Feeling Lyrical

Being an ascetic is not all it is cracked up to be.  Not that it is really cracked up to be anything.  Or that I am disciplined in the art of self denial.  But maybe in some way I am.

Now I am confused, once again.  I hope you're happy!!!

Today at the Sombrero. Cliff playing a song I wrote.  Wasn't my idea but I like it.

"no more mr nice guy, no more mr easy, call me mr spice guy, call me mr sleazy!" Has to do with Oprah and Dr Phil, Cosmo, etc. convincing women their love life sucks.  Was kind of a joke, but Cliff saw the lyrics and ran with it. People like it, much to my surprise

Ever notice when people say, "I hope you're happy!!", they don't really mean it at all?   I used to be so naive and gullible that I half believed they might actually be serious.  That often led to a peculiar dynamic.  Like when southerners say, "Oh no! Don't rush off so soon!"  They mean, nice seeing you, bye, don't let the door hit you on the way out. Go home now.  Took me forever to realize that.

When I figured out their real meaning about hoping I was happy, I'd feel compelled to prove I wasn't happy, just to please them and not be hated for happiness in their world where it is all my fault.  That is a mistake.  I'd advise doing everything you can to be even happier when confronted with that bit of sarcastic well wishing.

I'm feeling lyrical.  The never ending (or beginning) tune that keeps evolving in my mind, with ever changing lyrics found a new phrase I like.  Even the phrase has no definite beginning, but I'm saving this part:...time stands still, until she says goodbye.

Time is so non-linear to me.  If I'm in a certain space because of the person I'm with or the conversation, or when focussing on something that has my passionate attention, it is like visiting another dimension where there is no time.  Then I come back to earth, or wherever it is that bills get paid and police hide in the bushes, and hours may have passed.  Or even days.

That dimension is my favorite.  That is why I play music.  It may only be a few minutes of that state of suspended animation, but it is like setting foot in Heaven for a brief time.  Once in a blue moon or maybe once in a hundred blue moons a certain person's company or attention can put you there.  But it is the most fragile of ways into that space because of the reality of the material world and all the ways there are to screw it up.

Do you run?  What do you do when you are so unprepared?  Kick yourself for giving up and almost going broke?  Or maybe deciding you will not give up and just trust the only things that ever worked.

There is a tuning in sort of thing that is the only way I ever managed anything.  It is hard to explain.  Even when I would do heavy math.  Others always seemed to have some strict explainable methodology, and credited their wonderful superior intelligence.   I always felt guilty because it didn't seem to work the same with me, even if I did very well at whatever it was.

Even when I was learning to fly.  I lucked into an instructor who must have got it.  And I did well enough that on the commercial check ride the inspector asked if I minded doing certain landings over, and would I tell him how I did it so he could better help students having trouble.  Cool.  But what do you do?  It's like Chevy Chase in Caddy Shack, "be the ball".

The point is, in deference to some of my beloved relatives who dispute any other dimensions than those we see, who dispute any Prime Mover or intelligence behind life, creation, and all that is, I have tried to operate "normally", as if I am the prime mover, and I do not do so well with that.  When I throw that out the window and trust that "thing" which involves tuning in rather than forcing the thought or action, I do better.

When I was little, like seven to ten years old, and I had the chance to run with a football against kids in the neighborhood, just about all of whom were older, I enjoyed that other dimension, timeless feeling.  And I did very well.  Coaches tried to recruit me for little league but the family said no.  But I knew that feeling of not thinking, just being.  Believe it or not, that was a spiritual space.  I see that now.

Blind faith is about all there is to go on sometimes.  But you have to incorporate doing stuff.  I'm not explaining this well.  Simply put, my impulsive course of action is to self destruct, rush in when I should hold back and be patient, or be negligently inactive when I should move--anything to avoid true success and hit the mark.

And now, I have to avoid panic or any stupid fear based radical action.  I know something about what I want (for lack of better way to put it), more than I have in I don't know how long; maybe ever.

Whatever happens I am not going back to where I was ever in the past. And if I don't get my way, then maybe I need to alter what constitutes my way.  Except I know what I know, and it would be almost easier not to.  It will be OK.  I think something is OK.  But it changes everything I can't be a slacker any more.  This is really not easy.  Odd that good things, positive change, and the right thing are often met with internal freak out madness.  That's because I want what I want right this minute, and  see now immediate way.  We shall see.