The Last Yard

I should try to finish the post that I basically abandoned the other day. Maybe in my fatigue I have more clarity. Burn It Clean for you Mudhoney fans. My friend Robert told me the other day about Eugene O'Neil. After he spent 24 years being intellectual, respected, getting paid, and earning kudos, he was so spent that he couldn't write anything but that which he exactly wanted--that which he wanted to see. Putting it all on the line he wrote some of the greatest plays in American history. After he gave up on being a great playwright!

Anything you want to win you've got to be willing to lose. A Final Four game, your relationship, at love, songwriting, anything. Everything.

My point last time (a few days ago) was that being alive, and excelling is basically like fucking the world. If you can stare in the eye of that which you love more than anything and remain dedicated wholy to being yourself, then you are going to be very successful at whatever you attempt. If you can do it when everyone around you is getting excited, falling apart, crying, annoying you, or just doing their damn thing, then even more power to you.

The more tired we get. The more stressed or scared we get. The more excited we get, the more we crave collapse. To just get the sucker done with and give up. And the more easily we collapse, the less able we are to please those around us. (Essentially please--which can easily piss the hell out of them in the short term--not please them, kissing-their-ass, pleasing them). And feel the way we want to feel about ourselves.

The crucible where all of this comes together and cannot be faked is fucking. You can be as smart as you want, as cool as you want, as cute as you want, as talented as you want, etc. etc. etc., but if you ain't bringing it, how is anyone going to really feel you? Even if they want to? How are you going to feel yourself? And how could you ever separate the two? (Yes you will have to prioritize them--and I highly recommend it--but separate them at your own risk. The bottom line is you want to receive and give love--and can't live without either.)

I would go so far as to say that men fall into two catagories, those who shirk from the challenge and those who crave it. Those who have performance anxiety and those who want the ball. Most of us are 3-D enough to have both at various points.

This is not to say that if you're good in bed you've got it going on spiritually. There are plenty of people who hide behind sex and sexual prowess even. This is just to say that all this shit--and I mean all of it--is inter-related. Just like in The Alchemist. And the way you want to be is what you want--ripped abs and all--and getting there--the sit-ups--is what it's going to take to get there.

And there aren't any shortcuts or fronts. You can't fake value--ever. You may be able to manipulate people--or yourself--short-term, but you will never get over on God. Who is you. Even when you refuse to be. You may be forgiven (and you are), but the difficult part about that is that you have to feel grateful to assimilate the grace that you had and didn't have to work for. Which is almost as difficult as doing the work as far as I can tell. : ) Whooo whooo!

So I was saying that I was falling in love. Becoming incorporated. Getting into this being that folks have named Eben Carlson. Getting into being this being. Owning all that that indicates. Or something like that.

I find that he doesn't really dislike just about anyone. And that even making fun of people or scoffing at people in my head (which I have done copiously for years, mind you) doesn't do anything that I want. I don't want to see a lot of what goes on in the world, but upon closer examination almost none of it really threatens me. For what that's worth. I find I'm most happy when I'm focused on what I want. Or at the least free and clear of the cultural/personal critic that I can easily be.

My most challenging challenge, has of course, expelling the demons relating to myself--my own people.

There's a whole lot to learn in the reformed smoker motif. I find it easy to excuse, ignore, and even be amused by other people's shortcomings. And find myself most offended by people who are like me. Or maybe are like me ten minutes ago--or are me 10 minutes ago. For whatever reason, this segment of the populace has been the most difficult to embrace. My own people. My people. Me. Their neuroses cut to the quick. My neuroses. Are never novel. I know what they mean even when they, when we, when we are withholding the nasty stuff with every ounce of our being.

But a strange and wonderous thing started happening after I had stopped indulging these feelings. They stopped. The thoughts still come up and ask for attention (they've stopped demanding), but, eh, they pass. I guess I figured I couldn't be a true love artist until I had compassion for everyone--those in power included. Maybe those in power especially.

And even that I took from black folks.

Chalk it up. I hope they're cribbing from me as well, cause that's the only way we're going to keep this account balanced. I know I don't have enough time or energy to pay it back. Unless being human allows multiple realities to exist simultaneously--allows everything to get done at once--by doing that which you really, really want. By being who you really really want.

Once my own people don't repulse me, then I guess I'm back home, huh? Or close. I don't claim to be over anything, or incapable of anything in any given moment, but I am the person I want to be--both in the middle and on the edges. Through transitions, with hunger, stress, fatigue, whatever. As close to unfadeable as I've ever been. Through with cool and on to warm. Not that I don't get faded. Or even fade myself. Not that I'm not anything. Just that I'm mostly there. And solidly so. I pulled up camp and relocated, in a number of ways, maybe in every way, and now I can honestly say my calculations were spot on. And I get on my knees to thank the lord that they were. Because I made an incredible number of decisions while plumbing some the depths. While blind. While angry, alone and tired. And hungry and hurt.

Thank you.

I have no idea how it all came to be. Even though I've worked on nothing else for the last 10 years. I didn't think it was possible, I didn't think I could do it, I didn't think it existed and I had no reason to go toward it, there just wasn't anything else left to do.

Praise the lord and pass the ammunition.

ps; I've given up on any idea that "something else" will at some point happen. I happen whatever there is to happen right now. I'm not going anywhere. Anyone who wants can come over here, but I'm not going to go somewhere else into famous land, into rich artist land. If it wants me, and I believe it does, it's going to have to get off it's high horse and come over here.

