Diving in

Diving into river rapids. During my recovery, looking for work, working out my own work, calling out for help... it was about waiting because most doors were closed. This image of standing next to a river whose rapids grew faster and stronger, waiting for the right moment to dive in. I think the moment is here.

Also reminds me of this song: First call's "Parable of the river"

Alright

Everything's gonna be alright. We say it all the time but few act as if we believe it even though so many singers from Bob Marley, Alicia Keys to Justin Bieber sang a song about it.

Religious people beg and plead for an answer. Intellectuals discuss problems to find interim solutions because it seems like we will never find the order and peace we all desire. Ever since language and media existed, there have been apocalyptic messages. Warnings about our demise weigh down our faith despite our self-assurance that it'll all turn out OK.

To write the simple answers would be a waste of time for few believe simple solutions can solve the quagmire we see everywhere. So I'll let "Sounds of Blackness" sing it and play it.

Ring them bells

Yes the recording is 20 years old. Can't you tell by their clothes and hair. Bob Dylan wrote it even earlier than that. But the music and their vocals are so hypnotic. For me the lyrics are prophetic and the melancholic epic score give me chills.

Will it take tragedy for us to wake up to trends that kill society and the human spirit slowly but surely. And I'm not talking about politic, religion, race, sexuality or even morality here. Instead the slow death that kills us are policies and habits that discriminate, divide, take revenge, enslave and feed greed. What dies is always freedom, creativity, beauty, joy, love, hope and disillusioned youth.

I hear the bells warning us and I choose to seek a way out of a downward spiral.

安心-Peace

This song celebrates being at peace with the one you love. It's about intimacy and resting and walking together. Simple stuff. No weddings, shows, proclamations, fireworks, expensive gifts but just being together.

It's quite against the fashionable amazing, stunning, astonishing, dramatic, incredible, flagship that is sold to us every moment of exposure to popular culture. Instant gratification, completely exposed and over powering marketing of everything. From iPads, music, movies, shows, events, politics and even love.

Well I don't really want to be stunned or inundated by superlatives. Simple proximity to a caring loving person is enough. This is the meaning of peace. 安心

Delusions of grandeur

It's not hard to think I am better than I really am but equally easy to think I am nobody. The key is why? Does my value come from what I have, accomplished, won, lost, missed, regretted? Of course who I really am when all is said and done, is independent of all of them. Who I am is more linked to what I am looking for or what I really want. (Try to answer them each day and you may get a different result...)

It's just so easy to forget what we really want out of life in both success and failure. Getting evaluated and thinking the outcome defines us can be reward as well as poison. Thus the title. Successful celebrities let the fame and ruckus of the madding crowd convince them they really are all that (thus delusions of grandeur). 

Healing and strength can come to both those fooled by success and failure. In material or popularity terms I am not at all successful. Yet the 2 pictures show how I feel now. Hear the songs by clicking their titles.

Healing

 Strength

Complete

For the longest time, there was something missing in me. I was looking for why I live and breath. Before my misfortune and trials, I seemed to be content seeking and enjoying the journey. But after years of bad events, rejection and illness, I thought some conclusion like a movie ending was needed to satisfy me. I wanted to move but forgot how.

I thought I wanted to live like most people, be satisfied with living out my days in safety and having enough. Good advice. Except it became my excuse for withdrawing from the search. People also told me, just go after the money because opportunity comes with it. Go after the best investments, ally with the successful, hurry up, do more...

None of this is bad except everything I tried in establishing security, failed. Even trying to do work for free some people decided to reject even that. Despite that all doors seemed shut, the gems in my life rose to the surface from the most unexpected people. New friendships and new visions of the future emerged. What is more marvelous is that values I thought were lost are exactly what is needed.

Somehow, things I learned, people who enriched me, experiences that shaped my life, even rejections, oppression and mistreatment all made sense. I mourn those who left my life and feel for those who seem lost in some storm or the doldrums.

