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On Happiness

I have a talent for exulting in the moment. I read articles and statement in books about how if you look at the moment of joy it disappears and is gone and it is a moment that therefore must not be examined too closely and I scratch my head. That is not my experience at all. When I see the moment of joy and fulfillment often at random moments doing very normal routine things like driving home from work my inner child laughs gleefully like a three year old in a kiddie pool. No matter how my intellect tries to deconstruct what is happening in my mind the joyful laughter remains.

I realized something essential about a certain type of happiness, the fulfillment type with a looser association with joy. It requires expectation of future fulfillment to exist. It is a happiness at having something you want and knowing beyond a doubt more will come for the foreseeable future. I have not often experienced this type. It has a pleasant and luxurious feel to it.

As to the pure joy happiness that has managed to stay with me all my life even during episodes of obsession and depression, although it certainly is muted when depressed, it does not die. I'm thankful for that.

Lately I wonder if this happiness has anything to do with my improving health or if the happiness is helping the health. It is odd to see all the problems I have seen before that sometime seem to be much more important: lack of money, lack of fulfilling social interactions, lack of satisfaction in labor, problems with health, obliterating valued relationships into cosmic dust for various reasons and feeling like an idiot; none of it even seems to touch my emotions beyond slight temporal annoyance. The joy is singing and even the turbulence only sounds like a lovely bass line strumming along. I may or may not be the biggest inept moron to crawl across the earth with failures adorning the days of my life but everything is singing and I can hear it and it is beautiful. Nothing else seems to matter.

Thoughts on reincarnation and two spheres of existence

I did not believe in ghosts or reincarnation for most of my life. Only in the past six years after very intense lucid dreaming have I begun to reshape my view of what is possible. What I am about to say may be complete bullshit and I'm alright with that. I'm ok with it being nebulous and a mere possibility. I've seen patterns and I thought perhaps I would write down what I have observed.

First of all the world I experience out of body in my dreams lucidly no matter how emotionally intense or visually stunning never quite has the same zing as being inside a body. There is no real pain although it is possible to feel echoes of it and there is very little sensual pleasure even though there is echoes of that as well. These nerves and brain sensations do quite a lot to our experience of existing. It brings it all home when your emotions and thoughts translate into bodily sensation. It is all just an ethereal exercise up until that point. Plus there is power here that is not as easily accessed while not in body. It's hard to describe exactly why that is or how that is. I just feel it like a child rejoicing in the flow of a river.

The draw to keep coming back is like the draw to keep breathing. Those who are awake enough can help mold themselves and their future lives. Those who just leap and do not look merely ride along the current sometimes stirring and sometimes slipping further into sleep. Life here is almost like a game in the sense that it is a continual challenge to test yourself and your capabilities. What can I do next? Where shall I go? Who shall I be? Will I do better here, I wonder? It's like sports. What new goal shall I set for myself?

I used to be horrified by the concept of never having a chance to just rest already from all the pain and trial but now I realize that is a thing of joy to have the hope of continual growth and experience and existence would be horribly boring without it. Plus there is a time of rest when one must regain the energy and learn all one can while out of body before going back.

Also personal energy is not limitless. It is possible to get stuck as a shadow of this bodily sphere if you are too attached to something there. You need energy to travel back to the non-body sphere and often spirits need help finding it and remembering how to go back. It's very comforting to me to know that we are all connected and help each other naturally. Some people help spirits even while unconscious in their second nature while they sleep. There are those stronger spirits who help continually those with questions and those who need guidance on how to help themselves and others. They seem like they have been without body for ages upon ages but I'm fairly certain they too will come back eventually to the body sphere for growth and power and because they often can touch the lives of many more while in body.

I've been thinking of free will and determinism lately. It seems to me that life has a mixture of both and not completely one or the other. An awake spirit decides what goals to strive for and sets its path and an asleep one lets his gut instinct and desires guide the path he will walk but each spirit then decides every second how he will react to his circumstances whether consciously chosen at one point or not. Will one grow or will one shrivel? And every choice affects the next circumstance.

