the bad guy

In an economy of faith, the doubter is the villain.

In an effort to give a reasoned answer to my critics, and to understand why I behave the way that I do, I will use this time to consider myself as part of a historical world that contains both beauty, and sadness & suffering.

Things that I am, that are "bad":

(-I've been told that these parts of me are failings keeping me from the goal. It would be someone like me to want to state the goal for the record so that we all know what and why we are doing something. I think in this case, in the case against me, "the goal" is pure consciousness, or being without attachment or identification. Pure being.)

i am. . .

judgmental

intellectual

deeply thinking

analyzing

doubting

questioning

ruminating

indecisive

unsure

explaining

over thinking

emotional

struggling

desirous of acclaim

dramatic

over dramatic

really over dramatic

really really over dramatic

relentless

maybe a little bullying

Yes. I cry wolf. I doubt you and then myself, and then you again, and then myself again. I tell you that I have faith in what you say, but then want an explanation of why you hold your beliefs. I am a contradiction.

I will not deny that I am not an asshole. But, I can see a pattern in my behavior as recorded in my writings and work. My values are clearly reflected in my decisions and what I have written about. (I have a core that creates and influences my pattern) My "work" and what I "see" is a reflection of who and how I am. My failings I forgive as best as I can, but as for my inability to go along with the crowd without questioning the reasoning, and my ability to stick my neck out. . .) Perhaps doubting is not a failing but a powerful treasure?

So, why am I this way? Which of course is to ask another question, (but to understand that, and perhaps to even grow, we're going to have to use some of the above listed "red" words to get at an answer)

In the year 2000, my then girlfriend and I moved from Idaho to the heart of Seattle. We lived on Capitol Hill directly above and in front of the Space Needle. I worked at UPS, read fiction, listened to NPR & KEXP, made music, and took in as much culture as I could from what is truly a beautiful world city. My favorite things about Seattle are unique to it: the constant misty rain (like living in cloud), the constantly changing light creating a striking beautiful contrast in the jagged peaks of the Olympics and on the water of Elliot Bay, the fishy smells of living near the ocean mixed sometimes with the burnt coffee smells of the Starbucks roasting facility which we were sure really came from the crematorium next to the college.

Seattle is filled with life, like living in a modern and civilized rain forrest. Eagles overhead, possums running around, deer, foxes, raccoons, in the city. One smells and tastes more in Seattle, I swear, because of the humidity. I love eating at Glows, reading a Stranger waiting for the bus, trudging up the hill to THE ONLY coffee in the world, at Vivace. I love skipping rocks in the changing tide at Alki after the tastiest fish & chips I have ever known. The brothers who serve my order look alike and fight often. Their mother once got so exited when she learned that my daughter has a Greek name. I love Jon, Cheryl, and Kevin. They are some of my favorite people in the whole world, and make feel at home there even when I am so far away. . .

We moved to Seattle because it had been my wife's dream to live there. For the preceding five years I had been pursuing international rock stardom as a singer and bassist for an indy rock band in BoySee, ID. Upon our dissolution at the turn of the millennium, I was open for anything.

I had been in and out of college since '90, and had been sober for 9 years at that time. My wife and I had been together and living with one another for about 3 years, and upon making this decision to move to the big city, we lived with her mother for a time to save money. I had been financially self-suffient by this time for about 6 years--since I decided to dump college for rock stardom. (It was a good time. I behaved like me, but I look back and see that I was alive: trying, failing, creating, loving, fighting, learning, understanding, participating, being.)

I've been faulted for talking about talking, and trying to understand process. I've been faulted for letting the drama of my life supersede the work. My life is my work, and drama is life. Life is comprised of relationships, and growth and life occur in the details of drama. I think this is why we like movies so much, they help us understand our own drama--hopefully not to be used instead of drama. . . What's the point of being alive if you aren't going to be alive?

Another interesting point regarding process and understanding is the idea of graduate level study. Because my wife is now in her first semester at work on her MFA in painting, we've both come to learn that the point of graduate work isn't the work so much as it is being able to consciously know and understand the work--to be able to explain just what it is you are doing and why. I guess the point is that you have to stand up with your work and be able to defend it from your worst critics: your friends, mentors and colleagues. You do this then, in private, so that you don't have to defend it later in public. You've become aware and conscious of your work and process and don't have to defend it anymore--it can speak for itself. . .

In Seattle, I was the quintessential "Blank Slate." Like Forrest Gump, I had done a little of everything for a long time. I had worked in a hot and dusty tire store for a few years; Was a short order cook and baker for five years; Washed a million dishes; Had lifted boxes late into the night at UPS for a year. Studied both music and massage for a time; Had been interested in diet, health and healing for a period; Had even worked in a gold mind for a stretch.

