what I craved was the pain and hardship of a difficult journey

"I realized as much as sharing beaches and pina coladas with little umbrellas and my radiant bride, what I craved was the pain and hardship of a difficult journey. I wanted insecurity, strife, and what others want nothing to do with. This had been missing since I settled down to my lovely life...."

It's 3am, I'm browsing a book on Amazon, found the link on Facebook, having a cuppa. This time of night - I like it a lot. Quiet, no noise, the world is peaceful, time to do whatever....
the cat outside meows, wants to come in. 
The whole neighbourhood sleeps,
Kitaro plays his etherial melodies

...saw Alastair's post,...read the free intro....

There Are Other Rivers

www.amazon.com

Alastair Humphreys walked across India, from the Coromandel Coast to the Malabar Coast, following the course of a holy river. Walking alone and spending the nights sleeping under the stars, in the homes of welcoming strangers or in small towns and villages, he experienced the dusty enchantme...

I'm thinking about what he wrote 

".....what I craved was the pain and hardship of a difficult journey...." 

We need something to cut out teeth on.

The golden cage, is nice, for a while... but too much safety, niceness and we get bored, deep in our soul and we go to seek adventure....

Though these days adventure is pooh pooohed as 'danger' and 'bad' and  unethical, I mean you could get hurt... adventure is not ok unless it is totally 100% safe....

Too nice...

We humans need the excitement of being alive.

Love this guy's outspoken attitude... 

"Now I had a home and I had a wife. I had settled down. Life was good. But perhaps that was the problem." 

When  we are in the middle of the adventure - "What the hell did I do this for ?" we wonder.... . 

When we are back safe, with our friends, by the fireside, over a beer or a coffee,  -- it makes for a great story :-)

Perhaps life itself is such an adventure ? 

We dive into the waters of birth, grow up (plenty of hardship and pain ...), explore, hunt for OUR truth, hunt the mystery of existence (WTF am I doing here ? Why the hell did I ever sign  up for this ... traffic jams, nappies, corruption, pollutioni, beam me up Scotty.... )  ....we get out  difficult journey and ...." here we are...writing blogs at 03:30am....

I look forward to sitting round the fire and comparing stories with my mates. 
"How was your lifetime ? Did ya figure out the relationship honesty stuff ?"
..."Ahh....did I tell ya about the time....."

03:52 hours, Vientiane, Laos

PS: will I  now rush out and create difficult journeys for myself ? 
Hm...nope,
but it IS good to see a guy 'fessing up' to the fact that nice married life might need something else.... 
too much 'nice' becomes suffocating, 
need a challenge, a real challenge, not an office challenge, or a santized, homogenized, and certified safe challenge....



Who uses his light who trusts his vision lives beyond death
this is the Hidden immortal


       --Dao de jJing, verse 52 - Lao Tzu

De Ja vue - life repeats itself

de ja vue....
is is just me or is there a kind of boring repetitiveness about human activities ?
I mean the usual "powerful feed bullshit to the lower levels for own profit"
People manipulating people,
Ulterior motives disguised
censorship (cause we da good guys, we  gonna look afta ya' )
makes  me tired, seeing the same old crap again and again....

but then: I'm here in life, so that means I must be here for a reason, to deal with my own ulterior motives,
my own self bullshit,
My own self deceptions.....

cause what we see in the world out there is like a big mirror,
reflects what is inside us...
inside each of us,
in me...


Dire straits says is pretty well .... in Private Investigations:

It's a mystery to me
The game commences
For the usual fee
Plus expenses
Confidential information
It's in a diary
This is my investigation
It's not a public inquiry

I go checking out the report
Digging up the dirt
You get to meet all sorts
In this line of work
Treachery and treason
There's always an excuse for it
And when I find the reason
I still can't get used to it

And what have you got at the end of the day ?
What have you got to take away ?
A bottle of whisky and a new set of lies
blinds on the window and a pain behind the eyes

Scarred for life
No compensation
Private investigations

the movie of life

My teamates say something about three Dimensional  movies.

Hm..... !

I wonder, why "Three Dee" (3D) movies really capture our imagination ?

Because the stuff on the screen looks more real, well ok, not totally but a lot more than Two DEE (2D), and we love it ! 

Why ?

It lets me get even deeper into the world of the movie.

It lets me forget more deeply that I'm IN a movie, and for a little while I can forget my problems and totally enter into the story deeper and deeper.

It's like I'm IN the movie, in the world of the movie. In a 3D movie, I'm even more of an invisible all seeing spirit observing a story in the world of those people.

I can pretend I'm  there, with the hero, and I'm totally safe at the same time.

And the good thing is, if the hero gets blown up, - well it's just a movie after all. :-)

12 Nov11 Asoke

I'm having these thoughts, sitting on the side of the road in Bangkok, eating popcorn.

It's  hot, the air is fetid and heavy from car exhausts. I'm having a rest from waving a sign around and  washing windscreens to raise money for flood victims.

Perhaps it's those exhaust gasses, that have unknown spiritual side effects on me ? 

Then a new thought hits me. What if this 3D movie thing gets better and better until I REALLY believe I'm IN the movie.

What if I then forget I'm IN the movie  ?

Hey, what if I'm in a 3D+ movie,  right now!

What if life is a movie like that ?

It all looks three dimensional.

All around me is 'three dee', complete with sound and smell.

And this movie is interactive too, I'm an actor in it.

And the script has a lot of freedom, I can make up stuff on the spot.

Hm... let me see: there's full stereo surround sound.

I turn my head, 360 degrees, all 3D.

