Shopping for Perspectives

I was just thinking about what it would be like, if we could just buy a new perspective whenever it suited us, like buying ourselves a little treat...a gift from self to self. Maybe this is what we attempt to do with our New Year's resolutions. However, there is something of those, that resolutely stinks of the same old perspective, with the reins tightened up...and the fun squeezed out. No room for fun in our quests for self-acceptance. We think that we change, because we started going out running, and eating healthier...but, my inkling is that it is often change without substance....and the same old tyrannies still hold the fort...and rule the roost.

One of my little North-star thoughts, that guides me through times of difficulty, is that my perspective is contingent. Contingent, in that, it could very well be other than it is at that given time. My perspective, for good or for bad, has been forged from the fires of my history (even if how I see things may seem markedly different from the perspective I was born into)...and, another person could easily be in the same situation that I might (hypothetically) find myself in, but they could think about it, perceive it, respond to it, deal with it...in remarkably different ways. There is a whole spectrum of ways in which we could see the very same situation...even our very own situations...our very own immediate surroundings, immediate feelings...the stuff that is going on right here, and right now as you sit at the computer.

I am not really talking about our perspectives on the vast world that exists away from our own little corners, [although, this thought applies to all that too]...but, what really interests me is how we view ourselves...and the multitude of ways in which we could perceive ourselves differently. It is indeed interesting, when we use the variety of other possibilities to be a mirror to ourselves, how it is we are perceiving ourselves. When we take a few moments to think about all the other variety of ways we could look at our lives, and at the decisions we make or don't make, and at our behaviours...we realise, that we could see things radically differently, or even just a little bit differently. And yet, we are often so brilliantly resistant to the possibility of another perspective...we are often glued into place, refusing to allow ourselves a different perspective [with the exception of the New Year's resolution charade, which as I suggested before...keeps the old perspectives firmly in the driving seat].

If we managed a little moment of freedom, in that little rift of multiple possibilities, without feeling too nauseated, we might let our minds wander over the wild vast plains of contingency. We might even feel released, at least for a while, from the ways we often thought we needed to think about ourselves. It often seems to me, that we feel obliged to see ourselves the way we do, as penance for past family crimes [and I am speaking here, to those that feel weighed down...for there are some strange people out there who seem to be completely bouncy with self-empowerment]. Some of us seem to punish ourselves ceaselessly for some strange unspoken crimes against the family...as if the family were the mafia, and we now live in fear of being caught and punished...so in the meantime we give ourselves a little daily does of self-flagellation.

Anyways...fuck all that...all I am wanting to say, is that you could see yourself differently. You could you see yourself as more adequate...more acceptable...more lovable...more desirable...more able...more worthy, than you currently do. And it is infinitely interesting why you happen to be seeing yourself the way you do.


I speak to me, I speak to you.

I dare you to try this out as a little mental stretching exercise.

When you find a position you like...

...just sit in that position for a little while...

...and breathe...

...and enjoy

"The voyage of discovery is not in seeking new landscapes but in having new eyes."
Marcel Proust

This isn't just a story, this is the Truth

we are only ever talking about ourselves

me too

of course, this talking
is forever intertwined with some plot
regarding what is going on out-there
but,
contrary to what we tell our audience
what is going on out-there
is really only a small part
of the more major plot
that is really
us
telling the story of ourselves

in an act that would make any illusionist envious
we employ the sleight of hand
that throws the gaze of our audience-of-others
away from
us
onto the world around
us

we distract them
from stories that we rarely tell directly
toward another telling of our stories
one that we feel is safer
and takes the limelight
from
us
....to
.......some
................where
...........................else

we make suitable stories
out of
social theories
and
political theories

we tell stories of
art and history
of
science and math
of
theology and philosophy

we tell dramatic stories
writing our own special histories
of the world
telling versions of happenings
that we sprinkle magic truth-dust over,
rendering them
far more correct
than any other story-on-the-go

and
these stories provide
us
with a paradoxical cloak
where we
simultaneously
hide ourselves
and
reveal ourselves

but,
we are only revealed in disguise
as if we had fooled ourselves
into thinking we were not
the subject
of the story that we tell
in the encounter
between
us and the other

and

this illusion of suspended space
created by this
all-too-human act of trickery
lulls us into
heated debates
loaded with vitriol and violence
and

fooled into thinking
we we were not talking
about ourselves,
we alchemy
our thoughts into opinions
our feelings into stances
our fears into meta-narratives

and we will fight the difference of opinion
as if we were gods
in the world-of-rights
we will rage and seethe
when the other

does not align
does not conform
does not agree
with
us

even more so
when we believe that
we
are defending
others

speaking on behalf
of others

even others who have never
asked
us
to speak for
them

while we sit in our
positions
where we are the god
in the world-of-right
assuming the needs
of others
guessing the desires
of others

