Sometimes I formulate an idea of what I want from an hour, day, or week, and am quickly rewarded. This week peacefully and simply fell in place. The youth hostel Higher Lands inn sits in the mountains and is run by a lovely 26 year old couple and his sister. When finished with the work they watch movies and play with the pets; todo, dodo and tofu. The small dog plays with the puppy and they both sat on my lap while I read or watched movies. At first I thought the dogs tortured the cat who meow'd a lot. Infact I've never seen dogs and cat get along so well. They all were sharing the tiny patch of sun as I left the hostel five days, three books, two magazines, five movies, and four hikes later.
I split my time evenly between movies, books, and time hikes. You catch the path called "cloud pass" five minutes down from the hostel and "cloud pass" along a endless cliff edge. The pass is perfectly flat and easier to walk then central park. The "Taoist streams" cut through the mountains and create huge gorgeous lined with massive walls of rock. Why is a building sized rock more powerful to me than a building?
The rocks here are mangled, they look as if they are falling apart, and yes they look like Chinese scrolls. Maybe they are just a reflection and not as dramatic as other places in China with stranger formations but i loved them.
In memory the Wu We Si temple I practiced Tai Chi every day and while I walked along the "cloud path" I would sometimes carry a rock on my head. Years of slouching and two months of carrying a huge backpack reduced my stature a valuable inch - and also hurt my back a little. Nothing straightens your back and keeps your eyes forward like a little granite on your dome. Maybe I look kind of like an idiot but I could do worse things. The Chinese people who saw me just giggled and gave me thumbs up.
The Higher Lands Inn's location in a mountain and collections of DVD's, not to mention the quote by Lao-tzu on the door and the 200 year old Taoist cave on the grounds, all felt created just for me. How did they know?! How did I know? Anyway I approve. Higher Lands then wins a place in my favorite category of places; Accessible, naturally beautiful, with a tradition of love for any of my favorite languages - movies, books, and music. Amen. Of course you might suggest I go back to School but my pets M.B.M. love to be experienced away from the academy. In school it's all cinema, cinema, hmmm, literature, literature, hmmm. When you're alone in the mountains, or when I'm alone in the mountains, a good book is *_* in a really good way.
Its the difference of being shoved into a staff party, right after eating a huge falafel sandwich, and being offered some huge piece of ice cream cake... and stumbling upon a little diner in Idaho, after eating some beef jerky, and vitamin water three hours ago for breakfast, and being served up one of the finest club sandwiches, and milk shakes, in America. hot damn.
The very existence of Higher Lands spawned fantasy's which kept me up at night. "Shit... if they're gonna just put a nice little DVD hostel in beautiful mountains that's too easy. I can do that... but mines gonna... recording studio, and a music venue, kites, gem stone museum, Hang GLIDING! Brian Eno's gonna live there and record live ambient sets from sweet musicians all over the word, orphans can live there... ping pong... underground... nintendo wii"
The question I then struggled with was how to dream of an awesome future without losing my cool. Passions gain momentum too quickly and suddenly I'm getting married in Vegas. Getting ahead of myself then leads to anxiety and fear. Not to mention disappointment after returning from the sweet fantasy life of living in a crystal recording studio situated in a volcano... "it would be so easy...money... grants... new business models... I'm a failure"
Meanwhile, the present for me, when properly managed, can be so rich as to make desires feel silly. Why disturb the balance of a beautiful moments, followed by beautiful moments, with fantasy's? The positive side maybe that fantasy's and learning ways to control and manage them can be powerful. I found Higher Lands by following my heart several times over and in search of ideals and dreams; Chinese mountains, magic, DVD's - if i hadn't fantasized it I would not have found it - or appreciated it if I did find it. Dreaming of something and then finding it, or making it i guess gives you the real feeling of magic. Wow... the spell worked.
There must be a balance here somewhere. On a daily basis I practice lowering expectations to as close to nothing as possible. Food should be appreciated as a gift. If the ratio of good moments to bad moments resembles fair then it's a gift. My best days are experienced in this way but the next level of this video game would include the capacity to maintain this equanimity while striving for more.
I looked for some quotes that deal with related issues:
"Keep your eyes on the stars but keep your feet on the ground" Theodore Roosevelt. *not the most inspired but it makes the point*
"Give yourself the freedom to explore the possibility of life without limits. Goals are dreams with deadlines, a means to an end but not the ultimate purpose of life." Glynis Nunn *i don't really understand it but i think it might be really on point.*
"It is not enough to take steps which may some day lead to a goal; each step must be itself a goal and a step likewise." Johann Wolfgang Von Goethe
"You cant rest unless you set goals that make you stretch.’Tom Hopkins *i like this take*
The point for me is that I find a tension between acceptence of the present and dreams about the future. It can be a goal in itself I guess. I will try and improve my ability to dream and stratagize about the future and I will think of plans, ideas, and aspirations as worthwhile in themselves. This is what i think should be my next step - find the beauty in the plan itself and in the dream itself. They are SPELLS and they offer two possibilities. The first is to reach through time and touch yourself in the future - or to give something to yourself in the future. To build streets which connect myself in the present to myself in other presence. Spells which offer me to myself. Spells which create, find, and frame the straight lines from the labyrinth of my fancies, gestures, lives.
But why the straight lines? Why this fearfull desire to control nature? Who will admire the maze for itself with out trying to adjust it to fill their own holes? Order and the beauty exist as chaos passes through us and if we adjust only our own filters then past, memory, and reflection makes the world holy. The process takes on meaning and beauty by changing nothing but ourselves. The purest change in the world would be to make our eye's aware of the beauty everywhere. Suddenly the world would become beautiful and people could atleast know this possibility, as they believe men have touched the moon, by looking at the eyes as they see.
What does my future self want? It should want less! Why should I sacrafice moments from today to spoil myself in the future. I should learn to ride the present, to endure, and to pracice acceptence. Will this be a straight line? A straight line of beauty leading behind me.
But as such you will reject your humanness which lies in the ability to create beautiful lines in every direction? They are lines which connect and when you deny, or ignore, the opportunity to connect with yourself then cut yourself off. These are the goals. To live in the present in all of it's suchness. That means wholesome connection with your past and your future. To seek harmony between these three. To create a family out of the three. Your own past is like the mother and father which created you - it deserves respect, acknowledgment, humbleness, and gifts. Your future is as your own children and it's hungry for love, for someome to listen to it - sometimes wholy, someone to play with it, someone to teach it, to feed it. And always you are the center. You have the opportunity to reconcile each to eachother. To create peace and understanding in this midst of family drama. How beautiful a family can be, a home. The wise, respected grandparents, the trusted, poised, devoted, but questioning child, and finally the parents. The providers, and role models, the teachers, entertainers. Independent, and available. They deal with quarrels through patience and understanding. Love is work and requires daily care.
We should make avialable our masculinity and our femininity. We should learn to love that in us which does and that which is.
These are goals. Let them be visualizations. Symbols. They are easier to strive for but easier to remain detached from.
See the sun always returning. See the cloud becoming. See the moon as whole in every part. Even stars are sometimes visible. But why strain your neck to look at them. Look forward and forward more.
