Posted in Uncategorized on December 15, 2009 by heliopath
Time to lighten up the load. while I will still keep this as a deep thought space (or thoughts from deep space, whichever you prefer) I shall be posting more light stuff over at heliopath.wordpress.com. There I will be talking more day to day stuff, tracking my activities and my adjustment to the new reality that I am going to be hurled in to.
Posted in Uncategorized on August 30, 2009 by heliopath
play:
This summer has been the summer of trying to wrap my head around the scalability of love and relationships. Zooming in and out of the relative scales of the world. Something that seemed to be microscopically significant, becomes less important within the wider context to the world as a whole.
When you are out counting stars at night, each new star you find shines bright. you point at it with wide-eyed excitement and turn the person on your left “LOOK theres one!” but with each new star you find, the ones you already found become absorbed as part of the background. stale, boring, old… redundant. It’s a galactical battle to retain our short attention span (which many people note is an accelerating by-product of our tech-driven society). Perhaps this too has soaked into the relationship world.
Meeting new people is so exciting and invigorating. everything feels fresh and possible. the path of new discovery is built on spontaneity. new stories to tell, new verbal paintings to paint, new reflections to dig into. This process is such a life-affirming feeling (like a new crush), especially when compared to the old “known” ones. where everyone knows everything left to know about you, there are no surprises and your expectations are normalized and then it becomes stale. as a friend once told me, “with new people you can be who you want because they dont know everything about you; particularly random strangers, who do not judge or have predisposed expectations. those who know you for a long time frame you with what they already know of you, their perception of you based on your previous conversations and actions. they hold that judgement, that baggage, against you. with new people and strangers that doesnt exist, you are free and can be who you want to be”. (paraphrased and not directly quoted)
so people become addicted to that, surfing the waves of newness and excitement. Hell i think everyone does, it feels so great to meet someone new who inspires you or who you are attracted to at some level. but what about those who are more loyal, and have been there for while. their names are no longer associated with excitement. While the veins of those relationships run much deeper, the excitement and attention is no longer held. Active care becomes passive care. The texts received are no longer adrenaline stimulating but become normal, an assumed constant.
so then they are reduced to redundancy, become part of the background. it’s a sad tale, but as someone who makes his whole thing about “always being there for people because he cares” it usually puts me in everyones closet. i am contacted excitedly when they need me or wish something from me, but other than that they are elusive, busy with their normal lives. its just a cold feeling. of not being wanted, of not being that “special” someone, but just there. dont mind him thats just ro, hes always around. And then i get told about all the exciting new people they have met and how happy they are to meet them and how they miss them, or look forward to talking to them.
and i guess im probably to blame for putting myself in these situations and playing that part. for putting others before me too much and for falling into these traps. And perhaps im just a grumpy sour person because i see all these people getting excited, but no one is really getting excited over me. sure maybe thats a bit un-altruistic of me, but there are moments when i wish there was someone out there excited to hear from me, or still in that fun phase.
but how do we tackle this process?
how do you keep an old deep relationship exciting and still on top of the menu? how do you not get bored and seek elsewhere.
when i see people, girls especially, with wondering eyes (not that guys dont have them too but ive just noticed it with girls) first jealousy boils within me, and then then inadequacy sets in. Thats why i would have to feel that i am exclusive, that I am who they want and fulfill their broadest desires. And that i wont bore them. that i wont be rendered redundant and pushed to the “he will always be around, he is my safety net” category.
so the age old questions also present themselves.
how do you fight jealousy? how do you accept it, eventhough you feel some legitimacy to it. a real hurt?
and on the other side, how do you prevent the accidental creation of jealousy, how do you avoid it but still be able to spread your good love to multiple people, without making others feel compromised?
how do you stop from fading into someone’s background? how do you assure yourself that you matter to people even if it is a mere dormant/passive matterance?
how do you prevent people rendering you redundant and stale by the introduction of new and more exciting people?
how do you deal with it all?
if you have an answer let me know.
