Ray Bradbury - Waking Spirals

Fear of Failure

“Sometimes you just have to jump out the window and grow wings on the way down.”
— Ray Bradbury

Indecision
What will happen if I do?
What will happen if I don’t do anything?
What will those who love me think about it?
What will those who belittle me think about it?
Why do I always freeze when there is a decision to be made?
Fuck IT!!!
o
h

S
H
I
T

Freedom and success.
I knew it all the time
Blessings, G

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At a Crossing by G A Rosenberg

Ripples in a Strange Pond by G A Rosenberg

Labyrinth by G A Rosenberg

October

“October Country…that country where it is always turning late in the year. That country where the hills are fog and the rivers are mist; where noons go quickly, dusks and twilights linger, and midnights stay. That country composed in the main of cellars, sub-cellars, coal bins, closets, attics, and pantries faced away from the sun. That country whose people are autumn people, thinking only autumn thoughts. Whose people passing at night on the empty walks sound like rain…”
— Ray Bradbury

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Guarded Dreams by G A Rosenberg

Spatial Distortions by G A Rosenberg

Changing Lenses to Avoid the Status Quo

“I hate a Roman named Status Quo!” he said to me. “Stuff your eyes with wonder,” he said, “live as if you’d drop dead in ten seconds. See the world. It’s more fantastic than any dream made or paid for in factories. Ask no guarantees, ask for no security, there never was such an animal. And if there were, it would be related to the great sloth which hangs upside down in a tree all day every day, sleeping its life away. To hell with that,” he said, “shake the tree and knock the great sloth down on his ass.”
― Ray Bradbury

I believe fully in the adage that every day we need to do something that we have never done before. It needn’t be something that involves money. It could be talking to someone new. Especially if it is the type of person you would never see yourself talking to. If you are a business executive chat with a homeless person. If you are a socialist, talk to a conservative. If you are jewish, talk to a Muslim or a Buddhist. Seek out people who are different and really hear what they have to see. Find out what fears and dreams you have in common.
Explore your surroundings. Turn down a different street and see what is there. Go places you never have. Play tourist in your own city. A few days ago, I found out where the cruise ships dock here in Vancouver and explored the area imagining that I was from a different country and this was my first experience of Vancouver. It was amazing seeing a place I have lived for fifteen years for the first time.
We tend to view life through lenses made up of our expectations. These lenses can become strait-jackets if we’re not careful. They lock our perceptions in place. Constantly altering the lenses can expand our viewpoints exponentially. What have you done differently today?
Blessings, G

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Dinner Time by G A Rosenberg

Electric Surge by G A Rosenberg

Letting Go

“Learning to let go should be learned before learning to get. Life should be touched, not strangled. You’ve got to relax, let it happen at times, and at others move forward with it. It’s like boats. You keep your motor on so you can steer with the current. And when you hear the sound of the waterfall coming nearer and nearer, tidy up the boat, put on your best tie and hat, and smoke a cigar right up till the moment you go over. That’s a triumph.”
― Ray Bradbury

I climbed the hill
in search of the promise
i thought I had to fulfill
It would take hours
still I continued
for there was a tree there
that held a message
with which I was to return.
When I reached the top
where the tree once stood
was a stump
I stood there crying
for how could I fulfill
my purpose
what message could I bring back?
I sat a long time
close to despair
still it was rather nice up there
green grass and warm sun
and a quiet that I could hear
I left carrying
the hill’s serenity
and the message of “Letting Go”

Blessings, G

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Holding the Space by G A Rosenberg

Atomic Gold by G A Rosenberg

Self-Consciousness

“Self-consciousness is the enemy of all art, be it acting, writing, painting, or living itself, which is the greatest art of all.”
― Ray Bradbury

Self-consciousness does seem to be the most double-edged of awarenesses. On the one hand, self-consciousness can be defined as mindful awareness of what one is doing and its possible consequences. Awareness tends to be a good thing, no? Well I guess it all depends on what you do with it. We can use our awareness and act in incredibly mindful ways that benefit everyone involved the most or we can react in fear to our awareness and have it freeze us into immobility because almost everything we do can be criticized by others and very few things we do have no darker aspect to them. If any action can lead to negative consequences does that mean inaction is better. Doubtful as even that, perhaps especially that will have effects that ripple out. To me I would rather choose action.
Blessings, G

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Blasted Geometry by G A Rosenberg

Fractal Waves by G A Rosenberg

Staying Out of My Own Way — A Thought Stream

“Your intuition knows what to write, so get out of the way.”
― Ray Bradbury

I know if I shut up the words will come yet inside the yammering continues…so the field goes fallow and the beauty..may be there but it will show like a harlot’s illusion. Instead if i open to the beauty and type who knows what inner meaning may be expressed. I may show you my pain in all its glory, that radiating star that both colours and poisons but slowly heals through exposure to the air. I may show you inspiration, the candle lit from above that bypasses pain and encompasses it showing how to use it. Perhaps I will show you relationship, how we connect ourselves to ourselves and then to others.. or perhaps just a simple rhyme, beautiful in its simplicity. The two are not exclusive.
Blessings, G