"Whatever it takes to make it, I'm going all the way"...in my life. This is the feeling of being complete.

Cultural divide or treasure

Like all things in life, it is actually rarely gradual improvement. Besides sub-atomic energy from which we get the word quantum, I assumed the rest of life is gradual. Look closely though, even the Sunrise appears with sudden bursts of light. Exercise and training yields jumps in improvement after periods of apparent lull.

Carrying on my theme about learning being the purpose of human life, it is like that in our understanding, language and progress. Look at the iPhone phenomenon which suddenly started the domino effect of explosive use of hand held computers. Good or bad, they are becoming indispensable. And it happened suddenly to the surprise perhaps of even Mr. Jobs.

Cultural differences always fascinated me. Many are scared of the unfamiliar but I always saw people as people having created their own way of communicating. Language was like music and each one plays in its own key and rhythm. I learned a few and am still reaping the treasure of each. It takes time to learn but one day, it is possible to experience the rush of suddenly being able to sing a new song of another choir of humanity.

What divides us is also the show case of the beauty of unity and diversity of expression in being human on our small blue planet. Cultural diversity is our greatest treasure.

The point of life

It's going to be an obvious let-down for those expecting some fireworks, hollywood ending or religious salvation because my conclusion is simply: learning.

Some adults think children were meant to learn from us. They do imitate us so if we act like we know everything, they will be influenced to think it is possible to stop learning. Human nature is afraid of the unknown because if taking risks gave us negative results, we learn to fear risks.

School may be boring to many so learning is often associated with lack of fun. The Japanese chose the kanji 勉強 [benkyou] which is used to mean study. The characters can also mean forcing something to happen. Many will not learn unless forced perhaps.

When something bad happens and we can learn from it or just take it as fate. Companies, countries or any group of people can also learn from each other or just accept we are divided with no common ground. Actually genetics tells us we are all the same but humans tend to look at the differences and learn to exaggerate the significance. Somehow, color, accent,  clothes, the width of you face, symmetry or asymmetry and any number of preconceived notions of separation become imagined barriers impossible to overcome. Perhaps the only real barrier to our working together easily is language but even that can be learned.

The point of life is to learn how to live with our neighbors. Be it a family, a church, club, business, just 2 friends, a visit to the store.... It's not easy and that's the point. Why else are we given the invaluable privilege of living on our blue sphere of life in a vast universe of darkness, silence and violence?

Real achievement

Winning or getting top results is vague. Today parents push kids to get good grades even when the education system is unable to provide enough tools for even the top students to succeed. Perhaps it never did.

Life is even more complicated. Look at what is happening in the rising countries like the Ukraine, Turkey, Thailand, Egypt... There has been so much more transparency, education, economic rise and progress since 2000. But they are facing deep rooted problems on how to live together when they don't agree. Power grabbing, violence, skewed application of laws, revenge, lack of  forgiveness all help the groups involved to be locked in battles of words, of opinion and there is a risk of outright war.

In my part of the world, there is more stability on the surface because cultures here frown on dissent and confrontation in general. There is a tolerance of those in power that is better for short term stability but can hide the same deep divisions and problems that will not leave hearts and minds. Sooner or later tides will turn and the suppressed weaker groups could later be the stronger faction who will take power.

Democracy is meant to help dialog and smooth transitions of power without violence. But it too can become tools of the powerful to oppress the weak. When wealth disparity is high, the risk of instability, falling productivity and worst of all neglect of the young generation will also be high.

Real achievement then cannot be wealth or power or some trophy, despite that parents commonly push kids to get "qualifications" like badges of honor. In our times of change, relative peace, ever increasing channels to communicate and learn, we have little excuse not to achieve understanding, forgiveness, shared power, common goals and focused effort to move forward with our neighbors.

Real achievement is simply how we treat one another towards growth instead of playing politics, nurture stale mates and continue generations of escalating violence. Competition can be friendly, like what sports should be. The rewards of refocusing on people over the numbers will be real progress and better management of our lives on earth.