***after thought, influenced by others who have talked to me. One of the answers is usually, (the one buddhists love to bang on about) , “if you cant change the world change yourself”. so i guess, to come to terms with it in your own heart. to believe in yourself and that your loyalty and depth will matter in the long run. bright stars die quickly, but those that keep up a constant dull brilliance last long. do nice guys finish last? or do they finish last because they OUTLAST everyone else. oooooo.
i’d also like to thank the show chuck for constantly reminding me that good looks and charm aren’t everything and some girls fall for a good heart.
Posted in Uncategorized on August 3, 2009 by heliopath
we assume… or rather, I assume like rocks hurling through space that it’s ok, were all in it together. We are all born into this life, we are all taught by our parents, our instincts and our sensory interaction with the real world. We all grow up and develop different personalities that pick things and take off things from our “environment” as we walk and talk through life. (We learn far more than we can even think we learn and can’t come to grips with in our limited vision of the world). All of a sudden, we become an opinionated, core-personalitied, self-sufficient, physically and emotionally attractable human being. We are all composed of the same matter and constructed in a similiar fashion, yet our uniqueness remains vital and for that reason eventhough we are all the same, we are all different. while we are together we are all alone.
we are all rocks hurling through space. and i always think that “im with all the other rocks going in the same direction” but every once in a while im reminded of the cold fact that no… not at all, we are all going different places and everyone is unique and concerned with themselves. we are all on our own paths, which may cross with others (sometimes connect and partner with others) but the journey is still our own unique one. often i forget that, or rather find it hard to accept. i like the concept of share, in fact i feel unfulfilled when i cant share sometimes. although some experiences are also great alone (music, movies, books).
but ofcourse im not such a cold pessimist. i do believe some rocks, if not all, are destined to attatch to eachother and form a planet (create life?) that all space dust will amount to something and will find a home. it doesnt just dissapear (i really want someone to find that when things go through a blackhole they come out somewhere else, mario style)
but even though i believe all these things. its that once in a while reminder that things are not what they seem, reality is not what your mind makes you expect. creating false expectations. And when that gap is discovered, that you thought you found a companion but now its strayed off and become something completely different. Or when you subconsciously compose a role for someone to play and reality they do not play to that part, instead of accepting them as is for who they are. that can also be very discouraging. but when it happens, its a very confusing shock to the system. oh wait but i was so sure that, that was my destiny, that was who i was going to partner up with/thats how my life was going to be and now all of a sudden its not there and i am left with nothing but emptiness? but rejection and distance?
but hey as prashanth says, god isn’t a dick. he’s not going to have a jigsaw puzzle with one piece missing, each piece shall have its place. but of course he is god (if he is god at all) and the puzzle is a 4 d puzzle, in dimensions of space and time. things may not fit now but they might fit later and things might have fit before but fall out of fitting all together. who knows.
BUT there is hope for things are not all predetermined. We are flexible, bendy and able to be kind and compassionate when we are compelled to. certain people bring out the good in us, the good which we didnt even know existed. thats the kind of people worth being a part of.
Posted in Uncategorized on August 3, 2009 by heliopath
If someone wrote a biography of my life what would be like? no… more specifically,
if someone would write a biography of me in the future what will it read like?
will it cleverly find a way to link all my actions and experiences i’ve had so far to explain how I am the way I am and the reasons I have made the decisions i have made?
will it manage to explain through a trace of interpretative history how my life’s experiences were translated into my life actions? the “path” that i took to my own personal relative success?
after all thats how you judge a successful life right? a productive life. One in which all experiences contributed to a full sense of being and a powerful sense of action. The goals you set for yourself, based on personal preferences shaped by experiences – problems you see in the world and the way you address them; things you believe in and the way you adhere to them. success is relative, so only you can judge your own success. that is not to say that “everyone is successful”. there are goals and meters that we each put out for ourselves and only we can score them. Yeah sure we can lie and make excuses for not meeting them but inside we will know we are letting ourselves down. Ok maybe its not just ourselves, there are plenty of egomaniacs who in their eyes feel extremely successful eventhough they leave a blazing trail of pain and destruction wherever they tread. But the idea is not to let ourselves down, we answer to our honest true self.
