"If we were to include natural services and the environmental costs of our waste and pollution in our economic accounting, we’d have a more realistic economic system. And we’d see that the environment and economy are intertwined. Caring for one is the solution to problems facing the other."
-David Suzuki
The truth is, I think that the economy is failing simply because it is not a sustainable system, in the same way that any unmitigated growth is not sustainable. The way the economy is now-- or the way we expect it to be-- it is more like a cancer than a reliable indicator of a country's 'health'.
I'm certain that environmental raping and pillaging would not be such a problem if we all had to deal with the effects in our own backyards. For example-- if everything you used-- your fork, your laptop, your pillow, your clothing, your car-- was made in your own hometown, what would be the positives and negatives of that? OK-- so your pillow is made from local cotton and local sheep's wool. Great, nice, good for the farmers, the local economy. Your car is made from iron ripped from your beautiful hills, in a factory emmiting a foul stench in your air, powered by oil sucked from beneath your coastline... would you drive as much? Would you buy a new car every year? I don't think so.
If we are going to have a global economy, we have to think about global impact. If we think about global impact, non-stop cancerous expansion is not an option. Come on people-- this isn't capitalism anymore-- it's consumerism! It's destructive, and it's gearing down, grinding to a halt, forcing change. Change hurts. Jobs are lost, people suffer. So what? You'd rather put off the suffering until the world is a toxic bubbling mass of waste?
Wednesday, January 28, 2009
Sunday, January 25, 2009
Two unrelated things that have come to mind recently:
1)
When I was very young—about four or five years old, I think—I used to have a recurring dream about our living room couch catching fire spontaneously. It was the chocolate corduroy couch that had its’ back to the windows that overlooked Hope St.
The brown corduroy was my favorite couch for several reasons. Boy, our fat brown tabby, would curl up on one end. I would lean up next to him and he would purr while I petted him with my left hand and sucked the thumb on my right hand. The couch was also in the living room, as opposed to the family room—the living room being the more genteel space that my parents reserved for adult friends and glasses of adult beverages and fires in the fireplace. Kids and toys belonged in the family room. So the brown couch represented a clean, comfortable, restricted world.
The couch would always be burning on the right hand corner, opposite the cat’s corner. No-one would be nearby to help. I don’t know if I ever cried for help—I just ran my little self into the kitchen, and got the orange plastic mixing bowl, and then I dashed to the kitchen sink—I could just reach the tap on tippy-toe—and I filled the bowl up and ran back to the couch to splash the water on it. I ran back and forth, but the fire was more than little orange bowls of water could extinguish.
I always woke up feeling frustrated, angry. Abandoned. Where was everybody? Why was I doing this terrifying grown-up thing all by myself?
2)
In second year Fine Arts, I had a little solo show in a Summerland café. I had titled one of the mixed-media paintings “The Magistrate’s Daughter”. It was a head and shoulders drawing of a dark nude—her eyes black and far away, her expression mournful and exposed. A young couple bought it. The husband asked me about it—why did I name it that? I thought—I don’t know—that I couldn’t come up with anything clever to say. So I blustered and smiled around the truth, thinking that the truth would be lame and mundane. I told him “I don’t know… she just sort of suited that title. Don’t you think?”. I could tell that they were unfulfilled by my response.
The truth is this:
I have two European prints from my maternal grandparent’s house—they have both long since passed away. But I remember looking at the prints as a child, and wondering about them. One is a watery picture of a bridge over a city canal. It is called “Malines-Belgium”. The other is of a European townhouse, called “A French Magistrate’s House”. The etching is stark and straight, the front of the building ornate and imposing. I acquired the prints in my early twenties, around the time I started working on my BFA. I hung the prints in my Kelowna kitchen, and I would spend minutes at a time looking at the picture of the Magistrate’s house. Who was he? What was his family like? I built them lives, personalities. The daughter grew up, she never married… her oppressive and important father had something to do with this. She turned to secret night-time affairs to try to claim some piece of her life as her own… but she never became who she really wanted to become. She never got to become herself. And I held her back even more, because I didn't let her become real for that couple, either. I horded her story, kept her secret.
