Pathology of Genius

I drank to drown my pain, but the damned pain learned how to swim, and now I am overwhelmed by this decent and good behavior.

Frida Kahlo (1907-1954)

Slowly over time a condition of pathology has been developing unknown to me. It may have started as long ago as decades. It was most likely a gift for my father who given the gift from his father. It has been most surely aggravated by my lifestyle. Without warning the condition reached a tipping point and erupted in a matter of hours into the most painful event I could ever imagined to experience. I have always considered myself as having a reasonably high tolerance to pain, but this eclipsed any previous understanding of chronic pain.

Acute pain of the type I experienced for nine days can only be described as the most extreme physical suffering and distress, coupled with severe emotional torment. The word pain does not even adequately describe the feeling, a combination of torture, misery, torment; agony and anguish are more accurate definitions of the intensity of the feeling. Consider the moment when you slam, with excessive force, a hammer on your unprotected thumb. Consider that moment of searing, burning, throbbing pain that explodes into white light in your eyes while your nervous system is so overwhelmed by an electrical shockwave that your body can no longer command your legs to stand and you drop to your knees. Consider the feeling of accidentally sticking your thumb into a caldron of white hot molten lead then holding it high above your head to amplify the throbbing drum beat of your heart.

The severe pain I have described is somewhat temporal because your body immediately prepares a survival defense against pain. As the pain reaches your brain, neuropeptides and other peptides, such as the endorphins and enkephalins are poured into your system providing profound analgesic (pain-relieving) effects similar to morphine. Now consider what it feels like if your body has no defense and the pain is unmitigated and chronic, without anyway to lessen the severity of the agony and suffering. Here’s another way of describing the unrelenting torture of the past nine days. Due to my wife’s recent surgeries I have access to fairly powerful pain killers while waiting for a doctor’s to treat me. Consider stacking both Vicodin and Oxycontin on top of one another and eating them like Chiclets with absolutely no reduction in the severity of the agony. Welcome to the “Disease of Kings” or more commonly known as “gout”

In the medical references, attacks of gout are so painful that they are described as being comparable only to the agony of childbirth. Fortunately modern medicine has virtually eliminated severe child birth pain with 90% of women having epidurals. In my defense I’m not sure that those that decide to forego pain medication are in labor for nine days. My doctor indicated that there is only one condition that is more painful than gout which is passing kidney stones and by the way if you don’t treat the gout aggressively it can result in the formation of kidney stones. Oh great!

The word "gout" is derived from the Latin gutta, meaning "a drop," and reflects the ancient belief that the disease was caused by a malevolent fluid dropping into the weakened joints. The problem was that no one really knew what caused gout. For years people attributed it to all sorts of things; Saint Gregory the Great viewed his own gout as a form of mortification visited upon him by the Lord. Less lofty souls simply used their eyes and saw that most gout sufferers tended to be heavy eaters and drinkers who, as was often the case, happened to be either priests or members of the aristocracy.

Gout implies a grand life spent drinking the finest wines or that the road to hell is paved with good vintages. Kings and saints alike have suffered from it. So have great artists. Some sociologists have linked gout with the pathology of genius. Of course, this is all coincidence. Gout may not be a measure of your breeding or status, but in my case it could have been aggravated by many years of fine dining and entertaining of clients.

According to an article in Forbes magazine, “In the old days, treatment of gout was no less primitive than most other forms of medicine. After all, remember that for centuries doctors firmly believed in the healthful benefits of leeching and trepanning (a particularly painful operation, usually used in connection with bad headaches that involved boring a hole in the patient's skull). Not surprisingly, the survival rate was depressingly low and even though gout was rarely a fatal disease, because there was nothing doctors could do to treat it, many of their patients may have wished they were dead.

The closest thing to a remedy was "flannel and patience." The affected joint, most often the big toe, would be propped on a stool and swathed in flannel and the sufferer would simply have to wait in pain until the attack subsided--which could often be up to two weeks. The pain could be so great and the skin so sensitive that even the weight of a bedsheet could send the sufferer into agonies. It was believed that only port and other fortified wines were to blame for the gout but small beer, punch and whiskey were considered therapeutic. Doctors prescribed these in liberal doses although it never seemed to strike them as odd that their patients only got worse.


