The song Lateralus by Tool sings to the depths of my soul. Not only is Maynard James Keenan a lyrical and musical genius (see YouTube, below), he also captures in a very simple and meaningful way the process of spiritual birth and growth in this one, very beautiful and poetic song.
From the “black and white” conscience of unawakened duality to a budding awareness where one begins to see in colors and from a broader more spiritual and accepting perspective, MJK covers all bases eloquently. From overthinking and the separation of the body from the mind, to using One’s intuition while spiraling and reaching out into new realms and dimensions; opening to infinite possibilities. MJK encourages us to reach outside the box. Pretty effing amazing in my humble opinion.
Halfway through the song, Maynard’s lyrics encourage us to feel the rhythm, be connected and fathom the beauty. To me, this speaks to our need to find our own individual voices: to follow whatever will bewilder and inspire us.
If we cannot speak with our own voices then we are not being true to ourselves nor to any other human being. Embrace your divinity & still be a human. Find your voice and speak it. Sing it, be it.
So here I raise a toast to each of us to “spiral out, keep going & push the envelope, watch it bend.” So be it!
Many thanks to MJK for his willingness to follow his voice, spiral out and share both his humanity and divinity with us.
The more we push off doing something for “later,” the more we build up a wall that then needs to be broken down. Pressure builds with each moment that we avoid doing something that we know will help us in some way. As such procrastination is also a passive-aggressive way to block love from ourselves.
Sometimes a perspective shift such as in “Motivation Through Punishment?” can be helpful. I find that “should” and “ought”statements build shame and guilt. So when I say to myself things such as “I really should/ought/need to do (this task),” that I often don’t want to even think about it.
What I have found that works better for me is to say, “It will help me to do (this task). I will feel better once I get started.” So often we wait and hold off doing something because we feel we need: more time, more energy, more motivation. Just as we need to push a button or turn the key in our car’s ignition, to “get motivated” we need to start with action. If we waited for the car to start itself, we’d never get anywhere in life.
Another aspect that can cause procrastination involves the belief that what we do needs to be perfect. Even just one tiny step towards starting a project can help break down barriers, allow room for mistakes. It’s better to start a walking program that lasts ten minutes than to couch surf and expect a change.
Sometimes we also tell ourselves, or make ourselves believe, that we must do the entire project at once. Commit to a small time frame instead. “I’ll do 20 minutes a day today and get this thing started,” can take off some of the pressure. After 20 minutes, you can then choose to continue, or you can set a time frame for another day or time, then stick to it!
The longer we wait, the more walls build and then we need to break down. Loving yourself is not just about breaking down walls, it’s also about not allowing yourself to continue to build barriers. So today, and everyday, let’s “lose ourselves” in the moment, you own it, you better never let it go. While I do believe we have more than one chance to get it right (even Eminem in this very song talks about trying again, and again), we only fail ourselves when we fail to try.
So what step can you take today to start a project? Write it down. Make it simple. Then do it! And remember to celebrate climbing the mountain you’ve created. You’ll love yourself more for it.
Namaste
Photo courtesy of suphakit73 at freedigitalphotos.net
Doing the same thing everyday becomes monotonous quickly and creates dissatisfaction.
Creating new ways to do the routine things in life adds some spice and warms the heart.
Yesterday, while I made my breakfast, I played “Up for the Downstroke” by Parliament. Though I pan-scrambled my eggs the same way I do everyday, damn, if they didn’t taste better. I think it was all the hip shaking, sliding and gliding I did while I was making them. Now I have the weekend to practice my grooves before my kids are here to witness my new routine…shaking it!
Today (and everyday) I encourage you to find a new way to bring happiness into your life. After all, happiness is truly an inside job.
Now dance like no one is watching and get up for the downstroke, that’s an order!
Warning: This post contains some explicit language. If this may offend you, then please stop reading. Thank you!
Several months ago, I discovered that two of my favorite musicians were performing on the same night in my home state: Eddie Vedder (Pearl Jam) & Maynard James Keenan (Puscifer).
At first I mentally put the two bands “in the ring” to see who would win. Then I thought to see where else they were playing. After discovering they were performing in the same town on two consecutive nights in another state, I decided to travel mid-week to be able to catch both shows. I also made plans to meet another blogger while in her hometown. Taking time off work to travel to a concert is not my m.o., by the way, though this may change.
While I purchased tickets for the Puscifer (Maynard) show, I did not purchase them for the Pearl Jam (Vedder) one. Score 1 Tiffany….
Following the recent “bathroom statute” controversy in North Carolina, many bands have canceled their tour dates in the state. Pearl Jam did. Puscifer did not. Score Maynard 1: Vedder 0.
While I do not know why Maynard kept the show date, I have a lot of respect for him for playing last night. Yes, it could be financial as Puscifer is Independent. Though you may know Maynard from one of his two other bands, Tool & A Perfect Circle (APC), Puscifer is completely Indi. Or maybe Maynard understands something Vedder and others do not…
Near the end of the show, following bandmember introductions, Maynard said this to the audience: “This is all I’m going to say and then I’ll shut up: This is an election year & don’t vote for Neanderthals.” Yes! To me, this teaches more than shunning. Maynard 2: Vedder 0.
Maynard then dedicated the next song to North Carolina, “The Humbling River.”
Personally, I believe Maynard is a fucking genius. Much of his music contains a depth of spiritual wisdom. Lateralus by Tool has a musical architectural basis that is Divine.