Publisher's Weekly, Library Journal, Booklist, Kirkus are you listening?

New L Line

Chicago's new L line? In the city of da bears and brats (not to mention hired truck scandals, big shoulders and hog butchery services to the world)?

It's Pink! Glorious pink! The Pink Line, baby!

Ya feeeeeel it yet?

I think our international happeningness cred just rocketed about 400 points. Love is in the air...

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WhiteG.com

"I choose wisely/as if nothing ever suprise me"

About four years ago, when I was living in a miniscule apartment (300 sq feet) in Seattle, and subsisting on a minimum of human contact, wondering and working to deal with this book I had written and how to put it out given that it seemed to cement the fact that I would never again be part of what I felt was going on, I hit upon an idea.

At the time I was in a state of near constant panic. Evenings saw it subside to something closer to just plain old disease. But there it was, just staring at me.

It was usually in my seriously tiny bathroom that the idea hit me. Usually while I was brushing my teeth in the shaving mirror.

"What if we never panicked ever?"

Or, "what if--assumming we're here to get/be enlightened--at some point we will have to become permanently relaxed and enter a state of constant enjoyment? And, if we'll have to start this being present/never panicking/relaxed state at some point, why not now? Why not feel every step, see every color, hear every siren and let it go immediately starting right now?"

Why wait?

I wasn't quite ready to go straight there as I had a bunch to learn still from my panic and fear--mostly that I didn't want it and it hadn't done me a lick of good my whole life--but I held on to the idea. If we are going to get better, happier, enlightened, calm, BE IN LOVE, it will have to start at some point, probably when it doesn't feel quite right, and develop into a pattern.

When I started staring down my worst fears, I had a lot of opinions on the matter. I was primarily afraid that taking this turn was irrevokable, and would render me not only unemployable but also way out, yo.

I was afraid that if I turned off that voice of "concern" in my brain I would forget things. I would be a worse person. I would hurt people. I would get dumber.

And most of these have turned out to be true in some fashion, but also nothing to worry about. One of the things I learned in my undertaking was that it wasn't the fear, or the anxiety, or the hate that was the problem, but the response to it. The fear of fear, the anxiety caused by feeling anxiety, etc. These create a feedback loop not unlike sticking a microphone into a speaker--it gets horrible very quickly.

I bring this up because after years of what essentially amounts to training, I'm starting to feel the results of my decisions. I'm starting to fall in love.

I had to get a bunch of me out of the way first, and then I had to strengthen my body enough to handle it, and I still have enough to do that I don't envision being bored, but for the first time in my life I can see, can feel, what it is like to walk around being love. Being in love. Appreciating everything. Not in a corny or superficial way, and not just striving for nice, but appreciating that all this out here is real. And how real it is.

And how relaxedly it moves. And how deep it goes. And how caring it is. And how related , and overlapping and connected, etc. Not in a my ceiling is your floor way, but in a radical march of the souls way. In a every question has as much to do with me as you way. In a you can't really go wrong way.

If you couldn't go wrong, what would you do? Slow down? Speed up? Shift gears? Shut it down? Open it up? Get into it? Drop it?

And not being able to go wrong is not the same perfection as always being right. We do have complete choice as to what we do, with who we do it (whom?), and when. And, of course, the biggest, best, baddest baller on the block--how.

As you may or may not know, I'm selling stuff on eBay to get together money to go into the studio right now. I'm pretty much a hustler frrom birth (at different times closeted do differing degrees), so I can wheel and deal, but I've never really found a way to get my money on the same page as my art, as my belief. It took too much faith.

But recently, I've been getting deeper into it.

Putting my book out at $120 was a huge leap of faith. And one I took despite almost everyone I know's advice. I'm sure once it pops people will try to paint me as greedy or it as a marketing ploy (even some of my acquaintances have questioned me on this), but I can assure you, the money side of me wanted to give the books away. Wanted to ingratiate myself to the book powers that be. Wanted to go along to get along. You grovel and supplicate.

See--just now I thought I was being distracted by an email and a couple phone calls--and even a piece of spam. But then I decided to actually look at what was there and the spam said--Get Longer Orgasms!--and I realized I'm so proper I could talk about this all day and never get to the root.

The root of this, the root of our existence is our union. Coming together to procreate. That's the reason we're all here (literally) and if we get honest about it, the reason we're all here (in various forms of love--self-love, sex, intimacy, friendship, etc). We're here to get love, be love, do love. To love love.

So why isn't this life one big love bath?

What if I told you it was, even if you don't feel it. What if I told you it couldn't be anything else and that you had/have the choice to feel it/be a part of it/enjoy it every day or opt out. What if I told you the world was perfect. And getting moreso?

If you can see it as a metaphor, we might as well talk about sex. Cause that's the root of the root.

For mutual satisfaction, which I would argue is necessary for even self-satisfaction, a man must give up on his desire to be done with it, to sleep, to give up. He must work and sweat and relax. He must resist joining with a woman he desparately wants to andf resist relaxing when the payoff is greater than anything he has known. When he does this, he gets called a man. And, similarly, those called men, are assummed to have this trait. A man must be in control, and most so when he least wants to be.

You know what, this is all bullshit. I could throw it away, but I might as well let you see the mnistakes as well. I think this is just taking me away from what I want to be doing. (Which right now could even be eating lunch). A lot of this is true, and even necessary, but still writing it down is, at best, ---

Coldplay

Where did Coldplay get the riff for their hit Talk? Check out the Kraftwork song Computer Love--you can hear it on the iTunes snippet. This isn't a secret or anything, they asked KW to use it, but I didn't know that until I was trying to pick THE Kraftwork song to put on my Nano. It was close between Computer Love and Computer World, but I've DJed with Computer World so much, and I do call myself a love artist, so...

