Shake it out! Moving & Minimizing 1

A huge part of my movement practice has become moving in ways that my body wants to move because it is telling me to move, under the most stressful circumstances like school and sometimes even most non-stimulating circumstances like laying, sitting, or standing meditation.  I want my body to tell me how to heal it, so I give it respect in all that I do for it, constantly learning new things from it, and even others, even animals, even plants. 

One thing I have learned is about shaking the body, fully aware of it, but letting the body sort of do its own thing.  To start, you may focus on shaking at one joint and move to the next beneath it, like the shoulder, the elbow, then the wrist, even the fingers (which may take practice but you can still move them back and forth, slowly or rapidly).  This doesn't need to be so thorough but again, take full awareness, presence and loving energy into the action.  The shoulders hips and spine are so densely tensed for many, so doing this should help alleviate your body to a degree.  Just keep in mind that this is one of many new ways to move your body.  You aren't a shaking animal, but you can shake, as well as dance, climb, crawl, run, hike, and so many other things.  Enjoy this as a new thing to apply to your movement each day, maybe before or after or during other modes.  Get creative.

You have most certainly seen an animal shake its body, either because it was wet or it just has a lot of energy.  It seems there are so many social circumstances that I have been in where my body which I was tuned into, told me one thing to move, while the boredom and stagnation of the people around me told me not to.  We might shake our bodies before a competition because of nerves or when we are dancing, now there even is a name for a specific shaking: twerking.  However, so many will rarely elect to even begin these physical events and opportunities, which is unfortunate because they are fun and often excellent to the body.  I find that humans are special in their ignorance of the body, and I invite you to explore its many secrets.

Love,
Vision,

Strength,

Grant Big Fruit

Free Floo Womb of Hers

Concerns run around faster than I get to the next town.  I pack all my things that are not mine into a car that is also more so, not mine.  Drop it off, scavenge thru, sit and soothe, surf and numb, fast for space, a slower pace.  Driving up to the city, I have left behind gravity.  The claim is community.  But this tree always speaks better than "woke" devotee.  Why do we speak to start?

I pay toll and toll until we will have scheduled space in foreign place, complete with opportunistic haste.  Not alone, not all one, I flow slower and lower, until all our vibes exhaust.  Prius exhaust, fill with gas.  Inhale city gas. exhale mostly me, supposedly grounded mass.  Play on words I wish I could make, but no names in this story, or are there?  I love her, but current is not of her mind, I slowly, lowly bother her with this come-bother computer.  When is love?

Have I told you how epic I feel regardless of how i deal? Ideal or I feel, you feel?  I have no blame, like I said no name, but I do aim to un tame, defame, 'void maim, love dame.

Does she have any idea? 

I can only account for here and now, and pray for yah, leave from ma, give to 'llah.  We can connect and dissect.  All can dissolve this sect with love and sex, to touch her next, flow of hers fruits flowers to fill towers so we do not live in those cursed places away from Her.

"My" strength has been built by Her, can I simply share it with her daughter, ought to feel her love, sought to be made of pure her, purer, purrre.

Love,
Vision,
Strength,
grant Big Fruit to yah

Feel-through

Alone, I think n think

A slippery round rink too close to brink

But I heard somewhere

Delivered with utmost care

Love yourself, feel-through what's there

So I touch; "search" a few places to no avail

Again I exhaust own un-sown seed and my body starts to wail

With wounds open, I eventually find a better way to sail

Now I'm gentler, just - fingertips lightly hail:

MY hairs, smoothly whistled, 

Barely skin bristled,

An electric flow, 

how soft can you go !

how vulnerable did you know ?

how lonely, oh no ?

how anxious to blow ?

how depressed, death no longer a woe ?

how judged and labeled though ?

how connected, 

how unprotected

how rejected without feeling

repressed without dealing

!?!

damn

LET IT FLOW!

feel your sex

feel your heart

feel your body

feel your thoughts

feel your doing

feel your being, 

YOU

Do not disturb . 

Do observe !

Why we struggle to love, most of us don't yet feel how we are. 

Thank You. Thank god Too. 

<G>

What are the things we care about, during chaotic, busy, hectic periods of time?

What are the things we don't and sometimes shouldn't give a damn about, which are sometimes actually very important?  IE What do we sacrifice in the name of other things?

How should we organize or grit through the chaos?

🔺


Love, Vision, Strength
GT

RAW poetry

Seeking...

Take it on, suck it up, push it down

Struggle, she keeps us going down

On her, on all the gods

On your turn, somersaulting odds

Dedication to a conglomeration

Or to a lonely vocation

Fell off the line

Really circles... to refine

Leaking...

Life, pursuits, happy death

Reconciled with fairy meth

Opened eyes do disguise

Closed eyes trust for sunrise

Your time is done

While you read, it was fun

eeking...

A RAW MOMENT('S/S). NOTICE.

I don't give a fuck about editing this (Though I did read it over a few times and still edit a tiny bit) :) I will be thoughtful as I can and slowly write this, but I seriously want to put this out there and am never solely writing for myself.  As I build myself up through the chaos I sometimes too eagerly sign up for, I can create more thoughtful writing for y'all.  But take this from a pained heart, no matter how you take it, you can't take me apart.

Also, I think sometimes we just want to write, or talk, or express through movement or stillness how we are just at those moments.  There is writing that evolves, but raw expression is as good as it can be in those moments which you have in the short time people have their attention on it.  I think we should produce something of good yet spontaneous quality everyday, but still have those bigger projects in mind for the long run too. You pace it all too..

________________________________________________________________________________________

It's hard to keep track of everything, let alone to be aware of it when it comes up in action or your mind..

It makes it difficult too to deal with it when we do recognize it, while there are many other stressors out there. 

I find difficulty in navigating my thoughts when I do not take very thoughtful courses in school or do not meditate or deal with things on the surface level or miss friends to engage with deeply.

And on top, there's chaos !?!

As a teacher, or as a real hardass. You.. sometimes decide which.

I find myself getting spooked by chaos too often.  Chaos as in too much shit to handle at once, too many feelings and thoughts and actions and outside interactions or phenomena fuckin' with yo' flow.  I'm talking enough chaos where it's hard to find a way to express how it occurs and move on or the time or space to. But sometimes we can take it, let it seep in, and still make it to the next thing.

