Month: July 2012

Quote of the Day – July 6 2012

“Study hard what interests you the most in the most undisciplined, irreverent and original manner possible.”
― Richard Feynmann

I’m not sure but I when I first heard the Joseph Campbell quote, “follow your bliss” it sounded to me very much like this. Discipline and reverence don’t seem to be intrinsic qualities for me. I have always been intensely curious and I love to learn new things, yet structure for me seems mainly a challenge.  When I went to University, I found my roommate’s senior courses in pre-law much more interesting than my freshman mathematics courses so three grade A papers for him and $300 for me later, he graduated with the best marks he had gotten in his career while I got lackluster grades. Part of it was that the teacher wasn’t thrilled that i would arrive at the right answer in a way different than what she had shown in class.  Perhaps if I had attended more of the classes.

Even now  I find it a strain to discipline my thoughts and perhaps this shows in my writing. Life has always felt more weblike than linear to me with connections happening in the weirdest places kind of like a psycho-spiritual seven degrees of Kevin Beacon with concepts rather than people (seven degrees of Frances Bacon?) Still I have grown comfortable in my scatteredness and am not sure I would have it any other way.

Blessings, G

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Buddha on the Beach by G A Rosenberg

 

Twilight Ride in Big Sky Country

Quote of the Day – July 5 2012

“I may not have gone where I intended to go, but I think I have ended up where I intended to be.”
– Douglas Adams

 

So another journey begins, We have flown to Saskatoon to meet up with in-laws and to hopefully grab a day or two for ourselves along the way. As usual I live a life far different from that which I would have imagined. Yet each time I say that this is not the life that I would have chosen for myself I find myself asking “Who chose it then?” It is definitely an outgrowth of decisions made. All in all a positive one with lots of room for growth in every way possible. I have ended up in a life that’s filled with love and has more adventure in it than perhaps I let myself realize. May we all find ourselves in a place where we fit our lives and our lives fit us.
Blessings, G

 

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Orange-Teal Mandala by G A Rosenberg

Quote of the Day – July 4 201

“You wanna fly, you got to give up the shit that weighs you down.”
― Toni Morrison, Song of Solomon

What weighs us down? From early on my generation was told to ‘get a life’. After many years of wandering, studying what I would, travelling I met the person who fit with me and together we’ve raised kids, pets and hopes. Still every so often I start feeling chained down and that my life is not my own. Even the relatively few demands I have on me feels like too many. Then I realize that it is not my family that weighs me down as much as my attitudes about my family. In reality, they also give me the stability I need to fly.
So much of what weighs us down seems to be our expectations of ourself and what we perceive of as other’s expectations of us (really the two become synonymous when I realize that my biggest expectation of myself is that I don’t disappoint the people I love). If we can let go of those expectations then we will be able to fly free. By this i don’t mean let go of our areas of responsibility. As the old zen master said, “Before, enlightenment we chop wood and carry water, after enlightenment we chop wood and carry water”. When we see our responsibilities as part of the cycle of our life, our wings grow.
Blessings, G

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Night Field Under a Full Moon by G A Rosenberg

Origami Rose by G A Rosenberg

Deviancy — Art For Sale

OK, I’ve done it. After numerous requests of late for ways to purchase my art and after some difficulty with pay pal I have opened up a deviantART gallery at :

http://http://wakingspirals.deviantart.com/

I like certain things about Deviant Art and dislike others but in all probability would feel that way about almost any site I found. One of the things I dislike is that there is no way to sign it so for anyone reading this, if you purchase a print on Deviant Art and wish it signed, let me know and I will send you a signed print as well (Outside of Canada there may be a small fee for shipping / handling)
I want to thank all of you who have enjoyed my work and given me the inspiration and motivation to keep on producing .
Infinite gratitude and blessings. If there is any of my art that you may be interested in purchasing or think  I should add to the gallery, please let me know.

Surfing Emotional Currents (Redux)

Endlessly fascinating
in a solipsist way
sharing my thoughts with shadows
loving the lives they play
at peace with myself or am I
content to search, knowing
i may never find
elephants definition owing
what part I have grabbed in the blind

still if i don’t trust answers
new questions always occur
i laugh at my endless reasoning
yet will always listen to yours

I hunger for perspectives
A fractal shape i’ve never seen
even if smoke and mirrors
meaning i may glean

and yet at night
I feel lonely, tired, sad
sometimes a bit frustrated
more than a little mad

this emotional tidal current
catches me in its spin
caught up in the torrent
seeking calm within

and so i reach out to
and find you shadows there
you reflections of my being
help me conquer fear

together we travel on
we myriad tricks of light
we particles of existence
illuminating eternal night…

–G A Rosenberg (2010)

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Crossing the Spectral Desert by G A Rosenberg

Quote of the Day – July 3 2012

“I am free, no matter what rules surround me. If I find them tolerable, I tolerate them; if I find them too obnoxious, I break them. I am free because I know that I alone am morally responsible for everything I do.”
― Robert A. Heinlein

 

I love Robert Heinlein. In a way he along with a few other writers raised me to think for myself through a stormy adolescence. I learned it was ok to be myself no matter who i was and it was ok to love always. In his books, he also introduced me to both the idea of sentient computers and libertarian ideals, which I still lean towards many years later.

 

A few more Heinlein quotes just because :

 

““Always listen to experts. They’ll tell you what can’t be done, and why. Then do it.”

 

“Secrecy is the keystone to all tyranny. Not force, but secrecy and censorship. When any government or church for that matter, undertakes to say to its subjects, “This you may not read, this you must not know,” the end result is tyranny and oppression, no matter how holy the motives. Mighty little force is needed to control a man who has been hoodwinked in this fashion; contrariwise, no amount of force can control a free man, whose mind is free. No, not the rack nor the atomic bomb, not anything. You can’t conquer a free man; the most you can do is kill him.”

 

“Being right too soon is socially unacceptable.”

 

Recommended books by Robert Heinlein:

  • Stranger in a Strange Land

  • Time Enough For Love

  • Moon is a Harsh Mistress

  • Number of the Beast

    Blessings, G

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    Ankh Appearing by G A Rosenberg

    Hall of Being by G A Rosenberg


Additional Quote of the Day – July 2 2012

“I have found both freedom and safety in my madness; the freedom of loneliness and the safety from being understood, for those who understand us enslave something in us.”
― Khalil Gibran, The Madman

I so get this one. Understanding can be a trap for both the comprehender and the understood. When I say I understand you, I usually mean I understand the snapshot, the you or the situation as you are at this space / time. It does not mean that I understand all the yous that ever were or ever shall be. Thus, if you wish to know you are understood you have to present yourself to me as the snapshot and thus you are enslaved.
Thus I seek to always work towards understanding each you in space / time and thus set you free. I may be successful.
Blessings, G

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Fire and Ice by G A Rosenberg

Quote of the Day – July 2 2012

““The most important kind of freedom is to be what you really are. You trade in your reality for a role. You trade in your sense for an act. You give up your ability to feel, and in exchange, put on a mask. There can’t be any large-scale revolution until there’s a personal revolution, on an individual level. It’s got to happen inside first.”
― Jim Morrison

I am the rewritten song
taken from a melody
written long ago
adapted for modern times
charged with modern crimes
yet totally my own.

 

I am the movie
based on a book
taken from a legend
told around a long ago campfire
yet still myself
no matter how many changes ensue.
— G A Rosenberg

 

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Contoured Texture Mandala by G A Rosenberg