All great songs by the way.

I haven't forgotten that I owe y'all the skinny, I just want to have the time to drop it properly. I'm falling in love, if that helps... (don't get too excited yet)...

To be continued.

Not Trying to Tease, But..

Something great is happening. I don't have time to write it all down right now but will report back shortly. This is really good.

E

The Final Countdown

I've been feeling a bit abused lately. For the beginning of spring, I'd expect to have a bit more pep in my step. But I'm just doing the work. And fighting for my fun.

This may be my final temptation. Work. And meaningless nonsense. I don't like either. Yet, if I want to be deliriously happy I'll have to confront both without flinching.

Parking tickets, bureacracy, paper work, errands. If you can't be enlightened while doing that shit, then you're not enlightened. Anyone can be who they want in the studio with $200K in the bank (well, not everyone, which is surprising in and of itself), but what about the real shit? My feet walk on the same ground as everyone else's, and all of my labor to alleviate that hasn't gotten me anywhere different.

What it has taught me is to feel and process everything instantaneously. Upgrade the processor. Walk each step and deal with each stair on the fly. Feel it! Make sure you have the latest quantum software. In real time. Stare that motherfucker down and get on with it. Life is too much a joy to let a $50 parking ticket in a corrupt city with questionable bureaucratic efficiency worth it. Plus, I still haven't found the paperwork, so it could actually be my fault (expired plates). Why would $50 bust my flow for two seconds? Am I really that cheap? That hungry for drama? That ready to sell out? No, no no. Not this cowboy.

Then there's the city that re-elected the party boss even though he sits in hospital after a stroke and will likely not be able to return to do his job. So the Democratic Party bosses (the other ones) will fill the postion. Even though a better candidate (also a Dem) was running. Yes, Democrats are corrupt as well. Especially here in Chicago. Where they're the only game in town. And their corruption leads to police beatings, shakedowns, honest people run out of business, harrassment, etc. Drives me nuts.

But again, what kind of a love artist would I be if that busted my stride? Not much of one. People are entitled to all the corruption they want. If they feel that patronage is where safety lies, then I encourage them to explore it fully. Get into it.

And I encourage those affected by it to get into how that feels. And go for what you feel real safety is. And do it to death. It's no different in Kabul or Chicago. Our opportunity, our privledge, is to be here to do what we feel is love. And enjoy every step. Our children (and everyone else) will live and die by the results.

And now I'm getting riled. And divided. This is what this shit does. Separates us from ourself. It takes serious focus to concentrate on what we want when other's fears come a knocking. Or our own. The key is to do what is right while not caring a whit about the results. Just walk the walk. And be done with it once you go inside to have a seat. Or even if you're on to the next step. It's a beautiful day. The sun is out. Birds are singing. A miraculous energy holds the entire universe together--stable but changing constantly. What could ever be wrong?

I had a dream last night that I was getting back together with an old girlfriend. Two dogs were fighting and I grabbed their heads so they couldn't bite me and faced them toward each other--so that they would leave me alone. Is this mirror mind? Or am I just supressing anger?

Anyway, as the girlfriend left, our therapist, who had been overseeing the whole deal, asked me if I was going to marry her. I didn't respond but I sure was having to think long and hard about it. I'll spare you the more gory details but I think I'm just tired, and learning about how I respond to things when I'm tired.

I tend to go backwards, to things I know, even if I know there is more out there for me. I anger more quickly. I refuse to slow down. I say fuck it. I defend myself. I jump into the future or the past. I get into the results of what I'm doing instead of the action itself. I do other than that which I really, really want to. And being tired is my excuse.

Which, as I've explored exhaustively, is no way to live.

So, whatever else there is out there for me to learn from--bring it on. If it's being tired, make me more tired. However it makes me the best person, however it makes me the happiest person. However it makes me stong enough to do the things I want to do AND ENJOY IT. However it wants to come. Bring it. Cause I'm either on crack, or the Easter of all Easters is just around the corner. 40 days and nights in the wilderness followed by the rebirth heard 'round the world. (Translate into whatever tradition or non-tradition you enjoy most here). Bring it.

Not to say that after Jesus left the wilderness it was all fun and games--he was going to get crucified after all (which he knew), but at least he could eat, and enjoy the company of his friends, and do what he was here to do. There is a serious, deep pleasure in these things even when they're hard.

Bring it on.

A Good Un

In the Best Quote i've Heard All Month catagory:

"Look, if you like, you know, 'cinematography'--no, you're not going to like this."

--Larry the Cable Guy talking about his new movie, Health Inspector, in Newsweek

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WhiteG.com

It Doesn't Really Matter

HI all. Happy St. Pat's Day. I'm not sure if anyone is interested in this, but I've come this far, so no reason to stop now.

I feel like I'm learning how to be the person I want to be. Easy to say, but another thing to do.

I've pretty much always been the person I wanted to be when I had the energy, was happy, fed, dry and well rested. That part is easy. I've always been able to give when I felt like I had something to give. No problemo.

What I feel like I'm learning now is how to be the person I want to be when I don't want to be that person. When I don't give a shit. I'm getting unified. If Jamie Foxx is working on being unpredictable, I'm working toward predictability. Not predictable as in you know what I'm going to do (although you may) but predictable as to who I am. How I respond to challenges. That I am warm and helpful. Even when I don't have the time, energy or inclination. Especially when I don't have the time, energy or incination.