Most times though, we might agree it ferments into something much stickier, trickier, and stinkier.  This either erupts like a shaken cola or exhausts us like those extended and much delayed journeys we may have to mundane, yet expecting-something-of-us places.

Chaos hopefully gets you to consider your priorities at least.  If you haven't, you should in a coming moment 

:) 

My first priorities are to move, to soothe, to ground, to serve, to groove.  These things are in circles with my natural tendencies. They are also important to have balanced in order to do that which comes afterwards in priority level… which is to work, to search, to help others to also search. These things involve more effort, but ultimately don't need to be done - I could simply exist, if for a span of time.  But I believe I must dedicate as much of my waking time as my abilities allow to this second set of activities.

This first set of things is very difficult to develop, but when focused on, they build the capacity to do the second set of things.  But if the second set of things is focused on too much, then both sets of things tend to perform more poorly. 

I move, soothe, and ground by moving my body both vigorously and smoothly, at various speeds, various pace, various ranges, various intentions and various disciplines.  The soothing is essentially returning myself to that inner peace or a state of being sufficient, and the grounding is returning to strength, really just returning to action with intention, or being prepared to react with intention.  I recently told a great friend that my religion was to move some way, some how, everyday.  This has been true in so many ways, and although simple, its simplicity makes it applicable to every being, every creature out there.  For many animals it is all they "know", though those which are not free to roam may not experience that unfortunately.. but wait.. aren't human animals in that category as well as some of their typical diet?  (SEE THE AWFUL CHAIR, THE AWFUL FENCE, THE AWFUL CAGE)

The groove.. Is what it is, however it comes about, let it go or flow, it really takes some practice within whatever you want to become groovy within. I felt it especially this summer, but in a weird way when I did the GORUCK endurance challenges, I would be numb to pain or previous nuisances for  maybe a week or two after the events.  I felt quite on top of my game, but I felt insensitive too, which I was wary of, and especially while doing risky things like biking to commute.  This insensitivity carried some wariness to my sexual energy or intentions too, I felt like I was not able to express myself in the ways I wanted, to be sensitive to other people's pains and pleasures.    However, the groove can be immensely harmonious and awesome, not necessarily like that experience.  I started to become more sensitive and mindful later that summer, when I meditated and allowed more space for stillness.  That space and allowance of your attention to wander through your bodily sensations is vital to balance with the challenges you give your body.  These things balanced, I felt satisfied with all my progress, no matter how big or small.  School started to wear that vibe and balance away quickly though.  The interactions with people who were less aware of their bodies than I and less oriented towards bodily-being really quickly set me more on their level of being - more concerned with material things, with grades, with statuses, with social medias.  As I'm writing this, I would say I've come further from that annoying suck, though the stress still sucks, I hope for the flow to come again soon :>

But the plus you should realize I got to enjoy with this surge of people at the start of school is that I can serve them in ways they couldn't previously perceive!  Just by enjoying your body's movements and energies - easy example is dancing a bit or a lot as you interact - you can boost the mood of almost any social encounter.   I also try to share my ideas and insights when there are good opportunities to do so, or smile often as they are open to a smile. 

Work involves time, I don't care what physics equations say!  But it also involves a goal, sets of actions to achieve that goal, and yourself doing those "right actions" to make it all happen.  It is a grind, but often takes more time or more effort or more thought or a more "chill" approach to get it done well.  I'm working towards flawless handstand, then after that flawless handstand pushups, then one armed handstands, then so many other things.. I'm also working on school, and all the things of that first set I described. Work is a part of improvement, but it is not necessary for happiness and sufficient being.  Enjoy life without work as a focal point, I dare you.

The searching is to find that work.  But don't simply work or search SO you can work.  Work out of an intention that you REALIZE.  Realize things by exploring, not by researching, not by cherrypicking, not by googling, not by scratching the surface of things.  Explore by immersion, explore from afar, explore in all kinds of scenarios and change your perspective of all the things you have in your sights. This involves lots of time too, but its nothing you should rush..  I have lots I still have to explore, and they involve my feelings on the military, doing service, how I'm developing and might need to develop better, risks inherent in the paths I choose, the communit(ies)y I wish to establish, the beautiful creatures in my life now..  So much.  But I can't simply choose right now what to do for the rest of my life. I can only choose this moment what to do for this moment and to prepare for patterns of future moments.  

Most comfortable tone:

I'm fucking pissed at my intolerance to recent experiences in meeting people and hanging out with them, and inspiring people to get moving in a fun, expressive, balanced way.. But I'm a fucking bastard and haven't tried as hard in the direct ways I know I should.. Like emailing that UU church for starting a class, or getting more people to come dance in the park with me.. but I know, I KNOW that they will come, if slowly, I will be the ubermensch, the leader, the Moses to a revolution of movement when I put my goddamn discipline into it!!! It is for good.  To express the masculine and feminine. To balance through environment and context.  The current college environment is polarized like much of the US, to shitty phone attachment, goddamn spoonfed and regurgitated conceptions of social justice, happiness, sex and suc-cess.  Man.  Woman, y'all just gotta recognized how you're being played, then fight back.  I'll show ya :)

Simply put:

I'm having a weird social anxiety, social media checking, expecting kinda feel with a whopping side of misunderstanding of my life goals..  I want to clarify it, clarify my interests... all very masculine things, powerful things to instate.  However, I feel like it's hard for me to break through that over-polarized liberal wall of sulking as a man and waiting for the good to come rather than going out and getting it.  I will.  School hasn't started yet, and my work is just getting started. I know what I have to do.

Like ya

Some way, some day, somebody.. don't like ya
We go away, we daydream, sadly

We show virtue with no curfew,
yet those that appreciate it are few

They do not give us the strength to stand
Instead, making masturbation till bland

Constant contact, distractions from fact
When facts flow, find truth, change it, never exact

I am seen: strong, white, educated, blue eyes
Nevertheless, a disguise

Frustration, tension, reaching for it
Crevices, Devices, suffices, so lit

The "inaction in action" of the Gita
This wisdom must be why they don't like ya

Going forward

Stephen King purportedly said that you should write only 2 hours for every 5 hours you read in a day.  How much do we absorb and spew out right away?  Experience-wise?  Reading-wise?  Conversation-wise?  At least reflect on it first, unless habitually you can accurately perceive in the context of your peers and environment that, you are able to react with tip-of-the-tongue expression immediately.

