Almost 40 years old. Done the Vision Quest. Been on the Mindfulness Meditation Retreat. Lived alone in a cabin in the woods Thoreau-like for months on end. Travelled Gypsy-like across the United States. Played in a Rock-n-Roll band. Written a couple of books that have been published.

I have chopped the wood and carried the water.


And now I have been a parent for nearly 2 years. What I can honestly convey to you--with all of my Heart--is that there is nothing that compares in depth and profundity to being a parent. Of course you will freak out, experiencing all sorts of anxiety and psychological tremors. But most important of all your Heart will warm up to such a degree that the coldest chill in all of Eternity will not faze you.

It is inexplicable and irreplacable.
The Mystics can't touch it...
...far too ordinary... and way too obvious.
A Mother...
A Father...
 

Please vote in the comments section. A simple "yes' or 'no' will do. Or you can write something at greater length if you feel so inclined. Thanks!


It is really a very simple question. Is the world getting better? How is humanity faring in its status as dominant species on the Planet? Are we headed in the right direction?

I have always wondered about this and I tend to vacillate back and forth from glimmers of hope to outright disgust and despair. Yesterday I drove more than 200 miles south from where I live to the Metro Detroit area in order to pick up some musical equipment I had won on E-bay. And let me tell you, I couldn't get out of that area fast enough!! There was nothing I wanted more than to return to the quiet of the Northern Michigan Forest (though that is slowly giving way to the cities and suburbs approaching from the south, growing liike a mold).

Yes, I know, it is all people. I know that my dear brother and sisters out there are struggling and I am supposed to be giving them the benefit of the doubt. But damn if I don't have my preferences!!  ; o ) And truth be told one of my preferences is certainly not for a metropolis and all that comes with it (from the center and the hub to the periphery and the outer rim---i.e., city center and suburb, downtown and the endless series of strip malls that reach out like tentacles gobbling up all the Nature in sight, and entombing that Nature in concrete).

And yet.... and yet I say.... I do feel that there is progress being made on some fronts. The world is getting better and worse. It appears to me that the world is a never-ending bifurcation and there is a perpetual split in opposing directions. Progress and regress. Evolution and devolution. Forward and backward.

I do wonder whay you think.... feel.... sense... believe. Please do vote. I want to get a sense of what others here at Zaadz (or those  just passing through) pick up when they place their attention on the Pulse of the World. What vibe do you get? Is it all groovy and cool? Or are you pickiing up arrhythmias and discordant patterns (helter-skelter) when you tune into the Great Swell that is Humanity spanning the Globe like an evolutionary Tsunami---leaving no stone unturned and nothing as it was before?



(June 26th Addendum)

I wonder if the world exists in some sort of state of balance or equilibrium such that the positive/good is counterbalanced by the negative/bad. It seems to me that for many, many people the world is not gettting better, and that no one can argue against this fact. Yet, for others the world seems to be a state of increasing positivity. So how might one reconcile these facts that seem to contradict one another? What if reconciliation of the contradiction is in an appreciation of the polarity that the world exists is in a state of? What if every upswing is paid for by a downswing elsewhere? Would that mean we cannot say that the world is improving en masse or in toto? Would that mean that a recognition of improvment and betterment has to come with a conciliatory sense that this positivity is going to be offset somewhere in the Gaian System by negativity? That Enlightenment and the Dark Ages are fundamentally One? 

It's kind of harrowing to begin questioning your vocation like this, but, alas, here I am doing just that. Here I am, someone who fancies himself an authour questioning the power of words to transform---to make an impact, to shift awareness, to alter perspectives.

Maybe it's just me, but for all the words I have been exposed to over the years I feel no fundamental transformation of consciousness. Yes, I have been transformed in both profound and subtle ways by experiences.... by relationships.... but certainly not by words. 

Even when people have spoken to me words that seemed quite injurious to me at the time have not had their impact upon me because of their own nature, but more so because of the nature of the sentiment or emotion behind and beneath the word. It's as if the word is but a vessel for the real power. It is as if the word is but a messenger, and not itself a message. The message, the real message--the power of transformation and transmission--can be carried and contained in words. But dare say I, as the authour of numerous works, that words are powerless and impotent without and apart from the consciousness which infuses words with any and all semblances of power and potency which they might ever appear to have.

