Tag Archives: illumination

Deep

Deep: (adv) vast, profound or intense.

It was a brilliant piece of stagecraft.

Of course, at the time, nobody was fully aware of what stagecraft was, so certainly unacquainted with how to employ it.

But since it was a small room with limited beauty in its structure—and very few people were in attendance—turning all the lights off and hitting the center of the tiny stage with a spotlight granted an atmosphere to imagine any place in the world one might want to be.

They called them coffeehouses.

I suppose coffee was consumed but eventually, tea became the favorite, and somebody always brought along some sort of crunch or sweet to go along with the brew.

The goal was simple: to sit and listen to artists-in-training sing their songs, speak their verse or simply expound on thoughts while the audience remained silent, receptive and looking deep.

Yes—deep was a “look.”

It was a concentrated, fixed glance, eyes partially closed, suspended between focus and sleepiness.

We wanted something deep.

We wanted to be able to talk about it.

We wanted to seem deep, talking about deep things.

We were willing to come out to buildings which might need to be condemned, to sift through the illumination produced by the art around us and think about better ways to access untouched feelings, wishes and hopes.

As long as you didn’t take this “journey into the deep” for too long, it was delightful.

As long as you kept the lights low, it was possible.

And as long as there was someone up on the stage who knew four chords and a basic rhyming scheme, it was plausible.

Burnout

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Burnout: (n) physical or mental collapse caused by overwork or stress.

One of the most interesting little stories in the Good Book, whether you hold to its authenticity or not, is the tale of Moses and the burning bush.

Although I’m sure most folks are greatly impressed by the fact that God spoke to Moses from the flames, the thing that strikes me is that according to the story, the bush was burning, but not consumed.

In other words, God wanted to talk to Moses, but being a great caretaker of His creation, He decided it was not necessary to kill a bush to do it.

Isn’t that amazing?

Yet there is a deep, abiding, adult attitude–that we prove our prowess by stressing out and warning people how “burned out” we are with our circumstances.

Can we teach ourselves that it is possible to produce light without fire? Because it is completely plausible to emit an incandescence from the soul, which pours out of our eyeballs with a sense of enlightened contentment.

I have a simple rule: if it gets hard, stop.

If it seems difficult, take five. And if I’m convinced I am being punished, quickly climb down from the cross.

The only light that is truly powerful is the one that’s generated from my own heart, as I comfortably, joyfully and simply live out who I am, realizing that I possess illumination.

 

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Apprehend

dictionary with letter A

Apprehend (v): 1. to arrest someone for a crime. 2. to understand or perceive: (e.g.) great art invites us to apprehend beauty

Occasionally, the dictionary offers us two definitions of a word, which seem quite unique to one another, if not at odds.

After all, what does being arrested have to do with learning?

Yet in a world where we “Cliff” notes, “Tweet” all thoughts and “abridge” our art into compact units, we must understand that somewhere along the line, the attention span of the average person needs to be stopped, frisked and arrested instead of just providing an “Amber Alert.”

Truthfully, we do have the word “comprehend,” which connotes that a reasonable person can consider an idea to determine if it has personal value.

But there are things in life which are so essential that they require a yea or nay. Yes, there are too many votes being taken in this country for us to move forward to progress our spiritual or human rights.

How do we communicate this?

  • I have rejected preaching because it is pompous.
  • Honestly, teaching takes too much time.
  • “Sharing” is a bit ephemeral for my taste.
  • I believe the only way to truly impact our generation is through illumination. Yes–turn on the damn lights and then explain why you have temporarily blinded the room.

Certain things in our society need to be apprehended quickly–arresting our attention–or the backlash from Mother Nature and Father God will be universal.

1. No one is better than anyone else.

Stop debating it; start believing it.

2. The Earth is the Lord’s but we are the caretakers.

Grab a hoe or a shovel instead of just using resources.

3. The greatest injustice on Earth is the inequity between men and women.

No, it’s not “cute” to fight.

4. We can’t keep killing and still call ourselves civilized.

War is a “grave” possibility.

There you go.

I suppose I could wait around for people to comprehend these ideas and come to some sort of compromise through debate and cajoling, but I do believe these concepts actually need to be apprehended by everyone immediately … to avoid the foolishness and pain that follow folly.

 

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Anger

dictionary with letter A

Anger: (n) : a strong feeling of annoyance, displeasure or hostility.

I don’t think there’s anything that makes people more angry than discussing anger.

It is a bit comical that any debate on the subject of human displeasure, manifesting as spits of rage, actually produces such diametrically opposed opinions that you end up with a personification of the word you originally decided to discuss.

Anger is the most common emotion to human beings. Matter of fact, if you even consider those who claim to be “God in the flesh,” they are described as being angry more often than amiable.

But just because it’s common does not mean that we’re willing to accept it, adopt it, own it or admit that we participate. One of the great bastions of pride are those souls who insist they never get angry.

Let me give you a quick definition for anger which is a little different from Mr. Webster’s.

Very simply, anger is frustrated passion.

If it’s sexual passion and it’s not allowed to come to fruition, it can quickly become ferocious or even violent.

If it’s creative passion which is limited in resources or opportunities, it can descend into depression or even in the case of many unfulfilled artists, suicide.

If it is parental passion which is unable to communicate earth’s ways with its child, rendering the parent seemingly useless, it can quickly turn to tears and accusations.

Without passion, we basically die emotionally, causing us to produce a spiritual numbness that freezes our brain–without further illumination.

Yet when we have passion, we risk frustrating ourselves in a blandness of inactivity which can produce the anger of our undoing.

So what is the value of anger? It tells us that our passion is frustrated.

  • Don’t question the passion.
  • Don’t complain about the anger.
  • Minister to the frustration.

Maybe that’s why the Good Book says we should “be angry and sin not.” Because when the frustration that causes our anger is not addressed, every sin imaginable jumps up and volunteers to destroy us. 

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