for most of us to undertake.  Yet, for the seekers, it is an imperative activity to which all others depend.  Our conscience is that voice that leads us to a higher purpose...the one we rarely hear let alone listen to...the one that is God. 

Therefore a conscience cannot accuse or excuse, it cannot judge right from wrong because it only knows one side of the equation necessary for judgment.  If it judges it is ego, not conscience, you are listening to.  Rather, your conscience will lead you to "heaven" if you listen to it, which means you simply cannot judge the actions of others as right or wrong because you cannot tell the difference between the two.  A nice lead in to:

Who'd want the conscience, or the voice within, of a serial killer?

We all have the voice.  It's just that some egos are associated with the "good" of not killing, while others are associated with the "bad" of killing over and over again.  Still, neither is listening to their conscience as described above.  If they were, there would be no such thing as serial killing and we simply would not know ourselves as "good" for not killing or "bad" for doing it.  Now you can see the purpose for the "bad", it allows the "good" to exist.

Wasn't Jesus conscience trained by Scriptural teaching and learning?

Perhaps, but perhaps not in the way you think.  There are two things important in the "training".  First, there is knowledge.  That is what we learn in our schools, our churches, our faiths and our reading.  The second, and equally important is wisdom.  This is often overlooked.  This allows the knower to employ the knowledge.  One reason our schools suck so bad is that we attempt to teach knowledge without imparting wisdom.  Therefore, most don't know what to do with the knowledge they have gained.

It would seem Jesus used the knowledge of scripture to impart wisdom on those he touched.  He truly followed his conscience which at times seemed to go against what knowledge others took from their scriptural education.  That is why he was at odds with them, and what may have led to his death.  Wisdom would cause us all to listen to conscience.

If conscience was formed through the training you described, it would be egoic and not Divine.  It could be said that his training, assuming he had much, led him to his conscience but it cannot be said that his training created his conscience.


©2010 Thomas P. Grasso All Rights Reserved

The difference in Heaven and Hell

 There is a difference between heaven and hell.  In heaven, everything is right and good, and in hell everything is wrong and bad.  Soon, you will find that you are the Creator of either. ~Tom Grasso


©2010 Thomas P. Grasso All Rights Reserved

Q: Can't that 'voice within' be the dictates of conscience?

Depends, assuming I understand this question.  There are many "voices within".  Depends on which voice you are listening to.

There is a trick I have learned through listening.  We all have a higher vision of our selves.  That higher vision is our "soul purpose".  When a voice is contrary to that higher vision, I don't see it as being the one I want to listen to.  When it is in line with it, that is the voice that I strive to listen to. You will find that when we listen to the voice that works the "higher vision" of ourselves, we all would work in a unison not found in any Bible, and could work in a way to which a book like the Bible is not necessary.

First, you must know your higher vision.  It is never what it seems at first, but can be found in deep meditation and prayer.  It is a journey unto itself, one most people are too lazy or too ego-attached to undertake.  The first higher vision you have of yourself is usually ego-generated.  It is a defense mechanism of the ego usually appearing to be "good" while easily found although rarely attained.  That is not the "higher", it is the first.  It usually takes a very long time of focus, work and dedication to find that "higher vision". 

Then the work continues to focus on being in line with that higher vision.  It becomes easier as the focus needed becomes sharper through practice.  Once you attain enlightenment you will see it becomes your True Nature. 

I hear this "voice" clearly as a feeling of truth from within my soul.  I am still trying to discover my "higher vision" and my "soul purpose" and realize that it has been a process since my youth.  See, it ain't easy or quick!!

©2009 Thomas P. Grasso All Rights Reserved

Our Government doesn't represent the people?

It was stated during an internet discussion by a libertarian friend of mine that the government does not represent the people, but rather bankers and the very wealthy.  Below is my response:

It does represent the people, a people who have no interest in it whatsoever.  You never do go quite far enough in what really is the cause in government.  Sure, the bankers and wealthy have a foothold, but that is only because the PEOPLE have allowed them to.  WE vote for two parties only, WE vote for incumbents entrenched in the bureaucracy, WE keep the status quo status quo.

So, the bankers take advantage of our laziness...you can't blame the dog for eating the scraps that fall on the floor can you?

I have a feeling you like to blast the current status quo because you fear the truth, that unless this society takes control we are lost, and in order to take control there has to be something that wakes them, and in order to be awakened they have to accept their blame for all that has happened up into that very moment.  These things won't happen in this society...it has gotten too fat and too invested in the status quo.  Even you are invested in this status quo, because without it you simply would not exist as you like...an "enemy" of the "enemy".

So...in order for this society to wake up, two things must happen.  First, YOU must wake up as an individual (you think you are now because you believe you "know" things that everyone else is blind to, but you aren't because you blame the wrong things).  Without you waking yourself up, you will never be part of the solution.

Second, this society must suffer.  It is the only thing that wakes us up.  All of these government programs are the beginning to that suffering that was destined the first time government employed someone to protect you, or instituted committees that regulated how you could build, or what you could build.  The eventual suffering we will face is destined as we repeat the history other societies have created...it is a foregone conclusion.

I simply wish it to be me that suffers for the mistakes I have made and not my children.  I don't want to pass this mistake on to them.  I want to teach them from MY example of suffering how to live, how to be, and how to become wise beyond this insanity.  Teaching them does not include blaming others for the mistake...it involves taking responsibility for self and working toward your sense of higher cause. It means being the example, not talking about it.

So, I hope to expedite the course of suffering so that it may be me who bears the brunt, not them.  Let health care reign, let meaningless wars be fought, let's keep trying to kill an idea with a bullet or bomb, let's dump more and more into an antiquated war machine, let's worry about the meaningless distractions created for us so that we may never look at the heart of our existence.  Tiger Woods cheats on his wife...front page news; 50 million people in the US can't afford the right amount of food doesn't even get an honorable mention.

I just want us to hurry up.  I don't have much time yet and I don't want to pass this on to our children.  They are the ones who need to rebuild the house of cards we have built...only this time with brick.  

©2009 Thomas P. Grasso All Rights Reserved

Why put Christ "back" in Christmas?

The following is an excerpt from an online discussion of the meaning of Christmas, its pagan-like rituals and what is the "right" thing to do during the Christmas season.  This is my response to a rather heated debate between a myself, a Christian and an atheist on the meaning of Christmas.  What seemed to be my key observation was how angry the Christian was getting in relation to the atheist's remarks.  Why, I wonder, do we have the need to see the outward manifestation of our beliefs in others?  Why is it so necessary that our paths be not only accepted, but walked, by others?  As the Observer, I found not only the anger in others, but my need to mention the "wrongness" of others as a distraction from my path of inward experience.  In this, however, I realize I needed to have the outward experience in order to know the need for inward reflection on it.

If we could all just see what all of this does...what it all means. The entire debate is a distraction.

Religion, when not an inward ritual or protestation of faith, fails to be meaningful regardless of what outward signs of correctness there may be. Religion, when not an inward activity of a devotion one has chosen as his or her path, fails to be a path at all, but more of a "billboard" advertisement of what the path should be for the holder of the sign. If we all just did what we say others should do without saying anything at all, wouldn't this world be a much happier place to carry out this existence?

Christians could justify Christmas just by living Christ in Christmas. The action of having everyone else justify it makes it a meaningless and trivial ritual.

We are so soaked in our need to make others see things our way that we fail to be the way. That's my observation of this entire thread, my input included. I have failed to be focused on my path as my path, while allowing others to seek their destination in their own way. I offer my apologies.

 No one is truly wrong in the activity of debate, it is what it is without error or judgment if such judgment can be eliminated.  While the opinions may be "wrong" for me (making them "wrong" in my opinion), they are not truly "wrong" in the collective sense, the universe would judge my path as "wrong" or "right" as the other.  In this sense, they just "are".


Namaste.


©2009 Thomas P. Grasso All Rights Reserved

A Conversation of Ego

Me:
In this experience, in the "realm of relativity", spirit needs to the ego to find its purpose. When we move on to the "realm of the Absolute", our souls certain have no more use for ego. Remember, ego is a creation of God so that God may experience what It is through what It is not. Therefore, it is not only necessary, but perfect.

Bryan X:

I disagree on the point of the spirt needs the ego to find what it is. That is giving the ego weight which veils the oneness that you already are. If we give the ego weight and put it over awareness (spirit) then we have become the unstable. Unstable leads to insecurity mental anguish for you are identifying with something that will constantly be changing and in flux. Go to the core. Find the SELF, not the self.

Me:

Our experiences might be different Bryan. I have found, in mine, that the ego and the suffering it causes has helped me lift the veils and find my spirit. I cannot give the ego any more weight that my soul decides it has...for whatever purpose my soul has for it.