{although who at the end of their life is really going to admit they wasted all 85 years of living?, i guess not but then Magnolia like regret has to come into play. Do regret some missed opportunities on your death bed? is there anything you wouldve done differently?}
An unproductive, wasted life.
that would read as a sad biography. he had all this stuff, he had all these experiences but it all amounted to nothing. he got lost and confused between his own heart’s optimistic dreams, his parents ideals and the laziness that won the battle over his soul because he lacked external compulsion.
MY BIOGRAPHY WILL NOT READ LIKE THAT.
i will make that deceleration/dedication/decision/determination now.
I will have a productive life! I will find a way to use what I have, the people I have around me and my inner ability to do. My biography will in Lost-like beauty bring together all of my past experiences (my flash backs) to explain who I am, what I am about and what I have come here to do, and how I have done it.
Posted in Uncategorized on August 2, 2009 by heliopath
press play and then read.
if i had to declare my mission it would be
to set the others free,
free from the vice that holds them tight
into spiral living that they cannot see,
rotating around the tree
as you can see im not one to rhyme
my mind doesnt fucking function on time
but i feel a burn inside of me, when i stand on the side lines and see: people driving straight, in the mind going places, getting somewhere. but when you zoom out they driving in a great big loop, going nowhere fast.
and people use this knowledge, give a man some bread every month for him and his family, he will do what you tell him to do.
the manipulation of the abstract goal. ambition. curve the ambition to meet someone elses goal.
then you say… well so what? its a means to an end. the people working win and the people at the top win.
but what about the people who are indirectly affected by this machine? this machine whose parts dont know what the control tower is doing.
little pixels minding their own business. loving their families, providing for their lovers, doing what they can to improve their lives, educate their children, move to more comfortable areas, better life styles, climb up that social ladder.
yet you zoom out and the million individual pixels make up hitlers face.
if i was an artist i would depict this some day.
a million rights directed askew can make a massive fucking wrong
what then?
what do you do?
do the means justify the ends?
sensible decisions built on top of eachother to create one massive monsterous fuck up. does that really go justified?
well then… they say: what about all the lives that were improved. and how can you blame them.
how can you blame officers acting on orders with no concept of what the big picture looked like?
in the days before the gps, we drive straight on a road that incrementally circumnavigates over time.
what then.
what purpose can there be.
oiling the engines, greasing the wheels.
theres got to be a better way though. a way to direct this powerful faction for good, for productive society. a control tower with a deeper vision and those who work in parts understand are transparent to the end goal. manipulation is unnecessary because everyone believes in the goal being acheived. so they earn money AND they are powering a socially productive machine. instead of a manipulated little bastard. a million people getting up at 6am, crawling into a tower to be there for 12 hours so that I can get my 99 cent McMuffin that is 70% fake and 100% ill-nutritious.
well then others say: you can only say this because you are privileged, others do not have a choice, they have to earn a living, feed their families, educate their children.
you have a choice. and then i say well, Ya i have a choice so i wish to choose wisely. i wish to choose so that i can give others more choice. those who are stuck in society because of who they are, what they were born as. even their social marginalization.
more choice for those rejected for their gender
more choice for those who are forced into marriage/obligations/roles based on traditional customs
more choice for those who flee from war and famine, only to be beaten with a heavy stick and thrown back in the sea
more choice for those who find no option but the life of a gangster, a religious radical, a suicidal massacre-ist, a financial economic home wrecker, a sex trader.
what will mcdonalds do for these people?
they say the sex trade is as ancient as human and will exist as long as human exists. after all
a sad but biological and socially accurate fact. it still disguists me to my total core.
they also say: you kill a weed, 10 more will grow somewhere else.
then i stand there in silence, with not much of a response.
there is no reply really, just that burning desire inside to prove that fact wrong. Maybe like jacob.
then of course there is that other itching final nauseous thought that always gets me, that always prevents me from posting on here:
what do i know?
all this talk about how others dont see other peoples perspectives, yet here i am a hippo – guilty of the same thing.
is my free the same as their free? it certainly wasnt for bush.
but you cant deny human rights.
you CAN NOT DENY THE GOLDEN RULE. that is why it is golden. im glad obama referred to it in his recent mid-east speech.