Summerland couple… do you remember my name? Have you ever googled me? I hope you do. I hope you find this story, and connect it to the portrait hanging in your living room or den. This is who she is. She is a somebody. One day, I will show you the print of the Magistrate’s house, where she still lives.
1)
When I was very young—about four or five years old, I think—I used to have a recurring dream about our living room couch catching fire spontaneously. It was the chocolate corduroy couch that had its’ back to the windows that overlooked Hope St.
The brown corduroy was my favorite couch for several reasons. Boy, our fat brown tabby, would curl up on one end. I would lean up next to him and he would purr while I petted him with my left hand and sucked the thumb on my right hand. The couch was also in the living room, as opposed to the family room—the living room being the more genteel space that my parents reserved for adult friends and glasses of adult beverages and fires in the fireplace. Kids and toys belonged in the family room. So the brown couch represented a clean, comfortable, restricted world.
The couch would always be burning on the right hand corner, opposite the cat’s corner. No-one would be nearby to help. I don’t know if I ever cried for help—I just ran my little self into the kitchen, and got the orange plastic mixing bowl, and then I dashed to the kitchen sink—I could just reach the tap on tippy-toe—and I filled the bowl up and ran back to the couch to splash the water on it. I ran back and forth, but the fire was more than little orange bowls of water could extinguish.
I always woke up feeling frustrated, angry. Abandoned. Where was everybody? Why was I doing this terrifying grown-up thing all by myself?
2)
In second year Fine Arts, I had a little solo show in a Summerland café. I had titled one of the mixed-media paintings “The Magistrate’s Daughter”. It was a head and shoulders drawing of a dark nude—her eyes black and far away, her expression mournful and exposed. A young couple bought it. The husband asked me about it—why did I name it that? I thought—I don’t know—that I couldn’t come up with anything clever to say. So I blustered and smiled around the truth, thinking that the truth would be lame and mundane. I told him “I don’t know… she just sort of suited that title. Don’t you think?”. I could tell that they were unfulfilled by my response.
The truth is this:
I have two European prints from my maternal grandparent’s house—they have both long since passed away. But I remember looking at the prints as a child, and wondering about them. One is a watery picture of a bridge over a city canal. It is called “Malines-Belgium”. The other is of a European townhouse, called “A French Magistrate’s House”. The etching is stark and straight, the front of the building ornate and imposing. I acquired the prints in my early twenties, around the time I started working on my BFA. I hung the prints in my Kelowna kitchen, and I would spend minutes at a time looking at the picture of the Magistrate’s house. Who was he? What was his family like? I built them lives, personalities. The daughter grew up, she never married… her oppressive and important father had something to do with this. She turned to secret night-time affairs to try to claim some piece of her life as her own… but she never became who she really wanted to become. She never got to become herself. And I held her back even more, because I didn't let her become real for that couple, either. I horded her story, kept her secret.
Summerland couple… do you remember my name? Have you ever googled me? I hope you do. I hope you find this story, and connect it to the portrait hanging in your living room or den. This is who she is. She is a somebody. One day, I will show you the print of the Magistrate’s house, where she still lives.
Wednesday, January 21, 2009
Tuesday, January 20, 2009
I’m almost totally disconnected right now. I haven’t been phoning anyone. Not many people have been phoning me. My mom, maybe? She phones. She’s worried about me. Nate’s been phoning. He’s all moved out now, living on Vancouver Island, as per his dream. He already sounds happier… friends to play with, things to do. He has the sound of hope in his voice. A portion of that hope is pointed at me. Hoping I’ll move out there.
