Holloween

            As a kid growing up in suburban Toronto, Halloween was an event. City living made perfect sense when you considered the access children had to hundreds of houses and a multitude of candy. Given the effort, you could go from door to door without end. Every year, we used pillowcases to carry our stash. You needed all that storage room for all the treats you gathered. Occasionally, you had to run home and empty the goods out, only to return to collecting like some beggar would. We acquired so much candy that it was almost Christmas before we ran out. Every year, Halloween was more than just the spectacle. Back in my day, Halloween was pure adventure with the greatest reward. Kids roamed the streets, mostly without the parental guidance you see these days. A group of us, including my brothers and sister, would move from one area to another, hoarding in a manner worthy of A&E. Halloween was not only great fun, each eve held a special place in time, unlike so many other holidays. When I think back on all the Halloween nights I have experienced, it is my childhood memories of the day that stand out as best for me. There was something grand and carefree about Halloween when I was a child. Sadly, these seem to be lacking in these more modern times.

            In Toronto, Halloween brought an onslaught of children knocking at your door, but at my parents’ home in Strathroy, Ontario, it was a different story. The move from the big city left you longing, at times, for better times. Each year, handing out candy seemed anticlimactic. Perhaps thirty or forty children visited their front door. My Mom and sister always made such a fuss about decorating. Gravestones on the front lawn and spider webs everywhere were standard fare. Between the two of them, Halloween lived up to the spectacle, not that anyone really ever noticed. Over time, the children going to my parents’ house for candy each year dwindled to almost nothing. Granted, my folks reside just inside the town lines, just a few steps and country living is the life you see. It’s not really surprising, this decline. New subdivisions swallowed that end of the town years ago. What child would make an effort to run down a country lane with 4 houses on it, when they can access the goods en masse just a block or two away? After my Mother’s passing, my sister took full control of Halloween. For a few years, the effort seemed worth it. For a time, there would be no display, no fright night. There was just no reason to go to all that trouble for a measly 3 costumes. In an attempt to restore tradition, this year my sister is at it again. It’s not hard labour, more a labour of love. They still hand out candy (with lots to spare) but there still seems to be something missing. It’s not that Halloween died, it simply changed and shifted. Things just aren’t the same.

            I knew many a Halloween where candy was the last thing on my mind. As a teenager, come Halloween, I was drawn to social events rather than tricks or treats. I used to spend hours costuming for one shindig or another. I went to trip the light fantastic, usually with Kathy, a good friend who liked to dirty dance. We met at Seekers, a church youth group. I could not tell you just how many times we paired up over those few years. She was fun and so was teaming up with her. Despite my unannounced proclivity, we meshed on that dance floor time and time again. We partied but it was innocent and simple, pure entertainment without all the complications. You hear about youth today and how they like to play. Hedonism seems to be the preferred flavour. A lifestyle of excess is only overshadowed by their inability to see beyond themselves. Fun isn’t dancing or spending time with your friends, it’s drugs and booze and far too much freedom. I am sure that somewhere, one group or another hosts some form of celebration come this Halloween season, but all I can picture is each side of an arena filled with adolescents, using each chair as they stare at their Smartphone, talking to a friend on the other side of room. Things just don’t seem the same as they once were. Granted, Halloween night will still find children running from house to house. Jack-o’-Lanterns and frightening displays still litter the lawns of both urban and rural dwellings. It all just seems so lifeless to me now. Getting candy was only one part of what made Halloween so special. We made our own costumes, or at least my Mother did. These days, $19.99 at Wal-Mart will automatically relieve lazy parents of this responsibility. Halloween now seems to be for smaller children while devil’s night appears to fit the lifestyle of young people. Halloween still is but it’s not the same.

            October 31^st, 2017 will be my third Halloween living in Paris, Ontario. The first occasion occurred on a learning curve. While the 7 pumpkins we carved looked fitting enough, leaving the front gate closed and turning off all the outside lights seemed to only dissuade trick or treaters from approaching the house. From what I can remember, we had only 11 children knock on our door. Our mistakes were duly noted. Our second Halloween saw a different turnout. With 6 carved pumpkins, a giant hanging ghost and a ghoul head lighted from within, the place was festive for sure. We left the gate open and the front lights on and presto, one kid after another was granted 3 chocolate bars. When I was growing up the selection of candy we got varied depending on the neighbourhood. These days all kids want are the chocolate bars that come with the celebration. The days of homemade Rice Krispie squares, Unicef collection in that rectangular cardboard box, and cans of pop are long gone into history. Going through your stash meant pouring it out on the living room floor so a parent could have a look. With 5 children, it took my Mom some time but eventually the hoard became fully my own and I paced off to my room to gleefully worship it. I remember her fear, that somehow a razorblade or needle would find its way from snack to body part, usually the mouth and throat. You would think these modern times would convince people that it’s not okay to avoid inspection but every year, tales of damaged children fill the news on the very next day. Our second Halloween in Paris was much more successful than the previous holiday but there was still something missing. The energy, the joy I knew trick or treating as a boy seemed lacking in the faces of the children who came to our home. It’s almost like the process has become somewhat of an expectation rather than a pleasure. The children I’ve encountered since our move here seem dull and lifeless, even when standing at the door begging for some more. Joking with them as you reward their costume seems foreign to most of them. They appear startled and a little scared, as if warned not to enjoy things too much. The entire tradition has become rather lacklustre.

            This year, our third Halloween will see the very same things that last year saw. The pumpkins will be carved and the ghost hung out to dry. That ghoul with illumination will sit in the window facing the road and shine just like it did last year. The black cauldron I use for distribution will be filled just like it was last year. I will open the gate and leave the lights on, just like I did in 2016. Last Christmas, I was given a Captain America hoodie, including a face mask where the hood should be. The kids next door left me the Captain’s shield when they moved to England. I will wear this outfit when I open the door this year. I try to make an effort, I try to take as much part in the festivities as I can. I enjoy seeing each child as they stand waiting for gratification. I can occasionally see the anticipation in their zombie-like eyes. I can only imagine what the experience is like for someone growing up in this age. I often wonder if children still view the world though innocence rather than technology. Is the experience of Halloween an actual experience for them or is it something different, a ritual void of excitement and void of much needed laughter? It all strikes me as rather hollow. This is the way that I see things,  at least from the view of my front door.

            It doesn’t matter how many kids show up at our door. Their absence would only leave more chocolate for my partner and me to enjoy. We will still carve all those pumpkins and we will relish the feeling of home one gets when sharing such memories. Amidst all the carving, and all the display, a part of Halloween has survived for me. My partner stands right with me on this. We make Halloween special for us, any children who become involved are incidental. It’s not that they don’t matter, but they are not required when it comes to reliving your youth, if only for mere moments. When the darkness has fully set in and all the kiddies have returned to their lobotomies, my partner and I sit ourselves down and we watch It’s the Great Pumpkin, Charlie Brown, then Garfield’s Halloween Adventure. When the cartoons have passed away, we turn our attention to horror. Each year we pick from our extensive DVD library, each year we vary the choice. Whether John Carpenter’s Halloween or even Frank Capra’s Arsenic and Old Lace, it’s not necessarily the film that is important, rather the investment made. We will never have children and are both more than okay with that (trust me). They are irrelevant, to be fully honest. I do not require such relationships to be happy. I am responsible for how I react to the world around me. I still celebrate Halloween because it brings a part of me to life, even if things just aren’t the same.