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Of Shadow and Light by G A Rosenberg

Volcanic Mandala by G A Rosenberg

The HeArt Connection

“If you want to write, if you want to create, you must be the most sublime fool that God ever turned out and sent rambling. You must write every single day of your life. You must read dreadful dumb books and glorious books, and let them wrestle in beautiful fights inside your head, vulgar one moment, brilliant the next. You must lurk in libraries and climb the stacks like ladders to sniff books like perfumes and wear books like hats upon your crazy heads. I wish you a wrestling match with your Creative Muse that will last a lifetime. I wish craziness and foolishness and madness upon you. May you live with hysteria, and out of it make fine stories — science fiction or otherwise. Which finally means, may you be in love every day for the next 20,000 days. And out of that love, remake a world.”
― Ray Bradbury

Art involves folly and perhaps a bit of hubris. To believe that you can bring a feeling or a knowing to others through an image, a story or song lyrics takes guts. Yet for those who create and that includes everyone in one way or another, it is what we attempt to do. What are the very words we speak but symbols we string together to convey meaning. Through exposing ourselves to how others have communicated in these ways in the past and even more importantly developing clarity and compassion, we can learn to connect better with others. Art can touch us in ways that mere spoken words cannot. Through story, song and image we touch not only the minds but the hearts of others.
Blessings, G

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Cosmic Key and Lock by G A Rosenberg

Convergence by G A Rosenberg

Let It Spill

“From now on I hope always to stay alert, to educate myself as best I can. But lacking this, in Future I will relaxedly turn back to my secret mind to see what it has observed when I thought I was sitting this one out. We never sit anything out.

We are cups, constantly and quietly being filled. The trick is, knowing how to tip ourselves over and let the beautiful stuff out. ”
― Ray Bradbury

The witness knows that I’m too full
of transitory things
Momentary panic that stressors bring
On the surface, clarity gone
as the septic moment lingers
so let it spill on out
underneath is pure
learn to let it go
the empty witness’s sure
In hours it’ll matter less
in days not at all
so pop the troubled bubble
a child’s bubble gum
remember back to times
all it meant was fun
sing that happy song
that once ran through your head
Find the joy in what you are
the pure note’s stead

— G A Rosenberg

Blessings, G

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Amber Cathedral Mandala by G A Rosenberg

Nebulous by G A Rosenberg

Quote of the Day – November 27 2012

“There is more than one way to burn a book. And the world is full of people running about with lit matches.”
― Ray Bradbury

Ideas according to man are notoriously difficult to kill. Yet people try to kill ideas all the time. Either they try to excise all uses of the ideas and thought or they distort the meaning so that noone will recognize it such as freedom.
Yet ideas like books can also be preserved by those who love them and those who believe in them. Noone can stop an idea that’s been shared. Noone can squash a dream that’s in the hearts and heads of many.

So hear’s what I propose we do. Consider it an exercise for our growth, an invocation and an exorcism at the same time. As soon as you have an idea worth sharing, do so. Write a book, tell a story, sing a song, paint a picture, photoshop an image… carve it out of mash potatoes but communicate it. Send it out into the world and it will live. You know its happened when you have the idea com back to you. Even if the form is different you sent a new meme into the world and in your own way have changed human history. Just by expressing your idea and doing it well. Kind of humbling it is.

Blessings, G

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Small Tear in the Framework by G A Rosenberg

Reflection by G A Rosenberg

Quote of the Day – October 26 2012

“From now on I hope always to stay alert, to educate myself as best I can. But lacking this, in Future I will relaxedly turn back to my secret mind to see what it has observed when I thought I was sitting this one out. We never sit anything out.

We are cups, constantly and quietly being filled. The trick is, knowing how to tip ourselves over and let the beautiful stuff out. ”
― Ray Bradbury

How many times I’ve played my life as if it was a hand of solitaire, I dealt the cards out knowing full well how they would come out and then played it just as I knew it was. I believe most of us do this in relationships that we get into because we need the lesson which I suppose accounts for almost every relationship in which we find ourselves. It’s almost a cliche to say that the end is written in the beginning yet there it is…the alchemy that draws us into each other’s orbit decides how we will mix, partake of each other’s qualities and then either blend or separate.
As I’ve said before, we exist in relationship not only with people but with things, situations and events as well and like those, we know if we are being true to ourselves that most are transitory and the way we leave may be found in its beginning. Not that I believe its all predestined. Many choose to stay in relationships or in situations well past their sell by date. This may be because of happiness but more often it is done by our sheer stubbornness to make things work. This can lead to ongoing frustration or sometimes astonishing wonderful breakthroughs both for ourselves and the ones we journey with. After all are we not constantly changing? If that is so, if I am a different person than the one who entered the relationship, is the end still inevitable? Perhaps this is the change that involves letting the ‘beautiful stuff’ out.
Blessings, G

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Remembering by G A Rosenberg

Staring at the Ceiling by G A Rosenberg