Sound and light show all around me. Feels pretty real. What a superb total immersive movie this is !

I tell my teamates about this idea,

They smile, "Yea, nice idea."

After talking about it, the idea really grows on me. I make a mental note to write it all down (what you are reading here is that writing).

If this is a movie, and I'm an actor in it, then where am "I" really ? 

Where is the real Haiko ?

Well I guess he's sitting in some other dimension watching the whole show.

Is he eating popcorn too ?

Is he looking at the show telling himself "Here he is, washing car windscreens in Bangkok"

Have I forgotten that I'm in a movie ?

I dived into the movie called 'life time 237' and forgot the real me. I think it's all real.

The guy sitting in the other dimension, eating popcorn is laughing his head off because his imagination worked so well, I've forgotten this is just a movie.

Ok, its a bit more than a human made movie.

It's called life.

That's what I think enlightenment would be. Remembering that real 'me' watching this 3D movie called 'life', episode 235 in which the hero sits on the side of the road realizing he is a character in a movie. He winks up at the guy 'up there' eating his popcorn . "Hey I'm onto you, I know you're there....he he he, and I don't like being just a character in your imagination."

The popcorn eater just smiles. Infuriating.

If the guy in the life movie gets blown up, well it was just a movie...

I'm still safe wherever I am, eating my heavenly popcorn watching it all.

oooops, I don't think I'm that calm about that idea.

hm...I  wonder is that what they call attachment ? Identification with the illusion ('maya') of life ?

Or am I losing the plot here ?

Later that day I came across this quote on a website:

      If only the mind would release its hold, your hearts would have no difficulty in embracing every aspect of the human journey. You see, dear Ones, you sit squarely in the center of All-That-Is and nothing, absolutely nothing, can remove you from that spot.

'What of death?' asks fearful mind. 'Death is the end, there is no more.'

But, dear mind, from the center of Now, all things are ever-present.

The drama of life allows for the experience of birth and death, but the curtain of illusion falls readily and the actors leave the stage and continue on.

If this be not so, then what of the miracle of spring?

                        - Emmanuel,    http://www.emmanuelandfriends.org

Let me follow this idea a bit more and see where it leads.

The movie of life, could be some collaborative thing, not just MY single imagination, but the imagination of a whole lot of my  friends.

We all get together and we cast the roles.

"Jack, can you be the father, and Jane, how about you play the mum. I'll be the kid. I want you to spoil me rotten and bring out all my selfishness. Then you gonna die (exit stage left) and leave me your fortune and I'll think I've arrived in heaven."

"Yep, sounds good," Jack says, "I've never known how to balance love and limits, this is a good way to explore my boundaries, I'm in, if you're ok  being the kid that I work on?"

"Sure, just what I need."

Jane says, "I don't like the mum part you got there,  can I be an addicted mum ? would that work ?"

"Hmmmm.....yea, that would work too. Sure."

"Great,  I've a few things in that area I gotta get sorted."

Etc.... and so it goes.

We work it out so all the parts of the movie perfectly mesh together and everyone  gets their parts played out properly.

It's way more complicated than those multiuser interactive games, but it's the same core idea.

...........

.........

.....

...

.

Ok, time to get up and wave that sign, smile and wash a few more windscreens.

Amazing what a bit of carbon monoxide, heat and sweat will do for the creative imagination.

Could we bottle that and stick it in a pill....?

......back to 'work'.

----------

I've read about people who can make mechanical arms move like normal arms, by using the nerves signals and a computer to decipher them.

That is wonderful especially for handicapped people, by accident or birth.

Even more they can  make wheelchair move by thought signals, by decoding the brain waves.

Amazing.

But hang on a second: I  just have to will my fingers to move and they move. I just have to 'will' and command my body to move and it does.

Isn't that amazing too ?

I have a body, I only have to have the slightest intent to "move" and it does.

Why is that not just as wonderful and special ?

Heiko Rudolph

12Nov11, Asoke intersection,

Bangkok.

Fundraising with other Thai and foreign volunteers.

More details on the fundraising http://heikorudolph.blogspot.com/2011/11/bkk-floods.html  

The whole team

With thanks to Alan Watts for his inimitable style and humour.

One of his bits I like most is about music and life.

humility.... meeting her

I am losing interest in the 'getting there' thing,
Today, in Bangkok I met a lady at the temple near here (at Wat Boworn), she was  just sitting, looking troubled.
we talked, very humorously, 

5 Nov 11 Wat Boworn BKK

had breakfast,
she spoke good English,
there was a kind of innocence and beauty about her, 
smart, 
but seemed to spend her time wandering the area, sewing things, 
haunted by something ? !,....


After we parted, I felt strange, like I'd met a holy person,
someone totally different,
troubled, in pain, yes. all those things.
but there was an indefinable something about her, that shone through her.
And I wondered: who knows  or considers such people ? They are 'weak', 'losers' in the language of the competitive, pushers, and shovers and achievers.... 

And I heard again the distant echo....of a voice that said..... the meet shall inherit the earth ....
hm....
What is the point of power if not to help protect those without it ?
What is the point of a knight of honour if not to look after those who need it ? 
what is the point of money if not to use it for the common good ?

and then another thought: who is more lost ?
The competitive, pushers, and shovers and achievers....
or
the one on the street, with only a bag to hold all her things ? 

5Nov11 Bangkok

------

12Nov11: we met again by chance later. I realize: the teacher of humility does not have to know consciously what she is, and what she is teaching...
We are all teaching things to people all the time, ... most of it not consciously, and much of it depends on the student and how they take things....