It's easy to be committed when being committed is easy. But the question in any relationship--and that's one with yourself just as much with someone else, or even with god--is: Are you prepared to be committed when it's hard to be committed? When you don't want to. When you're tired, hungry, frazzled and frustrated. When you're done.

The first part is to be prepared. Avoid tired, hungry, frazzled, etc. But it's inevitable. You will be. And then what kind of a person will you be? You may even get worse than that. What about then?

Now I don't believe in judging a person on the worst behavior they've ever exhibited. In fact I believe in mostly the opposite. However, a little bit of dark goes a long way. Especially if it's been covered up or never explored. I feel that a lot of people could be closer—that I could be closer—if things didn't get so weird around the edges. In fact, I'm almost ready to say that if the edges were taken care of, that almost anything could take place in the center and people would be close, warm and loving. That that might even be called a normal, healthy, vibrant relationship that could last.

I have just as strong an impulse to crack on the guy who cuts me off in traffic as anyone else. But I'm learning that integrating that energy back up is much more productive in the long run. (Hard to avoid the bust a nut metaphor here. The longer it takes you, the more love you get. Read The Multi-Orgasmic Man and cross-reference that with the best sex you've ever had divided by Tich Nat Hahn--the Buddhist priest. Multiply the whole thing by the Star Spangled Banner and you're close to what I'm talking about.)

Why develop a negative relationship with someone that will outlast our physical proximity? Go deeper than any pleasantries you may or may not exchange? Why on earth would I want to be thinking about some stress case on the freeway any longer than absolutely necessary.

This is part of my Lent. The temptations are flying right and left. I did crack on Fed Ex yesterday. But I was able to bring it back around to something resembling kindness before the end of the transaction. Phew.

One of the most difficult things in the world is to be sane in the face of insanity. To be loving in the face of hate. To be tolerant of intolerance. To warm up to bitchiness. To stay rational to absurdity (that was Fed Ex).

As I've delved into before, all fear wants to do is replicate--infect. It doesn't care what else happens, it just wants to breed. To spread, to take over. Someone being an asshole wants you to be an asshole. Then their behavior is totally justified, their worldview safe: it is all jerks out there and every person for him or herself. In a sense, fear, or hate or control--coming at someone from above or below someone and trying to manipulate them--is our baseline. It will hold life together in a rudimentary fashion when all else fails. It's the lowest common denominator.

But we aren't free when we react like that. And that's why fear-based behavior so often leads to unhappiness--or worse.

(To me, it feels like the US, and much of the world, is right here--pretty darn good in the middle and pretty darn weird around the edges/under pressure. In my opinion, just flip these. Make the edges safe and take all the risks, say all the crazy shit in the middle, 4 hours before you go home, to bed. 2 hours before you eat. Get it out, break it down, have a good laugh, and then eat, sleep, make love, and do it all again. The danger is in waiting to respond, in "witholding judgement" when you really working up a grudge. You'd be amazed what mistakes are laughed at when everyone is happy, fed, rested and safe.)

When we are free is when we choose how we'd like to react. When we choose and take responsibility for the entire world we see every second. When we acknowledge that we are made in the image of god--and therefore are primarily creators, not consumers, of this experience down here. There's no big business, it's not George W., it's us. And ain't nothing ever happened that someone didn't want. And ain't nothing ever last that people didn't get wrapped up in.

We're the ones making it. And we decide how the story goes. Both as individuals and in groups. That's what's happening. What we do and what we allow. Or--even more radically--what we pay attention to. What we pay for. And that goes for bands, people, paintings, behavior, coffee joints, products, junk mail, etc. If we go for it, if we do it, there will be more and more. If we ignore it, there will be less and less. It's just like gardening.

So the key--the moment of truth--comes when we've been off getting all clean and neat and we come back to the world of our old patterns--our family, our friends, our business, our hungry self. This is basically caveman shit. Do we react as we always have or do we ignore even our own hot button issues to create the emotional and spiritual life that we want. Permanently, constantly, everlastingly, everlovingly.

The reason I'm so excited to be learning all this right now, and it's nothing I haven't been talking about for 10 years (some day I'll post my old manifestos)--the reason I'm so excited about learning all of this, is that for the first time in my life, the ideas are rooted, have become solid, are feelings in my body. Correspond directly to the flow of energy and feeling. Love is becoming my reaction. I'm taking responsibility for not only my life and livelihood but also my feelings, emotions, relationships (in real time), etc. It's all merging into the one thing I've always hoped or thought it could.

And that means I'm about to start getting some. Bottom line, I now have the skills to have a daily relationship with a powerful woman and be my powerful self. Including sex. (You didn't think I was loving the jerk on the expressway just to be nice did you?) And I can still be the person, the artist, the dude, whatever, that I've always been. My core is becoming solid.

When I was younger I would ask my married friends about their love life. Most of them laughed when I claimed that I was going to have incredible sex for years and years--with the woman I was married to. At the time, I rarely had girlfriends that lasted longer than 6 months. And with a whole bunch of them, sex was even kind of boring. With the woman and girls that it wasn't, the forces of nature that brought us together so passionately, that made it exciting, smacked us (or me anyway) around like a dingy in a storm. With a whole bunch of rocks right there. As much of it was drama as passion. Sooner of later, it was just easier to let it go.