Nate moved out on Saturday. After he left, I moved furniture around the basement suite. The couch angled here, the computer table swivels to the corner, the easel treks across the room with the unfinished painting onboard. I’m still moving things around. Inspecting piles of papers, bills, photographs… I even found a misplaced GST rebate cheque. Bonus. I’ve been wiping up dust with lemon-scented wipes, washing my sheets, my clothes. I haven’t settled in yet. I haven’t found a rhythm, a comfortable way to be without Nathan here. I’m not unhappy. I’m not bored. I’m not lonely. I’m… unsettled.
People want to know what’s next. I have nothing to tell them. That’s why I’m not calling anyone, not seeing anyone outside of work. I don’t really know what I want; the unknowing baffles me, muffles me. Home? Family? Career? Lifestyle? Money? Travel? Simplicity? Domesticity? Obligation? Reparation?
I make no move to contact people who are displeased with me. I make no move to contact people who are waiting on me to wake up, or whatever it is they are waiting for. I do not want to disappoint anyone, so best just to stay out of everyone’s life altogether.
In my heart, all the answers are there. I can’t hear my heart, my brain is so loud. I need this quiet time now. I need this resonance. This dark aisle leading to a personal Renaissance.
I don't know what I am doing, staying up late. I have an amazingly long day ahead of me tomorrow. I am going for an ultrasound on my left boobie... found a lump a while back. I'm not worried about it, though, because my GP said that breast cancer pretty much never hurts, and this little sucker goes through a startling monthly cycle of pain. She figures it's a cyst. Here's hoping. Also, tomorrow is garbage day, and I have to finish my lesson plan for class tomorrow, and I have to get the suite tidy and ready for showing... I talked to my landlord about decreasing the rent, possibly, maybe? But he figured he could get the price he wanted from someone else. So I'm moving at the end of February... don't ask me where to. I don't know. I'm OK with not knowing. I hope you are, too.
Sweet, meaningful, abundant, restful dreams...
Nate moved out on Saturday. After he left, I moved furniture around the basement suite. The couch angled here, the computer table swivels to the corner, the easel treks across the room with the unfinished painting onboard. I’m still moving things around. Inspecting piles of papers, bills, photographs… I even found a misplaced GST rebate cheque. Bonus. I’ve been wiping up dust with lemon-scented wipes, washing my sheets, my clothes. I haven’t settled in yet. I haven’t found a rhythm, a comfortable way to be without Nathan here. I’m not unhappy. I’m not bored. I’m not lonely. I’m… unsettled.
People want to know what’s next. I have nothing to tell them. That’s why I’m not calling anyone, not seeing anyone outside of work. I don’t really know what I want; the unknowing baffles me, muffles me. Home? Family? Career? Lifestyle? Money? Travel? Simplicity? Domesticity? Obligation? Reparation?
I make no move to contact people who are displeased with me. I make no move to contact people who are waiting on me to wake up, or whatever it is they are waiting for. I do not want to disappoint anyone, so best just to stay out of everyone’s life altogether.
In my heart, all the answers are there. I can’t hear my heart, my brain is so loud. I need this quiet time now. I need this resonance. This dark aisle leading to a personal Renaissance.
I don't know what I am doing, staying up late. I have an amazingly long day ahead of me tomorrow. I am going for an ultrasound on my left boobie... found a lump a while back. I'm not worried about it, though, because my GP said that breast cancer pretty much never hurts, and this little sucker goes through a startling monthly cycle of pain. She figures it's a cyst. Here's hoping. Also, tomorrow is garbage day, and I have to finish my lesson plan for class tomorrow, and I have to get the suite tidy and ready for showing... I talked to my landlord about decreasing the rent, possibly, maybe? But he figured he could get the price he wanted from someone else. So I'm moving at the end of February... don't ask me where to. I don't know. I'm OK with not knowing. I hope you are, too.
Sweet, meaningful, abundant, restful dreams...
Sunday, January 11, 2009
Rules: Once you've been tagged, you are supposed to write a note with 20 random things, facts, habits, or goals about you. At the end, choose 16 people to be tagged.
