Beautiful to Watch Them Grow

 

“Dwell on the beauty of life. Watch the stars, and see yourself running with them.”
― Marcus Aurelius, Meditations

 

A youth in rebellion runs
racing with the night
and my heart races as well
at the sheer beauty
and the courage to experience self
if only in the negation
of what he’s known before
I watch torn between
the wish to be the sail
that enables his ship to catch the wind
and the need at times to be the anchor
When my own ship sailed
and I went racing off
it is those anchor moments
I cursed and later treasured
and those sail moments
to know that they believed
that I accepted gracelessly at the time
but now help me be.
He runs now by day and night
in full impulsive glory
Even rudderless he’ll make it through
May he shine among the stars.
— G A Rosenberg

 

Blessings, G

 

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Saluting MarsSaluting Mars by G A Rosenberg

 

ShapingShaping by G A Rosenberg

Running With Beauty Among the Stars

“Dwell On The Beauty Of Life. Watch The Stars And See Yourself Running With Them.”
–Marcus Aurelius

 

Today we danced on clouds
They seemed solid enough
and I bowed took your hand
and slow stepped through sky ribbon
The feel was unimaginable
each movement a new shape
and we were part of it all. </h4
 

Tonight we’ll run with the stars
Still overcome with beauty bliss
and adventure’s touch upon us
we’ll race for kisses
as meteors streak by
and talk with constellations
as the sky returns towards dawn

 

Tomorrow the sun awaits
Caught up in joy and laughter
we’ll ride in Apollo’s chariot
and journey through it all
The world’s passing beauty
will return us home
as its siren call rings out…

— G A Rosenberg

 

Blessings, G

 

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EncounterEncounter by G A Rosenberg

 

MindfulMindful by G A Rosenberg

Elegance

 

“When I am working on a problem, I never think about beauty…….. but
when I have finished, if the solution is not beautiful, I know it is
wrong.”
― Richard Buckminster Fuller

 

When a solution is found that not only solves the problem but does so in an efficient way we call it elegant. Elegance is a type of beauty that involves both simplicity, efficiency and grace. In our lives, we encounter many varieties of problems. So often we settle on make shift quick fixes that appear rough and unfinished. Oh they last for a while but if we don’t find a way to integrate them fully in an elegant manner than the problems will reassert themselves. Therefore for a solution to be fully workable it must have that elegance.
Blessings, G

 

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By Any Other NameBy Any Other Name by G A Rosenberg

 

Ornamental2Ornamental by G A Rosenberg

Moving Forward in Awe

“In marriage you are not sacrificing yourself to the other person. You are sacrificing yourself to the relationship.
You become mature when you become the authority of your own life.
Life will always be sorrowful. We can’t change it, but we can change our attitude toward it.
Awe is what moves us forward.”
― Joseph Campbell

 

I feel like writing that sentence down a hundred times. Awe is what moves us forward. It may be awful and it may be awesome but at the extremes the impetus to move may always be found. It is in the middle the doldrums when we don’t feel the awe that our life hovers along or as I use to say ‘circles the runway’. When we have ceased to find the new, the exciting either within or without. When someone complains to me about how they’re stuck and how they feel no forward progress in their lives I ask them to do an exercise for me, each day notice something beautiful and write it down. Believe me no matter how bad life can get, there are very few days in anyone’s life that does not contain at least one moment of beauty. Realizing that tends to revitalize the awesome very quickly.
Blessings, G

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Weighing of the HeartWeighing of the Heart by G A Rosenberg

 

Weighing VariationWeighing of the Heart (Variation) by G A Rosenberg

 

CrossoverCrossover by G A Rosenberg

Make Something Beautiful

” If no matter what is given to you, you can make something beautiful out of it, that is intelligence.”
— Sadhguru Jaggi Vasudev

 

Funny, I read this quote and I knew it was what I wanted to write about or at least what I wanted to share for tonight. Yet it starts a whole string of quotes off in my head and its tempting to just list the words of others to show why I am moved by this one but I feel I want to tackle this one. I have seen people who have been given so much yet their lives were ugly things, lacking in either appreciation or integrity. I have seen people with almost nothing, beautiful in their pain and this beauty so truthful it made me weep.
So in this I definitely see beauty as being a function of integrity.

What about intelligence as Sadhguru says? Fostered by archaic systems of education many of us tend to have very fixed, very limited ideas of what intelligence is. To me, it goes beyond tests of IQ or the ability to do complex maths or be able to analyze a block of text tho all of those things may be a part of it. To me, its a matter of aesthetics.

It’s one thing to know that a squared plus b squared = c squared, its quite another to have an appreciation for how this relationship works in our physical universe and another to be able to create using this principle. This expression of mathematical understanding to create is beautiful as is any form of pure self-expression. Perhaps integral sext-expression is the link between beauty and intelligence. I find that concept pleasing.
Blessings, G

 

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Shooting FlameShooting Flame by G A Rosenberg

 

Spiralling FountainSpiralling Fountain by G A Rosenberg

Quote of the Day – March 15 2013

“We seldom realize, for example that our most private thoughts and emotions are not actually our own. For we think in terms of languages and images which we did not invent, but which were given to us by our society.”
― Alan Wilson Watts

 

How do we break away from societal conditioning or at least realize which ideas are our own and which are just rote learned responses? Meditation helps for sure but also self-examination. If I feel myself having a fast reaction to something whether it be someone asking for money in the street, someone expressing themselves loudly or in ways that I was raised to believe were pushy and rude I have started to watch my reaction (I used to try fighting my reactions, talk about a sucker’s game… better to bring them out and let them dissipate in the open air), let myself feel what I feel and then look at it and test it for integrity. Does this truly express my values or is it the part of me that is the conditioned robot?  It helps to remember that the idea is not to not be the robot but to be truly expressive of the self at all times.

