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It's Been Awhile

Posted on Jan 12th, 2009 by Photizo : A Livingstone Photizo



"Soft Watch at the Moment of First Explosion"

 The soft watch itself is a surreal symbol which adresses the
 unimportance or the irrelevance of time during the process of a dream.

It's been awhile since I've posted here on the blog and those who know me know why. Like the Dali painting above, time has been seen as a dream and like Dali's first presentation of the soft watch, life can be seen as "The Persistance of Memory,"  which for me is all time really is, a measurement of experience and memories from the begining to the end.

 Recent  day's have seemed like Dali's watch exploding into an ever faster and disintgrating pace of surrrealism. Yet at  the same time experiencing the Einsteining physics of the slowing of the days events while trying to gain clarity.  Though it has been awhile, alot has happened that maybe those who see daily what Dali painted above will understand. So today I felt compelled to just write and post a few things that allow for a little contemplation of time, experience and memory and try to find that peaceful place or unspace of no time. And what better song then "It's Been Awhile" by Staind  to throw a little light with an introspective song about realizing that it's been awhile since a lot of things.



While it's so easy to lose sight of the NOW, it's never to late to be present, as NOW is is the only time we will ever have.  Yet we all get busy planning our future for tomorrow or reliving the past as if  today were yesterday.  We fall into a reality trap, seeing our own perspective from past colored glasses of experience. As Einstein states,


"Reality is merely an illusion, albeit a very persistent one."

and as Salvador Dali paints in the Persistence Of Memory with time melting away


"The Persistence of Memory"
Salvador Dali

So I thought I would remind my SELF that it might be wise to hear the words of Marcus Aurelius

For a man can lose neither the past nor the future; for how can
 one take from him  that which is not his? So  remember these
 two points: first, that  each thing is of like form from everlasting
 and  comes  round again in its cycle, and  that it  signifies not
whether a man shall  look upon  the same things for a hundred
 years or two hundred, or for an  infinity of time; second,  that the
 longest lived and the shortest lived man, when they come to die,
 lose one and the same thing  -                               Marcus Aurelius



The pressures of the daily grind can literally bring our lives to halt, supressing the will to actively choose and wake up from the dream. Like Plato's cave shackled to watching the shadows in our socially constructed society that shapes our perspective to try and fit into it's social "Forms" and "Norms."  When, if you really think about it, all there can be is formlessness and the flux between the forms. Instead we percieve our reality on what we have constructed which in turn shapes our shadowy Mayan perspective or "our" opinion.

Everything we hear is an opinion, not a fact.
 Everything we see is a perspective, not the truth
.
Marcus Aurelius




"Galatea
of the Spheres"
Salvdor Dali

Surrealism is destructive, but it destroys only what it
 considers to be shackles limiting our vision.
- Salvador Dali

Progressive art  can assist  people to learn not  only about  the objective
 forces at  work in the society in  which they live, but  also about the intensely
 social character of their interior lives. Ultimately, it can propel people toward
social emancipation.     
                                                                           Salvador Dali



Yet as social creatures it's easy to be shaped by  these constructs of  the  Matrix of our own design and unnconsciously sleep through the days events. We drift  so far away from our True Self  that we began to experience time as some surrealistic dream  of being on the Outside looking in. Time to suspend what we think we know as reality and find the ideal image of the true self  through balance and walk the path of the Middle Way. And there is the daily challenge, to suspend the norms and just be part of the flux, and flow with the ever changing fluidity of life and not try to control it as we are so like to do. Bruce Lee often spoke of this as Wu Wie which involves knowing when to act and when not to act, or the natural action to do without doing.



http://www.palladiumkirjat.fi/images/oksakansi.jpg

"Wu-Wei"

"The basic idea of the Tao Te Ching is NATURALISM in the
 sense of wu-wei (inaction), which really means taking no unnatural action.
 It means spontaneity; that is. "to support all things in their natural stage" and
 thus allow them to "transform spontaneously." In this manner Tao "Undertakes
 no activity and yet there is nothing left undone."