You seem to wish to judge ego instead of see it as a tool. In my experience, my ego has been a chisel, my spirit the sculptor, and my experience the marble. In the Divine Triune (That Which Gives Rise To, That Which is Risen, That Which Is or Father, Son, Holy Spirit) my spirit has given rise to my ego which in turn creates what is so that my spirit can experience itself and continue the creative process. I cannot judge my ego as bad as it perfectly fulfills its purpose. Without it, my soul could not experience itself, so I love the ego in its purpose. This is rather easy to do or, to use your analogy, "weightless" when the perspective is NOT OF THE EGO, but rather in seeing the ego as it is.

What you seem to be doing is giving the ego much more weight than it deserves through your judgments. Learn to see if from the perspective of the Seer and not the tool. Then, you will see just how perfect and necessary each of our egos are.

©2009 Thomas P. Grasso All Rights Reserved

Today, A moment of wakefullness?

Today I feel love exploding inside of me.  It is as if a great warmth is surrounding my Being left frozen and numb by time.  I feel the life returning, the color enveloping the colorless, the rush of life filling the void left by death.  I feel reborn.

Last night I dreamed.  I dreamed of things that were, that are, and that will be.  I felt purpose in my Being, a drive in my soul to experience purpose.  From a book rose a memory and from my soul a command: "If you had but the faith of a mustard seed you could move mountains.  You don't have much time left to move that which you were sent to move."  I awoke with purpose, and a renewed understanding that my purpose will unfold if I just allow it to.  My faith may be able to move mountains, but only if I allow it to.

I love my wife, I love my children.  I simply love.  I love the stranger who I held the door open for while I was getting my morning coffee.  I love the beans that allowed my coffee to be.  I love the rain in my bare head, the sweat running down my back at the gym, the pain in my arms as they worked to failure, because all of these allowed me to know that I was Being.  I love my new dog, the memory of my old dog and the challenges each allowed to be.  I love the essence of lust my wife gives me, the challenge of patience my son gives me, the reflection of self my daughters provide, and each and ever moment that all of this existence is giving me.

To say that at this moment I have arrived in such clarity is an understatement of what is.  I cannot describe completely or accurately what is inside me at this moment save to say that what is inside me at this moment has changed what is not as I can see it.  The world is clearer right now, more beautiful, with each sight and each sound being clearer than I can ever remember it.  I can hear the silence more clearly, the light more vividly, and the things that are allowed to be by the presence of silence and light in a way new to me.  Such is the beauty of what is at this moment.

I will follow my purpose as it unfolds, and listen to my Inner Voice as it allows me to feel such instruction.  Such life, such purpose shall not be forgotten.  I have seen the purpose of anger, of hatred, of fear as darkness that allows this light to be.  I have felt the heat of battle as it has scorched my face, the wind risen veil of anger as it hides the love I wish could be.  They are part of me, and in order for me to be they must be.  These are not "me", they are but a part of the whole which is allowed to be by the light of love that is inside me.  In knowing the fear as I have I can see the love, in knowing the anger I can see the compassion, in knowing the "bad" I can recognize the "good".  I can see the place of each, the parts of me that allow the whole to exist.  I must not grasp to live, I must let go to Be.



©2009 Thomas P. Grasso All Rights Reserved

I lie

I lie because I fear.

I fear rejection, failure, loss, suffering, death, and ambivalence.

I fear because I am asleep.

I sleep in order to experience all that I fear.  This experience will allow me to know love and provide me a means to be loving.

In order to love I must first learn to love me.  I am not bad, I am not evil, I am not...

I am as good or as bad as anything else.  I am perfection as created, experiencing that which I must in order to walk the path I have chosen long before this life began.   I am love as much as I am fear and can be either upon choosing one over another.  I can be awake or asleep depending on my choice.  Neither is wrong, neither is right, neither simply is.  All things are there for my use to achieve my moment's purpose.  I must stop resisting...

©2009 Thomas P. Grasso All Rights Reserved

Q: "Is my salvation up to me?"

Q: (Paraphrasing) Do I need to understand that desire, hunger, passion, or lust is a "dream" I need to wake up from?  If my salvation is up to me, I am screwed because I simply wish to eat when hungry regardless of how many times I tell my body "it's a dream, you are not hungry".  I need not feel guilty from the listening to my body.

I would say don't replace one identity with another. You will only learn what you are ready to learn. You are experiencing all that you must in the way that you must. You can choose (yes, you have the choice) to be completely aware or to be completely unconscious. Neither is wrong!

If you are hungry, you may choose to eat or be free of the desire. If you want to enjoy Christmas, so be it. If you wish to be free of considering Christmas as any different from any other day, so be it. Don't, for one minute, submit to the idiocy of others who deem to tell you what is proper, what is right, as if they somehow know better. They are free to tell you whatever they wish, but you are free to listen to whatever you wish. And I use the word "idiocy" to describe the notion that anyone on this forum or elsewhere can somehow instruct you on the "right" way to live or be.

I rarely read this forum or engage in discussions here. I find the "commune" sense contrary to my purpose of the moment. Something drew me to read this passage at this time, and to respond. I don't question it, it just is. As you will be, or as any of us will be. Once the "Being" becomes united in community it fails to be anything other than the collective identity. I simply cannot see the act of replacing the Bible with another guide any better than living a lie.

God will tell you what you need when you are ready, and it might not be in this lifetime. The fact that you are questioning this is a sign that perhaps you are ready to seek the source. If so, follow your path. If not, follow your path. Or not.

One last thing. Believing that "none of this is real" because you read it in a New Age book means nothing. You must find this out for yourself in order to make your choice. Until then, it may ALL be real...or it may not. A book will not get it done for you, you must discover the path, walk the path, and then emerge from the destination as you were meant to. The inane meanderings of others who protest that "none of this is real" are part of the dream, or not, depending on your perspective. They may know it not to be "real" or know it to be a "dream", but few have actually experienced the dream, or peeled away the layers to find the illusion. The book itself may be a guide to such enlightenment, or it may be nothing more than a way to distinguish those who know from those who are.

©2009 Thomas P. Grasso All Rights Reserved

Handshake

"I extend my hand to you, but have no attachment to you doing the same. My extended hand need not be filled to experience its purpose." ~Tom Grasso

©2009 Thomas P. Grasso All Rights Reserved

As I...

As I talked today about all I knew, God said "listen".  As I walked  today aimless about, God said "look".

It is so easy to love the noise of ourselves so deeply that we forget to hear.  It is so easy as we head to our destination to forget to look at the marvels on our path.  Take time to be still and listen.  Take time while exploring purpose to look around you.  Not all things are said in sound, and not all destinations are found at the end of the journey. ~Tom Grasso

©2009 Thomas P. Grasso All Rights Reserved

Deepak Chopra Asks: What's the connection between spiritual energy and sexual energy?

This question is beautiful in that it allows us to explore so many different things all in one meditation.  As an American, we can certainly see how sexual energy's connection to spirit has been removed from our culture.  We have created sexual energy as sinful in most cases, and have packed it into a neat little box full of conditions but usually devoid of instruction.  Many of us learn at a young age that what our bodies feel and desire is wrong and out of line with God's will, and the resistance to this desire is in line with the spirit.  The education itself often causes sex and spirit to be completely devoid of one another, leaving us to seek alternatives to replace the void created in the split. 

In my experience, however, sexual energy is connected to us, the human Being, in more ways than most of us realize.  Sex is part of who we are, as instinctive to us as breathing and as meaningful to us as prayer.  Depending on our recognition of its source, sexual energy can be the most rewarding of actions or the cause of great guilt and suffering.  For some, sex is an egoic function meant to temporarily satiate egoic desire, a desire that can never quite be filled in the ego's mission for more and better.  It becomes an addiction of sorts, where the identity is clouded by the need to replace a normal self-loathing with a feeling of superiority or of accomplishment.  That feeling nearly never comes or, at the very least, proves to be very fleeting.  This causes it to be repeated over and over again always with the same results.

I can only speak from my experience here.  There are no degrees of Psychotherapy hanging on my walls, no certifications for sexual therapy to say I "know".  In this experience I have found the ego's need for sexual satisfaction to be anti-climatic (no pun intended).  I have felt the great tinge of need when the ego feels threatened, the call of the voices all stating that sexual satisfaction is the way to all satisfaction or as a means to regain control when afraid.  They lie.  Or at least they lie in the context that physical sexual satisfaction alone can satisfy or provide control.  They do not.  The voices are silenced for but a moment at climax, but usually return before your pants are back on to create in your mind all that caused you to look for satisfaction in this manner in the first place.

