Science (Whether Exploratory & Applied) is Still Science

From an early childhood, I often wondered if I was as inhuman as I felt. Certain aspects of my consciousness have never been able to logically process life in the same way that others around me have. This was obvious particularly when it came to people building walls and distinctions based upon biases. Whether it is gender, race, religion, sexual orientation, career path, or any of the infinite other aspects by which we apply labels to ourselves -- many people feel the need to create an "us vs them" environment. This is not to say that I universally believe that distinctions are not useful. There is absolutely a place for saying "this is day, and this is night". However, when prejudices cause argument and displeasure and pain unnecessarily, I fail to see the purpose of these conflicts.

One such conflict I've noticed with in recent years arises from the differentiation people feel they need to create between what they perceive or believe should be defined as science (and therefore whether or not someone deserves the distinction of being called a scientist), and that which is not. Specifically, I've seen people calling doctors and engineers non-scientists, as if the work they do is something other than scientific. Personally, I don't understand this prejudice or this separation of worlds. Keeping religion and science separate, that I understand. And I freely acknowledge (perhaps with glee) the distinctions between science and humanities. However, I've noticed that these separations are becoming more and more pronounced, as well. To the point where people separate concepts into STEM (science, technology, engineering, math). The divisions between science and technology and engineering are as bizarre as separating science and medicine. It is about as sensible as calling a 12 string guitar a non-string instrument. Perhaps I've gone too simplistic, but sometimes, when addressing such a debate, I feel it wise to return to the roots of our language, to see if this conflict could arise from the very words we use to speak about a particular subject. Therefore, below I've begun to build from the keystones up to the scaffolding about which we not only build our thoughts but also communicate those thoughts between one another.

From the Oxford English Dictionary: 

• scientist (n): A person who is studying or has expert knowledge of one or more of the natural or physical sciences.

• research scientist (n): a scientist who works primarily with gathering knowledge and understanding research

• clinical scientist (n): a biomedical scientist (also known as a biomedical doctor or medical scientist or clinical laboratory scientist) is a scientist trained in biology, particularly in the context of medicine.

• applied scientist (n): a person who uses scientific knowledge to solve practical problems. 

• Eg: engineer, technologist, doctor, architect

• Pure Science (n): a science depending on deductions from demonstrated truths, such as mathematics or logic, or studied without regard to practical applications.

• Applied science (n): a discipline of science that applies existing scientific knowledge to develop more practical applications, like technology or inventions.

and a closer analysis of certain subcategories within this original definition:

From my initial analysis, it is already apparent that there is an "or" involved in this realm I am exploring. One of the important things I have already garnered from looking at the original OED definition, and further looking at a few subcategories is one very important component that I feel is often misconstrued due to bias. Objective observation would indicate a scientist to be anyone studying or with expert knowledge in the fields. However, common practice from conversations with colleagues, as well as extensive exploration of the subject on the internet has revealed the expectation that a scientist is: someone who conducts original scientific investigation in an effort to discover previously unknown information utilizing the scientific method.

Yet nothing in the definition of a scientist technically requires this component of originality or previously undiscovered knowledge. So what is causing this argument among communities of people who have common backgrounds (the study of scientific knowledge and expertise in scientific knowledge) yet utilize this knowledge in different veins? If you look above at the definitions of the subcategories I've placed beneath the original broader definition of a scientist, you can perhaps see the glimmer of what I believe is the greater underlying issue at hand.

A research scientist is someone who tends to pursue original research. These are the academics whose grant money from government and private sources fund not only their salaries, but also their labs. Academic labs are the training grounds for new generations of scientists, and the places where new ground is broken for scientific knowledge and technological advances.

From Wikipedia: "A medical laboratory scientist (MLS), also referred to as a clinical laboratory scientist, medical laboratory technologist or medical technologist, is a healthcare professional who performs chemical, hematological, immunologic, histopathological, cytopathological, microscopic, and bacteriological diagnostic analyses on body fluids such as blood, urine, sputum, stool, cerebrospinal fluid (CSF), peritoneal fluid, pericardial fluid, and synovial fluid, as well as other specimens. Medical laboratory scientists work in clinical laboratories at hospitals, reference labs, biotechnology labs and non-clinical industrial labs."

Perhaps one of the distinctions necessary with this situation is between the "pure" sciences (theoretical and experimental), and applied sciences.

Now, I'd be the first to admit there are people who try to edge in on the scientific fields with pseudoscience (such as the insultingly poorly-disguised Creationism or slightly better costume make-up of Intelligent Design). There are plenty of material from crackpots and fools who think they have the right to claim to be scientific. It is certainly necessary to defend the world of science from such utter idiotic notions. Let alone those who try to create an association with a name (see Scientology, or Christian Science). We are surrounded with advertisements that vague and misleading statements or outright quotes of false scientific data. We have people who gladly grasp hold of poorly conducted scientific claims, such as the completely and utterly false belief that vaccines cause autism or are a danger to children or others health.

I could rant for days about people who grasp hold of the scientific coattails or attach themselves like parasites to the effective reality of science. I am all for ripping the throats out of false science and pseudoscience. There is no room in this world for the acts of those who would damage or mislead others. It is most assuredly one of our duties to be vigilant and defend ourselves and the public at large from such harmful individuals. But to blatantly build walls between effective fields that are science? That is to effectively discriminate (whether or not that is the intent). Labels are a method of creating conflict.

So why do some people decide to label applied sciences as non-sciences?

Doctors and engineers are scientists. They are applied scientists. They take the knowledge of pure scientists, and use it to better the world. Pure science, without application, is merely so much more acquired knowledge in the backs of dusty libraries, or these days -- more ignored entries on Wikipedia.

Likewise, applied science would not exist nor have continuous improvements to increase the quality of human life, without pure research science. The research scientists/"pure scientists" provide the material that is then applied by appropriate applied scientists to ensure that the knowledge acquired is actually of any real value.

