you be trippin’
Are you ready to take that ride?
sunday afternoon
black coffee pounding
def beats through my veins
a jazz rift drifts like dead flies
against the newscaster’s sand
blasted voice scratching head
lines across my brain.
senior prison officers pimping
passes for pussy, didn’t see
that one coming, male guards
female prisoners human beings
in denial of their base instincts.
ann abramovich knows the score:
‘i wish u peace, love, and health.
blah, blah, blah, fuck that shit. i
wish u sex, alcohol, bare orgasms
and hope u win the fucking lottery,’
she says.
refill please…
my coffee’s cold like countess
tolstoy’s love for pugachev, ditch the
news and dream dreams instead
sorry love no cream keep it strong
bitter, and black like these sound
bites on a sunday afternoon.
naked man in the shower
Naked Man in the shower: “Are you local?”
I open my eyes. A middle-aged, bald soapy guy is standing next to me.
“Yeah, yeah just around the corner,” I say.
“I’ve seen you in here a couple of times. Do you mostly go to the gym?”
“Yeah mostly…that’s where I spend all of my time. And you? Are you local?” I really want to ask if he makes a habit of talking to strangers in the shower, but I let it slide.
“No. I’m from Harbury. I cycle in and then swim.”
“I generally avoid the pool. That’s a good workout, cycling in Harbury, then swimming and cycling back.”
“It’s the cycle back that’s hard.”
I’m sure it is.
fear, desire, and hope
I’m curious to know where I am going next. Several timely quotes have presented themselves to me at a time when I am feeling transient. The first is from Steve Jobs:
“Remembering I’ll be dead soon is the most important tool I’ve ever encountered to help me make the big choices in life. Remembering that you are going to die is the best way I know to avoid the trap of thinking you have something to lose. You are already dead. There is no reason not to follow your heart.”
It is the fear of losing “it” that makes most people hold on to tight, play a cautious game. In his essay, “Our Feelings Reach Out Beyond Us,” Montaigne says it is fear, desire and hope that “project us toward the future and steal from us the feeling and consideration of what is.” These feelings of fear, desire, and hope trap us into spending to much of thoughts on what we imagine will be.
Plato’s remedy for this is to “do thy job and know thyself.” And as Montaigne says “he who would do his job would see that his first lesson is to know what he is and what is proper for him.” And once you know yourself, you will know longer spend time on irrelevant busy-ness and refuse “superfluous occupations and useless thoughts and projects.”
Love and cultivate yourself before anything else as Montaigne reminds us to do.
interview with neil del strother, author of The Flower in the Desert
(Neil del Strother)
Back in January, I posted a short review of The Flower in the Desert, by Neil del Strother. Recently, I had a opportunity to interview Neil about the book and his inspiration for writing it.
Clay: What is the book about?
Neil: The story is simple. My book is about a boy growing into a man, and a man growing through his life. It is about his trips into the desert and what he finds…and what he leaves behind.
At another level, it’s about that place of meaning, of being, of becoming, that all of us know…even if we’re not always consciously aware that we know it. It is the mystery, and each of us brings our own experience and heart to it. My hope is that my book creates a space where this place is felt.
Clay: What inspired you to write the book?
Neil: Many things.
One is an experience I had around twenty years ago now, where I became the plants, the air, the earth, the moon and the stars. It sounds implausible I know, but for a short while (far too short – I was scared I was dying) I was everything.
Another is simply my experience of life. The rhythm, the unfolding, the very slow coming to terms with my many imperfections (I wish this would get a move on!), the gradual and growing awareness that there is so very much more than me and yet nothing more at all.
Clay: If each book is a journey, what journey are you enticing the reader to take?
Neil: Every reader is already on his or her own (and our shared) journey. There is no other journey that can be made. I wonder is it even a journey at all? In the awareness is our unfolding freedom. It’s often a challenge.
Clay: You wrote the book as an allegorical tale, allegorical stories are meant to teach us lessons about how to live, what is your tale teaching us about ourselves and our relationship with the world and each other?
Neil: An essential meaning in my life has been and is about opening; about becoming aware and letting go of my many unhelpful (and often fearful) beliefs and patterns…and anything and everything else that keeps me from a connection with wholeness. I know this might sound like a load of old cobblers. Ultimately it isn’t about words, it’s experiential. For me it’s a long old road.
My experience is that I open that much more into the space each time I manage to let go part of my personal baggage. It’s a place of individual and shared wholeness. I believe this is the same for us all. It is on the cusp of this space that we may meet our deepest fear – the fear Marianne Williamson (and Nelson Mandela) have spoken about: “Our deepest fear is not that we are inadequate. Our deepest fear is that we are powerful beyond measure.” I feel this is essentially a fear of losing ourselves, of disintegrating, into the whole. We are nothing; we are everything.