I also had a bit of debt from the rock band days. Seems I would charge the necessary items on a credit card that stood between us and making the dream happen. That was a bad idea. Saving would have been a "better" (more disciplined) practice. Thus in Seattle I had to work a lot (for me). I had two jobs the whole time I was there and probably was working about 50 hours a week and going to school. Early on, I ended up getting my second job at the Seattle Central Community College bookstore. It was a natural hop from that job to reconsidering my collegiate career, and so I began taking classes the following quarter. . .

Seattle Central is a very good school. It was Time Magazine's College of the Year for 2001, and is crazy diverse. It took an uptight white boy from Idaho, and put him in a situation where he was the ethnic minority. My classes also had a high ratio of females to male (sometimes as high as 3 or 4 to 1--colleges are filled with young women. The future will likely belong to them because they, as the educated class, will outnumber educated men by a large margin.) It was here, at SCCC, that I felt that I finally learned the things I should have in High School. I felt educated enough to know that I really didn't know anything yet. It did put a mode of exploration and questioning into me, and it was during this time that I began to check out things (books and movies) from the public library in themes, letting the current lead me to the next question and exploration.

Tricky thing about SCCC though, was that they built into the curriculum a kind of cultural awareness and deprograming. Talk about feeling like an asshole. Imagine being the only white guy in a cultural unpacking class with a few black men and a predominantly larger number of women of diverse ethnicities that is unflinchingly looking at western and American social structures, identity politics, equality, and power. Many of these classes clearly pointed out false myths and narratives that engender a power structure based on the false beliefs of the past and the desire to maintain a level of wealth and dominance for those who hold it (my people, the dominant culture, the white guys).

To look upon the world and see how it is, is not judgment. To question why the system is structured the way it is, is not to want to control it, but to have an effect, to be able to influence one's world. Finding liberty in absolute powerlessness is almost impossible. Without hope, life can become a meaningless prison. Of course we do celebrate those who can find liberty in a state of powerlessness, who can find it within themselves, and they do change the world. Victor Frankl is one that comes to mind. His life and decisions are still effecting others. . .

Yet to even beging to allude that contemporary society and a Nazi Death Camp remotely resemble one another is morally sickening. Or is it? I guess it depends upon the individual and the system that we're talking about. Culture and society is comprised of the attitudes and beliefs of the individuals within the group, mostly the IN group. The system that regulates power and communicates your place in that world is a pattern, maybe conscious, maybe not. An individual can and should understand, question, and try to change the primary pattern that orders their world--whether this means family politics, workplace politics, or national politics. Life is emotional, and life is dramatic. I'm not saying that you should get a stick and convince those fuckers that they are wrong, but that an educated discussion of "why" for anything is perfectly reasonable for anyone involved in a activity that has an influence over other people's lives--especially one that seems to be imparting truth or wisdom, or one that says, "We're the good guys, Michael."

What I found missing in me in my cultural identity and politics class was that even though pop culture was a product of my tribe, the white men, I lacked an identity. Dominant culture was my culture, but I couldn't see who my people were, or why we behaved the way we did. I had to look back to my ancestors to find myself by examining what my tribe believed (and this is likely why I studied German literature upon my return to Idaho).

I know that this looks like a huge contradiction. If we are all one, how can we be different? We all live in, and came from different places, and The Land influences who we are because of how we live and what we eat. I followed my trail back to pagan Germany. Yes, I understand now. Recently I ran across this quote--"If you don't know your history, then you're homeless." And this validates how I felt until I ventured forward on my path backwards to my source, back through England to the pagan forests of Germany.

I mean, what's there to transcend if one doesn't know who one is, or from whence one came. It makes sense that you're going to have an identity before you can go beyond it. That said, if your identity happens to be that of the world's bad guys--the Germans--you may likely learn a thing about nuance. Which I think I did, and which I'd like to share with you. . .

Although I've been sitting on this for quite a time now(a few weeks at least), I hope to share more soon. I really haven't even gotten into what I wanted to write about--the transformation of mom into pop--a plastic attempt at heaven on earth (which is the cause of our suffering at this point, and will likely kill us if we don't begin to behave differently).

anyway,

A Murray Christmas to you!

