Turn off and write.
Are you there?
yes you ask everyitme and i am always. have you ever heard me ssay no? when you ask?
no
do you say no to asking?
yes. and to typos…
funny. now. listen and we’ll type. slow down and see only what you see. this question of self and what is not self.
before i remember asking always about other and not-other.
so here the question remains and the understanding has changed.
i am also texting aunt kerrie as i type this.
my god i love my family.
now lets begin. continue w family and also listen. you have done all that follows, now here you are back. i know you are hungry, but don’t move just type. just listen.
ok
so here now is the past. you are living in memory of what has happened. you are seeing the possibility of what may happen based on your memory of time. time changes. time
the clock in rehearsal – and then they said every day ay 4:06 or something it resets – it winds all around clockwise for a bit and then returns to the correct time. this happened on sunday and we thought it was us.
i am too deep in to hear you …
no, you can. listen. people need help. praying is good. not doing harm is good. but your own heart is a minefield. you turned away some one you love. you must turn away from people you love. sometimes. from hurt. there is no fault. but it is not fate. you can turn away. she was right when she replied “well, then move your ‘fucking face’ “. Turn away from things, change your idea of what is good for you. it is okay. let this human existence teach you something here. what are you seeing as you? why are you any less value than an other? what does that say about how you might be behaving?
i am not like others. there are those who seem to be all that i…
name them if u must but it does not matter.
and so now what?
now you say, wow. i do not want what i have.
but i have sunshine and life.
you have breath. you have voice. you have sense. so let the sadness, guilt, pain, fear go. let it go.
right, those are the things that i have that i do not want. and now what do i want that i have? mia, nate, rhys, family, mom, dad, all of these people that i care about and friends so many i could not fit them all in my home. who needs a home when you have so many friends to visit?
(Oh!) the places you go are your home. you are your home. the tortoise. you are moving slow, but look at the time and space!
my questions my smiles my movement…
Of course this question of self and what is not-self. i sit here in this bed my back does ache. walking and typing would be awesome, standing moving around and just speaking and having what i say transcribed. or maybe just heard.
ok so practice asking questions and listening to answers.
what is the self?
why do we hurt each other and our selves. each other who is our self.
When I say “I”, I mean “you”.
That may have been the most magical moment of my life. A bit of what mothers must feel maybe… this total connection to life itself. to the person on the other end of the line. A woman, who was going to be taking her son for a birthday party in the park or at least that is how i remember it now (my memory is quite literally a problem, and at times it feels sensorially photographic sans image – just the feeling and thoughts after an unknown. It is this way. And if this is the way i will feel as time is now – no pastpresentfuture then okay, but – there are other things i am feeling right now. as life fights in my smoker’s chest for the existence of not being stifled. my throat and lungs are coated. now let them seep truth)
shit. okay – go back to the story, stay in… so i am speaking to a woman who works for a company I called to get a copy of my car title. So in between official business we are having a conversation as we ask one another about where we are, the weather, etc. In between our conversation she reads the contract to me over the phone to authorize my agreement. A text well-rehearsed she must have said it many times and inside of it she paused: “When I say ‘I’, I mean ‘you'”, waited for my understanding and went on with the contract dialogue. After our work was complete, I repeated the words to her, telling her how blown away I was at that statement / idea / understanding for existence “When I say I, I mean you” ! Of course. and later I realized When I say You, I mean Me. When I say They, I mean Us. When I say Us, I mean All.
I am an emotional sieve. “Heart on sleeve” is something I hear often. If I am a ‘no thank you’ on something – you know it. And probably so does everyone else in the room. I do not do well at hiding my no thank yous or my yes pleases. There is an emotional ruler that I have been in service to for all of my life… but there’s something else, too.
Ah, time yu ol so en so
So here I am – it is good to look around – asking people to ask the question. What is “self”?
I have dozens of recordings of people asking themselves the question and sharing their thoughts.
Sitting around a table of friends, they talk about their experiences dancing and creating with me. Nick Gore is adamant, says I should be louder about my work, that someone needs to tell my story because something amazing is happening here. heheheh
“The world is always close to catastrophe. But it seems to be closer now. Seeing this approaching catastrophe, most of us take shelter in idea. We think that this catastrophe, this crisis, can be solved by an ideology. Ideology is always an impediment to direct relationship, which prevents action. We want peace only as an idea, but not as an actuality. We want peace on the verbal level, which is only on the thinking level, though we proudly call it the intellectual level. But the word peace is not peace. Peace can only be when the confusion which you and another make ceases. We are attached to the world of ideas and not to peace. We search for new social and political patterns and not for peace; we are concerned with the reconciliation of effects and not in putting aside the cause of war. This search will bring only answers conditioned by the past. This conditioning is what we call knowledge, experience; and the new changing facts are translated, interpreted, according to this knowledge. So, there is conflict between what is and the experience that has been. The past, which is knowledge, must ever be in conflict with the fact, which is ever in the present. So, this will not solve the problem but will perpetuate the conditions that have created the problem.”
– J. Krishnamurti, The Book of Life
I think of Wilbur Arnold and the Artful Living program and how blessed I am to be part of its making. Krishnamurti speaks on the Art of Living. I am reminded of all that is connected to me (by which I mean we).
I took the photo above at Wild Goose and didn’t write down the artist’s name, it is a big hanging paper lamp. Go and see.
Cole G 