I'm looking to read alot more before I express, but I can tell on some things, I do have the practical wisdom and experience enough to explain things that others cannot get from any book or feel from my words or someone else's words.  I wish to inspire action nonetheless, because of that simple reality - you must live the suggestion, not merely read it or ponder it. 

So, from here on, unless I really delve into a certain topic in class and feel comfortable explaining it, I can probably leave some of the more strictly intellectual, abstract, or genuinely creative expression out for later when I can delve into the absorption for more of my time.  My schedule seems to quell creation, and so does my habitually busy lifestyle/tendency to fill my life with more business.

I have plenty of article/post ideas which can be posted but truly wouldn't be of sufficient quality to send out yet.  No post is complete anyways, but there is a level I must achieve that is worth sharing for the time my readers spend, and hopefully there is a level of engagement I can also achieve with the readers.  My next task is to learn and express at a rate which motivates my readers and myself back and forth towards flowing in our todos and being in our best states while in any environments.

One way I will express so as to work on the act of expressing more efficiently is through video blogging, that is, youtube.  Below is my first video, simply an overview, and not too concise looking at it's length, so that is one thing I will work on too.  I encourage all of you to comment/critique/specific praise/recommend etc. on my posts and on this video as well as other people's posts/videos as opposed to solely doing whatever is equatable to "liking" any work you see out there.  So dive in, please, and share what you might have created as well! 

https://youtu.be/kuZzbw1QLZs

Love & Strength,
Grant 

Friendships

I look to friends like they could be closer,
For I know little of what it is to be closer.
Divisions, however, are all I've known.

We are crops competing,
Weeds that are choking.
Are we actually fully grown?

I believe the apparent progression to perfect, though never perfect, is something which we oft find troubling, and allow regressing.  For friendships particularly I have felt this, recently coming to recognize it when I had been most detached from its emotional and intuitive pressures.  These pressures have arisen from certain things which either I found troubling in my interactions towards others, as well as their interactions towards me.  Interactions include the understandings explicit and implicit in their or my language, and other ways of expression, like actions, in what they or I do.  I take a large responsibility for how I express myself, because I hold myself to peaceful and genuinely beneficent motives that seek to reasonably translate these very motives from my mind to the world, so I will often not settle my movement towards a common understanding if I have made mediocre discourse, or if my actions are misinterpreted.  This holds true for how one engages with me, insofar as I will see negative expressions as an indication of my failures, indeed, but ever the more enthusiastic they make me, because it gives me a new duty towards self-improvement and understanding.  Movement towards those ends begins upon awareness of such criticism.  The enthusiasm I receive from critique is synonymous to the pleasures a committed athlete or performer has when they work at length and/or intensity on a specific thing or set of things which others had illustrated they were lacking grace in.  Additionally, when such an achievement of spiritual growth is made, your confidence in discourse is all the stronger, your faith in friends flowers.

Faith becomes important in context to the rarity and difficulties of friendship.  Friendship in society is rare past the virtue of having shared goals and spaces, but can be recognized as potential in many places.  For as I mentioned, it is a failure on either side to not open to a friend, even to a potential friend.  This combined with the real possibility to form characteristically unlikely, unconventional friends.  They may not be driven to all physical commitment, nor may you, but to treat them like a gentle creature of affection, one which can only give so much attention in reciprocation to you, we grow ourselves.  Anything which is resultant from their affections towards us is delightful and may expand our creative awareness for good ways and feelings outwards (and inwards!) still.  (This particular set of understanding of mine is largely credited to R.W. Emerson's own essay "Friendship")

However this unrequited love spreads, friendship seems to have more apparently (though it seems duly apparent above to me) pragmatic components as well, which keep our lives' work satisfied and concordant with those friendships which compliment our deepest individual passions.  It first and foremost motivates us often from state of complacency relative to prosperous souls around us, into a mysterious, spontaneous realm of curious possibility.  Think to the bold and wandering feelings with friends, liberty and time to do things unconcerned with the crude judgement of advisers!  From the perseverance of these adventures, we do indeed swiftly pace our passions akin to eternal star-dance - acting, burning like they will never cease.  But we see too often they do come down to ashes and stardust...

Friendships which can last past the periods of waxing and waning furies of passions contain seeking, yet satisfaction, between the friends or between them and the world.  To build upon its pragmatic complexities, these friends are not limited to, and not quite necessitating, but might need sharing of the followong: of criticisms, of goals, of enjoyed or uncontrolled practices, of feelings, of emotions, of ideas, of creations.  These things may become quenched or seem boring at times, but there is always a facet of Nature to bring people together if each looks closely enough!

I hope to my friends, family, and to strangers as well, that we can see this shared Nature and Mind within and without, for there is such grand possibility with open arms and hands held high.

I also encourage all into looking past the physical components of friendship and understand the componenets of the Minda for an easeful translation from a compassionate awareness of humans as potential friends, to a similar awareness towards pragmatic approaches in our lives to opportunities and difficulties too.

A note:  Passions is actually a word coming from Aristotle and the Greeks essentially meaning "suffering", and so we often use it in a positive context, and even with such a concept as compassion, but I believe it should be understood more as an overpowering feeling, often uncontrollable but to different degrees, good or bad.

Your Friend,
Grant

Motivations

This morning went rather poorly.  But for however I am here, motivated to share the following thoughts with you, I am grateful for this opportunity.

I do not absolutely believe I can be motivated by my own self, yet I often seem to be.  It is difficult to recognize whether I have purely and solely pushed myself into motion or whether I simply follow the influences and forces acting upon myself.  However, I still do absolutely believe in the potential for any and every human to become what we might call self-reliant, independent - these not meaning total self-reliance, but mentally wired to be so motivating of every stimulus, still depending on necessary external sustenance - and importantly, all-around aware.  But is the credit for motivation to ourselves or to the experiences and ideas with which we are nourished with? I find myself to enjoy friends' company, yet be motivated to enjoy it only to the extent to which I can also enjoy my own - in nature's infinite adversity and blessings.  There is a balance I must strike to be truly getting the most of my learning and the most of my doing.

