Always Already Free: digital chautaquas from HereNow

SHAKEN

2006-08-10T15:24:00.000+03:00

Henk
MSN
2:02
you blog is causing havoc on firefox browsers, that you tube video is doing it

David: MSN
MSN
2:06
you blog?
2:07
URL?

Henk
MSN
2:07
your blog

David: MSN
MSN
2:07
which one?

Henk
MSN
2:07
alwaysalreadyome

David: MSN
MSN
2:07
yes?
2:07
browswer(S)?

Henk
MSN
2:07
when I open it in firefox, the browser is shaking

David: MSN
MSN
2:07
not on mine: but then I DO have MAC!
2:07

Henk
MSN
2:07
firefox

David: MSN
MSN
2:07
lol
2:07
wow

Henk
MSN
2:07
Internet explorer is fine

David: MSN
MSN
2:07
like Hawaiian Hoola dance
2:07

2:07..
?
2:07
strange

Henk
MSN
2:07
lol

2006-07-19T06:26:00.000+03:00

Ram Dass and Terence McKenna in a Cafe - Prague, 1992

Beloved you,
If ever a link "speaks for itself"....

;)

Here's where my GuruPurnima flowers are laid down this year (also).

Mmmmm.....

...the heart..

2006-05-27T11:56:00.000+03:00

...the heart..
Originally uploaded by Anantya.

"It is only with the heart that one can see rightly; what is

essential is invisible to the eye.

-Antoine de Saint-Exupery

...to protect the innocent

2006-05-11T20:24:00.000+03:00

...to protect the innocent
Originally uploaded by Anantya.

Thursday, May 11, 2006

Beloved Cousin X

Hey there cousin - how are you?

Cuz’n David

hey

Beloved Cousin X

What are you up today (tonight?)

Cuz’n David

just took a break for web-development to respond to Alternet article

about rock band GodSmack's support of the military

in other words: the usual

you?

you dear??

Beloved Cousin X

flipping out -running around like mad

also - the usual

Cuz’n David

some fun associated with this all?

Beloved Cousin X

Of course!

I was just thinking about you as I attempt to answer an essay

question “What is an essential paradox that defines your life? “

Cuz’n David

wow …great question

i suppose YOUR cant answer: "1000 passions – 1 penis"?

Beloved Cousin X

Ha!!!!

I could translate that a bit...

Cuz’n David

*awaits her version of same*

Beloved Cousin X

1000 penises - too bad I'm married?

Cuz’n David

ROFL

Ah brilliant minds...

Are you are school/work?

Beloved Cousin X

I am at home right now, working on an application for the (please

don't kill me) Miami Ad school boot camp (to take place in Mpls this

summer)

Cuz’n David

got a lot of fun pix to share......will email ya

Beloved Cousin X

Yes - please do

Cuz’n David

"dont kill you"

what is that about??

that PR nightmare you keep considering professionally having?

Beloved Cousin X

I'm thinking about trying my hand at brand planning

Cuz’n David

BRAND THIS MOFO.....

*mooz his cuz!*

Beloved Cousin X

You!

are!

Too!

Funny!

I wish you were here to moon me!

Then you could help me answer another crazy question:

Cuz’n David

ps: http://www.alternet.org/wiretap/36118/

(last comment: yours T)

*winces and awaits her question*

Beloved Cousin X

Question: “If you had to explain to someone what ain increasing

divorce rate, cable television, the space shutttle challenger

disaster in the 1980's, the populatirty of south parkk and the rise

of IM all have in comon, what would you say? “

Cuz’n David

Answer: hitting of the transpersonal wall of cultural novelty as the

dynamic convergence/divergence tension of so-called "(post)modern"

life goes eschatologically asontotic

Sorry,....you HAD to ask?!

;))

Beloved Cousin X

Hold on... I need to look up 10 of those words in my dictionary.

Will return later...

Cuz’n David

riiiiight

(admits he had to google for 2 spellingz)

Beloved Cousin X

Actually I'm reading your response to the Godsmack article...

Cuz’n David

but really?

Beloved Cousin X

Oh shit...my ride is here... early... must put on bra before leaving

house...

later babe!

Beloved Cousin X disconnected

Cuz’n David

Well then, if only to amuse myself… another stable at your what? MMPI

question there?

... I feel that all of those speak in, one way or another, of the

phantasmagoric magnification of, and fall out from, the ego's endgame

as its number, being soon "up" as it were (er, will be), casts

shadows back in time from some place (not so far off) there at the

upcoming end of history.

Cuz’n David disconnected

Uffda

2006-05-05T13:00:00.000+03:00

Uffda
Originally uploaded by Anantya.

Dear Grandma,

You stayed as long as you could.

You did more for free than most do for pay.

No stranger to loss and never spared the insults of time's passing

traditions and arriving contradictions,

you loved anyway,

and forgave anyway,

and served anyway.

No bit of terrible world news, neighborhood strife or family struggle

failed to touch your caring heart and frustrated sensibilities as you

marveled aloud in those exasperated, brave, longing-suffering and

treasured chuckling refrains:

- "what-in-the worrrrld ?!"

- "ohhhh golly"

- "my word!"

- "heavens to..."

and, on the lighter side, to help us chuckle too:

- "oh ishhh!"

- "well, for dumb!"

- "uffda nemmen!"

Gosh we miss ya gram.

Nothing's gotten easier since you left. Well, not much or for many.

- our president: "well, for dumb!"

- his war: "what-in-the WORRRrrld are we doing there?!"

- pollution and waste: "heavens, what ARE they THIKing?! Back when i

was a girl....."

- neighborhood/racial struggle: "ohhhh gosh, and they are such nice

people..."

- family stress: "Well my word,...why can't he/she/they just get

along...

...but, you taught us to never give up and that love, kindhearted

tollerance and hard work for worthy causes would help us find our way.

May your move beyond the trials of this confounding, precious,

precarious, promising life (you lived so well) find you now in a

state of deepest, deserved peace. And never seeming to mind yet one

more chore for any of us grandkids (..god, what we wouldn't give now

to do one for you), could I ask you to please put in a good word for

those of us still longing, praying and working hard to see this all

come out right down here?

...Uffda, do we need it!

Thanks gram,

"tates"

Speak!

2006-05-05T11:38:00.000+03:00

colbert n bush.jpg
Originally uploaded by Anantya.

Bol! <"speak!">

Speak, your lips are free.

Speak, it is your own tongue.

Speak, it is your own body.

Speak, your life is still yours.

See how in the blacksmith's shop

The flame burns wild, the iron glows red;

The locks open their jaws,

And every chain begins to break.

Speak, this brief hour is long enough

Before the death of body and tongue:

Speak, 'cause the truth is not dead yet,

Speak, speak, whatever you must speak.

-Faiz Ahmed Fai (poet)

a while

2006-05-03T13:47:00.000+03:00

a while
Originally uploaded by Anantya.

...I’d like to get away from earth awhile

And then come back to it and begin over.

May no fate willfully misunderstand me

And half grant what I wish and snatch me away

Not to return. Earth’s the right place for love:

I don’t know where it’s likely to go better.

I’d like to go by climbing a birch tree,

And climb black branches up a snow-white trunk

Toward heaven, till the tree could bear no more,

But dipped its top and set me down again.

That would be good both going and coming back.

One could do worse than be a swinger of birches.

-Robert Frost (1874–1963).

Mountain Interval. 1920.

Blinded by d'light (Simeiz eclipse 29-3-06)

2006-03-29T17:27:00.002+03:00

Blinded by d'light (Simeiz eclipse 29-3-06)
Originally uploaded by Anantya.

Blinded by d'light (Simeiz eclipse 29-3-06)

2006-03-29T17:27:00.001+03:00

Blinded by d'light (Simeiz eclipse 29-3-06)
Originally uploaded by Anantya.

Blinded by d'light (Simeiz eclipse 29-3-06)

2006-03-29T17:27:00.000+03:00

Blinded by d'light (Simeiz eclipse 29-3-06)
Originally uploaded by Anantya.

YOUR leader?

2006-03-18T11:04:00.000+02:00

YOUR leader?
Originally uploaded by Anantya.

To Make Legal The Illegal

"The President determines, the President shall establish and

maintain, the President determines, the President shall, what the

President considers appropriate, the President shall determine…

…that the surveillance is necessary

shall update a list of groups and organizations

that are subject to electronic surveillance

that there is a reasonable likelihood that the group or organization

whether it intends to engage in an act of international terrorism

whether the Program remains necessary...

The President determines…

what…

the President considers appropriate."

IMG_5256.jpg

2006-03-12T14:15:00.000+02:00

IMG_5256.jpg
Originally uploaded by Anantya.

Cosmic THEIF!

2006-03-03T19:14:00.000+02:00

Cosmic THEIF!
Originally uploaded by Anantya.

Re: De Parade's King of Cool!

2006-01-13T12:28:00.000+02:00

Re: De Parade's King of Cool!
Originally uploaded by Anantya.

Begin forwarded message:

From: David

Date: January 13, 2006 12:18:08 PM GMT+02:00

To: leon@mondoleone.nl

Subject: Warning: this letter contains WAY too much praise!!! :P

Leon-ANANDA!

Is "fan"mail fun or just scary?

...either way, blame your SELF not me. You are one major fucking

talent bro. And i feel blessed to have caught your act.

My name's david. I'm just mr. anyguywhocomestoyourshow to face the

horrible truth: not having learned to play that guitar i used to

hopefully drag along with me was a HUGE self-betrayal. There ought to

be some therapy group that meets like Thursday evenings from 8-9:30

to grieve NOT being YOU!

(laughing)

((trys to compose himself))

(((remembers Leon's act.... gives up control..... cheshire cat grin,

begins to RAVE again....)))

So man, i stare at this small promotional card that says "HIJ is

terug" and reflect:

- on how i would have NEVER torn a corner off to make that great

joint i smoked, at that magical carnival, if i had just known....

- what a great piece of memorabilia this image of a floating black

hat over a bald round head with the twisty thin mustache and the

goatee has become because....

- you made such magic with your combination of warm, humorous

investigative journalism

- you shot such smart documentary footage of such special people and

how....

- you made it all alive again for us in that crowded and expectant

little tent when...

- you added YOU LIVE to that mixed of images, film, light, sound,

stories.

Thank you thank you thank you!

I decided in that moment to never doubt anything was artistically

impossible.

i decided that art, music, film could save this crazy precious planet

and that because there were humans like you here, it was worth saving.

I decided that i was going to burn that fucking american passport and

beg for emergency dutch asylum.

I remembered i was also very stoned and that perhaps i'd better wait

till morning to make that last promise official (wink).

Please write me dear brother and tell me that you are well.

Tell me that life rewards those to risk as much as you to bring so

much light and joy in here for the rest of us to wonder at.

Whatever you wish for in this new year, may it blow even YOUR

creative shiny head just how true it all becomes.

Based on the kick in the (creative) ass that that special 30 min's

with you was for me at "Parade" (or what was that festival called in

Amsterdam park where i wandered into your world?!?!), I have started

to more energetically express my own dreams. I've started a new peace-

work organization called: EquiLife. When we have the $$$ I've got a

great idea to commission a musical/theatrical work from/by/with you.

Will share more when i can make this all more than just a dream, cool?

By the way: send a few promotional pic's of that magical face of

yours. i'd love to do some impromptu promoting of your work here in

eastern europe and at my blog, if i may/if it pleases. I've had great

luck as an occasional promoter for acts i fall in love with (friends

in LIVE to South Africa, Jason Webley over to Moscow a few times. You

MUST meet/hear Jason some time too.... he's from some part of the

same creative galaxy as you).

