A Shimmer In Bloom : Why you are such a contradiction, and precisely why I love that about you.

I ching:

Was meditating and saw the number “41” picked up the I ching book and went to that page. There I found this little beauty:

“The way to illumination appears dark.

The way that advances appears to retreat.

The way that is easy appears to be hard.

The highest virtue appears empty.

The purest goodness appears soiled.

The most profound creativity appears fallow.

The strongest power appears weak.

The most genuine appears unreal.

The greatest space has no comets.

The greatest talent matures slowly

The greatest voice can’t be heard.

The greatest image can’t be seen. "

Nothing is lost and everything is lost. I know enough now, I truly do, regardless of how people see me, I know. Life is a powerful training session that is a blink of a universal eye. It is the bubble growing and popping off the lips of a sweaty, chubby-cheeked child. It is the fleeting suspicion that so many of us worry about and it counts. All of it.

Not in the score-card Heaven-Hell way. Not in the comparisons of “Johnny went to Harvard” or “Jane is making boatloads in finance and her husband stays home.” No…the superficiality of those things has a way of giving measure or meaning to things when we can’t find either in ourselves, in our own evaluations of love and life and the amorphous question of where and why and how.

It counts. What you do, what you undo and how you make people feel.

It counts. What you build or destroy.

It counts. Who you lend help to and who you deny.

It counts. How you care about your thoughts and if you don’t care about them at all.

It counts. How you take part in the community of humanity or how you deject it as a separateness in inferiority or superiority.

It all counts, but least we not recognize that the beautiful contradictions count too.They are the universal reminders that absolutism is silly and impossible to ever prove, follow or own.

The contradictions tell us that there is not a mutual exclusivity. Jesus, Mohammed , Moses, Gandhi, Rumi, and Mother Teresa saw that…so did the witches that got burned and berated for tapping into the communal energies that are about. So too, did the Grinch, Tom Sawyer, Bridget Jones, Henry Miller, Van Gough, and the Shepard in “The Alchemist” tap into contradictions or for a more palatable term: "Paradox." But truly....I'm talking about CHANGING who you are and what you think at any point in time and NOT being considered a "Sell out" "Contradiction" or "Lost Soul." You, and all that makes you kind of contradict past, present or future self is just fluidity and growth.

Nearly every artist, poet and genius writer you can name off the top of your head. Have you noticed that? Have you noticed what calls to your deepest self is NOT the most perfect mom of five with a six pack, big boobs and a half-empty message about health and balance. Nor can you truly jump with joie de vivre reading the sullen dark and hardened bitterness of someone who has lost faith in all fellow men and every intuition. They are all provocative and such limited examples of the vastness that populates internet and books shelves and TV shows…

I ask you to notice the quiet ones.

I ask you to witness those people laughing and smiling despite miserable living conditions (mentally or physically).

I ask you to focus on the passivity of those who don’t need to be winning or to be the boss or showing how special, how big, one-upping and in the top percent they are.

I ask you to look inside yourself and change only the things you can….you.

I ask you to serve as an example of the strength and bravery it takes to be truthful, in the good times and bad and still hold yourself clear enough to keep from judging too harsh that you would be offended at their return in a different set of life circumstances.

I ask you to consider contradictions as something bigger than it’s rather derogatory meaning, and see them more as the TRUTH of what it is to be human and fallible and trying either very hard or very little, they appear in both scenario.

The contradictions are the BEAUTY. Contradictions within ourselves and our lives or those we love is change, and considerations of different thoughts when new information is presented. That's...at least I think....evolution. Contradictions make us human and real and should be seen with compassion, not judgment. They are relative. They are the small crack in a window pane that shows the illuminated dust on the floor or the gleam in someone’s eye.

I love this quote on friendship...change, contradiction and acceptance.