blurring the line between
righteous indignation
and
self indulgence

Weighing it up

I used to
measure deeds
by right and wrong

your deeds...my deeds

measure words
by truth or lie
measure experiences
by good or bad
quality, 
or a waste of time

measure people by integrity
or pretense
measure myself
as clean
or dirty
by productivity
or laziness
as managing
or stupid

and by many other measures
that were not forged out
of the shit of this life
but,
were hammered out
of the illusions of heavens
where ideals
thrive in ethereal balloons
buoyed up on immutable illusions
that will never burst

fuck all the measures
that are born in heaven
fuck all the measures
that are born
in unearthly places
in inhumane wombs

for they are not for me
and
they are not for you
lest we curse ourselves
and others
with them

hanging grindstones
round our skinny necks
far too near the ocean
of our own humanity

let curiosity
break apart
our
measures

let curiosity
redeem us
from
our tethers

...and the Greatest of these is Love?

I love the way the golden light

glances of the earth below

when the sun is sinking

to rest elsewhere

and

I love walking in the autumn time

through the crunchy leaves

all rusted and rich

in their transience

but, Love?

I love seeing my breath

like little wisps of mist

on dark wintry nights

lit up under streetlights

and

I love listening to Dinah Washington

as I stroll melancholy through the streets

weighted down with longing

for all things lost and gone

but, Love?

I love watching the birds

flick among the naked branches

stripped by the season's change

oblivious and light

and

I love seeing children play

smiling and giddy

carefree and mischievous

abandoned to pleasure

but, Love?

Love is for junkies

free people can never love

You can never love and be free

for Love is the wax of your foolish wings

Love is nothing but a word

spewed out of drunk mouths

at three in the morning

brimming with big empty feelings


Love is a word for magicians

addicted to illusions

getting lost in smokescreens

trying to make the loneliness disappear

Loss and Loneliness

To forget what it is
to kiss
and
to be kissed

To forget what it is
to hold
and
to be held

we have all been born
and we have
all been left
out here

abandoned
god forsaken
alone

we all know what that feels like
don't we?

to forget what intimacy feels like
looking up at stars in the night sky
in their splendid isolation
weaving connections
that aren't there
except in our
drunken minds

After the Hurting

After the hurting,
after the pain of separation
the realisation of differentness
after the disillusionment
after the end of enchantment

the reality of our
aloneness
alone
isolated
in the world of our feelings

what next

do we build bigger, higher defences
reinforcing security
on our boundaries and borders
on our territories
attempting to guard
against the traumas
against the enemies

do we get more adept at avoiding
and distrusting
refusing to allow
closeness and proximity
in case the other gets
close enough to kill
or wound us

do we find complex ways
of pushing people away
making sure they keep their distance
making sure that those who get in
pledge allegiance to our constitutions
resound their patriotism
to our policies
and principles

or do we keep on loving
knowing that...

if we avoid feeling hurt, we avoid love
if we avoid feeling pain, we avoid life
if we avoid feeling afraid, we avoid abundance
if we avoid feeling angry, we avoid intimacy
if we avoid feeling loss, we avoid truly holding anything

and, I know in the midst of this which will bring me more joy
but, sometimes it seems that we don't allow joy into our lives
either because we feel we don't deserve it
resolute in our need for eternal punishment
or because we are so hooked on the tragic rendition of our lives
that we fear we will fade into obscurity if we choose happiness
or that if we stopped picking these old wounds,
and found resolution and closure
we would lose something far too precious
even when that precious thing is slowly killing us

or maybe we just feign recovery
and fuck the pain away
keeping the past alive
in our behaviours
in our museum of forgetting

Your Love is like a Strangle Hold

I am a little Midas
touching things, and turning them into gold

the curse of one who attaches too much meaning
to the world he lives in
and the people he shares it with

this is not to say
that we ought not care for those around us
but, we are oftentimes investing far more
than we would like to admit
and far more than we ought
in the hidden economies of the heart

under the influence of our desires
we can
reduce the others we love,
down to our idealised visions of them
we relate to them as
trinkets, amulets and charms
rather than as the ordinary people that they are

flesh and blood and neuroses

we dehumanise them by
scripting them into our secret stories

the dynamics of needing
can be visible from the very outset of relationship
and needing strangles the life out of relationship
for no-one needs any specific other person

When we write stories, of how we couldn't survive
without that special someone
we are writing painful stories for ourselves
and stories that are radically disempowering to ourselves
and the more we live out narratives of disempowerment,
the more we drain the emotional reserves
of the others we are in relationship with.

our symptoms are evident in our participations,
evident in the energy of our togetherness

our secret stories are evident in our participation
even if not evident to us
for the last thing we would want to do
is acknowledge the naked emperor of our own making

the story of our participation, is also the story of our withdrawal

want to know why we withdraw,
look at how we participate

want to know the history of the separateness,
look for the energy in the togetherness