 We can all realize these truths within ourselves, because they are relational in the same way mathematics -  most clearly, geometry - is.  Any influence from another person can be the same within oneself if put into context: does this external action of another reflected on myself mean that I might use more or less of this in my own actions?

For instance, let's look at a physical relation.  A female training for ninja warrior competitions (involving athletic abilities of immense body-weight strength, grip strength, agility, etc.) sees a male competitor who is excellent on upper body focused obstacles and poorly coordinated on balance obstacles, and can observe what training or even techniques themselves are required or not as important to develop for themselves.  This female has a better sense of balance without much training because she has a lower center of mass (not true to every case, just this one, and this comparison) but she lacks the grip strength, not the upper body strength in comparison to this competitor, because they can do the same number of pullups, but she cannot hang with certain grips, whereas he can.  One might attribute her failure to upper body strength, but this is more complex than that, involving an understanding of not just performance, but of training in every sense.  Therefore, this female competitor should focus on those specific aspects to suit the direct failures - her grip strength and perhaps anything else mentally or physically involved in the obstacles. There is a weakest link(s) in every chain of actions.

In that example, a common misunderstanding of the failure/success can arise, but the solution is specific and measurable, and will show in relation to their competitions on the same course.  The same holds true for relations of people's character, but in those cases, it is not as easily measurable because of very dynamic situations and the impacts are usually not physical, but mental, social, emotional and spiritual.  People can observe their habits in relation to others however, but we must be wary of worthy and unworthy comparisons.  The complexity of a person's character also mustn't be overlooked, and regardless of one decision on someone's character, it could always sway the other way if approached again.  This calls for non-attachment to expecting a certain outcome all the time - fear or disgust - and that no human judgement is ever certain, even within the physical realm.

However, within the physical realm, there is a level of pragmatism we can have, and that is with regards to nature and its universal laws.  What is surprisingly most educating (in terms of awareness) to people is their mental isolation in nature.

Nature gives us a direct sense of necessary and unnecessary.  Read Jean-Jacques Rousseau's "Discourse on the Origin of Inequality" and you will be led through how humans are naturally good but soon establish false needs which separate us from our initial tendency to be compassionate towards one another.  But is virtue to be compassionate, always?  Our world seems to put compassion to great use, with all of our human-caused issues.

Personally, I desire to shape myself into as compassionate a being as I can, because I believe that my only motivation lies without myself.  My motivation is in tending to the world, however it calls.  More often do I find myself an observer than a doer, and more often a lover than a warrior.  But without the use of the destruction, there is no room for more creation. Finding a polar equivalency to both doing and not doing, to extreme maxes and minimums, there is harmony with nature and the social world to be found. The harmony lies in the allowing and flowing of the world around oneself, and doing all one can to change it for whatever outcome is most balanced, but at the same time, to never resist the forces (which are bigger than ourselves) at play.  It is in this way of being observant and patient for the world to shift, that we seem to motivate ourselves best - if we try to resist nature, we are often left battered and less motivated to act as strongly or weakly, if at all, again.  We can reasonably prepare for these things, and the adversity is what motivates us to start with, but I believe we must allow motivation to arise even from our blessings if we are to spread more compassion within a society of false needs.  Motivation to let go of our blessings as everyone's, not with ourselves, but with all, our provider, nature.  I see no property demarcations started by nature, just gill & lungs, water & land, and where we might find our providence, and our fellows.

Stay faithful, stay reasonable,

Grant

Faith

Time for a very focused sharing of my thoughts and practices recently.  I only share this intimacy with an audience of this nature because I believe all people can relate in some way.  My privacy is boundless: so long as I do not express it in words, mien or actions, it will be mine. I still own everything else in my mind, this is a snapshot of how it is, and how it may stay.  A point on the circle of my mind, we should say, soon another orbit or changing circumference may find my mind, but now, it is happy at its point, moving, yet defined for ever so shortly in its journey.

I have been happy, yet sad.  There is no time like social time.  There is also no time spent quite like my confident training time (sometimes I have trained half-heartedly or not shown up when I have told myself I would).  But terrible is the time when I am truly alone: in my mind, and with the first and most honest teacher, nature.  Terrible, like awesome, like awful!  The mind's choice, its "connotation" can be either good, bad or both, but what these words point out is the MAGNITUDE. The mind is magnificient in its powers.  I give myself a slap on the wrist now when I do something mindlessly, like shift through the applications on my smart phone for sake of occupying.. something.. perhaps time?  But every moment I am aware, I am aware of so many things.. and this is the terrible, awful, awesome part: that I am the one to translate, to filter this great amount of stimulus and impulse from the world around into how it shapes myself.  We should rest from this awareness, or it might consume oneself! Or we should irrigate it properly:  into the best parts of ourselves, and even when such vastness enters the worst parts - the doubting, mindless, allowing negativity - we should let it wash it all away into new covering, a healed wound or a repainted sign of our minds, signalling for a new idea to come hither, be brave.  

However we deal with it, there is no way like the way you have chosen, as some destinations are on far opposing poles of one's circumnavigation. Do not go forth halfheartedly.  With that, we should also see that many destinations, or creative opportunities, perhaps newly synthesized through the world or the mind, lay closeby our paths at all times.  Discipline gets us along this "path", spontaneity guides us, making a new "path".  

Constantly I see circles, yet tell myself I must stay focused on something. Why must I?  So I find ways to serve, to do, to occupy, but ultimately I must confront this overwhelmingly bright light of truth - avoiding my instinct to scramble into dark recesses of comfort.  It's colder there, and that will send me shivering, asking why, thrown into the light again.  This truth is on every circle of the sphere.  

All must.  

It is so difficult, walking in and out of nature, attached with the in and out of work-worlds.  Where is your mind busy, either frantically or freely flowing, and where is it stuck, either lazily or confusedly? 