Mindgame

>

another crack at Jack

-Despite this post's strange life--posted at The Sync Whole, and then removed by its author--this evening's family outing is prompting me to again reconsider posting it. Recently, I told some of my best friends in the world that I was done with Jupiter. Well, apparently, he is not done with me. I guess I will be writing about Megamind tomorrow. Although on the surface, this post may look like a desire on my part to have my way with a blunt object at the orthodoxy of The Sync Whole, it actually seeks to understand the nature of Father and how and why he can become a monster.

you don't know Jack

23

In The Playground

(In this chapter of The Shining, Jack's crackup/healing begins in earnest as he trims the rabbit shaped hedge near The Overlook Hotel playground. After trimming and joking about giving the Rabbit a haircut, he steps back to appraise his work and while his back is turned, all the hedge animals begin moving toward him.)

Let's talk divorce.

As I look back at my work this past year, it appears that I've been advancing a philosophy at The Sync Whole. This isn't something that I set out to do. While following my flow I'm continually reminded how the NOW speaks to my previous explorations and adds more layers to these models--yet I think the culmination of this work yields wholeness, so I continue. . .

As a reminder, this past March, I looked at a number that I called the "architecture of the universe"--432. I had seen this number highlighted before, yet thought its playfulness hadn't been completely explored. One could view this exercise as a scientific dissection of a whole thing: ⊙, yet the aim was the opposite--to make the parts conscious of their entirety, to make them whole.

By my reckoning, The Whole (⊙) is born of 2 Parents, comprised of 3 Kingdoms, and exists as 4 elementary states of matter. When I say "Whole", it's a loaded word for it's a symbolic pointer, pointing to everything (wholeness), and nothing (an empty hole)--it represents being and nonbeing. It's me and you knowing that we are everything, and it's me knowing that I am you also knowing that what we truly are is emptiness.

The focus of this post will be the 2 Parents. MoM & PoP. Right Brain/Left Brain. Religion/Science intuition/logic. Mystery/History. We are the children of divorce. Our healing requires the illusion of their separateness to fade.

That said, it might be interesting to talk about some of the symbolic pointers that are used at The Sync Whole. Let's say you just stumbled upon that blog, your first impression might be that they are some weirdo Jupiter cult. jUPiter, it turns out, might mean something a little different to all of us.

Jupiter |ˈjoōpitər|

1 Roman Mythology the chief god of the Roman state religion, originally a sky god associated with thunder and lightning. His wife was Juno. Also called Jove . Greek equivalent Zeus . [ORIGIN: Latin, fromJovis pater, literally ‘Father Jove.’ ]2 Astronomy the largest planet in the solar system, a gas giant that is the fifth in order from the sun and one of the brightest objects in the night sky.

Keep in mind that all possibilities are valid at The Sync Whole, and obvious associations tend to ring as truth. Thus, the cheerful and friendly quality of "jovial" is ascribed upon Jove/Jupiter.

jovial |ˈjōvēəl|adjectivecheerful and friendlyORIGIN late 16th cent.: from French, from late Latin jovialis ‘of Jupiter’ (see Jove ), with reference to the supposed influence of the planet Jupiter on those born under it.Jove |jōv|another name for Jupiter .PHRASESby Jove dated an exclamation indicating surprise or used for emphasis.ORIGIN from Latin Jov-, stem of Old Latin Jovis, replaced later by Jupiter. The exclamation by Jove dates from the late 16th cent.

Why Jupiter? Answering that question is like trying to understand just what it is we've been doing for the last four or five years. . .

ok, 911 2001 happens. 2003 Iraq war begins using the events of Sept. 11 as a springboard. 2005/2006 citizenry begin to question WTF happened, and when it began (V for Vendetta). Enter Conspiracy. . .

The events of 2001 led some of us through the plots of conspiracy to a general understanding of reality as dreamlike and devoid of a definitive answer. A mystery. (Mrs. Story) Although Fukuyama declared the end of His Story twelve years earlier upon the fall of the Berlin Wall on the resonate date of 9/11/89 (Nov. 9 1989--they put the day before the month in Europe), 2001 signaled both the end of something as well as the beginning. The film 2001 also shed some light upon the dreamlike quality of reality with its various wyncs at understanding 2001 the year and ultimately showed a correlation between the films we watch and the events we experience. Alignment. The Dream is Reel. 2001 ultimately pointed us at Jupiter, as Dave Bowman & Hal made their way toward that planet seeking the next "monolith" which of course (like the first monolith, was a gateway to a new state of consciousness. . .)

And thus, The Sync Whole operates under the guidance that the symbol of The Jupiter Mission points toward: a gateway advancing toward truth, healing, and wholeness. This is what DB discovered when he traveled beyond Jupiter and into the infinite.