But if we allow ourselves, and we do,  we get out of balance and can easily  feel on the outside of everything and everyone, disconnected and alone. Aaron Lewis of Staind writes about this in another brilliant song he first recorded live on the 1999 Family Values Tour in Biloxi Mississippi. In fact he never really wrote the lyrics as much as they just came to him live on stage as improv except the chorus and the first verse. So we get a peak inside the psyche of Aaron while he reflects  from a place of memories thathas him on the Outside Looking in.





And so with all that pain stuffed inside, alone he can't mend he allows for hope that tomorrow will be ok. We all may have these feelings that tomorrow may seem So Far Away, from  "All the mistakes, one life contained, but they all finally start to go away and youI feel like you can face the day and can forgive and not be ashamed to be the person that you are today... You can wake up from the dream and walk into a new day.


Staind - "So Far Away" (Acoustic in Yahoo Studios)





"A Woman At The Window"
 Salvador Dali

Time is a sort of river of passing events, and strong is its current;
no sooner is a thing brought to sight than it is swept by and another
 takes its place, and this too will be swept away.
  - Marcus Aurelius


DEO


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MLK Revisited

Posted on Jan 19th, 2009 by Photizo : A Livingstone Photizo

http://ginasmith.typepad.com/gina_on_gina/mlkjr.gif

In waking up to Martin Luther King Day its hard not to envision his historical speech, “I have a Dream” so I went over to You Tube and watched the entire speech a couple of times.

Martin Luther King, Jr.: I Have a Dream

The Complete "I have a Dream Speech." 11 minutes

In listening to his impassioned voice of faith and reason, justice and equality, I couldn’t help but think of the central point of his “vision of a completely integrated society, a community of love and justice wherein brotherhood would be an actuality in all of social life.” Or what he called "The solidarity of the human family"

 http://philsland.blogs.com/photos/uncategorized/martin_luther_king_jr_freedom.jpg

I like to believe his Legacy lives on in more then a sound bite once a year, or a token acknowledgment of a man most have never heard. That by his life, actions and words we continue to seek after the Dream of a “Beloved Community”.

 Martin Luther was an integralist who believed we are all dependent upon one another, that "the concept of brotherhood” was “a vision of total interrelatedness.”

"Whether we realize it or not, each of us lives eternally ‘in the red.’ “Recognition of one’s indebtedness to past generations should inhibit the sense of self-sufficiency and promote awareness that personal growth cannot take place apart from meaningful relationships with other persons, that the "I" cannot attain fulfillment without the "Thou."

He had no illusions of the mountains that would need to be climbed, nor of the struggle in raising people’s consciousness to the economic injustice that a consumerist capitalist society breeds. A structure that by its very nature feeds off the inequality and injustice of the poor while given privilege to the few.

http://i305.photobucket.com/albums/nn217/billyspnyc/martin_luther_king_jr.jpg


"It is . . . essential to notice that the two elements, the holy outcast
and the blessed community, must go together. Without the vision
of restored community, the holiness ascribed to the poor would fall far
short of politics and result in a mere perpetuation of charity and
service activities’’ [On Not Leaving It to the Snake (Macmillan, 1967). P. 133].

I am thankful for the inspiration that he gave others and continues to give today as his spirit lives on. I am thankful of others out there who have a dream and a vision. Like many here at Zaads who are committed visionaries spreading seeds of hope and love for a “Beloved Community”. Each of us, by defining the integrated self, seeks to expand the awareness and consciousness of others in a meaningful way. To help others realize the unlimited potential that resides within all of us to make a better world. To Make Poverty History  by actualizing the belief that it all starts with ONE.

http://www.icpj.net/blog/wp-content/uploads/2007/10/suso_logo_eng_gcap.jpg

 

 “Our lives begin to end the day we

become silent about things that matter.”

