Dedicated to Lincoln Phayze who always goes with the flow except for the times when he doesn’t.  Both of us are lost…

Source: http://vi.sualize.us/view/b37bd4f91ab74c2b5be4a419893cfda7/

That was an advice from somebody like me.  The gentleman in question works in the arts (I almost said “arts industry” and I was appalled by the ugliness of the expression).  Correction:  he used to work in the arts, but now he is in as much mess as I am.  He told me that once he was taking the program “The Artist’s Way” and one of the requirements was keeping a diary.  Yes, a diary.  Keeping a diary in order to awaken one’s creativity, reconnect with one’s creativity, and welcome one’s creativity back.  So the rules were simple enough – you wake up and write three pages without letting the pen stop.  The rule to remember is “Don’t get it right, get it written…”

It is a very catchy and encouraging phrase.  But no matter how encouraging a phrase may be, it still took me a while to actually start writing in my diary.  But I did.  I have some “volumes” completed, mostly filled with crap worth only getting rid of (by shredding, this detail is very important! LOL), but it does not matter.  It was not right, it was written.  My web-site contains very little of my private diary entries, it is more polished and edited. Of course.  Which course?  Moving on…

Of course. Which course? Do we know where we go?

Source: http://vi.sualize.us/view/kallini2002/d09d182bdef53d9a4b384576a47df417/

Am I creative?  We all are supposed to be creative, by the way…

Well, anyway, when I started this web-site, it was nearly impossible to find things to write about, and I stopped almost as soon I started.  Then I came back to it and I was more or less consistent.  There were some large gaps due to my mood swings.  When I am depressed, I feel like drowning, when I am high, I feel as if I am resurfacing…and what does it have to do with water I have no idea…  Maybe because I am a Water Sign?  Sometimes I dream that I fly so high and so skillfully…

In my dreams I fly so much higher

Source: http://vi.sualize.us/view/9f878a2f026418e54ca53b7917b261e9/

Coming back to the gaps.  There some of them, all due to polarity of my moods, doubts, losing faith, not really knowing what to do.  The last one started early in May when I finally found a part-time job, started dancing more and generally was busy with I don’t even remember what.  But I tried to come back.  There must be something about writing that I either like or need or maybe both.  Self-expression?  Letting out the pain?  Sharing my experience?  Pleasure of typing? LOL – yeah, that must be it, “pleasure of typing” – exercising my fine motor skills.

Exercising fine motor skills

Source: http://vi.sualize.us/view/kallini2002/5dc33cf6576d5f43e0de16fa8bf43253/

But the idea of “not getting it right, but getting it written” is very appealing.  I was reading some of my own posts from January and it turned out to be pleasant enough.  I have already forgotten the pain and the joy and details.  And it was nice to come back and see – my insanity (at one point), my pain, my suffering, and the progress I made.  So the verdict is “YES”, the point may very well be ZERO, but I should keep at it.  My diary, my web-site, “My life, my universe and everything”.  Life goes on and diary is only a reflection.  We all love mirrors, don’t we?

Or yes, we do.  Reflections, reflections, reflections…

From Robert Greene “The 48 Laws of Power”.

Law 48 – Assume Formlessness

Page 419

Judgment

By taking a shape, by having a visible plan, you open yourself to attack.  Instead of taking a form for your enemy to grasp, keep yourself adaptable and on the move.  Accept the fact that nothing is certain and no law is fixed.  The best way to protect yourself is to be as fluid and formless as water; never bet on stability or lasting order.  Everything changes.

Source: http://www.eso.org/public/outreach/eduoff/vt-2004//mt-2003/mt-mercury-map6-normal.jpg

In martial arts, it is important that strategy be unfathomable, that form be concealed, and that movements be unexpected, so that preparedness against them be impossible.  What enables a good general to win without fail is always having unfathomable wisdom and a modus operandi that leaves no tracks.  Only the formless cannot be affected.  Sages hide in unfathomability, so their feelings cannot be observed; they operate in formlessness, so their lines cannot be crossed.

The Book of the Huainan Masters, China, Second Century B.C.

Character Armor

To carry out the instinctual inhibition demanded by the modern world and to be able to cope with the energy stasis which results from this inhibition, the ego has to undergo a change.  The ego, i.e., that part of the person that is exposed to danger, becomes rigid, as we say, when it is continually subjected to the same or similar conflicts between need and a fear-inducing outer world.  It acquires in this process a chronic, automatically functioning mode of reaction, i.e., its “character”.  It is as if the affective personality armored itself, as the hard shell it develops were intended to deflect and weaken the blows of the outer world as well as the clamoring of the inner needs.  This armoring makes the person less sensitive to unpleasure, but also restricts his libidinal and aggressive motility and thus reduces his capacity for achievement and pleasure.  We say the ego has become less flexible and more rigid, and that the ability to regulate the energy economy depends on the extent of the armoring.

Wilhelm Reich, 1897 – 1957

Observance of the law

When you want to fight us, we don’t let you and you can’t find us.  But when we want t fight you, we make sure that you can’t get away and we hit you squarely…and wipe you out… The enemy advances, we retreat; the enemy camps, we harass; the enemy tires, we attack; the enemy retreats, we pursue.

