March 02, 2010
February 23, 2010
Aging and Follies
With my 30th birthday less than 10 days away I am primed for intro and
retrospection. Anyway, I thought I would share my journal entry from
today. Please excuse the style it’s not a blog entry, it’s a journal
entry. Therefore it reflects the way I think more than the way I intend
to write :)
I am taking a developmental psych class. I just read 2 chapters on late adulthood. It sparked my mind. When I look back on the last 10 years of my life I lament my own foolishness and the cost of my poor decisions. I feel I wasted time. Of course the time will only be truly wasted if I do not learn from my mistakes. Who has not wondered “If I only knew then, what I know now…” To hope to embody the wisdom gained over time without experiencing the cost of the lessons may be itself a form of folly and an expression naivety. Certainly wondering about how things could be different if I had made different choices has limited utility. That said, I refuse to believe that I am doomed to always regret my focus and choices when looking back at the successive decades of my life. It must be possible to grow in wisdom and perspective at an accelerated rate. The hard way cannot be the only way to learn deep truths.
With that in mind I started to think about how in retrospect the things that seem important are shown, in the light of greater perspective, to be rather foolish and often at a great cost. I can easily list the expected follies of the teen years. As I approach 30 I am becoming more aware of the resident foolishness of the 20s. What is far more difficult is to determine what I am doing now that I will lament later. Or more likely, what I am not doing, how am I seeing life, and what am I focusing on that I will one day wish had been different? Where am I missing the forest for the trees?
In a given culture and time I believe each stage (I use decades) of life contains likely blind spots and opportunities for growth. I do not look forward to looking back every ten years thinking thoughts like, “What was I thinking?” or “I just didn’t know…” or “If only I had known.” I have lived too much life to hope for a future where I would not change any of my decisions, but I am committed to and determined to do everything in my power to learn these lessons ahead of time.
What maxims are apparent to a 55 or 65 year old regarding my stage in life and the next 10 years? I have a 5 year old son. What do most grandparents wish they had done differently when their kids were young? I hope to find love and get married in the next several years. What advice would successful couples married for 50+ years give to me as I pursue this? When I do find my partner, what wisdom could widows and widowers impart to me about how to cherish her while I have her? Will I have the character to go against the grain and implement this wisdom when I receive it?
JDM
I am taking a developmental psych class. I just read 2 chapters on late adulthood. It sparked my mind. When I look back on the last 10 years of my life I lament my own foolishness and the cost of my poor decisions. I feel I wasted time. Of course the time will only be truly wasted if I do not learn from my mistakes. Who has not wondered “If I only knew then, what I know now…” To hope to embody the wisdom gained over time without experiencing the cost of the lessons may be itself a form of folly and an expression naivety. Certainly wondering about how things could be different if I had made different choices has limited utility. That said, I refuse to believe that I am doomed to always regret my focus and choices when looking back at the successive decades of my life. It must be possible to grow in wisdom and perspective at an accelerated rate. The hard way cannot be the only way to learn deep truths.
With that in mind I started to think about how in retrospect the things that seem important are shown, in the light of greater perspective, to be rather foolish and often at a great cost. I can easily list the expected follies of the teen years. As I approach 30 I am becoming more aware of the resident foolishness of the 20s. What is far more difficult is to determine what I am doing now that I will lament later. Or more likely, what I am not doing, how am I seeing life, and what am I focusing on that I will one day wish had been different? Where am I missing the forest for the trees?
In a given culture and time I believe each stage (I use decades) of life contains likely blind spots and opportunities for growth. I do not look forward to looking back every ten years thinking thoughts like, “What was I thinking?” or “I just didn’t know…” or “If only I had known.” I have lived too much life to hope for a future where I would not change any of my decisions, but I am committed to and determined to do everything in my power to learn these lessons ahead of time.
What maxims are apparent to a 55 or 65 year old regarding my stage in life and the next 10 years? I have a 5 year old son. What do most grandparents wish they had done differently when their kids were young? I hope to find love and get married in the next several years. What advice would successful couples married for 50+ years give to me as I pursue this? When I do find my partner, what wisdom could widows and widowers impart to me about how to cherish her while I have her? Will I have the character to go against the grain and implement this wisdom when I receive it?