In the early part of this century a fashionable treatment was to encase the sufferer's foot in a glass boot and use vibration-generated heat to reduce the pain. Unfortunately, more often than not it had the opposite effect: The vibrations would dislodge the uric acid, which immediately went to the kidneys and frequently resulted in kidney failure and sometimes death.”

One false belief was that only port and other fortified wines caused gout. England saw a dramatic rise in gout after 1703 when Pedro II, king of Portugal, decided to ally himself with the British in the War of the Spanish Succession. This resulted in a treaty that allowed Portugal, in exchange for buying British wool, to export its wines to Britain at one-third the tariff imposed on French wines. Everyone, except the French of course, found this an advantageous development and soon Britain was importing Portugal's finest wines in unprecedented volumes. These wines, like many wines at the time, were subject to spoilage and the shippers "fortified" the wines by adding brandy and then stored them in lead casks. Lead, however, is soluble in alcohol and an epidemic of saturnine gout--this is a particular kind of gout that is also found among moonshiners in the U.S. whose stills are also often lead-lined--erupted across the British Isles.”

The cause of gout is the accumulation of urine acid in the blood which begins to crystallize into needle like crystals in the joints. Elevated levels of urine acid in the blood are a result of digesting a type of protein that is high in purines. Treatment of gout requires limiting food high in perines as well as taking a pill everyday for the rest of my life, because the disease is incurable. It sounds simple enough until I looked at the list of food high in purines which includes, red meat, seafood, lamb, organ meats, duck, mushrooms, asparagus, alcohol, poultry and just about everything else I enjoy while fine dining. In simple terms if I like it, I can’t eat it and if I don’t like it, I can eat as much of it as I like. It is a great way to become anorexic. I’m not sure this diet is going to work well with me. Take anything you want but don’t take away my ability to dine well on the road it’s the only thing that makes travel bearable. Like the old NRA advertisements you can have my foie gras when you wrench it out of my cold dead fingers.

Just in case we have the opportunity to meet in a fine restaurant some time in the future, I want to profusely apologize in advance for my behavior. You will know which is me, I’ll be the one in the corner with a plate of seafood with asparagus, a vodka martini and a wonderful mushroom consume screaming “Son of a Bitch that hurts” as I hobble into the night. Just nod your head at another victim of the Pathology of genius.

The more severe the pain or illness, the more severe will be the necessary changes. These may involve breaking bad habits, or acquiring some new and better ones.

Peter McWilliams

Angel Of Healing

Let me take your sorrows
Let me drown your pain
Give me all the troubles
That run through your veins
I can extinguish the hurt
Just let me hold it in my hands
I can squeeze it into nothing
If you just show me where it stands
Hand to me all your problems
Let me cover you in light
I may be your ordinary angel
But let me heal you tonight

Tatianna Rei Moonshadow

The Instinct of Hope

Tomorrow is a day of recompense of which the future is uncertain. Once again a surgeon’s cold steel will exorcise evil in the weakness of flesh. Hopeless to change what is written in blood of the innocent, breathless I shall wait for fate to be revealed. In the darkness of the night the landscape is barren except for the warm glow of the instinct of hope.

Is there another world for this frail dust
To warm with life and be itself again?
Something about me daily speaks there must,
And why should instinct nourish hopes in vain?
'Tis nature's prophesy that such will be,
And everything seems struggling to explain
The close sealed volume of its mystery.
Time wandering onward keeps its usual pace
As seeming anxious of eternity,
To meet that calm and find a resting place.
E'en the small violet feels a future power
And waits each year renewing blooms to bring,
And surely man is no inferior flower
To die unworthy of a second spring?


John Clare (1793-1864)

Cradle of Inspiration

The finest piece of mechanism in all the universe is the brain of man. The wise person develops his brain, and opens his mind to the genius and spirit of the world's great ideas. He will feel inspired with the purest and noblest thoughts that have ever animated the spirit of humanity.

Alfred A. Montapert

True inspiration has its origins in many aspects of life, some more direct and immediate, others subtle requiring reasoning and discovery. Seeking inspiration is a primary tool for the creative process of an artist. In its purest form inspiration is an energy that stimulates the mind contrary to the established path of thought and consciousness, allowing new paths to be explored in a mind expanding experience. These new pathways stimulate neurons that alter perception and reasoning to the degree that revelations occur. Consistent with any life force, creativity is energy that ebbs and flows in intensity and magnitude providing periods of abandonment and periods of abundance. The challenge of the artist is to continuously mine copious amounts of inspiration to fuel and sustain the creative process over extended periods of time.