The image “http://www.urbanphotos.nl/andmore/batch/A107%20Martin%20Luther%20King%201967.jpg” cannot be displayed, because it contains errors.

 “Let Freedom Ring”


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Tagged with: Martin Luther King

The Open Door

Posted on Jan 19th, 2009 by Photizo : A Livingstone Photizo



The Open Door

Amy Lee - Evanescence

Sometime life seems like the movie the Matrix and we're all looking for the Key Master to open the right doors to the architect of our own design to find joy and happiness. Or as Neo is asked, "what is it that you want?" To which he simply says.... "Peace"."

But like in the movie, our time here is about choice,  the free will to open or close any door we choose knowing the conseqeunces of those actions. And that's where the challenge comes when our choices are clouded or fueled by emotions that drive us here and there. It's so easy so just say be the witness to your emotions  and realize them as objective realities. Yes we all live in the three states of consciousness of waking - Dreaming - Sleeping or what correspond to the three great realms of gross - subtle and causal, so that we all see the world in a different way depending on what state we are in at the time. But there are some emotions that are very difficult to dismiss. The two by which we are cyberneticaly wired.... Love and Hate or the Pleasure -Pain principle that finds itself lived out in our daily life of relationships.


Man is a knot into which relationships are tied.

Antoine de Saint-Exupéry,

Emotions are the subjective experiences from our own personal point of view that move us. In fact, the English word 'emotion' is derived from the French word émouvoir. This is based on the Latin emovere, where e- (variant of ex-) means 'out' and movere means 'move',' or the related "motivation."

Emotions move us, drive us and we even make lists of good ones and bad ones. Yet when it comes to the heart our emotions define us and  since we spend most of our conscious time in the waking state or sensorimotor world of people, places and things, we tend to just say that everything is Fine Again And we aware now of how
everything’s gonna be fine one day.

Seether - "Fine Again" Official Video


Now I chose Seether's Video for a reason as I believe it's in relationships that we find our meaning, our joy and happiness, and also our sorrow , pain and loss. And beacuse I am a fan of Seether and Amy Lee, I  thought I would use their videos which are a public display of their own relationship, emotions and the choices they each made through the use of music videos.

Amy Lee and Shaun Morgan were together for about two or so years and you may remember that both of them sang together in Seether's Broken Video which is about a relationship.


Shaun said he wrote this about his emotions towards a girlfriend with the first line
"I wanted you to know that I love the way you laugh..."  and It was a way of telling her he wanted her: "Cause I am broken when I am lonesome and I don't feel right when you're gone away"

Amy Lee,Seether-Broken


Shaun is a hugh fan of  Kurt Cobain and was heavily influenced by him and Morgan's interpretation of Nirvana's music is just a vehicle for emotional catharsis. So with the loss of his brother In August 2007, It was reported by the Rapid City Journal that Eugene "Genie" Welgemoed jumped to his death shortly after midnight Monday August 13, 2007 from an eighth-floor window of the Radisson Hotel in Rapid City, SD. According to police, no foul play is suspected in the death. It was ruled a suicide after an investigation which isndpired this video, the first release off their new album

FINDING BEAUTY IN NEGATIVE SPACES.

Seether - "Rise Above This" (Official Video)


 So having lost his brother, and losing his guitarist in the previous year he also did a stint in rehab. So you might understand the meaning of the new album title, but the story gets better. You see, Amy Lee of Evanescence decides to release the Album the Open Door that lays out the two's relationship and strikes a blow at Shaun subjecting him to the humiliation of Amy Lee, pretty much writing an entire album about him.

The song, Call Me When Your Sober sets the stage with Amy as Little Red riding Hood who pets the wolf, (Remember this metaphor as Shaun uses it in response in a future video)


Call Me When Your Sober
Amy Lee as Little Red Riding Hood

This video switches it so that the wolves allow their ears to be petted and shows how Red Riding Hood turns the tables (or at least walks down table) with a second wolf who is being evicted (arguably).