I have faith! I have it in all around, which overwhelmingly abounds!  Even in my most exhausted state, I have it.  I don't understand, and cannot imagine ever being able to know it all, but of the little which I do, I feel in control, and at the same time prepared for impact with the unknown - adapting, changing naturally so that I cannot ever worry, I am in tune with the sages of the Universe.  

[This was in many ways inspired while reading Emerson's "Nature" part of which is hyperlinked above, and long after his essay "Circles", and inspired in so many other ways by my own life.  I assure you all I'll get through Emerson and be onto many other greats soon.  Meanwhile, I'm reading 18th century philosophy and a history in ethical, social and political philosophy and thought as well.  I encourage the pursuit of that which you can know, but clearly don't and the acceptance of that which you will never have time or resources to know either.  You are always capable expanding in awareness and consequently of giving love well-received for your fellow humans.]

In faith,

Grant

Considerations, to act, during the storm - for the reader #1

Estimated Processing: 15 minutes

I am starting with this post, towards a series of posts on how you, the reader, can most simply make yourself more self-reliant. "During the storm" refers to doing this now, as opposed to later, because our life might just get busier, and it will help us during our current troubles.

As discussed in my most recent post, "Why I train, Why I be! & just one guide in such reflection", there is no universal consensus on how we should be doing things or for what ethical/other reasons.  There is no universal consensus in anything really, consider the ill, or maybe ignorant, or maybe both, but not necessarily, who think they actually are or believe in the flying spaghetti monster and not human. So my aim is to provide you with a base to allow for you to build upon with your own beliefs.  My approval has no weight on what you actually do, but if it matters to you, so long as you are seeking to help others in non-imposing and unrequited (asking for nothing in return, no allegiance to anything physically or idealogically either) fashion and not infringe on others' rights to do the same, then I believe you are set up for doing the right direction - not necessarily doing well, or at all, for the intention is part of it, you may still harm others, you may still not do much at all because you still must follow through.  Take everyone's advice with room for interpretation and to actually test it in your life, because you can always risk implementing it inappropriately, or have no need for it at all.

Everyone can benefit some from reflection, and we all do it.  Even if you think you've never reflected, you have when you were learning new things.  You had to decide which is better to do during the process, or not do. You may have thought about it after the fact.  You may not reflect much anymore, responding quickly and emotionally to things that happen to you, letting lots of negative feelings fester.  Maybe letting positive ones too.  But if we simply react the way we first learned to do things, and don't bother to consider more deeply, we risk missing out on doing better on things which aren't such "common sense" to us (what even is common sense, what is common knowledge if there is no universal consensus on anything, is it just between most people in a certain societal context???). That is like taking a test for 2nd level biology when you've only taken 1st level biology and you decide to go by how you first feel about the answers.  Some things require that deeper processing. The question is, what things require that? Does the amount of water you use/don't use when you get ready for your day one of those things to require deeper processing?  It could if you are aware of the fact that we Americans use lots of water each day and there's only so much water in the world.  But in that example, once we figure out how much we use or not, we can then keep doing that.  That is habit.  But what habits should we have right now, and what ones should we change or leave as they are, for the best effect on our lives and others' lives?

There are many questions to ask.  And many things to choose to process or not, because processing these all alone takes much energy.  But think if we all thought a bit more about these things, and the same important ecological and social things, maybe we could logically conclude alot more and get closer to some kind of universal consensus, leading to some better sense of peace amongst eachother!

Now, let's do some simple reflecting, where you can choose what to process or not, as well as apply it to yourself right away.  To begin, I will simply ask you how you are changing your life for the better. What do you seek to do in this life? What are your motivations?  Why are they any good at motivating you?

How do you plan on doing these things?

Are you struggling with doing these things?  Why?

These questions are so simple but essential if you want to make the most out of your human time. But sometimes we need to focus on just a moment at a time, an hour, a day.

You can reflect on any time, time period, or context you desire.  Change these variables, and you can change the reflection outcomes which you come to.

Right now, why are you reading this?  How does it benefit you?  What else could you be doing that could/could not benefit you?  Now ask that a little more often, especially if you feel like you need to be doing more things that are for your benefit.

Finally, if you answered to yourself that you are struggling, I suggest you try this exercise which I used to do when feeling down, depressed or just lonely while I was in High School and while at my University.  Start by getting a blank piece of paper and a pen, then write all the negative thoughts and things you could possibly come up with that pertain to yourself at that moment.

Tear it up.

Then, write all the positive things you could think about your life.

You will tear this positive list up, only after you write what you should do next - what you can actually start doing right now, not even what you can do tomorrow, but if it is something that might only avail the opportunity for a future time, then make note on your calendar, schedule or whatever system you utilize - to work on making yourself better.  We can call this the "realistic" or "productive" list. Dwelling on the negative will get you no where as the positive may not either, but it will certainly motivate you more as you go along.

You are only able to do things right now, you can plan to do things later, but when later is now, you have the choice to do those things which you planned.  They won't get done in the future unless you make the decisions that you can make right now and keep making them.  Simple, but remember not to stress about the future unnecessarily.  Be aware, not stressed.

Start with some momentum.  Some enthusiasm can go a long way!

Enthusiastically,
Grant

Why I train, why I be! & just one guide in such reflection

Finally! A day to blog.

Spartan Race has their little #whyirace which is awesome, and hopefully gets people to ask their why beyond the medals, mud, or even just the "fun" experience on the mountain, but that's not where my why has started.  I've inflected by feeling on my reasons and motivations even before explicitly describing them.  When I applied to the United States Naval Academy during my junior year of High School, I learned to give rise to those feelings via effective communication, or whatever my lack of communicating that was.  After most of my interviews finished, I talked to a Naval Academy grad who said I need a "story".  That "story" may have been developed better, but it doesn't matter to me as much as how I feel my identity in my memory's story (see Locke on identity as composing of one's explicit memory).  Today as I apply to American Ninja Warrior's College Team edition, I see the importance of "selling" oneself - the artificially created importance to "success".  The Dalai Lama has preached we should be more compassionate instead of desiring or striving for material success.  And many people who might be called gurus emphasize the move to simplicity of commitments and material possessions - see one of my favorite trainers, Mark Divine - so that one may serve each commitment wholeheartedly and for good reason and to leave the world a better place.

