Walls As Monuments

Men have always sought to control their environment. It is what any intelligent creature wants to do. From when it was started in 2500 B.C. until over a thousand years later, the Chinese hoped to control their border and protect it from invaders by their "Great Wall". It was a great engineering accomplishment that didn't work.



In more recent times a hollow, "evil empire", trying to conceal its weakness and ultimately trap within its borders its unhappy, unwilling residents dropped an "iron curtain" across Europe in the form of barbed wire fences and most notoriously the Berlin Wall. For years they spent countless dollars policing and maintaining the barriers, which were no match for the ingenuity and determination for freedom of the entrapped and enslaved population. It seemed each week brought a new tale of a successful bid for freedom made by some weary inhabitants from behind the wall.

On this twentieth anniversary of the fall of the Berlin Wall, perhaps it is more than fitting to consider not just the final triumph of freedom there, but also the philosophical implications of walls.

Walls show an inability to deal with a problem or a group of problems in a satisfactory way. Walls separate men and ideologies. To build a wall is never a solution. It is in fact a form of defeat. It is recognition that the problem cannot be resolved. The fall of the Berlin Wall is surely cause for celebration by all free men, for it proves that seemingly insurmountable differences can eventually be solved. But while some walls have fallen, others are still being built.

How is it that Americans, who fought so long and hard to have one wall torn down, willingly fight to have another erected? When there is the promise of hope and freedom and a better life, what individual wouldn't want that for his or her family? All of us, as Americans, (except for the very few indigenous peoples who are left) had our families come to America from somewhere else. Are we to now deny the promise of freedom and a better life to others?

Of course not. We just want people to obey the law. We also need to secure our borders. Unfortunately, it is impossible to secure all our borders. Just a Mexican wall alone will run many billions of dollars, and that will not stop people from invading our coasts or coming in through Canada. Nor will it prevent enterprising border runners from tunneling, scaling, or breaking through the barrier at isolated points along the many hundreds of miles of the Mexican-American border. So saying that we can secure our borders is ridiculous to begin with. It just isn't possible. Therefore, we must assume that there are other motives at work beyond national security. There always are, and because illegal immigration is a highly emotive subject, many narrow interest groups use it as a smoke screen to gain an advantage on whatever particular parasitic gain they try to rob from the American taxpayers.

Americans are the most generous people on earth as a nation. I do not believe that we are so selfish as to continue to look across our southern border and allow our Mexican brothers and sisters to be victims of a tragic set of circumstances. Instead of trying to deny access to America, we should all understand that the best hope and promise of America, for ourselves and our posterity, is to export that hope and dream elsewhere. When we help the Mexican people establish a better economy and a better future, we will see fewer people wanting to abandon their homes in search of a better life. When we export the dream of America to Mexico, we will stabilize our border. That is the solution; not some wall; not troops on the border.



Not only do we fail to solve problems by building the Great Mexican Wall, we create a host of new ones. Animals are already suffering due to our foolishness. Furthermore, we are saddling ourselves and our posterity with more debt and more overhead. This wall will need to be constantly maintained and policed, and it will not protect us. Nor will it keep out people who are searching for a better life.

Tear down the wall at the Mexican border. Replace it with an open door policy. Instead of sending troops to guard over the border, send aid to help Mexico become more financially successful. Build economic bridges through cooperative trade and guest worker programs. Get rid of unenforceable drug laws that breed gangs and violence both here and in Mexico. Americans have always been problem solvers, and we should never forget that. Just because a solution is not immediately seen, is no reason to give up trying to solve the problem.

There is one more wall we should visit. Perhaps one reason that the Vietnam Veterans Memorial is so moving, is that it sends a powerful message of the price of an inability to deal with a problem in an effectual manner. The fifty-eight thousand young Americans memorialized on that wall in our capital gave their lives fighting for America, and many of us have wondered: Did we do the right thing, the smart thing? Was it worth the loss of all those young lives? The wall symbolizes our inability to solve a problem, as well as memorializing the brave souls who gave their lives for our country.




That wall of names as a memorial is a monument that is just as historic as the Great Wall of China or the Berlin Wall. Those courageous young Americans did not die in vain if we can learn from our mistakes and become more intelligent as a people. Perhaps the greatest victory of the Vietnamese War was a new group consciousness in America that recognizes that our government, and indeed we as a people, can make mistakes. We have to always be alert to that fact, and be careful. We are not infallible. When a national program needs to be re-evaluated, we should not hesitate to do so. We need not proceed blindly down a path that can be changed to our nation's best advantage.

Our border cannot be secured by a wall and armed men, and our future cannot be secured by hoarding America. Export the dream and promise that we are all lucky enough to now enjoy. Do it in Mexico, and wherever else people yearn to be free. Deal with problems in an intelligent way as a society of learned and educated individuals, and never be so selfish as to hoard America to ourselves.

Let us export America around the globe, by supporting freedom and individual rights through the free trade of ideas and commodities. Destiny placed us here to help the world, not to wall ourselves off from it. We will secure our future and protect ourselves best by fulfilling our destiny and helping the world to better itself, while we continue to better ourselves.

America isn't a finished product. Let's make it better by building bridges instead of walls.

Looking for Leadership

America has been lost for a long time. Craving a mystical leader, the people chose hope over reality, they cast their lot with a stranger who promised what they longed to hear. And why not?

Was there anyone that they could look to for inspiration? Has there been any recent leader remotely worthy of the best hopes of all Americans? Name one, for I surely can not. Perhaps, the problem lies in the method. Should Americans look for leadership from their elected representatives at all? If elected officials are representatives in a representative government, then they should not be leading at all, but instead should be carrying out the will of the people to their best ability.

There, it is said, and it is simple. America has been misled for generations, not because Americans are stupid, but because they have had it all wrong. They have been looking for leadership in all the wrong places, trying to elect leaders when what they really should have been doing was electing bookkeepers and stodgy, boring, public sycophants who would serve their best interests without fail. But it was too soon, too early in the intellectual and emotional development of the country. A true public consciousness was only available in fleeting moments, as when we were attacked, or when severe adversity brought forth our survival instincts and the best of our human compassion.

Something has changed. Millions of cellphones, Facebook, MySpace, blogs, Twitter, and alternative news sources have begun the growth of a vast, extended neural net that places people in more instantaneous social contact than ever before. Suddenly we are talking to thousands of people whom we would have never even met just a few years ago. Events on the far side of the globe reach us in a more personal way and faster than ever. Newspapers no longer print the news reliably, so people have found new ways to ascertain their shared reality as it unfolds at an ever faster pace. This is only the beginning. The age of information has been transformed and we are in the middle of a cultural revolution.