Photos

Halloween 2016

Paris, Ontario

The River and the Highway

“There is something delicious about writing the first words of a story. You never quite know where they’ll take you.” (Beatrix Potter, English writer)

            Writing comes naturally to me. Since I was a very young boy, I found the written word made it easy to express myself. As I grew, any training I received in school only helped to strengthen my relationship with print media. My entire post-secondary experience was to further my command of the written word. I was educated as a journalist. I studied television and radio broadcasting to expand my reach. I worked in many forms of media but I always returned to my first love, writing. As the internet formed, I could access venues unavailable to me before. I began blogging almost immediately after my Mother’s death in 2010. I had maintained profiles on Facebook and other social media, but I failed to use them efficiently. Little by little, my blog grew from the ashes. What started out as weak, and intentionally simple, soon began to find a sense of form and structure as I played and developed. For more than 7 years, I have diligently posted. I do not write my blog because I am looking for money. You will never see my work monetized. I have created my own biography, in a sense. Anyone can go back through my history, at least what I have documented over the last 7 years. There is little I have not discussed in one manner or another. Writing is, for me, a daily exercise, a cathartic workout anytime my fingers pound the keys. You can almost feel the cleansing as each letter finds its place. As far back as I can remember, print (in one form or another) was my passion, even if I didn’t know it at the time. Like God and comic books, the connection has never failed. I am, after all, a writer.

“If you ask me what I came to do in this world, I, an artist, will answer you: I am here to live out loud.” (Émile Zola, French playwright)

            Strathroy District Collegiate Institute (SDCI) sucked the life out of me for almost 5 years. I suppose high school will do that. Of all the people I knew and all the activities I took part in, there are few fond memories held by either. I realize now that I was pretty much like any other teenager. I struggled with my identity, I struggled with the social game. I had no idea my world functioned through the eyes of bipolar disorder. This is completely beside the point. Although I played sports like any good breeder would, and participated in heterosexual rites of passage, for the most part I really just wanted to be left alone. My disability often ravaged me, even though it would be more than a decade before I received proper treatment. I tried my best to function and that usually meant projects I could do by myself. It’s not that I’m not a team player, I just find people very noisy and distracting. I function so much better in the silence. It has always been this way for me. I did all the normal things someone my age did in high school. I joined the band, standing at the back of each rehearsal with a string bass in one hand and solitude in the other. I did the theatre arts scene, performing in several productions before graduation. I loved English class. The study of writing and style were my favourite lessons. Shakespeare was my friend. I impressed my English teacher with my enthusiasm. Although this instructor was a bitch, I excelled in this area, so much so that she introduced me to the librarian and my journey began. Writing always just seemed to fit me, even when I was a kid. I won poetry contests and flourished as an amateur journalist. Working on the school newspaper just made sense to me.

            I joined the staff of the SDCEye approaching mid-term in my freshman year.  The monthly newsletter/newspaper was amateur and somewhat redundant, but the idea of being involved in its publication activated something within me. I had been constantly exploring this medium and this venue seemed like a good place to start evolving my craft. At first, I was assigned the sports page, responsible for interviews and such but eventually I was offered something even more exciting for me. My tenure as publisher and editor started with my sophomore year. I was put in charge of almost everything involving the formation of the publication. I not only shaped the essence of the paper but was also responsible for the printing and distribution. I was assignment editor, reporter and publisher all in one very committed young man. I was trained in layout, design and consistency, always under the watchful eye of the editor-in-chief, Mr. Bahnmiller. I instantly fell in love with the process and like a sponge, I absorbed as much information and its application as I possibly could. The few years in which I practiced my art may have been simplistic and rather amateurish, yet I still discovered something wonderful in the midst of it all. Like stepping out on the yellow brick road, I had to follow where that road would lead me. I carried my new sense of purpose in the words that were written and the form they had taken. Like a harbinger, it pointed to my future and I finally realized who and what I wanted to be.

            As I progressed in my studies, opportunity tried to lead me away. I expanded my base, formally studying journalism for print, in radio and on television. I even branched out in later years and worked exclusively in radio for a time. I had the voice and the looks for it. No matter what the field was, my writing ability always seemed to point me in that direction. I excelled at writing copy and advertising seemed a natural fit, but only to others it would seem. I always kept writing even when my view shifted. Over the decades, I published in religious magazines, in local newspapers and a few major publications. It’s strange, when my first partner died in 1995, I stopped writing altogether but when my Mother died in 2010, it inspired me to start again. For the length of those 15 years, I rarely created anything outside of my head. I think holding it all in affected my ability to express myself in terms beyond grief and futility. My ability to write did not pass away but it certainly went into hibernation. I always managed to find a way to not create, to not be inspired. All the pain was all that remained. Rather than using my command of the English language, I fell silent. For years, it really seemed like there was nothing left for a teller of tales. I still floated in the otherland but I just couldn’t find a way to write about it.

            I posted my first blog, “Lemon Cupcakes with Icing Sugar Sprinkles” (http://simplekel.blogspot.ca/2010/05/may-28th-2010.html), on May 28^th, 2010.

I touched on music and memories and the way things used to be. I didn’t know it at the time but the grief I felt over my Mother’s death reactivated something within me. As I reached out to my world for sanity, I dove head first into what would turn out to be my pure pleasure. Rather than simply posting once in awhile, I had to post 4 or 5 or 6 times each week. I managed to do this for exactly one year. Borrowed Knowledge did not find an agonizing death, rather it ended with the transformation into a blog much more reasonable to handle. Posting every day interfered too much with work and my home life but I didn’t burn out. I excelled and picked up speed.  The first year of my blogging really changed the way I viewed media delivery. I suppose that while many would not consider me old school journalism, I most certainly was brought up in that line of thinking. Blogging became a vehicle, a mechanism with its own reward. After 5 more years of blogging, Surviving God, ran out of steam for me. The confines of the thesis restricted my ability to fully express myself. On January 1^st, 2017, I began a new blog, unrestricted by anything but my imagination. This far in and it remains a delight to write on a weekly basis. Writing can often be an escape, so Otherland seemed like the perfect tag to write under. Day after day, I never grow tired of putting my thoughts onto paper (so to speak). It is still all that it ever has been, cathartic, structured and relevant. I rely on the purge to make it through my day, every day.