Understanding the need to accumulate creative inspiration is the easy part, while capturing the source of inspiration in sufficient quality to sustain innovation is a much more elusive endeavor. Each individual establishes a personal methodology for acquiring inspiration. For some inspiration is gained while exceeding personal limits of endurance while hiking mountain peaks, while other look inward to in contemplation and meditation, but everyone one is unique in the method of seeking and quality of inspiration required to function in the world. Admittedly some in society are devoid of creative pursuit never finding the need to challenge their perception of life, comfortable to reside in a familiar environment, always resistant to change.

One of my fundamental sources of creative inspiration is devouring an exceptionally wide universe to subjects and topics. Board exposure to the arts, literature, science, philosophy, engineering, design, geography, culture and history dumps an enormous amount of information into the crucible to be dissected and broken down to its fundamental elements. These rendered pieces of reasoning and thought bump into each other forming new combinations of connections and postulations needing exploration. Each discovery of a new source of information is savored as it adds new favors and insights to the crucible

The recent board meeting conducted in Montreal provided me a rare opportunity to find a wealth of creative energy which has fueled me for the last month and conceivably for many months into the future. The source of the inspiration is the other members of this nation board from which I participate with. Individually each one is what I would consider brilliant and driven toward pioneering leadership in new and emerging areas of practice and theory. They are all within their intellectual prime and are recognized internationally as the steward of a movement. This particular board has a focus on environmental infrastructure, so each of these diverse thinkers is committed to environmental change on a global scale. The most rewarding of all is than these individuals are not just committed to change they are actively redefining the world as we know, which adds to the inspiration for me. Observing and discussing how one takes creativity energy and effectively applies it with success to real world problems places creativity in a powerful context.

Our Meeting Place, Old Town, Montreal. Phot by Mr. Blue

Arriving to the hotel early I run into Scott in the lobby and decide to grab a late lunch around the corner at a small French bistro. As I order a glass of wine, we catch up on the intervening months since our last board meeting. Scott is one of the world’s leading authorities in industry ecology, a new science which has emerged as the focus of considerable interest in urban planning circles. Industrial ecology is an interdisciplinary study of technology, society and ecology that sees industrial systems (for example a factory, an eco-region, or national or global economy) as being part of the biosphere. Industrial ecology is the shifting of industrial process from linear (open loop) systems, in which resource and capital investments move through the system to become waste, to a closed loop system where wastes become inputs for new processes.

Unfamiliar with the concept Scott explains, the industrial metabolism, that is, the flows of energy and materials through socio-economic structures, is seen as the major driver of environmental burdens and threats to sustainability. Technology in its function of transforming energy and materials into goods and services, and inevitably also into wastes and emissions, is seen as a key to more sustainable solutions. As we eat lunch Scott receives a call about an industry swap meeting he organized before coming to Montreal. He is excited to know that the event was a huge success requiring the participants to be run out of the meeting room after running over by three hours. The focus of the meeting was to allow industrial manufacturers in the area to swap and trade post manufacturing waste and excess materials. With a sense of glee while concluding his call, Scott informs me the swap meet resulted in thirty five trade agreements which represents waste diversion of millions of pounds of materials now to be looped back into the manufacturing process of products and services.

As we finish lunch another board member, Steven is strolling past the restaurant on the cobblestone street. We tap on the window to get his attention and wave at him encouraging him to come in and join us. Smiling Steven nods while heading toward the door. Warmly we greet our old friend as he sits at the table. The small talk covers the usual topics as we catch up until we begin to discuss professional activities. Steven indicates that he is in the process of collecting photos for a new textbook on Biophilia. I ask Steven to define Biophilia and he begins with Harvard biologist Edward O. Wilson, PhD, who coined the term biophilia in his book by the same name in 1984. Dr. Wilson argued that human beings have an innate and evolutionarily based affinity for nature. He defined the term as “the connections that human beings subconsciously seek with the rest of life.”