Then comes along the Spirit.  It speaks to you in a much different way.  When you are with a lover...no not a "booty call" or a "friend with benefits"...but an actual lover, the Spirit speaks to you in ways that magnify the feeling and the moment.  The voices end, the fear fades, the need for control gives way to the need to accept.  You "listen" not to a voice inside of you, but rather to all that is inside of you.  Spirit, that which is Love Incarnate, becomes physically manifested through the action of sex.  Spirit, the Creator, creates love through the process of making love; the physical manifestation of the Spirit's desire to be Love through the conversion of sexual energy into the art of making love.  In this, spiritual energy and sexual energy become one in the same, the molting of the mind, body and soul into One Being.

This is not to say that egoic sexual energy is not of Spirit.  It is simply devoid of the recognition of Spirit in the act. The experiences I have had with egoic sex have brought forth a tremendous understanding of the act of Love.  As a result, I have found that desire and needs in the act of Love are expressions of that Love.  No fear, no guilt, no voices, just the action of converting the Love (energy) inside of me to something tangible in the physical universe.  If you wish to experience it, just open your heart and close your thoughts.

©2009 Thomas P Grasso All Rights Reserved

The Essence of Love In a Time of Hate

"Healing is the physical manifestation of love from the universe.  It is the nature of all things to heal, the truth of all things to love, and the essence of all things to experience what love is not in order to see all that love is." ~Tom Grasso

Storms rage and kill.  Man is killing man and nature with equal abandon.  Bullets fly and bombs drop, children are being blown to bits not for their security, but for the feeling of security that others halfway across the world will have as they board their planes, ride their trains, and gather for their entertainment.  The oceans are laden with the vestige of man's hate for his own planet, an example of human self loathing created somewhere between his quest for fire and his quest for easy forgiveness.  You see it all, you view it in totality as another polar bear dies and another glaciers shrinks in evidence of the capitulation of man to his ego, the replacement of man created in the image of God with God created in the image of man.  As you view the destruction with a tear running down your cheek and a cause in your heart you are left to ask one question.

"WHY?"

We often fail to see the beauty in things we consider "bad".  It appears that we replace our emotions with our thoughts, our feelings with our judgments.  We replace God with ego, and ignore the communication we have with God in favor of the communication we have with ego.  In this replacement, it appears we have lost contact with the Infinite Perfection because we have concentrated on communicating with the Infinite Imperfection.  When we communicate with Perfection, we see that there is no such thing as bad outside of our ego.  There is no such thing as evil outside of our imperfect need for it.  It is when we can not only understand "why" but see the purpose of the "bad", we then lose the judgment of something as "bad".  This unique state of awareness allows acceptance of all things as necessary.  We replace all things "good" and all things "bad" with all things that simply "are".

All travesties and tragedies have a purpose.  They allow the opportunity for action, for the "soul" purpose to be.  There are no tragedies greater than any other except in our minds.  There are no actions better than the others except in our own minds.  There is no healing more miraculous than any other except in our own minds.  There is no deed more splendid than any other except in our minds.  The mind is where we as God create, where the physical manifestation of Being and ego becomes what is.  The mind is the bridge between Spirit and body, between God and man, where That Which Is Risen gives That Which Gives Rise to the ability to create That Which Is.  In this dynamic, we often stop at the mind instead of going beyond it to seek what is providing the mind its purpose. 

So the answer to "why" is because all things are a matter of the necessity of experience.  All things "bad" that happen are opportunities for "good" to exist.  All things "good" that happen exist only because "bad" exists equally.  This is true in every case where either exists; one is because the other is.  Because of this certainty, neither is truly good or bad, they are equals in the light devoid of ego.

So it seems that in this physical universe we will always experience the essence of love in times of hate because that is the way it must be.  
  
©2009 Thomas P Grasso All Rights Reserved

The Snowflake

To see a snowflake, perfect in its design, magnificent in its seperateness, but complete in its Oneness is to understand your own place in the universe. Revel in your uniqueness that exists as a result of your Oneness and float through this time that takes you to your destiny. ~ Tom Grasso

 ©2009 Thomas P Grasso All Rights Reserved

An Answer to the Question: "How has America gotten to this point where debauchery and decadence rules the day?"

We have gotten to this point because neither side is right, neither side has the answer, neither side is the moral righteous. And the more they think they do, the less they are right. The more they attempt to inflict themselves on others, the more they do the opposite of what they intended.

Both ideologies (conservative and liberal) have created in our society a population that cannot think on its own, cannot act without being told in some way to act, and have created in their minds the notion that someone somewhere must tell them what is right and what is wrong. This has happened in every society...every civilization has fallen for nearly the same cause...and we are no different. Our fall just seems faster because we think we are right and have the resources to continue the delusion.

We have not imparted WISDOM into our society. We may KNOW a lot (and even that is questionable), but we never truly learn how to think on our own. Our schools teach us what to think about a subject, our parents teach us how to live an what to think in their image, and we never fully learn to develop WISDOM. So, we keep on repeating the same mistakes over and over again while actually working to convince others to make them with us. And if they question us on the mistakes we label them, make fun of them, and humiliate them into some corner of our society we do not wish to hear.

Those who believe they are right from the outset may never understand this. Everyone not like them is wrong. I say we are both wrong. The minute you have to live like me or me like you we are both wrong. The minute I seek to inflict who I am on you through the collective I am wrong. The minute I blame you and not me for the ills of society I am wrong. The minute I point my finger I am wrong. The second I do not consider me I am wrong. The minute I open my mouth without action to follow I am wrong.

The minute I need not speak but through action may be the first time I have ever been right.

An important thing to remember is that decadence is only decadence to YOU. You define it for yourself and then seek to make it so for everyone else. In this exercise, we have forgotten how to let others BE. So, we make them wrong and classify them as "less" than we are and in turn make everything about them wrong. This is one silly practice, and because of it we have created a society that can no longer be itself without thinking itself "decadent" if it doesn't act just like those who have defined it.

I would venture a guess that if we stopped classifying all of this meaningless garbage we would find that we really aren't all that bad. We tend to focus on meaningless drivel that does not deserve attention while allowing the meaningful parts of our existence flounder. It is this focus, or lack of it, that is undermining our society because it undermines the individuals who make up that society.

As it will. When you are the richest nation on earth with the most debt and the most toys, you tend to lose focus. "Things" become the most important aspect of life, money becomes the focus, and you are willing to do just about anything to acquire things and make money. You have, at that point, sacrificed who you are for who you think you are. You have become the illusion.

The only cure is to wake up. This requires deep inward focus and attention to self. Your ego has created a word you use often, "selfish", and made it bad so that you never wish to focus on self. Focusing on "self" makes you bad, whereas diving into the worlds of others makes you "concerned", and "good". 

I ask you one question, what has all of the desire to make all of that not you exactly like you accomplished? It seems to me that all of your desire to make the world like you has done nothing but given you the false impression that the world is falling apart because of its failure to be like you. That is your mistake, not the world's.

©2009 Thomas P Grasso All Rights Reserved

The Rushing Tide of Time

I have a purpose, a reason for Being that is so complete and so perfect that my soul's agreement with God was to forget it before I was born. Such seems to be the price of being born that one should forget such perfection and completeness in exchange for the experience of being what the soul is not. It is the absolute perfection of this existence, that utter perfection can experience utter imperfection so that it can BE. When one remembers this purpose, the folly of what can be this "life" (what we call all we know) becomes clearly necessary so that we may know all that we are.

The purpose of this blog is not to preach, but to experience. I have been given a desire to write, to express what is inside of my Being in this way. Recently, it has made much less sense for me to hide this "light under a basket" for it was given me for a reason. What that reason is I have yet to discover, and what will be the result I see no sense in questioning or speculating about. It is what it is, and in understanding that I have no purpose here I find no pressure, just the flow of creativity when it comes and when there is the possibility to share.

To share does not mean with anyone else, to share means to take that which is within me and expose it to the light. If others find this, read this, and see value in this so be it, but it is not written for any purpose other than to exist in itself as it was meant to exist.

I welcome this experience with my heart wide open, with this soul's embracing light loving the darkness that has allowed it to be experienced. I find love in my soul, peace in my heart, and the glorious excitement at was is to become of this moment.

©2009 Thomas P Grasso All Rights Reserved

An Ode to Dempsey (November 18, 2009)

You are but an old man now,
Seeking to define what time has done to you,
Finding that strength escapes you,
As did the youth you so eagerly took for granted.

You are but an old man now my friend,
I watch you struggle for that last glimpse of life,
To be with those you love,
With those for whom your loyalty was never-ending.

I am but an old man now,
Yet young was I when you first came to me,
How my struggle became your struggle,
And yet you sat by me regardless of who I was.