I've found that many people create subdivisions and barriers between as many aspects of the world as they can, so that the world can be better controlled, and through subtle distinction, defined as the dividers prefer. Perhaps it is the old idea of divide and conquer, but what I tend to see is a method of gaining power. Whether it is for money, honor, power, ego, or merely an inability to accept more people into the ranks -- there's always a motivation that drives the need to create an "us vs them". Sometimes, it isn't even conscious. The ability to define self vs other is, after all, at the very origins of life. The cell membrane defines the exterior vs the interior of the cell, creating the definitions of outside and inside. I know quite a few may contend with my arguments and perspectives, but as much as they wish to refute them -- unlike how everyone has opinions and assholes, I'm arguing fact.

Here, I have declared my hypothesis, provided my data, and discussed the outcomes of these different aspects. I've explored theory and application. And this is my conclusion: science is about a method and an approach: evidence-based physical deduction. Ultimately, what I am trying to achieve here, is a unification of individuals whose training and background is something held in common. The only small difference is how some of that information is applied. Why is it necessary to deny one group or another a particular title?

Of course, there's the statement I've heard from medical doctors that PhDs should not wear the title "Dr", and I've seen people with Masters degrees informed that their knowledge and value is less than that of those with a PhD. I've seen people with English PhDs called "Dr", while talented and brilliant scientists whose years have made them far more worthy to be addressed with such distinction.

 Ultimately, the world will be as it is, and if this blog post doesn't settle well in your stomach, then -- you're wrong. Just remember, I know better than you.

Emotions Should be as Water off a Duck's Back

The title of this entry is something my sensei would say to us quite often during my time training in his dojo.  I always thought I understood it, I always thought I believed it and agreed with it.  The truth, however, was far from that.  I was merely reciting it as a theory, and then in the next instant allowing emotions to soak into my skin as though I were a sponge.  It is a very simple thing to convince yourself of a delusion.  All that is required is access to one's own psyche (something we all tend to have), a desire to believe something, and the inability to actually practice what we think we should.  In other words, an inability to do rather than say.  An inability to practice what we preach.


Since humanity is so prone to hypocrisy, anyway, it is a very simple thing to take a single step off the slope and plunge into a world of delusion, never realizing one has fallen off the path and into a useless loop.

Hypocrisy is merely a part of the human condition.  Some consider it a plague, but I am more inclined to say that it is an aspect of our imperfection (such a radiant thing is imperfection).  Most people praise flawless diamonds and gem stones.  I would rather study a cracked and unbalanced maze of facets that did not aline with each other at precisely all the same angle.  These are nuances, character, individuality that make these stones unique from the other pieces that are considered "perfect".  I don't perceive perfect duplicates as perfection.  I perceive them as dull, boring, useless when it comes to the studies of the mind.  They are useful for sansara and applications to the physical world of science and engineering.  However, if you wish to talk philosophy or art, give me that which contains an imbalance that allows me to sense the differences of perception when a light is shined from 47 degrees, and from when the light is shone from 193 degrees.

Do you see how the refraction at this angle produces a photo effect resembling the northern lights, but if we hit it over here with the same beam, it is now fireworks?

It is at once sorrowful, joyous and stimulating to make such observations.

It is at once sorrowful, joyous and stimulating to be alive.

But more often than not, in the moment in which we are living, we are not filled with all of these emotions at the same time, to the same extent.  It is to say, they are all present, but it depends on what is stimulating our senses and what we are enticed or affected by in sansara, that determines the extent to which particular emotions are evoked.  This is how I walked the earth for nearly twenty nine years.

I did not experience my emotions, my emotions arose from what was going on around me or what I had held within me from an original reaction -- and all those emotions collected in a vast infinite pool inside.  Fermenting in a stagnant ooze.


In this way, I was not experiencing my emotions, my emotions were experiencing me.  I was reacting not to what was in front of me at all, any more.  I was seeing it through hearsay interpretation, through the eyes of everything I had been through, previously.  I would feel happy, and I would try desperately to hold to that emotion, not wishing to let go of it.  But the event that had caused the happiness would pass, and then I would feel only sorrow for the fact that it was over, even though I was clinging to what had given me happiness.  It was like holding onto a piece of food so long, believing it to be delicious but desiring to savor it -- that I never actually tasted it, and it finally spoiled and rotted into foul decay.

Rather than merely abstracting emotion into analogies (though I will use words to paint vivid and powerful pictures of poetic nature whether I want to or not, in the end) -- I will try to list at least a couple real examples: 

*1.  I used to believe it was an awful thing to forgive people who had harmed me.  I believed I should carry the anger and rage with me, as a weapon upon my belt.  The rage and anger were not swords and knives that I might wield against someone else.

If you've ever studied real martial arts and learned truly how to both utilize yourself as an instrument of self defense, and how to effectively avoid having to do so in most situations -- you will have also learned that emotion will quite literally cause you to fight yourself rather than your external opponent.  Rage will cause you to tense up and when you throw that punch or kick or try to move out of the way of an attack, you will be slowed and weakened because the wrong muscles will be acting.  You will be out of harmony with yourself, if you are not empty of emotion.  Rage will cause you to be less effective and place you in grave danger of losing a fight.

Thus, rage was not an effective weapon to use against other people.  It was more akin to stabbing myself first with the knife, and then attempting to use it to attack someone else.



*2.  I used to believe that holding sorrow within you was the way you prevented it from overwhelming you.  If you could contain the tears and screaming anguish, it would pass and you would avoid embarrassment that might lead to you appearing weak.

If you've ever lost a loved one, or ever experienced loss of the sort that unhinges you in ways that you cannot cope with -- you know that ignoring the pain and thinking it will just go away if you just clench it up inside, doesn't solve the problem  This is like clenching your fist as it bleeds from the outside, and expecting the wound to heal, or allowing a drowning man to grasp a hold of you to keep himself afloat.  You will not escape the poisonous, dark emotion.  You will only be pulled under.  No lives will be saved.


I am not advocating emotionless automaton existence

Emotions are the wine of life, both those of happiness and those of anger and sorrow and rage and all the things tha make us unhappy.  There would be no manner by which we would understand or experience happiness without something to compare it to.  We would simply be like the cars we drive, or the  computers we spend so much time staring at facebook with:  non-living, non-existing objects.  This is why I like flawed objects.  Flawed objects have the characteristic that begins to allow for emotion.  The imperfections, the imbalances that allow for change and challenge and individuality.

