I do not talk bad about any situation from my past. I do not hold grudges against those who have wronged or hurt me because in the end, everything happens for a specific reason. This reason is a lesson learned or a lesson renewed in our heart of hearts. So why does everyone else feel the need to hold onto the past? They hold onto it, due to their own fears and insecurities about the future. Hold onto your own pasts and let MINE rest in peace. I have enough shit in my life right now to be worrying about all of you idiots who continue to talk shit. I am a good person and I do not deserve any of it. I would do anything for friends and I would even die for them. 

The past is something that can never be changed, and it can never be forgotten but, we all need to move on from it and accept things for what they are. I do have Borderline Personality Disorder and honestly I do not care what any of you think about it. I am telling you due to the fact that most of you assume that I am an asshole, or a slut, or some things I am not even aware of. I can without a doubt right now say none of those assumptions are true. Due to my past I have a very large fear of being hurt/abandoned and that is why I shut a bulk of the people in my life out or cut myself away from them. I am sorry to all those I have hurt or pushed away due to my own issues. I am not even going to address the second assumption because none of you will listen or care. I know the truth and you all need to accept that truth or I am asking you to get out of my life and keep my name out of your mouths. I have not killed anyone and I have not done anything wrong.

Is it that hard to open your eyes and see how much of your time is being wasted on stuff you know nothing about but, only assume due to the boredom you have in your own life. Seriously grow up and stop falling back into the childish tendencies you can’t let go of. We are all adults, so let it go and leave me be.

Let go, accept the past, move on from it, learn this lesson, and let it be.

Many might have thought that everything is beautiful if you’re going to follow what your heart truly desires… That’s what fairy tales are… and even these popular writers instill in us every time we read those novels…

But it seems that it’s not that easy in reality… Everyone is on their own waiting for the great writer to manipulate their story and have their own happy endings.

We thought that we can never go wrong in love… And makes me wonder, if that is the case how come we often end up hurting and broken into pieces… We try to pick up the pieces hoping for someone to put back the pieces and start all over again… hoping… wishing that he’ll be the one… by the cycle still continues…

Sometimes we’ll think how stupid we are to be fooled all over again… By the same person or by the same situation… but still we continue to believe and have faith…

There are questions left unanswered, things done without realizing the outcome of it… But still we believe…

I guess that’s what really love is… Complicated yet can be understood not by the words we utter but by what we make them feel.

The surrounding was quiet and I felt safe. Even though, mist was slowly rolling out of the bushes and covered the path. Now, the normally playful looking park started to resemble monstrous scene from a Hollywood movie. Above all, I could not get rid of the feeling that someone is watching me. I heard a scream in the distance, and now the fear got me. I tried to shake of the feeling and pushed the pace a little. Almost half-way through the park, I definitely saw someone in the bushes, but the moonlight did not reveal what or whom did I see. At first the sight paralyzed me, but in a moment I let my feet do the work, and fled toward my house. I am not sure, I had ever run so fast, but nevertheless the shadow from the bushes was catching on. I focused on the house, and I heard the noise diminish, but in a couple of seconds the figure jumped in front of me. With a loud cry, I fell back and gazed at the figure. I know the person… WHAT?!

I like waking up in the morning, when you know the only thing you have to do today is go to the store. I should do it now, and then I could spend the rest of the day in bed, but the bed does not let me go of it vicious, loving claws of comfort.  After hours of enjoying the depths of snooze, I finally got out of the bed. After having a delightful breakfast, I figured that I could clean the house. The store can wait. Eventually, I found myself in the attic sorting all kinds of old stuff. Victorian paintings, Napoleonean armor and some other junk, but a small glimmer caught my attention at the far end of the attic. By the window, a small half-opened box was almost begging to be picked up. I opened the box, even though the hinges were quite rusty and I probably broke them. Inside there was a small medallion, so small I could barely distinguish it from the change, but it looked beautiful. I looked at the box – the cover had a weird symbol and a text that said Mutare in Tempore. I do not speak Italian, so I do not know what it means. Still, the medallion looked awesome, so I put it on.