Random floating thoughts

When I was a child I was exceedingly passive. There was hardly any sense of self. I was simply a portion of a whole. I belonged to the Sherman family, was part of Karen and Rachel, belonged to my tiny missionary school and in a sense I saw myself as representing America on Japanese shores. I literally thought of "myself" in these lenses. I was heart broken at the thought of having in any way been linked to the horrible deaths of innocent people burned alive where they stood by atomic bombs. I had this thought when I was seven.

Compassion came to me like breathing back then. I can remember crying about my fellow classmates who I was not sure would end up in heaven as early as the age of four and all the way until I was 17. Gradually over time I developed a sense of my true self and with it came passions. I think the process truly gained speed when I finally left home at the age of 17 to go to a ridiculous Bible thumping college. I went there against my parent's will, you see. And my sister's dominating personality was removed far from me for the first time in my life.

I began to have wants, desires, thoughts all my own in no way attached to anyone else. Most of the time I kept my inner self hidden from view and stayed passive on the outside. I revealed myself to a few close friends at college. I still have this habit of hiding who I truly am and often it is reinforced by fierce rejections. Still overall after 30 odd years I am more myself on the outside than I ever was. There is much less hiding these days....just the rather particular things..the odd things are left in the dark.

There have been relationship casualties to this process though. Breaking apart can be painful and leave a shadow of once was in interpersonal relations. I have learned that I have a temper and a habit of saying imprudent and ridiculous things, particularly making promises about human interaction that are almost impossible to keep. I have this strong desire to not make waves and just belong again and it is accentuated by the sense of loneliness I get from my continued indulgence in my passions and delighting in my true self. So I end up being a typical example of a people pleaser even as I quietly keep my distance emotionally.

My family interaction is almost a joke. We go on acting as if we are close but we have huge chasms of not understanding each other and not knowing quite what to say without starting some argument. I have become the proverbial black sheep and it is truly ironic since I started out a little angel, always the one to be obsessively good.

To complete this journey I must find a way to perceive myself as part of a whole again, part of the entire human race connected together in a mass of existence, part of something even larger than that, a collective consciousness that reaches beyond life or death. Now that I have broken apart to birth passion I must reunite with compassion and community bringing gifts of beauty perception and diversity of experience. Finding a small community to interact with on a regular basis will help with this perception and growth. I must learn to balance passion with compassion, forgiveness with ferocity of desire, self with community.

In my lucid dreams I am a creature of joy sometimes rather careless and fierce in my dealings with the world I experience there. Lately there has been more of the super-ego. I've been helping more but often in a callous cold way. I've been forgiving more even while feeling afraid and disgusted. When the compassion I felt as a child comes as naturally to me in the dreaming sphere then I know I will have grown in the ways that I have desired and do desire.

(no subject)

I stand alone and watch the ash settle
Staring blankly at the gray shadows once my life.
It happened again.
Three times now.
I watched my heart rumble and explode with lava
That evaporated every thread of connection.
The burns sear my skin raw and tender.
I know now how long it takes
Until they become angry scars
That frown at me in quiet hours:
Two years, maybe three.
I'm practiced in this area of pain,
Perhaps it will only be one.

Self-exile for the sake of sanity.
My weary heart and my overly clever brain
Have devised a scheme to create hope.
My mind which builds entire mythologies
While I lie resting unsuspecting
The power it holds over my life
Adeptly rescues my moping heart by
Merely focusing on a producer of beauty.
Focus is too tame a word;
Death grip is more accurate.

Successfully indoctrinated by western media
My brain sees the romantic union of two souls
As the ultimate form of beauty.
It is the reason to keep breathing
The reason to endure illness, poverty, lies, violence,
The incessant ugliness of human behavior
Just for the hope of it.
No matter how my conscious self sneers
I know this hopeful expectation lies in my depths.

Oh, my clever clever brain,
You choose only men that do not remotely want me.
That way you can never be disappointed
By the lack of appropriate bliss and beauty.
What ifs and maybes prevail over all.
Oh, the infinite power of "if."

Please, oh, please stop saving me, brain.
I'll do just fine drinking the small joys.
Loving prosaically, creating quietly.
Happiness is a flitting rainbow.
It is impossible for it to stay very long.
Please stop trying to make it last forever.
Happiness comes and goes
With the rain and with the sun.