Yes, words are truly empty until we pour Heart and Soul into them. And it is that Heart and Soul we drink, never the words.

 

Wordless transmissions. Here's the Zen. This is it.

No requirement for extended discourses in multiple syntaxes. Lord knows I am so over that. 1,200 pages of Integral. 40 pages of definitions and othger assorted explanations of appropriate terminology and their fitting context. Blech!!

It is as if there is something obscured by the (over) reliance of one prattling on and on---such as the further clarifications of this, that, and the other thing, the reductions ad absurdum, the blahdy, blah, blah, blah.

Chalk it up to being a parent. Yes, parent. I just don't have time for that shit anymore (says he who has authoured a near 600 page tome himself!!)!

I honestly don't have precious hours to waste in semantics and hyper-conceptualiuzation. Which is why I am issuing a call for a more potent form of transmission of awareness. Now! Encapsulated in as few words as possible, even to the point of being sealed up in glances, unpacked in postures, and delivered in the gently swaying spruce boughs summarizing the wordless nature of it all.

Ssshhhhhhhhhh....... you'll miss it otherwise.

I haven't heard from Steve since I responded to his letter. This is the longest period of time we have not communicated since we have known each other. That's more than 25 years!! I am assuming he didn't like what I had to say. Guess honesty and truthfulness don't have as big a place in some people's lives as they might otherwise confess they do. ______________________________________________________________ That is the irony in this, isn't it? Steve begged me to look at myself and be more honest with 'where I was at' relative to 'who I was.' So that is what I did. Yet the outcome is obviously other than what my friend had supposed it would be (or at least this is what I am assuming due to his refusal to answer my repeated phone-calls). I guess Steve didn't know who I was--or who I had become. I guess I did change. I guess I am different. I look at my priorities now compared to what they once used to be and I can notice the difference. I have changed. My values have changed. Life has granted me Fatherhood status and I am not willing to deny that gift. Maybe Steve wants me to continue along the same trajectory that he and I once were on. Maybe that happens to us in life. Maybe friends and family do 'lose touch with us' when the Universe calls us to new obligations. ________________________________________________________________ The big insight came for me when I realized that Steve was not my responsibility. It is his life. It is his choice. If he wants to go out in flames then who am I to deny him that. I can't determine whether or not he does or doesn't take his life. I can't talk him out of suicide is he is bound and determined to do so. You can only throw someone a life-vest so many times. It is up to them to grab it. The other person's response-ability is to hang on. I can't pull Steve to shore if he is not willing to hang on. _________________________________________________________________ Still, Steve was my best-friend for over 25 years (I just noticed I wrote WAS!). I know something has happened that has broken the bond we once had. It is not the same anymore. In that mauc Steve was right. I guess he was just assuming I was being 'fake' and 'inauthentic' because things had 'changed between us.' So he felt need to call me on that. He did call me on that. I responded. I am still responding. Everyday I respond in light of the choices I am making to be a response-able Father. That is my primary duty. If I shirk that obligation in trade for others I know I would never be able to forgive myself for that (besides, Uriah is one awesome cat and anyone blessed to be his Dad would be a fool to not want to be wholly present to love and support him). __________________________________________________________ Wow! It just hit me. I hadn't seen this until just now. Steve... are you jealous?? Are you upset because I have been blessed with Fatherhood? because I have a son? because I understand more than ever what real love and connectedness are? What if you.... Steve... are down on life because you are not sharing in this experience with me? What if you really don't 'get it?' What if it is not me, Steve? What if it is you? What if you are the one with the dishonesty and the inauthenticity? What if there are dreams and desires in you that you are not 'giving birth'--metaphorically speaking? What if you are coming down on me--and have been--because you have been fighting those voices inside yourself? What if you don't need suicide Steve.... but, instead, a birthing of dreams you have too long denies? I mean, you can't be alone and hate the so-called 'world' forever can you? What are you fighting Steve? Really?