So I try to steer myself away from extrinsic reasons and feel around for the intrinsic ones.. A meditation requiring focus, simplicity, and few distractions.  Among some of the things I've felt as good reasons for training, racing, involving myself in the community (particularly of Obstacle Course Racing or OCR, but also in classical Yoga pursuit - read the Yoga Sutras and familiarize yourself with the eight limbs of it if you think it's another stretching routine - and in fitness, in life) are that I can help other people, inspire people to move as they see me move, keep myself moving, healthy, disciplined, and also be more conditioned to save lives.  I plan to serve in the military and the Peace Corps or as a humanitarian for a while, and so this training is integral to that.  But even if I did not have those goals, I would still believe it is right to be training, to be capable of aiding yourself and others.  If you do not have the ability to carry someone out of a burning building, they will stay in the burning building, and more help will not always come.  Self-reliance and self-discipline do not simply revolve around the self if the self is situated in a social justice environment...

That is our natural environment.  A social atmosphere.  Altruism is actually an evolutionary theory now, and I am happy to say I took a course in Social Evolution under Robert Trivers, who proposed that theory!  So let us enjoy helping others by situating ourselves to be self-reliant and in that sense, most effectively interdependent! These whys might be put into mathematical formula one day, but no formula will ever give us the feelings which we experience with a specific, yet ever changing activity - we will be more uncertain about all of time's collection in activities when we focus on a moment of an activity in time and vice versa. These whys are special to us for that reason: we cannot actually encapsulate them and reproduce them, or truly compare them, for every moment is born anew.

These whys may not be described effectively by language.  I think J.S. Mill and even Emerson might say that these whys for their intrinsic good should be pursued for how they make one feel without any need for words or quantification of pleasure (more so Emerson than Mill maybe), but it is nice to explain (rather, attempt to) the preparation, pursuit, the reward and the good done in what one does.  A phronimos (essentially possessor of practical wisdom) would do things because they would understand by their good nature that these things benefit others and themselves:

  In many discussions, the word "habit" is attached to the Ethics as though it were the answer to a multiple-choice question on a philosophy achievement test. Hobbes' Leviathan? Self-preservation.Descartes' Meditations? Mind-body problem. Aristotle's Ethics? Habit. A faculty seminar I attended a few years ago was mired in the opinion that Aristotle thinks the good life is one of mindless routine. More recently, I heard a lecture in which some very good things were said about Aristotle's discussion of choice, yet the speaker still criticized him for praising habit when so much that is important in life depends on openness and spontaneity. Can it really be that Aristotle thought life is lived best when thinking and choosing are eliminated? (From the Internet Encyclopedia of Philosophy)

These whys can't always be quantified, explained, communicated, or even reflected on to begin with. So don't worry too much about if you cannot tell right away what it is you are doing or why or how long you should be doing it.  But if you feel rather than seek,  you should learn from nature how to walk and how to act.

Back to simplicity, the reasons why may not readily present themselves because of the distractions about.  But if you really meditate on these ways, letting go of the material distractions about you, then you will start to "get it".

Start letting go. Start feeling, not why or what or when or where, but it.  THE supports of nature itself, the daos.

Simply,
Grant

http://www.goodwill.org/

Here's a deeper talk with Mark Divine on the feeling aspect I've discussed, and on "manhood" but clearly can be felt either as a man or woman or human hood.  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8DfVyY8R2BI

Gotta do it raw

There's something about everyone's first that is incredibly overtaking.  Firsts being in regards to literally anything! I was just reading over some of my impressions and reflections of college and its many "sins" not too shortly after I started, and realized that a lot of the things that I desire to do now are things I really didn't care much about because I didn't experience them at all before, nor did I have any friends who told me that it was important to try those things. Yet, not trying those new experiences with a raw nakedness and unknowingness leaves you naked and unknowing for when you actually may try them later, or they may happen to you later in a way which you do not enjoy.

So to the virgins of drugs, sex, even exercise, forms of music, etc., you are to decide whether you wish to try it now or later, when the odds may not be in your favor. Though to stay a virgin to them also protects you from the desire of wanting more later, whereas not to stay one can go many directions.  Ultimately, I believe you should find a good intrinsic reason to do them, and not to do them just to do them.

Having done some things, I can say I enjoyed them, but naturally, I want more of them, I want to have them in the most pure form, the most enjoyable form. Some form that actually positively changes how I look forward, more than backward.   I want a lasting unity in spirit, something that despite physical time and space separations, I can feel like it is a part of my identity. It depends on how you value these things, but across the board, it is shown that people who can choose delayed over instant gratification tend to do better in a number of aspects in their lives.  Sometimes you get wrapped up in the moment, and that is good, but sometimes you should also realize that that snowball in that moment may not end well for you or others in the future.

I have not found the love of my life, or the time of my life, but I do have moments of love and ecstasy.  I could string those moments together, isolated from the times of trials and tribulations. However nice that may sound, it is not what I really need or can actually enjoy.  Because as physically temporary as those raw, absolute, connected moments are, they are not nearly as sweet without the pain.

...The scraping of my sensitive, soaking heart, and tearing of it's tissues to leave stringy sinews across varied venues...

I am raw, my soul has saw - not yet all. But it has been in awe.

Without that rawness created by the pain, I don't think I could truly feel as connected as I do in those moments - because that connection is healing all of my open, raw being.

It takes a delicate, yet controlled balance to feel this, but it is not quite something you can understand through language or demonstration.
You just gotta do it raw.

"..Faith comes in moments; our vice is habitual" - "The Over-Soul", Ralph Waldo Emerson

Why have I been losing faith? A positive direction to the question & my Ultimate aim

So I haven't been too reflective lately, in fact others have been reflecting a lot for me - thanks to a long call with my mother and then my stepfather, brother and some talks with good friends, who have seen in a different subjective perspective (still subjective to their relations with me, but closer to being objective from how I see things & you can never be perfectly objective as a human observer), and this all has helped me very much in standing strong with my intuitive faith.  I did journal the other day on "Why have  I been losing faith?", and it didn't help me too much in the respect that I didn't cheer up, although I did "look up" and "open up" - I was reminded I can find many interesting perspectives and observations about the natural world (something I thank Emerson for fueling, especially reading his intricate but echoing poems often).  Essentially, I am grateful for the support around me, and I want to be able to provide the same for others since it has helped me so much.  I want to provide windows to issues, so people can consider which ones to look out of when solving their problems. 