“Everywhere I go I’m asked if I think the university stifles writers. My opinion is that they don't stifle enough of them. There’s many a best-seller that could have been prevented by a good teacher.” (Flannery O'Connor, American essayist)

            Sometimes the path we are to follow in life is hidden, we are unable to find the direction we are supposed to take. Sometimes the path is clear and focused, leaving little room to wonder or question if you are going the right way. For most of us, setting out on the correct course is a mundane experience, usually determined by circumstance rather than some unique event or school of thought. In no way am I trying to convey that God comes down and makes the decision for us, pushing us through supernatural means to follow His path versus our own. I guess I still believe that the way we travel is irrelevant, it is the lessons we are to learn as we move forward that should resonate the most. Everyone’s path looks different but all the things we are supposed to absorb are usually the same. It’s not the highway that keeps you going, it’s the scenery.

            I never questioned what I was supposed to be. I just didn’t know it when I came across it. It was there all along, I suppose. For both my educational and professional life, I have followed a few paths at the same time. I specialized in media rather than focusing on my writing. I think in high school I understood my calling. As I was inundated with higher learning, I drifted away from my natural proclivity. I spent years, decades, paying attention to what would make me more money and I forgot about what really makes me happy. There is nothing more satisfying (including sex) than when I open myself to the flow. All the words just come to me these days. I don’t have to think about anything but starting, the rest exudes, sometimes as a dribble and sometimes like a heavy stream. It always takes me away. In a sense, putting “pen to paper” is always a trip to my otherland. Sometimes the visit is quick and sometimes it lasts, but either way it most certainly is a destination I never should have left to begin with. No matter the topic and no matter the style, it all makes sense to me now. I should have stayed the course, and followed the path well knowing, every river, every highway teaches something new.

“Your profession is not what brings home your weekly pay check, your profession is what you’re put here on earth to do, with such passion and such intensity that it becomes spiritual in calling.” (Vincent van Gogh, Dutch painter)

Photos

http://www.emlakeki.com/dunyanin-en-tehlikeli-yollari-haberi-37253

https://plannedspontaneityhiking.com/2017/06/20/big-south-fork-national-recreation-area-kentuckytennessee/

What’s Your Point?

            I just assume that most people would prefer to know the events that are about to happen in their lives. We want to be forewarned, made aware of what will be. I think that people in general wish things had been different, that somehow knowing what is going to happen would prepare them, ground them so they can better deal with whatever will be anyway. Like with prophecy, if we acknowledge what is to come we can change it somehow, that knowing the future would allow us to shape it into something much more palpable to our sense of well-being. I think it is better not to know, especially when dealing with the death of someone in our lives. I fear that the loss and grief would only be greatly compounded. I’m not sure insight into when someone is going to die would do anything but complicate the matter. I realize we all wish for much more than mere warning signs but having an outline of tomorrow would simply aggravate the same feelings, but today. Anticipating such things has rarely done anything but make us more stressed, much more out of focus. Rather than paying attention to now, we would scurry about trying to change the course of our history. The knowledge of an event would only exacerbate the inevitable. At least, in the moment, we have the moment. Tomorrow may not be a better day but it is still, if only in itself, another day. There is hope in the unknowable, that things might be okay, no matter what might happen next.

“We sowed our seeds watered with tears

Waiting for signs of growth took months of days

And then took years

We took our steps, we took our falls

Somewhere along the way we just got lost

And we lost it all

Nothing ventured, nothing gained

The risk of living is the pain

And what will be will be anyway”

            I cannot imagine what I would do if I was somehow able to tap into my history or predict my future. I realize that a million times a day we all wish that things had somehow turned out differently for us. Having the power to amend these “incidents” would only cause havoc and chaos. I can picture all of mankind chasing the past in order to affect the future. I can imagine who I would be, constantly paying penance even though my course had shifted. Any changes would not reverse reality. We think we could go back and fix things, or stop them from happening, but time is constant and what will be will be, regardless of how we try to manipulate it. Albeit the future is not set in stone like the past is. I don’t think we can change what was but we can make what is better, richer and much more kind to us. Once someone has passed away, we all tend to run off to some otherland to appropriately deal with all the noise. Almost instantly, the deceased becomes an amalgam of all the times we shared with them. Their life becomes a scrapbook, which we get to open and close depending on our mood. Altering or changing the events of our lives would simply remove one page for another, leaving us still wishing we could change the way things are. It’s a double edged sword and we need to be careful what we wish for. I’m not even so sure I would change anything about my life if I was granted the opportunity. Sure, I would love to go back and fix my mistakes. I would like to at least be given the chance to somehow alter the deaths of my Mother and my first partner, but it would be nothing but daydreaming. The past is set. There is nothing you can do about it now. I’m not sure I would want to. 

“It’s better not to know

The way it’s gonna go

What will die and what will grow

Goodbye more than hello

It’s better not to know”

            I think it’s better not to know just how your story will go. There are just some things that should be left the way they are. We can try to go back and amend. We can look forward with hope. When you really stop to think about it, all that trying has never done anyone any good. Sometimes things just are the way they are. Running about effectively changing your history would only compromise your now. There are no guarantees, not even in an otherland. Allowing time to pass, going with the flow, may not avoid disaster but it will carry you through it. Every person is riddled with the amount of time that has passed them by. Speaking from experience, it is the worn and beaten souls that hold the most promise. We have no choice but to grin and bear it. What is going to be will be, whether we like it or not.

            Quite often, people pretend that three wishes would solve all their problems. We would literally wish them away. Imagine, three different and very tempting alternatives to the life you currently live. What alterations one could make with so many indulging options. Our life would change in the blink of an eye but I am not sure that anything really would. After all, we all encounter the possibility every time we talk to a genie, play our numbers in the lotto draw or even when we wish upon a star. The problem is that wishes rarely come true and even when they do manifest, they are usually nothing more than a catalyst for more chaos and the complications it brings. I have never even won a door prize. I don’t really gamble. I rarely play the lottery. I dare not wish upon anything but the day itself. I have had to accept my life as it is. We all do. Hoping things can be different is nothing but another reason to worry about tomorrow instead of focusing on today. Regardless, you cannot halt tragedy, or misery, or woe. Your life might be different but you have only exchanged one lot for another.

            The good news is that we already have the ability to change our lives. Every day you carry the option to get on with living or just lay down and die. Every morsel can be used to feed the future. After all, “tomorrow is another day.” The way things are now is a direct consequence of your life experiences up to that point. The same cannot be said about tomorrow. Even the slightest tinge can make it a better day. What may have rested in destruction, should the path not be taken, may very well lead you to someplace better. The past is set in stone and the future is nothing but guesswork. We have the power of choice and in that choice we can affect what will be. Our past is fixed but our future lies in our very own hands. We might not be able to alter or shift events but we can make the right decisions and in so doing, influence the outcome. We may not be able to change the past with magic, or technology, or senseless wishing but we can adjust the future with forethought and the knowledge that by changing now, we can change then.