Excited to share a conversation about his passion, Steven continued with Kellert, who co-edited The Biophilia Hypothesis with Wilson in 1993 and more recently wrote Building for Life in 2005. In which defining the concept of biophilia as “a complex of weak genetic tendencies to value nature that are instrumental in human physical, material, emotional, intellectual, and moral well-being. Because biophilia is rooted in human biology and evolution, it represents an argument for conserving nature based on long-term self-interest.”

As his hands begin to moves with greater exaggeration Steven moves on to Judith Heerwagen, PhD, a psychologist whose research has focused on the relationship between buildings and psychological well-being and who has written widely on the subject, suggests Biophilia, has evolved as an adaptive mechanism to protect people from hazards and to help them access such resources as food, water, and shelter. In a friendly challenge knowing that Steven will take the bait, I ask him why Biophilia matters.

Animated he begins pounding the table, stating we should care about biophilia in building design for two primary reasons. First, it is becoming increasingly well demonstrated that biophilic elements have real, measurable benefits relative to such human performance metrics as productivity, emotional well-being, stress reduction, learning, and healing. And second, from an environmental standpoint, biophilic features foster an appreciation of nature, which, in turn, should lead to greater protection of natural areas, eliminate pollution, and maintain a clean environment. The discussion culminates is a jovial round of laughter as we chide Steven that he needs to seek professional help to deal with his obsession.

Looking at his watch, Scott says that Michael and Rick two other board members were going to grab a taxi together and should be in route from the airport. He flips open his cell phone calling Michael to get an idea of how long it would be before they arrived at the hotel and suggests that they drop off the luggage and head to our restaurant to have a cocktail with the crowd. About twenty minutes later they stroll in the restaurant bundled in thick coats to protect them from the cold. As the handshakes and smiles continue, I suggest we move to a larger table in front of a large rustic stone fireplace with an inviting roaring fire. As we settle in and order a round of cocktails, Michael declines and asks for some hot tea.

Looking much thinner than the last board meeting, Michael indicates that stomach still has not recovered having just returned from Lomé the capitol of Togo a country in West Africa bordering Ghana. Since the last board meeting, Michael resigned his position at one of the greenest development companies in the nation and started his own green venture capital company. After discussing the reason for his transition, the conversation turns to why he was in Africa. In an absolutely fascinating story, Michael explained how his new company is developing a distributed green power infrastructure for the country using biomass energy generators.

To many people, the most familiar forms of renewable energy are the wind and the sun. But biomass (plant material and animal waste) supplies almost 15 times as much energy in the United States as wind and solar power combined—and has the potential to supply much more. There are a wide variety of biomass energy resources, including tree and grass crops and forestry, agricultural, and urban wastes. It is the oldest source of renewable energy known Biomass is a renewable energy source because the energy it contains comes from the sun. Through the process of photosynthesis, chlorophyll in plants captures the sun's energy by converting carbon dioxide from the air and water from the ground into carbohydrates, complex compounds composed of carbon, hydrogen, and oxygen. When these carbohydrates are burned, they turn back into carbon dioxide and water and release the sun's energy they contain. In this way, biomass functions as a sort of natural battery for storing solar energy. As long as biomass is produced sustainably—with only as much used as is grown—the battery will last indefinitely.

From the time of Prometheus to the present, the most common way to capture the energy from biomass was to burn it, to make heat, steam, and electricity. But advances in recent years have shown that there are more efficient and cleaner ways to use biomass. It can be converted into liquid fuels, for example, or cooked in a process called "gasification" to produce combustible gases. Current agricultural practices in Togo is to burn the fields after harvest to remove the stubble, which is a major contributor to the poor air quality of the county while releasing huge amounts of carbon dioxide. Michael’s plan was to collect and use this agricultural biomass to fuel the power generators.

After discussing the culture, economy, geopolitical influences, government and obstacles in Togo the conversation turns to the financial model Michael was proposing to fund the five hundred million dollar investment. In a brilliant plan, Michael using a World Bank loan will sell on the international market the carbon credits generated by the biomass energy recover to pay the investors since biomass energy is carbon neutral. After five years of operation the biomass energy will generate sufficient carbon credits to pay off the investors, allowing Michael’s to turn over the entire national power infrastructure to the Togo government. I sat there in total amazement thinking about how Michael was poised to take a country of over eleven million residents making them independent of oil using sustainable power in a matter of five years. I always talk about changing the world, but here is someone that is doing it. What an inspiring discussion that was for me.