Anyway, I get back to Holland often and did decide to apply for

citizenship (no shit! :))....so, the next cup of coffee or glass of

wine is on ME!

Much love and do stay in touch!

David

PS: you DO read English, no? :-o

;))

Suchness

2006-01-12T03:27:00.000+02:00

DSC09370
Originally uploaded by Anantya.

When the fire of your most silent attention
makes alters of any old view

...then the thing you'd just finished beholding
bows you down to now pay its full due

Gate Gate ParaGate

2006-01-12T03:22:00.000+02:00

DSC09399
Originally uploaded by Anantya.

A glacier rattles in the cupboard.

A desert sighs within the bed.

And the crack in the teacup opens

a door

to the land

of the dead.

(duuuuuude).

Ah,....this US!

2006-01-11T16:47:00.000+02:00

Ah,....this US!
Originally uploaded by Anantya.

Wanderers in touch...

2006-01-11T14:41:00.000+02:00

IMGP7291.JPG
Originally uploaded by Anantya.

This big round world: slippery-wet, deep and green, high and mighty when not blistering bright and sandy brown... and full of great ways to flow, slash, surf, run, climb, wander, dive, leap, plumb and resurface.

With so much to get into, out of, around, on top of,.... warmed, chilled, challenged, blessed: its ALL here. So who in (from?) the hell finds the time to horde, push, clamor, trick, dupe, take, waste, fool, ruin, gorge or covet?

People finding enough time and attention to be all lost in stories of moments past, busy making and having problems rather than having the time of their lives are simply not getting OUT and INTO it enough....or being prevented by those that ought to be.

*makes note to himself, "Basic Human Right #7: some people need to GET OUT MORE or at least get out of the way!"

There. That's better.

PS: Little Prince says: Question EVERYthing/one/day...and keep wandering in wonder!

Happy Birthday Dakini Moya

2006-01-09T16:36:00.000+02:00

Happy Birthday Dakini Moya
Originally uploaded by Anantya.

YOU!

Jai Jai Jai Ma Prem Dashananda...

Dashka moya,

In this moment, when i only want to be giving YOU the biggest,

BESTest gift of your life, deliver the most inspiring congratulations

to the brightest light in my personal sky, i find myself only able to

give myself. How could that possibly be enough?

That on THIS day of the world of friends and family lining up to say

thank you, to praise you, to honor you....so also MY day to show you

how grateful i am for your birth, for your appearance in my life, for

these precious 3+ years since Life brought us together, that on THIS

day you wake me up this morning with thank-you kisses?!

We are crazy in love, drowned in this Gift.

WHO to thank?

What birthed us for this, prepared us, purified enough of crazy

animal in each of us to let such celestial light glow from our merely

human hearts to one another?

So this is the magic of our love then (the obligation of our

gratitude): we just can't find enough ways to express our joy to each

other, our thanks, our excitement, our curiosity, our inspiration at

the wonder, the beauty, the gift that the other is. What Grace. What

Mystery. What FUN!

Beloved, this day is MY birthday too. Some part of me was dying with

waiting, waiting for you to hurry up and GROW up (giggle)....waiting

for you to get ready for me (or at least get old enough so that

neither Russian law, your protective father or crazy old girl/

boyfriends could get in our way ;) ), ready for us ready for

this..... Love.

Dearest one, i wish you only ever more Light and Peace and higher and

Higher realization of your own very nature.

May you, born so bright...so already full of goodness, faith and

happiness, be full of humor and deepest trust as you go forth and

share all that you are and the One you Love (Who is NOT "other") with

all others.

As the first willing, grateful victim of your relentlessly and

irresistibly transformative kindness, smile and expectation, now at

your feet, I invite all others to this feast of friendship.

I pledge my every breath, my very heartbeat in service to your joy,

ease, health and and and.....

....use me up, take it all, burn it through and through so that this

fire that is our human love leaves nothing but giggling dancing

footprints on the cosmic sands of this time, nothing but sacred ash,

just a ****POOF*** of billowy purple smoke and the twinkle of a new

light at the dawn in the east of all human longing,....

....a Transcendental Brilliant human Star has come of age.

(and god, is she cute!)

Always and Forever....

-me

Nay-sayers be....

2006-01-07T17:17:00.000+02:00

equiideas-dm-topia
Originally uploaded by Anantya.

....danged! (lighter than "damned" but let's me fume a bit ;) )

What's wrong with a world where cynicism is misconstrued to be any kind of sophisticated, or worse yet "educated", response to the challenges we face here at the dawn of the 21st century?

"Funny" (read TRAGIC) part is how even the darkest detractors of us "tree-hugging-hippiedom-idealists" types, the defenders of movement towards effective peace-now initiatives, ALL want/need the earth and all others to function with greatest, effectiveness, loyalty and devotion to feed, fun and fuel their silly pseudo-rebellious rap.

Need we (silly granola dreamers) be the ones to have to remind them how dependent they are on the thriving of this precious biosphere for even the very breath they borrow with which to blow their cocky, righteous, unthankful empty and uncreative adolescent horns?

Porcupine Tree: da kine!

2005-12-17T16:46:00.000+02:00

Porcupine Tree: da kine!
Originally uploaded by Anantya.

If the sounds we're

Ek kan e bikki Afrikaans prat, ooe!

2005-12-17T16:45:00.000+02:00

Ek kan e bikki Afrikaans prat, ooe!
Originally uploaded by Anantya.

The Felt Presence of Immediate Experience.

2005-11-02T00:26:00.000+02:00

The Felt Presence of Immediate Experience.
Originally uploaded by Anantya.

Earth-Life Report: wednesday 0:22, november 2nd.

Mind:

It a closed or open spiral, this highest vision of eternal life?

A closed spiral would be as experientially eternal as say an

infinitely rising orbit.

As what, around what??

....or what onto what??

Transcend AND include.....transcend and include....transcend and

inclu.........

Around, around and on and on and ...... ON? (or Back Around)?

Heart:

Ah, such a gift to be possessed by the passionate, loving, wondering,

awe of mere being.

Is the samadhi of gratitude's purple bliss an im- or ex-plosion for

you? You know, the way that feeling so filled with gratefulness for

being overwhelmed by gratatude just seems to be bliss setting its own

fire aflame.

Body:

Chai or beer?...Chai or beer??....Chai or beer?....

(%=>P

Walk it!

2005-10-28T12:36:00.000+03:00

Walk it!
Originally uploaded by Anantya.

All know the way;
few actually walk it.

Mr, Bodhi Dharma
Equitable Exchange, lifetime member

WORD.

2005-10-15T23:10:00.000+03:00

WORD.
Originally uploaded by Anantya.

I have sworn upon the altar of God eternal
hostility against every form of tyranny over
the mind of man.

—Thomas Jefferson

The Man(u)

2005-10-15T11:16:00.000+03:00

The Man(u)
Originally uploaded by Anantya.

Some people come into our lives and quickly go.
Some stay for awhile and leave footprints on our hearts.

...and we are never, ever the same.

Steal this tune!

2005-10-12T16:17:00.000+03:00

Steal this tune!
Originally uploaded by Anantya.

From http://www.alwaysontherun.net/thievery.htm:

Miss Liberty turn inna Jezzabelle

All de dreams you go sell, de whole dem turn inna hell

Her bed of roses are filled with thorns

Her righteous robes are tattered and torn

If she had only stood for love

That would have been enough

She wouldn’t have to hide her shame

If she had only stood for love

That would have been enough

But now she’s burnt us all with her flames

Amerimacka

Oh what a beautiful life

Amerimacka

Is like licking honey off a knife

Amerimacka

Oh what a beautiful sight

Amerimacka

Oh what a beautiful life

The land of the free built on slavery

Our consciousness in captivity

The promise land is the liar’s den

Your culture of greed has got to end

Now we’re laying in the mud

Looking up above

Tear water just ah drop from the sky

They try to keep us in the mud

Separating us from love

But me nah go let dem conquer de I

Amerimacka

Oh what a beautiful life

Amerimacka

Is like licking honey off a knife

Amerimacka

Oh what a beautiful sight

Amerimacka

Oh what a beautiful life

Fucking Idiot!

2005-10-07T22:57:00.000+03:00

Fucking Idiot!
Originally uploaded by Anantya.

Shame on you.

That's it, you "christian" cad, hang that empty, guilty head of yours.

...you little confused boy in a man's body...

...your undersized mind in an oversized job...

...you stunted cold heart in a massive precious world...

Shame on you.

Shame on us.

Tonight i watch this KGB thug, live on moscow TV, put you to shame

Like you and your neo-con cadre he's a power greedy pig but...

he doesn't pretend to give a damn about his poor

he doesn't giggle or stammer when talking about his wars

he doesn't have script writers to pen and polish his lies

Tonight i watched you on CNN

...left in the dust by a smarter tyrant.

Shame on us!

Time's up.

People of Russia... People of America... People of the world....

WHEN will we be done with these ridiculous bullies?

When will we grow-up and obviate such insulting stooges?

We deserve such grotesque monsters

They are our punishment

...for not being conscious enough

...for not being responsible enough

...for being so lazy

...for being so selfish

Ask the poor...

Ask the planet...

Ask the gental...

Ask yourSELF if you don't agree that...

TIME IS UP!

Awash in your Light

2005-10-06T00:03:00.000+03:00

Oh Lovers...
Originally uploaded by Anantya.

O lovers, lovers it is time
to set out from the world.
I hear a drum in my soul's ear
coming from the depths of the stars.

Our camel driver is at work;
the caravan is being readied.
He asks that we forgive him
for the disturbance he has caused us,
He asks why we travelers are asleep.

Everywhere the murmur of departure;
the stars, like candles
thrust at us from behind blue veils,
and as if to make the invisible plain,
a wondrous people have come forth.

* The Divani Shamsi Tabriz, XXXVI

Tough-Luv

2005-09-21T16:10:00.000+03:00

Tough-Luv
Originally uploaded by Anantya.

A young person in my life is going through changes, and some tough

times. And it's got me thinking...

I have this very special nephew who i love very much. He's now 14-15 or

so and really "testing" both his freedoms and limits as well as the

patience of those who love him so dearly and serve him daily.

He's at that crazy age where the exploration of his possibilities and

the testing his freedoms (the range elasticity of his relations and

rules) is now his driving fascination. This is that critical period in

a boy's (and girl's) development where the boundaries between healthy

curiosity (necessary experimentation) and dangerous fascination lie in

beguilingly close proximity.

How to support a young person at this stage in making the right choices

when the process of developing discrimination itself is almost always

one of surviving and then learning from mistakes? How to balance the

giving of enough room for a youngster to move, experience and reveal

their unique tendencies (strengths/weaknesses, attractions/aversions,

sensibilities/liabilities, etc.) without failing to, creatively and

clearly, surround their widening sphere of new freedoms with effective

limits?

So yes, as i was saying, I have this very special nephew who, while not

being my kid to actively co-parent, I love so much and want to wholly

positively influence to come through his adolescence empowered, not

burdened by reactivity and patterns of unhealthy rebelliousness (from

having concluded/constructed a personal survival strategy of mistrust

and unhealthy secrecy, self/other-destructivness, addictive and/or

antisocial behavior etc.).

How did we all make peace with the temptations or trappings of "sex,

drugs and rock-n-roll" ourselves. What is your "would've, could've,

should've" personal history about all that. Were you over-disciplined

or under by your parents and schools, culture and laws?