The formerly invisible common sense thinkers are about to seize power from the parasitic elite, and no one even understands just what is happening. The formerly intellectually suppressed are breaking the chains of their bondage and stepping out into a brave new world of independent thought, where they can resonate in communities of minds and quickly be catapulted into a new state of mass consciousness.

The real leaders were always amongst us, placed here by God (or nature if you prefer that term) to help guide the ascension of consciousness. The individual, the most important resource on our planet, is about to take a major step forward.

The exact opposite of an Orwellian future lies ahead. Even now, the parasites and power-grabbing cheaters cannot see it. They cannot fathom it because they are hollow and could never begin to understand what is happening. They will implode into nothingness and no memory of them will remain.

Feel it now, reach out with your mind and touch the face of the future.

It is coming, unstoppable and irrevocable, and with a swiftness that is difficult to comprehend at this instant. Open your mind, and feel the vibration of thought.

Miracles Often Taken For Granted

Last night, a rush job at the shop needed parts from several different distributors spread across the nation. I ordered the required parts, some from Wisconsin, California, and Texas by overnight express, and received them all this morning. Companies like UPS and FedEx are amazing, and we often take them for granted. It used to take 6 months to get from the East Coast to the West Coast, and now we get packages overnight routinely!

Then today, while driving in my car, my cell phone rang, and I picked it up to hear: "This is Bob, from Alaska, did you get that photo I just emailed you?" I explained that I was in my car and that the office phone had been forwarded to my cell phone, and told the inquirer that I would check my email as soon as I got back to the office.

Again, miracles that we have come to rely on and which we take for granted: Cell phones, call-forwarding, and the internet! None of this stuff existed a few decades ago. It would have seemed impossible back then. Now, if it doesn't work, or if a package arrives an hour later than expected, we feel irritated!

How soon we forget the miracle, and then become cranky. Amazing!

A Glimpse of Eternity

Tonight I spoke at some length to my best friend about Complex General Relativity and some of the theories about the electron. To be sure, the more I learn, the stranger the universe seems to me.

Trapped in this human body, my mind is not yet able to access infinite intelligence, and yet sometimes, I can almost imagine I sense it. The most religious experience I have ever had was at the birth of my son. As the doctor removed his umbilical cord, he immediately passed my son into my arms. Suddenly, my son's eyes opened, and I was the first thing he saw in this universe.

What I saw, when I looked into to his eyes was alien, and I experienced a sense of vertigo as I felt what he felt, a whirl of sensations from this universe to another, spiraling down into the void of his eyes. In his face, I saw the faces of many of my family; my father, and both grandfathers and my brother, too. So many people, all in one shriveled little face. But beyond that, in the depth of the void in those eyes I felt a great intellect absorbing all that was in the room, and if ever I believed in the reality of God as an entity, it was at that moment when I stared face to face across a million generations of human soul.

Here was my son, a vessel descended from the ancient Russ, and who knows how many thousands, even millions of years beyond that. At this first meeting between father and son, I didn't get a sense of a human child, but instead I glimpsed a doorway to infinity and a brief window to all of creation. Deep in the depths of those strangely dark eyes was a light and I stared in awe at the immense depths before me. I saw spiraling galaxies and the untold history of all mankind, timeless eons streaked past across a vast empty space, all in just a few scant seconds.

Then, the doctor spoke, breaking my hypnosis, and I was swept back into the reality of the delivery room. The portal through my son's eyes closed, and he moved with a slight sigh, but he never cried. I sat down with him in my arms, and the eyes became his own, and he was looking up at me, studying me with calm curiosity. He, like me, was probably wondering who this strange being was in front of him. A nurse walked by, and his eyes followed her, he was quite aware of the environment now. I don't remember what words I spoke to him, I probably said something stupid like, hello. It was incredible to see this little creature, suddenly so alive and alert in my arms, just soaking up every sound and image around him. He turned to the sound of voices and when I remarked about it, his eyes returned to me again. My time with him only lasted a couple of minutes, before the nurses whisked him away to finish his post natal operation and antiseptic applications.

I have never forgotten those few magical instants, and unfortunately, I never had another chance to experience the live birth of a child, but I can tell you honestly, it was the experience of a lifetime. Even today I still recall vividly the immense intelligence that I felt in front of me for that brief moment, and the giddy sense I had of falling into eternity through alien eyes.

I can tell you I hunger for what I felt that night, as I think does every man of substance. For in those seconds, when the void spoke to me, I felt a continuity and rare cerebral serenity that is mostly not available to living men. For just a little while, I was completely at peace and I hadn't a fear or concern in the world, because what I saw was so vast and all-encompassing that I knew all things were on a path to righteousness, and nothing could stop what was to come.

I have come to believe that the struggle to ascend is more an act of compulsion than of ambition. We cannot be content to stay wherever we are at any instant. There is no rest for man or woman in this world. Life is a constant journey and we cannot stop, even though the mystery only deepens the more that we learn.

Earth's Upside-down Anti-civilization

Earth currently exists as an upside-down anti-civilization, where the economic value producers are enslaved at the bottom of a hierarchy, which is ruled by a parasitic elite. Those at the top use trickery and power to continually drain the economic value producers of the pyramid of their economic output. Altruism is the most prevalent trick that the parasites use to deprive the economic value producers of their wealth.

Who can be against the betterment of their fellow man? No one wants to be labeled a miscreant, so altruism is a powerful trick to get the economic value producers to voluntarily give up their justly earned riches to the parasites. This trick has the added advantage that the lazy and indolent always want to go along with any idea that gives them a FREE ride, so that segment of society will always be willing and earnest supporters of any political group that promises them a helping hand.

In reality, the parasites, disguised as altruists, want nothing more than to enslave the economic value producers and to cheat wealth and power to themselves. They have no more concern for society than a vampire bat does its victim. The most egregious sin of the current societies on planet earth, are that they limit the maximum growth of the individual mind, which is the most precious resource on the planet. For by depriving the individual of his or her earned gains, they act as a disintegrating force and thereby rob humanity of many untold new breakthroughs that the unfettered individual mind could achieve.

Companies of individuals that band together to integrate their minds and resources, to create new products and services for their fellow men, are many times bled into oblivion by hoards of regulations, taxes, and unfair trade practices all enacted by the more powerful parasitic elite. This again, thwarts the maximum integration of thought and enterprise.