I have had almost 3 weeks to consider my friend Steve's stark and unrelenting honesty. It took me aback at first. I adopted Steve's position relative to what he perceived as being my 'inauthenticity' since becoming a father. It was nearly 2 weeks of me examining my motives and recent decisions over the past 12 to 18 months. I melded with Steve's perspective. And in doing so I hated my self---- I hated life!

That's when it dawned on. Steve was totally right. I was being inauthentic. I was lying to myself. I was being less than perfectly honest with people close to me. But it was not with who Steve thought it was. I was, instead, and perhaps to Steve's dismay, being inauthentic in relationship to him.

___________________________________________________

Steve assumed--as did I--that we were still comrades fighting the same old battles against the world. It was Steve and I against conventionality. It was Steve and I refusing to conform to conventional wisdom. It was Steve and I out on the limb. It was Steve and I distancing ourselves from those whom we assumed 'just didn't get it.' It was always Steve and I as long as I can remember.

Then I became a Father. Then, more properly put, I became responsible for caring for another being in ways unimaginable to me before. That's where Steve and I diverged.

__________________________________________________

I was the one to try and maintain the frienship. Even with all of Steve's spewing forth about suicide and ranting against the world, I still attempted to connect with him. I still tried to empathize with him. Even to the point of denying myself the realization of what I now know.

Like I have already mentioned, I wrestled with what Steve had shared with me in his letter about me 'giving in' and becoming increasingly 'inauthentic' since engaging parenthood. I think part of me assumed that Steve was right. I respected Steve's opinion maybe too much. Now I know that.

I know that because in adopting Steve's perspective as my own I was feeling less and less enamoured with the prospects of living. I felt how much 'hatred' and 'spite' there was in Steve's view. I wore those clothes Steve. I put on the glasses you told me to look through and the world became a dark and foreboding place indeed!

___________________________________________________

Something Steve doesn't understand is that I don't have the luxury (if you want to call it that) to enagage philosophically in the ways I once did. My existence is far more practical now---and I ought to mention, far more meaningful. I have to constantly forego the tendency within me to want to disengage from the world around me by entering into philosophical rhetoric about this, that, and the other thing. I can't piss and moan about the world nearly as much as Steve can because I have the duty of caring for a little boy who looks to me for support, guidance, love, strength, wisdom, understanding, instruction, and nurturing.

Steve cannot possibly understand that. He has no reference point. His experiential base (though he will never admit this as far as I can tell) is such that he cannot possibly empathize with me. He hasn't tasted the fruits of parenthood and the kind of care and compassion it elicits. Which is why his words ring shallow--if not empty--to me now.

In Steve's letter there was far more than what I shared last time. I consciously skimmed over mentioning some of the parts of Steve's letter that had to do with me. Some of it struck way too close to home.

I've always appreciated Steve's radical honesty (sometimes I even think the guy is incapable of lying completely, to the point where some of his relationships have clearly suffered---uhm, can you say, 'social graces,' Steve?). ;o  )  Anyway, Steve and I have always shared a desire for honesty and transparency in human relationships. It was sensed as lacking by both of us, so we swore to always be honest with each other. No matter what. Not sparing thought of a single feeling. Never worring to offend the other. Just be honest. 

Steve, in my opinion has taken this to a level far beyond what I have. I still go along and promise to do things that I don't really want to do when someone asks me---'Oh yeah, sure.... I would be happy to.' I still lie. I am still caught up in a web of relationships where I feel forced to go along with someone else's agenda in order to maintain peace.... in order to maintain a relationship. 

This is what Steve busted my balls for. He sees my complicity in lying for social reasons as enmeshing me in relationships that I would not otherwise freely choose to be in. He as much as called me a 'slave' in his letter. He attributed some of his recent disaffection with this-world to me. He said I had let him down. Me! That he always felt like he had at least one comrade in this-world... and that I was that one.... but that in the past year and a half (pretty much since my son Uriah's conception) I have begun exhibiting tendencies and doing things that he asks me to consider are possibly against my Nature.