Such on obliging mind, have I.
I ask for magic and it provides it.
I ask for hope and it procures it.
Now I ask for clarity, will this also come easily?
I am skilled at self-deception; truth comes harder.
The cost of living with genie brain is far too high.
Will clarity even make a difference?
Can it even touch such a remote cycle of emotions?

Is my passive observer doomed
To watch as yet again as my heart explodes
Into obsessive burning passion
Over yet another object of beauty, poor soul,
Until I am forced yet again
To pack myself away in order not to annoy
And in order to regain myself?

At least the life that is lost
Was more my ex-lover's than mine.
I made my world around him.
All my efforts were to please him
And those he cared about
Some of whom I too cared for.
But the ego stroking benefits
Were not enough for me to
Even think twice about what I must do.
The only way to calm my bubbling mind
Is to completely cut out the stimulus.

There are a few strands left of the old life.
They will likely be with me for some time,
Possibly until I leave this world.
I'm thankful for that at least.
Love and care amidst the chaos.
Now to rebuild a life that is truly my own.
And make sure my volcano erupts more quietly next time.
So I don't have to leave this new world behind too.

An Evolutionary Tale

I am an Italian soprano
Who risked everything
Safety and politics
Health and honor
Just to sing.

In the French court
There is no escaping
The web of social politics.
If you do not please power
Dire consequences follow.

Love was my undoing.
He was a mercenary
And I was homesick.
A diamond love began
That refuses to crumble.

Dirt floors,coughing,
Rotting wood, fever stench
Replace sculpted white walls
Thick red velvet curtains
Tinkling china, chattering voices.

I am a Victorian heiress.
My mind is easily bored.
I surround myself with artists
Poets, painters, essayists,
Scientists, scholars.

My hair grows gray.
I have never really loved.
All I hold is empty knowledge.
I'm comforted by upright rules.
I grow rigid and unkind.

My deepest desire
Is to live in Asia
Talking to mountain philosophers
Drinking tea, wrapped in silks
Watching cranes on a lake.

I am a Chinese girl.
I have a talent for dreams.
Soon I am placed with teachers
Who strictly guide me in wise ways.
But youth prevails over wisdom.

My breasts hang like fruit;
My hair a black silk waterfall.
He was a traveling tinker.
I felt his eyes before I saw him.
He ignites the fire below.

We wander off into the pines.
I am betrayed by desire.
How strange to feel
That the knife is cold
And then to feel nothing.

I am a queen, consort to the moon.
I reflect my lover's light.
There are many adoring followers
But my own light is lacking.
I am too proud, no compassion.

I am fragile again.
I choose an imperfect beauty.
I fear a second lust murder.
Compassion comes more naturally.
I still struggle with self and pride.

This time I do not stifle passion.
The love energy is the strongest
I have ever experienced.
But I get obsessed, unbalanced.
Fortunately, I have help on the journey.

I waited until youthful fire
Simmered into a calm flame
Before the dream travel this time.
Rigid rules are splintered.
I sing for a while and I write.

I am a ball of rainbow light,
Pure joy and pure love.
With a laugh I burst
Into a million pieces of energy
Intermixing with everyone, everything.

I am everything.
I am nothing.
I am fragile.
I am indestructible.
I am me and I am you.

I am at the beginning.
I am at the end.
There is no time,
Only the humming truth,
Beauty, love, joy.

(no subject)

Endless points of light
Dance upon the snow.
No clouds hide the sun
Enthroned in a sapphire sky.

If this were a dream
I would rush into the sky
Bubbling with laughter and a smirk
Tugging at the corners of my lips.

But I stand still, quiet
Feet firmly planted on ice.
Frozen ripples seem to move away
Blasted by the heat of happiness.

In one short moment
My universe twisted
Revealing pure joy and beauty
Making every particle sing.

I feel the moment subside
Like a wave in nature's course
Familiar fragility aches again
But the vibrations linger.

In a dream conversation
I told another that I had found
What I intended for this life.
It has been in my grasp some time.

I have been a petulant child
Demanding impossible perfection
Pushing good desire to an extreme.
I was blessed living blind.

Pain will always travel with me
But I shattered a shadow.
I shall clean the soot left behind
And renew my journey with vigour.

