Maybe the fact that we have flaws makes us a perfect human.
This is a beautiful video my cousin sent me. I must credit the creator, Verodigm, from Instagram. Here is the link to the video, and I am pasting the video below:
Funny how in recent weeks I’ve been singing that Charlie Brown Christmas song in my head. It’s funny because its June 5th, in NYC, and it is warm, and very probably going to get much warmer in the next two months.
As a child I had a very emotionally-split relationship with Christmas. I loved the gifts of course, and the large family get-togethers, which thank God we still continue to this day. But because my parents were not around most of the time, because I was raised by my grandparents for the better part of my young childhood, I felt a lacking; a longing. Like many Hispanic households we stayed up celebrating on Christmas Eve till the clock turned midnight, which is when we could open the gifts. Excruciating for a group of young kids just itching and wanting of those gifts 🙂 After opening all the gifts, and all the clamor and excitement, hugs kisses and laughter, yelling etc., everyone would leave our house probably after 1 or 2am. I remember being in the dark after they left, looking at a darkened tree, and feeling that void. I was happy with my gifts, but I didn’t know why I was so sad. Later I figured out that drop from the excitement to the quiet darkness was probably too much too quick for me, and so it felt like a dramatic void. But underlying I think was that I wanted to be with my parents.
Since maybe as a teenager I was not too much of a fan of the Christmas entourage. The decorations, the songs. I think I always related it to this sadness, and so I didn’t feel as joyful with everything Christmas as so many others popularly are.
Ironically, since my grandma has passed two years ago, and since I have commitment from my parents to being a healthier presence, I have enjoyed Christmas now, the whole thing. I long for it actually. The cold days where we wear snug sweaters. Cozying with family and loved ones. Seeing the joy in the kids’ faces and setting up fun things for all of us to enjoy in those special times. Now it’s the first week of June, and I am singing Charlie Brown’s Christmas song in my head, thinking of that scene where the characters are all ice skating to that harmonic melody. While I’m here on the topic, I have to plug Laurel and Hardy’s March of the Wooden Soldiers movie from like 1930’s or 1940’s. That I enjoyed in my childhood 🙂
Please enjoy here Charlie Brown’s Christmas song. By the way, the Vince Guaraldi Trio, who makes those Charlie Brown songs, are so good:
Ever looked into someone’s eyes and seen complete understanding? A short talk on the experience of the eyes:
My uncle is about to pass away. He battled many things, one of which is addiction. I love him dearly.
My grandma passed away in late June. She raised me.
There was a challenging, yet beautiful connection between my grandma and my uncle (mom and son). I think they needed each other in some ways.
Love you both. I am glad my heart feels your loss…it will be a way to connect with you.
Love is spontaneous. It cannot be controlled. You cannot “make” love; you cannot do anything about it. And the more you do, the more you will miss it. You have to allow it to happen. You are not needed for it. Your presence is the hindrance. The more you are absent, the better. When you are not, love happens.
Because of their inability to be absent, modern man and woman have become incapable of love. They are only capable of doing things. The whole modern mind is based on doing. Whatsoever can be done, modern [people] can do more efficiently than any that has ever existed. Whatsoever can be done, we can do more efficiently. We are the most efficient century; we have turned everything into technology–into a problem of how to “do” it. We have developed one dimension and that is the dimension of doing, but in developing this dimension we have lost much.
At the loss of being we have learned how to do things, so that which can be done we do better than anyone–better than any society that ever existed on earth. But when the question of love comes, a problem arises because love cannot be done.
For example, meditation: we have become incapable of it, it cannot be done. Or play: we have become incapable of it, it cannot be done. Or joy, happiness: we have become incapable of them because they cannot be done. They are not acts; you cannot manipulate them. On the contrary, you have to let yourself go. Then joy happens to you, then happiness comes to you, then love enters you, then love takes possession. And because of this possession we have become afraid.
Modern [people], the modern mind, wants to possess everything and not be possessed by anything. [The modern person] wants to be the master of everything, and you can only be the master of things–not of happenings. You can be the master of a house, you can be the master of a mechanical device; you cannot be the master of anything which is alive. Life cannot be mastered; you cannot possess it. On the contrary; you have to be possessed by it. Only then is there contact with it.
Love is life, and it is greater than you. You cannot possess it. I would like to repeat it: love is greater than you; you cannot possess it. You can only allow yourself to be possessed by it; it cannot be controlled. The modern ego wants to control everything, and you become scared of whatsoever you cannot control. You become afraid, you close the door. You close that dimension completely because fear enters. You will not be in control. With love you cannot be in control….
-Osho, The Book of Secrets
I really appreciate this actor, Joseph Gordon-Levitt. Every time I encounter him he seems to put a lot of work into himself and being a good, healthy, balanced human.
Here he gives a TED talk on how people who “paying” more attention leads to greater happiness than craving attention. He touches on many related topics such as social media addiction, and also the concept of “flow.”
I’m posting this video here because it alludes to special things about the energy of attention; things that do not seem to be understood or cognizant in the public or private mind.
A deep and beautiful talk on the healing, fulfilling, and transformative power of authentic human connections.