Any/all personal politics and "religious" morality aside, we all know

there are most serious physiological, psychological and emotional

developmental implications of all our kid's most basic choices/actions:

the company they keep and personas they try-on/test therein , the diet

they consume and any inebriates they may experiment with, the

sensitivity/skillfulness of their teachers and learning environment,

the cultural and (in the "west" therefore inherently) commercial

messages they are boraged by and submit to or resist, etc. When and

with whom an adolescent first experiences/explores their sexuality,

their states of mind/consciousness, their sense of

art/performance/creative expression, their spirituality, their polity,

their social/relations constructions, etc. is often a very strong

determiner of subsequent conclusions about reality (...self, other,

life) and therefore also, until later personal reflection (either of

their own free will or forced upon them, usually by some dysfunction,

negative symptom or breakdown) major factors aiming at least the

initial trajectory of their impending adulthood.

As we all know, the new saying is that "it takes a village to raise a

child". But what to do when "the village" is itself so confused and

lacking in concrete and conclusive evidence to justify its rules, a

healthy world that would give its/any demands and limit setting real

foundation and justification? Indulge the rebellious adolescent mind

for a moment and entertain:

Rule Test #1: "Don't have sex until....

-a) ...you are married." (Marriage: an "institution" or

cultural/religious convention so fraught with failure, dysfunction and

violence as to call into question the intentions of its advocates),

or....

-b) ...until you leave this (the family's) house." (which is to

communicate nothing more than the blatant or de-facto communication 'if

you are not going to duplicate/imatate/submit to and confirm MY

conclusions about how to manage/limit/control human sexuality,

pair-bonding, etc. then you will have to go away and/or do that in

secret." or the like).

-c) ...until you are (usually in conjunction with "b" above if not

honoring "a") in a committed relationship." (as if all such

Judeo-Christian based moralizing even showed up in any statistically

rigorous mental/emotional/psychological health research (or even

layman's observations) as proving its a requisite guideline.

Rule Test #2: "No taking of "drugs"...

-a) ...in this house." ( or in other words "i would rather have you go

to potentially dangerous places with potentially dangerous people to

ingest potentially dangerous/unknown substances....etc., than to do any

such thing here"), or...

-b) ....at your age" ( or the risking that the youth will see what may

appear to them as merely another typical and lazy adult

double-standard), or...

-c) ...as we define them". ( the irony is that statistically speaking

both the one speaking and the adolescent listening/weighing his/her

options are currently under the influence of some of the statistically

most deleterious substances so commonly available: refined white

sugars, nicotine, alcohol, caffine and any number of complicated new

and highly experimental popular pharmaceutical psychotropics like

antidepressants, anti-anxiety or anti-ADHD meds. Furthermore, into that

already deeply chemically compromised (and therefore of dubious

integrity) conversation (usually read "shouting match") add the more

deeper "political"/ or human rights irony that if the "drug" in

question happens to be a naturally growing plant of the Cannabis Sativa

family, the guardian presuming to lecture of its evils and prevent its

accessibility themselves now stand against decades or overwhelming

scientific evidence as to its non-toxicity and entire nations of

conservative legislation which are enjoying a humbling list of positive

feedback from its de-criminalization.).

What is a loving parent, guardian, relative, family friend,

teacher.....etc. to do?

Clearly so little is clear. And, therefore, open and deeply caring

sharings, research and mutual self-inspection are required.

The basis for any rules found necessary at this stage of raising the

adolescent must be fully available for mutual inspection as to the

rule's depth of reason as well as intuition, tradition as well as

legality, chemistry as well as cultural, personal as well as collective

moorings. If the young adult is not to be rebellious isn't the adult,

not wanting to merely play petty dictator (with all that is rightfully

insulting to developing intelligence and justifiable insighting of

further rebellion about that), also accountable to be completely

transparent in revealing their drives, reasoning, including even

misgivings and conditions justifying re-consideration?

Its easier to just make rules, or at least at first it may seem.

The lazy close their minds, end the conversation, risk making

uninformed, idealistic, reactive or merely fear-based rules and thereby

guarantee at best only postponement, if that, of these same issues to

the next generation and at worst incite division, suspicion, separation

and the failure of the kind of spirit of mutual respect and honoring of

difference that only rigorous and deeply empathetic intelligent loving

progressive consideration/investigation/conversation can engender.

But are the unconscious friends, or worse yet these preditor-dealers,

any better? Is there any proof that their noxious pandering, and

peer-pressure pushing (if not more innocent grass then more deadly

bath-tub poisons) is not 100x worse than merely over-protective

parenting? How to cultivate and maintain the kind of intimacy and

respect that would have our kids turning to us rather than to strangers

of dubious intent when making such important (and inevitable)

decisions?

When my nephew, in some attempt to bond with me his "cool" uncle,

started to talk about Marijuana I chose to tell him that while i

thought that its use could be of value to some people consumed

infrequently in a manner respectful of its effect and influence, my

sense was that it was not something that people in his age group should

be yet experimenting with. He asked why and a rich and valuable

discussion followed in which i felt i had effectively made a case for

abstinence based on age/maturity. Do i believe that such a conversation

is conclusive or could really form the basis for a decision on his part

not to experiment with, in the case of this discussion, grass? No. If i

were his legal guardian i would be drawing him into a much deeper

consideration, enrolling him into the limit-setting process and set of

conclusions i would work to reach together. And I feel relatively sure

that both his mother and his grandparents, his primary parentors/role

models, will do their best in that direction.

I have this nephew i love and wish i could spare him, as well as all

those around him, the chaos of his developmental years and the

necessary mistakes and wrong turns he will most likely have to take.

His own maturity, merely developing as it now is, will surly itself be

a pivotal factor in how much freedom he deserves to be entrusted with.

Yet another one of youth's frustrating/bewildering Catch-22's.

I have this nephew I love, we all love. May he make it through without

too much trouble, danger or over-stressing those that live for his

health, happiness and success.

Angkor('s) Away

2005-09-11T12:29:00.000+03:00

Angkor('s) Away
Originally uploaded by Anantya.

We wandered the ancient ruins of Suryavarman II's temple matrix in
absolute wonder.

Thrilling to amble along its crumbling byzantine pathways, through the
hidden moldering galleries which encircle its five central towering
shrines.

The sturdy yawn and long patient stretch of nature's inevitable
upending of even our greatest architectural impositions has deeply
fractured, or irreparably penetrated and ensconced, every camber,
column and veranda in its leafy serpentine embrace.

Like a some 1000 acre effigy (an improbably lude elemental slow-dance;
20 meter jungle Banyans writhing upon and lifting 20 ton sandstone
walls), this celebration of impermanence teases as easily at all our
expectations of time and place as it does the incense laden splahes and shards of
bending and broken light. A shy jungle sunset meandering along side us; amber-brown here then as suddenly breaking through safron-honey-pink there.

This timeless place of incomparable artistic devotion, every surface
dripping with chiseled cosmic filigree, telling 10,000 stories yet
somehow, like a veiled dancer trailing her amber promises but always
disappearing just out of sight around every next bend, keeps all her secrets hers.

Now a steep stairway calls us to climb up to its shady terrace where a time-scorched Shiva Lingam shrine odalisques in decadent repose. Midway mounting that steep rise dividing the stairway now in two we encounter a massive orimental wall. In the center of this towering slab, this sculpted story of worship, was a moment of such subtle revelation for me.

Time and the elements had seen fit to leave for us, in clearest relief
there at the center of our gaze as we ascended, the hands of two
lovers. Her head tossed back in ecstatic delight as she places into the
palm of her beloved a......a, a, ........(what was it?, a piece offruit, a flower bud, a, a, ....SOMEthing or nothing if not agift).......insipiring his upturned gaze, fueling his devotion and gratitude.

Heart swells as tears well and bliss descends.

There it is: us, people, mankind, loving each other in poetic delicacy
around 1000 years ago. The "gift" ...whatever. The "other" ...whoever.
This play, this pull....timeless and relentless. Even still. And in
that moment, and in their passing, and the generosity of the artist that
enshrined such intimacy for us, and we so privileged to be
wandering and wondering herenow.....all of us and even everything in cosmic
nature at once captured, embraced, upended, evolving and trying always
to dare to love here, in the crazy epic swirl of it all.

We wandered the ancient ruins of the citizens Angkor and were, forever, changed.

Please?

2005-09-05T20:47:00.000+03:00

Please?
Originally uploaded by Anantya.

PLEASE!

L'Dog!

2005-09-05T01:47:00.000+03:00

L'Dog!
Originally uploaded by Anantya.

What is Lotus Dog?

Lotus Dog is a rock-tronic music project led by brother and sister

song-writing team TSO and Jolie. Closer to a community than a band,

Lotus Dog's debut release features more than two dozen guest musicians

and contributors, from Afghan tabla player / vocalist Tameem to Oakland

rappers The Conscious Daughters.

Combined with Jolie’s heart-felt vocals and TSO’s avant garde

production style, this rich assortment of musical elements results in

an unusual blend of rock, electronic, and hip-hop flavors. Lotus Dog

defies convention with hip-rock-tronic music that tells their story

with few rules, and few boundaries. Guitars, drums, electronic loops

and effects, and a myriad of exotic and orchestral instruments are

utilized - varying in mood from aggressive and driving to melancholy

and atmospheric.

But it’s the lyrics that most define the intent of Lotus Dog. “Each

song is a prayer,” says lead singer/songwriter Jolie. “We wanted to

look as deeply and earnestly as possible at the human experience

including our relationship to Creation itself.” Not inspirational or

spiritual music per se, Lotus Dog is more an experiment in the

reflection, integration, and transcendence of spiritual views.

Another important, if somewhat audacious goal of the Lotus Dog project

is to convey a depth of philosophical significance without compromising

quality and style. In other words, we want to create music that is both

deeply meaningful and fun at the same time. Music that takes

responsibility for contributing something of value to human

consciousness, without being self-righteous. The lotus symbolizes the

innate desire for wisdom and wholeness, while the dog symbolizes

playfulness, mischief, and unconditional love.

Taken as a whole, much of today's media is a chaos of fragmented

motives, beliefs, sensationalism, and cynicism, which seems only to

aggravate the compounding crises we face as a planetary civilization.

Given this dilemma, the age-old capacity of art to unify human beings

on a heart and soul level - above ideology and dogma - becomes vital.

Only attempts to contextualize the noise, rather than overpower it, can

ultimately spur the predominance of our better nature. This attempt is

the essence of Lotus Dog.

Thank you for listening!

desiHER

2005-09-04T18:58:00.000+03:00

desiHER
Originally uploaded by Anantya.

T-8 Days....and counting!

They say how life appears to you is a function of what you are really

focused upon or called by.

Sifting through recent random photos to inspire my every next rant

here, i came across this one from a walk Dasha and I took with friends

through a magical Warsaw arboretum/statue garden.

It would not be fair to say that, when i not separated from my beloved

for so long, the Shakti is so possessive of my attention, but this

rather protracted period of (de-facto) Brahmacharya practice in her

absence has me now feeling Her everywhere!

Counting down...

- to tearing off these orange robes,

- trading them in for the human-silk of her fragrant embrace,

- dropping the cool control (& cold showers) of pranayama's conductivity

- for the fecund peach-purple cloak, the floral leafy glen,

...of my Cinnamon Girl's return

......10, 9, EIGHT, 7, 6.....

*sigh*

DarknesLIGHT

2005-09-02T11:50:00.000+03:00

DarknesLIGHT
Originally uploaded by Anantya.

Heartlighting moon
calls

fluttering darkness
turns

dancing difference
melts

nightlinging maya
unmasks

darknessing brightness
comes

(...home).

Mythos Radiatus

2005-08-30T21:56:00.000+03:00

Mythos Radiatus
Originally uploaded by Anantya.

Behold, I stand at the door, and knock:

and if any... hear my voice,

and will open the door,

I will come in to him,

and will sup with him,

and he with me.

-Revelations the 3rd chapter and the 20th verse...