My clean eyes see my tasks
So much more clearly.
If I can keep this momentum
Who knows where my path will lead?

(no subject)

There you are again
Hanging on the edges of my mind
Like a hentai tentacle monster
Whose loathsome arms grow right back
Now matter how I hack.

What would he think about this?
How would he feel?
Why did he do that, say that?
How would he react now?
What if this happened to him?
What if that?
"What if" to infinity.

I have at least banished you
From my maddening merciless dreams.
It only took never seeing your face
Not even so much as a picture.
Not even so much as a musical note.

How can your echo still be with me?
You were never my lover, hardly my friend.
How can I be this ridiculous?
I see every flaw.
I see every possible sneer.
And yet still there you stay
Entwined in my heart and mind.

I see even the way
We would rip into each other
Until all that remains are
Two quivering heart-dead masses
But even that will not exorcise you.

It makes no sense to feel this way
About a man I hardly know.
I am haunted by a love that lives
Outside of space and time.
It cares not for trivial things
Like compatibility and comfort.
It is pervasive as air.

I began the mantra of
"I forgive you; I forgive me."
When I was seething, cringing
At the mention of your name,
Hoping it would open my prison doors.

Although the cringing stopped
I was not freed.
I tried mentally wishing you happy
Sending you on your way
Saying to myself I would never see you.
And yet your ghost remains
Choking me in lugubrious chains.

I forgive this human weakness
That fills me with this vague need
That sets my heart on fire
With anguish, anger and desire.
I forgive your coldness and your fear.

In my brighter moments
When I feel every particle
Inside and out hum and buzz with joy
This love seems a beautiful thing,
A cloth of diamond weave
Woven tightly around me like a cocoon
Making me into a butterfly.

I look forward to the day
Perhaps in two or three years
When I realize suddenly
I have not thought of you for months
And I wish you happy and well.

(no subject)

I had a delightful weekend. I saw the Botanical Garden over in Mathai(sp?) for the first time. What a lovely place. So tranquil and pretty. I lurked around downtown Ann Arbor for a good portion of Saturday and visited several wonderful adorable stores. I got some rare books on Japan. The best was a large coffee table book on Kabuki, Japanese theater, with large pictures a lot in color. The book store owner said it was made in the 40s but I have not checked the book itself. Matt, I really think you would enjoy looking at the pictures in this one. :) You would have loved the book on Japanese puppet theater but it was far far too pricey. It was a first edition.

Feeling in a haiku mood.

1.

Dripping onto snow
Icicles melt steadily
Soon only a thought.

2.

Faded yellow light
Grey winter sky in window
The night approaches.

3.

Yellow peach feathers
Beating fast against the air
Now a quick strange crown.

4.

Waking on my side
His scent is on the pillow
Pain skewers my heart.

5.

Memories and dreams
Fill up my mind to bursting
Happiness is false.

At least joy is real
Here time flies by far too fast
Join the dance of love.

(no subject)

The shiver of winter replaced
The sweat of summer.
What passion fired the heart
When moist skin met skin
Has grown so cold and hard
It shattered at first conflict.

My heart is an icicle
Hanging jagged and deformed
Threatening to fall onto
Wanderers that stray below.
Warmth is a foreign memory
Now that frigid existence
Fills day after sunless day.

Hope lies sleeping
Deep in a dark cave.
She dares not show her face.
Perhaps she waits for sunlight
To free stiff muscles and joints
Now moving in slow routine.

Cynicism is my company;
Loneliness is my lover.
They take more than they give.
But lately that seems the same
As everything that has come before.
Still I wait for the sun.

(no subject)

So I think it is safe to say I'm single again. If the man thinks ignoring me will lead to good things and that he can just show up later and claim me as his...well he has larger problems in the head than I realized. A relationship is a two-way street.... Silence leads to death of intimacy of any kind. I tried to reach out and tell him I cared and would always be his friend no matter what happened but that apparently was not good enough a stimulation for him to actually respond.

I'm sick to death of internet dating. Maybe in a while I won't be...but right now the idea of doing all of that again makes my skin crawl. If some man happens to fall into my path and show interest I will be willing to evaluate his relationship potential but I'm tired of putting my vulnerable inner self out there only to be ignored or skewered.