I hope in some small way (actually, I hope in a big way) that my book speaks to every reader of their greatness. I have written no words for this, it is about our individual stories dancing in the spaces my words leave alone. A lot of people have told me what they feel my book is about…they are right, even though it’s often been the first time I’ve realised it.
Clay: Tell us a little bit about your background.
Neil: My childhood was not altogether easy, although I have heard many many people speak of childhoods a great deal worse. I was, to an extent, emotionally neglected and I learned of the emptiness that this can bring. I was also lucky enough to learn just a little of love from my grandmother and her friend Ms Barnes.
It took me some time to find my feet as an adult. When I left university I worked in a range of jobs trying to find one that felt right for me. None did. My greatest loves were football and writing and, as I wasn’t signed up by Manchester United or the mighty Brighton and Hove Albion (their loss), I drifted somewhat tardily into journalism. I freelanced for papers and magazines before finding a niche writing about education for consultancies and government departments.
I have a degree in Politics and American Studies, an MA in Journalism and a Dip Psych. I am a qualified, if non-practising, Journey Therapist (www.thejourney.com). I also have some experience of shamanism, attending workshops and taking part in healing ceremonies with the San Bushmen in Botswana.
Clay: What attracted you to write a book of this kind?
Neil: Perhaps it sounds daft, but this book wanted to be written…it had been waiting within me for some time. I finally got around to writing the first draft during the weeks that I walked the Camino de Santiago de Compostela, an ancient pilgrimage route across Northern Spain, a year or so ago.
Clay: Is the book a part of some greater spiritual awakening?
Neil: I hope it is part of a greater spiritual awakening that is happening within all of us. We all know that we need to step away from the extraordinarily destructive and life denying actions of our current human world into a place of greater love and reverence for life and our planet.
Clay: Anything else you would like to share?
Neil: Yes, when I write I sound a darn site wiser than when I speak (and act). Or a great deal more pretentious. Take your pick!
Clay: Thanks Neil.
To find out more information about The Flower in the Desert, visit the site here. You can also download the first chapter and experience Neil’s wonderful book for yourself.
Waayaha Cusub
Something different from Somalia beside the usual reports of death and destruction:
the invitation
(click to enlarge)
By the way, you knew I couldn’t stay away for long.
To what degree do you believe that your past experiences determine who you are, and what is possible for you now?
How this plays itself out for me is that most of us are unaware of the past experiences that control or influence our present behavior. Our innate tendency is to act habitually. This is a useful trait to make our lives more efficient, but it can have negative effects if the particular habit we have formed limits us. Some habits we develop all on our own. Others habits we pick up from our parents, teachers, priests, or other persons or sources of influence. Habits can become so ingrained that we no longer question their origin, we just accept the act as being who we are, as our nature, much in the same way we don’t question our breathing. We just do it. Or walking, we had to learn how to walk, now we just do it. So to that extent, I do believe our past experiences determine who we are and what is possible for us now.
For example, for some of us who claim not to be good at maths, we perhaps got a few bad marks on our maths tests back in the early days of our education. Based on these few bad marks, we start telling ourselves that we are no good at maths. We habitually tell ourselves this until the statement becomes fact and that fact becomes a belief. Then we go into our next encounter with maths believing we are no good at maths, do poorly on at it, and take that as evidence to confirm that we are not good at maths.
If I adopt this belief that I am not good at maths early on in my life, then chances are I will make decisions about my future based on the “fact” that I am no good at maths and steer away from careers or projects that involve maths. From my past experiences I now say, “I am no good at maths.” How that limits what is possible for me now is I stay away from opportunities that would require lots of math. To the extent that I am unaware of this limiting belief born of past experiences, the more control it exerts over me.
Make a list of all the things you find yourself habitually saying, I am no good at that. Or I could never do that because…
Now think back to what experiences you’ve had in the past that has led you to adopt that belief. No examine how that belief defines who you are and limits the possibilities available to you.
When our experiences become restricting “truths” they are, as Jack Elias, the noted hypnotherapist states, “no longer models over which we have power as creators; rather they have power over us as our ‘definers’.”
how much do you want what you want?
What are you must desirous of? Put another way, what is it that you want most? Now ask yourself how much do you really want it? Here’s a story about Socrates that may help you clarify how much you want it.
A young man asked Socrates how he could get wisdom.