We are but old men now,
And as I watch you fade into memory,
I know that this place you have built without effort
Will be a part of me forever.

For who could know that a true best friend,
Could be found in one who has never spoken a word but has said so much,
But who has in this moment taught me
That anger should never replace the pain I knew I’d feel in your departure.

But now I will watch you until I can watch no longer,
And comfort you as you have comforted me,
And love you as you have loved me,
And know that the gift you give is in the tears I now shed.

I shed these tears for the two of us,
And for those who love us, who will sit with us without question,
For we are old men now my friend,
The end is near…we shall be comforted.

Simply (October 29, 2009)

Like as if a pebble through still waters,
Awareness ripples through the story of my life,
Seeking to see beyond that which is the illusion of reflection,
Slowly defining that which is beneath the surface.

As though the seeker and not the sought,
The truth that ripples through the delusions of stillness,
To allow true stillness to be, to all no distortions between
This and that, here and there, then and now.

That which is in the Deep has become the here and now,
That which was the surface slowing sinks into the Abyss,
To feel, to Be, is to be numb and to Be not,
To be there is to know what it is to be here.

To have is to realize what it is to have not,
To see is to know certain blindness, to be bad is to know what goodness is,
To seek is to know no search, to cry is to know pure bliss,
To hate is to know love and to lie is to know truth.

I am..

Not simply as some thing, but as all things.

I am…

Not simply as God but as my own Creation.

I am…

Not as what I seek to be but as what you have made me.
You, the other, the same, my Creator as I am surely yours.
For what am I if not what I am in your mind,
And what are you if not what you are in my mind.

Good, bad, kind, mean, right, wrong,
What can it be if not me? For you cannot exist
If I do not exist, you cannot be if I do not make you so,
And I am just a figment of my own imagination as you are yours, and we each other's.

You are truth in all that you are because you are truth in all that you are not.
You are the bane of the existence to that which loves that you are.
You are to experience that which you were not, in order that you may finally be.

You are because you were not and because of that you will be.

Simply.

This Mind

Alone I fall but the morrow comes,
And aye such tenderness escapes the lot of me,
I am lost or so it seems,
Beyond the capacity of this mind to see.

Once the sound of music pained,
The look of a trampled man never gave me pause,
And yet such burden borne on me,
Was this mind's own rigid, frightful cause.

For hate, dislike, lost and found,
Are but visions of fantasy like flags unfurled,
It's true nothing in this dream has changed,
Except how I, this mind, see this world.

Timeless Life

Divine, I slip out to the shore,
Enticed by ocean's lapping sound,
I hear the silence that gives me pause,
In this space I find such truth profound.

To be born today but forever alive,
Is to step anew where my feet once tread,
I swear I can feel the waves but tease my skin,
Yet when I look I can only see a sandy bed.

Felt I those waves as once alive,
But now have but sunken to the sea?
Perhaps they never where but in my mind,
That part of ocean somehow part of me.

Alive! I rush to breathe at last,
From Root to Heart, from Om to Crown,
This destiny that suffers not,
What is left of "me" I leave to drown.

Escaped I from the lie that was,
Onto the shore of truth's own lapping wave,
Once what I want hath died what is can live,
I shall not miss those things that I have lave.

Let go! Let go! this somber soul,
Feel time slipping from your hands,
For that which is alive only but in your mind,
Shall wash away as Timeless life demands.

Dear Mother

I have been laying awake for the last hour, struggling within myself not to be attached to my feelings of anger and sadness for what you have done. I have attempted to meditate, reviewed the blessing of my life and basically did all I could do to let these feelings pass except write this to you. I wish to let it out of me now in order that the light it is exposed to shall end such attachment. So here I sit alone in the darkness allowing my spirit to write absent of any thought to guide it from this abyss. Such honesty may prove painful, but necessary, on this path to more enlightened moments. My sadness is only compounded in my seeming need to write that which could prove so painful to others.

You have stolen too much from me, and as I regress back into a feeling of anger over what you have done I realize that it is truly just sadness disguised in a more soluble form of emotion to me. You have beaten tears out of me, you have lied anger into me, and you have stolen from me all I could have been. That is certainly not true of this moment, I am as I must be, but you must realize that what YOU are has offered little to this world beyond children stolen from their essence and driven into lonely darkness. Such a legacy left by someone who I wish could feel the selfless love around her is truly something that wreaks such painful havoc such as the desperate sadness I feel at this moment.

You have lied, and in your lies you have taken much more than you have given from the souls of those who, through birth, lay committed to your care and love. You remain this moment so selfish of love and unselfish of hate that you spread that hate like a disease around you. You have belittled your daughter into a life of such servitude that the truth smells so foul she must run from it. You have created in your world a reality so devoid of truth that any semblance of it has been removed, often with reasons just as fabricated as the lies that created them. You have driven your son into a life of ended despair that caused him to offer similar pain to the ones he loves the most. You have not been the light; that beacon of love that the ships you send into the world may find direction. No, you have been the bastion of darkness that causes those ships to run aground, stuck in the mud as helpless vessels of the pure hatred you have born into them.

You have poisoned me, and in such a condition we spread that poison to others who you have also rejected in your failed reality. You have caused me to reject a grandmother whose only fault was to not be part of the ingredient to your affliction. You caused me to hardly know a grandfather whose only memory I have was one of patient, caring love. You have stolen years from a father and his son, and in doing so created such pain that both seemed to have relived over and over again the only attachments to joy they could find from each other. This is just a small tasting of the poison you have shared with the world around you, a world who neither deserved such a fate nor asked for it.

Today, however, you failed. I have found my father, and understand in my short conversation with him that we share a bit more than just a bloodline. We share what you have created, your masterpiece of pain that left a aged man with a trembling voice and a younger version of him with tears in his eyes. Today you failed to beat every tear from my eyes. No, I shared a few with the world around me as an antidote to the poison you have fed it, and I left it a hope for continued health tomorrow.

And as I look into my mind's eye I see my own children, one who is left to tears over the thought of "Mr. and Mrs. Grasso" who were once her grandparents and the other two much luckier in having never met them, and I renew an oath to work to keep your poison from their hearts. I am so ravaged by the illness at times I am unsure of my abilities in this regard, but committed just the same to ending your cycle in me. I can only hope that the new memories and visions in my heart can replace those you have created. I pray the love and sanity I have found grow wildly in my soul to replace the scars and fear you have burrowed into it. I realize that I have this power to remove you like a tumor because only I can create you into anything other than a distant memory. That is where you belong - in the words of one of my favorite songs - "In My Rear View Mirror".

You have created you the monster, but I keep it alive. It is high time I finish the exorcism, and in meeting the man who should have always been a part of my life I pray to do just that. I realize why you needed to remove him, he knew the truth and you needed to keep us from it. Rather than be the truth you created it, and in doing so turned a man who was nothing more than a good husband and father into a monster so much like you. I find it odd that your description of him - the monster you created - is actually a self-description, and I find it odd that as you sit still at night you don't see that irony. It is YOU who sought removal of your self from the lives of your son and his family who could have so unselfishly loved you, and it was YOU who forced the removal of a man, my father, from his children while destroying all he worked for in the process.

And the song replays like a broken record along the time line of your life. Misery, tears, anger, hostility and separation follow in your wake as if you are a tornado spawned from hell and not satisfied until all beauty is removed from heaven above it. I wonder if the price was worth the trip, as it seems more long for you to be in their rear view mirrors than want you in the car with them.

I have forgiven the beatings you provided me...as from the same song they "made me wise". I am not sure I have forgiven you the tears my daughter sheds at the very discussion of your selfishness. It would seem, given what I know of you, the reaction you craved. You get your importance from the misery of others, and if there is one piece of advice I offered my daughter at your expense it was to not give you such power. It is what you crave, what quenches your thirst, and to steal it away from you is the only way to slay the beast that lives in your soul. Perhaps when her tears no longer are created at the thought of you the forgiveness will be given me to share.

So now, I will walk this path given me in complete bliss at the opportunity it has brought. Time will tell how complete this path makes me, but I have confidence that I will be as I always am: where I need be. My only desire, if you can call it that, is that I walk the rest of my journey cured of the illness you have bequeathed me. I have found the antidote, love, I just need to perfect my taste for it. Such perfection will be the end of you.

In spite of all of this I still love you, my mother, and feel an immense degree of sadness over your condition. Perhaps that sadness is magnified by the fact that your condition is so easily cured, for I have found that the truth is truly a cure for all blights on the soul. I just wonder if you have not lived for so long in your fantasy that you can no longer see a different reality. Such sadness cannot be born long on a soul, take it from your son who has had to live it to some degree for much too long. So, despite my anger and sadness I will always have my arms prepared to open for you should you choose to find love and truth in your life. That seems to be proof enough to my spirit that I am truly finding cure of what you have made of it. And in that, I end this with a smile and a hopeful recognition of what fate can bestow.