Mao Tse-Tung, 1893 – 1976

Keys to Power

The human animal is distinguished by its constant creation of forms.  Rarely expressing its emotions directly, it gives them form through language, or through socially acceptable rituals.  We cannot communicate our emotions without a form.

The forms that we create, however, change constantly – in fashion, in style, in all those human phenomena representing the mood of the moment.  We are constantly altering the forms we have inherited from previous generations, and these changes are signs of life and vitality.  Indeed, the things that don’t change, the forms that rigidify, come to look to us like death, and we destroy them.  The young show this most clearly: Uncomfortable with the forms that society imposes upon them, having no set identity, they play with their own characters, trying on a variety of masks and poses to express themselves.  This is the vitality that drives the motor of form, creating constant changes in style.

The powerful are often people who in their youth have shown immense creativity in expressing something new through a new form.  Society grants them power because it hungers for and rewards this sort of newness.  The problem comes later, when they often grow conservative and possessive.  They no longer dream of creating new forms; their habits congeal, and their rigidity makes them easy targets.  Everyone knows their next move.  Instead of demanding respect they elicit boredom: Get off the stage! We say, let someone else, someone younger, entertain us.  When locked in the past, the powerful look comical – they are overripe fruit, waiting to fall from the tree.

Power can only thrive if it is flexible in its forms.  To be formless is not to be amorphous; everything has a form – it is impossible to avoid.  The formlessness of power is more like that of water, or mercury, taking the form of whatever is around it.  Changing constantly, it is never predictable.  The powerful are constantly creating form, and their power comes from the rapidity with which they can change.  Their formlessness is in the eye of the enemy who cannot see what they are up to and so has nothing solid to attack.  This is the premier pose of power: ungraspable, as elusive and swift as the god Mercury, who could take any form he pleased and this ability to wreak havoc on Mount Olympus.

Human creations evolve toward abstraction, toward being more mental and less material.  This evolution is clear in art, which, in this century, made the great discovery of abstraction and conceptualism; it can also be seen in politics, which over time have become less overtly violent, more complicated, indirect and cerebral.  Warfare and strategy too have followed this pattern.  Strategy began in the manipulation of armies on land, positioning them in ordered formations; on land, strategy is relatively two dimensional, and controlled by topography.  But all the great powers have eventually taken to sea, for commerce and colonization.  And to protect their trading lanes they have had to learn how to fight at sea.  Maritime warfare requires tremendous creativity and abstract thinking, since the lines are constantly shifting.  Naval captains distinguish themselves by their ability to adapt to the literal fluidity of the terrain and to confuse the enemy with an abstract, hard-to-anticipate form.  They are operating in a third dimension: the mind.

Image:

Mercury.  The winged messenger, god of commerce, patron saint of thieves, gamblers, and all those who deceive through swiftness.  The day Mercury was born he invented the lyre; by that evening he had stolen the cattle of Apollo.  He would scour the world, assuming whatever form he desired.  Like the liquid metal named after him, he embodies the elusive, the ungraspable – the power of formlessness.

Authority:

Therefore the consummation of forming an army is to arrive at formlessness. Vitory in war is not repetitious, but adapts its form endlessly… A military force has no constant formation, water has no constant shape: The ability to gain victory by changing and adapting according to the opponent is called genius.

(Sun-tzu, fourth century B.C.)

Et si tu n’existais pas
Je crois que je l’aurais trouvé
Le secret de la vie, le pourquoi
Simplement pour te créer
Et pour te regarder

Above all, I like beauty, balance, and harmony.  It may come as existence inspiring, uplifting and intoxicating as the scent of fresh rain mixed with the air of spring or melancholic, enigmatic and refined.

I cannot remember how many times I have been asked what I am looking for.  The only answer I can come with is Pure Happiness.  As simple as that.  I have learned to enjoy small things in life, here and now, a cup of coffee, a walk, a good conversation, a smile from a stranger, a sound of rain, snow falling on my eyelashes.  I am not looking for perfection, which in my opinion does not exist anyways.

Existence inspiring, uplifting and intoxicating

Source: http://vi.sualize.us/view/kallini2002/7052d8370eacfe4b12ffa31eb111d0b1/

I am looking for a kindred spirit, a man I can fall in love with, totally losing myself and yet having the luxury of remaining myself.  Eyes I can drown in I find totally irresistible.  Anything that has depth to it.  Dark clouds, oceans, mirror effects, reflections, fluidity, illusions, allusions, formlessness.

Foreign languages, literature, films, poetry, images, paradoxes, songs that reflect my mood, dancing, some insanity once in awhile, passion, fall colours, colours Blue and Orange for one reason, colours Dark Maroon and Deep Wine-Red for quite another, courage, absurdity, intensity, character, sense of humour, philosophy, quotes.

Things I don’t like, though.  Over explaining.

I hate  verbal diarrhea and mental constipation.  Especially combined.  Arrogance.  Righteousness.  Pretence.  Superficiality.  Indifference.

