STICKS AND STONES

“Sticks and stones may break my bones but words will never hurt me.” I would like to think that the faith within our hearts is stronger that the book we live by.  They can burn a million books, but they can’t out the fire of my faith within me.  One ignorant act can create a domino effect of a blood bath, and will it be justified?  Will the screams of women and innocent children be the retribution to one single match?

The world is filled with many ignorant individuals, but ignorance is fuelled by uncontrolled egos, and when you add them all up, their formula equals mass destruction.  And in a world of a million followers and one leader, blind faith is a dangerous catalyst that can burn like bush fire through a virgin forest.  

Followers rarely step back and examine pre-actions, and leaders most times are too busy creating strategies to stroke their egos, so that they may shine in their own glory as news-networks across the world treat them like the paparazzi treats movie stars. What would happen if ignorance is downplayed, and treated for what it is, a jackass looking for fame, at the closing of a people’s holy season.

It’s like children in a playground.  The bully awakens the fear among the weak, and the weak are considered cowards for not fighting back. When in reality the bully hides his fear behind his actions. Most times it’s the unpopular kid looking for a little attention.  And we all know there is good and bad attention, but attention is attention at the end of the day.  As adults we play the same “Look at me, look what I can do” games in the hopes that we will get the attention we seek.

Sometimes adulthood is simply years masking childhood insecurities that have been left to ferment and stink.

In my opinion, Mr Jones is getting far too much publicity for his ignorance and notice, I said Mr and not pastor, and the closer some claim to be to God the further back they stand. Whatever Mr. Jones views are on Islam, it’s his views. We are all guilty of condemning other’s beliefs, maybe not publically, but if we examine ourselves, we do.

We live in a land where democracy is the king of freedom of expression. Jones burning of the Koran is his act of bullying. It is a shame that he can’t live and let live, and allow other groups the freedom and right to worship.  But the more attention we place on him, creates that domino effect that can spiral out of control.

Sensationalism as it stands sells news, and increases ratings, but even that has its price...especially with today’s self serving agendas.  There is hardly any consideration placed on the needs of our fellow man, because from major conglomerates to individuals, masturbation is really the order of the day. 

The sum of all our paths

      Logically, the sum of one plus one, will always equal two, and when presented with linear equations, there are formulas to find the proverbial x and y.  Life makes sense because there are rules and solutions and it is easy to find the correct answer after the equal sign.

Love on the other hand is not a variable like numbers to be worked out with some formula. For the most part the problem can’t be laid out, since most times it is impossible to see the entire sum before us, and this is just in our everyday life. Hmmm imagine if we layered that with past life incarnations, and the spiritual threads connecting us with others in this lifetime. How can we ever comprehend the magnitude of this soul problem. Perhaps if there was some way to take all our incarnations and our association with certain individuals, plus the complexity of the mind and heart, maybe we might venture close to finding the answers we seek from time to time. Love then, can don a resemblance to logic as we know it…unfortunately we don’t and can’t have those variables before us. So what we are left with is a mathematical sum that is missing 90% of the numbers. How can we ever work out the solution?

Perhaps life is not about finding answers, but rather about searching for the lessons that we are presented with. For example, let’s say in a past life, two souls found themselves in a mother child relationship, and the mother abandoned the child for whatever reason, and the child grew up feeling abandoned all its life.  And in this lifetime, these same two souls enter into a husband and wife relationship, where the wife feels that one day her husband will walk out on her, and she places an additional stress on their marriage, and the husband doesn’t understand her fear, for him leaving her. Her problem is that she brought her past fears back with her, in this lifetime.  Okay let us take that a step even further, what if, the said woman becomes the victim of a terrible accident where she is rendered paralyze, and her husband is forced to care for her for the rest of his life. Perhaps when he says his prayers he asks God ‘why him’ do you think he will get the answer, that he is learning responsibility due to something he did in a past life, probably not.

So these variables to situations and problems are not only unexplainable, for the average person it will be unbelievable.  It will be like telling someone from the 18^th century, that men will one day walk on the moon.

Babies crawl, and then walk. Talk when they are good and ready. Our problems are the results of so many situations that we can’t even fathom; we can make great ‘guesstulations’, but that is the most any of us can do. In an ideal world, given all variables, life is logical, love is too, to a certain extent. We are that candle in the wilderness, exposed to so much darkness, that all we see in front of us, is the pathway to go one step at a time while trusting in the universe, that the lessons we encounter is necessary…and are rather building blocks to a bigger picture we can’t see.

Visibility

Safe spaces are underrated, but if it weren’t for them, the day will feel like 50 hours long, burdened by a mixture of positive and negative self consumed thoughts about being who I am.

Yesterday I ventured into POS, simply because I had been craving a ‘Sally’s double’s for a while, and since I had some time to kill, I detoured down town, parked opposite Church’s Chicken and walked to the Sally’s doubles stand near the Jerk stand. I stood behind a score of people waiting, some with napkins in hand, some eating. My eyes caught sight of a woman with short dreadlocks, giving another woman the eye, her lips pointing to me. The woman looked back and caught my eye. I neither smiled nor diverted my gaze. Somehow in that brief moment between glances so many thoughts flooded me, reminding me of those many insecurities I thought I had crumpled and thrown away.  But unknown to me, someone went into my trash, rescued and ironed them; now they stood crisp in front my eyes. What were their glances about? The thoughts swirling around my head, made the glances impossible to decode…neither their lips nor eyes bore any smile. Standing my ground I kept my stare fixated upon theirs…being reminded of my visibility, gave me an inner strength I had not felt before. When I got my doubles, I went and stood behind the one who initiated the stares in the first place. She kept looking back, and eventually walked a small distance away and kept staring.

I am comfortable in my skin, was the mantra my heart repeated. My thoughts however were not so comfortable, and weaned in and out of past insecurities. When I was a cub, my lips were positioned to meet others with a smile, but my visibility was greeted by frowns and misconstrued meanings…my smile disappeared, my stare saw only what was in front me…others hatred and ignorance for who I was. I became stoic and in some cases reserved, and this was my mask.

The thing about this mask is that it comes off in safe places, like work and home and among my special circle of friends. And sometimes when I am so comfortable, I misplace it, especially when I refuse to venture outside that scared arena…so when I was confronted by it, I was left mask-less…but a funny thing about being left naked is the strength we foster within. Today I am going to destroy that mask…face the sun in my visibility and step forward.