Emotions are how we truly experience the world.  Just seeing a sunset, or just tasting food, or just having really great sex, is nothing, if we cannot feel it.  And we cannot feel these wondrous sensations, without having known what it is like to lose them, to not have them, to have something that is the opposite.  Emotions enrich life, they enrich existence.  Emotions are what make life, life.

Food is the sustenance  of the body, but as noted above, it does spoil.  Emotions are the sustenance of the spirit -- but they too are perishable.  Time effects both food and emotion.

So how do we avoid consuming rotten emotion and getting emotional poisoning?

We avoid illness by letting go of emotion.  Truly letting go.  Acknowledging the amazing wonder of the emotion, and then letting it leave us like heat leaves the body on a cool night, or our bodies dispose of waste.  Carbon dioxide is exhaled, and the digestive processes take care of the rest.

Digest your emotions, let them nurture you as they can, and then let them pass out of you and into the world around you.  Revel in the awesome uneven features of the mountain ranges, and the incredible slight imbalance of plants and animal life and the vastness of the ocean and the way the waves flow across the beach irregularly.

Appreciate too the apparent perfection of ripples in a still pool when a stone is dropped into it.

And let go all, as it is appropriate.

If you do not allow your body to urinate and defecate, it will fall ill, poisoned by its own waste products.  In this same fashion, if the soul does not let go of emotions when they have passed -- it too will fall ill.  So, inhale as new opportunities for stimuli arise.  Feel the emotions of the past exchanged for those of the present as you hold your breath for a few seconds.  Exhale slowly to allow the old emotions to flow out of you.  Hold your breath to allow the emptiness of your lungs bring calm to the new emotions that you have allowed to span your body.  Repeat the process.

You are feeling, you are feeling new things as change happens, you are breathing, you breathing new air as your lungs exchange that which you had for that which you now have; there, now you are alive.

Yearning to be a Child Once More

Disclaimer::  I would like to begin this blog entry with a few words to stipulate (as usual) that this entry is merely my feeble and blind wanderings through the desert of existsnce.  I feel this subject may actually be possibly more inflammatory than some of my earlier ones (I have natural desire not to unhinge people).  Therefore, let it be said that everything in my blog and in my poetry (this post and all posts before and after) are merely what I have found within myself.  They are in no way what I feel should be applied to other people.  The reflection I see in the mirror is my own, not yours, or yours, or yours.

Prologue:


Now, let's see... to be perfectly frank, the threads of this web of thought are so complex and numerous, I am currently at a loss how to construct this stream of consciousness.  Which thread to I grasp onto first?  I suppose the easiest way to approach this problem is to begin with simple facts.

1.  I post my poetry on http://deathforgets.deviantart.com .  A while back (some years), I received an email from my mother containing a photo one of her friends (the mother of a childhood friend of mine) had found, scanned into the computer and emailed to her.  My mother had forwarded me the photo.

2.  I do not have any photos on my person (where I live away from my childhood home) of myself as a child.  I may well be the only person who lives like this, or perhaps we are the vast majority.  I never presume to be special or presume that anyone else is like me -- either.  I am merely myself, and you (every person reading this) are yourselves each.

3.  I posted this photo on deviant art, as I had shown it to my muse.  She had suggested I use it as a profile photo, and I generally trust the sage advice of my muse.

4.  I have never, until tonight, posted a childhood photo of myself on Facebook.  Firstly, note number 2 (above) -- I just don't have access to said photos.  Secondly, I was simply never motivated to do so.  I had no concept of why people tended to post photos of themselves as children.  I did not understand any relation to dwelling on the past.

I do not believe I have as yet posted a blog entry on the metamorphosis I have undergone.  I will need to do to address the changes I have undergone in life, with particular examination of my most recent reincarnation, in a future blog post.  Suffice to say here, in this post, that about a month ago -- I was reborn yet again through one of the more radical alterations to my psyche and existence.  I know this sounds like the mutterings of a madman -- and I fully embrace the diagnosis as a madness of individuality.  Again, we'll discuss this in a future blog post.

Why did I mention the bit in the italics?  Even before this rather strange occurrence in which I changed, I still did not tend to dwell on the past.  I was always desiring to strive forward.  In fact, if anything, I was so focused on striving forward I was going the opposite direction of posting photos of my childhood and reminiscing.  I would daydream and panic about the future.  A common malady I know.  More widespread than the cold.

I have subsequently lost interest in panicking over future or regretting past events (stay tuned for a detailed explanation in a future blog post).  Why, then, you ask:  why did you post the photo of yourself on Facebook?  It was to serve as a bridge for this blog.  This will sound egotistical, but it is not:  I glanced at that photo as I was passing through my deviantart account, and had this sudden odd sensation of gazing upon a Bodhisattva, or enlightened soul.  That really does sound terribly arrogant and self-aggrandizing, but it is not at all intended in that fashion.  It could have been the photo of someone else I saw at that moment.  It just happened to be the photo of me.  It is not at all important or relevant that it was a photo of me, ideally.  All that matters is that it triggered a stray series of possible realization.



Analysis:

That realization was thus:  in the photo, I look like an enlightened soul.  I have no memories from this age (I think this is a photo of me when I was four).  I humbly submit the postulate that a lack of memory is indicative of no separation between conscious mind and subconscious mind -- and that the state of such a being is in the true bliss of natural thought and existence.  This would suggest that true "innocence" might be defined as an existence in which there is no distortion of the natural state, the unity between conscious and subconscious.  It is the overwhelming seduction and trauma of the world around us that pulls us from our state of bliss and tears a delineating line through the brain to create a definition of conscious and subconscious.  In the moment that we become self-aware, we are pulled into the gravitational field of sansara (the world delusion).  I humbly submit for anyone reading this post that the manner by which we enter this world does not have to destroy us from our true selves, but it is something in our upbringing or something that we are subjected to, that breaks the whole.

There are definitely many flaws in the last paragraph, and inconsistencies that I have toiled to no avail by which I might connect a bridge with no missing or damaged planks.  Instead of spending an eternity upon trying to repair the infinite microcosm of the ever-expanding sub-cosmos of the fractal of life -- I will let this stand as a "hand waving" statement, and attempt to offer other qualitative observations:

1.  I have long noticed the statements "I wish I were still a child, life was so much simpler then", "I miss the slow pace by which life passed when I was a child", and "look at the happiness in this child's eyes."