The group turns to Rick to ask how his architectural practice is was proceeding. Rick is a principal in a firm that specializes in Biomimicry which is a relatively new science that studies nature, its models, systems, processes and elements and then imitates or takes creative inspiration from them to solve human problems sustainably.

In the 1997 book, "Biomimicry: Innovation Inspired by Nature", Janine M. Benyus introduced the concept. We spend some time discussing the numerous examples of men and women who are studying some of nature's most wondrous achievements including photosynthesis, natural selection, self-sustaining ecosystems, etc., and then, "... consciously emulating life's genius," to improve manufacturing processes, create new medicines, change the way we grow food or even harness energy. Rick explains that Biomimicry principles instruct us to: build from the bottom up, self-assemble, optimize rather than maximize, use free energy, cross-pollinate, embrace diversity, adapt and evolve, use life-friendly materials and processes, engage in symbiotic relationships, and enhance the bio-sphere. By following these principles, you can create products and processes that are well adapted to life on earth.

I look around the table and realize that the entire board is present with the exception of Dan. We decide to call Dan see if he wants to join us in front of fireplace. Ten minutes later the board of directors is complete as Dan opens the door and heads toward the table. With a close clipped beard of salt and pepper, Dan is the original hippy who decided to join the establishment in order to make a difference. Dan’s area of expertise is environmental law and his firm represents a dozen of the most recognizable environmental nonprofits in the nation. This board is just one of more than ten boards he is a member of. Recognized as a brilliant thinker, Dan is a voracious reader of science and technology journals providing him an informed opinion in a vast array of technical subjects.

As a lawyer Dan always has the final say on official opinion and enjoys the mantel of devil’s advocate. He has become the ring leader of the board. Many times during past board meetings he has spoken about his crazy Uzbekistan clients that he had to entertain. While ordering a glass of vodka, Dan makes another reference to drinking vodka with a couple of friends in Moscow. I finally decide to ask Dan what the hell he was doing in Russia and with that Dan revealed his early work in the law firm before he was partner.

Apparently his law firm was hired by the newly formed Uzbekistan government after the fall of Russia to negotiate leasing of the oil and mineral resources of the county to western investors. The firm’s senior partners were experienced in the land title issues but needed someone with an environmental background to work through the regulatory requirements. So as a budding attorney, Dan volunteered to head to Russia and learn international environmental law. As Dan is explaining the complicated process of working during the formation of the new government, I suggest that the environmental regulations were probably lax during those early days. To my surprise Dan says that since the government was being formed they allowed the first environmental laws to be write by University professors and as a result the newly written laws were so of the most restrictive and complicated in the world. Under Uzbekistan law any lease holders were liable for all past environmental sins and were required to correct them. Since the overriding environmental mitigation was so costly that no one would be able to sign the lease agreements. Dan would work with the government to structure very complicated leases which would manage some environmental restoration early, but the more onerous restoration would be tied to future lease revenues.

His stories are filled with the colorful wild characters, wide open emergence of organized crime, shady backdoor agreements and a party like Wild West frontier. As the stories flow I take the opportunity to sit back a look at the group around the table, each individual an accomplished passionate professional in the peak of their career. Each one a wealth of knowledge and experience, each one an inspiration. Collectively, they are a group which is capable of changing the course of history. I am privileged and honored, if not a little intimidated to be a part of this group of friends. Knowing that these moments of true inspiration are fleeting, I drink in the joviality and friendship while sitting around a roaring fireplace in a beautiful restaurant while the snow blows past the windows. In a few days we will be once again scattered to the four corners of the world, experiencing new stories to share the next time we meet. Until we meet again I shall reach repeatedly into this cradle of inspiration.

"Leadership can be thought of as a capacity to define oneself to others in a way that clarifies and expands a vision of the future."

Edwin H. Friedman

The Blackness of Gravity

A Perfect Storm of Turbulent Gases in the Omega-Swan Nebula, Photo by NASA

“Gravitation is a natural phenomenon and one of the fundamental forces by which all objects with mass attract each other. In everyday life, gravitation is most commonly thought of as the agency that gives objects weight. It is responsible for keeping the Earth and the other planets in their orbits around the Sun; for keeping the Moon in its orbit around the Earth, for the formation of tides; for convection (by which hot fluids rise); for heating the interiors of forming stars and planets to very high temperatures; and for various other phenomena that we observe. Gravitation is also the reason for the very existence of the Earth, the Sun, and most macroscopic objects in the universe; without it, matter would not have coalesced into these large masses and life, as we know it, would not exist.” (Wikipedia, 2008)

Beyond a critical point within a finite space, freedom diminishes as numbers increase. ...The human question is not how many can possibly survive within the system, but what kind of existence is possible for those who do survive.