Into the Rain

Such pity poor does Nature show
To those she must endure,
To be free alive beyond what minds contrive,
Is her destiny for sure.

These eyes can see so easily,
Through panes of weathered glass,
Nature's plan to shake off this man,
Or have his ego shunned en masse.

Such tears have formed throughout the years,
Now come pouring from the sky,
And through this weathered window pane,
Comes the understanding why.

This box is sealed with mental locks,
She offers me the key,
With pain assumed by us insane,
We create all reality.

This box is why I can stay so dry,
And absent of her pain,
But through that door there is much more,
So I walk Into the Rain.

Through that door into the light, from the confines of darkness into the freedom from it I walk. Unsteadily, as if walking for the first time, I take my first step beyond what I know into the Rain. Why does such pure water feel so dirty? Why does the chill course through my body as if I am feeling life for the very first time? I stumble a bit, unsure of my balance as I venture outward, but somehow I realize that the more I seem to venture from the confines that held me, the more I seem to venture outward, the more I venture inward. This Rain, as it cascades down my now bare skin onto the Earth that is now part of me, is bringing me alive as if for the very first time.

We are but one,
One body, one soul, one part of Creation,
We are all part of the same Sea,
And in this existence we share,
We are all but teaspoons from this Sea,
And surely one day we will all return to Her.
Our spoons may look different,
The bowls may be larger or smaller,
The handles may be ornate or plain,
But it is not the spoon that matters,
For it is just a vessel, a distraction from the Sea.

I realize that as much as our egos seek to separate us from all that is, we are not separate from any of it. Although ego provides us with physical differences we are not different except in our perception of the physical. Although our minds offer us borders from which to divide ourselves, we are not different. As the mud runs through my toes I realize that somewhere someone is also allowing the mud to run through their toes. The same Earth, the same air, the same sky, the same Rain, the same emotion, all is the same but the vessel that carries the Sea. In the Sea we share a Oneness and the same purpose, and it is the purpose of ego to have us forget the Sea and to focus on the vessel that carries it. In this sense, the battle is not between "good" and "evil", but between awareness and ego.

So, with arms outstretched and eyes focused on the sky, I walk into the Rain.

Think

Some dream - to be lost in it all,
To think that this matters is simply to think
And to think is to die,
And to die is to dream and to not wonder why.

Some time - it just passes by,
To count the seconds is to think within time,
And to think is to die,
And to die is to think as the time passes by.

Some things, we hold on as tight as we can,
To hold on to these things is to think who we are,
And to think is to die,
And to die is to hold on to these things as life flashes by.

One side you are God, the other you're man,
And to live in a dream is to think that you can,
And to think is to die,
But to live is to be as the thoughts roll on by.

Right or wrong the thought matters not,
To think that your right is the start of the fight,
See to think is to die,
But to live is to be absent of thought in your mind.

It Is Love

She reaches me in places I have never been reached,
Filling my being with Light,
Surrounding my soul with the essence of Love,
Driving me to heights never achieved.

She touches me in ways I have never been touched,
I can feel her near me even when she is out of sight,
I can sense her around me even when she is not near,
Sensing in all that which she is to me.

How can I explain the unexplainable?
How does one describe that which has no description?
It is just as it should be, such beauty surrounds,
It is so purely all that need be - it is Love that is me.

I find her in the Holy half of me,
Softly being there to share the Light,
A part of me as surely as I am part of it,
The beginning of life and the end of fear.

When such demons invade the other half of me,
She is there, the light to defeat such darkness,
The sound of silence that instills such grace in me,
The view of eternity from inside the abyss.

She is not me, but she has discovered me,
And in this I am utterly devoted,
For peace and love have removed anger and fear,
It is simply meant to be, It is Love she has found in me.

Once you feel pure Love it is all you wish to feel,
The darker half of you cowers in its presence,
You even feel the sunshine in every raindrop,
You feel the warmth in every snowflake.

Once you live in pure Love it is the only life you choose,
You feel joy in the challenges that befall you,
Happiness finds you even in the worst of pain,
You open your heart to what is, not what was or will be.

You see beyond the confines of an evening sky,
The void that allows the stars to be,
You find the light in the darkness in which you stand,
And when you smile you are free, It is Love that you see.

Sick

I am so sick of being unhappy.

I am so sick of being miserable.

I am so sick of worrying.

I am so sick of being unsatisfied and of not satisfying.

I am so sick of being tired.

I am so sick of being sick.

I am so sick of being separate.

I don't know how much longer I can take it.

Guilt

Today while meditating I realized that I am the guilt I see in others...that I am the guilt I throw on the world. I live with the complete understanding that all of the guilt I carry inside of me is what has driven me not to trust and to see impending pain in all that those I love do. While seeing this realization, I am not sure how to expose it to revelation - to the awareness that ends such darkness. I am sure such tests shall present themselves to me, and in those tests I will see my reflection on the world.

I open my heart to change, my soul to awareness and my Being to Oneness. I seek to find God in me, God in you, and God in all around me. I cannot judge my past actions based on this realization, they are but an illusion created by my own illusions. Rather, I must forgive in order to seek forgiveness, I must be peace in order to find peace.

God, please help me in this challenge, please allow me to be.

Looking into the Pond Looking Back at Me

The world is but a reflection of me,
Whatever I share with it, it offers in return,
Whatever I give it, it gives back to me,
Whatever I see in it, it sees in me.

I can only change the world by changing my self,
I can only find love in the world if I am love,
I can only find peace in the world if I am peace,
Whatever I am in the world the world is to me.

The world is but a dream surrounded by darkness,
It is as I wish it to be even as my ego fights what is,
The more I fight the more I suffer,
I am but Looking into the Pond Looking Back at me.

In order to be forgiven I must forgive,
In order to be loved I must be love,
Forgiveness is an action of love, but love is not an action,
It is a state of Oneness with Being, the part of us that is God.

To be one with Being is to be Love,
To be separate from Being is to be the illusion,
To seek Being in the light is to not find it,
You must be wandering in the darkness for it to be revealed.

When you find Being you will know it,
It will no longer be separate from you,
You will no longer need the darkness to see the light,
You will no longer search for what you are -

You will be the Pond Looking Back at You.

This Daily Test

Today was certainly a test...but not one you could "pass" or "fail", just one you had to experience. It is just a test based on its own merit, one on which you could sit back and review and understand its place in the moment. A proverb stated "You hear and forget, you see and remember, you do and understand." Today was a chance to understand.

Through the many challenges, I don't think I could have handled them any differently than I did at those moments. I am still working on being the watcher, on seeing my mind rather than being my mind, so I was not prepared for the giant steps today would have me take. I caught glimpses, but the pull was just too strong.

So today I did, and I understand. I understand I am not ready to run yet, so I will continue to walk. I understand I simply cannot expect to get to the summit without many tries from the base of it first. And I can honestly say that I am happy to have seen this, to have done this, and to know that I can at least see what it is I am not yet prepared to accomplish.

I am also happy that I was able to collect these observations and not hold on to them. The reactions today are NOT me, they are my mind, and I certainly am becoming less my mind each and every day. I am not disappointed, I am not angry, I just am.

Find health, give peace, be love...

T

Denied

To have felt the rays of love
From an unselfish sun,
Is a gift of existence which cannot be returned
And cannot be denied.

To have felt the splash of clean water,
Upon uncleaned skin,
Is to feel the hand of Nature comfort and provide,
As to open the soul to that so denied.

To seek that which is beyond this moment,
Is to starve the Being of that which gives it life,
While to stand on such stable ground arms outstretched wide,
Is to stand in the Presence of that which cannot be denied.

~Tom Grasso 4/4/09

This Moment

This moment I am but a fetus,
Provided for by all that is,
Warmed by all that is around me,
Secure in the knowledge my universe is that which contains me.

Then I am born.

This moment I am but an infant,
Provided for by all that is,
Warmed by all that is around me,
Secure in the knowledge that my universe is that which contains me.

Then I grow.

This moment I am but an adolescent,
Provided for by all that is,
Warmed by the knowledge that I am so much more,
Yet secure in the knowledge that my universe is all that is me.

Then I mature.

This moment I am but a young man,
Providing for myself,
Warmed by the knowledge that I am my own man,
While secure in the knowledge that my universe revolves around me.

Then I grow older.

This moment I am an man in mid-life,
Providing for those around me,
Warmed by the knowledge that those I love depend on me,
While faced with the knowledge that my universe is something I cannot understand.

