Why Would Anyone Want to Play or Bend Reality?

by Downhillskater.

For someone who rarely touches coffee and soda pops, someone who doesn't care for cigarettes and prefers natural highs over altered states, someone whose alchohol vocabulary is limited to ordering drinks by color...

I feel like PURPLE today... Can you make me a purple cocktail???

I would think that I am an unlikely voice for mind altering substances.

But what do you do when you see something change someone's life? Something out of the ordinary? I debate writing about it. The world is too simple and judgemental.

Who needs to hear a story about transformation where families re-connect and lives are regained... when the hunger is for misery and pain? Who wants to hear about doctors going against popular politics because they are saving lives by unconventional means?

Somehow in the sane-ness that is my life, I have intersected at a junction that looks like insanity to the common mind but is a portal of possibility under another realm.

I am the girl who doesn't drink coffee and doesn't care about the latest fashion cocktail. I've never done acid and being on LSD meant that I was literally driving up Lakeshore Drive.

Shall I share what is on my mind? I debate with myself... How narrow is my mind?

And ...

How narrow is your mind?

More thoughts to come....

On Being Brutally Honest

by *helmen.

What is being brutally honest?

The dictionary defines "brutal" as extremely ruthless or cruel,
or crude and unfeeling,
or harsh and unrelenting,
and lastly as disagreeably precise or penetrating...

My friend encouraged me to go to an open call for an upcoming reality relationship show that is seeking people that are "brutal and honest" and I found it very interesting that everyone has a different flavor of the definition..

For some, being brutally honest is like being like a machete in a relationship with an attitude of take no prisoners, perfect for the ruthless and cruel position.... communication with casualites.... MY MY MY how sophisticated... Now if the goal is to create connection, I would say such "brutal honesty" is not conducive to peace and understanding... if anything it is mindless and unfeeling as well. I would also vote that it is also very disagreeable but may be questionable in being precise.

Precision is a skill. Ask any marksmen, any strategist, any artist, any technician... anyone going for a GOLD MEDAL... precision is distinct from just shooting away.

So I listened to my fellow auditioneers as they displayed proudly their brutality...and wondered if this reality dating show is out to capitalize on pathology and neurosis. I showed up because I've been defined as "brutally honest" by my friends and family. I think I understand myself as the "unrelenting" definition in the game of life and my friends would be in agreement.

Unrelenting means....

having or exhibiting uncompromising determination.

If all of us are dreaming and searching for love, I find it interesting that people are willing to teach people to UNLOVE with their brutal honesty. NO ONE wins in the end with that strategy.

Isn't love a WIN-WIN game? I think you can be brutally honest with someone you love and be loved more for it... and yes, it may be difficult to grow and mistakes and shortcomings will be on the plate... but maybe being unrelenting towards an ideal or target of love can be the best brutality you can practice.

Not Naked Enough?

I find it interesting that no matter how vulnerable and in the space of naked truth I stand, it is still found questionable. Afterall, there REALLY must be something else behind me, something absolutely dark and with ulterior motives.

If I am happy, it's "wrong and not fair to someone else." If the way that I present myself is not in the exact way someone wants and they want to be even more privy, it's judged that I "have trust issues." If I say that I think Life is perfect and that I even see within the dark moments space to feel alive and passionate, I am questioned about my confidence.

Am I the party pooper or am I being pooped on?

"Just who do you think you are, Miss Little Girl?" someone asked last week. At first I wanted to clock him because I didn't like feeling wrong for me being myself. But I got that I wasn't his style and maybe I seem like an alien being in comparison to the world of people in his life.

"I'm being myself."

With everyone having so many styles and different sets of expectations, it makes sense that I live my style and not live for the sake of meeting someone else's expectations. People can be frivolous anyway and change their mind as to what makes them happy and ANYWAY, everyone is growing up and trying to figure out life. We're ALL in our own personal soups.

Thankfully these abrasive moments meet the balm of true friends around me who know how to listen to my nakedness with a bit more grace than the person stepping on my toes. I actually make them happy and that makes friendship conducive. I wish these conflict lovers would get a clue. Oh well.

Here's to the mystery of life.