A risk of course, is if the symbol of Jupiter is concertized, and no longer points toward the goal, but becomes the goal. As I stated earlier, I think we all read the symbols we use slightly different. On it's face--the truth of Jupiter is Joy in the only moment we have, NOW. This is the Rainbow Bridge. By becoming and staying aligned with NOW, one is completely present and timeless. Everything & Nothing in a moment. The Alpha & Omega Point Break! The Philosophers' Stone. The Fountain of Youth. The Tree of Life.

The Jupiter symbol is sticky for me though. One of the "true" associations that has been made regarding Jupiter is that it = 42 (& 421, & 214, & 1024 & 99, & ect). Because one of our first associations with our jupiter symbol was the Douglas Adams answer of "42" to life the universe and everything, I've tended to read it fairly personally. Like Dave Bowman, I am a "42". Because IMDB. (Douglas Bolles) Also, my birthday is 4/2/72. Sure, just coincidence, and Jim is a 420 which is close (and totally loaded as well.), but I am 42 (db). From the beginning of our games, I couldn't help but read ME as the point. And I'm sure you've well noted how my reading of sync is so micro. That my life doesn't point to it, but it points to my life. I'm always telling you about how everything relates to me! Since I was a little child, I've always known that the movies speak to me, personally. . .

solipsism |ˈsälipˌsizəm|

nounthe view or theory that the self is all that can be known to exist.

Of course the common usage of solipsism has a connotation that points to an egocentric, self-centered individual. The irony of course in all this is that despite this selfish looking practice of mine, the message I personally receive from the Jupiter symbol loudly and clearly is selflessness! Huh?

Jupiter is the father. Others stress that Jupiter is Joy., but I'm unwilling to OVERLOOK the fact that he is The Father.

In Roman mythology, Jupiter or Jove was the king of the gods, and the god of sky and thunder. He is the equivalent of Zeus, in the Greek pantheon. He was called Iuppiter (or Diespiter) Optimus Maximus ("Father God the Best and Greatest") As the patron deity of ancient Rome, he ruled over laws and social order.

Iuppiter originated as a vocative compound of the Old Latin vocative *Iou and pater ("father") and came to replace the Old Latin nominative case *Ious. Jove^[4] is a less common English formation based on Iov-, the stem of oblique cases of the Latin name. Linguistic studies identify the form *Iou-pater as deriving from the Indo-European vocative compound *Dyēu-pəter (nominative: *Dyēus-pətēr meaning "O Father Sky-god").^[5]

Older forms of the deity's name in Rome were Djeus-pater (“day/sky-father”), then Diéspiter. Djeus is the etymological equivalent of ancient Greece's Zeus and of the Teutonics' Ziu, gen. Ziewes. The Indo-European deity is thus the god from which Zeus and the Indo-Aryan Vedic Dyaus Pita are derived.~Wikipedia: Jupiter

Traditionally, he hasn't really been a role model, in fact, the state of the world as we find it, is his doing!

See, to get into power, Jupiter in his Greek mask of Zeus, fought the existing power--his father--and overthrew him using his father's methodology and practices thus becoming the self same image of his father. A monster in a monster economy built upon fear and revenge.

42

Mid-Air

(In this chapter of The Shining, The Overlook's black cook strong with the intuitive abilities known as "Shining" finds himself in Jupiter Country--Up In The Air--aboard an airliner rushing back to The Overlook from his winter home in Florida hopefully in time to save Wendy and Danny from the MONSTER that Jack has become in assuming his ROLE as the caretaker for The Overlook.)

Although this post has now taken us UP into the mind of Jack Torrance let's return to chapter 23, and get back down to the playground so we can talk about one of the major themes that I'm reading from the dream lately. Often my sync choices reflect to me tension in my own being. To find wholeness I'm presented with an overall "lesson" coming at me from all points. For quite some time now, (perhaps a few years even) the theme has been the idea of growing UP & what it means to be an adult.

&

While in the playground (down to earth), about to give the rabbit a heir cut, Jack Torrance thinks about his father, and his childhood. His father was an abusive man whose authority was based upon his physical power. He beat his order and his idea of civilization into his wife and children with his cane. Vitto Corleone, the Godfather, inhabits a similar world. He explains his role thusly, "Women and children can be careless, but not men." And this is because it is man's duty to maintain our system of living--civilization--a patriarchal little experiment that's been going on now for the past 10,000 years or so.

So then, to be the father, is to be the head of the family. The wife--usually an over emotional and irrational creature-has her duties too, but primarily her role is to serve her spouse, the head of the family. Their Son, the heir to the throne, lacks the discipline and rationality of the father, and at times seems to have too much of his mother in him, but will eventually have to learn his place, his role, and do his duty. It's the father's job to prepare him for a life and world of order, to teach him about a system that lacks carelessness. He has a tool too--you know, "spare the Rod. . ."