Alright. I got 'tagged' on facebook by my friend Laura. Since I don't write 'notes' on facebook, I figure I'd launch into this project here. I think it's kind of funny because this is my blog. All I do is write random things about myself. But it is my birthday, my thirtieth birthday, and I'm going to indulge myself. I'll see if I can come up with stuff that I don't think most people know.
A Random 20 Things Note
1. I want to go to the Burning Man Festival at some point in my life.
2. If I won the lottery, the first thing I would do is learn how to scuba dive so that I could take my Dad to Truk lagoon. I want to learn how to scuba dive regardless of whether or not I win any money in my life. Wait... I have a scratch ticket that I got for my birthday-- I'm going to scratch it right now... Oh damn. No winners.
3. I can bend my big toes at 90 degree angles.
4. I don't like dry dust touching my feet.
5. I like live bugs, but not dead ones. I can't touch dead bugs. If I do, I squeal. I think it has to do with that time when I was reeeeally little, and Dad was giving me a bath, and a dead fly fell out of my hair into the bath tub. I was so mortified and grossed out.
6 and 7. I have great balance, but poor flexibility. I don't ever wish to win any kind of award for any sort of physical activity. I just have zero interest in physical competition.
8. I sometimes wish I wasn't white.
9. I don't have any mentors or heroes. There is noone I want to be like when I 'grow up'. I have always just wanted to be the best me I can be-- no-one else can be a guide or model for that.
10. But I do admire the following people: Mr. Dress-Up for bringing me joy; The Dalai Lama for bringing me back to my spiritual self; David Suzuki for bringing me awareness and practical steps for saving the planet; Robert Bateman for inspiring me artistically as a kid (and again now that I am mostly over my art-school snobbiness); Gabrielle Lacelle for being an independant, amazing adult female in my life; Stirling Alexander for just plain being wicked, and a destroyer of adversity.
11. I am not very romantic.
12. I don't like naked animals-- pigs, elephants, naked vole-rats-- but I think those hairless cats are pretty neat. I like pretty much every other animal. Except for maybe porcupines and honey badgers.
13. I talk to myself. I answer. I argue. I don't care.
14. I used to chew my toenails when I was a kid.
15. If I have any enemies, I don't know about it. I believe in peace, nonviolence, and altruism as a way of life.
16. I want to become a Buddhist, but I don't know how. Am I one if I say I am? Also (even though I feel foolish for it) I am kind of worried about what Jesus will think.
17. I try to say nice, friendly things to myself (in my head) in the morning, like "Good morning honey! You had a goooood sleep! Don't you feel great? You are going to have such a wonderful day today!" I do this, because if I wake up thinking crabby thoughts (like "Ohhhh I DON'T WANT TO GET UP! WHY DO I HAVE TO GO TO WORK?"), I tend to be clumsier and crabbier throughout the rest of the day.
18. I like being by myself more than I like being with people, but I feel guilty for feeling this way. I want to get over the guilt so that I can more thoroughly enjoy myself, both when I'm by myself, and when I am with people. As it stands now, I'm wishing to be alone when I'm hanging out with people, and feeling guilty for not socializing when I'm alone! Not productive! Not healthy! And I really doooo love people. I'm just not getting enough time alone so that I can actually enjoy them when I'm with them...
19. I want to live in a house furnished with only plants and pillows. (But I know I couldn't stop there!!)
20. I really love being who I am, in the end. I want to make the most of my life, my talents and circumstances. I don't want to wait for my life to happen. I do want to share my experiences with good people. I want to take responsibility for who I am, and where I'm at in life, every day, for the rest of my life.
If you read this, consider yourself 'tagged'.
Namaste,
Endrene
Alright. I got 'tagged' on facebook by my friend Laura. Since I don't write 'notes' on facebook, I figure I'd launch into this project here. I think it's kind of funny because this is my blog. All I do is write random things about myself. But it is my birthday, my thirtieth birthday, and I'm going to indulge myself. I'll see if I can come up with stuff that I don't think most people know.