***

********* *

***

I have lived on the lip

of insanity, wanting to know reasons,

knocking on a door. It opens.

I've been knocking from the inside!

-Rumi

***

******* *

***

"Knock three times

...on the ceiling if you want me!"

-Tony Orlando & Dawn

ONEder

2005-08-27T13:21:00.000+03:00

ONEder
Originally uploaded by Anantya.

"There's no-one else"
she said it seems
or so i thought
she led my dreams
....moving now before me

"...not even me."
she laughed in jest
or so i felt
she halved my breast
...arrising now within me

"Else?"
I asked not knowing why
and so she grew
my gasp her cry
...to feel her thrill now as me

"N'else!"
she quipped now coming home
and so i knelt
bowing low to own
"...how no-one ever was me!"

"None is One"
meshewe sighed
"and so we're born
though never died"
...her poem's so undone me.

(on the count of three) Fear No More!

2005-08-25T21:41:00.000+03:00

(on the count of three) Fear No More!
Originally uploaded by Anantya.

"Where/whenever the 'other' appears, fear arises."

Illusions of separation, separateness, difference, "otherness" are

making a tragedy of this magical life.

Let's declare it over.

Done.

...call it a draw, a tie, "even-steven"....whatever.

Hell, claim your "side" won for all i care.

We all,.....ALL need to disarm.

Inside. Outside.

Take the rest of eternity off.

Just tack up a note on the old rusted door to the failure that has been

most of human history.

...a note like "world-wide illusion of critical

human/gender/cultural/religious/ideological differences (and related

projections, defenses and fighting, etc) cancelled due to bad weather"

(or "....cancelled due to no justification for same!" or "...cancelled

due to lack of interest." or..."....cancelled cause we noticed that

even frogs were having more fun." or etc.)

What else?!

"But who first?" they ask.

"You!" Life answers,

...and in a flash and flush of warm descending bliss

a trans-dimensional collage of saints and sages of all ages

overwhelming your head, flooding your heart

...reminding you that yours would certainly NOT be the first gun laid

down, first heart reopened, first Self RE-cognized

How long will you/we wait?

....must it get so much worse before it gets better?

for you? for us all??

Wouldn't you enjoy writing this chapter of your life story penning

yours the hero's way?

...the chapter in which you took your stand in the genius

and transformational amnesty

of a new kind of brave peace and liberating surrender?!

The kindest among us now

and all those who've awakened before us

have already braved this inevitable surrender

...of egoic identity, motivation and destiny

Their sacrifice (only of illusion)

Their loss (only of separation)

...but their victory (of Self over selves) is our

proof

inspiration

call

demand

...saying "do it!" "....wake up now!"

They stand there (HERE) in the Heart of hearts

always calling us up and out

always inspiring us down and in

...into the loving light

and fearless forever

of eternal day

So let's FEAR LESS

and let's LOVE MORE

Let's dare this ecstasy

...even if only a bit more each day

...and even/especially now

...and Now

....and NOW!

The Martians are coming...!

2005-08-09T14:20:00.000+03:00

The Martians are coming...!
Originally uploaded by Anantya.

>>

>>

>>

>> The Red Planet is about to be spectacular!

>>

>>

>> This month and next, Earth is catching up with Mars in an encounter

>> that

>> will culminate in the closest approach between the two planets in

>> recorded history. The next time Mars may come this close is

>> in 2287. Due to the way Jupiter's gravity tugs on

>> Mars and perturbs its orbit, astronomers can only be

>> certain that Mars has not come this close to Earth

>> in the Last 5,000 years, but it may be as long as

>> 60,000 years before it happens again.

>>

>> The encounter will culminate on August 27th when

>> Mars comes to within 34,649,589 miles of Earth and

>> will be (next to the moon) the brightest object in

>> the night sky. It will attain a magnitude of -2.9

>> and will appear 25.11 arc seconds wide. At a modest

>> 75-power magnification

>>

>>

>>

"Destiny"

2005-08-09T07:06:00.000+03:00

"Destiny"
Originally uploaded by Anantya.

I lie awake

I've gone to ground

I'm watching porn

In my hotel dressing gown

Now I dream of you

But I still believe

There's only enough for one in this

Lonely hotel suite

The journey's long

And it feels so bad

I'm thinking back to the last day we had.

Old moon fades into the new

Soon I know I'll be back with you

I'm nearly with you

I'm nearly with you

When I'm weak I draw strength from you

And when you're lost I know how to change your mood

And when I'm down you breathe life over me

Even though we're miles apart we are each other's destiny

On a clear day

I'll fly home to you

I'm bending time getting back to you

Old moon fades into the new

Soon I know I'll be back with you

I'm nearly with you

I'm nearly with you

When I'm weak I draw strength from you

And when you're lost I know how to change your mood

And when I'm down you breathe life over me

Even though we're miles apart we are each other's destiny

When I'm weak I draw strength from you

And when you're lost I know how to change your mood

And when I'm down you breathe life over me

Even though we're miles apart we are each other's destiny

I'll fly, I'll fly home

I'll fly home and I'll fly home

-Zero 7

happy (and Free)

2005-08-09T04:57:00.000+03:00

IMGP7291.JPG
Originally uploaded by Anantya.

"He who would travel happily must travel light."

- Antoine de St. Exupery

"He who would travel Free must become Light."

- A Wayward Saint

DanceJam 2005!

2005-08-09T04:51:00.000+03:00

NorCalFlyer.jpg
Originally uploaded by Anantya.

We, the people of planet Earth,

In recognition of the interconnectedness of all life

And the importance of the balance of nature,

Hereby acknowledge our interdependence

And affirm our dedication

To life-serving environmental stewardship,

The fulfilment of universal human needs worldwide,

Economic and social well-being,

And a culture of peace and nonviolence,

To insure a sustainable and harmonious world

For present and future generations.

Steal This Blog!

2005-07-30T12:38:00.000+03:00

Steal This Blog!
Originally uploaded by Anantya.

"If we had done as the kings told us five hundred years ago, we

should all have been slaves. If we had done as the priest told

us, we should all have been idiots. If we had done as the doctors

told us, we should all have been dead. We have been saved

by disobedience. We have been saved by the splendid thing

called independence, and I want to see more of it. I want to

see children raised so that they will have it."

-Robert Ingersoll

Look Out!

2005-07-28T12:59:00.000+03:00

DSC09480.jpg
Originally uploaded by Anantya.

9448031 (LOVE)

...disconnected10:12

Equitable Exchange Welcomes YOU!

2005-06-15T23:06:00.000+03:00

earth 1
Originally uploaded by Anantya.

Just a begining but were already so proud!

Check it out and join along!
http://www.equitablexchange.org/

:))

All work and no play makes....

2005-06-04T13:19:00.000+03:00

DSC09299
Originally uploaded by Anantya.

"The philosophers have only interpreted the world in various ways; the point, however, is to change it."
-Karl Marx

*** *** *** *** ***

Allow me to set the scene...
Don't know how well this photo blogs, but it was a fantastic bit of bronze work: a laborer set upon his shovel with the most curious expression of enlightened resignation. And to display our beleaguered yet oddly hopeful laborer the artist (obviously some sort of Marxist/Buddhist) had foregone the standard gallery display pedestal opting rather to prop-up this wry, accusing, smirking curmudgeon in the corner of an old handmade wheelbarrow, half full of rich black soil... and all this in some old abandoned brick factory 60k's into an old Polish forest outside of Warsaw.

But, and this is more to the point I guess, this moment of really great (ok, yes, "folk") art just toppled into my heart, climbed up into my head and really started stirring up some kind of righteous proletariat shit-storm ...

(to be continued...)

Mystery School Musings...

2005-05-31T17:11:00.000+03:00

DSC09260
Originally uploaded by Anantya.

We are all some kind of ephemeral organic artifice, veils of sorts set dancing upon the timelessly free trade-winds of cosmic being.

Rag-tag band of wayward saints and sinners all, we map our journey, chart our evolution by the the only celestial tomb free enough to fly upon: the way of the white clouds.

May this little nothing of a note find you (yes, YOU!) helplessly in love with the vibration of your own unique free-fall into ever brighter bliss.

Form whom the bell tolls....

2005-05-31T16:30:00.000+03:00

fetalcosmos
Originally uploaded by Anantya.

I've been doing a lot of pondering about the mystery of time (and Time) lately and this bit of reading really brought me to the edge of my seat....

"The angel of the Apocalypse doesn't say: 'there is no more time' but ' there is no time to loose'. Throughout my life I've always felt as though time were being eaten away on the inside, as though it were on the point of using up all its possibilities, as though it lacked duration. And this lack on its part has always filled me with both satisfaction and terror."

It is by a French thinking named 'Ciorian' from some publication of his notebooks. Got to track down more of this cat.

Sri Sinbadananda

2005-05-24T02:46:00.000+03:00

emm
Originally uploaded by Anantya.

May the guru's gracious glance ever dwell upon me.

It creates all worlds, and yields all nourishment.

It bestows the viewpoint of all holy scriptures.

It regards wealth as useless, and removes faults.

Always focused on the Ultimate, It is sovereign over all universal qualities.

This glance confers the path of liberation.

It is the central pillar supporting the stage of this world.

It showers the nectar of compassion,and reveals all principles of creation.

It is the creator of time; pure existence, consciousness and bliss.

âTHE GURU GITA

OUR KINDa BUDdha!

2005-05-24T02:38:00.000+03:00

Image 008
Originally uploaded by Anantya.

Come, come, whoever you are!

Wanderers, worshippers, lovers of leaving,...
It does not matter!

For ours is not a caravan of despair. Even if you have broken your vows a thousand times,...

Come, come, yet again, come!

No Rest for the Weirdy

2005-05-24T02:27:00.000+03:00

smallpope
Originally uploaded by Anantya.

"The pope's funeral continues. They keep coming up with these new facts all the time. I was watching it today, and they said that the Vatican, just today, released the pope's will to the public. I didn't know that he had a will. The surprising thing is, he left everything to the Church of Scientology."

--Conan O'Brien

The Vision Splendid

2005-05-24T02:16:00.000+03:00

964587
Originally uploaded by Anantya.

Either everything is profound or nothing at is at all.

Too simple?
...not to one who sees the wonder of God's artful handiwork (and/or sense of humor?!) in even every slice of toast!

;))

DSC09255

2005-05-22T18:43:00.000+03:00

DSC09255
Originally uploaded by Anantya.

*tounge of the silent heart caught babbling to buddha-mind at 17:35 on bright and magical Warsaw afternoon*

(currently playing tune: Van Morrison's "In The Garden")

Love as much as you can from wherever you find yourself. Go beyond all reason to love and then love more. Love till it hurts and then love the vibe of that ache. Love is sacrifice of everything into its source....do that, follow that, fall into that, be lived by life, .....and meet the greatness of all beings there.

"There"?....HERE and now!

Love,
.......us.

DSC09271

2005-05-22T17:08:00.000+03:00

DSC09271
Originally uploaded by Anantya.

*head bobbing ecstatically to-n-fro to some FAT rock'n Porcupine Tree track*

...whew!
Been a longtime, long time, ..... (Zep?)..... since I got a word in edgewise here. My quieter hermetic self's been running the show for a while.

But with my beloved back in squeezably close proximity (NO thanks to Putin's Russia or those idiots at the Polish Embassy) it feels just all Spring all over!

Great road-trip out to the country-side 60k's outside of Warsaw and will blog a few pic's yet today.

...nice to feel "back"/up to expressing more again. Is there some more attractive word to describe "psychic composting"?

;)

Cosmic Cookbook #1

2005-04-12T13:42:00.000+03:00

Cosmic Cookbook #1
Originally uploaded by Anantya.