As the twilight was readily switching the daylight, I was finished with the cleaning and sorting of the house. I packed the last precious pack of play-doh from my childhood, and remembered that I need the store. So I recalled the items and set on my way. Since the weather was warm and the sky clear, a hoodie will do just fine, but I better leave the medallion at home. The local store is right around the corner, and since it is still quite bright, I can even shorten the trip and go through the park. The familiar track gives me a pleasure to be outside. When coming out of the park, I noticed that the sky is almost completely dark, and the lanterns are already lit up. Yeah, I should have made the trip earlier. It was becoming very late, so after shopping, I decided to go through the park again, because earlier I did not see a soul there, so nothing could strike my fears. Nevertheless, midway through the park, I felt a cold breeze, and in combination with the mist, I felt very uncomfortable, even slightly scared. So I upped the tempo, and quickly reached my house. I noticed that the house gives out a slight glow, but did not pay much attention to it, because I thought it was reflection of the new neon lanterns.

What happened next, I will be never able to explain. I had problems unlocking the door, which was creepy on its own, but when I entered the house, my groceries fell out of my arms, and I froze in place. The medallion was levitating in the middle of the room, giving out shimmer that filled the whole room. I got back to my senses, and slowly approached the miraculous scene. Suddenly, the ground shook, and all shadows, came to life. Every single dimmed place in the room, started to stretch, twitch and move. Then the noise came. It sounded like someone was dragging a rusty slab across a blade of misery. The croak of the dead. I could not move; I wanted to grab the medallion, because it seemed that its light could save me from the atrocious shadows, but as soon as I reached slowly for the medallion, the shadows with a loud shriek tried to enclose me. I panicked and ran out of the house into the darkness of the night. The sunny lanterns blinded me, and in shock I foot raced to the park, and tried to hide in the bushes. I did not look back, so I do not know whether the shadows followed.

Desperately crawling through the bushes, I heard someone coming. I stopped dead and listened carefully. I could not hear the screams of the shadows, and could not believe that I have escaped the numbing figures. Crawling further I suddenly heard footsteps on the path again. Not to be heard, I stopped moving, although left in an uncomfortable position, completely exposed to any threats. The footsteps were now only a couple of steps away, I was scared to death that I will give out my position, so I hoped for the best, even though, I probably was noticeable. Then, the weirdest thing happened. The moonlight for a very brief moment exposed the figures face, and at that exact second my body was overwhelmed by cold thrill. It cannot be! Now I had to expose myself, to ensure that I was not mistaken. The figure must have noticed me, because after a short halt, the figure fled in an insane speed. In the confusion I forgot all the shadows and medallions; I had to make sure of what I saw.

As I dashed through the bushes to catch up to the figure, I momentary remembered about the shadows. The figure was running straight in to their hands! I ran as fast as I can, and after some shortcuts I jumped in front of it. The person fell back, and now was laying on the ground in the moonlight. I could see the face clearly. What is going on? How can this be? I stood on the path and gazed down on … myself. Before I could wrap my head around the situation I was shocked again by the immense darkness rushing towards us. The shadows! I completely forgot! Instantly, I threw myself around and sprinted to the house. I need to reach the medallion, for whatever reason it felt like the only hope. My legs begun to sore half way to the house, I must have bruised them when running away from the shadows previously. But it did not matter; I had to reach the house in spite the constantly enclosing shadows and the soring legs. The shadows had almost reached me, as I dashed for my life into the house. Without thinking I grabbed the floating medallion, dropped down, squeezed it close to me, and shut my eyes. The time seemed to stop and stand still, and I felt nothing.

There I was – fallen on the park pathway with the figure in front of me. The moonlight was pressing on my eyes, blinding me from the face of the thing standing in front of me. Suddenly, the lighting changed somehow and the mystery figure was revealed to me in all its fullness. It cannot be! Huh? What? How? In front of me stood – I. As soon our eyes met, the person threw around and dashed out of the park at an incredible speed. After a few second complete darkness rushed over me, and it felt like death itself is speeding through my body.

