manhood and initiation

Initiation is the departure from the world of women. It is often a fear-filled experience - one intended to shock boys out of the world of their childhood. There is a wound. There is the gift of knowledge. There is self-awareness.

Modern man has lost the ritual, and now there's talk about a world of boys. Marie-Louise von Franz talked about it in Puer Aeternus. She describes the archetype of the child god, who wants to fly to the sun - a modern-day Icarus. After reading the book, I began to see the phenomenon everywhere.

I just reread A Separate Peace. On the back cover reviewers talk about the "evil" in the book. I think that's a load of bull. It's a story about a bunch of boys - blind, animalistic boys. It's only through a destructive act that they find their bearings in the world of men. It's a book about how everyone grows up - some through the war, some through the machinations and mistakes of boys. In essence, to grow up means to take responsibility for our actions - it means to know our mortality. In fact, the book ends beautifully as Gene takes responsibility for his actions, and Finny accepts and forgives his friend. The death should not bother us, because these are two boys that have become men. And the world of men is a world of risk and death. Gene and Finny's world is no different from the shores of Normandy. We should be happy for two boys who completed their path to manhood.

In a world where we lack initiation, we are often induced to wound ourselves to break the bonds of our childhood. The real problem is that we seem to get stuck in this masochistic reality. We must take the necessary steps to healing. The wound is perfect and natural; it is a step towards manhood. The question of healing is different though. When we have wounded ourselves, we are often doing it unconsciously, though deliberately. It is this unconsciousness that prevents healing, because healing only comes through awareness.

to meditation

I'm off to meditation for a while, and won't be blogging.

a latenight birthday blog

IF we are everything we have been and everything we will be, if the notion of time is misguided, then my world makes sense. If you can feel the silence and yearning in a moment, because you are not yet fully what you know yourself to be, then you will understand me. If the goal of my life becomes to find that stillness - that silence - that knows itself beyond time, then I feel right.

I am worlds - a dichotomy of this physical body and the motion within. This motion shapes the body like wind the dunes. There is a surging within me. I see far, and I want to see farther. I want to see the ultimate motion - the revolving of worlds. I step; you step. And when we forget that this is a dance we are learning, there is deep magic in our rhythm. When we lose ourselves to the motion, nothing remains the same. Pushes and pulls do not encompass it. It's the silence of held hands in the park. This is the rhythm I'm yearning for. If you don't know it, how will you ever?

I'm a man like any other, and yet... and yet the static nature of my being grips me. My breath shortens. Can I break these bonds? No, I'm wrong. These are not bonds. They are my freedom, my creation, my wisdom and love. The true action finished long before the act is complete. The motions, the thoughts, the impulse, and the intent defined what you see. Every moment we're swaying, like bamboo in the breeze. Just as empty. Who is the man who sees beyond, who understands the whole, whose intent echoes through eternity?

If you tell me Jesus was a God placed into the flesh - like a fish made magically to survive on land, I do not understand. If you tell me Jesus did not fear, did not sin, did not stray, I do not know him. But if you tell me he was a man fragile, empty, prideful, full of the longing that I feel, then something rings true. If he was subtle and human, then I have something to grab onto. But if you present him as a steep rock face - insurmountable, unknowable, a mystery incarnate AND you deny the same to me, then what am I? And what was he? And how could we ever know each other?

a heaviness

A heaviness settles on me. This is a long journey - life. Short and long. A tour guide in the Chinese garden quoted five blessings today: health, wealth, long life, love of virtue, and a happy ending. The happy ending surprised me. I think a part of me (though results oriented) did not want to outwardly accept an end goal as a good. I think about moving along the road of life, and so often I hear that we must love the road, not focus on the end. I believe that. But it occurred to me that this doesn't negate the good of the end.

I'm always searching for answers to put into my schema of the world, and lots of times this leads me on dead end paths. Because I realize that something is so much larger, more complicated, subtler. And life... I'm overwhelmed. It's too much. I try to take in all the surroundings, and it's staggering. There is so much happening. It makes me wonder about the smallness or largeness of myself. Another man: what difference does he make? How can something so mutable mean anything, and yet... and yet.

I'm getting more and more into yoga, and this has me less excited about Vipassana. They don't want you to do yoga there, but maybe I'll just go for a shorter time. The fact is that I need to learn about my death, and this is what meditation ultimately is. It's a study of our own existence and therefore our mortality. When I first heard the phrase, "To philosophize is to learn to die," I thought, "How beautiful. I must study that." I may or may not have finished with philosophy, but the yearning to understand death pervades. Don Juan said that death stalks him, one arm's length off his left side. Death only needs to tap him on the shoulder. Paulo Coelho imagines his death as a beautiful woman. She says, "I am going to kiss you," and he responds, "Not now, please." And Socrates, oh Socrates. His irony and humor resonate through to me. How lightly, yet with such seriousness he treats his death!

I grow older, and I watch my body change. My powers grow. My mind focuses. My intent grows clearer. I become myself, carving away pieces of stone like the great masters. And yet... and yet. Every moment is nearer my death. I've heard Buddhists say that every inhale is a birth, and every exhale a death. Our life literally waxes and wanes with the moments.

through fire

IS it necessary to live through trial? I could abandon the trials, but not without abandoning my path. Are we born to want the greatest thing we can achieve? And therefore the most difficult to attain? And then we have to decide how much it means to us? I don't know anymore, but it's my suspicion.

on the internet

I swear before the anonymity and celebrity of the internet that I will dedicate myself to my purposes. I remember that I am borrowing this energy, and I will put it to best use.

Remember:

All day I think about it, then at night I say it.

Where did I come from, and what am I supposed to be doing?

I have no idea. My soul is from elsewhere,

I am sure of that, and I intend to end up there.

This drunkenness began in some other tavern.

When I get back around to that place, I'll be completely

sober. Meanwhile, I'm like a bird from another continent,

sitting in this aviary. The day is coming when I fly off,

but who is it now in my ear who hears my voice?

Who says words with my mouth?

Who looks out with my eyes? What is the soul?

I cannot stop asking. If I could taste one sip

of an answer, I could break out of this prison for drunks.

I didn't come here of my own accord,

and I can't leave that way.

Whoever brought me here will have to take me home.

(Rumi)

lists

I've been making lists of things I desire. I have a few files dedicated to certain areas of my life, and I can think of nothing missing. What a strange feeling: the world feels infinitely more immense, and my life infinitely more picayune.

the power of one

The memories of my car accident are still haunting me. It's not the accident as much as the sense of reality that I had while in it. Everything outside that moment feels dull, covered over, as though I'm not really experiencing the world.

To know that I have sensory input capabilities far in excess of what I'm using - that is frustrating and a mystery. In the past day, things have seemed brighter and clearer. I see more detail. Sometimes I get captivated by something as mundane as a broken old streetlight outside a bar. I don't know what's causing it. Maybe it's the yoga I've been doing - that's the only noticeable powerful thing I'm doing right now.

I think about my powers, and the potential of my powers. I don't believe in limits. Maybe the inertia of myself does inherently believe in limits, but I see beyond. And I don't know what that means.

I think about the self and the journey one must travel.

I think about dance and my future. I am yet ashamed of the grandiosity of my desire.

I think about man's relation to the things around him. Today I noticed how every single thing in existence has a a story. A history, a future, a composition of qualities that give it it's suchness. And there's really nothing else.

I wonder if man must become an abstraction to truly be one with the world.