Psilocybin is the most commonly available and experientially accessible of these compounds. Therefore my plea to scientists, administrators, and politicians who may read these words is this: look again at psilocybin, do not confuse it with the other psychedelics, and realize that it is a phenomenon unto itself with an enormous potential for transforming human beings - not simply transforming the people who take it, but transforming society in the way that an art movement, a mathematical understanding, or a scientific breakthrough transforms society. It holds the possibility of transforming the entire species simply by virtue of the information that comes through it. Psilocybin is a source of gnosis, and the voice of gnosis has been silenced in the Western mind for at least a thousand years.

*** excerpt taken from "New Maps of Hyperspace" by beloved friend (mentor, transcendental alchemist, psychedelic bard...) Terence McKenna

Benny Zen

2005-04-11T23:55:00.000+03:00

Benny Zen
Originally uploaded by Anantya.

Jesus I miss him.

My first dogs were Bassets and so you can imagine how stoked i was when magical Lizzy, Patron Saint of Wayward Creatures (winged, pawed, hoofed....), and I came across this wonder-mutt: 1/2 Black Lab - 1/2 Basset.

We called him "Banna"...looked like a Basset in a black Tux.

I miss that "little gentleman" and I miss the kind of (at least semi-) settled life that would allow me the luxury of this great magical world of relations.

Peace to you wherever you are Banna-man. Please forgive your wandering human-friend for having wandered (again) too far.

Longing

2005-02-03T18:42:00.000+02:00

Longing
Originally uploaded by Anantya.

still
again
alone
...and there's an ache only our bones know how to sing
to the mute chilly silence of our longing skin
one pillow too many and 7 (slow) kisses too few
warmth but no fire
fields but no flowering
tears but no flowing
to alone for loneliness
to rich this purple secret pain
shadows hug memories better
here
softness becomes sharp (and flat)
here
gender's lament lost on cool deaf cotton
and still
this ache for all together would melt
if we weren't
still
again
alone

SoDONEda

2005-02-03T17:28:00.000+02:00

SoDONEda
Originally uploaded by Anantya.

RedCity: There in their dark-hot sweaty womb-room they spin in reveries beyond your aloneness and expect your glee.
DeadCity: There in your aloneness you're hot in the wrong tomb where no rote spasms sweat either of you free.

Just TRY
...to control the dream (of this "waking life") or any one in it and..... NIGHTMARE.

Just FORGET
... that all here is impermanent, ever changing and destined to die (at least disappear beyond all recognition) and.... NAUSEOUS SHOCK.

Just MISTAKE
...even for one lazy, hopeful, indulgent moment (or three), her as "yours" or pass yourself off to her in kind and..... SUFFER DEEP.

Just CHOOSE
...the wrong face (body) of God to love tonight, the wrong moment to speak or be silent and better..... RUN FAST.

Just EGO's
...usual casual murder of love's fragile footprint and all the cruel karma it invites in...... SHARPEST RETURN.

RedCity: Ultimatums in blood worse than the crimes they would blame and punish for this careless cut.
DeadCity: These windows, so used to hiding the innocent from the Nazis below, do nothing to hide the guilty from the SS within.

aLIVE with LIVE

2005-02-02T18:14:00.000+02:00

Brother Ed
Originally uploaded by Anantya.

Here's once of the sanest Crazy Diamonds to ever shine from my Ipod or, thank my lucky stars (and Sri Adi Da!), next to me on stage singing our favorite Lennon ballad together with the heartbreaking chorus of some some 40,000 deeply passionate Atlanta LIVE fans before us.

*endless grateful sighs*

You know his band right?! No?! LIVE?! ....you must. These guys are simply stellar humans and crazy-great musicians.

If you love the passion of really powerful progressive rock but find 99% of the nagging and whining (inane, adolescent, lost) lyrics of, sadly most, of today's MTV flat-land output just too much to suffer in trade, tune in! If you love transcendental poetry yet wish Rumi would have had an electric Fender (or Chad Taylor) at his ecstatic command then search no further: www.friendsoflive.com
...and dearest devotee of the Real, true friend and the band's radiant front-man Ed Kowalczky's brave journal (over at Wilber's WWWorld): http://eddiek.injournals.org/

Thank you Wax.
THANK YOU LIVE....
...for gifting my life with the perfect soundtrack for almost every moment (dark or light) of this wild and most extremely precious sacred Ride.

The Two Russian Food Groups

2005-01-23T12:14:00.000+02:00

The Two Russian Food Groups
Originally uploaded by Anantya.

"I love this country... its the PEOPLE who drive me nuts!"
-Lenin

"I love Lenin... its what they did with his ideals that have driven them nuts!"
-D Michlin S.

"Most people are below average"
-M. Michlin

Easy

2005-01-23T11:57:00.000+02:00

Easy
Originally uploaded by Anantya.

*gets tired of howling at the moon,...praying to the wind,....waiting for the UN to get its shit together...*

Stands up on the sofa and shouts: "That's IT!. I've fuck'n HAD it!!". "I hereby COMMAND all of human existance to STOP generating unnecessary suffering for each other and the planet!".

"Let them eat TOFU!".

Sits back down.

*readjusts his footy-pajamas and tophat....exhales a biiiiig sigh.....mumbles self-satisfied to himself "There, that ought to do it."*

One!

2005-01-22T14:37:00.000+02:00

Comuning
Originally uploaded by Anantya.

My senses discovered the infinite in everything one foggy autumn evening in rural Minnesota over a quarter century ago, and then among the Banyan monkied coastline forest of timeless Goa, and sometime later still in Hawaii, as the lustral beams of moonlight danced over the steep cliffs of Hale Akua; then later still, spirited away at the feet of most loving brave company, to the soothing melody of Saleem's giggling icaro, and the dry rustling rhythm of Bolinus' endless breeze.

For I, like so many and yet far too few, have been privileged to be initiated into the sacred realm of the entheogens, sacramental plant teachers of countless generations of the family of humankind; have been vouchsafed a fleeting glimpse behind Our Lady Gaia's veil; have imbibed the amrta of Indra, the ambrosia of the Olympian gods, Demeter's potion; have for brief blessed instants gazed into Lord Shiva's blazing third eye.

Having been graced by these and other holy visions, my life has been transformed and enriched beyond measure.... I have become an initiate to the sacred Mysteries of antiquity, what the Greeks called an epoptes, one who has seen the holy.

As unworthy as any for such an avalanche of Grace,... as unprepared as most to behold, in breathless awe, beauty of such an extreme nature at once almost as alien as it is anciently familiar. Brought down to the very knees of being even as exhaulted in the fathomless bliss of celestial return.

Washed up now (and always happily again and again), like only so much grateful cosmic floatsam, I come running into the clearing where you stand....come rushing up to you desparate to share it all in an instant, pointing wildly back towards the shaman's secret valley and stammering to you with mad pleading eyes wet with the mischevious urgency of ultimate import,....clutching at your cloak, panting... "something!"....."SOMEthing!!"....."SOMETHING!!!!"

Two....

2005-01-22T14:18:00.000+02:00

Finding
Originally uploaded by Anantya.

Three....

2005-01-22T14:17:00.000+02:00

Longing
Originally uploaded by Anantya.

The Vision Splended

2005-01-22T14:16:00.000+02:00

The Vision Splended
Originally uploaded by Anantya.

The prophets Isaiah and Ezekiel dined with me,
and I asked them how they dared so roundly to
assert that God spoke to them; and whether they
did not think at the time that they would be mis-
understood, & so be the cause of imposition.

Isaiah answer'd: "I saw no God, nor heard any, in a
finite organical perception; but my senses discover'd
the infinite in everything..."

William Blake
The Marriage of Heaven and Hell (1793)

STEAL THIS QUOTE!

2005-01-14T16:42:00.000+02:00

Sri Chomsky
Originally uploaded by Anantya.

http://www.chomsky.info/

Noam Chomsky Quotes
All over the place, from the popular culture to the propaganda system, there is constant pressure to make people feel that they are helpless, that the only role they can have is to ratify decisions and to consume.
Noam Chomsky

American society is now remarkably atomized. Political organizations have collapsed. In fact, it seems like even bowling leagues are collapsing. The left has a lot to answer for here. There's been a drift toward very fragmenting tendencies among left groups, toward this sort of identity politics.
Noam Chomsky

Any dictator would admire the uniformity and obedience of the U.S. media.
Noam Chomsky

As soon as questions of will or decision or reason or choice of action arise, human science is at a loss.
Noam Chomsky

Censorship is never over for those who have experienced it. It is a brand on the imagination that affects the individual who has suffered it, forever.
Noam Chomsky

Colorless green ideas sleep furiously.
Noam Chomsky

Education must provide the opportunities for self-fulfillment; it can at best provide a rich and challenging environment for the individual to explore, in his own way.
Noam Chomsky

Either you repeat the same conventional doctrines everybody is saying, or else you say something true, and it will sound like it's from Neptune.
Noam Chomsky

I have often thought that if a rational Fascist dictatorship were to exist, then it would choose the American system.
Noam Chomsky

If the Nuremberg laws were applied, then every post-war American president would have been hanged.
Noam Chomsky

If we choose, we can live in a world of comforting illusion.
Noam Chomsky

If we don't believe in freedom of expression for people we despise, we don't believe in it at all.
Noam Chomsky

In this possibly terminal phase of human existence, democracy and freedom are more than just ideals to be valued - they may be essential to survival.
Noam Chomsky

Language is a process of free creation; its laws and principles are fixed, but the manner in which the principles of generation are used is free and infinitely varied. Even the interpretation and use of words involves a process of free creation.
Noam Chomsky

Personally, I'm in favor of democracy, which means that the central institutions of society have to be under popular control. Now, under capitalism, we can't have democracy by definition. Capitalism is a system in which the central institutions of society are in principle under autocratic control.
Noam Chomsky

Predatory capitalism created a complex industrial system and an advanced technology; it permitted a considerable extension of democratic practice and fostered certain liberal values, but within limits that are now being pressed and must be overcome. It is not a fit system for the mid-twentieth century.
Noam Chomsky

Propaganda is to a democracy what the bludgeon is to a totalitarian state.
Noam Chomsky

Resistance is feasible even for those who are not heroes by nature, and it is an obligation, I believe, for those who fear the consequences and detest the reality of the attempt to impose American hegemony.
Noam Chomsky

Sports plays a societal role in engendering jingoist and chauvinist attitudes. They're designed to organize a community to be committed to their gladiators.
Noam Chomsky

States are not moral agents, people are, and can impose moral standards on powerful institutions."
Noam Chomsky

The Bible is one of the most genocidal books in history.
Noam Chomsky

The intellectual tradition is one of servility to power, and if I didn't betray it I'd be ashamed of myself.
Noam Chomsky

The more you can increase fear of drugs and crime, welfare mothers, immigrants and aliens, the more you control all the people.
Noam Chomsky

The only justification for repressive institutions is material and cultural deficit. But such institutions, at certain stages of history, perpetuate and produce such a deficit, and even threaten human survival.
Noam Chomsky

The principle that human nature, in its psychological aspects, is nothing more than a product of history and given social relations removes all barriers to coercion and manipulation by the powerful.
Noam Chomsky

The United States is unusual among the industrial democracies in the rigidity of the system of ideological control - "indoctrination," we might say - exercised through the mass media.
Noam Chomsky

There is no reason to accept the doctrines crafted to sustain power and privilege, or to believe that we are constrained by mysterious and unknown social laws. These are simply decisions made within institutions that are subject to human will and that must face the test of legitimacy. And if they do not meet the test, they can be replaced by other institutions that are more free and more just, as has happened often in the past.
Noam Chomsky

Three quarters of the American population literally believe in religious miracles. The numbers who believe in the devil, in resurrection, in God doing this and that - it's astonishing. These numbers aren't duplicated anywhere else in the industrial world. You'd have to maybe go to mosques in Iran or do a poll among old ladies in Sicily to get numbers like this. Yet this is the American population.
Noam Chomsky

Unlimited economic growth has the marvelous quality of stilling discontent while maintaining privilege, a fact that has not gone unnoticed among liberal economists.
Noam Chomsky

We can, for example, be fairly confident that either there will be a world without war or there won't be a world - at least, a world inhabited by creatures other than bacteria and beetles, with some scattering of others.
Noam Chomsky

Greatful She-va

2005-01-13T22:43:00.000+02:00

Greatful Shiva
Originally uploaded by Anantya.