In a couple moments I was left there on the ground dazzled by the events that just happened. I did not know how much time had passed, but finally I got up. Looked around, and still without a clue of what happened started slowly moving toward my house. Stupefied, I entered my house and wondered what the heck just happened. I put down the groceries and noticed an old piece of paper. I picked it up, and wondered where it came from. I did not have a paper like this, so I read it. On the paper were burnt three words. Mutare in Tempore

Image by glennharper via Flickr

The removal of petroleum subsidy is an unexpected New Year gift from the government; many people will rather prefer the oil refinery work to its full capacity before they stop the fuel subsidy. Unfortunately non of us have the Bouazizi heart, it’s the survival of the fittest those that have the heart of men will scale through this hardship, for the oil marketers and their cohort that have deliver us this expensive new year gift we say bitter thank you, from now on there is nothing to expect but inflation with the increase of premium motor spirit everything will be affected from transport fare to food to health care and other basic amenities. The government must also take some part of the blame, yes they are loosing trillions of naira for subsidising fuel but they know some of this marketers that smuggle the petroleum product to neighbouring countries why not take necessary actions and arrest them, but that is not possible this is Nigeria they know someone that know someone that is powerful that the government that is behind this confusion. While some petroleum station sell their product for 150 naira others sold theirs for 140 naira instead of the official price of 64 to 65 naira, to borrow this words from one of Nigeria Afro beat legend Fela suffering and smiling i.e the people suffer while working and smile at the same time. There is no statement from either party when this fuel hike will stop, but one thing is clear everybody will have to work their butt out to survival.

Don’t Ask Just Continue to Live

The most frequent question asked by my students is about life. They want to know what life is, why life is so mysterious, and why we are unable to understand it.

The art of living does not demand much. Just don’t waste your time and energy on such absurd issues. Just start living moment to moment, flow with the life, drink the life to the lees, be part of it, never think of beginning or end, just dance because you are a blessed one who has got a chance to be involved in this mystery.

Confusion is the Key to Understanding

Some of my students often tell me that I continue to confuse them. Yes, they are right because confusion is my method of saying things. If there is no confusion, there is not solution. Mind needs to be shaken and disturbed to make things clearer. I would not like you to have any roots in the mind in the name of love or in the name of meditation or in the name of God. Your mind is very cunning. It can thrive on anything; on meditation, on love, it can thrive. The moment I see that your mind is thriving on anything, I immediately have to uproot you from it. My whole effort is to create a no-mind state in you. I am not here to convince you about anything. I am not here to give you a dogma, a creed to live by. I am here to take all creeds away from you because only then will life happen to you. I am not giving you anything to live by, I am simply taking all props away from you, all crutches.

I want you to be clear in your mind, pious in your thoughts, away from the old borrowed ideas of life and death. If you really want to be in the stream of joyous life, just plunge in, thinking that it is leading you to nowhere, without any prior thought hindering your progress. Just swim in the stream and enjoy every new second of life.

So many times we think that we know something, when the case is really otherwise. We think that a given fact or idea is true and really seems to be logically sound but it isn’t really, what one might say, a gut level truth for us. Perhaps you grew up hearing a lot about that fundamental truth and it seems to you to be correct….. But is it really so? Have you really understood the meaning behind the words that conveyed you the message…. Has it sunk deep into your way of being or is it just that you have heard it often enough times to think that you believe it to be true when its actually not the case….. Its also very much possible that to the present point of time, you have not even realized that its not really a truth for you, just something that you have grown up listening………..

One of the most fundamental truth that qualifies such a classification is the concept of death….. Every one knows… That a day would come and we will die…. We will have to leave our possessions behind, at least those that are of a physical nature….. When we look around, we notice that people actually die at some point of time in their lives. Whether its due to the old age or due to any other reason, each of those who have died had to face death… So it seems pretty safe to conclude that death is the ultimate destiny that we all share in terms of our physical life experience……

However, the question arises, is it really a TRUTH for you…. Have you really accepted this fact at the roots of your being that you will eventually encounter death at some unknown point of time in life…. Is that belief a part of your being…. Do you REALLY know that you will die one day?