Puscifer’s music is also heavy on drums and bass with frequently primal rhythms, qualities that I like. Frequently the drum rhythm has an irregular beat: bonus. Different from Tool & APC, Puscifer includes female vocals and synthesizers.
Personally, I really like that Maynard shows a broad spectrum of the human condition. From “Humbling River” (we are better together than as one to cross the river) to “Remedy,” (you act like you’ve never been knocked the fuck out). He understands concepts that, I believe, many in spiritual circles miss, & maybe I’m just projecting
Anger needs to be expressed. If not creatively, then it will eventually come out … destructively.
Sex is not shameful.
Irreverence is necessary to get out of our self-contained buckets of shame.
We get more of what what we fight against…. And is probably why the NC show went on.
Change comes about by honestly looking at our shit, not denying or glossing over it.
Sometimes people need to be emotionally shocked to be woken up.
Maynard 8: Vedder 0
If you can catch a show, I believe it’s worth it. At the very least, check out some of the band’s songs. Expect performance art and beautiful music. Send me hate mail if you didn’t like it! 🙂
Some of my favorite Puscifer songs include:
Rev 22:20
Momma sed
Vagina Mine
Agostina
Potions
The Humbling River
Tumbleweed
The Arsonist
The Rapture
Know that most of the album titles are sexual in nature.
Music is a potion and elixir for me. Maynard James Keenan’s (MJK) work with Tool, A Perfect Circle and Puscifer have been incredibly helpful for me beginning over 20 years ago. I have listened often to MJK in the past two years while recovering the pieces of myself following years of self-abuse and the “bottoming out” following the demise of my marriage.
I fully recognize the resistance you may feel in reading that pain is an illusion. When we are experiencing pain it can be all consuming and all encompassing at the time. Physical pain can often be easier to feel that emotional, or worse, spiritual pain. When we surrender in the moment, we can find that our pain begins to subside.
“All this pain is an illusion” is found in the songs Parabol & Parabola by Tool. These two songs are incredibly powerful and are best listened to consecutively, as the lyrics for the songs mirror one another.
While in Parabol one feels like one is descending with the decrescendo of the music, in Parabola, the music seems to be an ascension. Both songs are from the album Lateralus, which is based on the Fibonnacci sequence.
These two songs, I realize, are very much in alignment with my descent and ascension from the abyss that I experienced this week. I hope you enjoy the music, at the very least the lyrics.
Praise to Maynard James Keenan, you’re a fucking Genius! See you in April!!!
Parabol
by Tool
So familiar and overwhelmingly warm
This one, this form I hold now.
Embracing you, this reality here,
This one, this form I hold now, so
Wide eyed and hopeful.
Wide eyed and hopefully wild.
We barely remember what came before this precious moment,
Choosing to be here right now. Hold on, stay inside…
This body holding me, reminding me that I am not alone in
This body makes me feel eternal. All this pain is an illusion.
Parabola
by Tool
We barely remember who or what came before this precious moment
We are choosing to be here right now
Hold on, stay inside…
[Chorus:]This holy reality, this holy experience
Choosing to be here in…
This body, this body holding me
Be my reminder here that I am not alone in…
This body, this body holding me, feeling eternal
All this pain is an illusion
Alive!
[Chorus]
Twirling round with this familiar parable
Spinning, weaving round each new experience
Recognize this as a holy gift and celebrate this chance to be alive and breathing
A chance to be alive and breathing
This body holding me reminds me of my own mortality
Embrace this moment, remember, we are eternal
All this pain is an illusion
Dead Can Dance is one of my favorite musical groups. Eclectic sounds on ancient and varied instruments coupled with the voice of the Diva Lisa Gerrard are just well, fucking amazing. I’ve listened to their music for over half my life now, sometimes I hear the lyrics as if for the first time.
Today, in reflecting on recent life experiences, movies (The Imitation Game: Behind Every Code is an Enigma), posts I have read and created, interactions with other bloggers and the unfolding of my own cryptic, binary, puzzling enigma, this song popped into my mind.
While I prefer Lisa’s voice, the lyrics here are just too poignant for where I have been lately. The desire for truth and intimacy without the facade is so fully expressed in this song…and my lifelong desire to be understood by another, a lover. I can remember this longing as early as the age of 10 (though it probably started at birth, I have few memories of my life before 10 that are positive).
In reading what others are writing lately, I know others can relate to these lyrics.
Dead Can Dance
“The Enigma of the Absolute”
Saloman hung down her head
Laid bare her heart for the world to see.
She craved for intimacy.
Through darkened doors her aspect veiled with indecision, gazed out sea.
She craved lucidity.
Cast adrift from past relationships in her life,
Hoisted up the ideal. This was her saving grace.
Seas of rage that once assailed her concern for the truth
Had passed her by and left her high and dry in her saviours arms.
Across the sea lies the fountain of renewal,
Where you will find the whole cause of your loneliness
Can be measured in dreams that transcend all these lies
And I wish and I pray that there may come a day for a saviours arms.
Namaste
__/|\__ Ananda & Metta
2016.02.27
Image: Google, from searching for Saloman. This image could not be ignored given repeated mental images of the Merkab recently. Interesting that I’m “wrapping” my mind around the various layers of meaning behind annual, the return to the beginning, represented by the ouroboros (the seeing of something for the first time!) Will post more as my understanding unfolds. Sometimes my muse water drips concepts that can be confusing; Grace in action, I suppose.
"Together, one mind, one life at a time, let's see how many people we can impact, encourage, empower, uplift and perhaps even inspire to reach their fullest potentials."