_________________________________________________________

"You know I love you Deej. We have been through so much shit together. Most people will never understand what we have meant to one another. I know. And because I know I have to tell you you are disappointing me. Yes, I know you have a son now. That's cool. But is having a son any reason to compromise and totally throw your soul away just so you can fit into some image of what others expect of you as a parent?

"See, you think I have lost a little fire for living. You are questioning me Deej. But what about you? Do you ever wonder what I see in you? Do you ever wonder why I don't want to come around to a Birthday Party for Uriah? Do you really ever ask me? Or do you just assume you already know the answer: that I am some big Dick who doesn't care?

"I do care Deej. I probably care more than most. That's a lareg part of my problem. I actually give a shit about something more than 'society' and 'social norms' and 'fitting in' and 'keeping up with the Joneses' and 'status' and all of the games people play to try and 'one-up' their neighbors. And that caring is why I am going to tell you why I didn't show up to Uriah's Birthday Party.

"1. You don't get along with the other-side of Uriah's family (his mother's side, I should add). And if you do it is all an act.

"You remember those talks we have had Deej? I do. I know how you really feel. I know what you have told me. Those are not the kind of people you would ever choose to hang out with if you had an option of doing so. I do have an option, and as your friend I refuse to spend time with people who I clearly cannot share a single meaningful word with. They are loud, obnoxious, and ill-mannered. And you know it. But you just grin and bear it. For who? For Uriah? Is that how you teach him Deej.... to be inauthentic like that? Are you teaching him to cover over his real feelings? Teaching him to lie to himself and everyone around him about how he really feels about certain people and situations? Are you modelling that to your son?

___________________________________________________________

Can I just say, 'Ouch!' here, before I continue with more of Steve's letter? 

___________________________________________________________

"I am not asking you to take parenting advice from me Deej. You know better of me than that. All I am asking you is to think about the subtle little ways in which you have given your soul away in the last year and a half in order to maintain an illusion of peace and stability for Uriah.

"Get that? It's not real Deej!! You don't really want to spend time with certain people. You don't. Shit I don't. Shit even people amongst that family can't stand to be around each other!! So why force it? Why make an illusion of togetherness when there is not the spirit of togetherness present? Why do it? Why put on the show? Why manufacture the lie?

____________________________________________________________

This is where some real soul-searching begins for me.

Steve sent me a letter in the mail. I don't think I have ever received a letter from Steve before (well, apart from the 2 years I was in the United States Navy, when we shared letters and phone-calls on a somewhat consistent basis). To say I was shocked to receive a letter from Steve would be an understatement. I immediately feared the worst. Before I even opened up the letter to see what was in it I called Steve's house.

He answered. 'Whew!' I thought. His voice even sounded like he was in a good mood.

'What's up Deej?'

'I just got your letter in the mail.'

'Did you read it?'

'Hell no! As soon as I saw who it was from I called your house to see if you were still...

'Aw come on Deej. Give me more credit than that!!'

'Well, can you blame me? How the hell was I supposed to know. I immediately assumed the worst. I figured it was your last will and testament.'

'You should know me better than that. I told you I wasn't going to enact any of the cliches of suicide. I am way too much of an egotist for that. When I go it is going to be 'special?'


___________________________________________________________

Our conversation lightened up from that point on. It was the first in some time that I remember joking with Steve, He commented on the fact that he felt relieved and lighter as he had come to some realizations because of what I had been sharing on my blog at Zaadz. He even apologized for putting me in such a tough position as a friend. He went so far as to say he wouldn't want to be in my shoes---that if I were coming to him with the same stuff he wouldn't know quite how to deal with his best-friend telling him he had no desire to stick around any longer.

'Just don't take it personally Deej,' he told me. 'When this all goes down I want you to know I value and appreciate our friendship no matter what. I won't judge you for what you do or don't say. Some of that shit you have been writing is tough-stuff, and I can see why you would think I was manipulating you emotionally by intimating my own imminent exit. This shit ain't easy. I still don't quite have it worked out yet how I am going to pull this off..... so why should I expect you to know what to say to me. Again, I don't expect you to beg and plead and argue with me..... and if you do.... then I don't expect you not too either!'