But I always had a notion, deep inside my head, that it was possible. That it had to be. That a grand unification theory existed if we were just smart enough, just dedicated enough, just had the time. That the special theory and the general theory (the male and femle?, east and west?), all were similar expressions of the same thing. And that everything pointed at the same thing if you looked at it from the right angle. And my guess was that that thing was love.

In some of my best relationships, I cought glimpses that even one radically loving person in a relationship could both make it work and be so unfadeable that they would be impossible to leave. (Radically loving meaning loving one's self so much that both yourself and your self's love for that other person are indespensable--and knowing how to prioritize and manage those both strictly and with compassion. --You know that you can't get left until they crack you right?) Maybe a buoy is a good metaphor. No matter how deep nor how fast the swells, a properly anchored buoy just does it's thing. And is always there ding donging softly the next morning when the seagulls come back around and the sunlight on the water makes you wonder how anything could go wrong ever.

This isn't about being perfect, but more about knowing one's own tendencies, likelihoods, and how and when one's own shit rears it's lovely head. And how that tends to affect the people around you. How to stay safe and snug around the edges while take enormous, putting it all on the line, life-saving risks right down the middle. Yee-haw!

Maybe, it's just that for the first time in my life I feel like I can take care of myself and have extra left over to give. I don't look at people as opportunities to get something, or above or below me, but as opportunities to be with, play, talk, share, build. I feel safe around the edges and have extra in the middle.

It may be easier to explain this way: For the first time in my life, a life that includes all kinds of art projects, nice stuff, volunteer work, etc; I see that it's as easy as you get what you give. Moment to moment. Constantly. Breath to breath. And that there's no magical store anywhere-of money, of love, of food--of anything. And that that perspective actually brings about prosperity--when you feel like you don't need it. And that neediness actually brings about scarcity. On the material plane, emotional plane and the spiritual plane. And am ready to meet the challenge.

It's almost cliche--ask not what your country can do for you..., life is what you make it--but to feel this second to second is something else. To be constantly grateful for the gift we have of being alive, the opportunity to be here and do what it is we want to do--how could being rich--physically or spiritually--feel any different? From there it's just the chicken or the egg--do we feel grateful, safe, and loved first or are our lives filled with things to be grateful for, peace and loved ones first?

It doesn't really matter.

(I would like to note that all this stuff is rooted in the body. I don't believe you can stand, walk, relax, skip, dance, sing, paint, eat and sleep the way you really want to and not come to address these things eventually. The answer's in the pudding. To embrace this viewpoint I have had to stretch, lift, hit the elliptical machines, walk, do sit-ups, etc. All of us wants to be alive--our mind, soul, and body--and all are holy. You can learn as much making love as you can at church. And if you don't believe that you can take it up with the big guy. It's got nothing to do with me.)

Lots of love.

Getting Into It

I am definitely NOT Jesus (thank the lord), but I am having fun comparing my Lent to his. I just figured out my second temptation this morning (it has to do with a killer deal I'm working to procure). I'm constantly surprised at the number and variety of ways that I'll allow myself to feel put out. Basically whenever something switches from what I consider "going my way" to "not going my way". Forget that 99% of "not going my ways" actually end up going my way in ways I later come to understand. Put it this way--I got mad as hell when I got a chest infection and had to stop smoking.

The sermon today at church was great. (If you're not into church, consider this a Sanskrit teaching like in yoga class, or a particularly good moment on Oprah or something). Abraham, the chosen one, is ordered by god to sacrifice his only son, Isaac. He goes to do it and god says, no, no, just playing. But thank you, now I know you're serious. (Of course, this also mirrors god's devotion in sending his only son to die for us--now I know I've lost half of you. :) I'm amazed at how many people can draw from just about any source but the bible. Maybe I shouldn't, as I was the same. I took from self-help, Buddhism, Hinduism, Sufism--just about every ism but the bible. I'm not going to insert some wack pagan remark here, because these are all holy traditions in their own right, but I do find that I have the most to learn from the tradition in which I was raised. Even if it did take me the longest to be able to stomach it. More on resenting/taking for granted that with which we are most familiar later.)

The gospel reading was Peter trying to get Jesus to stop with all the "The son of god will be put to death stuff". Jesus replies that Peter has his mind on human things, not heavenly things. After, of course, telling him famously to "Get behind me Satan!" (See, it's a White Stripes reference!)

The priest this morning put everything through a Hollywood/movie lens. For Abraham, it was how he was, until that time, the star, and by being humbled so, he realized how much of what he was doing wouldn't be felt for generations--by other people long after he was dust. And how much of an opportunity he had to create something for future generations (this wasn't in the sermon, just my own editorializing). That it wasn't "about" him. Even though he was chosen, promised, etc. This one sunk in.

For Peter, the priest described the fear of a supporting actor taking the stage alone. He described in wonderful detail how many killer lines Peter got to lob, and what kind of seat he had while Jesus knocked them out of the park--what basking in the Jesus glow must have been like in general. In this passage, when Peter was confronted with Jesus' mortality, and the notion of having to carry his own cross (or even having his own cross), the fear shot straight through through him--and promptly trampled what he knew was right.

I'm not conveying this half as well as the sermon, but I really liked the idea that we're neither the star of the show nor a bit player. We can neither take the whole stage (what I needed to hear) nor can we shrink off and hug the curtain (what I used to try to do--and probably why I need to hear the first one now). Every one of us is crucial to what's happening and none of us is the only thing that's going on. (Not to mention that it's just as often our insecurity that leads us to imagine ourselves the star as it is to want to bask in someone else's reassuring glow).