Dasha and i were going through a tough time over the past several weeks....not something easy to put our fingers on exactly. In the general irritability that was shadowing us I have been very "short" (too quick to react with critical energy)or somehow just standing in some unrelenting demand for her to be more conscious, more vigilant and she has been unusually "peculiar" (too quick to jump to emotional/hysterical reaction)or kind of sleepily at the wheel of her own conscious presence.

Well the tapas (heat) of compassionately mining the core of our breakdowns for which way t-h-r-o-u-g-h drove me back into some great classical transcendental wisdom (so dear to my own awakening and personal history). What a blessing to feel which lineages of wisdom really "work" for you, no? These teaching/teachers/transmissions just ZAPPED me with clarity, bliss, insight, gratitude, etc....like really a "low level re-formating" for the ego and shot in the arm for the spiritual heart.

Love Wins!
(...again)
;)

http://www.ramana-maharshi.org/
http://www.poonja.com/
http://www.gangaji.org

Ego-I

2005-01-07T16:37:00.000+02:00

Ego-I
Originally uploaded by Anantya.

Only A Fool Will Fail To Cultivate The Relationship To The Beloved. Likewise, Only A Fool Will Fail To Cultivate The human Well-being and The Spiritual, Transcendental, and Divine Realization Of his or her any partner in intimate embrace. And This Is Also True: The ego (or the self-Contracted individual) Is Just Such A Fool!

The emotional-sexual ego Constantly Hunts For an other. The ego-"I" (or self-Contraction) Hunts (or Seeks) an other (Even all others and The Total Objective Cosmos) In Order To Be Gratified, Consoled, and Protected. The Compulsive Hunting (or Search) For an other Is Generated By The Feelings Of Un-Happiness, Emptiness, and Separateness That Possess and Characterize the self-Contracted being.

Once an other Is Found, the ego-"I" Clings To the other, At First pleasurably, and Then Aggressively. The ego-"I" Depends On the other For Happiness, and, Over time, the ego-"I" Makes Greater and Greater Demands On the other For Fulfillment Of itself (In all of its desires). Often, In time, the other Becomes Depressed and Exhausted By This Demand (and Thus Leaves, or Dies). Just As Likely, the ego-"I" Discovers, Over time, That the other Cannot or Will Not Satisfy The Absolute Demand For attention and Consolation. In That Case, the ego-"I" Feels Betrayed, and the ego-"I" Begins The Strategy Of Punishing, Rejecting, and Abandoning the other,

Every conditionally Manifested being Has (In time) Often Been The Proposed Victim Of This Strategy Of Separate and Separative selves. Even More, Until The Heart Gives Way To Divine Love-Bliss, every conditionally living being Is The Original Genius and Grand Performer Of This Strategy Of Separate and Separative selves. It Is The Strategy Of Narcissus, and It Is The Dreadful Work Of all conditionally living beings who Are Not Awake To The Truth Beyond the ego-"I".

-Adi Da Samraj

Ahhhh.....

2004-12-24T03:28:00.000+02:00

Ahhhh.....
Originally uploaded by Anantya.

Uh-o,
....Here comes trouble!

(%=>))

One man's savior.....

2004-12-16T21:52:00.000+02:00

Guardian
Originally uploaded by Anantya.

Having forgotten you've drifted off....falling into the mindless bliss of an afternoon's nap, your heart gives wing to nostalgia's eager flight...mmmmmm.....and so, you've drifted off.

Its this place again. This place, each to her own, we all go behind the scenes, beyond the mummery of all pretensions, free of the illusion of relatedness and the presumption of firmiliarity.

You come, by and by, to your own self... or is it? You there, in a form far more intimate that any mirror ever go-betweened.

Shy in the extreme and pregnant with unspeakable devotion you look down as you lovingly gaze up. Beaming self onto flowering self, one. One of you starts softly admitting now, a mother's milk of tender murmur, the kind of confession a secret tear could only make to an old Mt. Tam conifer, ...you softly confide, 'We have no idea who we are do we?, ...where we are or...or what, in God's name, is really going on here. Do we?'

And though knowing it makes no difference at all, even as it changes everything in an instant, all is suddenly unmasked:

One man's savior, another's cartoon.

Once man's search, another man's suffering

The ego-"I" IS the illusion of relatedness. And every aparent "you" just another teddybear of a wayside rest on the souls' endless exodus Home.

Hugged and abandoned, embraced and surrendered, we drift. Then that island, now this sandbar, tomorrow a bit of melting shoreline. All as already gone. We who worship this river, the flow of our sacrifice, the current of our love of this way. We of neon blood and amber ash, who dare this ecstatic mad Yoga of the Openhanded YES,...this love of the Two-Armed Form,

...for us the burning is slow becoming done and we, then steeped in Her darkness, now know Her fire only as d' light!

"MMMmmm...." you sigh, saying thanks with both breath and ripening tremble.

And She's crying in love with both you and you as she enfolds the dream's deeper gift again. The patron saint of both sigh and belly-laugh: a grey fluffy, blue-bibbed embrace of a remembra-murti. An "ah ha!" that has you getting down to getting that........

That you had been drifted
...in a deeper land.

Treasured One

2004-12-09T03:23:00.000+02:00

Treasured One
Originally uploaded by Anantya.

To us:

We are old friends, little one.
I've got my half of our story ready but you'll have to learn a thing or two here before you can tell me yours.

Some friends are more than just uncles.
Some uncles are more than just (proud) friends
.....of nieces who snuck more than the "official carry-on limit" of stars with them, in here, in their fresh, knowing, devoted eyes.

You and I look into each other's hearts when we talk....giggle and tease. I know you already deserve (from me) more devotion then i reveal and I already receive (from you) more forgiveness than it may seem i deserve.

"Oh when is your birthday again, angel?"
"Oh nevermind, i'm just so glad you are here with me now".

Only a plastic fool would sob less at the grace of being so adored.

We trust each other's hands when we climb.

And we'll all have to trust both your mother's loving work and your father's working love
...until they fly you to me whenever they finally say...

Yes.,

To us.

Om Mani DassanAnanda Ma!

2004-12-07T19:57:00.000+02:00

Ð»Ð°Ð¼Ð¿Ð° Ð³Ð¾Ñ‚Ð¾Ð²Ð° ÑƒÑ€Ð°
Originally uploaded by Anantya.

"Its one thing to hide from your own shadow but entirely another to celebrate your own by delighting in that of an other. The former is the order of the day, the latter an entirely different Way."

-Author Unknown

(to some)

ug-ji

2004-12-07T19:03:00.000+02:00

ug-ji
Originally uploaded by Anantya.

"Are there any boots to walk on thorns?"
His reply came back crisp and direct, "There are no thorns."
Unsatisfied, I pursued, "The thorns are very much there for me!"
With quiet patience he answered, "Stop looking for roses and there will be no thorns."

NOW THAT WAS REALLY SOMETHING!

New Agers and Seminar Samadhists: BEWARE :-)P

Tru Friends

2004-12-01T14:47:00.000+02:00

Tru Friends
Originally uploaded by Anantya.

If its true for you to that we need to "make friends" with our enemies or challenges in life as much as we value our easy relations...., that we must learn to love and make good use of our break-downs to get to the break-throughs we have been longing for, then it is also true that there is an entirely different category of connections too.

You know what I mean: there are these rare friends who are, in there merely simple and loving presence, such a gift of goodness, clarity, humor...etc. that you feel surly the word "angel" has now found a more personal meaning for you.

I have been blessed with the appearance of many such brothers over the course of this Earthly round. Today my men's tribe is where I'm drawing a lot of strength and for whom I'm feeling so much gratitude... saleem, aaron, nashon, lee, pat, michael, cas, ryan, henk....(and the list of sisters is even longer).

Stranger still is how, no matter how (or how much) we feel we fall short of the goodness we would like to more fully embody and be for all others, we are, foibles included, sometimes blessed to be just such "angles" (or True Friends, as I prefer) for others. What a gift when we are allowed the blessing of just no reactivity with another....when we feel so easy and accepting of them and in our peace, silence, loving of them they feel so much relaxation and permission to .....well, to simply be.

Can this be cultivated? Can this be an ideal towards which all relations can evolve?

Let it be so.

All gratitude and celebration of all of our true friends!

Lalaleeleela at 13!

2004-12-01T03:35:00.000+02:00

Laleeat13
Originally uploaded by Anantya.

Long may you run old girl!

A poem for one of the sweetest dogs i have ever known:

*****************************************

TREAT ME KINDLY
Treat me kindly, my beloved friend,
For no heart in all the world is more
rateful for kindness than the loving
heart of me.

Do not break my spirit with a stick,
For though I should lick your hand
between blows, your patience and
understanding will more quickly
teach me the things you would
have me learn.

Speak to me often, For your voice is
the world's sweetest music, as you must
know by the fierce wagging of my tail
when your footsteps fall upon my ears.

Please take me inside when it is cold
and wet, For I am a domesticated
animal, no longer accustomed to the
bitter elements. I ask no greater glory
than the privilege of sitting at your
feet beside the hearth.

Keep my pan filled with water, for I
cannot tell you when I suffer thirst.
Feed me clean food that I may stay well,
to romp and play and do your bidding,
to walk by your side, and stand ready,
willing and able to protect you with
my life, should your life be in danger.

And, my friend, when I am very old, and
I no longer enjoy good health, hearing
and good sight, do not make heroic
efforts to keep me going.

I am not having fun. Please see that my
trusting life is taken gently. I shall
leave this earth knowing with the last
breath I drew, that my fate was always
safest in your hand.

--- By Beth Norman Harris 1968 ---

Blame Bliss

2004-11-26T14:25:00.000+02:00

Theologues At the Edge
Originally uploaded by Anantya.

And there it was.

In an instant.

Like a 10,000 watt satori -SMACK- upside the wandering mind!

Crystal clear knowing, an oasis to the thirsty heart: The One is at play as "the many". The Many, no less deserving of honorific caps, are nothing but the One. Any problem I, or anyone, may be having with any part of this thruth is simply the dramatic tension of this Divine 'Leela' (Sanskrit for cosmic play) by design. Blame God for The All. Blame Bliss for the madness of The Many.

***explanation warning: Attempts to transduce/translate moments of deep and highly personal insight are almost always doomed. Attempting this anyway is simply a matter a kind-spirited goodwill, if not some invitation to some strange kind of brain-sport. Unless that kind of thing feels fun for you, don't bother reading on! ***

Obviously not the first time I have attempted to digest the welcome intrusion of this brand of insight, but this time it rang my bell with much more illuminating detail (same bamboo stick, harder -WACK-?). This time it struck me with much more applicability to the specific ways in which I tend to slip into struggle-mind, resistance and despair. It penetrated to the core of my reactions to so-called "modern" life and the nightmare of current affairs. It attacked the double-bind my idealism knots me up into, namely the persistence of seemingly unnecessary suffering in light of the longing (need) for peace, harmony, utopian co-existence, etc.

