With out you, I dont sleep.Just dream.

[HollyNichole]

So theres so many expectations you have for yourself....These preconcieved notions about how things are supposed to be, how they are supposed to turn out, or whatever. Rarely do people just stop. I mean really, really stop; and just look around them.

I mean, How often have you?

I just recently have learned to. I've found that often times, if you just regress back to the basic rudimentory thinking process you used when you were a child for just ten seconds a day everyday you can really overcome the stress of adulthood.

When is the last time you questioned something?

...And, believe me; by that I dont mean questioned a dumb move some politician made in a decision, or an athlete made in a game, or even a faux pa that an A-list actress made in her choice of wardrobe for an awards show....

I mean really,really think. Like you did when you were a little kid. Like, why are we really here?

Even if you have a chosen faith and truly believe it....Well, the debate of Evolution vs. Creationism isnt exactly new material. Or if you are really devout why not just sit a spell and ponder the reason why we are actually on this planet? What is this divine plan?

Or How about this one?

Are we alone? Is there someone else out there?

Or...

What happens when we leave this planet?

...I think that is one of the problems with todays society....Theres too many distractions....Not enough of us are just sitting and just thinking anymore. All of us feel like the wieght of the worlds on us...But, damn. If we all just tried to revert back to that ten year old kid inside us....You know the one Im talking about....The one that used to lay in the grass and just stare into the sky... And think. And dream....Maybe we could fix that. Go inside yourself and find that kid...feel the sun burning down on your skin....smell the earth below your head...hear the quiet.....or even the not so quiet. Remember when music said something to you? When there was that one artist or band that just spoke your language...That just got you? What were they saying? What did you get out of them? How did they make you feel? What song felt like your anthem? The one that made you want to rebel? The one that made you want to question things? The one that nomatter how good things were or how bad things were you had? The one that made you literally burn inside because you loved that piece of music so much that it hurt?

Listen again; But really listen.

Or how about this? Why does life have to be so staged? So repetative? So dull?

We only have about eighty, ninety, or a hundred years on this planet; if were lucky. Why the hell is everyone so lax about just going through the motions?! All of us are born in these little towns or nieghborhoods and if were lucky we go off to college and go abroad maybe one summer...Or if we have money we travel when we have time at our own liesure...But who really explores anymore? What happened to the days when all was a new frontier? When all was undiscovered?

...See thats the real issue here. Everyone and everything is over exposed. You need it? You can find it on the internet! You can check the surf on the West Coast without even going there...You can navigate the peaks of Everest without even getting out of your PJ's.

And this my friends is the problem. We have an exorbitant amount of information at our fingertips....Hell I even just looked that up via, dictionary.com. Heavens forbid I get up and find a real dictionary!

But as I was saying we have an unlimited amount of information being thrown at us on the daily. Too much to properly process to be quite honest. So its no wonder society as a whole doesnt want to voluntarily read or learn....No, we have prizes at the end of any task...We have degrees tempting people, and furthermore; money as the ultimate prize which lures you to obtain a degree in the first place.

And now onto my next point, To distract us from our daily monstrous amount of information we have several devices to assist us. My favorite: The Television. The absolute supreme temple of excess....We also have several other devices for this, but the television is probably the cheapest of these....All these things conglomerate into the one staggering factor that were all sitting there doing something else....

Why not go on adventure? Have a day out of the ordinary?

Brave the price at the pumps and fill your tank rather than snagging that adorable pair of stilleto's from ALDO...I swear, it will be worth it.

Grab your friends....Get lost...Literally....Help yourselves find eachother again while your finding your way home.

Do something crazy and silly....Do something that makes you feel young again...Do something that makes you feel alive.

Be creative...For the love of God be creative, and show the world and yourselves that theres so much more to you than what you youve shown as of late.

Ive been doing this.

I have been living like each breath is my last. Look in my eyes, I swear you'll see passion... And thats much more than I can say for most people.For the first time in a while I can breathe...

Maybe if more people started this than the world could be a better place. If we all start Breathing. Living. Remembering. Thinking. Dreaming. and exploring this crazy place we live in.

Who knows...Maybe we can figure out this whole world peace thing...

Or not...

...But hey, a girl can dream....