“Those tiny stems became these trees

With dirt and storms and sun and air to breathe

Like you and me

And some fell down and some grew tall

And those surviving twenty winter thaws

Have the sweetest fruit of all

But innocence and planting day are both long gone

So much has changed

And if we had to do it all again”

            We may not able to predict what may come. What has been will always stay just the way it is. The only option we are left with is to effectively change ourselves in order to amend the past or affect the future. We spend so much energy on wishing things were different that we miss the opportunity to actually do something in the now to make things better. We may even use hindsight and foresight in a negative sense, bringing much more damage to our lives then we ever considered possible. We know that nothing remains the way it is, not ever. Change is inevitable, like the sun and the moon and the stars. We have the power to make a greater day. We have the option to thrive or just survive. The past may restrict us and the future may hinder us but acting within the parameter of the now allows us, at least, an alternative to what we think has happened or what we fear will occur. Either way, you cannot alter anything unless you apply yourself. People will come and people will go. Death is the ultimate determination. If I could go back, if I wanted to, I would raise the dead, bringing back those people whose absence makes my life a sadder place. I fear I would only be forcing repeat performances. Everyone is going to die. Knowing  how and when would be a nightmare in itself. Imagining the clock ticking down each day, each hour, each second. It would be maddening in the most literal sense. I’m unsure what it all really means or might mean. I only know that when it all comes down, it’s still better not to know.

“Nothing stays the same

Life flickers like a flame

As the seasons come and go

Goodbye more than hello

It’s better not to know

Is it better, better not to know?”

(Better Not to Know, Amy Grant 2013)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3vCk60ijYQE

Photo

http://writingwhilethericeboils.blogspot.ca/2011/06/ins-and-outs-of-internal-dialogue.html

Mission Statement

"Your vision will become clear only when you look into your heart. Who looks outside, dreams. Who looks inside awakens." (Carl Jung, Swiss psychiatrist)

            Since the death of my first partner by suicide, it’s amazing just how much crap I’ve taken off people. I suppose that I have allowed it because I felt like I deserved it.  I’ve been paying penance for so long, I am completely overdrafted. I blame myself for what happened to Doug, I have since the moment I saw him lying on a metal slab, frozen and very much dead. Guilt, especially survivor’s guilt, has been a prime motivator ever since. I then promised myself, and him, that I would make it a priority to be kind and understanding towards everyone, especially the mentally ill. I made a commitment, albeit post-mortem, to turn such a negative experience into something better, into a productive experience. This has not been an easy feat, no matter how sincere my intention. I have tried to make what happened that cold February night a catalyst, an impetus to lead me. Over twenty years later, I still try as I might, yet it seems rather impossible to do. There is something so foreign about being kind to everyone. Even Jesus got pissed off outside the Temple. No matter how I try, I always seem to come up short. It’s difficult loving everybody. It’s even harder being kind to everyone. People tend to get on my last nerve. Every day that I come in contact with other mortals, I find myself drifting away from my mission statement. I cannot help but prognosticate what will be. Each day is another journey down that damn rabbit hole. I step out the door, and in a second or two, all the words mean little. In a sense, there are no more promises to keep.  

“I can teach anybody how to get what they want out of life. The problem is that I can't find anybody who can tell me what they want.” (Mark Twain, American writer)

            I try not to judge other people. After all, who the hell am I to condemn anyone? I completely understand the cliché, “Therefore but by the grace of God go I” (John Bradford). It’s not always easy putting yourself in someone else’s shoes, let alone walking in them. It’s difficult not to evaluate another person based on your own biases. We really have no choice in the matter. Existence is always subjective. While my father is much more Christian than I ever have been, his theology has taught me a thing or three nonetheless. He constantly reminds me that one must learn to discern rather than judge. These “powers of discernment” (Hebrews 5:14) come from learning to gauge a situation rather than pronouncing condemnation. Rather than judging others, we should be judging ourselves and our ability to discern between right and wrong, good and evil. Until we learn to direct empathy at ‘me’, we cannot really find it when approaching or dealing with another. I get it, I try to live it. Rather than cursing other people, I try to have some semblance of empathy, no matter who they are. While I have not had the most pleasant of journeys, I can only imagine the misery that people less deserving must go through. You have to train yourself. Rather than relying on impulse in response, we should be acting on instinct. It can be so very hard to do. Still, I try not to judge other people or myself. It’s the most important part of my mission statement.

“Always begin with the end in mind.” (Ellen Muth, American actress)

            I try to have compassion, even for murderers and terrorists. Just imagine what someone who murdered their spouse or ran over a child while drunk driving must experience in the afterglow. I’m sorry, but I felt pity for Jeffery Dahmer and I sympathize with the madness of Omar Mateen, from the Pulse nightclub shooting. I have been publicly mocked and ridiculed by many Christians for taking this position regarding my compassion. I think it’s disgusting when someone professes agape love then condemns a criminal to the death penalty. People tend to rebuke you when you actually follow the teachings of their religious mentors. Jesus commanded his followers to see Him in those they deal with, in a stranger we will find Him (Matthew 25: 34 -40). We should remember that rule applies even to those in jail (“I was in prison and you came to visit me”, 36b). Having sympathy and understanding towards any criminal does not mean you condone or agree with what they have done. You can still hate another person for their actions without dismissing them as a human being. It should be our mission statement to apply the rules to everyone, not just those whom we find acceptable to our terms. Compassion knows no separation and everybody is worthy to be loved, even if they don’t deserve it. 

“Vision is the art of seeing the invisible.” (Jonathan Swift, Irish satirist)

            It doesn’t matter how aware I am or how enlightened I think I am, something always comes along to remind me I’m as hopelessly lost as everybody else on this planet. Recently, I picked up a stomach bug and was heavily ill for just over a week. The worst part was the vomiting. At one point, I couldn’t keep water down. The entire experience went on and on for far too long. I started to lose myself in it on day four. Through my haze I cried out to God, begging Him to help me. I made bargains and many promises to keep. I felt like karma had come and that I was being punished, yet again, for something I had done to go against Him. In my weakened state, I was a babbling thing. Sad and floundering and very much overcome by raw emotion. I condemned myself in my stupor. I judged myself for my misery. I suppose that even an Atheist will cry out for God, given the right circumstances. Not that there is anything wrong with that but for me, it is not really part of my nature. It’s strange how we spend so much time considering others and yet we forget to consider ourselves. We judge ourselves far too easily. No one is perfect and no one ever will be. Even in our compromised state we should remember to love ourselves, first. You can’t be kind to another unless you can be kind to yourself. This is the most basic tenet of any mission statement

“All men dream: but not equally. Those who dream by night in the dusty recesses of their minds wake in the day to find that it was vanity: but the dreamers of the day are dangerous men, for they may act their dream with open eyes to make it possible.”
(T.E. Lawrence, British writer)

            I am flawed and imperfect. I make mistakes and I struggle with this life just like the rest of us do. No matter the trouble, no matter the fare, somehow hope always seems to float for me. I have no reason to be a good person. This life has offered me little in terms of payment. I am happy because I choose to be, not because of any real reason I have been given. I have learned many things along the way and I have ignored just as many. I doubt, I question, I feel. I am constantly aware of  just how human I remain. Of all those understandings I have gathered along my way, there are few that rumble on a constant basis. We live. We learn. We move on with our lives. Sometimes the truth cannot help but rise to the top. We spend so much time trying to develop loving relationships with those close to us that we lose sight of anyone else who may pass our way. We really tend to only love those who love us in return. We forget about the faceless, nameless minions who trudge through life with much more contempt than any person should have. We must take the time. You will never have a chance to be the answer to a prayer unless you do. Whether to yourself or to others, be kind.  This is my mission statement. After all, as Jesus noted, “If you love those who love you, what credit is that to you? Even sinners love those who love them” (Luke 6:32, NIV).