Frank Herbert (1920 - 1986), Dune

The kinematical and dynamical equations describing the trajectories of falling bodies are considerably simpler if the gravitational force is assumed constant but bodies never fall in unison. This theory is useful to explain the dilemma we all face in the search for happiness and spiritual balance. Humans by their nature, encoded deep into their being are solitary souls that preserve a secret world of existence that is inaccessible to all. I call this the secret garden where we sequester our hopes, fears, desires, and the inner realm of our dreams. Over the course of a life we allow precious few to glimpse past the door of the garden. All of us float in isolation in space subject to the attractive or repulsive forces of gravity. Our family, friends, relatives, mentors and strangers all exert the force of gravitation on us to varing degree. In thermodynamics the closer two bodies are the greater the gravitational bond, although this might not be the case with spiritual influences.

As the gravitational pull grows within the closest of relationships an elliptical orbit is established which represents a balance of energy for a small moment in time. We find our selves falling into comfortable orbits that may or may not allow the individual to nourish and tend the secret garden. As relationships build and families grow the gravitational forces change and shift, creating new orbits some of which are closer, others than travel further from the nucleus. It’s most important to realize that at any moment in time everything is in constant motion and dynamically changing. Each new experience, each new acquaintance, each new flower in the secret garden changes the balance of gravitational forces in our lives. Relationships in order to survive must allow orbits to change and seek new balances. Excessively close orbits can implode and collapse like a black star, consuming all light and energy, destroying both bodies. These orbits are inherently unstable and destructive, but the pull of gravitational forces appears too great to overcome creating a death spiral in the secret garden as the blackness of gravity blinds us.

The Aristotelian theory of gravity was a theory that stated that all bodies move towards their natural place. For some objects, Aristotle claimed the natural place to be the center of the earth, wherefore they fall towards it. For other objects, the natural place is the heavenly spheres, wherefore gases, steam for example, move away from the centre of the earth and towards heaven and to the moon. I like to think that all bodies move towards their natural place eventually overcoming the influences of gravitational forces that traps us into artificial or obsolete orbits. Therefore is becomes our primary challenge to find our natural place where the secret garden flourishes. We must always be moving toward finding the natural place regardless of the consequences, because denial of this state of balance is spiritual destruction and emotional bankruptcy. In this balance a new series of orbits will be established that foster personal growth and fulfillment.

This explanation oversimplifies the inherent contradictions in life which is the duality of existence. Gravitational forces are just one example of the duality of life, being pulled in two directions by opposing forces. We all seek to balance between opposing forces in seeking happiness. Yet it must be understood that happiness is illusionary always fleeting and can not be guaranteed without constant toil and mental exertion. Each of us must always tend the secret garden, unending in our journey to find those precious few souls which we can allow for a moment in time a glimpse past the door into the garden. Over the years, I have become comfortable with the duality of life, since most of my existence is bifurcated by travel, a constant state of disconnection. Acceptance of the duality of life in seeking our natural place, our balance, while always in motion and changing is the essence of spirituality and emotional bliss.

Many religions embrace the struggle in finding balance in the duality of life. Hinduism seeks enlightenment through the acceptance of Advaita or the concept of oneness with the duality of life. Advaita (a+dvaita = non-duality) simply means that the Source, by whatever name known - Primal Energy, Consciousness, Awareness, Plenitude, God - is Unicity, Oneness, Non-duality. The manifestation that arises or emerges from the Source is based on duality, the inevitable existence of interconnected opposites: male and female, beauty and ugliness, good and evil. At any moment there are bound to be interconnected opposites. The sage accepts the duality that is the basis of life and is anchored in peace and tranquility while facing the pleasures and pains of life exactly like the ordinary person. The ordinary person does not accept the duality, the existence of interconnected opposites at any moment of life, chooses between them and is unhappy.

