Update: 5/15/2020
As my creative inspiration waxes and wanes like the tide, I look back on old writings often with a sense of wonder at the cycles in the expression of my emotions. Unfortunately, I still feel like I have a long way to go before I update this as frequently as I used to, but some thoughts I have to share:
For a long time I have been uninspired in my writing. I felt I had scraped the bottom of my soul for my deepest vulnerabilities, doubts, and dreams, and how they echo more universal characteristics that I've recognized in literature and in my relationships with others. I felt I had said everything I needed to about how I will work for a better future.
I thought I did, but I was wrong. I'm just getting started-- I thought I was blind to life, but in fact I had chosen to close my eyes. In a world of technology and engineering I began to forget my creative tendencies. My love for artistic expression. The importance for emotional connections and friendships. And the importance of helping others see the value of expression, art, and natural beauty. Again and again, as circumstances pull me into a world of 100 hour work weeks, I briefly wonder if it is worth balancing this life against my creative and spiritual investments.
Midnight Dreams
Midnight dreams and tears shed,
Childish love and ancient fears--
Coping with the great unknown
And wisdom found in suffering.
I yearn for love and innocence--
She called me from the starry sky
The phone would melt between my fingers,
Felt her presence in the moonlight.
As quickly as it came, it goes--
Dawn is tearing through the night,
She wields the blade of new day's hope
And freedom from a past of pain.
When we are so lost in life,
That when we search for love
But all we find is emptiness
How do we get by?
People can't be promised.
We must cherish those who love us, yet
The only constant is the present,
See it as our greatest gift.
When color fades from sight
And dreams are simply bought or borrowed,
We must free our expectations,
Simplify our thoughts and senses.
Close our eyes and ears and mouth,
Surrender unto the surroundings
Only for a moment... Feel the magic flowing
Through the veins that weave reality.
Nature is the breeding ground
For all that is miraculous,
Yet we construct our isolation
Choose to blind ourselves for what?
Is it worth it to forget immersion?
Bathe in nature's symphony:
We've copied it with cellophane
Made cheap for instant satisfaction.
For many color still escapes,
They seek the dream which we survive
As one collective consciousness:
Persist, and then invest in symbiosis.
Protect the miracle of life,
The greatest glory that we have:
The chance to change the world's course,
Reversing our destructive wake.
To connect with all of life in as many ways as possible to relate the dream of harmony contains the magic of life's miracle. Persistence is reliant on this network of symbiotic connections balanced against parasitic ones. Humankind came along and broke the balance, as a parasite we leeched natural resources on an unimaginable scale while leaving countless species extinct.
We cheapen the natural process through imitation and teach division from nature through structured moral systems. Christianity can teach us to be above animals and let millions learn to ignore the power of feeling a connection to all life. If thou shalt not kill, why don't we stop killing flies, spiders, and livestock? Some have tried, and among them lies the truth of what we lost. Peace requires that we understand our place among existence. To callously disregard the destruction of even the smallest being implies that we refuse to acknowledge that us and the fly are equally at the mercy of the great mystery behind the miracle of life and all existence.
Not to say Christianity or religion can't bring out the best in humanity, but parts of organized and sensationalized religion have brought out the worst in it. We have developed the tools to either protect life on a scale of which we have never seen, or continue to destroy it at an exponentially more frightening pace using excuses for our convenience. Regardless of career, background, or beliefs, I think we can all get behind the idea of protecting the earth so that the future of life itself can be secured.
The smallest effort to right the wrongs of the past is a powerful step in the right direction, so to all of those who have felt too scared and insignificant to try to make the world a better place remember this: it takes a snowflake to start an avalanche. Even if you don't make the breakthrough, or your children don't make the breakthrough, or those whose lives you touch in compassion don't make the breakthrough, they have the inspiration and opportunity to effect others that could. Like the snowflake binds to other flakes, rolls into a ball that expands and breaks free the entire cliffside, our actions, like those snowflakes, will all play a part in attaining the harmony with nature that we know we have the power to achieve. Maybe it is a massive goal, but like an avalanche, a massive outcome should almost certainly start from the most minuscule and inspiring beginnings.
I wonder where the molecules of water froze in the upper atmosphere to form chains that became the particular flake that landed in the right spot to ball up and break the shelf. Or the many possible astrophysical causes of whichever atmospheric pressure system caused the wind to blow that snowflake to that particular location. Such is the magic and the mystery behind the natural world that many try to use God to understand. I don't need to understand it-- to appreciate that we do not know and that we are doing our best to recognize the many mysteries of the natural world inspires me more than the idea of God ever did. And certainly it inspires me more than our artificial, man-made world ever did.