[Wandor]

God, you are so right...what astounds me the most is not that I simply tolerate various undisputed routines, but when given a choice between taking a leap and staying at home to stare at the computer, I voluntarily choose the latter. I mean, what the hell!
I've been stressing out over a lot of obligations recently, and I've been thinking about a lot of the things you talk about now. Sometimes I wonder what would happen if I just threw all those supposed "obligations" away, and let life carry me wherever...unfortunately, some of the routines are worth it in the long (or short) run, so right now I'm just trying to detach my own contentment from how much work I get done every day. And it's funny, because suddenly the plainest things seem beautiful.

[naturegeek]

Oded Sharon makes an excellent point - it's Maslow's Heirarchy, and while we have the luxury to be at the self-actualizing level most of the time in our culture, we distract ourselves with nonsense much of the time instead.

"Victims of Comfort" we are - yet not victims at all, but only of/in our own limited imaginations...

It truly ~is~ a wonderful luxury to be able to stop. To breathe. To be grateful. To be joyful. And to remember how lucky and blessed we truly are.

Education, Human Rights, Help pull people out of poverty and war and get their basic needs met, and more people will have that kind of luxury as well. Maybe.

I was thinking about war and peace and human nature last night - we went and saw "Charlie Wilson's War" and it was very thought-provoking - the whole point of the movie is right at the end, I think. I was daydreaming about if all the weaponry of the world suddenly disappeared... then I realized that before guns and missiles and tanks and aircraft and bombs, humans fought wars with stones and fire and spears and swords and arrows and catapults and battering rams... so I gave up my daydream.

I wish humans were more tolerant, compassionate, and peaceful. But I guess all that starts at home, and within each of us. So I'll just try to be that way myself, and "be the change" I'd like to see in the world. Unfortunately, I'm no Ghandi! So "try" is the operative word. (Yoda pops up... "Try? There is no Try! Do or Do Not!")

Sigh.

[thefirstofmany]

And some days, I have to just pull the covers up over my head!

[Oded Sharon]

These are the words of a person who can afford saying them. I doubt a starving Somalian boy has the time to stop and think. Neither does a war-refugee from Iraq.

I love to stop and think about the flow of space around me, but just the same I try to be grateful I can do that and realize the world can't ascend if we can't solve all our small issues on one hand, and overlook them to see big issues on the other.

keep thinking :)

[Luna]

This as a beautiful passage :) :) I loved it! I understand all of the things you adressed :) I usually embody all of your philosophies, but lately i've been absorbed in all of the expectations, expectations, blah blah...So thanks for reminding me to go back living the right way :)

[serenity]

awesome :)

[naturegeek]

Wow, that was incredible. "too many distractions" is really key, isn't it? But it's not the distractions' fault, it's our attention - it's this wonderful gift we have and we spend it willy nilly on all sorts of unimportant things.

I taught at an outdoor science school for many years and we did a thing with the students we called "magic spots" which is what you described in the middle - we'd send everyone to find a spot they liked where they couldn't see anyone else, and sit, quietly, for 20 minutes or so.

Sometimes I'd give the kids a journal and a writing assignment - usually something to help focus their attention on the beautiful forest around them.

Sometimes I'd tell them their goal was to get "wonderfully bored." And know what? The kids would smile and nod and know just what I meant. That luscious daydreamy space where your mind is just floating like a puff of dandelion on a warm summer breeze.

Kids, at the end of the week, would often say that was their favorite part of the week - even kids, you see, have over-scheduled hectic lives, and don't really get to take the time to just "be." It's such a gift to give them, and ourselves.

Thanks for this wonderful reminder!

Think I'll go have myself a magic spot soon...

[David Prentice]

Inspirational. Just one thing though - you don't have to go far to explore the world around you. You don't have to use up such a limited resource filling up your car (although personally I can't wait 'til the oil runs out and we can go back to horses. Imagine - one day all those hunks of metal zooming about on the roads are suddenly going to be completely and utterly worthless. Oh, how I'll laugh...). How many people can say they truly know their home town? Take a walk down a street you've never been along before and see where it takes you. Ride a bike out into the coutryside and smell that clean(ish) air. Do whatever, but do something.

Great post. Thank you.

[Meg]

I literally hung onto every word of this post. All so true, and so far beyond so many people's grasps. I know of people who would be scared to read something like this, offended that they should be asked to question their very lives.

This made me want to get out and do something. I think I'm going to take a walk tomorrow, get away from my computer screen - I've been holed up in my house too long. Thank you for making me see that.