“When you discover your mission, you will feel its demand. It will fill you with enthusiasm and a burning desire to get to work on it.”
(W. Clement Stone, American businessman)

Photo

https://jayblock.com/the-hole-in-the-roof-a-story-of-vision-and-faith/

Tunnel

“On my deathbed I will pray to the gods and the angels

Like a pagan to anyone who will take me to heaven

To a place I recall, I was there so long ago

The sky was bruised, the wine was bled

And there you led me on

In your house, I long to be

Room by room patiently

I’ll wait for you there

Like a stone

I’ll wait for you there

Alone”

(Like a Stone, Audioslave 2002)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7QU1nvuxaMA

            If suicide is such a bad thing, why the hell are so many people giving in to the urge just to end it all? It doesn’t help that celebrities like Chris Cornell (Soundgarden) and Chester Bennington (Linkin Park) took it upon themselves to lead the way. What stellar examples for us all. Every time you turn around, someone else has decided to exit stage left, with little regard towards those left behind to clean up the mess. Incidentally, I am able to indulge this topic as both an attempter and a survivor. I know what it feels like to enter the act deliberately and I know what it feels like to have to deal with the remnants of such a deliberate act. I understand there is a point where rational thinking ceases and something else takes control. There is a tunnel that sweeps away our reality and replaces it with the fixation and impulse to just give up and then give in. One becomes entangled, unable to see beyond the urge and unable to deny it. You cannot see past yourself when you enter the long dark hallway that you think points to home. You don’t think about other people, no matter how close you may be to them. Your mother, your spouse, not even the dog matter once you start travelling down the hole. Sometimes it doesn’t matter where we try to go, it’s about where we end up. People who survive suicide idealization and have actually attempted to die, make it through the tunnel but only due to circumstance. They may not have taken enough medication, or the rope broke, or the wife walked in, are standard explanations nonetheless. Those who survive their suicide attempt don’t always come through it intact. They may be lost and might never be found. Some even remain in that damn tunnel, constantly trying again and again to escape this life. Apparently, just living makes dying seem so easy.

“I never wanted to write these words down for you

With the pages of phrases of all the things we’ll never do

So I blow out the candle and I put you to bed

Since you can't say to me now,

How the dogs broke your bone

There’s just one thing left to be said

So say hello to heaven”

(Say Hello 2 Heaven, Temple Of The Dog 1991)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Bgsg9xfsSoc

            According to Statistics Canada, there were almost 4,000 suicides in the actuarial year 2009. The 3,890 deaths by self-harm in Canada during that year “resulted in a suicide rate of 11.5 deaths per 100,000 people.” Males had a suicide rate “three times higher than the rate for females.” While there are suicide deaths in all age groups, “those aged 40 to 59 had the highest rates.” People who are married “had a lower suicide rate than those who were single, divorced or widowed.” For that annum, “a total of 2,989 males committed suicide ... compared to 901 females.” Over the past decade in Canada,  “the most common method of suicide has been hanging.” This includes both the act of “strangulation and suffocation” (at 44%) and is then “followed by poisoning” (at 25%) and “firearm use” (at 16%). Men were “far more likely to use firearms than females.” Women “tend to use less fatal methods, such as poisoning” compared to men who “tend to use more violent methods such as hanging and firearms.” For the year 2009, suicide attempts were “20 times more frequent than completed suicides.”

            Over the last 45 years, “suicide rates have increased by 60% worldwide.” Globally, suicide is one of the “three leading causes of death among those aged 15-44.”

While such rates are usually highest among elderly males, “rates among young people have been increasing to such an extent that they are now the group at highest risk in a third of all countries.” Mental health conditions such as depression, substance abuse, and psychoses “are associated with more than 90% of all cases of suicide.” Suicide typically

manifests from several “complex sociocultural factors and is more likely to occur during periods of socioeconomic, family and individual crisis.” Contributing issues can greatly vary but include “loss of a loved one, unemployment, sexual orientation, difficulties with developing one’s identity, disassociation from one’s community” as well as other social or belief-based influences like existential crisis or religious persecution. Statistically, across the board, suicide rates keep going up. Unfortunately, as the rates go up, the bodies drop. You don’t have to be crazy to see where all this is going. All these people trying just to die, it’s like they all have tunnel vision.

“Waiting for the end to come

Wishing I had strength to stand

This is not what I had planned

It’s out of my control

Flying at the speed of light

Thoughts were spinning in my head

So many things were left unsaid

It’s hard to let you go

I know what it takes to move on

I know how it feels to lie

All I want to do

Is trade this life for something new

Holding on to what I haven’t got”

(Waiting for the End, Linkin Park 2010)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5qF_qbaWt3Q

            Tunnel vision is defined as “the tendency to focus exclusively on a single or limited goal or point of view.” It refers to a “narrow focus, concentration, fixation, narrow-mindedness, single-mindedness, close-mindedness.” Those who attempt suicide experience this “constriction” in a literal sense. It is a concentration upon the objective with little to no awareness of those things reduced by such a narrowing. When it comes to suicide, the “common cognitive state ... is constriction.” Although I found it impossible to locate a statistical breakdown of tunnel vision in suicides, I am left with eyewitness testimony including my own. We can either accept the fact based on that witness testimony or we can discard it altogether. Regardless, “suicidal thoughts and plans are frequently associated with a rigid and narrow pattern of cognitive activity that is comparable to tunnel vision.” This idealization  leaves the person “unable or unwilling to engage in effective problem-solving behaviours and may see his or her options in extreme, all or nothing terms.” It is important to “recognize that most suicides are driven by a flash flood of strong emotions, not rational, philosophical thoughts in which the pros and cons are evaluated critically.” The motivation is meaningless once you start following the process. Your sense of everything else quickly declines. You don’t think of anything but the embrace of death and the motion of dying. Not even the rush of power one grants themselves can overcome the sting.