Your son is just a Big Baby after all and when YOU can impress upon him the importance of the system, the order, the civilization that makes our way of life possible, then you've done your duty and turned a soft heart into a man. (And the system requires above all else that you do your duty, even if it means choosing the system over life.)

As caretaker for The Overlook, Jack is put in the untenable position of having to chose between what's expected of him and what's necessary. He attempts to satisfy the expectations of civilization upon him in his role as the father, against what is actually needed for the emotional and physical well being of his wife and child. He is trying to balance his egoic adult responsibilities within the system without identifying with and becoming his role. (Impossible?)

Vitto, The God'sFather, wanted to spare Michael, his fourth child, from inheriting the life that was his--the life of a mob boss operating in a Dog-Eat-Dog, vendetta economy. Vitto dreamed of Michael being 100% legitimate, not a gangster, not a thief, not a criminal, not a murderer. Vitto purposely insulated his last born away from The Family. Sure Michael knew the score, but he wasn't part of it.

Michael was a college man, and a war hero. Clean. And God does Pachino look boyish in this role. His father, the head of the family, purposely kept Michael away from the "Family Business", which is a serious business indeed. Of course, like in all myths, Michael too became his father when he acted to avenge him in a situation where the proper care of family's interests required a strong and necessary response to the actions and claims of fellow "business" competitors acting within the bounds of the competitive system. Behaving like a proper king, Vitto stepped down and handed over the kingdom to his son, rewarding him for doing his duty and making him the head of the family business which is later explained in a big reveal to his naive wife as being no different than any other business, just more direct about how it's practiced thus revealing the corruption of the entire system of men. It is a man's world after all and everyone in the system is dirty--lawyers, politicians, judges. Everyone has a price. That the business of business is the exploitation anything or anyone to get more. Material is dirty. More Better Cheaper Faster (the speed of NOW!)

And this is the nature of the Overlook Hotel as well. Although it looks impecably clean and only rich and dignified people stay there--it is run by dirty gangsters. Or this is what Jack discovers in a scrapbook found in the basement of the hotel when he begins learning his duties. His employer made it very clear that their could be no rats in The Overlook, and so as Jack put out traps he learned the true nature of the stately place for which he was assuming the role of caretaker. He learned the nature of the business, that the pursuit of and acquisition of material leads to an identification with material--and thus the vices of The Head tend to be materialistic in nature:

What if our father was different though? What if he did spare the rod? Let us look at another chapter 23:

The LORD is my shepherd; I shall not want.

He maketh me to lie down in green pastures: he leadeth me beside the still waters.

He restoreth my soul: he leadeth me in the paths of righteousness for his name's sake.

Yea, though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I will fear no evil: for thou art with me; thy rod and thy staff they comfort me.

Thou preparest a table before me in the presence of mine enemies: thou anointest my head with oil; my cup runneth over.

Surely goodness and mercy shall follow me all the days of my life: and I will dwell in the house of the LORD for ever.

Oh if only that guy was the father, eh? Sounds like a good life for a kid.

Of course Our Father has a wandering eye, and tends to blow shit up in bursts of anger. . .

-Whose lord is a Shephard? God our parents are screwed up, and with that we begin moving toward the whole . . .

the eyes have it, proceed with the motion. . .

Yesterday, 11/9/10 (written 9/11/10 in Europe), The Goddard spaceflight center reported discovering two giant bubbles at the center of our galaxy pictured above. You'll also recall from a fascinating NOVA program, that at the center of not only our galaxy, but all galaxies is a supermassive black hole.

November 9th is a big day, as I mentioned above. It was, (before 9/11/2001 occurred) The End of History. It's the day that the Berlin wall came down. The subject couldn't be treated any better than it is in a novel called Black Dogs by Ian McEwan.

This is the story of a Man and a Woman, a Marriage, a Divorce

and a kind of reconciliation. . .

The husband in McEwan's Black Dogs is East Germany, and the wife is West. Her being is defined by her spirituality, and in the face of western materialism, she becomes a buddhist. He takes refuge in science, structure, organization, and political policy. The Wall divides the once whole of Germany. It's not a natural boundary, but a created division. This story continues. . .

At our center we are Whole. We are one thing and we are nothing. Yet the two bubbles at the center our galaxy prompt me again toward the idea of the Garden State. Union. The Sync Whole has us looking UP, looking to Jupiter as this loving exemplar of being, yet these two bubbles at our center and my current tummy ache decry that Jupiter is only half of the story. . .