The most radical part was when he asked us how we would write our own screenplay. What would we leave out? What juicy lines would we deliver? I'm moving at Reader's Digest speed now. Imagine the things you would take out of your own story. Imagine the things you don't want anyone to know. Are ashamed of even thinking. God's love for you was 100% even as you did it. Pretty great stuff. His punchline: nothing can separate us from god's love.

***

I'm in the Lent mode and looking hard at what I want/am ready to learn to come all the way around. Who am I resisting? I've "done the work" reluctantly enough to know that there is an actual, physical and emotional payoff to learning that which I fear and resist. So now I usually just try to muster up the energy and "git 'r done". Or just enjoy myself--they often turn out to be the same thing.

In many ways I come from the vanguard of the liberal white tradition, and I think my last 5% (in the coming full circle metaphor) is in many ways coming back home. Like a reformed smoker, I went as far out and as far away from how I was brought up as I could. If it had informed the way I was living, and especially how I felt, after doing what I was supposed to do throughout high school, college and the work force, then I didn't want any part of it--and it must be wrong, right? I ditched Chomsky for Ayn Rand, Elliott Smith and Radiohead for hip-hop (and mainstream hip-hop at that--gasp!), I ditched yoga for lifting weights. I cut my hair, started shaving, doing my laundry, waking up early, and wearing Italian suits and English bench-made shoes. Earrings--gone. Nipple rings--gone. Moping--gone. Cutting own hair--gone.

I told myself that I was creating a hybrid of liberal and conservative--of community-based and individual values--but the way I felt the checker at the co-op held my organic chicken (like I had tortured it--and a baby seal or two--gleefully) pissed me off much more than George W. jumping into Iraq to finish his daddy's business. And lying about it.

To tell the truth, I was burnt. And people being jerks overtly and openly seemed much more real, much more honest in a way, than the morass of cloyed intentions and confusing care that seemed to swirl around on the left. Individuals claiming to represent communities and importance being doled out on the basis of need exhausted me. As I understood it at various times, the best thing that I could do, as a privledged white man, was de-privledge myself. And shut the hell up. Needless to say, this was problematic. Ultimately, I just wanted to know where people stood without mind-reading. And, what they liked and wanted. What their vision for the world was.

But even those statements hint at the kernel of control that seems to wriggle down deeper as I pull pieces out. In one sense, getting tired of critique and leaving the seminar is nothing but a more perfect form of critique. And an even more passive one at that. (Even though it may be a necessary step). The question remains: who's bringing the love, baby?

And to include myself in the answer, I'm going to have to love my own people--and, like it or not, the blue-haired young woman at the co-op, with or without PETA pin, is probably closer to who I am right now than George W., may god bless his soul. I am going to have to love white people. My white people. Even though I know our tricks inside and out. Our strengths and weaknesses. I'm often immune to their (see), our, strengths and often painfully aware of our weaknesses. But I'm white. And if I want the world I want this time around, then I'm going to have to love my people. It may be a distant love, it may be a close love, but it's going to have to be love. Appreciation on a bad day. Real time. Sounds good.

After all, I give everyone else the benefit of the doubt.

They say you should only critique that which you love. And that you can only truly hate that which you once loved. Are we getting somewhere yet?

And beyond all that, I just don't want to carry any dislike inside of me--for anyone! I don't want to be responsible for the foibles and shortcoming of my people. A know-it-all (too late?). I don't want to cringe as the already drunk college guy throws his keg cup down the street before noon on a St Patty's Saturday. I don't want to care if you ignore me at parties (if you can find me at one to do so). I did that and more. Much more. Way more. The sullen indie kid won't make eye contact, the businessman turns my hand over while shaking it.

What haven't I done? Nothing as far as I can tell. And I'm not self-flagellating here. I don't care that I did it either. How could I even tell someone not to smoke, if 10 years of a pack a day ten years ago is who I am? What if it's all process? Think about that? What if it is all ends? If the Nazis were means to an end and it was all ends. Every second an end? Every moment the payoff? What if it's all necessary? Everything happening right now? Everything happening right now!! And the best thing we can do--to be the lovely and lively individuals and communities we are--and to be more so as quickly and powerfully as we can--is get into it!?!

I watched the movie Shine last night, it wasn't quite as good as the book (is that critique?--that's a JOKE, yo!), but it had a few good points. If you don't know the story, David Helfgott was an Australian classical piano prodigy who had a schizophrenic break and largely came back from it. And could kill some almost unplayable pieces. In the break, he became like a child. He would walk around naked, hug everyone, get lost, leave the water running all over the floor, and in general have no boundaries or fear. Some of which was great, and was probably liberation, and some of which was probably a reaction to a more essential fear that he had swallowed whole.

The remarkable thing, though, was that he was pretty much into it all. Some he had to work on (especially "Daddy", who may have inspired or complicated the break), but I believe he could really see--most of the time. He loved traffic! When was the last time you sat in traffic excited? And why not? Finally at rest and moving at the sane pace we've dreamed of for years!?

Now if we could just have that freedom without groping women randomly or endangering ourselves or others (not to mention keeping the wheels of our considerable society moving).

Anyway, I want it all. As Snoop Dogg says: "I want it all--clean socks and draws". I want to walk down the street and be happy that we're all not talking to each other--if that's what we choose to do. Because that is what we have chosen--and are succeeding.