______________________________________________________________

Steve's letter (excerpted with his permission) contains a more explicit rationale for why he is set on taking the route he says he is as committed to---just as committed as the Dalai Lama is committed to his vow of celibacy (good one Steve!).

'I want people to question the supposed superiority of the human race. This notion that we are privileged and blessed above all other creatures has always seemed questionable at best, and a total fabrication at worst. I just have never seen myself as above and beyond the fray; like the way most humans have come to exercise their right to demand the near-infinite numbers of killings for the sake of not just their needs.... but their desires. That is not a way of life that I buy into! And never will!

"I don't think I should ask untold numbers of other creatures to die just so that I might live... and live more abundantly. It seems a crock to me. I mean, why should I not be a sacrifice for other creatures Deej? Why should we all not be a sacrifice for the sake of another creature's abundance and health? Why should I not be a meal for the starving Wolf or the near-extinct Jaguar? Why? Wouldn't it be better to give myself for the sake of diversity' (Steve's italics)? Doesn't that make more moral and ethical sense to you: that if I am a proponent of a diverse world then I as a human-being will choose to exit the World-Stage so that other creatures are not extinguished through my daily need to consume.... through my daily need to desire.... through my daily need to impose my will on the natural world around me.

"Think about it Deej. The world is not experiencing a shortage of human-beings.... yet there is and are shortages (ongoing extinctions and eliminations for centuries now) of other creatures that make this-world the diverse playground of the Gods that it has been, was, and always has the potential to be. It is just that humans are usurping that diversity and homogenizing the Planet. That is what Globalization is: Globalization is the Homogenization of a once diverse diorama.

"It is the collapse of possibility at the ontological level of being Deej. Less diverse ontologies Dave.... not more.... that's what Globalization offers. Just mark my words."

___________________________________________________ 

I saw Steve last Saturday evening for what may be our last Saturday get-together for awhile. I told him I had some gigs coming up and my weekends would be full. He seemed to accept it, though he did look away, and divert his gaze, suggesting to me that there may have been some feelings of rejection on his part.

I also invited Steve to Uriah's 1st birthday party. I wish he could just let himself go. He has spent so much time on the outside looking in--always the cool observer--that something as simple as involving himself in the celebration of a child's 1st year on Earth is painful. He told me as much. He told me as much in his body language. He started squirming in his seat right away. It was like he was already looking for an excuse (even though I know he has nothing to do, nowhere to go). It is so lame. I ended up telling him as much. I guess it was my turn to rant.

When I went off I didn't think about Steve or his so-called tenuous state of existence. He likes to make people think he is on the edge... some sort of precipice... and if you dare offend him (though he likes to offend everyone else) you will be responsible for pushing him over the edge. In all honesty Steve--if you read this--you know I think it is a pretty heady Power-Trip you get on when you do that. You like to think you are not at all emotional in your tenuous relationship with existence, but you force others to tread lightly for fear of guilt and shame in saying something that 'pushes you off your little perch' and into the abyss.

Honestly, I think it is cheap to do that to people. Here is my decades-long Buddy taking a stance of indifference and dis-illusionment with the world, and yet subtly--as an undercurrent, in the background--there is this vibe I feel around him that puts me on edge. I feel like I have to tread lightly and censor myself for fear of the repercussions that Steve himself suggests are imminent.

That sucks! Steven and I have always prided ourselves on being honest with each other. So here you have it Steve (a continuation from Saturday's rant).


THE LOADED GUN

I'd like to think I am above and beyond handing someone hell-bent on suicide a loaded weapon. And yet, at some point in time I get sick of the talk (which often means the subtle manipulations of others that goes along with the suicide pose). "Just do it then!" I feel like saying. Shit or get off the pot! I mean, if you were really that serious about what you say you are serious about then why would you go on talking about it everytime the conversation comes around to you. Is it your way of controlling the mood of our relationship? Is it your way of maintaining the power to determine the course and contours of our exchanges? And if it is then quit being such a God-damned Narcissus!

I am sorry.... but I thought a friendship was supposed to be an exchange.... a communion.... a process of reciprocity---of giving and receiving.