A Random 20 Things Note
1. I want to go to the Burning Man Festival at some point in my life.
2. If I won the lottery, the first thing I would do is learn how to scuba dive so that I could take my Dad to Truk lagoon. I want to learn how to scuba dive regardless of whether or not I win any money in my life. Wait... I have a scratch ticket that I got for my birthday-- I'm going to scratch it right now... Oh damn. No winners.
3. I can bend my big toes at 90 degree angles.
4. I don't like dry dust touching my feet.
5. I like live bugs, but not dead ones. I can't touch dead bugs. If I do, I squeal. I think it has to do with that time when I was reeeeally little, and Dad was giving me a bath, and a dead fly fell out of my hair into the bath tub. I was so mortified and grossed out.
6 and 7. I have great balance, but poor flexibility. I don't ever wish to win any kind of award for any sort of physical activity. I just have zero interest in physical competition.
8. I sometimes wish I wasn't white.
9. I don't have any mentors or heroes. There is noone I want to be like when I 'grow up'. I have always just wanted to be the best me I can be-- no-one else can be a guide or model for that.
10. But I do admire the following people: Mr. Dress-Up for bringing me joy; The Dalai Lama for bringing me back to my spiritual self; David Suzuki for bringing me awareness and practical steps for saving the planet; Robert Bateman for inspiring me artistically as a kid (and again now that I am mostly over my art-school snobbiness); Gabrielle Lacelle for being an independant, amazing adult female in my life; Stirling Alexander for just plain being wicked, and a destroyer of adversity.
11. I am not very romantic.
12. I don't like naked animals-- pigs, elephants, naked vole-rats-- but I think those hairless cats are pretty neat. I like pretty much every other animal. Except for maybe porcupines and honey badgers.
13. I talk to myself. I answer. I argue. I don't care.
14. I used to chew my toenails when I was a kid.
15. If I have any enemies, I don't know about it. I believe in peace, nonviolence, and altruism as a way of life.
16. I want to become a Buddhist, but I don't know how. Am I one if I say I am? Also (even though I feel foolish for it) I am kind of worried about what Jesus will think.
17. I try to say nice, friendly things to myself (in my head) in the morning, like "Good morning honey! You had a goooood sleep! Don't you feel great? You are going to have such a wonderful day today!" I do this, because if I wake up thinking crabby thoughts (like "Ohhhh I DON'T WANT TO GET UP! WHY DO I HAVE TO GO TO WORK?"), I tend to be clumsier and crabbier throughout the rest of the day.
18. I like being by myself more than I like being with people, but I feel guilty for feeling this way. I want to get over the guilt so that I can more thoroughly enjoy myself, both when I'm by myself, and when I am with people. As it stands now, I'm wishing to be alone when I'm hanging out with people, and feeling guilty for not socializing when I'm alone! Not productive! Not healthy! And I really doooo love people. I'm just not getting enough time alone so that I can actually enjoy them when I'm with them...
19. I want to live in a house furnished with only plants and pillows. (But I know I couldn't stop there!!)
20. I really love being who I am, in the end. I want to make the most of my life, my talents and circumstances. I don't want to wait for my life to happen. I do want to share my experiences with good people. I want to take responsibility for who I am, and where I'm at in life, every day, for the rest of my life.
If you read this, consider yourself 'tagged'.
Namaste,
Endrene
Wednesday, January 07, 2009
You've heard that saying, "That which you resist, persists"?
I must be resisting a lot of things right now. I feel very boxed in, curled up tight in my strange eggshell world... as though everything I do takes management, manouvering. There is no flow, no freedom, no stretching room.
I don't know what I need, and I feel selfish in thinking that there is something missing when I already have so much. Maybe it's not that there's something missing. Maybe it just IS that there is TOO MUCH. Too much of some stuff, not enough of others.
OK, that's enough of this. Send me good vibes, if you have some to spare.
x
e
I must be resisting a lot of things right now. I feel very boxed in, curled up tight in my strange eggshell world... as though everything I do takes management, manouvering. There is no flow, no freedom, no stretching room.