On another note: I think I may have been using my imaginative powers to try to escape. I think I may have been trying to construct a place to escape to instead of bringing what I want to me in the real world. Thinking I was in an unenviable position, of course, another reason to delay my success. I'm coming to see that I'm doing exactly what I want and how little I want to change. I already have cashmere, a $2,500 microphone and the guitars I want. I want my own house and I'm sure I'll find another $25K or so in recording equipment once The Love Artist goes big, but if I've been taken care of like this during my salad days, it ain't gonna be no thang to do a mortgage, flowers, a few trips, whatever. I've been out of the country flat broke--and that worked out too.

So, in the spirit of eternal prosperity, once my work reaches critical mass, I think I may want to put some of my hard earned scrilla into getting creative tools into the hands of young people. It's amazing that for $10K you can build a recording studio and almost no schools have them. We teach wood shop, technical drawing and commercial foods and we don't teach beatmaking? That's crazy. Maybe I'll put them up in Boys and Girls clubs and negotiate a 10% cut off of every beat sold.

Turn that into more.

Turn that into more.

Go Cubs

Beautiful day today. I just had a nice Bi-Bim-Bop. Surprised myself by complaining that there wasn't enough meat. Not that they brought me any extra.

I bet my life that The Love Artist is a $120 book. And have backed it up with $50K in cold, hard borrowed cash. Then there's the $100+K that it cost to live while doing it. And the $750K-1MIL that I would have earned in the normal economy during the same time (almost 10 years now).

What hurt the most was the house, though. Everyone I know has a house. Or at least a condo. At the very least an apartment. As a good Taurus, and all-around normal white person, I crave house like there's no tomorrow.

As hard as the house has been the lack of relationships. Watching my friends and family get married used to bug me more than it does now, but I'm still ready as a mug. I'm'n'a have to make up for lost time.

But I can hoestly and easily say I wouldn't do a thing different. Even if I never make a cent. The rich feeling I never had when I had money, power and prestige I now have in spades. And I'll never give that up.

And I'm absolutely sure I'm right. Absolutely. I did (and do) the math constantly. You don't stare down one of the precepts of the most powerful economy in the history of the world without crunching the numbers.

I'm so sure I'm right I'm actually surprised that not a single other person really gets it yet (that I know). It's a bit like Groundhog's Day, every once I a while I remember that culturally it's winter just about everywhere in the western world. But you can't tell people McDonald's isn't going to deliver the nutrition and feelings that they want and that they can and have to afford something better. You have to wait until they all get sick. That's love. And then you can try to describe that them getting sick is god loving them. Or just set up a stand selling organic broccoli and keep your mouth shut.

I'm so sure that multiple price points are the future of mass culture that instead of getting an apartment, moving out of my mom's house and getting on with things, I've plowed every cent into a recording studio and am making the follow-up album to the book. And bought a video camera and shot the documentary.

I'm building the White Gold brand to be unbeatable. I hope you do the same with your ideas and love. I can't wait to buy it, to feel it, to love it.

Mostly, I'm doing exactly what I want, every single day. No excuses, no prisoners. Once my training is done the money will come so fast and furious, it will be all I can do to keep my head. Keep my eyes on god.

I'm ready for that too. Taking a spiritual culture worldwide at market speed. Real time. Let's go, biotch.

The only one's left to win the series.

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WhiteG.com

Faith

Sometimes I wonder if it's true that our beliefs really do create the world we live in. If so, those without faith would never reap it's benifits, and those with it would rarely need it.

With relationships there really is something to not needing one. Nothing's quite so unappealing as someone who's desparate. And little is more attractive than someone who knows what they want. And is willing to do whatever it takes to putt it off.

The world, then, would be a belief factory. Where we go through trials and tribulations just to realize that we were blessed and safe the whole time. A whole lot of work just to learn that we are entirely capable and can learn and accomplish whatever we set our minds to. That it is already done.

So why do we ever give up hope? Or, even more concrete, why do we ever doubt ourselves in the first place? If all we hope to gain from it eventually is the ability to believe. Isn't that starting off on the wrong foot? Aren't we making 90% of the work before we even set foot out the door?

Just something I thought of at the gym today.

Guest Series

Hi All. I'm going to be having a guest series with a couple of friends chiming in with their thoughts on the and their world. If you feel like you've got something to drop that relates directly or indirectly to White G, let me know, I'll consider it for worldwide publication.

This Thing Rocks

HI All. It's Lent. And whether you're a Christian or not, it can be helpful to check to see if the spirit has cast you out into the wilderness. See if you're facing three temptations, or just downright thirsty.

My priest mentioned this morning that there are always 40s around when god's close by. He didn't mean 40 ouncers (which we used to call torpedoes, by the way), but was referring to the 40 years the chosen people spent in the desert before arriving at the promised land, the 40 days and nights of the flood, and Jesus' 40 days in the desert. Some bibles say he was "led" into the desert, but I think the Latin (Aramaic?) is closer to "expelled into". This was his preparation for his ministry. As the minister said this morning--he made personal choices that had corporate consequences.

He gave up being a god--and being in charge. He decided to accept the cross--to be human. While he was starving, broken and more or less lost--while he was in the wilderness.

The minister this morning also asked another poignant question: what could be more important than your relationship to god?

The test of a relationship, of one's commitment--to one's self, to another, to god--doesn't come during the honeymoon, or the good times, or at a convenient time. It doesn't come when you feel strong enough or are ready. It comes when it's a test. It comes when you are in the wilderness. It comes when you have made the best decisions you can make with the information you have and it's time to see just how holy your values are.