Socrates replied: “Come with me.” He took the young man to a nearby river and shoved his head under the water. He held it there until the boy struggled for air, then he let him go.
The boy took a moment to compose himself. Socrates then asked the boy: “What did you desire most when your head was underwater?”
“I wanted air,” replied the boy.
Socrates nodded: “When you want wisdom as much as you wanted air when you were immersed in the water, you will receive wisdom.”
In the same way, when you want what you say you want most as much as you want air to breathe, then you will get the thing you desire.
Rock on Socrates.
RIPA
Yeah, we’re fucked. Our civil liberties, if ever we had any, are on the verge of being stripped right from underneath our noses. The Home Office is hell bent on pushing a piece of legislation through that will allow 653 governmental offices to have access to every phone call, text message, email, and website we visit. Agencies like the police, local councils, the Financial Service Authority, the ambulance service, fire authorities and even prison governors.
What’s really insidious about this gig is that these folks will not require the permission of a judge or magistrate to get our information. All they’ll need is permission from a senior police officer or the equivalent of a deputy head at a local authority.
The “government” says it needs this kind of easy access to help fight terrorism. Please! That old chestnut!
They, and I’m using ‘they’ deliberately because there doesn’t seem to be any names associated with the ‘they’ in government who are pushing so hard to strip our liberties away.
The Home Office did a six month consultation to find out if they had any support for this idea. Only a third of the respondents approved. 50 percent of the folks believed that the scheme lacked sufficient protection against the abuse of our personal data that these yahoos would have access to.
This new level of access would fall under the foul Regulation of Investigatory Powers Act (RIPA) or as I call it, the Rest in Peace all of our privacy Act. Communications companies will be forced to keep all of our emails, phone calls, and every web click for a year. And guess who has to pay for all of this? Yes that’s right – Us, to the tune of £2 billion over 10 years.
There are a couple of sane people in government who are opposing this move vocally. Chris Grayling has been quoted as saying “The big danger in all of this is ‘mission creep’. This government keeps on introducing new powers to tackle terrorism and organised crime which end up being used for completely different purposes. We have to stop that from happening.”
To give you an idea of what it would be like to have your information out there in the open, I pilfered someone’s mobile and this is what I found:
Bob: so what have you been up to today?
Sue: well….sending you emails…reading some Keats letters!! No idea how I ended up there…but i did…an unplanned interruption…reading some book about how to teach your dog new tricks…called management and organisational behaviour!!
Bob: keats as in john keats? one of my favorite poets
Sue: it seems if you give your dog – errrr – workforce treats they perform better
Bob: will you be able to teach me some new tricks?
Sue: what do you want to learn?!!
Bob: hmmmm… dangerous question
Sue: mmmm, yes.
Ok there is no Bob and Sue, but you get the point. Our private conversations are at their mercy, whoever they are. You would hope that they would use our private information responsibly, but what guarantees do we have? Who will be watching the watchmen?
involutionary path and evolutionary path
This hit me smack dead between the eyes this morning. It’s a passage from a book by a Russian guy named Gurdjieff, who basically dedicated his life to answering the question: “What is the sense and significance of life on earth and human life in particular?” He developed a school of thought called The Fourth Way, but I won’t go into that just yet. The passage in question that caught my eye was this – and I’m paraphrasing here – life is like a river that forks into two branches. There is the involutionary branch and there is the evolutionary branch. People who take the involutionary branch essentially just spend their whole life meeting the basic requirements of nature. In polite speak they are like cattle and all of their energy is focused on eating, breeding, raising their young and being a good member of the herd. People who take the evolutionary branch embrace life. They are never satisfied with the status quo. They are always pushing the boundaries. Always looking for opportunities to grow. These people, according Gurdjieff, will have something extra in life that other people will never have.
Now the thing is I think there is no end to the amount of people who talk about personal growth, who talk about not living life in the comfort zone. I’ll hold my hand up and say that I too have been guilty of loitering in the comfort zone, which is why this passage probably struck such a cord with me this morning. Although I am a cautious man, I have never been known as someone who doesn’t like pushing the edge, but lately, I have been sitting back in the comfort zone with my feet up, six pack in hand, and the beer belly to show for it. But they say it only takes the right passage at the right time to change the course of your life.
