On This Big Round Rock

I can’t count the number of times I’ve closed my eyes and aimed my face at the sun, but I can remember what it feels like to have that warm light radiating down on me. The tighter I close my eyes the wider my smile gets. I’m 30 years old and I still get happy every time I see the sun shining.

In the depths of depression, it’s impossible to walk outside and even see the sun, let alone feel its warmth. There sets a glaze over the eyes of the depressed soul. The existence of love within, the fullness of spirit, the magic of life that causes wonder – all of this becomes lost. The deception is that it is right there around us all the time, we just lose track of it, we become wrapped up in the distractions of the world. As we gain one thing that we desired, we decide that it doesn’t make us happy enough, so we look for something else to make us happy. This half-life of happiness, that worldly objects barely afford us, is what causes the gradual decay of our ability to love life.

I used to tell a girl, “Living life loving you makes loving life easy to do.” The problem was that if that person ever went away (which she did), loving life would, by default, become harder to do. I now assert that living life loving, makes loving life easy to do.

To find solace in the mundane things, by remembering all that we have and have achieved, is the answer to overcoming the foolish ruses of the deceiver. The world is God’s creation but it can certainly be the devil’s playground if we allow it. Stripping down and letting go of the chains of remorse, wanton desire and greed, will help us to ford that mucky river and find that shallow, narrow path once again!

No matter your geographic location, you can always close your eyes and be in the same place every time. Within your mind, heart and soul is where the love is that you keep for your loved ones. Your family and friends are all there collectively. We can all look up together, at the night sky, and see the same sky. We’re all on this rock together!

Requiem For a Joyful Journey

What a joy it is, this wonderful place! To get away alone for a day, only a faint trace of the human race. To live in Utah, in this mountainous wonderland…I hear the sounds of a distant stream, the subtle crackles from firewood, the flicker of light in the distance…

Sitting in the back of the Cherokee, writing down simple thoughts, thanking God for who I am, and forgetting about what I am not. The bright future lies ahead, and I remember the river…flowing as it did and I followed it. She cleansed my life, once in shambles–yet now there is a glimmer, a reflection of light on the other end of a long tunnel…

The Sophistication of Modern Medicine

written in January of 2001

I transcribe some of my earlier writing to illustrate a brief image of how I felt and still feel about the commercial drug market…

Sophisticated drug dealers, from the other side, wearing white jackets, labcoats…they get you in their clutches, and you’re more addicted than a junkie.

of course…their needles are all sterile

of course…their drugs are much more powerful

of course…their test tubes make the drugs that are pure, and they kill the pain– but never eradicate the root of the problem

No matter which side you’re on, the system is going to get you. We’re a nation, a people, a planet– all addicted. We’re born into it and life is about breaking out of it…

We do not have to allow this, this is not our fate, we will overcome this. Don’t let the doctors win, the white-jackets, the pill-pushers, just because their scheme dresses as a legal market aiming to heal the planet…this guise, this ruse, we must refuse…

The answer to beating this is in organic self-initiated attacks on the disease.

Self Intervention

Friday, July 9

Every time I watch the television show Intervention, I get my hopes up for the individual(s) featured in the episode. The producers of the show usually do an excellent job of introducing each character and drawing the audience into their stories.

The show is actually quite depressing. 90% of the time, whatever the problem, the person ends up going to the rehabilitation program that the producers are offering. You get to see how happy the family is that they finally decide to quit drinking or shooting heroin or throwing up after binge-eating. Then they show how healthy and happy the person is after a couple of months of treatment.

At the end of each show, you can expect to find out that after getting a taste of the good life, the drugs and alcohol ultimately defeat the individual. You’ll see something like, “After 90 days of treatment, Ryan went back home to his family and relapsed on heroin.” This is where I get pissed-off, because it is the same story over and over.

Drugs and alcohol, along with mental illness, are destroying our civilization. Human beings all over the world are bombarded with tempations to “drop-out” of day-to-day life. One of the endless reasons why this happens is because drugs and alcohol do actually have something to offer. Being drunk or high feels good…for a little while.

If you are a family member or friend of someone with a drug or alcohol problem, or mental illness, you may have a hard time understanding what this person is going through. You may find it impossible to pinpoint why they are doing what they are doing. I may be able to shed some light on this topic…this blog will aim to do just that.