The parasitic elite, will always collapse productive civilizations if given a chance. It doesn't matter to them if a country or an entire civilization is destroyed because they are able to grab still more power in times of economic uncertainty and chaos. Such times are fertile ground for the rise of authoritarian governments as evidenced in recent history. The Nazis, Fascists, and Communists all seized power in times of financial chaos. Collapse a society's economy, and its people are all more than willing to yield their freedoms in return for sustenance.

One has to look no further than America at the end of the last century to see a perfect example of parasites sucking the life blood of a country. Surprisingly, the people were just as gullible as many other contemporary societies, and they willingly gave power to a succession of parasites who continually added tax upon tax to the economic value producers until growth became restricted. Despite fast action by enterprises, which shifted many labor services to low wage overseas markets, the parasites were so bold that they grabbed more and more of all that the corporations made. In addition, the system became more and more corrupt, as the multi-layered parasitic elite powers reinforced themselves at every turn.

Shortly after the turn of the millennium, the banksters seized power through the newly restructured banking system and bled trillions of dollars of wealth from the coffers of the nation. A brief credit collapse and panic allowed the parasites to breach all previous fail safes and declare a state of emergency in the form of a multi-trillion-dollar rescue/stimulus package. They then usurped much of the funding, misappropriating funds for their own speculations, much like chronic gamblers who are never content until they are busted.

During this same time period, gullible voters who were promised change, voted in a president who was a virtual unknown to them, hoping that he would foster in a new age.

Thoughts on Mount Vesuvius

August 24, 2009 marked 1930 years since the eruption that wiped out the thriving metropolis of Pompeii. The morning topics of conversation still included the last hunt at the coliseum where men fought for their lives amid a throng of trees planted in the middle of the coliseum to simulate a forest, and wild tigers, a lion, an elephant and alligator, and even a python were released to attack them. It is hard to imagine spectators cheering, as a man was torn to shreds in front of them by an enraged tiger. That image alone robs me of much sympathy for the thousands who lost their lives that day. Nor was it the first time that such a fiery end was brought to development in the area, since around 1660 B.C. the Avellino eruption wiped out the Bronze Age settlements that were there. Today approximately 3 million people live around the area, and many will also die a fiery death.

Men often suffer fates of their own judgment.

The lives of many of those in Pompeii, were much as ours, and despite our current technologies, they lead very fine lives and had beautiful houses with courtyards and fountains, lead pipe plumbing, and many lovely frescoes painted on their walls depicting Greek mythology. It was a good life for the lucky ones.

Most American houses are simplistic by comparison, and the average American is probably harder-working, has far less free time, and is more worried about future finances than politics. And yet, that can change very quickly in times of crisis, and even now a ground swell of fear and dissatisfaction seems to be growing among the populace. A new political activism is rearing its head.

If a few million Americans turn off their TV's; if they stop believing and watching network news; if they demand satisfaction from their legislators, and indeed become legislators themselves, replacing the stagnant political elite that now fill the seats of government, there's no telling where the next decade might lead us.

If they wake up and see that they have leaders who have no respect for the law, the constitution, or the rights of man, and that they have been hoodwinked time and again and they become sick of it, then who can guess where a new American revolution of political activism might take us?

Like an erupting Mount Vesuvius, they could blast the parasites that infest every level of government into a hastened oblivion of anonymity. Otherwise, if this nation continues as it has, supporting law-breaking leaders, even to the point of electing an ideologue who supports violating the sovereignty and laws of a small nation like Honduras; a man who has appointed a host of sycophant czars to do his bidding, some of whom are avowed communists; then America will fade away and become another nothing over time, just like so many civilizations before it. It's history in the world will be a relatively brief one, as compared to many others that predate it by thousands of years.

What a crime it would be, to let the dream and promise of America be stolen away by the complacency of the uninformed.

Or perhaps, to be more generous, Americans have just been too trusting for too many years. They believe the lies and promises that the slick-Willies of politics spin for them.

They hope too much, and they act too little.

Health Care is NOT a Human Right!

Where do they get this stuff? I have seen this drivel written in a lot of places recently, and it is total baloney.

Far from being a human right, health care is an individual responsibility. One's good health is first and foremost one's own responsibility. The individual needs to acquaint his or her self with basic health knowledge, beyond what they are taught by their parents and in school, and they need to do that which is necessary to maintain their body throughout their life.

This means among other other things that one should NOT rely on popular medicine as the be-all and end-all of answers regarding one's health. For one thing, there are many flaws in how western medicine approaches health. But not to get involved with the conflicting philosophies of how to best maintain one's health, one must first acknowledge the wisdom and truth of self-reliance.

In this world, the individual must assume primary responsibility for all aspects of his or her well-being in order to achieve the most personal growth and to become the best individual possible. It is a sneaky thing to say that health care is a personal right. It's sneaky, because like many things, the parasitic manipulators of the world, those that thrive off the efforts of the true economic value producers, always want to remove self-responsibility from our lives. An individual that looks to others for guidance is one that is automatically led by others.

In the name of altruism, cheaters and parasites continually steal from individuals who are unwittingly enslaved by them. Never fall for the altruist's false dictum that they just want to help you. All they want is to control you! Only YOU know what is best for you. You must be the master of your own fate, and not be tricked into relying on others to lead you.

Otherwise, you become a pawn of society, instead of an integral working part of its leadership. Your rights as a free individual include life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness, they do not include having someone take care of you. You must take care of yourself.

Wise decisions as to your health, and who you elect as representatives in your government are your responsibility. Never be tricked into thinking someone knows more than yourself about what is best for you. You must be the one to learn what is best for you. That includes all aspects of your health: your eating habits, exercise, safety, and adopting the best personal health insurance plan possible. It doesn't mean looking for a hand out, or needing to rely on the government to take care of you. It does mean voting for intelligent representatives that will act to make good and fair health plans available for everyone.

We can never get good health plans enacted while so many people are allowed to vegetate on fatty foods that are unhealthy, and to lead lifestyles that doom them to poor health, unless we find a way to penalize poor behavior, and reward responsible behavior. Why should those who choose a healthy lifestyle have to pay elevated rates, so that the irresponsible masses can be "taken care of" and coddled in their wrong life choices?

Health can be immediately made more understandable, by recognizing the responsibility of the individual. Everything is simple, when it is broken down into its most basic elements.

Health begins with the habits of the individual.

Replaying History

All students of history know that history repeats itself many times through similar scenarios.