If we could learn as fast, or as well, in comfort, then we'd probably be comfortable all the time. And I think that people are actually becoming more sensitive so that they don't have to endure the same amount of duress that they had to at one time. And can still learn. This is progress.

But why the wilderness? Why alone (on a Saturday night)? Why sober and hungry and cold? Why facing the endless void?

The answer, simply put, is that's where you are. That's where the source of all that is warm and nourishing and together. All that's civilized and comforting and safe. And if we never get there, and never stare it dead in the face until it blinks, then we go through life not knowing. Not knowing the safety we crave (Homeland Security is estimated at $100 billion a year). Or the intimacy we can almost taste. The warmth we're sure everyone else is enjoying all around us.

All of those are generated from within.

There is no truly strong society without truly strong individuals. And the shortcut to that strength is the wilderness. Ask 50 Cent, ask Oprah, ask anyone. Or just let yourself lead you.

My own temptations this year seems to be shaping up around money. To get into the studio with the tools I want to use I am selling guitars and a few computers. I'm hustling.

My question is: what is having faith? Is it buying a guitar I want and keeping it even though I don't have the money yet and have significant credit card debt? Or is it selling it knowing that I have another and will have more access to more money soon enough?

At various points in my life this has been my wilderness. I sat on a bench outside an office building in downtown Seattle for probably a half-hour working up the guts to go buy a pair of $500 shoes after not having had a job for years. At the time I was living on credit. And ended up buying a pair of $200 loafers from the same place. Church's shoes. They went out of business because not enough men in Seattle wanted hand-made round-toe classic shoes. They really are beautiful shoes.

It took me weeks to get up the guts to buy a Rolex, but that was on the wrong side of hold for me at the time. One thing I've learned is that god takes care of you on both sides. It ended up having a problem and I was able to return an unreturnable watch. Thanks be to god.

If we are to be love artists in the most wealthy of civilizations ever, we must master money. This is a non-negotiable. Neither lack nor abundance must sway us in our choices, behavior or love. This could even be job #1. The price of admission. We must stare poverty, debt, windfalls and all the rest of it in the face so long it hurts. And finally, refuse to flinch. This is where I'm sure the gold is. The spiritual gold. The feelings we crave. The rich that we are but don't enjoy. The inside out.

And I don't know the answer this particular moment. I'll sell the damn thing if it means being closer to my larger aims. If getting into the studio sooner, with slightly fewer inspirational tools, or being able to stay unmolested longer, will yield the state of creation/being to which I aspire.

But I've also seen a radically different route. One that may be faster. Getting yourself into the studio with the tools you want, and doing whatever it takes to do so, may be the quickest route. We may be able to learn without learning. The lesson may be a spiritual and not a musical one. It may not take more time but more guts.

Consider this: Joaquin Phoenix didn't know how to play guitar OR sing until he got the part of Johnny Cash in I Walk the Line. And that's his voice and guitar playing in the movie. And on the soundtrack. (Not to mention that Johnny Cash--who has hands down the most captivating voice I've ever heard in person--auditioned with the songs he thought he was "supposed" to sing, only to be told they were played out. He was about to be thrown out of the audition when he decided to sing a few songs he had written. He went home with a record contract.)

What if the task now was becoming a person who could sit down and do whatever it is that you're going to do. And we're so adept, smart and learn-ready that technique is almost a forgone conclusion. If this were true, would you change your area of expertise? If it only took four months? A year? I didn't sing a lick all winter and I swear I'm four times as good. Because of what I've learned at the gym, at church, over the holidays, from the weather, in my dreams. Because I made the decision to do or die--right now.

And I'm broke again until something sells. But it no longer bothers me. I know god is in charge of cash. I could be rich tomorrow. And most people fall off after they get the gold, not before. I just want to know the right amount to believe.

This thing rocks!

Cash Rules Everything Around Me/C.R.E.A.M.

Get the money, dolla, dolla bills y'all.

One of my favorite Wu-Tang lines. Cash, of course, rules nothing around us but plenty of folks actin like it do. It's gonna be a minute until we get as strong as our economy.

Speaking of which, I'm getting loaded. With recording gear. My next recordings are going to rule. I'm going to make sure I've got the real deal to record with. Just invested in a mic that can raise the hairs on your neck. That costs money. Magic costs money. Pixie dust costs money. White Gold costs money.

So as soon as you're tired of cheap art, please let me know. I'll hook you up. There are people driving Whitney Biennial artists' prices up around $100K. And none of em want a $120 book? I can't believe that.

It's also Lent and I'm wondering what to give up. I think TV, mainly because I want to learn how to integrate a day's energy quickly enough that by an hour after dinner and clean-up, I'm present and ready to be amorous and intimate. That takes some doing. And you've gotta head straight into it. Let it never be said that I didn't expect serious rewards in this life and the next for the sacrifices I've made. Now I'm immodest--it says in the bible to leave your piety for god. That if you try to get appreciated here on earth for it, you've already cashed that check. Better to get it in heaven. I think they're right.

But it's also time to let folks know that I gave up coffee, beer, smokes and sugar (and wheat, sarchasm, and a whole lot of other stuff for that matter) to have more fun. And it works. I have more fun now walking around on a semi-nice day than I used to have drinking and having sex. What's real is all I want. I know that's the only fun going.

I'm also looking back over the songs I did in my band in Seattle--VS Gut. They were good. It's funny how long it takes to appreciate your own efforts. That's why it's so hard to edit your self. They may demand release. I'm thinking--feeling--on it.

Get ready for Easter--get to be reborn.

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WhiteG.com