Bardo Way

A bit of fiction — based on my own mental experience.

“I wonder if I’ll ever get a glimpse of reality the way it appears to the others.  I wonder if they’ll ever know reality as it appears to me,”  Sam’s thoughts raced ahead of him, while spinning bike tires sent the warm summer rain into an arch behind him, lifting all caution from his mind.  He sped down the winding country road, chasing his thoughts along the fringes of two realities, hoping they would collide again and lift him above his murky haze.

On the Northeast outskirts of town, where Decker Street rolls out into the endless stretches of Wisconsin-country roads,  Bardo Way branches off to run alongside the railroad tracks, past the dwindling city streets and houses.  The old round barn, the remaining remnant of the Bardo family farm, marks where the road leaves the tracks to wind down the valley with the creek.  Passing through the maple groves, somewhere near the reservoir, it plunges through the fringes of reality.  Bardo Way is a liminal route where the world drops away and the entire universe opens up; a rural road of the mind, of transition, which all people experience throughout their lives

Like all before him and all who will come after him, Sam had to figure out how to get there.  Was he allowed to go to the edges of sanity and come back?  He had to learn the pitfalls and limits of these realities.  This is a story that will seem unreal to most.  In fact, it is a fantastic reality for everyone.

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I will be throwing myself into writing (my story) and interviewing for  my “regular” blue colar jobs, as well as keeping up my usual, loving duties as a full-time dad (stay-at-home-dad), so some of my future posts may be simple videos from YouTube or elsewhere.  They will all be carefully chosen and posted with Truth and Love in mind.  Also, I have a lot of drafts started which may come to fruition in the near future.  I’ll share snippets from my fiction writing as well.

Peace and Happiness to all.  Live in Truth.

Deferred Happiness

“I’ll be happy when this is over.  I’ll be happy when the new year is here.  I’ll be happy when I’ve got that accomplished.  I’ll be happy when I’m an adult, when I am more powerful.  I’ll be happy when I’m a success.”

Guess what.  If I keep this up, I’ll never really be happy.

But if successfully accomplishing a challenging task or getting through a difficult period of life doesn’t make me happy, then what will?

Responsibility!  Taking responsibility for the happiness of our lives.  That will make us happy!  We can empower ourselves by taking the responsibility for our own happiness.

Circumstances do not dictate our happiness.  Other people do not dictate our happiness.  We, our responses and reactions to our circumstance mold our emotional nature.  We have a choice to change our emotions.  We change our minds, why not our emotions?

Happiness and Love are the Way to success.  It’s confusing, I know, but it is important to put the horse in front of the cart, and understand that success is a bi-product of happiness.  Happiness does not come from economic success or academic succes, but those kinds of achievements can and do come from happiness.  I am as successful as I am happy.

I am the happiness; I am the Love that I am looking for.  The emotions come from within.  What I am feeling is not thrust upon me from outside.  What I am feeling is evoked from within me.  I make a choice to find the Happiness and Love and let it radiate out.

Related articles

• A Life of Happiness. (emilystroia.wordpress.com)
• Your happiness is tangled in your choices (paradoxicalwisdom.wordpress.com)
• The infernal pursuit of happiness (seventhvoice.wordpress.com)
• Attitude (myawakeninglife.com)

Distilling the Essence of Ideas

Our thoughts and ideas are never purely our own.  The influences and ideas of others and the experiences that we vicariously share are all gathered in our subconscious to be distilled into an essence that our soul finds agreeable.

Most IDEAS are years in the making and their development takes place behind the scenes.  Ideas begin with conversations, and they percolate through our collective consciousness, and likely they are grasped by many people simultaneously.  The idea, still only a rough concept, distills in an individuals sub conscious and as the vapors rise in day-dreams and night dreams, we extract the essence and our minds grasp greater Truths, if only for a fleeting moment.

A few individuals distill their ideas in writing or speaking or inventing.  Some of those people share the distillation process by publishing a novel or poems or music or public speaking.

Many of us wonder about their “brilliance,” thinking to ourselves, “I knew that,” or “I had that idea years ago.”  We are all brilliant distillers of ideas.

New Friends

English: A brick wall in Giza, Egypt. (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

Sam sat on the shaded bench just outside the pharmacy door, his thoughts impatiently searched for cool places to escape the sweltering heat.  A few thoughts settled on the bench next to him but the others were busy tumbling about on the sidewalk around his feet.  With closed eyes, he watched them as they came and went by their own volition.

 

“Hi,” came a sudden bright voice next to him.

At first he ignored it, believing it was his own mind, but feeling the bench shake a bit his thoughts scattered in all directions, disappearing into the cracks in the sidewalk.  Sam flinched and opened his eyes, startled that someone was sitting next to him.

“Sorry.  I didn’t mean to scare you,” she said pertly. “Were you sleeping?”

“Ah, No.  You didn’t scare me.  I was just thinking about stuff, and you, surprised me,”  stammered Sam.

Related articles

• can’t sleep (anexerciseindiscipline.wordpress.com)
• You are not your thoughts (completecoach.wordpress.com)