In other news, I feel ready to do, and less inclined to talk of it.  I wish to experience more so as to then be able to reflect on after (or not reflect at all, just enjoy it as is), to really have something tangible to understand.  

Ways I have been connecting my self through experience:

Getting slightly more serious about schoolwork - the interest in bio is rather, eh, but I can kindle it.

Going to rock climbing team practices regularly 2x2 hour practices a week, but only two weeks left :(

I feel challenged on a totally different level at these, which I crave.  On partner exercises, I will always ask for harder and it become enjoyable when you immerse yourself in the social aspect of it - my partner has the power to push me further than I could myself, literally, we throw eachothers' legs down to the floor and we have to keep them off the floor, like in a leg lift. 

Going to the Yoga and Reiki club one time a week for peace and control. 

Still doing OCR (obstacle course racing ) practices virtually every weekday morning, some days I have actually not seen anyone else at practice and gone back to sleep because I have fallen out of my strict bedtime ritual from last year - never not in bed later than 2300 to get up by 0630.  This year, I can be up as late as 0130 and sometimes later..

Calling and not being afraid of talking to my family and sometimes strangers, even if it goes no where special, just being able to loosen up from my introverted self and actually do things and connect to people that I can sometimes doubt my being able to engage in. YOU ARE NOT ALONE. YOU ARE LOVED, AND CAN LOVE.

Ideal Ways for me to add in connecting myself:

I would like to connect more with OCR friends, ordinary people who wish to better themselves through physical and mental training, deeper philosophy conversations with people (my stepdad is great for that), writing more creative things like poems for the Huntington poetry club I go to now, and also definitely reading more philosophy and non fiction.. and even fiction (I miss my Deltora Quest and Ranger's Apprentice reading in middle school and earlier.)

Ultimately you may ask, what am I interested in all of these things for?  Well, I wish to enter the life of the coach, the teacher, but also that of the lifetime student.  I will always seek new knowledge, but I wish to help others establish a baseline, or a set of experiences that will illustrate to them the beauty and strength they can find in life.  I wish to do this in as big a way as I can, and in as micro a way I can, every day, or one day, but find how I can do this every way possible - I have been blessed with a taste of good, and worked hard to find the good I feel now, and I wish to find a way to allow others to do the same.  This may be vague, but my questions will only specify, and they are quite lengthy for this post now.  I will leave this there.

For now, ask yourself, what have I done or sought or felt today or all of those, that made or could have made a difference in others' lives or even just temporary feelings?  And ask yourself, how temporary really is a mood, when it carries actions taken that are influenced by those moods?  

One last thing, don't forget to smile and choose to do and feel good!

Very Respectfully and Sincerely,

Grant Tamutus

With each form, a question

I hope at this point reading my blog you can follow my reflections a little more closely, and that you may also reflect while reading, which I'm sure is explicitly done in most of my readers' minds.

I bring this up because I don't want to give you a story which you have no use for.  My intention is rather to offer you a telling of yet another pattern that reflects the rest of the Universe and is but one pattern which the Universe chose to form in the instances of my telling.  It is with this knowledge which I invite you to reflect on, to allow to sit in your mind and meditate upon, or to simply enjoy on face value, but preferably to get you to something which is readily transferable to how you reflect and act.

Also, know the a difference as Locke says in An Essay Concerning Human Understanding, between those who blindly accept truths and those who actually investigate truths when they are given to them.. Now they may seem evident to you, like your belief in God - for example, Jesus as the begotten Son of God.  But why do we believe these things which others have been told, who tell us, but have not actually seen that which they are talking about? Now I will not be here to sway your beliefs with evidence of erased history which is quite interestingly left out from what you are told in Sunday School, but just understand that 1) What any principle describes for you is by no means a description of every instance, that is, you cannot prove it, but you can reject it, 2) By totally accepting any principle you leave out desire to learn principles which surround it and may be in more cases applicable or probable to be true, that is, you accept ignorance to some degree and finally 3) What even is your understanding of a term which you have not experienced to be able to describe but have second-handedly heard described? that is, if someone told you what "x" is, but their explanation was dependent on their experience of it, then their explanation of it may not be what you would experience of it, and it can be accepted even when you did not have the experience, but you won't truly understand "x" until you actually experience "x".

"Truth has been my only aim; and wherever that has appeared to lead, my thoughts have impartially followed, without minding whether the footsteps of any other lay that way or not." - Book 1, Chapter 3 of the Essay.

Be critical, it's good for you and others.  Don't be "minding".  It's for the truth.

My religion (part 2/2 on My "dealings" with feelings)

I was raised and confirmed Lutheran Christian, and I did enjoy my experience within the church.  But I never really felt like I could feel a relationship between myself and God.  I just couldn't force feed myself love I didn't feel like was there for me. I believe in Love, a transcendent Love, but I could not feel it just in myself.  The teachings and parables of the Bible deeply intrigued me, and I have my Sunday School teachers and my family to thank for raising me with such a benevolent and loving community, but it was only the love of the people I could put a finger on at first.  When I realized the Love Jesus had was for the children of God, I then realized that's the Love I should focus on spreading.

Later after reading Ralph Waldo Emerson, I found many of my implicit ideas of Love manifest explicit in his works, viz. that of nature's offerings.  Nature gives us absolutely everything we could ever need to live.  It also is bound together by some kind of "Universal glue" as you might call it, the laws of nature, and all nature is is a constant balance of different forms from the same basic essence.  Nature gives us so much to look at, yet reflects the same idea everywhere: balance.