I told Steve I was personally offended that he made no effort to spend time with Uriah. It was as if he could give a shit that he was alive or not. I mean we are talking friends here!! I have and know superficial acquaintances who have spent more time with Uriah than a best friend! What the fuck is that??

Ohhh.... and about that birthday party... I am sorry it can't be all about you Steve.

Steve is not the kind of guy who is going to play up his disaffection with life for sympathy from others. He is pretty stoic emotionally. It's not like he is trying to get people to beg him to continue along a course he is no longer interested in. When he is done he is done. And if you think you are going to go to Steve and convince him to live for all the 'right reasons' you are wasting your breath. Don't bother.

This is how Steve has put it to me:

'The last thing I want people to think of me is that I am some sort of emotional basketcase. I didn't just have a bad day, Deej, and then get all emotionally unbalanced to the point of becoming suicidal. I didn't just forget to take my meds man!! Heck, I have meditated on the nature ... the meaning... the significance of Death as long as I can remember. I know I am going to die. I know this body-mind is not made for Eternity. I understand it is all going to fade away---with a whimper or a shout. The question for me is how do I want to go out.

Do I want to let cancer take me unsuspectingly? Do I wait for the Bus to hit me as I absent-mindedly cross the street one day? Do I wait for a terrorist attack with Dick Cheney out on a hunting trip? Tell me Deej... how do you want to die: by your hand or by someone else's... or this vague thing we call 'Fate'?"

I know Steve has thought about Death and Dying alot. We both did for many years. We would discuss the best and worst ways to Die. It as if we were Stars and had chosen to become Supernovas: to go out with a bang! To make a statement in dying. And to, above all, make it anything but an accident.

__________________________________________________________________

Steve's rant to me last Saturday also included something about why he was contemplating his own impending voluntary exit from the World-Stage. I remember him saying something about us (humanity, I took him as meaning) needing to make a distinction between disaffection with Life as a whole and disaffection with Culture/Civilization---i.e., the human-generated constructs we all live within, as, and through.

I wish I could remember exactly what he said, as it was truly inspired at the time. I'll try to recapitulate his thoughts as best I can. And Steve, I am sorry if I mess up---you'll just have to join Zaadz and speak for yourself!!  ; o )

'Deej, do you think everyone that chooses the voluntary exit does so because they are 'life-haters?' Do you really think that acts of suicide are statements against Life inthe form of Planets and Solar Systems and Stars and Flowers and Rivers and Streams? Do you really suppose that someone is thinking.... 'Fuck you Yellowstone! You suck and I'll be glad to never see your face again?'

That would be silly, wouldn't it Deej? That would be stupid, right?

'Well... yeah.... of course.'

'Yet what is the rhetoric against voluntary exits from the world? Isn't it that everyone who chooses that path must hate Life in all its forms? Isn't the rhetoric such that it makes it sound or seem like anyone who take the path of the voluntary exit must be a player-hater? That they hate or despise Life, period? That they don't want to exist, at all, right?'

'Yeah... I totally get what you are saying here. That there needs to be a distinction made between existence-as-such and existence-within-systems.'

'Well, if you want to put it like that, yes, sure. I would put it like this, though: that suicide is not a blasphemy against God and Life and Spirit and Source and Suchness. People don't get fed up with the Buddha and Christ!! They are choosing to exit the realms of Mara and the Anti-Christ Deej!!' 

'It's like they are trying to unplug from the Matrix.'

'Leave it to you to bring in the pop-culture reference! But yeah.... it is not like those taking the path of the voluntary exit are trying to not to exist period. They are oftentimes just making a statement to Civilization and Culture that as Primordial Beings they will not exist under certain conditions.... or, as you put it.... they cannot exist-within-certain-systems.'

'It's kind of like ecology, isn't it?'

'What do you mean?'

'We know that every creature requires the prior existence of a certain habitat (ecology) in order to not just survive.... but to thrive. That apart from that habitat they cannot exist.'

'Yeah Deej.... that's it.... exactly! You do still get it! Sweet, parenthood has not completely deluded you!'

____________________________________________________________________

That's my friend Steve. I wish everyone could be so lucky as to know a pain-in-the-ass like him!!!    ; o )   Love ya Steve!!