It focusses upon the (at the time) recent break up of Lee’s relationship with Shaun Morgan  and instead of taking the issues from the relationships, she turns it around and deals with the wolves on her own.  So we have the tale of Red Riding Hood taking on the wolf and about a young woman taking control of her own situation. So to watch the video knowing all this background just makes it that much more interesting and the looks she gives when she says you only call me when your sober with her head tilt and look at 2:31 into the vid and her last look into the camera when she says I've made up your mind and laughs are priceless. Take a look.

Evanescence - "Call Me When You're Sober" Official Video


So not to be out done in the public eyes, Shaun's emotions are relased through his own video in response to Amy's. Shaun is quoted as saying, "

"The song is about not allowing yourself to be beaten down by what people say about you and kind of believing in yourself, and ultimately knowing that you'll be better for it"

I think it speaks for itself, and look out for the wolf and the chorus:

So break me down if it makes you feel right
And hate me now if it keeps you alright
You can break me down if it takes all your might
'Cause I'm so much more than meets the eye


Seether - "Breakdown" (Official Video)


But as yet the story does not yet end, for the 13th and last cut on the Open Door Album is Amy Lee's song about her new boyfriend, Josh. In "The Open Door" cd in the "thanks section". There's a part there that says

"Josh, you are my muse. Nothing inspires me the way you do. Thank you for all my missing pieces. Thank you for your strength and love. Thank you for letting me see myself through your eyes, because only then could I know that I am good enough for you".

 Basically, Amy is saying that she let him flirt with her for a while and then she started to ("shouldn't have let you torture me so sweetly, now I can't let go of this dream") and now she feels like she's good enough for someone again.



Josh and Amy Collage

Note in the beginning how she metaphorically
 burries a picture in the ground like a seed.

Evanescence - "Good Enough" Official Video


So how do you deal with all these emotions we feel daily, some so powerful such as love and loss that it remains a daily burden?

First.......

Take reponsibility for your emotions - If you think someone else is causing your emotional issues, then you may be waiting a lifetime for them to change... see it for what it really is and deal with it.

Witness the Emotions in your body
- A good key here is if you  feel your spirit being pulled away from from you then you are not in control of it.

Define the emotion. Is it fear, love anger?

Next, express the emotion, write it down, tell it to someone, but find a way to release it. Not all of us have access to high end video production or the talent of the two artists above, but they are definitley releasing their emotions through the medium of music videos. Then once it's released, burn it. Just as in the final video "Good Enough" that then allows for a new beginning as the flowers begin to bloom amid the burning wreckage of her past.

Then celebrate that closure and let it go...let it go.......

DEO



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All The Water and Air on Earth

Posted on Jan 29th, 2009 by Photizo : A Livingstone Photizo

http://aura0.gaia.com/photos/48/476100/large/Global_water_and_air_volume-SPL.jpg

Dan Phiffer found this image on a message board (it's by Adam Nieman / Science Photo Library), and by his calculations, he says it's accurate.

Left: All the water in the world (1.4087 billion cubic kilometres of it) including sea water, ice, lakes, rivers, ground water, clouds, etc.

Right: All the air in the atmosphere (5140 trillion tonnes of it) gathered into a ball at sea-level density. Shown on the same scale as the Earth.

From Science Photo Library: Conceptual computer artwork of the total volume of water on Earth (left) and of air in the Earth's atmosphere (right) shown as spheres (blue and pink). The spheres show how finite water and air supplies are. The water sphere measures 1390 kilometres across and has a volume of 1.4 billion cubic kilometres. This includes all the water in the oceans, seas, ice caps, lakes and rivers as well as ground water, and that in the atmosphere. The air sphere measures 1999 kilometres across and weighs 5140 trillion tonnes. As the atmosphere extends from Earth it becomes less dense. Half of the air lies within the first 5 kilometres of the atmosphere.

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Tagged with: Earth, Water, H20, Air, Atmosphere, Gaia, Photizo