Today, I was reading the events of post WWI Europe, the turmoil in Germany, Austria, Italy, and Russia. Mostly, I was studying the events in Germany and Bavaria and how those events led to revolution, riots, murder, and hyperinflation. Specifically, I studied how the mindset of the populace was inevitably pushed towards desperately looking for effective leaders, and how none were to be found.

It was in that social turmoil that a young Adolf Hitler found his market niche and talent.

I wondered today, seeing the events unfolding in our country, what the next decade might bring. From what unknown wellspring will new leadership appear? Will we see dismal financial times; riots; hyperinflation? I certainly hope not. But the recent words of a friend of mine echo in my head as a warning. My friend has worked hard all his life, and now finds his business very stressed due to the economy. We spoke of the current problems in our federal government and I mentioned some radical ideas of secession by Texas, which I had read on Facebook by posters. And that is when my friend said: "We haven't been represented in our government in a long time."

That mindset seems all too accurate and is becoming pervasive. Our elected representatives have not been doing the jobs that they were supposed to do. And now, we find ourselves in an oligarchy ruled by banksters and narrow interest groups.

Compared against the post WWI period (in Germany), it cannot help but give one pause.

Dying In One's Dreams

They say you never die in your dreams, but I have. Usually, if something catastrophic is about to occur, the dream either ends, or one finds oneself suddenly in a new dream sequence.

Once, I believe I did die in a dream. The scene was a parallel reality, and I was stationed on a moon base. It was a large installation, the size of a small city, and we were pretty much self-sustaining. We had a lot of telescopes for deep space observation, and the technologies were more advanced than in our time frame (or else the scale of the operation would not have been possible). I do not recall my past in that dream scape, except that I know that my parents were both alive. I was single and around thirty.

I was in a section of the moon complex that did not have artificial gravity, and I was in a space suit, but without a helmet at the time. Suddenly, an unknown event, (possibly a meteor strike or an explosion), caused a major decompression and as the atmospheric pressure dropped very rapidly, I feared that I had no hope of surviving. I held my breath for as long as I could, realizing that this was surely the end.

As I started to lose consciousness, my last thoughts were of my parents, and I didn't want them to grieve over my death, since I was dying doing something that I loved, exploring the universe. I floated to the nearest bulkhead and with a sharp metal tool, I scratched into the bulkhead: "Don't cry for me". There was no more time, nothing else to say, and as I floated through the last seconds of consciousness, the words that I had scribbled there were the last conscious memory that I had, as I blacked out. So I died, on the moon. I wasn't saved. I wanted to live, but I didn't panic, and I accepted my fate gracefully.

There wasn't another dream sequence, and I awoke normally. That is the only dream I have ever had, in which I died. That was some years ago, I've lost track of how long. But I have never forgotten the vividness of my death, and I can still see the image of the words I scribbled on that bulkhead in the seconds before my death.

"Don't cry for me".

Altered States of Consciousness

I have had sentient dreams where I was able to float entire pages of my calculus text off the book and arrange them in front of me, concentrating on six pages simultaneously. I have gone to bed, unable to solve a difficult problem, and awoken in the morning with the solution. And the detail in some of my dreams is amazing, and I often dream in color. They say you can't feel pain in a dream, but I have had several dreams in which the pain was very real. In one, I was being electrocuted, and I knew that if I didn't wake up I would die. I awoke with a start, and my pulse was pounding. I wondered at the time, if I actually might have died from heart failure, if I had not been able to force myself awake in time.

Then there are the detailed dreams I have had, where weeks of dream time passes, and I live life much as normal, shooting pool, going hiking, riding my bike on some days, and then suddenly, I awake, and I look at my clock and see that I have only been sleeping for ten minutes! This has happened to me several times. Nested dreams are also possible, where I have dreams within dreams.

The most amazing case I ever experienced of nested dreams, was at age 17 while still in high school. I dreamnt that I got up and went to school, and a couple of weeks went by, and then suddenly, I woke up and I was still in bed. I had gone back to sleep after the alarm clock went off and had actually been dreaming. So, I got up again and hurried to school because I was late, and a couple days passed, when suddenly, I awoke again, and realized that I had been living a dream within a dream. At that point, I was for several minutes, very disoriented. I literally was not sure if I was still dreaming or if I was awake. Apparently, this has happened to others, because I read a line from Edgar Allen Poe that went: "Is all that we see or seem, but a dream within a dream?"

Perhaps the most interesting phenomena I have experienced during sentient dreaming is one I experienced about five years ago. I was having a sentient dream, where I could will the direction of the dream. I was able to change the style of wallpaper in the room I was in, and I could change scenes at will. Suddenly, I pulled back from the scene that I was dreaming, and I was outside the dream, almost floating in a blank netherworld. To the left of me was a channel of energy that beckoned to me. It was a column that streamed from somewhere below me to someplace higher. I don't know how I knew, but I did know that all I had to do was to step inside that column, and I could dream any reality that I wished. The column seemed alive and super intelligent, and somehow, I had the knowledge that it was my subconscious mind. There was no form to it, other than appearing as a column of energy, and I could see thousands of events being played simultaneously within the column. This super intelligence seemed benign, and friendly and I did not fear it, but I feared something there, I don't know what. I think the sheer power of its mind made me leery, and I awoke with a start as I pulled back from it.

I wanted to step into the column, but something stopped me. Maybe my good sense told me that I would possibly not return. But I will say this: I do not believe that I was dreaming in the normal sense. All of the images I saw before seeing the column were normal dreams, but they were controlled by me. The pink rose-covered wallpaper, my ability to defy gravity and float; that was a normal sentient dream. But the column of passing parallel realities was not my dream, it was real. I believe it was being generated by the super intelligent sub-conscious mind that resides within me. And I think all those lives and scenes that I saw passing by at super speed within the column, were thousands of alternate realities that my subconscious mind was fabricating, just to entertain itself.

The sub-conscious mind is trapped within us, and even though it has its own consciousness, we are its ears, eyes, and feelings. We are the only link that it has with the physical world. But being super-intelligent it must entertain itself somehow, so it constantly plays out all these alternate realities, drawing from our own experiences, and extrapolating upon them to create new worlds and experiences. To the subconscious mind, those worlds are no different than our real physical world.