a nice wikipedia research brings out this beautiful contents list:
The Golden Rule
Contents
* 1 Ancient Greek philosophy
* 2 Religion and philosophy
o 2.1 Global ethic
o 2.2 Buddhism
o 2.3 Baha’i Faith
o 2.4 Christianity
o 2.5 Confucianism
o 2.6 Hinduism
o 2.7 Islam
o 2.8 Jainism
o 2.9 Judaism
o 2.10 Sikhism
o 2.11 Taoism
tell me thats not beautiful. tell me thats not human. as ancient as the human and will be true as long as the human exists. even when machines take over i am sure their fundamentals will be built on a similar system. a code. perhaps a better code that cannot be broken. broken everyday, because distances exist, or are created.
us and them. when in the end the truth is that its just we and us.
and then my friend says
to each his own.
and i reply
to each his own indeed, im surprised that we arn’t born with that tattood on our ass. we probably should be. but the golden rule is golden and we should be reminded of it upon each breath. each shared breath of air
Posted in Uncategorized on August 2, 2009 by heliopath
24th year of life.
a feeling of uneasiness has been passing through me lately. I think it’s because i often get exposed to amazing moments of light for brief periods of time before they are switched off for longer. it’s like a fluctuating current that’s more torturous than keeping things exciting. it leaves me feeling a bit shallow, a bit empty, a bit left alone.
I was explaining this to someone. It’s not that i don’t feel loved, or that I don’t appreciate how good the world has been to me (im so damn lucky) but it’s just all this greatness and love is so fucking abstract. i find it in inconsistent pockets, in people I know around the world who give me amazing 10 minutes online conversations. its in 2 hour movies not about my life.
even moments when i feel connected to someone, it is so fickle and fizzles out in an hour or so. in which case i find myself jumping from one to another. I have this awful habit of putting so much energy and faith into people but they don’t send it back in the same way, and so i stop, and they wonder how i went from 10% to 100% to 10% again, while the whole time they wanted to chill out at 50%. i don’t want to chill out at 50. maybe my expectations are too high, or unrealistic, maybe i let out way too much intensity and emotion.
this gap makes me feel alone. again this is the quarter life crisis thing the article is on about? too much choice they say. perhaps. i just want somewhere to focus my energy, my love, my creativity and insane ideas. i just want to not be teased by these flickering lights… fluctuating currents.
of course no bday post would be complete without some phoney comitments.
i want to spend more time on myself and less on others (heard that one before)
i want to limit the time i spend online, specially with people who fool me into believing that an online powerful friendship is enough to get by with. i mean its great but, it’s frailty sucks. i guess im finally coming around, a few years ago i was determined to prove online communication empowered friendships. they do, but it sucks when you spend more time online than you do in real life with eachother.
5 or 6 years ago i was struggling to figure out why I am the way I am when my parents are so different. I couldn’t figure out how or why I had such different perspectives on life. Such different values and priorities on what matters and what doesn’t really matter. My dad seemed to be the opportunistic social-status chasing full throttle capitalist type of person while my mom was overhyper pretentious superficial fashion, “How do we look”, what do others constantly think conscious.
It seems however as I grow, or as I spend more time with them with my own more developed mind, I am able to understand them, and their ways at a much deeper level. I can see my mothers flame hearted emotionally charged good intentions and even my dad’s soft hearted, human-understanding point of view.
One of the greatest pleasures about living at home for the last year or so is exploring the truth that lies behind each’s Performance Exterior. Late night post-dinner conversations with my dad where we sit in the dark venturing into realms of the political, economical, psychological, sociological, philosophical parts of human existence- reminds me that perhaps we do ultimately share a similar approach to life and a way of thinking that I never picked up on those several years ago. We even start by presenting different angles to a situation but through discussion settle on a common equally calibrated position on the subject. It really is quite exciting and leaves me in quite a buzz. A buzz i have always been addicted to when I can do it with people I am close to. Who knew that was something that would happen at home?
Evolving relationships are the most exciting kinds. People are never what you expect, in the end we all have minds, thoughts, wishes, dreams, hopes, hang-ups, self-inflicted weaknesses (those not real weaknesses but just exist in our heads) and issues as we go through reality.