“You kept everything inside

And even though I tried, it all fell apart

What it meant to me will eventually be a memory of a time when

I tried so hard and got so far

But in the end,

It doesn’t even matter

I had to fall to lose it all

But in the end,

It doesn’t even matter”

(In the End, Linkin Park 2000)

            I remember it like it was yesterday. I was blind, blind to empathy, blind to everything else. I could not see past how I was feeling, how I was suffering, at least in my own mind. Once I took the valium, the course was set. I sped into the graveyard with little concern for anyone’s safety, including my own. In that moment, something happened, something crossed over in me. I moved from thinking about it to actually doing it. It started to call me, in a sense. I became solely aware of the pain. It wasn’t about some gain or drama, only extinction and the master plan. It was a long dark journey into the night. I don’t recall considering anything as I moved toward my very planned doom. I didn’t think of my family, I didn’t think of my friends, I didn’t even think of myself, not really. It was a completely barren and worthless otherland that I entered into. It was so tempting but the temptation, at this point, was hallow. Suddenly, the pain lessened, the voices lessened, everything lessened. Nothing I knew was with me, I was alone and racing down the inevitable path I had chosen. Everything went quiet as I approached the median that laid just ahead. As a different journey began, I can remember that feeling of nothingness, of hopelessness yet impending relief. The tunnel swallowed me whole. All I could fixate on, every single fucking part of me just wanted to die.

“In the end,

It doesn’t even matter”

(In the End, Linkin Park 2000)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eVTXPUF4Oz4

Photo

https://refresher.sk/30679-Smrt-A-co-bude-dal-Precti-si-8-teorii-o-tom-co-bude-nasledovat-az-nas-zivot-skonci

http://onedio.co/content/did-you-know-that-suicide-rates-go-up-in-the-spring-months-15059

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/s-l-young/suicide-statistic-_b_7771670.html

Sources

http://www.statcan.gc.ca/eng/help/bb/info/suicide

http://www.statcan.gc.ca/pub/82-624-x/2012001/article/11696-eng.htm

http://www.survivorsofsuicide.com/understanding.shtml

https://www.google.ca/search?num=30&safe=off&rlz=1C1CHBD_enCA731CA731&q=tunnel+vision+definition&oq=tunnel+vision+&gs_l=serp.1.1.0i67k1l10.3756.3756.0.5588.1.1.0.0.0.0.119.119.0j1.1.0....0...1.1.64.serp..0.1.117.YDO-AlHRRvw

http://www.puckermob.com/moblog/inside-a-suicidal-mind

Note to Self

            In the 1980s, going to Mother’s restaurant was a dining event. There was something so familiar and quaint about the establishment that all my memories of the then franchise are warm and fuzzy. The Americanized Italian restaurant carried itself rather well. Each diner was essentially the same, with hardwood accents, faux Tiffany lamps and the feel of welcome. It was an experience, not just for the atmosphere but also for all that food. The menu was enormous, just like the portions. My personal favourite was the huge and very deluxe panzerotti. The salad bar sat dead centre of the restaurant and was something you would die for. Everyone I knew loved the place. In London, Ontario, there were several Mother’s restaurants. One was located in the far west end of the city, and was frequented by my family. Another was located in the downtown core and was a favourite hangout for travellers gone in too deep. My partner, then a young boy, knew only of the Brantford location. One day they all just disappeared, never to be heard from again (or so I thought). In 2008, the brand name was purchased and the process of reestablishment into the market began. Slowly, one diner after another reappeared throughout Ontario, including the Kitchener experience in 2014. We went in with great hopes for the place. I keep forgetting that when you hold out expectations, it usually means disappointment. We walked into the newly opened attraction and instantly realized something was missing. The place felt small and cramped and the plastic red and white checkered tablecloths made it look more like a cheap barbershop than the original splendour that was so vivid in my mind. Not a single Tiffany influence could be found. The menu was cliché, the portions had been drastically reduced in size and the prices overinflated.  It was more a homogenized disaster than a pleasant visitation. Still, the influence of the original remains quite present. When we bought our home, we installed a faux Tiffany lamp over our dining room table, specifically because of the original Mother’s layout. It joined our household not only because of its look but also for a sense of atmosphere (something so lacking in the new restaurant). Our choice was under direct influence, an amalgam of the Mother’s we once both loved when we were younger. A place, sadly, to which we have not returned.

Note to self:

You can never go home again.

            Come summer, most kids stick to ice cream and popsicles. Growing up, for the most part, I was one of those kids. Whether from the neighbourhood Dickie Dee ice cream cart, the local tuck shop, or even the ice cream truck, the standard fare was always familiar and always the same. Even the brands seemed to follow into each venue like a shadow would. I can’t recall that I ever noticed, like I do now.  Breaking away from the norm was an alien idea to me. One summer, I discovered something different. The cherry snow cone that I experienced at Ontario Place sent me on a slushy tangent. Every chance I got, I ordered one. The shaved ice, the sweet nectar, soon became my palette’s best friend. I tried raspberry blue and green lime. The cherry, that I mentioned, was without a doubt my favourite. At the Canadian National Exhibition I tried an orange-coloured mango, then at the London Western Fair I tried grape. A few years ago, I consumed a cranberry snow cone from a local booth, much to my delight. Throughout all these years, through the pear-flavoured and the chocolate-flavoured (ewww), I never realized that I had never tried the lemon snow cone. I like lemon, but I am not fond of sucking on sour things. It has never really been important to me to taste every flavour known to man. I just consumed whatever I would come across. The Paris, Ontario fairgrounds are located  almost directly across from the back of our home. Less than 1000 feet from the yard, every Labour Day week the fair comes with all its glory. We had been once before with my Dad and other family members, but this day the two of us ventured over just for the pleasantry. We didn’t go on any rides and the exhibits were very small town. It seemed destined to be a waste of money, but live and learn. On the way out, we stopped at the snow cone booth to have ourselves a little treat. Ben got himself a tangerine orange and I finally gave in to the temptation of bright lemon. It was good.

Note to self:

Sometimes, it’s okay to eat yellow snow.

            At this point in my life, there is little left for me to want and little left that I haven’t had. I find peace and harmony on most days. My relationships are both challenging and yet rewarding. I’m content for the most part. I have found the very things that I always looked for. On sunny days, I appreciate the warmth. On cooler days, I appreciate the cold. Despite all the things that have passed before me, I am able to seize the moment rather than fixating on the past. There are many things about my life that would be considered overwhelming and clouded when viewed by another. Most people don’t understand how I stayed afloat on stormy seas let alone managed to swim to shore. For all the moderation, regardless of the chaos, I strive to remain balanced and aware and even enlightened on the rare occasion. Life is good most days. It has not always been this way. Underneath it all, there is a volcano always ready to spew. The right circumstance, the perfect stimuli, and my world falls to pieces. Try as I may, the feelings just come and there is nothing I can do about it. I suppose if anyone else had to identify their frozen solid partner after they offed themselves, their experience would be close to mine. It’s been over 20 years and occasionally, I am still haunted. The grief found its place long ago. I am usually in a clear frame of mind when it comes to the reality of the situation and what happened. Sometimes, I am not so good. I am swallowed whole. I guess I need more therapy, but I would argue that most people who have survived such misery would be in the same boat. Sometimes, I see him, lying dead and lifeless. This picture appears before me with no warning. Sometimes all I need to do is close my eyes. I have tried a million times to just get past it. No matter how productive, no matter how positive my days become, it always returns, sometimes with a vengeance. I often wonder if other suicide survivors harp back on the event without giving conscious permission. Does their experience flash before their eyes like mine does? What exactly does it mean to carry such weight, such burden? Does it ever go away? Should I want it to go away? No matter the trying, no matter the exorcism, it remains.