2.  I have long observed the fondness by which people treasure items from their childhood, images from their childhood, and symbols of a time before memory.

3.  Children who have not as yet gained self-awareness, have been repeatedly documented for their propensity for observation that might well go eons beyond the average person's ability to perceive themselves or the world around them.

All three items, I submit for you, as shadows that dance upon the wall, hinting at the possibility that we are not initiated into life as torn from the divine and divided from the greater reality -- but rather are surgically altered and brutally mutilated into something else other than as what we first appeared upon this physical plane.  I am not saying this is an illness or an avoidable change.  I am not condemning the passage from "innocence" as defined in the confines of this blog entry, into less innocence and onward into adulthood.  I am merely attempting to reconstruct something that is highly evasive and incredibly radical in theory (radical for me to theorize about).  When I say all of these statements, they are only mine, only me.

Whatever it is that I am seeing now, saying now, typing up now (whomever it is that I am becoming) -- all of this feels cyclic to me, as though I have this sensation that I have managed to build a connection back into my subconscious and more readily complete the whole me.  I will never desire a loss of self awareness.  I treasure, perhaps foolishly, my link with "the great world delusion", and I do hold to the postulate that in the perceived existence of contrast and duality and dichotomy within the perceived existence we share, these are the things that allow for our interaction.  I cherish interaction with the world around me, the ability to experience sensation, and the tremendous gift of conversation with other souls.

I had contemplated posing different hypotheses as to why or how we are altered into this state of suffering and desire, but there are far too many variables to account for.  Instead, I propose an image of a child at rest inside the womb.  The process of birth is a violent and brutal one, but upon the child and the mother.  I, as a member of the male gender, can only attest to second hand knowledge (hearsay).  I have experienced the process of being birthed into the world, as have we all -- but I will not ever go through the experience (wondrous and violent and horrific and beautiful) that a woman does every time she brings a new life into this place we share.  If we are tossed into this world so violently, severed from the deepest connection a child may know (the umbilical link to the maternal origin), then it is the first human who was the first domino in civilization to experience trauma -- and in so doing, passed that trauma exponentially on to others as they emerged from wombs.  A domino that caused a cascade of a domino rally.  Or, if you do not like dominoes, perhaps the following works better:  like the first pebble to fall into the calm pool of water, causing a ripple.  The more people brought into this world, the more pebbles dropped into the same pool.

We go from a population of a tribe of humans first evolving from earlier hominids, to an explosion of 7 billion souls individually dropping into the same pool, and it is no wonder that as time has passed, sansara has become more and more and more concrete.

And I offer for you, in all humility, the thought that people are drawn to their childhood images and childhood objects because subconsciously they yearn to find a way to heal their division in their mind, or perhaps it is more accurate to say:  we crave a more direct link between conscious and subconscious.  A return to that innocence of clarity.  By extension, and by all amusement, one could say that when we begin to lose the agility of spirit, and we begin to sediment into a concept of self (the whole idea that the identity and personality are established around the age of 25), we commit spiritual death.  In so committing to an abstraction of existence, we are essentially severing the flexibility and fluidity of natural living, and once and for all stating:  "I am this, forever".  It is like saying a stone will forever be a stone, and that erosion by wind or rain or water or oxidation or other processes, will have no effect.  Even that which we perceive as inanimate, changes.  Volcanoes erupt, the seasons change, the earth cycles through ice ages and more warmer periods of existence.  Ice caps shrink and grow.  To assume that our personality for even a split second is truly not a dynamic thing, is truly feeding the beast known as ego.


Though it is easy to crave what we have lost, to dream of a return to innocence -- it is not possible.  There will never be a method by which we can time travel.  Alright that's presumptuous of me to say -- we know technology overcomes unexpected obstacles.  Nothing should surprise me, and nothing should be listed as 100% impossible.  Let us say it is technologically improbable, particularly at our current state.  Since, from what we understand of existence as a collective species, that time and space are dependent variables that cannot truly be separated, how can it be possible that we might simply program a little wind-up box to move us through time.  Surely, we must also account for space.  In my mind, in order to be capable of time travel, we must be able to know precisely the extent of the universe and the location of every particle defined at the time to which we wish to return to.


Science has show thus far that evne the particles we perceived as the smallest, are composed of smaller pieces.  That which we state as having no mass at all (photons) still are said to possess a wave-particle duality.  I say to you, anything that is said to be a particle must have mass.  To be particle and be devoid of mass is to say that the sun is a star, but produces no light.  It is a nonsensical statement.  I wish to say that I believe photons merely have an imperceptible mass that we cannot detect, because we are too large in comparison.  If we were the size of an electron, we would perceive the mass of a photon.  However, if we were the size of electrons, we would have no concept of anything outside what we define here as molecules or large structures.  How could we?  We would have no method to detect where the "universe" ends, just as we cannot now.  I state from personal desire, and practical complication that time travel would not only take us to a place we remember only vaguely with great distorted sense.  I have drawn the conclusion that, for these reasons and so many more that I could list endlessly -- we should not ever time travel.  Story tellers have tried to warn us of the arrogance and ego we are making in saying we could correct or fix history.  For, every fine detail, down to the number of water molecules you drank a few on that day, are critical to the fractal that is the most incredibly wondrous thing we call life.



Conclusion:

Therefore, since I am here in this moment, as defined as an adult -- I do not wish to be a child.  I do not wish to be anything other than what I am, right now.  Here I am, humbled by the change of a breath, the movement of my own flesh and blood.  I am grateful for all that this name "Wesley" has known throughout its passage through time and space.  Every person I have known, has helped me to find where I was not -- so that I could be here, now.

And people call me egotistical for thinking I have a right to write a blog, or egotistical for owning a pair of pants.  I exaggerate ever so slightly, of course.  A good story lends itself to the act of embellishment.  I apologize that if my madness has offended you, I will still refuse medication.  I love who and what I am.  I am sorry if that is disturbing.  I am sorry if it appears as arrogant.  I am but a man whose mind is muddled by incoherent jumbles from a few things I once read about Zen.  Having read a few random passages, I thought perhaps I might misinterpret everything, and give you this jumbled, broken puzzle to decipher.



