river of being

Some of us stop to smell the roses and some of us say, isn't god amazing, that he made roses that smell so good? I think there is such a huge, un-raftable rift between those who can appreciate that a rose with any other name is still a fuckin' rose, and those who think that a rose is a gift from god.

It is with great displeasure that I have to live in a world that seems like nothing less then a monotheistic orgy of self-induced pain and suffering, stemming from a compilation of books (ironically nicknamed "The good book") that induces a fairly pure neurotic inner horror. I am sometimes amazingly irritated at the fact that I have been born into this world, am actually traveling through my life, this bardo plane of pure natural beauty, and I have to contend with so many others out there like me, who are passing through this glistening pure bardo plane of unbelievable sensory delights, yet find some sort of grasping terror in their hearts at the thought of the nothing, the oblivion, as a friend put it recently, that sets us free, into the most amazing mystery of all. And in the terror they reach out and grasp this pure fiction, God the benevolent omnipotent micromanaging motherfucking anal retentive CEO of the galaxy. What a small way to live, is my opinion. And yes, I have my moments of terror as well, as I gaze into the darkness that is the resting place of our minds (egos?) after this path we follow has come to its inevitable deadend, down the yellow brick road, to find the fat little man behind the curtain. Inexplicably, it turns out he is us, we are him. None of your pastors, teachers, or political leaders talk about that much, or know what that means.

It seems that we who do not give up our ghosts and allow ourselves to be possessed by the holy spirit of the bible, who the gnostic christians rightly believed was satan himself, the dark side of this cosmic endeavor, a rutting Pan-like underlord who personifies the beastly yang concept, the oozing serpent of our dark soul, we who do not allow ourselves to be possessed by this beast, are struggling to find a way out of here, like a jilted joker or a thankful thief. We see the Destroyer as the Divider, a meaningful and important concept that has had enough sway in this world already, we've had enough. I believe what I am trying to say here is basically sacrilegious, no doubt a word coined by the religious, just as pro-life is coined by those who insist on the biological primacy of human birth, meanwhile not understanding what life means at all, in all likelihood. The cosmic understanding of life is deep deep deep. Is this rock I am holding alive? Is this daisy, this frog, these dust motes in the sun, is the love in my heart a living thing, are my thoughts a living part of nature? The pro-lifers idea of life is limited, the pro-choicer is trying to keep the options open, keep the Divider at bay while we desperately go through our lives looking for some meager happiness, clutching to the shreds of love left to us by the Destroyer culture, those hell bent on the pure destruction of everything biological, a form of life found lacking by monotheists.

What is lacking about life, lust, love, and lunacy? What is bad about this, good about that? Who decides? Mostly, we do, via consensus, and of course, this has its place and is a structure formulated by tribes to maintain a degree of safety and contentment with this amalgamation of skin, bone, thought, and feelings we call our lives. Here on earth, we are blessed with a beautiful green planet that is neverending in its wonder and beauty, pain and suffering. It is an example of the plethora of life, existence, samsara, maya, the great dream.

We dream each-other and communicate through our hearts. To be possessed by the holy spirit is, perhaps, a death sentence for our very souls, as we give them up to a maniacal power, a skulking and terrible death force. Maybe our basic endeavor is to give it all up, give up all of our ideas, our definitions, all the ties that bind, before we can see what really truly is, now, here, alive. Why do we need a religion, a career, a political affiliation, box of who we think we are? Don't all these limits, these ideas, these screens we see ourselves through, do nothing but bind us to them in a way that destroys our freedom to live as a spirit being, both matter and energy, light and dark; to evolve, to transcend, and become rooted in the universe?

The options seem obvious when one realizes the truth of our own personal drama. The Tarot, the I-ching, our DNA, the mytho-poetical quantum collective unconscious all show us the truth, the journey we all share on this circular planet, in this spiral galaxy. Yet, we try to pretend one thing or another is who we are, rather then becoming the river of being that we are.