In the teachings of the Yoga of Devotion Retreats, the sage accepts the 'duality' of life; the ordinary person chooses between the interconnected opposites, and lives in the unhappiness of 'dualism'. The man of understanding certainly sees preferences being made in daily living between the polaric opposites, but is totally aware of the fact that the preferences happen according to the individual programming in each case, and are not made by any individual person doing the preference. The man of understanding is, therefore, always in tune with the Source or in balance with gravitational forces. When the final flash of total understanding happens, it is not at all unlikely for the individual to realize the unbroken wholeness of the universe and to clearly see the whole range of polaric opposites as a great illusion or a play of a feigned quarrel between lovers.

Another source of insight and inspiration on the challenge of duality is from a chapter in the book 'The Tao of Physics'. A basic conjecture in Tao, the Chinese philosophy is that there is an underlying equilibrium of two opposing forces in nature. The Chinese call these the yang and the yin. The yang symbolizes the masculine nature of reality, the rational, calculating, analyzing side; whereas the yin represents the feminine, the more sensitive, delicate, conscious side of things. Chinese believe that all human life is interplay between these two forces, and equilibrium is desired between the two for a smooth functioning of things.

This duality is not only seen in human nature, but also in all things in life. Every aspect of life has this dual nature, or rather everything has these seemingly opposite extremes to itself. Good-evil, success-failure, life-death, expansion-contraction, up-down, positive-negative are all examples of these opposites. The greatness of Tao and Hindu philosophies lies not in the realization of this duality of things, but in overcoming the so-called opposite natures of the duality, and realizing the underlying unity in them. It is the art of seeing good in evil or success in failure and living between the lines in harmony.

The duality of life is most prominently in conflict between our inner secret garden and the world around us which requires allegiance and strict codes of behavior. Whereas our dreams, hopes and desires more often lead us into an orbit which is in conflict with the gravitational forces that are pulling us in another direction. It is the inability to escape artificial or obsolete orbits which fuels conflicted emotions and ultimately creates greater and greater instability as one suppresses the need to seek the natural space of self actualization. Living to sustain another’s orbit is not living at all, its indentured servitude of a life denied.

In the early 20th century, Sigmund Freud attempted to define the duality of the human mind with the psychoanalytic model of the id, ego, and superego. Freud posited a structural model of the mind in which these three parts interacted and wrestled with each other for dominance; the result of this constant struggle is the whole of each human's behavior. The gravitational forces that we place upon ourselves are also in constant motion, ebbing and flowing attempting to seek a natural balance. Any state of emotional equilibrium is fleeting as we grapple with new thoughts and experiences.

The term id is derived from Latin meaning inner desire and is dominated by the pleasure principle standing in direct opposition to the super-ego. “The id is responsible for our basic drives such as food, sex, and aggressive impulses. It is amoral and egocentric, ruled by the pleasure–pain principle; it is without a sense of time, completely illogical, primarily sexual, infantile in its emotional development, and will not take "no" for an answer. It is regarded as the reservoir of the libido or "love energy".”

The super-ego tends to stand in opposition to the desires of the id and acts as the conscience, maintaining our sense of morality and the prohibition of taboos. Freud's theory implies that the super-ego is a symbolic internalization of the father figure and cultural regulations. Fractured relationships with one’s father can manifest itself in an over compensation of the super-ego at the expense of the id or keeper of the secret garden.

“The ego is the mediator between the id and the superego; trying to ensure that the needs of both the id and the superego are met. It is said to operate on a reality principle, meaning it deals with the id and the superego; allowing them to express their desires, drives and morals in realistic and socially appropriate ways. It is said that the ego stands for reason and caution, developing with age.”

“When the ego is personified, it is like a slave to three harsh masters: the id, the super-ego and the external world. It has to do its best to suit all three, thus is constantly feeling hemmed by the danger of causing discontent on two other sides. It is said however, that the ego seems to be more loyal to the id, preferring to gloss over the finer details of reality to minimize conflicts while pretending to have a regard for reality. But the super-ego is constantly watching every one of the ego's moves and punishes it with feelings of guilt, anxiety, and inferiority. To overcome this, this ego employs methods of defense mechanism. Denial, displacement, intellectualization, fantasy, compensation, projection, rationalization, reaction formation, regression, repression and sublimation were the defense mechanisms Freud identified.”