 

On a different subject, today just as an experiment, on my Facebook status I asked people, “What is the most beautiful thing you see right now?” and received so many fantastic responses. Shared joy is increased! I loved the idea that just for one moment, no matter what was happening in their days and lives that whoever read it would look around them for beauty. For me at the moment, it was my son having a bit of a temper tantrum over delayed plans. I have been enjoying watching him individuate more and more (tho there are parts of it that drive me a bit nuts as well) . Easily tho the responses to my question made my day. I may be getting the hang of this social media thing and how it can be used to share meaning after all.

 

What is the most beautiful thing you have seen today?
Blessings, G

 

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Wondering if His Dreams Have Wings
Wondering If My Dreams Have Wings by G A Rosenberg

 

Green EggsGreen Eggs by G A Rosenberg

Quote of the Day – November 14 2012

“There is no escape. You can’t be a vagabond and an artist and still be a solid citizen, a wholesome, upstanding man. You want to get drunk, so you have to accept the hangover. You say yes to the sunlight and pure fantasies, so you have to say yes to the filth and the nausea. Everything is within you, gold and mud, happiness and pain, the laughter of childhood and the apprehension of death. Say yes to everything, shirk nothing. Don’t try to lie to yourself. You are not a solid citizen. You are not a Greek. You are not harmonious, or the master of yourself. You are a bird in the storm. Let it storm! Let it drive you! How much have you lied! A thousand times, even in your poems and books, you have played the harmonious man, the wise man, the happy, the enlightened man. In the same way, men attacking in war have played heroes, while their bowels twitched. My God, what a poor ape, what a fencer in the mirror man is- particularly the artist- particularly myself!”
― Hermann Hesse

 

This quote casts me naked and vulnerable and I couldn’t be happier. So often i tire of being the wise, the talented when I know of my own idiocy and foolishness. I give advice and inwardly I mock myself in derision for am I not lost and sail in an almost constant sea of confusion? How can I be a one-eyed man when the dust has crusted my cyclopean shut? So yes i have doubts and confusion amidst the clarity and i shall never deny it. i can be largely an ignoramus tho sometimes I can tell a hacksaw from a hand grenade. But everything I see, the darkness which lies all too often in our human hearts and the occasional flashes of sunrise that light the heart from within, kindness, cruelty, and life in all its shades, I shall embrace.
Blessings, G

 

 

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Stellar Romance by G A Rosenberg

 

Phoenix Writhing by G A Rosenberg

Quote of the Day – September 18 2012

“A warrior does not give up what he loves, he finds the love in what he does”
― Dan Millman

 

Somedays it gets harder than others. Could be a thousand small fires or messes spring up that have to be solve. Perhaps arguments with loved ones. Perhaps we fell just distracted diffused and impatient and irritable. Somedays we have to work to feel love for what we’re doing and see the beauty that’s out there. Because face it, the world has as much magic when we’re a mess as it is when we’re centred and feeling the joy.  It may be a bit more difficult to see it and appreciate it. Sounds like it may be time to take a deep breath, count to 10 and find something to appreciate, something that may make us smile. Curiosity has always been a good thing for me. What can happen next? What outlandish thing can I think of? What could the true nature of that flower be? How many colours in the sun? What’s the most beautiful thing in my line of sight. What do you love? Where can you see it the most closely? Go there if only in your mind…

Blessings, G

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Ganesh Within by G A Rosenberg

 

Lonely Orb in the Mind Stream by G A Rosenberg

Quote of the Day – August 15 2012

“And those who were seen dancing were thought to be insane by those who could not hear the music.”
― Friedrich Nietzsche

Sometimes we can’t hear the music that others dance to. We see them go through the motions and wonder at the rhythm or lack thereof in their movements and become puzzled. So often the temptation is to diagnose, to remedy, to try to bring them to the point where they realize that they don’t hear the music that we can’t here. Would that we could listen with the heart. We may catch the strains of an ineffable tune with beauty that we have denied ourselves before. We may even wish to dance ourselves if only we could bring ourselves to break free of the fear of being misunderstood by those still denying themselves the song. Perhaps we continue to hear nothing but with open hearts we realize that that is not the loss of the dancer but ours. Love brings faith that the music is there whether we hear it or not.
Blessings, G

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Shining Through by G A Rosenberg

Quote of the Day – August 6 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 believe I’ll break one of those rules now. Does a rule exist that when you have a quote, some writing and a picture on a blog entry that they should relate to each other? Is it even customary? It seems difficult when my brain tends to go all over the place so I might have to ask you to bear with me.
A few months ago I read a post on FaceBook about how wonderful life was and someone else commented indicating it was selfish to feel that way when so many suffered, were homeless and others mistreated and tormented. Reading this hit me hard because I felt truth in it and yet…
It’s way too easy to give in to despair, to feel life is too hard too unpleasant and not worth living. Many people seem intent on ruining this life for the rest of us to make it even better for them its true and yet…
In every given day even when shit storms are happening there are countless moments of beauty, a flower, the smile of a baby, the full moon, someone doing a random act of kindness for someone else.
I would not and don’t ever advocate closing our eyes, ears, hearts or minds to the plights of others. I believe compassion to be one of the most important qualities to develop along with love yet if we get so wrapped up in the horrors of the world that we can’t appreciate awesomeness than what’s any of it for? What keeps us going?
So I will admit that all too many of us have really rough lives and help in anyway I can at the moment but I will also say appreciate and love the beauty, the kindness, the love, maybe even just a bit more. It gives us the strength to make life better for everyone.
Blessings, G

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Essence by G A Rosenberg