(no subject)

I'm not doing well. Not happy at all. I have all these dark assumptions that Greg is lying to me and actively avoiding me. That perhaps he wants to break up but doesn't know how.

What is more likely is that he finds himself in a rough place because of his deception hiding me from his family and so lies to me to cover up that mess as he lies to them. WTF is this all about? Why is deception so necessary to him?

I do not feel affection from him or hardly any warm feeling other than sexual desire which he swears he only exhibits because I need it and he would rather be "good." His emails are terse, lacking in any real emotional information. And he routinely sees me only twice a month for the past few months. I can't live on this. It isn't enough. It's not fair to ask me to be focused on him only when he gives me so little.

If he gave me any kind of real emotional communication and connection in email or calling I think I might be able to hold it together....but even so...I can not deny my needs are not getting met.

I need attention. I need to be with a man who tries as hard as possible to be with me as much as humanly possible. A man that can't wait to see me and spend time with me and shower me with love and affection. A man who enjoys me and knows me and understands me. I begin to think this utterly impossible.

If I take an objective look at the facts, his behavior is more of a man with a casual regular hook-up than a man in a serious relationship with emotional connection and importance. But I have to factor in that he is hugely emotionally damaged from years of being bi-polar and unmedicated. He never really went to therapy even after the breakdown two years ago that put him in the hospital.

Even so I can not ignore that blaring non-happiness ocurring. He simply may not be capable of making me happy for whatever reasons. I will talk to him and give him one more chance, but if things do not improve within two months, I'm done.

I'm sad though because I really do love him. Part of the reason I'm so unhappy is because I really miss him. I smell his distinctive scent on the pillow next to me and want to sob.

I have reached my most cyncical state about romance and yet I can not do casual sex emotionally. I need stability and commitment. What will I do with myself? I have a higher than average sexual desire. I'm doomed either way.

Literally getting smoked out

So my landlady's sister moved in downstairs last month. She inherited the lower flat from her uncle and my landlady inherited the upper flat which she rents to me. Well I wasn't too pleased about having neighbors again particularly since they were not overly friendly and the 60 something guy, the sister's husband, likes to go around in his boxer shorts. But something even worse started happening...her sister smokes.

I'm allergic to cigarette smoke...very allergic. It's an old house. The smoke has been rising into my flat through the cracks. The smell is strong and even though I can not see the smoke I can taste it. My asthmatic chronic cough is back. It also makes me sneeze and have nasal congestion. I'm so angry that I'm suddenly being slowly poisoned in my own home for which I pay 500 a month....and there isn't a thing I can do. I can't ask the woman to not smoke in her legally owned home. She may feel sorry for me when I tell her she is making me sick...but I bet she isn't going to change her ways.

I plan on telling my landlady when I pay rent, but she can't do anything really. Her sister owns the property. So I need to find an air purifier in hopes it will help. I don't really want to pay for one. Do any of you guys happen to have a spare one lying around? Ultimately though I need to move. Clearly this situation is not good for me.

I need to find a place for which I don't pay more than 500 a month but hopefully less. I can't live with carpet anymore due to my allergies and the fact I let my bird fly free when I'm home and well...poop is really hard to clean out of carpet and a breeze to clean off of wood. Apartments always have carpet so I need to find a flat somewhere or someone who is willing to share a house where I can fit my furniture and they don't mind the bird. Also I want to live in a safe neighborhood so nothing in downtown Detroit or Hamtramk. Oh and I can't live in someone's basement mostly because my birdy needs lots of sunlight to be happy.

It's so specific. I suppose I can make compromises and I guess a lot of situations have to be better than being slowly poisoned. Do any of you know of any flats or house renting shares that would meet my needs?

President Obama!

I helped make history. I'm so proud of my president. I'm so proud of my country. I cried tears of joy last night.

(no subject)

I can feel the tugging.
Nimble fingers of the sun
Pluck pluck pluck the scabs
That cover my wounded heart.

Why must I be soft again?
Surely that leads to pain.
Perhaps it is merely chemicals
That thrusts beauty in my face.