Enjoy.

EDIT:  How blissful it is to realize that I was in error to state that I had not already written something that addressed the beginnings of my new self (the reincarnation I reference to people in blog/poetry/conversation).  That entry is this

Funsized and Her Knight: A Fairytale

I write this blog to share my inner feelings and my fragmented, fermented experiences that relate to things that are personal.  I try to illustrate in words what I cannot capture in images or demonstrate through pure action.  I wish to convey to other souls that I am not limited by the use of this abstraction that I am building from.  The medium I have chosen for my artistic endeavors is not as stale or stagnant as others have claimed.  I believe language can be a useful tool in the communication between disparate individuals, and I do believe that communication is one of the most incredibly beautiful things that we can invest energy into.  I celebrate any time communication can overcome the subjective differences of the past, and the pressure of those who love and believe they have our best interests in mind.  Thus, I wish to tell you a fairy tale that might potentially provide such a revelation.  I will attempt to weave such a historical piece not from the distant realms of castles and knights and nymphs, or leprechauns and enchanted forests -- but instead from the very fabric of this reality that we have constructed together to provide us a method of bridging the gaps between our souls.

I am going to record, here, in this blog entry:  the beginnings of a story that will only end in a the very distant future.  Right now, where I sit, here, in this temporal position.  This is just the preface of a greater adventure that two very brave and radiant souls have begun upon.  While I have but bits and pieces of this splendid and magnificent triumph, I shall in all humility, do my best to provide what moth-eaten memories I have managed to preserve.  In this tale, I shall speak of two primary protagonists:  one male, and one female.  These are the essential ingredients, after all, for any heterosexual love story.  Here are things as I remember them.



* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *



I cannot precisely recall the specifics of my meeting our young male protagonist.  In that, I mean, I cannot tell you precisely what year or what quarter it was.  The records the university used to have posted online that might have allowed me to reconstruct my memory, have been deleted -- and the details are not honestly absolutely of a critical quality.  Imagine, if you will, I am a now an very elderly individual whose youth was spent in some studious profession.  In kind, I met our young hero in the initial capacity as a tutor.  At this time I was a tutor to the apothecary.  The records where information detailing how I went through life were written on parchment, which having encountered the floods of more recent unfortunate weather events in my humble abode, became water-logged and nearly indecipherable.  Regardless, our hero was a troubled spirit when first this humble story teller crossed paths with him.  He was quite powerful, even then, but had been scarred by such horrors and awful tragedies he had beheld first hand in battle -- it is little wonder he did not realize his own potential.  Our hero was a impressive figure, walking with the clear air of a knight errant, though with a ferocity reminiscent of the most regal of citizens (he does this without realizing it).  Like any brave soldier whose life had been spent far too close to the line, he carried fallen comrades with him, and the guilt that goes with it.  He was to later inform me that it was my persistence and belief in him that gave him the strength to hold strong through his studies, and graduate from the university.  After the brief honor I was bestowed as serving as his tutor, we retained contact through occasional conversations on the wondrous electronic world of Facebook.  This will be the first time I mention this strange yet useful tool.  For, had it not been for Facebook, I might well not have had the continued pleasure of calling our hero my friend.

I could attempt to dig through more water-logged parchments from my distant past, in an effort to pull forth more candid images of our hero from his early days, but I do not believe my efforts would be of much avail.  My poor records are quite damaged, and they would not do much to contribute to the wonder of what this tale really is about, anyway.  It should be suffice to say that our hero was a fantastic person from the get go, but was unable to accept himself for the glorious soul that he has always been.

But that will not always be the case.

Now, let us jump forward a couple years.  Our hero graduates in the Spring of 2008 and moves out of the Kingdom of Davis, to a distant land.  It is now the Winter Quarter of the year 2009.  I am once more serving as a tutor, this time for the court physician.  One of my students was our glorious heroine.  Slight of frame and clever of wit, as all who met her would easily recall, our heroine made an impression upon anyone that crossed paths with her.  Unlike many of similar stature, she never suffered from any sort of inferiority complex that might have plagued such historical figures as Napoleon.  In fact, if anything, our heroine might well be one of the most solidly-composed individuals this old man has been so humbly fortunate to have crossed paths with.  By the end of the time that she spent studying under my tutelage, it was clear she would surpass any of her instructors (most easily of those being myself).  I have no doubt that, should she read these passages, she will deny and possibly scold this old man for having written such words, but I cannot in good conscience write anything less than such truth.

Now, it is unnecessary to describe many events that transgressed, for in truth just as my memory cannot reconstruct a lot of these aforementioned events, I have an even more difficult time recalling other elements that are not critical to this story.  Let us summarize events in this cohesive and poorly-crafted method.  Our heroine was being courted for some time by an individual whose qualities did not coincide very well with her own.  This is not to speak ill of other souls whose spirits are undoubtedly valuable in their own right.  It is to say, they were ill-matched.  It would be like saying you were trying to drink milk with orange juice.  Both beverages are delicious to those who enjoy them, and separately are quite nutritious.  However, combining the two is ill-advised.  In doing so, you will cause the milk to curdle and experience a most unpleasant stomach ache.  For a brief period in the temporal record, this old codger did spend time over meals and coffee, conversing with our young heroine, and in doing so -- did end this previously-mentioned courtship.  This was a critical event, as it freed our heroine from this previous romantic entanglement.  How can we have our heroine and hero dance, if they are with other partners?  It is only rational.

Recall that by this time, that though both our heroine and hero had attended the same scholarly court -- our hero had departed the court for a distant kingdom.  He was within no proximity of our heroine.  Thus, though try as I might, I cannot envision this story without my limited involvement.  The next important event in this tale is the creation of a most magical piece of artwork:  we shall refer to it as The Wolf and the Wave.  Our heroine, among her infinite talents, possesses great artistic craft.  With her gift for constructing images from pigment and parchment, she gave to this humble soul an illustration of two things I hold most sacred.  I think you can guess what they are based upon the name of the artwork.  I received this gift in the month of June, as an incredibly generous item for my birthday.  Wishing to display the amazing talents of our heroine for all the world to observe, I utilized the photolithic wonder known as a digital scanner, and transmuted a digital version of the Wolf and the Wave to the incorporeal realm of Facebook.  In August of this same year (2009), our hero logged into Facebook and beheld the incredible illustration our heroine had devised.  Spellbound, he summoned a chat window and sent me in no less than these approximate words:

"Wes, can you inform the young woman who created that artwork, just how incredibly gifted and talented she is?"