Note to self:

It’s never easy, letting go.

            I’m not much for public displays of affection. Since I was a little boy they have made me uncomfortable and I usually cringe when someone does so in front of me. The other day, I walked past two young teenagers almost screwing on a bench in the middle of the food court. In the Wal-Mart, some girl stood feeling up her boyfriend right in front of her children.  I have to admit that in general, I have difficultly expressing myself in these terms, particularly in a public forum. Even in private, if there is the slightest angst or underlying issue, I have trouble expressing myself. I don’t mean on paper like with Valentine’s cards or sexually with my long-term partner. I have trouble expressing my feelings, especially when I am surrounded by gloom. I have built walls and no matter how I am criticized for them, it is these walls which served to make me so strong. It isn’t easy to dissuade them from building. They have been part of me for so long that my cold reactions are more a natural versus forced phenomena. While I am friendly, kind and rather approachable on my best days, when I turn myself off, the complete opposite occurs. I am bitch. I am asshole. I am a frozen ghost. It is not an easy feat for me to overcome this obstacle. I do try and I often fail. The slightest hint of anything out of the ordinary and I return to my tower, all alone way up high. I have been greatly criticized as of late, criticized for being so detached and distant. It’s just the way that I am sometimes. I guess some people believe that being a stone is the same thing as being like a stone. Unlike my alter ego, I breathe and I feel and I suffer. I’m just not going to show it under negative circumstances. It goes without having to say but I’ll say it anyway. I have the right to protect myself, even if you don’t like it.

Note to self:

A rock feels no pain.

            For several years in the early 1990s, I worked as the Media Coordinator of Student Affairs at Lambton College in Sarnia, Ontario. I published a monthly magazine, programmed the college radio station and was responsible for all sales and promotions. For most of my tenure, I was happy with my place in the scheme of things. I became close friends with all the office staff and spent a lot of my free time with them. I had close relationships, especially with the office secretary. Unfortunately, one of my co-workers decided to embezzle funds from the Student Association. I had a pretty good idea what was going on but I said nothing. It was hard to turn in a friend no matter what they may or may not have done. What a tangled web we weave. Soon enough, the blame began to shift to me. Like a good Bipolar would, I told them to stick it up their asses trying to damn me. I quit in the very same breath. Just a few months later, the police came and carried away the office manager. I had long ago moved on and found myself living in downtown Toronto. No matter where I have worked since and no matter who I worked with, I just don’t get involved like I did at Lambton College. I’m not a prick about it but I just don’t think mixing a work life with your private life is a very good idea. Something always rears its head and ends up biting you on the ass. I guess that you really do get what you pay for, even if you couldn’t see it coming. All these years later and I often warn my partner of doing the same thing I did back in the day. He laughs me off, convinced I am overreacting. People need to have their own experiences sometimes, at least when it comes to learning hard lessons. Whether it is someone in the neighbourhood, or a new colleague, even a professional you see on a regular basis, it is never a good idea to mix your private life in with your public persona. You might think the two mesh quite nicely but all you are doing is asking for trouble.

Note to self:

Don’t shit where you eat.

            I am always surprised when a social contact asks me if I know Jesus as my personal Lord and Saviour. Sometimes, I just say yes. After all, throughout my teenage years I took to altar call after altar call, trying to get The Christ to notice me. I was born again several times before my 21^st birthday. The truth is, these days I am so far away from Christianity that even the Devil leaves me alone. Damnation would be rather moot at this point. Even though I find myself thinking differently then during my fundamentalist days, I still hold the direct teachings of Jesus in high regard. I just realized a long time ago that most religions preach the same message as Him, just in a different bottle. I am no longer interested in searching for something that it is obvious no one can find. I still consider myself a theist, albeit an agnostic by nature. I want so much to embrace the idea of a personal God, in such an impersonal world, but I have never experienced this epiphany. I have studied religion from theology to cosmology, from Judaism to Waco, from Nietzsche to Swedenborg. I have come to recognize that even the worst esoteric example is simply trying to say the same things as the best example, just from a different perspective. It’s hard to trust a deity who would have people burn in hell because they didn’t follow the rules. If God is really like that, boy are we all in a lot of trouble. To some capacity, I still believe there is a personal god although I don’t think we have a clue what we are dealing with. I’m not sure that God is anything like what we would imagine it to be. So when I am approached by those intent on my salvation, I often tell them that it’s not that I don’t believe in God, I just don’t believe in their god.

Note to self:

Blind faith is better than no faith at all.

            It’s strange. I am uncomfortable with public displays of affection yet I don’t have the slightest issue talking about sex. I suppose my youth may be the reason I am so unencumbered. Let’s just say the mania that is so present when I’m not being treated for bipolar disorder is a driven bastard. I had no problem sneaking away from my traditional lifestyle and venturing into pure hedonism. Instant gratification just left me more time to keep playing. I prefer the term slut to manwhore. The truth be told, those terms barely touch the surface. It was a different time and yet it was somehow not completely satisfying. When I am sitting alone, drifting in my memories, I try not to envision any of these experiences. That was then, this is now. In truth, only a few are even memorable, and those were with my partners. Sex became my otherland, a pure escape. Add in some casual drug use and you have years of living dangerously. I’m not sure I want to know just how many people I touched in any sort of manner. Sexual promiscuity is one thing but the compulsion I experienced was often more than I could handle. I was possessed in a manner, all impulse and no instinct. The mistakes I made in my youth may have cemented the idea that love is all that matters but such excess comes with a price. It’s not a moral issue for me, I really was in no condition to control myself. If I was able to go back and change my life, I’m not sure I would. What I have done and who I was are only voices if I listen to them. It’s not shame or embarrassment that lingers, it’s regret. Sometimes it can be so hard that it hurts.

Note to self:

That’s what she said.