*** author's sidebar: Damn! This starts getting too didactic, too wordy, contrived, and defended. It was simply so: a gift of insight that reverberated in the body as real relief, a let-go at the knot in the solar-plexus, a resurgence of warm enlivening 'YES'-energy at the heart. Do I betray the purity and power of this wisdom-gift by trying to share it by efforting to successfully language it for you? Yet, if we don't try to share our deepest insights, where do we then meet each other? In silence sure, but that's a lonely place that so few of us know the pleasures of. We starve, trolling on the safe, dead surfaces of each other's confusing self-presentation, but we struggle too to really "get" the gist of each other at depth.***

The (or, really, any) "problem" is not with The One but rather with being awash in/as any one thing, part or portion of its many fractured subsets out here in planetary cosmic space. The "Many" then are merely the dynamic tension, or "play", of those portions (people, places, substances, energies, etc.) of The One still momentum-ed towards greater separation (all adventure or drama made possible by the separate-self-sense identity), polarized against (like the electric passion of love or the terrified nausea of war) or in dynamic cosmic dance with the other portions of The One which, having exhausted their karmic momentum and divisive trajectory, now having rounded the apex of Great Return and helplessly enduring the egoic vertigo (and sacrificial freefall) back into the ecstatic oneness with The One.

What of this bliss then? Well, all actions or the impulse towards (experience of, or union with) any object, experience or other is, regardless of its perceived or labeled "goodness" or "evil" within the subjective theater of conditional (human) existence and judgment, is none other than the expression of union-gravity (or the very real physics, or motion, of all merely temporary or separate "smithereened" selves or somethings towards RE-union with their source). All desire (no matter how lofty or craven) is ultimately, seen in this light, nothing but the desire for experience of and absorption back into bliss (or the state of non-separateness, release, peace, dissolution), regardless of the specific strategies or styles of hopeful any separate-self may exploit dramatizing the hypnotic logic of its own doomed seeking.

The knowing of this all necessitates no change, makes no difference (as the Play, or Leela, is, in all of its both gorgeous and horrific scenery, as perfect as The One who is forever at Play AS it all). Afterall, for the One, AS THE Very One, there is no "problem" (or other) even while for the One, as the unilluminated shards of now separate-selves hurdling their helpless way through the karma's house-of-mirrors, there is only problem(s) (or the seeking for Bliss, relief, union wherein only the bitter and aggravated frustration of empty reflections can be found).

Intimacy with, or submission to, the Mystery is not some 'better' or superior vantage point from which to solve or resolve anything about the Mystery. For true mysteries, especially the Very Wonder of Being Itself, are not problems to be solved but experiences to be lived, right? No? Tell me then, which is the 'better' place from which to experience a rollercoaster: a bench on the ground below it or the padded and sweat-soaked seat upon it? Just depends on which Divine momentum is driving your becoming in any one moment: out and into the adventure of being some "i" some"where", or the pull of the return Home back to One.

"So what?", you ask?
(a fair question, for sure)

"Blame Bliss" was/is for me like a special cosmic skeleton key for decoding the otherwise indecipherable motives for what appears here as so much unnecessary destructiveness, disease and suffering. What this insight makes available for me is the remembrance and understanding that EVERYthing here is always ALREADY only a temporary and unnecessary reflection of the One by who's crazy grace (or merciless adventure lust) all beings and experience are given to arise, persist for a time and then disappear back into. Any resistance, revulsion, rage or heartbreak I may feel about this Leela is at the same time both perfectly justified and yet paradoxically unnecessary. Remembering and enjoying this knowing then is, for me anyway, a profoundly liberating, relaxing and sane-making insight.

The real human value of this re-cognition, this simple truth around which all my mad rambling here so earnestly chases its own tail, is in how this understanding can (DOES, for me) utterly reframe or even physiologically return (or forward-escape) one into the bliss of peaceful submission as, gratitude for, and humorous devotion to the wherever/however/whoever one seems to be appearing as now, and now.........................and now.

***Whew! Sure, hope I wont feel the need to do THAT again soon ;)) ***

Grace

2004-11-07T01:30:00.000+02:00

Grace
Originally uploaded by Anantya.

Every fiber of my being aches to reach you, wherever you are now, with this ecstatic teary overwhelm that is my gratitude for you dear grandma.

You have been so many things to me...teacher, nurturer, confidant, play pal, guide, inspiration,.... and proof. You are the proof that life is best lived as service to others and love of God.

You are one of the most selfless humans I have ever known.

Even in your last hours you hung on till we could all come and laugh and cry and wonder with you at the Mystery of it all. Only you and your deeply peaceful fulfilled life could empower us to do the impossible,....to let you go.

For me you are forever and everywhere alive, now as Love Itself. Knowing that the very blood flowing in my veins is also yours calls me beyond all self-doubt to walk towards the bright new day and life your passing this morning ushered in for us all.

I can't be consoled. I'm going to miss you forever.
Thank you for this hole in my heart and life through which the One we both worship just keeps pouring on in.

Grandma, I love you so.

Divine Recluse

2004-10-29T21:10:00.000+03:00

Divine Recluse
Originally uploaded by Anantya.

I have this friend, Barth, back in my home state of MN. This dude's just got to be one of the sweetest guys i have ever had the pleasure of hanging out with. We go pretty far back too.

We studied German together at the U of M one summer session and Barth took me up on my invite to come crash-in when i had gotten my new scene set-up in the Black Forest of southern Germany.

We'd go sometimes over a year without even a word and then connect and discover that we'd both been living just an island away in Hawaii. Just strange stuff like that. No matter the time that had lapsed since our last time hanging-out we'd connect like neighbors,....no, brothers!

He has an awesome head on his shoulders and blows my mind with each new landscaping adventure he hungrily dives into each new summer.

My friend found himself a wonderful partner and they just had a kid.....wow. What an adventure.

Don't know when I'll get back home again but I sure look forward, after spending time with family, to giving my "old" buddy a call, hearing "Daaaaave,...wow, man....c'mon over!", and taking our time swapping stories and catching up.

Here's to you brother!

Awaken Little Sister.....please!

2004-10-29T11:22:00.000+03:00

Only India
Originally uploaded by Anantya.

The simple pleasures...
What else is there really?

We all know that life can be, at its core, so so simple.

How is it then that we allow it to become so overwhelming, stressful, unintellegable,...no, worse yet, to even mistrust it (Life or Nature) as being unnatural, unhealthy, alien and all too often predictably dangerous? How to return or forward-escape into harmony with each other and this precious Earth again or anew? Can you see a really positive future and if so a clear way to get there for all 6+ billion of us?

Sure, there are many ways to approach thinking about and trying to transform a cycle of disfunction (like our relations to each other as world citizens) or dystopian break-down (like our relationship as humanity to the Earth we depend upon) into a break-through or postive evolutionary bottleneck successfully navigated.

Here's one of the ideas closest to my, not wholy rational, hope for twarting the impending and tragically unnecessary negitive future who's ominous shadow, cast backwards in time, has been progressively darkening the social, economic, ecological and political landscape and discourse for decades now. One of the very few vectors for transformational genisis to manifest, a point of sufficient and causative potential to redeeme this fall into profane history, to transform this nightmare of modernity into merely a stressful and strange evolutionary passage, is the awakening, empowering and (re)emergence of the feminine in all people and every aspect of human life.

For both the journey and the "destination" (my vision is very utopian,....yours?) of mankind to be a postive experience for all, as the most brilliant, inspired and far-seeing among us have always intuited and communicated it can be, women specifically, as the first wave or "point of power" in an evolution-revolution, which ultimately will touch and transform all people regardless of gender or any other difference, must re-awaken to much, now lacking, power and wisdom (most often unique or uniquely accessable to their gender). They must identify their power as a collective "group" to organize their transformational force and notice that, as a collective, they need not wait or ask permission any more of any of the crumbling artifices of the soon-to-be late patriarchy. Every aspect of suffereing humanity begs the rebalancing geniuses and empowering effect of the feminine returning to the politics of partnering, child bearing, conscious parenting, right livelihood, community building, world ecology and economics....etc.

The "men" or the power that we attribute to the last many thousand years of principally male powers (scientific materialism, reductionist thought, dominator ecology policy, win-loose economic strategy, etc.) holding sway, has had its time. Its gifts, and many there are, are as obvious but not outweighed by its auto-toxic effects in absence of a balancing force of the feminine.

This is the conversation that can bring me to the edge of my seat nowadays. Where is the dialogue (the call for the re-emergence of Yin in this Yang-run-wild world) most active? Dasha and I spent an interesting drive with 2 Polish film makers talking about just this theme the other day. We were on a journey to the Czech boarder so I could walk out and back into Poland with renewed permission to stay for 3 months (again a brilliant example of uniquely male, left(hair!)-brained thinking at its best). I asked these media professionals: "Where are the Utpoian films?", "...furthermore, where are the films where women/the feminine rise up and make a massive difference, reversing, with bravest manifestation of non-violent of absolutely unstoppable autonomous power, the negitive plot-line of the 20th century?"

This all led to a very spirited conversation about the distinct absence of these kinds of films and they were asking why I thought this was such a frightening fact and I tried to explain to them that I don't believe that we can live into (or create) any reality we are not capable of envisioning. So, if the artists (especially in the more popular visionary mediums of fiction film and documentary) are not bearing witness to the vision or longing or even possibility of bright futures, then how likely is it that the, most often much more asleep, masses of humanity are going to be feeling the hope or power to move in such a positive direction?

Your thoughts?

PS: ???(!)

Alone

2004-10-25T12:18:00.000+03:00

UNtitled
Originally uploaded by Anantya.

Alone we enter and alone we leave.
What to do in-between is the big question.

If you follow rules and the definitions of others you are promised more predictability, more safety, more company, more congratulations, more approval..... than if you choose to strike out on your own.

The choice to sacrifice the "guarantees" and applause of your country, your culture, your family, your marriage, your gender.... for the ups and downs, the glories and risks of writing your own script, is not a small one. You make the "other choice" and you do it alone.

My life is still, like most, a real "work/play in progress". The number of "mistaken" choices and "wrong turns", while far too plentiful for the average person to suffer or be held responsible for, is far outweighed by both uncountable glorious peak moments (inner and outer, personal and relational) and the overall sense that I'd rather "fail" going along my own way than "succeed" going alone theirs.

My prayer and intentions are very clear: peace and love and freedom and wellness and joy and humor and entirely positive co-evolution from here to .....well, yes, to eternity. This is just me and the tune that my strange wandering jig dances to.

And then there's the daily living of the journey from here to there....or the exploration of the ever unfolding herenow which floats, in my case, half upon the let-go and silence of a zenlike acceptance of however this moment arises and the other half upon and heart-filled river of warm hope, constantly flowing and following the gravity towards Home.

....or something like that.

And you?

Ah the French LOVE Americans!

2004-10-23T21:12:00.000+03:00

Ah the French LOVE Americans!
Originally uploaded by Anantya.

Viva la contrast!

My French brother Emmanuel just found the paradoxical nature of American life really amazing. During the same week that g-bush was killing innocent Iraqis in the name of ....well, you know.....Emm and I were lazily exploring the wonders of beautiful (zany) northern California.

This shot is just classic: the Americans loved Emm....but the chicks were just animals with him!

;)

Gotta Do IT!

2004-10-22T08:16:00.000+03:00

Gotta Do IT!
Originally uploaded by Anantya.

PS: You KNOW she's a Kerry-Girl!

BurningBush

2004-10-20T18:32:00.000+03:00

BurningBush
Originally uploaded by Anantya.