In receiving that message, I had one of the very very few clear moments of insight into the greater workings of the universe that I shall ever be so fortunate to have.  Like a jolt of lightning to the brain, or perhaps pure insanity -- I realized something more powerful was occurring.  Knowing full well the modest and humble approach in life that our hero has always taken, I replied:

"Dude, I won't do that for you.  You can leave her a message yourself and tell her just how you feel!"

In that moment, I know the Divine had at least, for once, helped me make a correct decision in life.  For his message and her reply upon my Facebook wall post would be the first exchange of words these two would have, despite their disparate locations in physical dimensions (spacial not temporal).  From that moment, life would never be the same for them, for myself, and for those around them.  What would ensue in the months to follow between August and close to the end of October, would be the sort of amazing turmoil that only they could truly convey.  I, having only hearsay and secondhand observation, cannot in good conscience attempt to capture even a shadow on the wall that would do justice to what they and those who loved them both, endured as they would dance around one another.  Our hero and heroine are two most radiant and amazing souls, with very diverse backgrounds consisting of composite variables that made communication a most problematic and complicated procedure.  They began by constructing a very rapid and deep friendship due to their many many shared passions and interests in life.  But, as such deeply intense connections can do, this also gave rise to what appeared to be an insurmountable chasm between their very souls.  Had you stood beside them, at times, during the months leading up to the next important aspect of this tale -- you would have quite likely been required to seek refuge in an asylum.  For, these two souls so enhanced and amplified one another, it was as though one were not staring at one, but two suns going supernova, so bright were they shining.

I do not wish to focus upon these months, as I do believe I have conveyed already to the best of my ability, what transgressed.

Let us move forward to the next great event, which heretofore shall be referred to as The Great Trial, or The Forge, for it tempered their connection and brought to the surface what all those blessed to know them now gather close to bask in the radiance of.  It was late November, and is the tradition -- it was Thanksgiving time.  I do not know all the details, but from my poor and limited comprehension, our hero accompanied our heroine down to the court of her mother to share this holiday with them.  It was during this journey and intimate time that they finally accepted their affection for one another.  However, our heroine's mother discovered their affection.  Unfortunate to the tale of our two protagonists, our heroine's mother does not approve of our hero (for reasons that I am unable to comprehend).  Let it be said that I have here in my records something suggesting an unfortunate personal experience for the maternal ward of our heroine, and therefore I am led to believe that our heroine's mother acted out of instinct -- believing herself to be protecting her child.  What transgressed was this:  our heroine's mother cast our hero out of her court and forced him to journey many hundreds of leagues back to his residence, alone.  I was myself residing in my city of origin, at the time, when I received a crystal ball transmission from our hero while he was traveling by mass coach back to his realm.  Our most distraught hero, broken to the bone, wept of his most desperate anguish and shame for having caused any turmoil between our heroine and her mother.  Having experienced for a brief moment, true love, our hero was understandably torn asunder.  However, true to his nature as the most gallant soul that he is, our hero swore to me that he would never trouble our heroine again.  He refused to be a source of pain or conflict for anyone, much less someone he was so utterly and completely devoted to.  I, in sagely old age, did my best to console our hero and told him to contact me once more upon his imminent arrival at his domicile.

Hours would pass before I heard from our hero once more.

When at last I did receive another crystal ball communication, our hero's mood had altered.  He was no longer the wraith of a man whose soul had been banished to Hell.  Nay, instead our hero was as an elated spirit whose victorious achievement of his quest had brought him not only glory, but the favor of the woman he worshiped.  Thus, it was, that our hero conveyed to me the determination with which our heroine had informed him via her own crystal ball, that he would be in real trouble, if he tried to never speak or see her again.  To attempt to quote our heroine:

"You can run to the ends of the earth and hide in the deepest hole, and I will still find you and drag you back (chained if I must) to be with me.  There is no way in Heaven or Hell I'm going to lose what we have!"

And rightly so, I must say.  It was our heroine's determination that gave these two amazing people the strength to commit to their love.  Not only has their true love survived any test thrown upon it by obstacles external or internal.  It has grown and flourished, as those around them have been so fortunate as to witness.  Thus it was that love triumphed over communication and disparate distance and experience.  With each passing day, our hero discovered himself anew through the eyes of his beloved, and our heroine grew too.  Not in stature (for such a feat is not possible, not even for our amazing heroine).  Nay, she grew in talent, and determination.

And last weekend, on the same day I dug up the Wolf and the Wave, and went to the art store to have it framed and permanently displayed proudly upon my wall -- our heroine and hero became engaged to marry.  I do not think I can recall too many other moments when I have heard the angels in Heaven sing with more happiness than upon this occasion.  Few are such moments when such amazing and true love are seen.


I would like to end this piece with a simple expression of my gratitude to both our protagonists for allowing me to retain their friendship -- for great and immense is the honor to this humble scribe to have such amazing companions.

Mistakes Do Not Exist

Prologue: 

The aforementioned blog title occurred to me last night, while experiencing an emotional crisis of internal origin.  In truth, I had been contemplating this topic since I had begun work upon the hardest thing I've done in my life thus far:  forgiving myself.  Forever and a day, have I quite often contemplated (as I know so many other souls do as well) the "what if" questions of choices we've been made, or that others have made.  From the smallest decisions that seem so insignificant that they don't appear to influence any other lives, to the largest buttons being pressed by those who regulate entire nations -- all of these variables combine through parallel and perpendicular coordinates of time and space and other dimensions far beyond my humble comprehension.  Like electrons or photons whose spin will be detected as dependent upon the other regardless of distance between two the two subatomic particles, I had a sudden and profound sense of change in the world that occurs from something as simple as the cockroach I killed last night or the bacteria dying inside my mouth when I choose to brush my teeth.  It isn't to say I think that in cleansing my teeth twice or thrice a day, I am brewing hurricanes along the gulf of Mexico or stewing up more earthquakes along the already-ravaged coast lines of Asia (my heart pours out not only for the victims of Japan, but for those in Africa and the Middle East, and South America, and those I have passed in the streets of Sacramento).