The answer in most cases, when assessed honestly, would be a NO…. Even though the idea of dying is most familiar to almost everyone, it hardly seems to have sunk deep enough into a person’s being…. How is that possible… How do we know that….. Because, most run after things in life which the ‘death’ shall simply wipe out in one blow…. No matter what it is, we want so many things, that we simply wont even bother about, if we really knew we would die one day…. The opposite of the above is also true…. So many things that we would do, knowing that death awaits us at some corner of life road, gets neglected. Most reach the their deathbed with “the music still in them”. You may want to share, to love, to smile, to hug, to live, but you don’t do that… Why? Because you ‘only’ know that you will die…. You have not realized it……

Of course, the above idea of death is not the only concept that fails to grasp foundational ground in one’s character….. The list could be endless…..

So why does it matter to make such an assessment? What is the difference between just knowing something and realizing it as a fundamental truth inside of you…. How would it hurt us to just know something instead of realizing it?

Let me explain with a simple example….

We all know about a “chair”… So what is a chair? In simple words, a chair is simply a furniture to sit upon….. Now whenever I say chair, you may imagine a four legged wooden structure that qualifies your idea of chair….. Now if you notice, what I said was not the real chair….. I pronounced a word ‘chair’ but that word ‘chair’ was not actually a chair….. In other words the word ‘chair’ isn’t really the furniture we are talking about… Its just a word… Moreover, it is very important to realize that that word points to a reality… That reality is the actual chair.. The word is nothing more than a simple permutation of the alphabets…. Its the reality, the meaning behind that word that really matters… The word acts as a pointer towards the reality of a chair…. For someone who knows the word ‘chair’ but has never had the opportunity to sit on a chair (I know this is a highly impossible possibility) the word chair may not convey the true meaning to him… Only after he has been running for a long time and is finally provided with a chair to sit down and rest, may he be able to assess the true importance of the actual chair…..

So as we see, it is the difference between knowing the words and knowing the reality to which the words point….. If we get stuck and obsessed with words, we totally miss out on the reality towards which the words point…. You may know it logically…. But your life wont be in harmony with that fact…. The truth would be something you just know…. Not what you feel…..

Talking of the difference this will make, a nice place to start would be to say that you will feel full of inner conflicts…. You may notice yourself doing or acting opposite to what you thought you would do….. Your thoughts and actions will lack congruency and will tend to cancel each other….. You may think you believe one thing and may be wanting to do the opposite at the same time……. Self doubt and diminishing self trust are common symptoms of such a problem……… Its definitely not pleasant to BE something and KNOW something else……

So how do we sort this out… How do we stop being self sabotaging and come to a place of inner oneness that magnifies our efforts…

The key place to start is to recognize all these truths that are yet to be true for you….

You must begin by finding out all those little unconscious beliefs that define your current identity….. Notice the situations where you know you ought to do things in a certain way but almost certainly fail to do it in that way… Perhaps you believe in non-violence but also find yourself ready to punch your friend for any stupid thing he says…. Every time you bring any such illusions into your full awareness, you wont repeat that mistake again… An inner shift will take place and perhaps it would feel very strange to be in that phase of change but soon you would adjust…. The illusion will most certainly fall away the moment you notice its fake nature…. Any illusion recognized as an illusion dissolves in no time….. So pay attention to your life….. And change for the good……

Generally when dating, if someone is interested in connecting with you they call and make an effort to reach out, correct? I know this usually means a man is supposed to symbolically “chase” a woman, but what is it about the other way around that makes going after a man so taboo?

We all need confirmation. But women are used to the “special treatment” a man gives her when expressing interest OVER other females. I do not know of anyone who is above this. Women love those expected phone calls and the sweet “I miss you” texts. There is proof in validation.

But who are we kidding?