I don't know how powerful the subconscious mind actually is. It is like having a living super human intelligence, a separate being living inside of us. Perhaps, some forms of hallucinations and schizophrenia are merely caused by the subconscious mind intruding into our waking conscious minds. I do not know if the subconscious can accurately be defined as another living entity within us, nor do I know if it is somehow connected to infinite intelligence. But what I do know is that I can certainly not hallucinate dreams while I am awake, and mostly, I do not usually have sentient dreams where I can control the direction. If I could control that alone (sentient dreaming), I could be the world's greatest creative genius. I believe we all have that same power within us, and therefore, it is only necessary to contact that subconscious mind and it will try to help you.

I believe that the subconscious mind reacts to emotions and thoughts and it is beyond language. Language is a primitive form of communication, subject to much misinterpretation. So if you want to harness the power of your subconscious mind, my suggestion is to wish very hard for something. Visualize whatever it is that you want, and the subconscious mind will find ways to please you. It will find ways to give you what you want. Just as I solved calculus problems in my sleep, it will solve your problems for you. But one must be very careful, and never communicate one's fears to the subconscious, because it cannot quite differentiate fears from desires. If you are afraid of something happening, it quite possibly will find ways to make your worst fears come true, thinking that that is what you want to have happen.

So never fear, and be careful what you pray for, because you just might get what you ask for, or what you are most afraid of. This is my best advice at this stage of my research into states of awareness and the subconscious.

Dream boldly, and never fear!


Relevant links: www.poemhunter.com/poem/a-dream-within-a-dream/

Grasping at Life

Is there any such thing as objective beauty? I think not. I look at a face and see what others cannot see, or they see, what I miss entirely. No one taught me what attracts me; no one can teach me what I already know. My best sunset is not necessarily one that you might like.

Once, in the last year of his life, I was taking my father to his early morning dialysis treatment, while the sun was just rising over the mouth of Back River, reflecting many beautiful shades of orange and pink across a mackerel sky. He saw me looking at the clouds and he said: "Some people would think that is beautiful."

"Yes," I said, in complete agreement.

"But it's nothin' but a bunch of goddamn colors to me," he said angrily.

It shot through me, as I realized that he had completely lost all appreciation of life since my mom had died, and his failing health left him wishing for an end. He died later that year in a merciful, morphine-laced sleep at Franklin Square Hospital.

My dad was never very big on talking about beauty, just as his dad (who had fled Russia and the communists) never spoke much about appreciating life. So I can't really say what he felt about a lot of things, or the depth of his feelings. But speaking for myself, I know I am still alive when I look at something so beautiful that it makes me go all hollow inside. When I feel a hunger to have and to know and to be in the moment, and to feel the same savage instincts of my youth.

There is much beauty in this world, and much to be grateful for. And there is a lot to be said for not having all that you want, and to still be grasping at life with both hands. Not having what you want, and still having goals, and still having passion and being willing to fight, is all about life and living.

Put me in a box when I lose that, because that's when I'll be ready to join my ancestors.

Words and Consciousness

A friend mentioned to me that my blog sounded religious, and that just confirmed to me the strong connotations of familiar words. (Like good and evil.) Therefore, I need to develop some new terminology, something that won't sound like I am talking about spiritual values, when I am actually just speaking about logic and how thoughts are integrated into higher levels of consciousness. This I will do later, but for now, let me say a little more about consciousness.

In fact, consciousness itself and its origins would take an entire book to explain. That has already been very well done by Julian Jaynes in his book: "The Origin of Consciousness in the Breakdown of the Bicameral Mind" (1976), and while I do not agree completely with his thesis, I have never seen a more thorough description of consciousness, nor a more detailed mapping out of its requirements. (In fact, as I read it, I was reminded of theories of linear algebra and vector spaces, since basically, there is a similarity. You cannot achieve a three dimensional space without the proper basis vectors, and you cannot achieve consciousness without a proper basis. One cannot be self-aware and question, until a "my space" is achieved, a sense of self.)

Anyway, I just want to formulate things logically, with no basis in any religion or any necessity for a belief in a spirituality that goes beyond biological consciousness. My theories are based upon reality, and if they happen to coincide and support others' beliefs in spirituality or religion, it is accidental and a coincidence of reality intersecting their personal beliefs.

For let me be clear when I say that although I might have spiritual beliefs or theories, I never expose them to the public or my friends, since I do not believe most people exist on exactly the same planes of thought, and therefore, I might be unable to make them envisage my particular consciousness and beliefs. To be sure, my thoughts about spirituality are by nature, not well-formulated, since no one living can speak from direct experience on anything beyond their own corporeal existence.

It is not necessary for any of us to share the same spiritual beliefs in order for us to all live in harmony and peace. There are preexisting laws that are rooted in consciousness that are inescapable. Conscious beings throughout this universe and indeed all universes are bound together as brothers and sisters by these laws.

Consciousness is as consistent as gravity, as an integrating force throughout the universe. Just as gravity attracts all particles of matter together in an unrelenting manner, integrating pieces into parts, and dust into planets and solar systems, so do all conscious minds continually absorb information and integrate all stimuli and data, transforming them into thoughts, memories, and knowledge.

This is the unstoppable force of consciousness everywhere. It is an upward evolution of thought, an ascension of consciousness to higher planes of thought. With mankind, that thought is riddled with emotion, and the emotion sometimes corrupts the purity of the thought processes. But in the same vein, the emotions are responsible for compassion, sympathy, and empathy, so we are not heartless brains; we are not just computers or machines, due to our emotions.

So the irony is this: That which makes us great, makes us troubled. Our emotions infect our thoughts with all manner of distortions. Men are able to be tricked and led astray by crafty tricksters who use human emotions to twist the truth.

My goal is to map a path that is completely dictated by logic, and is supported by the preexisting universal laws of consciousness. For once that path is mapped and learned, it will be much more difficult for people to be led astray, and hoodwinked by their emotions or tricked by devious cheaters.

Look around you, and a study of history will show you that the history of man is a history of bad government. It is a history of entire peoples led astray, taken this way and that by their leaders, through pointless wars which caused the loss of millions of lives. You will see oppression, genocide, massacres of the innocent. Century after century, this has been the story, and perhaps it was all necessary. For we needed their example, from which to learn. We needed to see all the dead ends of authoritarian governments; Nazism, communism, ruthless dictators who pop up like mushrooms, always leading innocent people astray and causing millions to suffer.

That is no longer necessary. There is another path, which exists and awaits us. It preexisted before the first creature on this planet lifted its head from the mud and looked around. It has been said accurately, that we are all stardust, since the elements that compose us were all formed previously in the interiors of other stars that later went supernova and exploded. Earth and our sun were formed from those remnants. It took us 15 billion years to get here, and we all live a very brief lifetime, less than one hundred years for most of us.

