Post 338: Rhythm of Life

Scribbled down a rhythm poem - thought to post it out here, I think it's better read aloud, and maybe faster - the tone and voice relaying its own story - but for now, I just post its words:

Is this really all life is to be
A game of moments, a gamble
Everyday we open our eyes
And with open arms start our lives
We start off proudly until we scramble
We stay quiet, make sure no one can see
The struggles we keep within
The voices that keep us from opening
We silently just keep on searching

Is life such a job, such hard work to live
To measure and keep track of all that we give
To balance the sheet, not trust too much
Try to keep a distance but think 'stay in touch'
Be careful with our words, not say too much
Not reach out for we will hurt
Not love because we've been burnt
Anxious and alone, we cover ourselves with armor
Try to not forget, to never let the hurt go
To never shed tears, or let all the demons show
We fall into judgment
We start picking sides
Our soul we start to fragment
From each other we hide

Alone we move, always keeping an eye out
For we've learnt the hard way
That love is not what this world about
We start to run, in hard moments never stay
We bind ourselves down
And plaster smiles on our faces
Kindness is our weakness
And being guarded will win the races
Cause to yourself you must keep
Cos that's what they say its about
Care too hard, and alone you weep
And we all resign ourselves
Never reach out, or stay in the darkness
As we watch each other come crashing down
And with these thoughts we spread around
Slowly plague all those who still hold on
We live in norms, in safe places
Anywhere we can maintain these spaces
Running non stop, just keep going slowly insane
Fighting so hard, this battle with our souls in vain.

No, this is not what life should be
We need to slow down and just breathe
So much energy, in separating we have spent
And soon we won't even have the time to repent
Need to stop from each other moving
In the end we're all just losing
Waiting for some other day to make amends
I know my words will fade,
Its hard to change the way we're made
I am but a ripple in the water
I am getting hurt hard just as any other
But this cannot be the answer
And all these protections we build
And all these conversations we avoid
Silences with which we try to counter our void
And all these hearts with all they are filled
We need to give them a voice
To reclaim our power to make a choice
Stop trying to step on each other to get ahead
We aren't living if inside we feel so dead
We need to open our eyes and hearts alike
Do what we know, what we feel is right.
Before the only thing that slows us down
Is the final toll of the bell, the very last sound
..before we fall finally into the ground.

- RKS

The Delicate Art of doing Nothing Day 337

I sometimes am guilty of the need to always move. Maybe more than sometimes. The need to do something, to move, to proceed to the next thing, to put in effort and energy into things that matter to me. Doing that, is a way of showing your care, showing your commitment to a future, or just not falling into a rut of well.. not moving. It's isn't all without sense or reason. I have had to constantly work hard at many relationships, at many desires and wishes in life. The choice of having things come easy to me, to luck sprinkle its dust on me - has not really been my story :) Somewhere though between being efficient and ambitious, having a desire to be present and have a closeness with some - it started feeling like a bit of channeling energy and it getting reflected back to me in negative ways. And somewhere, I began to wonder if I am still doing this for this promised future and from a place of my love for others, or was I running from myself, from a space where I need to confront myself, be with myself - face the quiet, truly experience what I am feeling and experiencing as a consequence of being where I am.

I was told of this a lot by many in many ways, the spirit of tolerating. The spirit of tolerating your emotions, yourself. The need to not do something constantly. To let situations play out. It's been a lot of patience and work on my part as it starkly goes against how I've built myself up. But it is a rewarding and appreciating experience. I realise the art of doing nothing is not one without effort. It takes effort to be still, to be with yourself. It's just as much work to be with patience, to let people be, to let yourself be. To understand your fears, your inhibitions. To understand which demons wake up to play in their coveted darkness brought on  by difficulties. I learnt is sometimes allowing yourself to be the best you can be for you, for the situation involved. In a very difficult way, it's a way of truly caring for both of you. It's a space of contemplation, not necessarily separation. It's a space of nothingness...and it's so rich with lessons, with thought, with compassion for yourself. It's giving you a room to be as dramatic, as self piteous as you want to be :) But it's also a space to look at yourself, at this moment - and without feeling the need to move forward... you realise the moment you're standing in. Your present...your present which is as capable of giving you love in sadness, trust in pain, and validation in loneliness. It's a present which allows you to be friends with yourself.

In trying to learn to do nothing even for a few moments to calm the racing heart, the scampering demon, the fleeting mind... I think it's giving me a way to do what I really want to do. To be who I really want to be - for myself and for those in my life. It is still painful at times, and i need to consciously shake myself into just being still... but one of the things I've learn in this nothingness state is that we are always learning, we are always growing. And one of the most difficult endeavors you will have is to truly love and accept being with just yourself, in just this now without promises of anything more. Being alone in a way that' not lonely, allowing yourself to be with everything else and everyone else, as you choose, as you want, and giving them in return room to share themselves as they choose.