As we struggle to seek a natural state of balance it is easy to see how both internal and external forces can create conflicted emotions which can paralyze an individual, manifesting into feelings of helplessness, confusion and conflict ultimately laying the foundation for depression. All of us must embrace the duality of life recognizing that some actions of self survival may be viewed as instability in the orbits surrounding us. Acceptance of the duality of opposing forces allows us to embrace adjustments in our orbit by the ones that love us the most, for it is a principal of natural law that no orbit can remain static or fixed. As a result no one should expect to keep someone confined to an orbit that is in conflict with the natural place of self balance.

Outlining a framework for happiness is the easy part, actually finding and maintaining that natural state of grace is a life long pursuit, a journey without end that will take us to places unimagined. We should not fear where the attractive forces of nature may take us as long as it toward balance where the secret garden flourishes and dreams are realized. I have found that taking my hands off the wheel, eliminating the desire to steer and manage gravity, is the most empowering feeling of all. Seek out whose individuals who make the garden grow, allow the gravitational forces of attraction to move you to your natural place or otherwise fall into the blackness of gravity.

The great majority of us are required to live a life of constant, systematic duplicity. Your health is bound to be affected if, day after day, you say the opposite of what you feel, if you grovel before what you dislike and rejoice at what bring you nothing but misfortune. Our nervous system isn't just a fiction, it's part of our physical body, and our soul exists in space and is inside us, like teeth in our mouth. It can't be forever violated with impunity.

Boris Pasternak (1890 - 1960), Doctor Zhivago

In the space which thought creates around itself there is no love. This space divides man from man, and in it is all the becoming, the battle of life, the agony and fear. Meditation is the ending of this space, the ending of the me.

Krishnamurti

Propitiation of Faith in the Blood of the Innocent

There is no pain, you are receding.
A distant ships smoke on the horizon.
You are only coming through in waves.
Your lips move but I can’t hear what you’re sayin.
When I was a child I had a fever.
My hands felt just like two balloons.
Now I got that feeling once again.
I can’t explain, you would not understand.
This is not how I am.
I have become comfortably numb.

Pink Floyd

“Suffering is one very long moment. We cannot divide it by seasons.”

Oscar Wilde (1854 - 1900)

In the silent darkness of the heart of the night my soul searches for strength to face the spilling blood of the innocent. Do the origins of faith reside in the uncertainties and cruelty of destiny? Is the path to spirituality and acceptance of the inequalities inherent in life found by the trial of fire and pain? Does atonement seek the path of least resistance in the suffering of those most innocent? How do I ebb the rising anger in my soul which consumes my flesh and clouds my mind like a vile poison? It would be easy to steel my emotions and allow my thoughts to drift to the blackness, a world without hope, a life without compassion, an eternity of isolation where pain is held at bay. What justice can be found in the continued torment and suffering of those pure in heart, those who represent the light of the world? I can not understand what lesson is to be learned from the spilling of the blood of those live with the grace of angels, those that have changed so many lives, those that embody all that are good and kind, those that have already suffered intolerable trials of spirit.

Once again the storm clouds of uncertainty approach as I look to the horizon, indifferent to those who stand in the path of fury. After six weeks of wistful calm a second medical opinion casts a shadow of doubt over us once again. A new series of tests on my wife’s mysterious black mass had resulted in another more ominous conclusion of cancer. As if all previous trials of suffering were unable to shake my wife’s unyielding positive view of life, this diagnostic message was targeted at the most consuming fear of all, a long painful and undignified death. Unlike all other tests of faith, she collapsed into a deep depression unable to confront the possibilities of what this might mean. It has been a difficult personal journey concealing our burden from all as we wait for the fog of uncertainty to clear revealing the invariability of the path before us. Standing in the shadow of the future we hold our breath wondering if it is possible that the propitiation of faith will cheat death from its ultimate reward and prevent the spilling of the blood of the innocent.

“You desire to know the art of living, my friend? It is contained in one phrase: make use of suffering.”

Henri-Frédéric Amiel


What though the radiance which was once so bright
Be not forever taken from my sight,
Though nothing can bring back the hour
Of splendour in the grass, of glory in the flower;
Grief not, rather find,
Strength in what remains behind,
In the primal sympathy
Which having been must ever be,
In the soothing thoughts that spring
Out of Human suffering,
In the faith that looks through death
In years that bring philophic mind.

William Wordsworth (1770 - 1850)