Now, at last, we have the facts clearly on the table in front of us. A new civilization is on the verge of being born; one based upon integrated truth and honesty, and the naturally ascending growth of the human mind. So it is important and necessary, that we map that road with as much accuracy and undeniable logic, as one would use to prove any theorem of mathematics. So that this time, there will be no distortions of reality; no twisting of the undeniable laws of all conscious beings in the universe.

I know that there are many people working simultaneously towards this goal. They are removed from me, and not in contact with me, but I feel them. My logic tells me that like many scientific theories that coincidentally come to pass through different people simultaneously and at the same time in history, this expansion of the consciousness of man is occurring worldwide, right now, everywhere. It can be delayed, but it can't be stopped. We can all participate. We are all connected in consciousness, even though we are not all on the same page.

Soon, an event will happen. History will change. Perhaps you are that change. Perhaps you, see the future. It took you, as the unique individual that you are, 15 billion years to get here, and like me, you will soon be dead. So step ahead, into the future, using your mind. Allow yourself to expand your consciousness and think bold thoughts. Imagine a future free of wars between men; free of sickness and ill health; a future where biological immortality frees man from death itself. For all of these things and more are possible, and you can help it happen. Look up and forward and not back and down. Open your mind.

Consciousness is calling you to higher levels. Will you heed that call?

Amoralistic Good and Evil

We often speak of good and evil and use the words carelessly, since we are comfortable with their meanings. But I think we may sometimes be lax by tossing them around too freely, not realizing that others may not know what exactly we mean, and we might therefore be alienating them from a viewpoint that would otherwise be helpful to them.

Shakespeare said there was no good or evil, only the saying that made it so, and that is true, since until we label something it lacks concept.

For a moment, let me temporarily compare the word evil with the adjective, bad. Something that is evil is bad, while something that is not evil, is good. But something that is bad, is not necessarily evil. If my car breaks down while I am on the way to the movies, that is bad, but it is certainly not evil.

So let us define good and evil in the context of man, since that is the one arena in which we all have experience, and it will be easier to judge our accuracy. Man, due to to his intelligence, is a collector of memories and experiences, and he categorizes memories and defines and associates meaning to them. To do this, he must integrate many memories, many definitions, building simple truths into ever evolving complexities, much like fractals define the most complex crystals. It is this ability that allows us to manipulate complex ideas, and continually grow and evolve to higher levels of consciousness. Thoughts and actions that allow this process to proceed in an orderly fashion are good. But thoughts or actions that impede the growth of man are bad. Those things that arrest the development of man, preventing him from achieving higher levels of consciousness, we herein label evil. They are like dirt in the gears of a well-oiled machine. They gum up the works and cause disorder in the otherwise orderly ascension of the mind of man.

Twisted thoughts, those based not upon truth and logic, but upon emotion and instinct are the ones that are most commonly evil. I look for a faster evolution, a quicker progression to what I deem are a better set of circumstances, and in my zeal for advancement I shove my brother aside; I bend ethics and a sense of fair play and I try to rob my way faster to where it is that I want to be. This is best for me, I think, because it gets me to my goal faster. But of course, the well-learned mind knows that this is not true, because in order to ascend, one must use the principle of integrated honesty. Without honesty, the entire system becomes unstable. For without honesty, misinformation is integrated into the system, and soon, all of our beliefs fall into question.

For thousands of years, the religions of this world have sought to define the proper course for man, and they have shared many similar beliefs, since in fact, all roads to higher consciousness must inevitably have similar qualities. So we see from the oldest of times things like the golden rule: "Do unto others as you would have them do unto you." Its sublime wisdom is just as accurate today as it was twenty thousand years ago. Other rules and commandments are just as wise, such as: "Thou shalt not kill, or thou shalt not steal." Common sense dictates that these rules are probably good, but many would, and still do, try to break these simple rules, for their own individual reasons.

Logic demands that we live by certain codes so that we may maximize our personal growth. Utmost among all the rules is the simple golden rule listed above, for by treating others as we would have them treat us, we do not rob or cheat or murder. We do not surreptitiously steal from our neighbor, nor do we covet his wife. We do not commit any acts that we would not want committed against ourselves. By respecting the rights of the individual, we guarantee our own positive growth to higher levels of consciousness, where we can obtain the most satisfaction and understanding from life.

Thus, we can easily see that we arrive at at a preordained system of laws that preexist in the universe for all intelligent life. This is the nature of consciousness. Intelligent, conscious beings must assimilate, order, and integrate knowledge about their environments in order to evolve to higher levels of consciousness. All things that promote that organic growth while simultaneously respecting the rights of all other sentient individuals are good. But those things that interfere with such growth are evil. This is an amoralistic definition of good and evil, and it is a universal law that cannot be ignored without consequence. It is independent of all religions and places no judgments on human behavior other than that all individuals must respect the rights of others.

It is a deceptively simple principle, but it is sound, and no person can become their best without its application. This simple summary of a much more detailed treatise, is all one needs to understand the concept of amoralistic good and evil.

"Do unto others, as you would have them do unto you."

About Eating Animals

I just happened to make a post on a friend's FaceBook wall about being a vegan, and I was fascinated, as I always am, by the rationalizations and defensive postures people assume, as soon as it is suggested that it might be morally wrong to murder innocent animals for our food, when it is not really necessary.

My post stated that animals are individuals; that they are conscious of their surroundings, and they have feelings and emotions, just like we do, and that therefore, they should be respected as individuals. I won't write much about this here, because I don't have time. But I just wanted to post a note here, so that it would remind me to revisit this subject in depth later.

Diet is very important to all of us, since that is what helps to maintain our bodies, but the fact is, that few Americans have healthy diets. Beyond the moral choice of whether to kill animals for food or not, one should consider the decisions that they should be making everyday regarding their own personal diet.

Eating animals is NOT healthy. Animals absorb toxins from their environment throughout their life, and those toxins become trapped in their tissues. So when you eat an animal, you are eating a higher level of toxic substances than you are when you eat a plant. Furthermore, the diets of factory farm animals are nothing that you will enjoy learning about when you study up on it.

Remember when they figured out what was causing Mad Cow disease? At the time, it seemed like common sense that one shouldn't grind up diseased animals and feed the remains to other animals, and yet it was that very procedure that had given rise to the disease.

And then there are many other toxins that one gets from eating slaughtered animals. There is just so much wrong with eating animals as they are bred and raised for slaughter, that many books have already been written about it.