I go to the Unitarian Universalist Churches ( http://www.uua.org/beliefs/what-we-believe/principles ) as of recently because of my own interest, also my stepfather the philosophy professor goes, also Emerson was a Unitarian minister back in the day until he rebelled to write and philosophize some more, also it's all freaking inclusive!  I could not think of a community more in line with my values than one which allows all.  I don't think all NEED to go there to practice, I simply believe all should realize we are at base made of the same, worth the same to an earthquake's "judgement", and need to stop dividing ourselves based off of stupid differences in ideology or form ( http://www.msnbc.com/msnbc-quick-cuts/watch/bernie-sanders-gets-personal-on-religion-629654595662 )

You might wonder how I worship.  I worship every day, every moment, and the subject of my worship is exactly that human element which connects us all, it is not just a human element either - it connects us to the very dirt on our soles, and the "Sols" of the sky.  Let us be one with that.  It's comforting and simple to me, that's all I need honestly.

Sure we won't take down all the walls and distinctions that divide us as humans, but we'd damn do better if we tried.  If you understand that people can't simply generate ideas, that they can only form ideas from what has been presented to them by their experiences, then understand that the morally unlucky by accident of birth can't simply generate the ideas and therefore belief to carry out action and become habit so that they'd simply go "rags to riches", B1TCH35, you're missing the point.  It frustrates me that people may think that others are absolutely responsible for their own success in a world which deprives many others of the opportunities and the proper experiences which allow them to have success. You may be lucky enough to believe otherwise, but that doesn't mean you can tell me exactly what everyone else actually knows explictly and can act on.  So I merely believe we must do whatever it is to take down these distinctions and this unwillingness to take care of others when they have no one who took care of them homeless or starving or without love.

Personally, I have found it hard sometimes to see love in certain places.  And I'm not saying to be unrealistic.  There are threats in this world, and I simply see action on them as a balance requited for the future good of humanity.  Do good, and take care of the bad.  We need to learn the right way to evaluate those together, so we don't have all these interpretations and all these directions we fight and keep away the potential for harmony.  I honestly don't even know though if half the people in my ethics class however, are intending on contemplating that for more than a 30 minute homework assignment.  If we don't live this everyday, what is this?  It's fucking sad.  How do you challenge those people to actually invest and care, when they don't even know themselves or know their cares or know how to care?

I believe in love, Love, luv, but only that which connects, not that which allows for separation, and believe in your love for your material purposes, what good is it actually to the whole?  Is it connecting at the expense of separation?  Maybe for now, that's the best we can do.

Just realize pure love is love for all.

My "drugs" (1/2 on My "dealings" with feelings)

Usual: to train not to "workout"

I never identified my drug without

Cause you don't think it's a drug that amounts

Check my endorphins, or get the fuck out

Hold on as I seek a way to clout

All this emotional I want to shout

Music is my second way to free

My mind from my personal insanity

Personal, it's only about what you see

A high that you can get for free

But will it really set you free

Or just put you on your knees? 

What is Usual? What follows?

Exercise is clearly like a drug to me, and I take it quite seriously because I need it to balance my energy levels and in effect many other aspects of my daily life.  I guess my habit started in High School, when I would add on an extra training session of my own after Cross Country practice in the fall, after Wrestling practice in the Winter and after spring track practice and usually before lacrosse practice in the spring.  I felt a need to do it.  My sleep was pretty skewed during high school, but after a tiring school day sometimes running on 4-5 hours of sleep, I would look forward to "waking up" from the "pump" of a highly physical practice.  

So this winter semester taking a course in Intro to Philosophy of Religion at Rutgers, I fell out of my discipline for 2 a days and it has bled into this semester.  I know my psyche directly suffers from it, because I know how much strength I retain even without consistently training, which is a slap in the face to me - I can only imagine how much better I'd be if I was consistent!!!  As my wrestling coach once told our team "you have 3 options when you walk in that [wrestling room] door: get better, stay the same, or get worse."  He then directly equated staying the same with getting worse, because relative to your opponents, they are getting better, so you would be worse still relative to them. 

It makes it more frustrating when I got sick for the second time, last Tuesday/Wednesday, so training fell out and was substituted with resting.  I realize I start listening to more music.  Less writing and desire to writing actually, as I've not touched my reflective evening journal for the past few days - my willpower falls.  The music serves as a number, or rather a dumber, something that just takes my time and energy away from thinking, but doesn't help me produce any of my own feelings, reflections, powers.  I can't quite let it flow.  I have danced today, which helped me get the will to write this finally.  Slowly getting back what I need..

You may be like yeah whatever, or yeah you still can do crazy calisthenics shit (which anyone can too with the time put in and right path followed), but I can't flow without this, I need a way to grow, to spread, or I'm basically.. dead 

Coming back

I really wanted to post more this spring break, but the circumstances in which I had drafted some posts changed, with me being pulled away from publishing mid-post.

I don't like to leave something halfway.  No one does.  But life is so busy, so dynamic, so hectic and just chaotic at times.  We often don't know how to control ourselves let alone the wide world.

I believe thoughts sometimes need time to turn around in our head.  Not everything can be done at once.  But it's a constant busyness which can help keep us purposed towards some good.

But these things we want to do will stay in our minds.  They don't just erode.  They are planted, and if we cultivate them, little by little, they will grow.  Relationships, builds, projects, the grandest systems we wish to implement for a better, more efficient and enjoyable life down to the very basic simple ideas.

I saw Inception the other day with my half awake mother (wonder what she was dreaming), and it was really thought provoking watching it for a second time since it was released in 2010 (damn, human, time flies).  The idea of a foreign or created idea being the most infectious and least defendable thing in a human mind as brought up from the very start of the movie, is an extremely profound notion.  It takes a full understanding for it to manifest its ultimate power, but to get there and create, and pass on new ideas is just an awesome capability that I don't think we can argue against.  Passing them on may be the hard part, or rather is it the building up of the ideas into something understandable that's hardest?

We will come back to these thoughts, ideas, things and people.  There's time and space. But even if we never fully understand what we wanted to in the beginning, we can try to pass these ideas on before we leave this Earth. Hope it will continue to grow and flow.  And feel happy with the work we started.

I don't know when I will come back to you, but I will.  In this life, I will still feel the emptiness of unanswered questions which drive me towards good.  The pile of books to read, texts left without texts back, and tasks left in limbo.  After this life, I will come back someway.  If not physically, oh I'll find a way for my dust to make you sneeze. If not mentally, oh I'll find a way to make you think of what I left behind.  If you question my impact, I've just impacted you.  And that's  how I will come back.

Grant
ing you good thoughts