With love,
Alex
For a long time I have been uninspired in my writing. I felt I had scraped the bottom of my soul for my deepest vulnerabilities, doubts, and dreams, and how they echo more universal characteristics that I've recognized in literature and in my relationships with others. I felt I had said everything I needed to about how I will work for a better future.
I thought I did, but I was wrong. I'm just getting started-- I thought I was blind to life, but in fact I had chosen to close my eyes. In a world of technology and engineering I began to forget my creative tendencies. My love for artistic expression. The importance for emotional connections and friendships. And the importance of helping others see the value of expression, art, and natural beauty. Again and again, as circumstances pull me into a world of 100 hour work weeks, I briefly wonder if it is worth balancing this life against my creative and spiritual investments.
Midnight Dreams
Midnight dreams and tears shed,
Childish love and ancient fears--
Coping with the great unknown
And wisdom found in suffering.
I yearn for love and innocence--
She called me from the starry sky
The phone would melt between my fingers,
Felt her presence in the moonlight.
As quickly as it came, it goes--
Dawn is tearing through the night,
She wields the blade of new day's hope
And freedom from a past of pain.
When we are so lost in life,
That when we search for love
But all we find is emptiness
How do we get by?
People can't be promised.
We must cherish those who love us, yet
The only constant is the present,
See it as our greatest gift.
When color fades from sight
And dreams are simply bought or borrowed,
We must free our expectations,
Simplify our thoughts and senses.
Close our eyes and ears and mouth,
Surrender unto the surroundings
Only for a moment... Feel the magic flowing
Through the veins that weave reality.
Nature is the breeding ground
For all that is miraculous,
Yet we construct our isolation
Choose to blind ourselves for what?
Is it worth it to forget immersion?
Bathe in nature's symphony:
We've copied it with cellophane
Made cheap for instant satisfaction.
For many color still escapes,
They seek the dream which we survive
As one collective consciousness:
Persist, and then invest in symbiosis.
Protect the miracle of life,
The greatest glory that we have:
The chance to change the world's course,
Reversing our destructive wake.
To connect with all of life in as many ways as possible to relate the dream of harmony contains the magic of life's miracle. Persistence is reliant on this network of symbiotic connections balanced against parasitic ones. Humankind came along and broke the balance, as a parasite we leeched natural resources on an unimaginable scale while leaving countless species extinct.
We cheapen the natural process through imitation and teach division from nature through structured moral systems. Christianity can teach us to be above animals and let millions learn to ignore the power of feeling a connection to all life. If thou shalt not kill, why don't we stop killing flies, spiders, and livestock? Some have tried, and among them lies the truth of what we lost. Peace requires that we understand our place among existence. To callously disregard the destruction of even the smallest being implies that we refuse to acknowledge that us and the fly are equally at the mercy of the great mystery behind the miracle of life and all existence.
Not to say Christianity or religion can't bring out the best in humanity, but parts of organized and sensationalized religion have brought out the worst in it. We have developed the tools to either protect life on a scale of which we have never seen, or continue to destroy it at an exponentially more frightening pace using excuses for our convenience. Regardless of career, background, or beliefs, I think we can all get behind the idea of protecting the earth so that the future of life itself can be secured.
The smallest effort to right the wrongs of the past is a powerful step in the right direction, so to all of those who have felt too scared and insignificant to try to make the world a better place remember this: it takes a snowflake to start an avalanche. Even if you don't make the breakthrough, or your children don't make the breakthrough, or those whose lives you touch in compassion don't make the breakthrough, they have the inspiration and opportunity to effect others that could. Like the snowflake binds to other flakes, rolls into a ball that expands and breaks free the entire cliffside, our actions, like those snowflakes, will all play a part in attaining the harmony with nature that we know we have the power to achieve. Maybe it is a massive goal, but like an avalanche, a massive outcome should almost certainly start from the most minuscule and inspiring beginnings.
I wonder where the molecules of water froze in the upper atmosphere to form chains that became the particular flake that landed in the right spot to ball up and break the shelf. Or the many possible astrophysical causes of whichever atmospheric pressure system caused the wind to blow that snowflake to that particular location. Such is the magic and the mystery behind the natural world that many try to use God to understand. I don't need to understand it-- to appreciate that we do not know and that we are doing our best to recognize the many mysteries of the natural world inspires me more than the idea of God ever did. And certainly it inspires me more than our artificial, man-made world ever did.
With love,
Alex
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