Check out some of the books and websites, and I feel certain that without even making a moral choice, you will realize that you should try to eliminate as much meat as possible in your diet. And with the mercury levels in today's seafood, you don't want to eat too much of that either.

We largely perpetuate the practices of our parents with regard to eating, and society largely gravitates towards unhealthy, but tasty, fat-laden foods. In as much as we all only have one body to get us through this life, we should all try to take the best care possible of that wonderful machine that is carrying us around our personal universe. The moral choice needn't even be considered initially. Just do it for your health.

After study, you may come to appreciate the prescience of "Soylent Green".

What is an Artist?

I had a best friend who lasted longer than any set of tires, and we traveled together from the first grade of school until our late twenties. Many miles and years spent together, and many thoughts shared between us. He was an artist. That was how he defined himself, anyway. Once, when I asked him why he didn't complete a task, or why he wasn't more self-disciplined, he looked at me and smiled and said: "Mike, I am an artist. I have an artist's mentality."

So for him, (and he was very talented and very creative, and could sculpt and paint, and create just about any thing he could envision), there was a need to be spontaneous as part of his artistry. I saw it as a great excuse for procrastination and disorder, and acquiescing to the same basic weaknesses that I saw in myself. At that time, I was in college and pursuing a very vigorous set of courses and an extremely heavy course load, trying to make up for wasted years of loafing after high school. But his statement remained with me, because it defined him, as he defined himself. In order to maximize the beauty and thrill in his life, he required a certain disorder, and he allowed himself the luxury of lax discipline. This was what made him happiest. And since he lived with his mother, and had never had a job for more than about a week, and he knew he didn't have to ever worry about getting one, he was free to carve out his own special niche in the world.

My friend wasn't lazy by any means. In fact, he took on projects of gargantuan proportions, many of which were doomed to fail before the start, simply because only a highly disciplined mind could have stayed focused long enough to complete them. Mainly, I think he just wanted to prove to himself that he could do something, and as soon as he knew he could, the desire for completion escaped him. There were some very large projects that he did finish, and most of those were important to finally establish an income stream for himself, independent of his mother. He became successful as a businessman, and built his universe to suit his needs.

I came to believe that many artists were like my friend, and that they were disorganized misfits who just couldn't bear to get a job. So they labeled themselves artists, and they sang or danced or acted or wrote stories. I didn't have much respect for artists, as I saw them.

The label artist can be a derogatory term as it had come to be recognized by myself, but I have changed in my thoughts over the years, and I just realized this fact the other day, as I was writing an email to a friend. My friend had told me that she had made a few commercials, and that while doing them, she was a relentless perfectionist, and that she is normally not like that in her normal line of work, which is as an attorney. I told her: "That's because you are an artist, and an artist seeks perfection".

Those words rang in my ears and stayed with me for days, perhaps because subconsciously I had realized an important truth long ago, and it had finally risen to the surface in an innocent comment to a friend. An artist seeks perfection, but what is an artist? To answer that question, one must answer a broader one: "What is the nature of man?" (I use man synonymously with woman; a woman is just a special kind of man. But that is another blog entry entirely).

No one can describe the nature of man in less than a library, but I can reduce one aspect of man to a simple concept that allows me to explain my definition of an artist. Man is a social creature. From a zoological standpoint, this attribute gave him an advantage over fellow species of animals, because there was strength in numbers. Later, his cooperative nature allowed him to develop methods of communication and other skills, and again, he was elevated over his fellow animals, due to his social nature. Men want to share; it is inherent in their nature. They also, because of their intelligence, seek to order the universe in their minds, so that they can understand it and predict their own futures.

An artist is one who seeks perfection, I accidentally wrote to my friend. But more than that, he or she is someone who tries to share through whatever it is that they do as art. They may not realize this concept consciously, and many artists would probably decry it as a lie, but any fabrication of art is ultimately an attempt of understanding and indirectly, it is also one of sharing. You can describe many things as art, and I won't venture to be precise as to what is art and what is not. Anything that achieves a degree of perfection might be labeled as art, but that begs the question: "What is perfection?" We needn't concern ourselves with absolutes here.

I can look at a shirt that a native in Africa knitted and see great artistry in the maker's skills or beauty in its colors. Or I might look at the scribblings of a kindergarten student, and see abstract art in their renderings. But the person who is a true artist is never content. They strive to achieve perfection in whatever art project they take on. Their "perfection" is what works for them, and they might choose to stop before completion, just as my old friend, who let so many projects die. I label them artists not just because they chase their own private perfection, but because in so doing, it is their attempt to understand their universe and to share a particular point of view with others. It could be something as mundane as knitting a sweater, or as unusual as planting a row of yellow umbrellas across a mountaintop, but their creativity is a result of their humanity and their inbred desire to understand the universe and communicate their findings with others.

The best artists are those whose special talents help us to experience things that we might not be able to do on our own. They touch us on an emotional level and communicate directly with our soul. This could be from music, dance, painting, writing, or sculpture. It may be an architectural masterpiece or just a certain way a garden is planted, or how someone applies their makeup. They create a mood, an altered state of awareness for us, that we may never have experienced on our own. They open a window to their universe and invite us to experience what they are experiencing. It is a statement of themselves, and an affirmation of humanity and the uniqueness of the individual soul.

Ralph Waldo Emerson once wrote: "Every man is my superior in some way." I try to remember that and learn from everyone I meet. So far, I have never seen that principle proven wrong. Because each of us has our own unique talents, and each of us is an artist in our own way. We all seek understanding, and often, without even realizing it, we try to share. When you are dissatisfied with something that you have done, or even with the current state of your own life, just remember: It's the artist in you, seeking perfection.

The Rule of Law

My friend called me yesterday, very upset, and on the verge of committing violence. He had paid the taxes on his business property, but there was a shortfall, and without having received a notification of said shortfall, his property was about to be auctioned off. He had gone to pay the small shortfall (only a couple of hundred dollars), but there was a three-hour line out the door, and he feared he couldn't pay the taxes in time to avert the auction sale, which was to occur this coming Monday (this having been Friday afternoon).

I assured him that the information he had been given was wrong; that we live in a land of laws; and that the individual's property rights are protected by those laws. But he was not consoled, because a city employee had assured him that his property would be auctioned off come Monday. I made a few calls, and he checked with a city lawyer across the street at city hall, and sure enough, he had been misinformed, and it was only the debt which was up for auction, and he had six months after that to pay off the debt.