Yet when I kill a cockroach at 2AM on a Wednesday morning, just before I a try to crawl into bed for a few hours respite from my tangled neurons, I am altering the timeline of the world.  No matter how minuscule, (to steal lyrics from Sting):  every breath you take, every move you make, every smile you fake -- you are indeed altering the course of others around you.

If I send a text message to someone, if I send an email to someone.  If I think about sending a message to someone, and do not -- all of these choices change microcosms that alter macrocosms that create the indecipherable yet all too predictable fractal of the living universe.



Postulate: The Divine divides itself into the infinite that we perceive, and yet retains itself in the whole that are the billion upon billion stars and molecules and quarks and smiles and grass hoppers and gloomy weeping willows.



Contemplation:

Over here, right now I sit at a desk in Sacramento.  While I wait for my actual work that I conduct in sansara, I write abstractions of my interactions with you who are reading this, with the people I rode beside on the bus, with the birds flying overhead, and with the tangle of people I cherish as holy and sacred.  Every single person to whom I have said dearest friend and smiled with genuine concern, every single one of you has affected me as I know I have affected you.  Like magnets, like energy-wave-matter-particle-perception-inconceivable dream-wake-dreariness, this stream of consciousness that I dare assign my current name to:  all that is, all that was, all that will be -- there are no mistakes.

Even that which I have regretted or wished to have pass but did not, these intentions or misinterpretations or miscommunications and chances that have passed -- these are not things I can regret any longer.  For had not this very specific sequence of events occurred, I would not be able to offer this humble stream of consciousness to you, now.  From where I sit, watching the world watch me, it is with meaning and without meaning; I am an inconceivable question to myself that I am attempting to answer.  These are not mistakes, even when these actions or these words or these silences have caused me to weep or wring my hands and tear at my back.  Even when the blood upon my hands is not my own, these are not mistakes.  These are lessons, and lyrics that have come to pass.  In a composition I cannot sing, since I was never taught to read sheet music, I can still give thanks even for those moments that have nearly driven me to complete annihilation.

Does any of this make sense to anyone else but me?  I do not worry.  I write these blog entries for myself, in the hopes that the process of pressing keys will bring me a lighter heart.  Nay, my heart is already full, brimming with the sweet wine of graciousness that I may be here, right now, breathing, listening to the music of someone I will never meet.  How miraculous!

For a long time, so many people have called me arrogant or proud or egotistical.  For so long, I was made to feel guilty for the bite I took from the meal I had dared to cook for myself.  I tried to slit my own wrists (figuratively).  I tried to use white out to erase myself from past blog entries, from photographs, from people's cell phones; I tried to isolate myself from the rest of the world, so that the world could be pure of me.  Then a friend sends me a text thanking me for being there oh so many years ago, to listen.  A friend calls me on the phone, asking if I'd like to share a pitcher of beer and celebrate their success.  A friend calls me, weeping over a relationship about to hit the cliffs and sink beneath the stormy seas -- and I hesitate to answer the phone.  I think:  I am not important enough to need a phone.

I do not matter.

But that is another form of sansara, the world delusion.

It is just an inversion of the ego.



-1 x (ego)

And thus, there is still ego involved.

Staring at this equation like a cloud in the sky drifting across the sun, I thought further.  I suddenly realized and said to myself:  it is actually egotistical to call something an error or a mistake.

Thus, in my humble opinion, I must offer these words:  it is arrogant to assume that anything we have felt anguish over in life, anything that we did not agree with, was a mistake.  In calling something a regret or a mistake, we  are daring to say "our perspective is the only perspective that matters".

Now that is real arrogance.



Conclusion:

 My opinion only really matters to me, and to anyone who wishes to consider it something valid and viable.  I would never ask anyone to listen to what I have to say.  I listen to myself because I am myself.  This is what I am.  I stop removing myself from the equation and committing the sin of trying to destroy myself.  I stop trying to commit a form of suicide that would actually not only harm myself, but all those that I am so blessed to interact with!  How dare I insult those whose radiant affection and kindness has enriched my life beyond my wildest dreams.  So, to honor any and all friends and family, I am going to stand with my back straight, when I have the strength to do so.  I am going to stride forward.  Here I am, dearest loved ones.  I have made no mistakes.  I am merely learning, and the more I learn, the more ignorant and blissful I become.  As the infinite fills my eyes and folds up into my pockets, I am the sunlight in all directions.

There are no mistakes, merely experiences and lessons I hope I can truly take into account in my continued evolution.  Cause and effect.  That I live, I have the option to change.  That I change, I live.

Forgiveness Brings Freedom

This will be a stream of consciousness regarding the title topic with potential subtopic tangents that hopefully will give broader perspective of what I am trying to convey.

Let's begin with the postulate:  In forgiveness, there is freedom.


Background:  I grew up believing that you should be forgiving and patient with people to a point, but that you should not allow yourself to be taken advantage of.  As I got older, forgiving people who tried to take advantage of me, or even inflict harm upon me, seemed to be a poor decision.  I began to feel it ran contrary to the idea of "looking out" for myself.  I would bear grudges for a long time, if someone caused me great emotional pain or turmoil.  Without realizing it, I was slowly collecting quantities of negative emotion in buckets, like dirty water that had been soiled after cleansing the body.  But, instead of allowing the water to flow free back into the world where it might dissipate the dirt and grime that others had intentionally or unintentionally flung upon me, I kept it close to me.  In retrospect, it is little wonder that upon reaching adulthood I was stricken with depression and became quite chronically ill.  Anyone who knew me through my years in college and even up till recently, would have sensed this in some fashion or another.  Mine was not an uncommon malady.  In fact, I suspect it is quite routine to become so poisoned by years of wear and tear.