I wonder how these thoughts will strike me when I am 60. Will they be an important realization en route to a truly remarkable life? Or will their folly be apparent?
crazy major props to the young Christian photographer whom I basically ripped off here check him out at:http://www.flickr.com/photos/zackahern/
JDM
Your absence arouses me
The serenity of your absence arouses me.
Highlighting the very core of existence.
Time has only increased this new awakening
And my body burns with a new desire..
Life ~ Unpredictable madness
Heat of the unknown possibilities
Excitement of new wonders
Exploration ~ How kind.
I am, but a sweet wine
Aged in youth, not ready to be poured..
And taken in
My precious stranger
Take me in
And swallow me whole
With your energy and integrity.
Now with undeclared time and freedom
My life, as mediocre as it once was.
Is now full of everlasting possibilities
And I am ready to conquer and journey
Through this quest for knowledge
Highlighting the very core of existence.
Time has only increased this new awakening
And my body burns with a new desire..
Life ~ Unpredictable madness
Heat of the unknown possibilities
Excitement of new wonders
Exploration ~ How kind.
I am, but a sweet wine
Aged in youth, not ready to be poured..
And taken in
My precious stranger
Take me in
And swallow me whole
With your energy and integrity.
Now with undeclared time and freedom
My life, as mediocre as it once was.
Is now full of everlasting possibilities
And I am ready to conquer and journey
Through this quest for knowledge
Dyanna Dunlevy
September 05, 2009
Pleasure in Him
You awake to find yourself in a strangely familiar wood. You get up feeling refreshed and a little bit confused as to where you are. You begin to explore the area, finding meadows filled with flowers, trees heavy laden with fruit of every kind, and finally, a simple stone pathway. Following the path you set out to see more of this enchanted place. It curves among giant oaks and redwoods, passes over streams and under a mighty waterfall. As you continue on in wonder you begin to weave your way up a mountain. You have never felt more aware or at peace. As you crest the top you come into a large plateau and see that the path leads to a stone fountain.
As you enter the plateau you begin to smell a sweet...no warm...well...wonderful aroma emanating from the fountain. The fountain is simple yet gracefully designed and crafted. On it there is an inscription that reads, "Drink me and you will never be the same, you will never thirst. Indeed, I will become in you a spring of water welling up to eternal life." You are immediately overcome by the strongest thirst you have ever experienced. You wonder weather it is safe, so you stick the just tip of your finger in. Its cold, but where it contacted your skin becomes immediately hot like fire. Unsure, you cup your hands and bring them to your lips. Though it is like ice and fire you drink deeply.
At first it tastes sweet, sweet like the best desserts you have ever had, then it is warm and flavorful, then its as though you are partaking of all the finest foods and drinks and fruits all at once, the combined pleasure of them all in this water. As it rushes down your throat you experience a new sensation, to your disbelief you experience the thrill of flirting, then the excitement of pursuit, then the passion of new love, followed yet by the deep comfort of commitment. The magic liquid reaches you belly. Slowly at first, warmth begins to spread in every direction. Seemingly lighting every nerve aflame until you feel you will be consumed. Waves of pleasure crash through you again and again until you know your heart will explode for its beating and your cells will burst under the intensity of it.
As the waves recede you begin to hear a melody. Though it is not just a melody, it is the melody. It is the song all others were but whispers of, the song of His heart. It carries you enraptured in its beauty, through crescendo's of triumph, playful moments and accomplishments, in fact through everything wonderful in the human experience. You are then filled with awe as though you are taking in all beauty and majesty at once. Next you begin to feel enveloped in the warmth of the embrace of love. Into perfect security and comfort you hear the voice human ears were invented to hear speak, He says, "I love you, I treasure you, I adore you, you are mine and I am yours."
You become aware that you are laying in the grass of the plateau filled with the assurance that nothing is worth seeking other than this water and the man who's voice spoke to your deepest soul.
JDM
September 01, 2009
Life is no "breif candle"
This is the true joy in life, the being used for a purpose
recognized by yourself as a mighty one; the being a force of nature
instead of a feverish, selfish little clod of ailments and grievances
complaining that the world will not devote itself to making you happy...I want to be thoroughly used up when I die, for the harder I work
the more I live. I rejoice in life for its own sake. Life is no "brief
candle" for me. It is a sort of splendid torch which I have got hold of
George Bernard Shaw
August 29, 2009
It Is Not Beauty I Demand
It is not Beauty I demand,
A crystal brow, the moon's despair,
Nor the snow's daughter, a white hand,
Nor mermaid's yellow pride of hair.