Common sense would normally tell you that the government can't just confiscate one's personal property without recourse, but he had been given bad information by several sources and he was on the verge of flipping out. This is how crazy violent acts occur. Whenever I see where someone went into a courthouse with a gun, or made some crazy decision to commit a violent stupid act, my first thought is usually: "What was done to them to provoke them?"

Usually, individuals are relatively just, and it is a relatively safe assumption to say that we ALL want to be treated fairly and with respect. Luckily for us, we live in a country of laws that are among the best in the world to protect the individual.

We can all sleep comfortably, knowing that this is not Venezuela, and we will not wake up to find that the government has taken over our business, or confiscated our property, so long as we pay our bills. At least for the present, this is true.

However, there are always forces at work trying to steal your rights, and we must be ever vigilant against such people. I cite for example the recent misuses of the law of Eminent Domain, used to steal valuable waterfront property from lifelong residents, so that rich corporations could build more valuable malls and hotels there. This misuse is a great danger that is currently being fought in many courtrooms. I cite this recent online definition of Eminent Domain, which would allow for a much broader interpretation than has previously been assumed:

"The power to take private property for public use by a state, municipality, or private person or corporation authorized to exercise functions of public character, following the payment of just compensation to the owner of that property."

Heaven help the poor land owner if that definition is freely applied by the courts! There are many other recent abuses of our laws which have been enacted by the courts, of which most people are oblivious. In particular, I am thinking of how trial lawyers have ravaged the coffers of so many large companies using falsified claims and crooked witnesses. The tobacco companies, the asbestos manufacturers, and many others have been targeted successfully, and have had their rights violated by the scoundrels who perpetrated the raids, and the courts which enabled them and were complicit through their rulings. People have in the large thought not much about these abuses of the law, because they were hoodwinked into believing bogus data.

"Ask not for whom the bell tolls, it tolls for thee," are words as true today as when John Donne first penned them.

Our laws as written, give us many rights, but those rights are also subject to an ever-changing interpretation. Justice Oliver Wendell Holmes believed that the law evolves with the society it serves, but that in itself can represent a danger. Some standards must not be changed, for some truths do not change. Society may just as easily devolve as evolve, such as in Nazi Germany.

Therefore, I suggest that the law and the U.S. Constitution alone is not enough of a standard to protect present and future generations of Americans. We need an interlocking "Constitution of Morality" that will specify the spirit and intent of the law for the maximum protection of the individual.

This Constitution of Morality would help prevent abuse by radical activist courts, over-zealous defenders, and marauding prosecutors run amok. It would take many years and heated debates to frame such a standard, but I think it would be a worthwhile project and should be pursued. It would be like backing our constitution by a "gold standard". There is far too much leeway in existing laws, and our constitution is rife with opportunity for abuse.

History proves that our government can perpetrate abuses that we, today, would not think possible. We should act sooner, rather than later, to clarify and protect our constitution, so that we might avoid violent upheavals in the future, as enraged citizens rise up against future injustices.

Of course, we might have to bust the heads of a lot of trial lawyers and activist judges along the way, who would stand in the way of all that. Those foxes know that such an interlocking document would take away their ability to cheat, rob, and steal. But we shouldn't let that deter us. There are many excellent judges, who even now are speaking out against such abuses.

My guess is that some character will come along one day, and see this potential vehicle to fame, and pick it up and ride with it on a bold white charger. I just hope that individual's heart is pure and just, because to do it right, will take another George Washington, or another John Adams.

Pertinent links: http://www.online-literature.com/donne/409/
http://www.expertlaw.com/library/real_estate/eminent_domain.html#7

How Many Calories Make a Thought?

I have noticed, many times, that after being engaged in deep thought, especially deeply creative thought, that I would sometimes feel very fatigued. It occurs to me, that from an energy standpoint, our bodies are only able to generate a certain number of calories of energy per day. So therefore, we can only think so much in a day; we can only create so much in a day. And beyond that, all thoughts are not equal. A deeply complex thought that calls all one's experience and knowledge into play, must certainly burn more calories than a simple thought of recognition such as: "This is cheese," or, "This is water."

But when one realizes a revelation, such as suddenly understanding the principle of the speed of light, there is not only expended the caloric energy of thought to reach that realization, but there is often a corresponding surge of energy due to elation. Thus, life-changing thoughts and experiences must truly burn the most calories and therefore be the most taxing.

Perhaps that is one of the reasons that many great thinkers have been very lean. They not only aren't concerned with pleasing themselves through the sense of taste, but they also are burning more calories by thinking vigorously.

Voltaire immediately springs to mind, and the unbelievable number of manuscripts which he produced. "Voltaire left behind him over fourteen thousand known letters and over two thousand books and pamphlets." I can't even begin to imagine how anyone could write so profusely. (see link below)

http://www.kirjasto.sci.fi/voltaire.htm

Commutative Property of Math Does Not Apply to Life

The commutative property of math: A+B=B+A does not apply to life. Lost and found, is not the same as found and lost. For if something lost is found, there is joy, but if something found is lost, there is sadness.

I only mention it in passing.

I found a tree of shade in an open field, and I used to go there to sit and think. The tree gave me thoughts that I had never had before. One day, it was gone. Someone came and took the tree away, and there was only an empty field. At first, I felt quite empty, as if I had lost a valued friend, but then I realized that someone had removed that tree for a reason, just as surely as it had been placed there.

Like a flower that blooms and shares its beauty, only to quickly wilt and fade, my secret spot had been taken from me, but it's memory remains. A wise hiker learns that there are many hills and pastures, and many sights beyond his favorite destination. But still, I am reminded of Robert Frost's poem, "Reluctance".

From which, my favorite part is:

Ah, when to the heart of man
Was it ever less than a treason
To go with the drift of things,
To yield with a grace to reason,
And bow and accept the end
Of a love or a season?

I stand in an empty field, lacking the desire momentarily, to hike further. I remember that beautiful tree, and reminisce my moments there, embraced in the thoughts which it shared with me. And I wonder, did the tree ever sense that I was there? Would it have shared its thoughts so freely if it had? I think the tree shared, hoping that someone was there, but never really knowing.

And in that respect, I shared its prayers.

I sat beneath a tree and shared its thoughts, and I was made the more for it, unbeknown and unknowing.

Trees yield their fruits so that their seeds may be propagated and live on. Those thoughts from the tree are now in me, and they live and travel with me. If fertile ground is found, I will plant them elsewhere.

A tree shared its secret thoughts with me and I will carry them forward.