Look george,
WE THE PEOPLE you are taxing, jailing, lying to and killing in your war are the same people you depend on...

- We cook your meals.

- We haul your trash.

- We suffer your smirk.

- We connect your calls.

- We drive your ambulances.

...WE guard you while you sleep.

Do not fuck with us.

***I am David's nearing breaking point***
((thanks Tyler for this righteous crib))

sunsetcloud

2004-10-20T16:29:00.000+03:00

sunsetcloud
Originally uploaded by Anantya.

* * *
Sun left her signature
Under my bed
I tried to pick it up
and failed three times
I called out for your help
You came
And lifted
Me
From golden flame
Of sundawn.

8 June 2003

to us

* * *

Magical Martscha

2004-10-20T13:34:00.000+03:00

Magical Martscha
Originally uploaded by Anantya.

GIRL POWER has found their campaign leader for Poland! This amazing sprite of human is a whirlwind of creative energy, curiosity and bravery.

Dasha and I just love being around her....
-watching how she cares for the little "monsters", Natan and Stashik
-taking her up on invites to tour her room and see what new wonders of art or mechanics of redecoration have transformed her roof-side perch.

Martscha dear,
We see how much you miss your dad, how much you love and long to be with him so far away in New York. We see how much your mom struggles to be everything for you without him there. Have faith honey. Forgive all us adults and our half-made world and hurting, searching, wandering..... hearts.

We love and believe and give thanks that you are. We delight in your ever visit and feel a preciousness and shared responsibility for your young happiness that you can not yet know.

Shine on and on and on...

We love you.

Stairway to.......WHERE?

2004-10-19T13:51:00.000+03:00

Stairway to.......WHERE?
Originally uploaded by Anantya.

*swearing to himself that the first lighter waving overhead or shout for "FREEBIRD!" and he's OUTTA here!"

Home away from Om... (a plant rant)

2004-10-15T13:26:00.000+03:00

I live here.
Originally uploaded by Anantya.

I grant no human being the right, power, or authority to determine, define or in anyway control or legislate my relationships to organic nature.

Those who historically and currently presume to (and activly) do so stand in opposition to a most basic human right of yours and mine.

Any opposition to this most basic right is a confession of both catastrophic ignorance and tragic estrangement (from the life-matrix in which all is arising, sustained and in due course sacrificed back into).

Note: those that oppose this basic human rights are, in fact, almost completely male home-sapiens and almost exclusively monotheists who find permission, justification, blessing even, from their, also (surprise, surprise) masculine, so-called "gods" to sublimate, commodify or kill nature, or the feminine, wherever their fear, greed or ignorance so moves. Further, almost all focused support for the negitive codification (or classifying as "illegal") of nature is driven by one of two motives: the motive to profit (i.e. pharmaceutical -vs- "herbal medicine", petrochemical industries -vs- hemp) or the motive to congnitive(mind/emotion) control (i.e. entheogenic plants, fungi, etc. which awaken/deepen perceptual/cognitive capacity, dissolve conceptual/cultural boundaries, etc. -vs- cultural/political/religious/economic propaganda).

This is YOUR life.
This is YOUR earth.
How you explore the mystery of everything "outer" is YOUR sacred exoteric adventure and basic human right.
How you explore the mystery of everything "inner" is YOUR sacred esoteric adventure and basic human right.
As long as you do no harm to others in the adventure of your explorations, both inner and outer, you have the right to do so without question or conflict with the artifice of any other human's judgment, dissension or supposition of superior authority.

The same MEN who divided up your outer world, seek to also divide up your inner world.

If you feel, in ANY WAY, not at home in their "brave new world" return to the magic and wonder of nature and your prior intimacy with Her.

You are not a commodity.
You are not a vote.
You are not a Government ID number.
You are not a tax payer.
You are not a world health statistic.
You are not a TV radiation receptacle.
You are not who your parents defined you as.
You are not who your schools educated you to be.

You are part of a great wondrous Mystery which is alive, bright, mult-dimentional, evolving, passionate, creative, free, .....and in every way alive....in every way calling you home.

May you, exactly YOU personally, for all of our sake, be deeply merged with and empowered by the organic Earth matrix by Who's Grace our very life, this very moment and your ever brighter next possible insight, opening, awakening is given to be.

The Vaults of Erowid (and She) await you

Imagine...

2004-10-15T12:42:00.000+03:00

Imagine...
Originally uploaded by Anantya.

...Imagine there's no countries,
It isnt hard to do,
Nothing to kill or die for,
No religion too,
Imagine all the people
living life in peace...

Every (good) Thief...

2004-10-14T13:55:00.000+03:00

Tribute to Amilie (and Grandma N!)
Originally uploaded by Anantya.

...Wishes to be Caught!

Ok, so its not MY idea (thanks Amelia!) but it sure has been fun... This little guy, once successfully kidnapped from my Grandma's garden last year, has been a blast to tote around this crazy big world. Though not always been easy to keep him on his "M' Saltines-n-Guinness diet" (like the nutty Koalas and their fussy insistence on Eucalyptus leaves (and Twinkies)), this wayward gnome of hers makes the most surreal of travelogue models, a perfect accent to any photo that would otherwise be just too cliche' (Eiffel Tower, Big Ben, Kremlin, Nameste'ing Ronald at Bangkok McDonalds....and other such destination standbys).

One day one of my family will actually visit this nutty photo-driven digital rant of mine and, I am hoping, tell my beloved Grandma about this silly testament of my devotion to her smiles, our joy in making her giggle.

The Catholic Left

2004-10-13T01:34:00.000+03:00

The Catholic Left
Originally uploaded by Anantya.

Wandering this picturesque town in northern Poland my buddy Claudios a couple of weeks ago now. We passed a beautiful old mill and stream running through a part of the "old town" and he let me into the "meeting hall" that had been one of the epicenters of the Solidarity movement... a place where L. Walesa he often spoke.....a meetings that eventually tipped the scales of political power and collective will, changes that eventually became the fall of the Berlin wall and eastern European "comunism".

Never had seen or felt such a mix of church and grass-roots politics....a Catholic church no less.

Well, as they say, even a broken clock is right 2x/day.

OxanAnanda Luv

2004-10-10T14:18:00.000+03:00

OxanAnanda Luv
Originally uploaded by Anantya.

Sometimes just to watch is magic enough.

Two great old friends enjoying a sweet reunion.

Our sister Oxana....
still dancing her way
to Ukrainian vibe
home away from hom

And still our invitation
for her to run away
come and play
will have to wait....

for now.

My Personal Hero

2004-10-10T10:57:00.000+03:00

My Personal Hero
Originally uploaded by Anantya.

Since I have never been any good at doing anything "their" way (yes, my folks really tried,...just ask them...lol) I have had to haunt the alternative archives of all human possibility, run the stranger edges of secret society's after-party confessions to find some shining few I could, given the apparent unavoidability of this strange trajectory called "my way", look up to. And well, .....um,...... here he is!

You don't laugh at my Deity Of Choice (that's PC for "my own personal jesus") and i won't laugh at yours, ok?

;))

Black Forrest - White Light - Green Redemption

2004-10-07T21:53:00.000+03:00

Marble and Magic
Originally uploaded by Anantya.

My brothers' work
deep as their stone is hard
...brilliance in what is hit
...magic in what is left

My brothers' play
deep as their grass is high
...flowering beyond all permission
...fragrantly framing marble's hiden bust

My brothers are
deep as their hearts are wide
....feeling me now remembering them
....longing for home and wondering when

Passage

2004-10-05T20:52:00.000+03:00

Passage
Originally uploaded by Anantya.

Often the places inbetween are the vaule of the journey, no?

Been here?

Then you know what I mean.

Young Republicans Speak Out

2004-10-05T16:22:00.000+03:00

Ah These New Democrats
Originally uploaded by Anantya.

I sent a right-wing leaning friend of mine an article questioning whether g.bush's emotional "health" (lack of empathy, appropriate remorse, sincerity, humility... etc.) and he barked back a terse and biting rebuff about preferring someone who can "think" to someone who can "feel" when it comes to the leader of his country.

His "either or" viewpoint reminds me of another propaganda ("clear") channel that claims to be "Fair and Balanced" but,....dont make me go THERE pleeeease!

(whew!)

Hmm....Anyway, with over 130 million adult americans potentially available for consideration for the office of President would it be too much to ask for the candidates to be required to posses both the HIGHEST levels of academic qualification AND if not the same degree of proven emotional well-being at least not be taking psychotropic pharmaceuticals for emotional imbalance?

AAAAAAAAaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaargh!

PS: ...couldn't help myself

The Gangz All Here

2004-09-30T00:41:00.000+03:00

The Gangz All Here
Originally uploaded by Anantya.

Images in the collective becoming art in the eye as you wander a far away city...bringing them back in memory to your every next experience of their unique expression.

Fabric of art, light, sound...mystery onto mystery.

Grafiti on the walls of alone's journey to the alone.

Kick'n back...

2004-09-29T22:03:00.000+03:00

Kick'n back
Originally uploaded by Anantya.

Wandered off (again).
Lost our way (thank god).
Found a place to just lay down (and give up).

Watched summer's heat wave (goodbye).
Clouds did their best fluffy cartoon (tricks).

Fall apples and spring water fed (our smiles).

Sweet smoke (and lazy love) .
Happy grass (and chilly cheeks).

And two curious cows (too shy to join, too entertained to look away) shared a knowing nod ...
...as she turned to me and said "I love our life".

To have and to hold....

2004-09-20T11:15:00.000+03:00

To have and to hold....
Originally uploaded by Anantya.
("mir")
...no not the Russian word for their ancient space-station.
...or the Russian word for Earth.

PEACE,...that's it!

Personal Questions ALERT:
Why is something so obvious so illusive?
What wouldN'T you give in exchange for a world of it?
How can you hope for it if you can't imagine what it would look and feel like?
How is the amount of it in the world OUTside you right now like the quality of it INside your own human head and heart?

Preaching ALERT:
Seek it and you will NOT find it. Peace is Always Already the case, before any of the (mis)adventures of apparent loss and the stressful (doomed) strategies for seeking its discovery-recovery. Peace simply awaits your return,..calls you from behind every breakdown of egoic will, every unearned kindness, every close-call with any kind of death. Just waiting for you to ripen and fall (in)...and REmember, REcognize and RElax the REsistance.

Poetry ALERT:
"I have lived on the lip of insanity, wanting to know reasons [where is this Peace?, when will it come?, how will men change?], knocking on a door. It opens. I've been knocking from the inside!"
-The Essential Rumi
- the "[ ]"s are mine.

Aquarium Life!

2004-09-20T10:38:00.000+03:00

Aquarium Life!
Originally uploaded by Anantya.

She stares at us just as we at her....feeding us with delight at her wet flutter dance-life just as we her with these stinky flakes of fish food.

"Don't know who it was who discovered water, but it certainly wasn't a fish"
-M. Mcluhan

........

...dunno, maybe Ryan understands this more. To me it is all just more of the magical same (Mystery).

My She Dreams...

2004-09-20T10:08:00.000+03:00

My She Dreams...
Originally uploaded by Anantya.

True Love Test #422: You KNOW she's going to kill you for doing it but you've shut off the alarm clock (again) and now lay back down next to her and smile in wonder...

How can i love her more?
What can she really know of the preciousness, the treasure she is to me?
To worship her joy, serve her smiles with open hands, wings with no cage, no ringing here but the song of Love's own call.

To be awake enough herenow to celebrate this spiritual companionship so...even in this half-made, wonderous, terrible world where the Heart has yet to win,.... is to be born again as Mystery Itself.

...(tears).
.........((again)).

No, ....i'll definitely have to wake her.
Soon.

But not just yet.