Tell me not of your starry eyes,
Your lips that seem on roses fed,
Your breasts where Cupid trembling lies,
Nor sleeps for kissing of his bed.
A bloomy pair of vermeil cheeks,
Like Hebe's in her ruddiest hours,
A breath that softer music speaks
Than summer winds a-wooing flowers.
These are but gauds; nay, what are lips?
Coral beneath the ocean-stream,
Whose brink when your adventurer sips
Full oft he perisheth on them.
And what are cheeks but ensigns oft
That wave hot youth to fields of blood?
Did Helen's breast though ne'er so soft,
Do Greece or Ilium any good?
Eyes can with baleful ardor burn,
Poison can breath that erst perfumed,
There's many a white hand holds an urn
With lovers' hearts to dust consumed.
For crystal brows--there's naught within,
They are but empty cells for pride;
He who the Syren's hair would win
Is mostly strangled in the tide.
Give me, instead of beauty's bust,
A tender heart, a loyal mind,
Which with temptation I could trust,
Yet never linked with error find.
One in whose gentle bosom I
Could pour my secret heart of woes.
Like the care-burdened honey-fly
That hides his murmurs in the rose.
My earthly comforter whose love
So indefeasible might be,
That when my spirit won above
Hers could not stay for sympathy.
A crystal brow, the moon's despair,
Nor the snow's daughter, a white hand,
Nor mermaid's yellow pride of hair.
Tell me not of your starry eyes,
Your lips that seem on roses fed,
Your breasts where Cupid trembling lies,
Nor sleeps for kissing of his bed.
A bloomy pair of vermeil cheeks,
Like Hebe's in her ruddiest hours,
A breath that softer music speaks
Than summer winds a-wooing flowers.
These are but gauds; nay, what are lips?
Coral beneath the ocean-stream,
Whose brink when your adventurer sips
Full oft he perisheth on them.
And what are cheeks but ensigns oft
That wave hot youth to fields of blood?
Did Helen's breast though ne'er so soft,
Do Greece or Ilium any good?
Eyes can with baleful ardor burn,
Poison can breath that erst perfumed,
There's many a white hand holds an urn
With lovers' hearts to dust consumed.
For crystal brows--there's naught within,
They are but empty cells for pride;
He who the Syren's hair would win
Is mostly strangled in the tide.
Give me, instead of beauty's bust,
A tender heart, a loyal mind,
Which with temptation I could trust,
Yet never linked with error find.
One in whose gentle bosom I
Could pour my secret heart of woes.
Like the care-burdened honey-fly
That hides his murmurs in the rose.
My earthly comforter whose love
So indefeasible might be,
That when my spirit won above
Hers could not stay for sympathy.
George Darley 1828
August 04, 2009
These aren't questions of the mind.
I spent the last four days in wonder and awe over the majesty of our God's creation. I was blessed, refreshed, stirred and inspired. God spoke to me and nourished my heart. The expansive mountains and His presence drew me into a place of being who I am, where I am (emotionally) and feeling what I feel. This is in contrast to my norm of trying to be who I want to be, where I should be and feeling sensible or productive feelings.
I brought along a book I haven't read in several years. Upon opening, out fell a picture of Shea and Malachi dated April of 2005. I was stirred by it. Here was my family, my bride and my heir, at our pinnacle of happiness and success, a moment in time, where I was as close to living my dream as ever before or since. This came in the context of being surrounded by men young and old in various stages of hope and happiness; one - engaged, another - expecting his first, still others in the sweet partnership of later years. I realized that I had not made peace with the loss of my family and all of the hopes and dreams to be lived with them. I was so grieved and jealous. Not envious, but jealous. Just so strongly desiring what everyone around me had.
This uncovered some carefully hidden burning and sorrowful questions filling my heart: "Why is my story so different? Why can't I have this too? Why is my bride in the arms of another? etc. In my mind, I have many answers to these questions, many of which point the finger at me. But these aren't questions of the mind, they are yearnings and groanings of my heart which my mind has no power to address.
With no religion or accusation, but more with confusion and sorrow I brought these questions to my loving Father. True to form, He hasn't answered me directly. But He has with an assurance of his love, goodness and faithfulness. I can say He is good, loving and faithful.
JDM