My Mara Post 336

She whispers in my ear
The wind she drapes for her dress
She speaks softly for me to hear
Her sudden need for my flesh
Her distress, and perfect paranoia

She talks of the darkness ahead
She pours it delicately
making small cracks in love
She spells the doom and the end
How we have all been forgotten

She weeps consistently on my sleeve
She tells me her sad stories
Of how we've have tried and lost
That no one will know or understand

The blade she hands me
With a sense of duty she urges me on
She tells me to take the step
And to end this dance once and for all

And I stay still, let her move around me
I try to not fight her, for she pulls harder
Her cold fingers on my neck
Her ice reflected in my eyes
I watch her move through my veins
And with each labored breath
I hold her without too much movement
Not sure of who will surrender first
I watch her as she watches me
We know we're part of each other
We're caught in this game...
I watch her dance and whisper
The end of all good as I know
The end of any kindness I will receive
I breathe, I hold still
For she is my weakness
And she is my strength
She is my confusion
She is my truth

Draped with the wind she comes
Dropping ice on spring days
She moves possessing me
And I move with her, my Mara.
- RKS

A prayer for self Post 335

Teach me to love myself kindly
When my confusions hit me hard
Teach me to discard bitterness
When I am hurt by others choices
Teach me to be compassionate
To those I love who hurt me
To give forgiveness to both of us
To be strong when others need to lean on me
And even stronger when they want to leave.
Teach me to love myself in the silences
In the quiet nights that don't contain warmth
In longer days that I drift into alone
Teach me to hold my hurt and disdain
My fear and my vulnerabilities
And give it to the heart of love
That surrounds us all..
And through that..
Teach me to love myself kindly
Purely and beautifully...
For my soul aches and my hearts worn out
And I am ready now to learn,
To wake up to a morning where love never leaves
And where we're never alone again.

- RKS

Questions in the Dark Post 334

These glass walls you hide behind
A mirage is all your silhouette becomes
A thought I hold on to too tightly
A breath I don't want to let go of.

Where do you go when you're quiet
When you turn your back and turn away
When you walk away and don't look back
Where do you go when you don't hear me
Where I can't reach you and you don't see

These quiet spaces that choke me
The silence of a heart that wants to speak
The quiet desires that don't find their way
To my lips, to your arms, to where we exist

Where do you go when I can't touch you
Where do you hide when I call out for you
When I keep holding on to a memory
Of when you wouldn't let me go
When I cry tears you don't taste
Where do you go where I can't follow...

Your walls they hide you from my sight
Yet through my walls you just walk through
And from the dark
You come.
And despite me...
I smile.
And the questions just slip away
Cos I am too afraid to, cos I know...
That I can't ever go
Like you go from me.
- RKS

This Place Post 333

Wrote this a little while back, thought I would share it - was one of those times, when things seemed simple and perfect… 

What is this place you take me to?
This dream I have not yet dreamt
This feeling which washes over
And seems to wipe tears I have not wept.

What is this emotion you breathe in me?
Surrendering feels like becoming whole
This feeling of completeness that finds me
And seems to heal my injured heart with ease.

What is this moment you lead me to?
As though I have been but not lived till now
As though I have held my breath for so long
Fear flees my mind, for to me it no longer belongs.

What is this place you take me to…
I follow your trail down to this wonderland
Where happiness doesn't need to be understood
And all that I could want has found me.

- RKS

Balancing Post 332

Been more than a month since I've written here. Did the thoughts pause, the observations, feelings disappear? Barely - more like the opposite :) A wave of emotion and journeying both within and taking me far away has been happening. A part of me going through its motions, questioning, feeling lost and thinking sharing that here might not be the best thing. And just that thought gave me this blog to write.

Isn't it strange how we often hide when we're down, when we're hurt - we tend to shy away and not speak of it? Our reactions are reprimanded by mostly ourselves. We take these parts of being human and categorize jealousy, fear, hurt, desires we think we shouldn't have as "wrong". We spend time to distract ourselves, to move away from that which is difficult to understand. Temptations we cannot work with, conflicts - so much we have channeled and decided these as our own battles. These as the shame we carry, and the guilt we bear - and it like a demon of the dark must be locked in the basement. We must put on a smile and greet the world in appropriate manner, proceed as is expected, for that is what is after all, right. Right?

But if we really look at ourselves as different personalities, isn't the weaker side of us the one that needs the nourishing? Isn't the jealousy in us that needs to take a step back and laugh at ourselves a little bit? Isn't our anguish over another person a bit benefited by sharing the ridiculousness of it all? And isn't sadness sometimes most healed by the comfort of acceptance, of a hug? So if a balance of all our negative emotion truly is a positive trait in us, in sharing with others - why are we trying so hard to put it away?

If we take a moment and really take a DEEP breath and feel where the pain is, where in our body we feel the ache, and consciously say "no". Immediately we can feel a tenseness within us. We are doing something wrong by experiencing pain. We are doing wrong by tolerating sadness - this must be corrected. This is our reaction. Now in the same way... if we take another deep breath and feel with the power of a "yes". Yes I see you my hurt, and I accept your presence. I sit with you my pain, and I understand your grief. There is almost a physical relief that spreads on us. By us tolerating this energy we've termed as negative, these feelings we believe are holding us back - by sitting with them, and sharing the balance of our kindness, we are moving forward together. There are so many battles we are in all the time, but the one within is one we can quieten.

Sadness, disappointment will always be there knocking on our door - we have to go through what we must. But if we find that balance within, if we find that tolerance within - we can rest and we can meet this hurt and pain at our convenience. When we choose it, when we're ready - perhaps, even after a good nights sleep... or two :)