Just like we both agreed on tonight, it is about how you deal with these, how you manage them – to not let them bring you down or stop you from moving forward. You have to put them in their place and keep walking even with scars, they will heal better the more you keep moving, the more you keep going. After all, that is what we are here for. Here to do something, to make a difference, to live our lives and to help others live theirs too.
Everyone is good and no one is bad, even those who are terrible have some goodness, some purity that actually went astray in a very logical and understandable manner. That doesn’t necessarily excuse some horrifying actions, but they are not far from our own, they are only spawned out of some sort of negative reactivity or tempting irrefutable opportunity (greed to help your family? to help yourself live a better life than you might have suffered?). And because of this they can be understood and they can be diffused. I strongly believe this, we are one in the same and people are not always who they seem to be. There is always so much more behind what they present to you, and its our job to figure it out and see how they interpret life differently and figure out a more productive middle way.
LOST anyone? isn’t this exactly what its all about?
even lil benny linny is a good guy who was beaten and alienated from his father and by association Dharma. crazy shit.
Either way I am grateful to have the parents I have and to inevitably share more with them than my rebellious Rage Against The Machine listening teenage self would admit.
well as you might have noticed there has been a sincere lack of output on this page.
One of the main reasons is that i have been scared to. Or rather, unsure to post. Because you see my mind has taken a different turning since i started at Soas in september, unlike bentley i find myself a lot more emotionally and psychologically involved in what i am studying, passionate about what I am learning.
Of course like anything there are somethings that are dull and somethings that pull me in. Specifically the theoretical and scientific aspects i find way too synthetic, Policies devised in laboratories that shatter once taken outside of that airtight chamber. The other thing that just gets ridiculous after a while is the political battle within ACADEMIA. People with conservative, western mindset say one thing while people on the radical, liberal, ground level say something opposite. And its not just different perspectives, i can deal with that, but its the spending so much time and effort tearing the other side’s arguements down that they forget to keep focus on the real issues at hand. In typical human style a battle of ego ensues above initial purpose or objectivity. Instead of figuring out how to extinguish poverty (a goal that neither disputes) they’d rather prove who one is more right than the other, and always has been.
i guess parents do the same thing when they are figuring out how to raise a kid, well damn it stop arguing and pay attention to him and his needs first.
Besides this though, the realistic, historically applicable stuff is what really gets me invigorated. When we spend time looking at india, it’s history since independence (and often looking a bit at colonization) we can begin to understand why it is the way it is now. Which is amazing because until recently I always looked at india with this queasiness in my stomach and a head full of WHY?? and also just plain confusion because nothing seems to work there. Well while learning about it hasn’t completely unraveled all the mysteries or presented any solutions, it has made somethings a bit clear.
One of our teachers is amazing and luckily I have him for 3 different classes. He really makes an effort to combine political power distribution with economic policy, so appropriately tieing that knot between them to understand why people would do such seemingly weird things? Sadly, too often In the end it always breaks down to people’s immediate incomes, where will they get assured money from, and who will protect their income streams – thats who they will vote for. Nothing to do with moral values or "where they stand" on issues. All of that is usually just a tool to get those extra followers, but most people end up supporting those who will look out for their interests. That even includes the politicians themselves who make deals with businessmen, and/or who make deals with other politicians so that the businessman can get what they want. The professor has helped me see that bribery and corruption is not just this "dirty bad thing" but more a necessary means to survival. Which makes me very sad. People have to do whatever it takes to ensure that they can raise a good family. of course this usually gets out of hand, they want to raise a good family, drink liquor, drive sweet cars and date multiple women (talk about expensive!) (oh…or multiple men for you girl-power people)
So we look at what has gone on at various stages in India, Pakistan and Bangladesh. We look at what is going on now in India, Pakistan and Bangladesh and things are pulled a part and put back together like an impossible puzzle. But it seems that everyone has a different approach to doing the puzzle. Maybe im brainwashed but it seems that my professor has some pretty awesome and creative (read: alternative) ideas on how things really work below the surface. Once you can figure it out, that doesn’t mean you know where to go from here, you know possible ideas of where to go from here but then getting it implimented and most importantly, convincing people who are capable of Doing it, to actually try it is just unthinkable. Yet my professor powers on.