Then I grow old.

This moment I am an elderly man,
Provided for by all around me,
Warmed by little that is around me,
While faced with the knowledge that my universe is quickly coming to an end.

Then I die.

This moment I AM.

Ode to an Ending

It is time to let go,
Let go of all around me,
Let go of the pull such things may have,
And just let them be.

As setting suns betray the day,
I can hear the foundation of my life cracking around me,
The stones, they fall into the sea
With a splash that resounds in the endless night.

You are but the sand for which I built this foundation,
The rock of salt for which there is no steadfastness,
The time of day for which there is no reply,
Just the memory that seems to say "all things must die".

There are no hands reaching out to save me,
There are no outstretched arms to comfort me,
Just the unending need to leave behind,
Those things that left me behind long ago.

So, plead not my self,
Nor plead for that which will not come,
Seek solace in the loneliness from whence you came,
And in the solitude for which you are heading.

Do not feel distant my being,
Nor find distance from that pain that sees you alive,
Find comfort in knowing that these things, as all things,
Are but temporary in the moment they are conceived.

For now walk alone with those around you,
Seek to play the tune in which they seek comfort,
And bide the time to bid them farewell,
As they have bid you farewell long ago.

Do not find pain in their ignorance of you,
Nor fall for tricks found in their phony words of love,
Stay true to that which brought you here,
That trust that all things are as they must be.

At last the suns betray this cold night,
A warmer day may appear upon the horizon,
Or a colder blast from that which all things come,
Or from which all things find a reality.

For memories that find themselves in the Now,
Shall die before they take root in the making,
Unless it is me that gives them time to be
Anything other that what they where.

And as I pause to take note of the essence of what is now,
I bask in the glow of knowing such things are in passing,
That the suns shall surely betray this day as well,
And that yet another rock shall crumble into the sea.

But for now I will savor such absence,
Of a caring hand, a loving embrace, a tender kiss,
And know that this rock too shall fall,
Perhaps in the absence .

Such is the ode to an ending,
A cause not withered by time or dreams
But born in them beyond our control,
And to that birth I remain so betrayed.

The Ego of Me

What is the ego? Well, there seem to be two simple answers.

The first one is anything that follows the simple phrase of Being "I am". Whatever you can put after "I am" ceases to be about the inner self but rather the outward expression of your mind, a form of ego. It is you and your story, it is your identification, it is your need to be something other than what you truly are. It is the "apple in the garden", the "original sin", the wedge between Being (God) and you.

"I am ugly".
"I am fat."
"I am a Democrat."
"I am right."

None of these describe who you truly are, but rather are identification with the outward expression of thought. None of what comes after the "I am" is real...but rather the dust from which it will return.

The second answer is anything that comes after the phrase "you are". It is what you identify others to be, not what they truly are. It is truth in your eyes only, a judgment that, as all judgments are, is faulty at its conception. It is what you use to either bind another to you or segregate them. They are either with you or like you or they are not. Whenever you follow "you are" with something, it is your own ego assigning the label.

"You are beautiful."
"You are a loser."
"You are mean."
"You are wrong."

Odd, but when you say to someone "you are beautiful", it may have come after they have said "I am ugly." See the fault of judgments? They are based in nothing real, nothing stable. We often might say to someone "you are a loser" right after we ourselves have failed to meet our version of identity in ourselves.

I will leave you with a story. If I was to ask you "what is a tree?", what would your answer be? Common answers would say "Well, it is branches and leaves and bark and twigs and tissue and roots." But is that really the tree? Collect the branches and leaves and bark and twigs and tissue and roots and put them in a bucket. Do you now have a tree?

The same thing can be said if I ask "what is a human being?" The common answer may be "Well, he is skin and bones and muscle and blood and water and organs and hair." Is that really true? Collect some skin and bones and muscle and blood and water and organs and hair and put it in a bucket. Is what you have a person?

What makes the tree a tree and a person a person is not the form you can see. It is the indescribable force that resides beyond the form that not only makes us who we are, but binds us. It is the part of us made in the image of our Creator, the Being in the Human Being. It is the part of us we need to find as we look inward. It is the part of us that is God.

A Cross to Share.

We all have our "cross to bear"...something (or some THINGS) that causes us despair or suffering in our lives. Sometimes these crosses not only cause us to fall, but cause others to suffer in our failing. I find the story of Jesus failing and Simon of Cyrene yet another example of the New Testament bearing the challenges of life into prose and example, and while I am not here to debate the veracity of the story, I am certainly understanding of its place in our lives.

I can personally speak of many things in my early life that led to tremendous failing later in it. There are literally an encyclopedia of instances and times that created my cross, that which I bore for most of my life. There are probably many examples in your own life you can site as a "cross", and a few times when that cross just became too much to bear. In our weakness, we dropped the weight, fell to our knees exhausted and in utter despair. In other times, we stood weary and weak but defiant, finding our own method of dealing with the torture in our minds, our souls, our "being". Some turn to drugs, some turn to suicide, some turn to continuous and unrelenting self-destructive behavior meant on "protecting" that self from the dirt below.

I have always found it odd that in my need for self protection and in the practice of self-destructive behavior to that end I seemed to only "wet the wood" of my cross. In that, I made it much heavier than it need be, and the cross itself was only too willing to accept my offering. Stranger yet, the more I "wet" the wood, the more I sought to defy it, as if I knew more that the weight suggested I did. I can only say today that as I stare at the scars on my knees, the bruises on my shoulders and the splinters on my back that I obviously knew far less than I believed. Each scar and bruise is a lesson learned (hopefully), each splinter an example of the futility of attachment, the suffering of ego.

It was only when I could offer my cross to someone willing to bear it with me that I could see the absolute idiocy of attachment to the pain of the past. We all can site a dozen examples of pain in our past we hold on to today. I have heard from friends who have suffered so intensely, not because of the pain itself, but because of their attachment to it. They can't let go of it, and they use it as a reason or cause for any assortment of issues they have today. Still, when we pass off the lumber to someone we love, we find it utterly torturous to have them deal with the suffering our attachment to pain has caused. In some, this creates unmatched suffering and a dysfunction, to others it causes an awareness of the lunacy such attachment creates.

I can say that when I shared my cross, the suffering it created caused me to seek to shed it completely. That was the purpose of the sharing it seems, to light shed on the idiocy of holding onto it, to finally seek and end to the suffering and my attachment to it.

In our lives, we have many "soldiers" who will whip us into carrying our cross with false strength. They will continually use the "whip" of whatever power they have over use to push us forward, usually to the destination of their choosing. If we fail to reach their assigned destination, they use the power of their "whip" to complete the torture. Our cross (or our attachment to it) becomes their control over us, and we allow it because we ourselves have no identity without the cross we bear. If we also have an attachment to the soldier, we will not only carry the cross of our lives but also learn to love the whip in their hand. We see what they consider the necessary destination as our ultimate goal, that in somehow pleasing them by the sweat and blood of our brow we will find pleasure ourselves.

In this the soldier can be those we "love" or who "love" us. It can be mentors, husbands, wives, teachers, parents, siblings, or even just a best friend. The whip can be sexual in nature, or the return of love, or the idea that "forever" is more solidified. It can also be just a positive reaction, an feigned acceptance (acceptance can never be earned, it is always there). Perhaps in this metaphor we can see the relativity of this analogy in our own lives. If we can see it, we can become aware of it, and in the awareness such unhealthy darkness cannot survive.

There are times when our actions while carrying the cross cause other to suffer in our midst. Our own "Simons" bear the weight of our cross for us and in this suffer along with us. Some are pressed into service, like the guy at the bar we beat up for no real good reason, or the family we gave the finger to when the cut us off in traffic. Others volunteer (although some not knowingly) when they enter into a relationship with us. Regardless of the reason for their "assistance", they are scarred nonetheless, hampered in the shared splinters and binding bruises. It seems as if their joining in our suffering only "wets the wood", makes our cross all the heavier for their effort. We not only have to deal with the original carpenter of the cross, but now we have to deal with the guilt of putting them through pain on our behalf.

In this action and reaction, it seems perfectly acceptable for anger to be the method of reaction and guilt the continuance of the anger. In our Simons seeking change in us, they may use a variety of means to see this happen. We owe them somehow, or at the very least we find them seeking freedom from the memory. They, in turn, create their own little cross out of the splinters we leave them from ours. What seems worst, as we relinquish the control the cross has over us, it seems as if they cannot, they need to hold onto that cross as if it is the only thing between them and certain death. They become more than just our helpers, our partners, but now they become the soldiers destined to see us to THEIR destination.