It seems strange nowadays, but I do have difficulty even picking a film.  Maybe I just do not want to waste my time watching some garbage.  The major difficulty is, of course, in defining what garbage is.  I can only pass a judgment after having watched a movie.  Now, I try to laugh at myself on many accounts.  This one is no exception.

Maybe it simply was awhile since I was aware of what is out there.  There is no list in my mind of what I should watch.  So I feel like a blind person in a forest.  Then I go to the “Hidden Gems” category and try picking something suitable.  Then I get stuck with what is exactly suitable.  Suitable for what?  For my mood?  For improving it or for reflecting it?  Or neither?

When I picked “Two Lovers”, it is hard to say what exactly I expected.  I think instinctively I knew it would not be a simple comedy you forget right after the film is over.  I like Joaquin Phoenix and he was so highly praised for his performance, that it was hard to resist.  The fact that Gwyneth Paltrow was there also was almost a turn-off, but you can’t have everything.  So there, the choice was made.

After having watched “Two Lovers”, I haven’t thought much about the film.  Not because I would say it was not good.  It was not thrilling; I would even say it was boring to a point.  But I kept thinking about it, which is always a sign, that the film is really not bad.  Anything that makes you think is worthwhile.

I read the reviews later.  The critics sympathized with Leonard (Joaquin Phoenix) and commented how likeable he was and how the critics knew what he should have done and how he should have behaved in order to make the right choice in love.  Pick somebody familiar and safe (and boring) and forego flashy, unstable and instantly attractive.  Save yourself trouble, trade excitement of love and a possibility of heartbreak for security, stability, maybe friendship. 

“However, while it is clear to the audience which of the two women Leonard should focus his attentions on, he instead pursues the other one.”  (Cinema Autopsy, Thomas Caldwell)  http://blog.cinemaautopsy.com/2009/06/06/film-review-two-lovers-2008/

Of course, there is truth and merit to that, but I wonder how many people could actually resist falling in love and how many of us sit and calculate the odds and the possible outcomes.  Maybe those who took the decision-making courses (you know “What-if analysis”, “Strategic Thinking”).  I know I did.  But I still prefer to be in love rather than not.  Maybe that is why Leonard is so likeable.  Not because he is bipolar, because he is very human.

That is the word – BIPOLAR. 

The film does not put such emphasis on his diagnosis and Leonard is only shown as a depressed person, rather than manic.  The diagnosis is mentioned in one of the reviews and whether it is an assumption or not, there is no way of knowing.  Being bipolar, I know the difference much better than film critics.  But, let’s say it does not matter.

But one point was so touching, so it took me a few weeks to really come back to it and remember.  Subtlety and gentleness of the film is chiefly responsible for the fact that I cannot stop thinking about it.  The first scene – Leonard is going (home?) or on his way to deliver dry-cleaned clothes – and he jumps into the ocean.  Suicide out of the Blue?

Here critics should have said that it was not advisable to jump fully-clothed in freezing water.  Oh, no, I never jumped.  I only thought about jumping from the balcony from the 20^th floor.  Oh, yes, I can sympathize.  That scene is now somewhat haunting and somewhat a relief really.  To see it from a different perspective.  You do have to jump in order to see the light of day.  To realize that there actually will be another day and …who knows what.

Just do not ask the film critics what is right and what is wrong.  Whom to pick and fall in love with.  Make your own decisions.

I wanted to make a different post on Halloween.  A poem by Edgar Allan Poe.  “The Raven”.  I thought it would be more becoming.  More becoming my mood and the spirit of Halloween.

My plans have changed.  They usually do.  Something happened and it was somewhat pleasant, somewhat strange and more becoming my melancholic mood and longing for love.

“Gefunden.”  Some things are just strange.  The only thing that I remember from years of learning German was (is) a poem by Goethe.  “Gefunden” means “Found”.  It is about a flower the author finds in a forest while walking there without a thought in mind.  Instead of picking it and letting the flower die, the author digs it out with all the roots and replants it in his garden. 

Und pflanzt es wieder

Am stillen Ort;

Nun zweigt es immer

Und blüht so fort.

The reason the poem has surfaced again was that I met “a friend of a delicate nature” who claimed that he could read German.  His claim turned out to be somewhat exaggerated, since he could not read nor translate “Gefunden” with the online translator.  But that is quite understandable and, to be honest, is precisely what I assumed at the beginning.  Reading a language without properly learning it seems a tall order.  But this story is not about him.  Well, not entirely.

The poem keeps coming back to me.  And this time I found out that Goethe wrote this poem not about a flower, but about his love for a real woman.

I have a dream.  I want to find my love and I found a flower.  Literally.  Where and when?  I was working and walking in circles in the department store full of misplaced clothes.  Of all days, it was Halloween, my birthday.  I did not expect to find anything.  Yet I did.  I found a red rose, slightly battered, slightly faded, smelling of perfume, still beautiful…

I picked it gently and took it home, treating this red rose as a gift, as a sign, as a new hope.

Some things do come out of the Blue.

And my friend with his beautiful deep eyes, seductive voice and a reminiscence of a true love is only a vision of my longing for something or someone whom I will find.

One day.  Out of the Blue.  On the Halloween?