I don't know what I need, and I feel selfish in thinking that there is something missing when I already have so much. Maybe it's not that there's something missing. Maybe it just IS that there is TOO MUCH. Too much of some stuff, not enough of others.
OK, that's enough of this. Send me good vibes, if you have some to spare.
x
e
Saturday, January 03, 2009
I have been working diligently (with only occasional procrastinatory breaks) on my lesson plans and preparations for the classes I will begin to teach this coming Monday. Truth be told, I haven’t gotten as far as I would have liked. By now, I feel as though I should have the entire first week mapped out, and instead I have only a blurry outline of the first two days. But haven’t I said that I don’t believe in ‘should haves’? I have. I don’t. If there is a reason behind my snail’s pace, I am slow to reveal it to myself.
Let’s think. It could be that my mind is playing the ego-based game of ‘scramble’—the ego loves when chaos reigns, because the ego thrives in chaotic environments. It’s easy to ignore our true selves when we are immersed in the frantic panic of deadlines and ‘should-haves’ and ‘ought-tos’.
It could be that I’m thinking about turning 30. I guess I thought I should have (Doh!) been ready for kids by now. I’m not. I don’t feel much remorse about not wanting to have kids, about not wanting to get married, about not being able to give anyone a clear answer when they ask me “What’s next, Endrené?” I just feel good, mostly. I don’t feel sad to be leaving my twenties… not in the slightest. I am thrilled, in fact, to be entering this new decade of self-assurance, strength, and challenge. If there is any kind of disappointment attached to this birthday, it is that I do not have the dough or the time to celebrate it the way I REALLY want to—by myself, on a beach, somewhere warm. However, I can look at this YEAR as MY YEAR, and accumulate the needed dough and allot the necessary time so that at some point this year, I can celebrate myself exactly the way I have envisioned. I had wanted badly to go to the Burning Man Festival this year… but I find myself asking… why? I’m not particularly social, not on a mass scale like that. I like my interactions to be tight and intense- and brief. I don’t like crowds. I’ll revisit that one later.
It could be that I have been reflecting on my ‘resolutions’, or perhaps—‘realizations’ is more like it. Winter is always a reflective time, due largely to the inclement weather and the pervasive darkness—but that’s beside the point. The points are: I am tired of taking advice. I take a lot of it. I look for clues, answers, outside help, public opinion. I craft my response to the world in the way that will make the world happiness. I say that I like movies that I don’t. I try to like everything, in fact, for fear of offending someone. In that spirit, instead of listing things I think I would like to try or learn about in the next year, here are a list of ‘don’t likes’ that I am not willing to waffle about. Not this year, anyway:
I don’t like LED Christmas lights. DON’T DON’T DON’T!
I will not try skateboarding or snowboarding.
I don’t like romantic movies with predictable plots.
I don’t like ANY movie with a predictable plot.
I LIKE weird, unhappy movies.
I like to watch most movies once, and only once, with few exceptions.
I don’t want to teach art. TO ANYBODY. I want to teach English!
I don't want to own property. Not this year. Maybe never.
I don't want more STUFFffffff!
OK, the list isn’t that long. Complaining isn’t healthy anyway. I just want it made clear to the universe that I plan to take my own opinions seriously from now on, so any universal influence has to come from nearer to my own heart. No more billboard prophets.
I have been isolating myself quite a bit lately—I’m not sure if it’s out of habit, disposition, or by choice. All I know is that I don’t get out very much, and I’m totally fine with it. I’ve been incubating. I sometimes wish that I could have a warmer social life… but even in my isolation, I find that I don’t get as much alone time as I would like. Enough nurturing, creative, alone time. Good lord, I sound like Oprah.