Perhaps my body can not help
But notice once again
The rhythm and chords
Of my favorites songs.

Perhaps I can not help
But feel the silver moonlight
Reflecting off my heart
As if it held no shadows.

Even the old familiar way,
That slanted skewed way,
Of viewing the world workings
Has tried to creep back.

But I'm more hardened to that
I deny its former glory
I shun its former power
I shatter its hold over me.

"What if" it shall remain.
No solid acknowledgment.
No constant scrutiny.
I will not be its domain.

This chapter is closed.
I begin life again.
With my golden pen
I will start another.

Emptiness and folly
Beauty and hope
Love in all its forms
I am a swirling mass of chaos.

Apparently my twisted heart
And my malformed brain
Can not help but see light
Even while wallowing in the dark.

It seems I am forced to see
Both the light and the dark,
The ecstasy and the horror,
The disgusting and the divine.

I am a lens.
Light and dark
Flood through me
Spilling around.

If I shape myself
In just the right way
Hardened here, softened there
Perhaps I can make rainbows.

(no subject)

Ash, lava, ash.
In my heart are
flames or smears.
Why does my heart,
Nay my very mind
Betray me?

Against my best efforts
To be suave and calm
To be sharp and sure,
I floated away in a cloud
Higher, ever higher.
Far too high.

Shattered.
Too many sharp tiny pieces
Lie scattered tattered
By the wind of my emotions.
I have no motivation to
Ever put them together again.

So what is left?
I do not know.
I can not know.
I know nothing.
Anger and shame
Dance devils in flame.

The hall I walk was
Once silver with moonlight
With beauty and magic
Floating on the night air.
My heart soared in flight,
Eventually I had to fall.

Now I traverse a hall
That feels like a circus
With lit plastic clowns
Laughing and pointing
At the biggest clown of all.
Half-asleep she peddles her unicycle.

I saw this coming
Long, long ago.
And yet I played my part
Just like I had not known.
I did try, oh how I tried.
But happen it must.

I carefully shaped it,
The dagger, and placed it
Tightly in his hand.
Then I jumped up and said
"Right here. Stab me right here."
He complied.

Cursed is she who flies
She who sees too much.
She who feels too much.
For she knows nothing and
She must pay;
Pay she does.

Day follows empty day.
No more magic
No more clouds
No more flying
No more falling
Not from such heights.

I dig in the dirt
Perchance to find sustenance
In the awkward love of two
Broken people grasping
Each other to their
Aching hearts.

FYI - I don't want to explain about the origin of this poem. It's merely self-expression. Thanks.

(no subject)

So Matt is mostly moved out. Still a little bit here and there left to take away. I'm adjusting to living alone again. I don't have much experience with this. Just a few months here and there really. I've been turning on the TV just hear people talking occasionally. I'm enjoying the ability to play whatever music I want without consultation. This room is rather empty now. I kept the chair in the living room. I want to go to Ikea and find a sort of drafting table with a slanted top with drawers or shelves underneath....hope it exists. I figure if I keep all my art supplies lying about and have a good surface to work on I might actually be more creative in that department....maybe. I'll have to drape cloth over all the paper products though....my bird loves to chew on paper.

I think Greg is my boyfriend....not completely certain. He mentioned not being interested in other girls...just me...so that mean exclusivity right. Right. Things seem to be going well but I'm encountering a wee bit of frustration with his lack of experience but he has the appropriate matching ideals. I just need to be more willing to mention my expectations and emotions more often. He can only see me once a week which is a bit frustrating but much better than not seeing him at all. :p

(no subject)

Well that happiness was rather short-lived. Hello, painful reality, won't you come in and have a cup of tea.

(no subject)

I am a happy happy woman. Yum, yay, ha, joy, weeeeee! That is all.

(no subject)

Silver circle of light
Quietly shining in the mist.
Wisps of gray float past.

Yellow daisy in shadows
You deserve a brighter showcase
Even if only for a few minutes.

Open rosebud in the night
Intoxicate me with your scent.
I am dizzy with delight.

My heart is the moon reflecting.
My mind is a rose unfolding.
My spirit is a daisy smiling.

Love abounding.
Hope replenishing.
Joy spilling.