Now where did I put my sword?
stay tuned for claylowe 2.0
I have existed from the morning of the world, and I shall exist until the last star falls from the heavens. Although I have taken the form of Clay Lowe, I am all men, as I am no man – and so, I am a God. – Clay Lowe 2.0
Abandon all hope, ye who enter here…
I’ve been in hermit mode for a week
I’ve been in hermit mode for a week, venturing out of my cave only for the essentials – food, water, and the gym. This time around in the cave, I’ve been studying the nature of power. I’ve spent time with Machiavelli and his famous analysis of statesmanship and power, The Prince
and The 50th Law
In other news, I’ve written a treatment for a screenplay to which I am seeking funding for through the film council. I’ll keep you posted on my progress.
how do i love thee?
From a poet to her Internet lover:
How do I love thee? Let me count the ways. I’ll get my husband to eat horny goat weed and promise him sex in the woods. Once there, I’ll slash his throat and stab him in the chest. Then we can run away together.
That’s what Joanna Hale did to her husband Peter. She was found guilty today by jury.
I know poets are suppose to be passionate, but this is passion on crack.
sex sales and the whole world is buying
A young lady of 15 has written a letter to the local paper. She is lamenting about the rampant sexism in her school. She says she often hears “lads saying how amazing a girl’s behind is or her breasts.” She is quick to add that she is being polite in her description of the boys’ actual words. She wants to know “How can men treat girls as meat?” In her world “It is quite obvious that any dignified girl or woman will never set foot near a guy who is obsessed with her chest and can’t keep his eyes off her behind.”
It is odd that her letter raging against sexism should appear just below a picture of a Vivitar movie camera advert with a young blond girl holding the camera while sitting on the floor in just her underwear. I like to read about the latest gadgets. Isn’t it funny that a magazine that is 100% about gadgets has, on every single cover, a picture of a beautiful young lady in a swimsuit? Well perhaps not funny, but certainly a commentary on the use of sex to sell products to men. We seem to have a switch that regulates our rational thinking and diverts the energy elsewhere at the sight of an attractive woman. The less she is wearing, the more we revert back to being like our simian primate cousins.
Our young lady goes on to ridicule the boys she hears utter childish words like: “I’d tap that.” She goes on to wonder why her school does nothing to promote the fair treatment of women. “I suppose it can’t exactly be taught. Guys just need to grow up,” she concludes.
I would like to tell her that we will grow up, but I know that we won’t. In every man there is an adolescent boy trapped inside and a ranging simian wanting to get out. You need only play fly on the wall to any group of men, regardless of class or status, and let a beautiful young lady walk by, and you will hear the men groan, “man I’d like to tap that.” If they don’t say it with their voice, they will say it with their eyes.
should we stay or should we go now?
The headlines in the British press over the past week have been fixated on President Obama’s upcoming decision on Afghanistan. What should he do – send more troops or look for an honorable way to get out? Perhaps President Obama should turn to the words of a former president – John Quincy Adams – for counsel. J.Q.A. had this to say about American entanglement in foreign affairs: ‘…she goes not abroad, in search of monsters to destroy…She well knows that by once enlisting under other banners than her own, were they even the banners of foreign independence, she would involve herself beyond the power of extrication, in all the wars of interest and intrigue, of individual avarice, envy, and ambition, which assume the colors and usurp the standard of freedom…She might become the dictatress of the world. She would be no longer the ruler of her own spirit….’
is positive thinking undermining us?
I am in the business of helping people help themselves, or at least guiding them through a journey of self-help. One of my bones of contention with the self-help, positive psychology industry has been the dumbing-down, over optimistic approach to achieving the good life.
Barbara Ehrenreich has a new book out that addresses this issue called Bright-Sided: How the Relentless Promotion of Positive Thinking Has Undermined America
I like to think that my approach to the industry is more about challenging people to think for themselves and in doing that, to focus on what they can do and what they do want and not the opposite. And maybe my thinking is left over from the “can do” attitude the army instills in you, or from my mother who beat it into me that “if you want something, go get it. Period!”
news and world events
Re-engaging with the news and reading current affairs has reawakened a part of me that has lain dormant for many years now, probably since I left the army 12 years ago. I think back then, I felt it was my duty as an officer to be keenly aware of world events. So I religiously devoured current news, world events, history and politics.
It wasn’t until I got a job in sales that I drifted away from an active interest in news and world affairs. Most of the positive psychology books discourage paying attention to the news. The news headlines were deemed to negative to be consumed by minds in active pursuit of a positive mental attitude. And so I drifted away from world affairs, politics, and history.
So this week as I submerged myself in news via the press, radio, TV and the Internet, I began to rediscover a lost love. And I fear, like Pandora’s Box, I have let loose a terrible and great evil into my world and I don’t think I can put it back. To paraphrase an old army cadence: I like it. I love it. I want more of it. Make it hurt, drill sergeant, make it hurt!