I liken this event to getting water from a stone. You turn the spigot, nothing comes out, and you curse the stone. You do this for weeks and curse the stone each day for its failure. Suddenly, just as you seek to be finished with the stone, it produces a torrent. Do you still curse it? Or do you appreciate that it finally is doing as you need it to do. Sure, it took its time, but is it where you want it to be or are you where it WAS? Perhaps your lips are still cracked from thirst, but you seek to curse the stone for being a STONE...a strange occurrence at best. You seek to tie your condition to it, rather than understanding that things were as they were intended to be.

Perhaps we should just learn to love the stone for being a stone and a well for being a well. Accept them, and should the stone provide water for you love it just the same. It would seem that in keeping anger towards it for what it did yesterday, we seek to hold on to the attachment we created in our anger towards it. We create a cross that we simply do not wish to relinquish, and in that creation a bit of insanity uniquely ours. We become insane, a slave to pain and ego that will only seek to repeat itself over and over again!

At the end, perhaps we just need to love. We need to love those we are in love with today. We need to see them as they are, not as we would like them to be or how the WERE. We need to open our hearts and arms not to our vision of perfection we expect the other to be, but in an unselfish love that seeks to accept, not to pass judgments. Can we forgive? Can we live for today in a way that makes yesterday a forgotten moment and tomorrow unexpected? The answers to those questions will not just seek to create peace in our own lives, but growth to loving relationships that never fail.

Still, if we seek to "choose" we have failed in our quest already. Don't choose, just BE. Don't think, just BE. Don't talk, just DO. And best of all, don't question, just LOVE. These all happen simultaneously in acceptance and Being, and they are without effort or "work". Be still, and these will happen. Learn to find the silence that allows the noise to be. Happiness abounds from this point forward.

The long ride home.

So, you are on a crowded highway trying to get home after a long day's work. "You" are tired, frustrated, anxious, and just plain bitchy. The idiot in front of you is more concerned with his cell phone than with your need to be 10 feet further north. The truck on the left of you is not letting you in, a sure sign that he has completely disregarded you and your need to be in front of him. The bastard behind you is laying on the horn because you feel that getting in front of that truck is much more important than his need to get home. A language typically reserved for drunken sailors abounds in this world of hostility, a language you may not ordinarily speak but one you surely understand. It seems almost foreign coming from your lips.

This scenario is truly a definition of insanity. "You" repeatedly act as if your screaming, horn honking, middle finger raising self can actually have an impact on the situation by acting in such a manner. "You" are suffering, painfully so, and in acting in such insanity you have no real clue as to why you are suffering so much. You are in darkness, and now is the time to bring some light in.

I often wonder if the creatures of this planet look at humans and give thanks they are not us. In this wonderment comes the realization that we create 100% of our own suffering. We simply refuse to accept our condition when it doesn't suit us.

Another thing to bore you with...

So the "not as good as the guy I was mentally fucking..." was supposed to do what exactly? Make me angry? Make me sad? Pay me back for needing more than you can give? Have me suffer?

Hardly, it did none of those things. If you think I am naive enough to think those things were not happening for quite a while you are crazy. Even Saturday before the wedding, you were sopping wet, I know that is not me doing that. There is no way a man you barely want to touch can get you that excited...so stop thinking I am some turnip farmer who just fell off the truck.

My real reaction was at having needing to go to any extreme for even the slightest fraction of relief or pleasure. No, I did nothing except lay on the sofa and meditate, but the fact that you allowed it to "happen", even if only in your mind, spoke volumes. I suppose I am the only one in a two person relationship who needs to be concerned with the other's happiness. It is, in essence, where we are - me wanting sex daily (even multiple times daily) and you using it as a weapon to exact revenge (or simply just allowing it to reveal how far off we really are).

Beyond the bullshit there is that coldness you displayed early in our relationship, the one that really drove me to extremes of fear and reaction. It is really hard to depend on your soft side, it always has been, given the coldness of your nature. Oh, you can be sweet and beautiful, but look out world when the tide turns and the beast moans! It is that coldness that I first saw in the hotel room not a month into our relationship (the first of many sleepless nights), the one that confuses me to this day.

Do I protect myself from the beast or remain open to the side of you that simply does not exist in "our" world anymore? You were, after all, not attracted to any soft side of me in the beginning. I was not one who was cold and callous most of the time, but I certainly did not take shit from anyone, let alone someone who could destroy my "world". Something changed in me with you, something that didn't like the asshole as much as the potential Being, something that sought change even in face of the demons within. Sometimes I just am left to wonder whether it was better to seek the change alone than to count on another who simply is not interested in the effort.

Well, I find myself here, at this moment, still in love, still hoping, still paying...not that you are spiteful or anything. It just is that you are all you hated in me, again, something you can blame me for. After all, I have such control...such power...as to make you all that you seek to change in me, rather than you being that which I seek to be. I do wonder what will be next, can the change I see in me effect a change in you? Or will you simply continue to hear the voices you have become so attached to whispering in your ear? I can't control them, and I must learn to stop suffering for those things beyond my control. I am pure in this love I have for you, and yes I am human all the same. I simply cannot be anywhere else.

Here are the facts as I see them, (no anger, just the way things appear):

1. I do not matter in your life as a matter of fact or anything else.
2. You seek the approval of others even as it masquerades as a need for self approval.
3. You need absolutely nothing to do with me, and you masquerade it as anger and hostility when in fact it is simply a loss of love (like a boyfriend-girlfriend thing that has run its course). There seems to be no hope for redemption, no hope for reconciliation, no hope for salvation because you simply don't want it to happen.
4. You are as interested in my wants, needs, fears, feelings or thoughts about as much as I am in who is in the American Idol top 12.
5. I am unattractive to you on so many levels that ugly is too kind a word.
6. I am last on your list for all things.
7. You had no issue discounting any of my feelings with the wedding and of course simply cannot find any fault with anything related to you. Everything Heins is perfect. Still, as long as we were able to pay for it all (yet not have a nickel to rent a game to play with the kids today).
   
8. The only time you care to show love is in public, where the absence of the "show" would "embarrass" you by displaying the way things really are. During the reception you were kind, caring, loving, and almost normal...afterward right back to the "us" as we really are.
   
9. We must continue to focus on my faults, because in doing so we focus on things we cannot change (the past) because you simply do not want this thing fixed. If we continue to focus on things we cannot fix, we get to continue to argue, feel pain, feel anger and be distant. You love the distance, and you shall have it. The only thing you don't want is to be alone, so you will tolerate me to that end.

I accept these things as they are.

So, the question remain open, are we in a relationship now for the self or for each other? Do we "separate", or as you say "start going out with our friends more", or do we dive into each other in the hopes of finding salvation. I know from experience you cannot find safety in the outward world, it can only be found inward. Still, I am no prison camp guard, if you wish to be free you simply can be, but I cannot function in this relationship as it is now. It either goes inward or it ceases to be. Once it goes outward it is no longer a relationship, it is a farce. I can live in the farce, once it is clearly defined, but I cannot continue guessing as to my status in your life. We can stay here in the cold and callous times we find ourselves in, believing that watching TV is "togetherness" and that sex is a tool for revenge. Yes, as you get your freedom I will be angry and hurt, but in that suffering I will learn. I always do.

Perhaps this will be the last time I bore you silly, it doesn't really mean anything except allow me to vent when I have no other recourse. I changes nothing, probably doesn't even give you pause to reflect and certainly cannot get you to see things through different eyes. It is what it is, and it makes no sense to make fudge for someone who doesn't like chocolate, even if it is covered in vanilla frosting. We just lick the frosting off, and spend our time dwelling on the part of it we don't like.

A Book to You, My Wife

I just am not sure what it is but I feel totally uncomfortable. Maybe it is payback, but I hope that we are getting beyond the need for purgatory and more into the realm of Heaven. Let me explain, and maybe in the writing there will be some solution even without burdening you for it.

It is a fear that I have felt often in my life. That sinking feeling that I will be abandoned, left in the dark without a light, suffering, alone, lost. My heart actually begins to beat louder in such distress, as if I am on the edge of a tall cliff just before I dive into the unknown waters below. It is a fear that could bring me to tears if only I hadn’t faced it so many times before; they well up in me only to be suppressed by the anger that has kept me warm on so many cold nights. It is the lone wolf in me, the shadow of fear replaced by the radiant explosion of anger, the loneliness of dread replaced by the voices I have heard way too many times before.

It is the Genesis of the pattern of self-destructive behavior, the ego screaming for it’s binky, it’s blankie, it’s way. It now scares me, and added to the fear of being vulnerable is the fear of vulnerabilities outcome. I would never let it get this far without doing something stupid, something irrevocably dangerous and harmful. This time, I am identifying it, trying to make it disappear in the light of awareness and in this effort I am discovering the root of its existence, the cause of its awakening, the meaning of its reality. Its days are numbered.