            You wake up in the morning, you do your work, you pay your bills and you come home at night. Day after day, we all repeat the same motion, just so that we can be happy. Unfortunately, most of us never are. All the time we spend gathering money, and things, only makes us want more. We need more so we take more. We all seem to be wishing for the things we already have. We justify living like this because it’s normal for everyone else, so why not us? There was a point in my life where I did not think it was possible for me to be normal and lead a normal life. Now that I have one it can be a little boring, if you ask me. Be careful what you wish for. I am not about to complain. This life that I  have been given is but a moment’s time. It has been a wonderful, breathtaking adventure that was simultaneously one major pain in the ass. I hope that my life is more than just a picture of me then. In the end, I am left standing at my window watching the birds, and the squirrels, feed as they please. My house is beautiful. It contains many things that are atheistically pleasing. It is my comfort zone, the place I can hide. I have rediscovered a boyhood joy, collecting comic books. I have my music, my friends and I have my writing. I gladly talk with my father every day. For the first time in a long time, I am content. I am content spiritually as well as circumstantially. All these things have completed me. I could not ask for more.

Note to self:

Good things come to those who wait.

Photos

http://drhelmspickett.com/note-to-self-hes-got-you

http://www.area10church.com/messages/2017/2/12/021217-note-to-self-the-friends-that-get-me

Bob

            Panpsychism is an ancient philosophy that is being re-examined by members of the modern scientific community. This school of thought claims that “everything material, however small, has an element of individual consciousness.” It is an evolving theory but one of the oldest. Great thinkers such as Parmenides, Spinoza and even Plato subscribed to the idea that “consciousness, mind or soul (psyche) is a universal and primordial feature of all things.” Plato himself was a staunch believer that “This world is indeed a living being endowed with a soul and intelligence ... a single visible living entity containing all other living entities, which by their nature are all related” (Timaeus, Plato). Traces of this ideology appear throughout antiquity, in doctrines found in Mahayana Buddhism, Taoism and Stoicism. Stoicism, for example, “developed a cosmology which held that the natural world was infused with a divine fiery essence called Pneuma, which was directed by a universal intelligence called Logos.” In Christianity,  Logos is the title given to Jesus “as the pre-existent second person of the Trinity.” Although there is slight correlation between those two, any real unifying factor was lost to more than 2000 years of a Patriarchal theocracy.

            In modern thinking, Panpsychism helps to explain the “hard problem of consciousness.” It has been concluded that human beings are “like the rest of the universe, in substance and in spirit.”  It is believed that a “proto-consciousness field” exerts itself throughout all time and all space. In a nutshell, the entirety of the universe is “self-aware.” For centuries we have accepted the “dominant theory,” that “consciousness is associated with complexity, with a system’s ability to act upon its own state and determine its own fate.” In principle, “some purely physical systems that are not biological or organic may also be conscious.” For hundreds of years, science has tried to explain away the universe. We have tried to come to an understanding regarding where we came from and why we are here. There always seems to be a missing link in all the thinking and all the study. In fact, Panpsychism can neither be “explained in terms of anything else nor be reduced to anything else.” To say that “consciousness is ubiquitous is to say that every aspect of concrete reality partakes of mentality in some way or in some measure.” So what does this mean to a mere mortal? If the universe is conscious then why has it been ignoring me? Who have I been talking to? If everything is one with each other, collective in a sense, then why do most human beings feel so alone? If the universe, like God, is out there, why does it seem that no one is listening? If the universe is alive, does that mean God is dead? Who do I pray to now? If the cosmos is aware and enlightened, then it surely must have a name. I think its name should be Bob.

I think I will call it Bob.

            What does it mean to have a conscious universe? Is this all merely another way of approaching the idea of divine omniscience or even Nirvana? Scientists have been working to understand the cosmos but the deeper they peer into it, the more questions seem to arise. The very idea of the entirety of everything being aware seems contradictive to most religious manifestations of God. I suppose science has always managed to get in God’s way. So then is the living, thinking universe God? Is this the unspoken truth, the “universal” idea underlying all the subjective interpretations? Over the centuries, there have been many theories which resonate with the idea of Panpsychism. The oldest, Animism, “predates even paganism.”  In Animism, “there exists no hard and fast distinction between the spiritual and physical (or material) world,” everything is sentient. Every person, every rock, every planet, even our shadows, the universe itself, all possess anima (Latin meaning breath, spirit, life) and are considered very much “animated and alive.” Animism is a supernatural belief system. A central force “organizes and animates the material universe.” This tradition remains “the belief system of many indigenous tribal peoples.” The Christian part of me was well trained to avoid these blasphemous and heathen ideas. They are considered evil, at least in the pages of the Bible.

“Ex nihilo nihil fit”

- Out of nothing comes nothing –

(Parmenides of Elea, pre-Socratic Greek philosopher)

            Sometimes it feels like the Universe is calling out to me.  I don’t hear voices. I don’t see visions. Occasionally, I sense a presence far greater than myself. I’m not sure if it is God or Jesus or Bob. I would like to know exactly what name I am supposed to worship under this week? Perhaps everyone sees fit to call “It” exactly what they want to. We insert coincidence and serendipity to give meaning to something we can never define.  I can only speak for myself but not once in all the years I have searched for meaning in the stars did one ever drop out the sky and teach me how to be a better person. Like happiness, God is something different to each of us. It is one thing to one person and something completely different to another. We are bound in our subjective nature, caught making up something in light of all the nothingness. In a sense, we all keep God in our very own otherland, explained away by our preconceived notions and the complexities of man. Let’s be honest, that is exactly where such esoteric interpretations belong. What we believe really has little to do with anything but our own folly. If the universe is sentient, if it is aware, it apparently has placed the same restrictions upon itself that anything Holy would. It doesn’t matter how much you cry out, or pray, or even beg, Bob (like Jesus) refuses to answer. We always get nothing out of nothing.

            I went for a walk last evening. The dusk held its own against the coming of the night. The view was clear and bright and full. Deep was the cosmos, raw and bleak and lonely. Nonetheless, the sky danced with stars and cosmic trails and planets hiding at a distance. I was surrounded by the beauty of it all. In a dark recess, I stood bewildered at the display. Under the moonless sky, I spied what felt like the reality of it all. The vastness and the overwhelming majesty of the night sky humbled me, as it always does. My nothingness was validated in the stardust. I tried to talk to it. I tried to listen. In the end, I got exactly the same thing from the “self-aware” universe that I always receive from whatever god I was praying to that day. Apparently, calling out for Bob offers me as much gratification as calling out for Jesus ever did.

I guess nothing really does beget nothing.

Photos

http://shidiq90.blogspot.ca/2011/04/

https://theelectricagora.com/2015/09/28/panpsychism-is-it-testable/

Sources

http://awarenessact.com/scientists-now-believe-the-universe-itself-may-be-conscious/?=ewao

https://www.google.ca/search?q=%E2%80%9Cpanpsychism.%E2%80%9D&rlz=1C1CHBD_enCA731CA731&oq=%E2%80%9Cpanpsychism.%E2%80%9D&aqs=chrome..69i57j0l5.5285j0j8&sourceid=chrome&ie=UTF-8

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Panpsychism

https://plato.stanford.edu/entries/panpsychism/

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Logos_(Christianity)

http://www.utsc.utoronto.ca/~seager/pan_seager.pdf

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Animism