Both sides are on their best behaviors for the first couple of months. Feeding off each others energy and giving more than we planned to. We open our experiences and give a meaning to the past. We attempt to remain casual on the surface when deep down this new person is all we ever think about.

Until they aren’t.

We start to forget the little efforts we made. Women continue to expect preferential treatment. Men continue their regularly programmed schedules. It’s typical, really. As adults we immediately pull back the moment a person comes too close to us. Even when we originally let them in.

Unfortunately, we cannot love in these patterns. The emergency *romance cut off switch* is a temporary fix for the problem of insecurity. We keep telling ourselves we are not worthy of love. And this affirmation inevitably becomes a self-fulfilling prophecy.

So choose instead to challenge yourself.

Do NOT pine away in vain for a person who shows you through action what they will NOT do. Continue to be honest and open. Love freely because that is the only way to function. Go after who and what you want. And give what you expect to receive.

You should not wait for a person to “make up their mind” about you. Trust your intuition and place faith in the process. Being honest with your intentions will weed out the doubtful.

And make room for great unexpected surprises.

Where are we heading?

Recently we have been bombarded with news related to the downfall of economy and politics, the anger people manifest through riots, looting and arson and everything we hear seems to be alarming.

On one hand, the governments of the world seem to face tougher times than before as people start to believe this is the decline of democracy. All countries are in a debt that never decreases and the governments think that cuts are the solution to saving all the money they need to repay their massive loans.

On the other hand there are the people nobody cares about- the people who elected the government and who are not represented at all. The average minister hasn’t been in touch with the public for a long time (even though they claim they how people live) and it is fair to say that the lack of communication between the people and those elected to represent them creates confusion.

“Confusion” is the best word to describe the current state of the NHS, the educational system, the probation service and so on… Nobody actually knows where things are going wrong, but cutting the funds for everything seems to be the best solution.

I don’t recall hearing any of Europe’s ministers complain about their GP or their children’s teachers. I don’t remember any of them saying how hard it is for them to pay their rent or bills or even find a library. Instead, I remember all the people I heard talking about their doctors being unable to diagnose them and give them an appropriate treatment when they are seriously ill. I remember people talking about the low standards of education that can be found in schools and universities across the world and the hardship of getting a proper education. I remember lots of complaints, but whose fault is it?

In my opinion, the governments are to blame for a lot of things that go wrong in our society. I think increasing tuition fees is going to be a national disaster because in a few years’ time, we’ll realise we no longer have enough experts in any of the areas that are important to us (health, education, environment etc) and the ones we will have will be too expensive to hire. What will their solution be? Bring immigrants to do the jobs we can’t do because we couldn’t afford studying.  Universities have lower educational standards then ever before and nobody seems to care that students pay so much money in return for NOTHING!

I’m not saying managing a country and its economy is easy, but I am saying the way they are trying to do it at the moment is wrong. Their approach towards society is revolved around money and nothing else. People don’t seem to matter any more and that is the biggest mistake because without people, you can never have a functional society.

Another problem is the law. In my opinion, we have so many laws to obey and to protect us, but in reality, they are all part of a utopia that we create in our own minds. All these rules and laws are supposed to offer us a more secure and comfortable life, but in fact, they are just things to get angry about when other people are in breach of yours but if you don’t respect someone’s rights, you are very likely to be indifferent to their feelings. Punishments no longer reflect the society we live in. Most of them are “for fun”. Young people who offend usually get some sort of punishment that changes them into insensitive people who couldn’t care less about what happens next.

Every action of ours shows how we have become extremely individualistic and we no longer care about others. All we ever want is money, properties, cars and so on when all we need is a bit of selflessness. We all need to contribute to our society if we want to have one. We all need to express our opinions but we need to keep them realistic and non-offensive. We need to think where we’re all heading and whether we like it. Personally, I don’t like watching the news anymore and I think we should all try to contribute to changing them. I want to hear that someone helped their neighbor, not murdered them for an iPhone.

It’s about time we became RESPONSIBLE as humans and teach others how to give to society instead of take.