Conceptual:  Many traditional ways of coping with this affliction tend to take the form of physical inebriation, self-deprecation, denial, externalization (blaming outside sources and taking no personal responsibility), and outright self destruction.  It is arguable that all of these are, in one form or another, a type of self destruction.  It is rational that the autonomic response is a pre-programmed method of suicide.  Like cells in our body that accumulate an unrepairable mutation that could give rise to cancer, perhaps our own sentience contains some form of underlying subconscious whole-organism codes for apoptosis.  It would make sense from a mentality of protecting the species to have members that are ill, weed themselves out to strengthen the larger group.  However, the conflict between the subconscious and conscious minds arises in the act of gaining self-awareness.  At least, when we become so involved with what might be termed 'the world delusion', we lose track of the fact that there really should be no division between the subconscious and conscious minds.  When there is a division between the two, and the being as a whole is afflicted with emotional and spiritual pain and anguish such that the subconscious begins to seek an end to the torment and the conscious mind rejects the destruction, you can become an incredibly destructive person in the larger world around you.  Alternatively, if you give into the pre-programmed whole-organism apoptosis - you have failed to find the source of your problem and are merely surrendering to the easiest path out.  Life isn't about simplicity.  At least not when it comes to sansara.

Intermission:  I make no apologies for what I speak here in this blog post, previous blog posts, or future blog posts.  I speak only from my perspective and completely ignorance.  I have had suicidal thoughts.  I have contemplated killing myself, but chose not to.  At first, I could not end my own life because I did not wish to damage my body or my spirit.  Even in my moments of greatest despair, I could not damage what I felt was a functional living entity.  How could I damage my body or take my own life, when there are people in the world who have far less than I do (either in physical body or in mind or spirit) and yet have a desire to live?  Contrary to the concept of an honorable death by my own hand, taking my own life at this point would have been a great dishonor not only to myself, but to those who cared for me.

Footnotes:  Let us bring into a parallel vein, the concept that all of these poisons, all of these negative feelings, all of these inabilities to forgive people for the things I perceived as wrongs perpetrated against me -- they were sleeping giants attached to my back.  They were huge stone idols I pulled with me everywhere.  They were giant leather brief cases loaded with the endless paperwork and detailed transactions between myself and others.  I was paying "back taxes" on things that hadn't had any real meaning in my life for perhaps decades.  I will not list the specific details of things that I have carried with me (the actual passages of my life are not critical to this entry), but I will say that the first step for me, was to awaken the giants.  This is not what I would say is the method anyone else may need to use.  It is incredibly dangerous to awaken the giants that have been kept in a comatose state by IV drugs such as my misery and wrath.  I can quite honestly say that in waking them, I came closer at times in the past few months to my own self destruction than I have ever been.  I doused my soul in so many flammable reagents and explosive sediments, that the single spark that ignited the entire thing very nearly consumed me.  In fact, to honest, I cannot say that it did not truly consume me and devour what I had been.  This is, however, a beautiful image in its own right.

Conclusions:  After the flames died down, I awoke.  Like a phoenix reborn, I had the sudden epiphany that forgiving everything and everyone was not only an immensely positive and purifying process -- it would sever the chains that had burdened me for so long.  It was not the sudden sensation of removing heavy shoes that gave rise to light feet, nor was it the sudden sensation of angelic revelation that comes from confessing sins.

In all candor, I don't believe in sin.  Not as any organized faith of any dogmatic practice from any nation or region of the world would define it.

The strings that have held be to all of the experiences of the past, like a giant spider's web into which I had flown and struggled and in so struggling, had become nearly inescapably trapped -- these threads are severed.  I am no greater than what I was before.  I am another Homo sapiens sapiens with a pulse and breath and face capable of smiling and frowning, eyes capable of mirth or mourning.  But, I am free.  That sorrow that I have carried for so many years, is gone.  It just evaporated in a split second.  Dissolved into the earth and took with it the vast giants whose weight had nearly struck me down.  I am sharing this with the world not because I am hoping anyone will follow in my foot steps.  I would never think that my chosen path is applicable to anyone but me.  The path that has found me, is the one I shall walk.  I just wish to express that I find forgiveness to be the single greatest liberation I have ever experienced.

And in conclusion, I will readily admit that other people are easier to let go of.  I have always taken the greatest responsibility or sense blame upon myself.

The most difficult person of all to forgive was myself. 

Why "Dark Poetry" is Perceived As "Deep"

I've often contemplated, as a poet, why poetry touching on emotions and subjects of sorrow, misery, anger, rage, despair and the vast variety of negative emotions are considered to possess "deep meaning."  As a child I believed these things were deeper, because happiness was a surface emotion that merely disguised the misery and suffering everyone must be enduring in what I felt was an purely cruel and unjust world.  Happy poetry, I felt, contained no substance.  It was merely fluff and nonsense.  Like writing an owner's manual that explained nothing.

I know this is not the truth.

Instead i propose the following explanation:

It's easier to find "depth" in sorrow and sadness and negative emotions, or at least to believe it exists there, because those emotions are dark, which is perceived as "deep".  They are often buried and confined, contained and hidden from view.  These emotions gather in the cavernous pits of our stomach and digestive tract, they cram tightly into knots along the our backs.  Tying us into heaps of useless meat, overcooked and fraught with senses of failure and powerlessness.

Poems that delve into those depths, that drag these emotions to the surface and illuminate them in the light of day or the brilliant flickering light of a candle are deep because they must be deep to reach their goal.  Like a deep sea adventure or a crazy dive into the uncharted paths of narrow and twisting caves, poems that struggle with what we struggle, are an adventure as much as the psyche can be an adventure.  Let's face it, the brain is such an incredibly complex mystery with deep fissures and folds, twists and turns like an impossible maze of hedges that we might never decipher. 

Light-hearted (happy) poetry can be deep as well.  I am not stating that happy poetry cannot contain profound observations on the human existence, profound observations that might strike chords with millions of readers, profound imagery that might brighten other people's lives or profound repetition of a word or phrase that hammers home a point that the writer is trying to express.

For some reason this entire stream of consciousness reminds me of a quote from the film "High Fidelity":

Was I depressed because I listened to pop music, or did I listen to pop music because I was depressed?

Alright, so it doesn't relate very well to my topic, but I'll be damned if I don't simply love that statement and see it as something profound in commentary about mass media, society, and culture.  As a poet, I wonder:  do I write depressing poetry because I'm depressed, or do I become depressed in order that I might create depressing poetry, because it is more readily and easily perceived as deep.