But it’s here right now my love, talking to me, telling me that I am going to lose, telling me that it will be more painful to lose if effort is expended, forcing me to hear it while pretending it doesn’t need to be heard. In turn, I cry inside like a baby, begging it to leave me alone, begging it to go back to sleep while pretending I can’t hear it. It is the saboteur of our life together facing me yet again, but this time I feel as if I have someone I can rely on to face it with me, and in that battle I feel it only right that you know what you are facing. You are facing the worst of me in love.

I have never been more in love with another human being more than I am in love with you. Such dependence does not shine normally in my heart. I learned at a very early age that to love is to be vulnerable. I used to call such vulnerability a “weakness”, one that I simply would not have in me. I would sabotage every possibility of such weakness, ensuring that I was alone just long enough to find someone else to practice such strength on. I could never let anyone in on this feeling for to do so was to increase the vulnerability, to ensure the weakness. One could not simply be strong and expose a weakness! No, it was simpler to get such “conquests” to hate me in my strength than to love me in my weakness.

It is obvious to me now that I have never really loved until Megan was born. I never really felt the need to be loved, in fact a part of me relished such loneliness. That changed when I met you. Your tenderness touched a part of me still in infancy, your smile warmed a part of me still left frozen. Your touch made me tingle, my voice made my heart race, your eyes just blew me away like salt in a tornado. This was the very first time I met you, imagine that. A man-boy who refused to love or be loved in such despair after one moment with a soul so much a part of him he couldn’t not get her from his mind. It wasn’t just about your outward appearance, that attraction would come soon enough, it was some thing about you that words cannot describe, the part of you that is me, the Oneness we shared even before our first kiss.

It ended life as I knew it my love. It ended me as I knew me. It took time, just as an infant takes time to grow into puberty, it took time to finally see what it was that was happening. Every time we would meet or work together my mind could not get past the physical manifestation of this new feeling. My heart would speed up, my mind would race, my palms would get sweaty. I would get lost in your eyes for what seemed like hours. I needed to be near you, not in you, but near you. Again the “in” part would come later.

Destiny worked to my advantage. Things fell into place. The miracle of existence became the miracle of fate. I could smile again it seemed…or could I?

I have told you about the first time I noticed you sexually. I can still see you sitting there and the slight movement in my pants as I got a glimpse of the frog. I remember looking at your back, your hair, your arms, your skin. Your lips, your mouth, those rings on your fingers…I am beginning to feel that movement again…where are you when I need you?

Anyway, the turmoil started in me the very first date we went on, right about that time you made the comment about the man crossing the parking lot. The voice began, “what are you doing” was, I believe, the very first question out of my mind. You were just so special to me in my soul and so damn attractive to the rest of me that there was no way in hell this relationship was going to work out. I overlooked it, but it ate at me for weeks. I began to see threats all around me the more I fell in love with you. I fell in love with you during our first introduction, I fell complete after that first date. I was gone the first time our lips touched, I was completely lost as I touched your body. I was, for the first time in my life, vulnerable.

And that created the threats I mentioned. I caused the monster to roar loudly in my mind. I saw your friendliness as a threat – you were flirting in my mind’s eye. I saw your not ending the relationship with Shawn as a threat – were you leading us on to choose between us? Were you fucking him behind my back or vice versa? I was a mess baby, not because of reality, but because of what my mind was telling me reality was. That thing with your fake “cousin” – proof that my mind was right and my soul was wrong. The arguments we had were not really me with you, they were me with me. It was my mind sabotaging what my heart longed for. The battle inside of me was a tremendous war, it tired me beyond fatigue and caused me to morph beyond all identity. You didn’t answer your phone? You were lying. You didn’t tell me where you were? You were cheating. You weren’t with me? You were with someone else. Man, I can still remember those days and I can still feel the utter fatigue of the struggle within me, not to mention the additional struggle it was causing with you.

Yet you stayed and fought me through it. I never really did address the cause, we just fought and forgave (or not) and forgot (or not) and moved on (or not). The beast was still there, only feeling a bit more dominant for the fight. Still, having sex with you was the highlight of my life. I could live for a sexual encounter with you. I still remember vividly some of the great sex you gave me. It’s mind-blowing to me even today. God to get back to that would be completeness in life. Not only are you greatness, you completely take my soul from me when we are intimate. And now to the beginnings of fear I have right now.

No, this is not another “I need wild sex” prose, it is rather a voice in my head speaking to the subject. I can almost hear you telling me someday that this is not mutual. Whether it is your hands in action as mine try to be, or the fact you never make me feel desired or even satisfactory in this aspect of our life together, there is something that tells me that someday in your coldness you will finally tell me that you simply are not satisfied in this way, that you needed more, that I was just not “it” for you. This voice is loud, and I know where it comes from.

I am opening myself up a bit, wanting to show you love and affection in the way I feel it when the wall is down and the door open (this is a cliché fest, I know). I scares me in a big way, as if you will use this vulnerability against me. It keeps me from being fully dependent on you or the relationship. You know how you are scared to do to bed alone after watching a scary movie? That is how I feel emotionally, like the darkened hallway I am about to enter is wrought with threats and doom is certain. It freezes me, causes me to swing at enemies not really there…always with the voices going “or are they there?” I want so desperately to believe they are imaginary, unreal tokens of emotional immaturity even as I swing in air almost waiting to hear the “thump” of weapon meeting reality, the threat realized.

So the fear, what I call the “beast”, doesn’t dwell in the darkened hallway, but rather in that part of me that fights the demons who reside there. Fear prompts feats of great strength and achievement, but in my case it can do just the opposite (and usually does). I am not talking physically, but rather mentally. Fear certainly propels my body into better than average action because I create an anger out of it. What fear does to me mentally is a whole different story. It is almost like I regress into infancy, my mind works to subvert my soul, instilling in me that need to act out before acted upon. It is what drove my fuck-ups in the past with you…the need to feel in control dominated my common sense and soul. If I could create in me the knowledge that I was desired by someone other than the threat, then I was safe. You could steamroll me and I would survive because I was still desired. Stupid shit, I know, but when you walk in unconsciousness all things are possible even stupid things.

Today I feel that fear. I loved last night, sitting on the sofa with you, just feeling you on me. It was emotionally fulfilling to me. I felt great inside. I had you half naked, I could feel your skin, your tits, see you in your beauty as my wife, my life. I could feel the blood rushing to my groin, the racing of my heart, the absolute beauty of love that I had each moment we shared. Beauty is defined as those moments to me babe, no other definition is needed.

Yet in it all was the nagging question created by the beast, “why doesn’t she want me?” You know, no playfulness, no teasing, no seduction. In fact, I tried to rub her, but you hate when I touch you there. I must say you are the first person I have ever known who hates to be touched there. It starts me wondering if you don’t want to be touched there, or if you just don’t want to be touched there by me. I am sure you can see where the question would come from. I am sure if you went to rub my dick and I stopped you, telling you “I don’t like when you rub it” you would question yourself.

I really didn’t care to watch TV to be honest, but I was not giving up that moment because the TV was on. I loved every moment of it, and really only fantasized about you “taking” me once (in this fantasy, you actually just went down on me as we sat there and then took over from there). Other than that one moment, I was just in the moment, loving it all and wishing it didn’t have to end. Other than that one moment it wasn’t sexual, it was love purely without the physical – which made it a bit easier to let you sleep (although not entirely easy).

I am walking in fear today for sure. No, not the kind of “I am an idiot and need to be stupid” fear, just fear. I see threats, everything from you needing to go out more with your friends to who you are walking with on Saturday to your need to look so freaking hot as to kill me each moment I am not inside of you. I see you being pulled from me when I will need you the most. I see some pain, a fear of losing you, a fear of needing you in a way I can’t console. I fear a separation in us that only widens, a gap to large to cross or close. And yes, it scares me…I have much more to lose than you do it seems.

Awareness is the difference this time. I feel it…I can see it almost as an observer, but not quite. I can observe it but I can still feel it, meaning I am not separate from it yet. I long to be, not as a dispassionate observer, but a passionate one. I long to be soothed by you in understanding me and where I am at any given moment. Things like this will only bring us closer I hope, in a way that begs us both to be dependent on one another for needs such as this. It is new territory (for me), unexplored ground from which these feet will carry me. Are you my guide? Are you the outstretched hand that beckons me further when there is nothing left inside? Are you truly that which guides me? I long for the answer, and will give you all that I am in the quest. You remain my love, my soul mate, my reason for searching.

I love you…

T