Me on the other hand, while I am enjoying this bubble bath of knowledge, soaking up as much as I can, will probably try and get down to something more real. I hope to at least. However what real "is", is totally uncertain. Ask those ancient greek dudes. But, this is something I will have to figure out soon.
Anyway going back to the begining, writing something here has intimidated me for a while. My mind has evolved and moved into more detailed, yet new and less confident, pastures. I wasn’t sure how to take this along with me. Here it seems I normally write about people and situations (usually drunken party observations) so how could i suddenly flip the switch and go hardcore political, serious and uncertain of myself.
but then i realize in the end, this thing is my mind. And so it should evolve as my thoughts evolve, it’s never meant to be confident or publish-ready, its mind ramblings put down on a pad. And Stupid people like you waste your time reading it. So fuck it. I’m going to keep trying to write what comes to mind. It might get more serious, it might get more detailed (less accessible) but i figure since im getting smarter, no reason people who might have read my late night broken hearted bentley monologues, won’t want to read it. so yea…
In other news I feel the world is really becoming more and more plugged in. This twitter craze is getting out of hand, facebook was lost long ago, blogs, blip, music (you guys checked out this Spotify thing yet?)
the anthropology of youtube tries to put all things in perspective. But even among friends more people are throwing out blogs. More people are sending interesting links around, organizing and coming together on issues. Social Network literally is a community. I feel closer to some of the people I share my online life with than with some people I live around. its freaky.
i’m sure more will come out.
i thought of starting a proper serious blog somewhere else but like i mentioned before I think ill keep things here until i maybe formulate some solid world changing ideas.
<a href="http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1068646/"><img alt="" src="http://www.atnzone.com/nz/wp-content/uploads/2009/01/theclass_l200811131511.jpg" class="alignleft" width="261" height="385" /></a> so i just got back from seeing "The Class" which is a crappy translation of the original title Entre Les Murs [Between The Walls] a simple little film that struck me in all the right places. It is a briliant illustration of how sometimes what a film needs most is a whole lot of nothing. No gigantic plot hooks, crazy twists, over complicated drama, feel good moments. Sometimes you need a bit of pure and simple realism.
This movie seems to deliver that. When i saw the trailers i was like, oh god, its another "cool teacher helps troubled kids" movie. But it wasn’t. Leave it to the French to take out over dramatic Michelle Pfeiffer and put in some simple humility that makes the whole experience so much more enjoyable. Perhaps the honesty and sincerity is driven by the fact that the person who wrote the book -> wrote the script and -> acted as the main character in the movie.
And it’s not even about him, its about so many things on so many levels yet its about nothing more than everyday life.
Its a really straight forward story following a teacher and his realistically multi-ethnic, multi-personalitied class, through ups and downs of every day normal school life. And even about the issues, i lightly touches on the surface but doesn’t dwell on them or dig this whole story around their troubles. Everyone has their thing and everyone has to deal with it in their own way. We find out a little about everyone but never enough to completely understand what is goin in their head. And thats the way it should be, another place where hollywood takes us too intricately to the root and source of problems, which we can never really do in real life. Other people’s problems are complex and we can never understand them unless we were born as them.
Beyond the class room it also looks at the institution of this public french school: staff meetings, watercooler moments and the clash of teachers with different teaching styles / perspectives. The most interesting part of this filmis that it makes no judgment, it takes no side it just lets you watch everything for what it is. Just like real life.
It watched like a documentary without having the pressure of being a documentary (no quirky narration, dramatic interviews or concise analytical thesis) It was basically as if a camera man went into any average class room and just recorded.
I definitely think we need more honest films like this. Again to show us what we often forget, how interesting human society is, how interesting people are, through all their darkness and happiness, through their natural issues, cause and effect of personalities. In the end it’s really hard not to just fall in love with all the kids. I can imagine how teachers can do that. This film is so real it’s tangible. you can get so involved and feel like you understand these characters and people so well without really needing to know them at all. Just observing from the side.
Between this, I’ve Loved you so long and Persepolis, even in recent times the french keep winning me over. I should keep my eye out on what they are doing more often.