Did I ever reach any sort of point? I just vented. Anyway… good things are coming. For me, for you, for the world. Listen closely to your true self. Don’t pass judgment on others; remember that the only person you have any control over is yourself. Use that control to do good, to be good goodness and light unto this world. Speak peaceful words, thankful words; let all words of judgment curl and dry and blow away like brown leaves before they reach your lips. Covet nothing, no-one. Move forward gently, soundlessly, with showers of multicoloured petals falling in your wake. Let your goodness speak for you. The air you breathe is enough. Your smile is enough. Your warm small hands, doing warm small things; this is enough.
Namaste,
Endrené
Let’s think. It could be that my mind is playing the ego-based game of ‘scramble’—the ego loves when chaos reigns, because the ego thrives in chaotic environments. It’s easy to ignore our true selves when we are immersed in the frantic panic of deadlines and ‘should-haves’ and ‘ought-tos’.
It could be that I’m thinking about turning 30. I guess I thought I should have (Doh!) been ready for kids by now. I’m not. I don’t feel much remorse about not wanting to have kids, about not wanting to get married, about not being able to give anyone a clear answer when they ask me “What’s next, Endrené?” I just feel good, mostly. I don’t feel sad to be leaving my twenties… not in the slightest. I am thrilled, in fact, to be entering this new decade of self-assurance, strength, and challenge. If there is any kind of disappointment attached to this birthday, it is that I do not have the dough or the time to celebrate it the way I REALLY want to—by myself, on a beach, somewhere warm. However, I can look at this YEAR as MY YEAR, and accumulate the needed dough and allot the necessary time so that at some point this year, I can celebrate myself exactly the way I have envisioned. I had wanted badly to go to the Burning Man Festival this year… but I find myself asking… why? I’m not particularly social, not on a mass scale like that. I like my interactions to be tight and intense- and brief. I don’t like crowds. I’ll revisit that one later.
It could be that I have been reflecting on my ‘resolutions’, or perhaps—‘realizations’ is more like it. Winter is always a reflective time, due largely to the inclement weather and the pervasive darkness—but that’s beside the point. The points are: I am tired of taking advice. I take a lot of it. I look for clues, answers, outside help, public opinion. I craft my response to the world in the way that will make the world happiness. I say that I like movies that I don’t. I try to like everything, in fact, for fear of offending someone. In that spirit, instead of listing things I think I would like to try or learn about in the next year, here are a list of ‘don’t likes’ that I am not willing to waffle about. Not this year, anyway:
I don’t like LED Christmas lights. DON’T DON’T DON’T!
I will not try skateboarding or snowboarding.
I don’t like romantic movies with predictable plots.
I don’t like ANY movie with a predictable plot.
I LIKE weird, unhappy movies.
I like to watch most movies once, and only once, with few exceptions.
I don’t want to teach art. TO ANYBODY. I want to teach English!
I don't want to own property. Not this year. Maybe never.
I don't want more STUFFffffff!
OK, the list isn’t that long. Complaining isn’t healthy anyway. I just want it made clear to the universe that I plan to take my own opinions seriously from now on, so any universal influence has to come from nearer to my own heart. No more billboard prophets.
I have been isolating myself quite a bit lately—I’m not sure if it’s out of habit, disposition, or by choice. All I know is that I don’t get out very much, and I’m totally fine with it. I’ve been incubating. I sometimes wish that I could have a warmer social life… but even in my isolation, I find that I don’t get as much alone time as I would like. Enough nurturing, creative, alone time. Good lord, I sound like Oprah.
Did I ever reach any sort of point? I just vented. Anyway… good things are coming. For me, for you, for the world. Listen closely to your true self. Don’t pass judgment on others; remember that the only person you have any control over is yourself. Use that control to do good, to be good goodness and light unto this world. Speak peaceful words, thankful words; let all words of judgment curl and dry and blow away like brown leaves before they reach your lips. Covet nothing, no-one. Move forward gently, soundlessly, with showers of multicoloured petals falling in your wake. Let your goodness speak for you. The air you breathe is enough. Your smile is enough. Your warm small hands, doing warm small things; this is enough.
Namaste,
Endrené
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