Heresy

The power of choice

This heresy is another result of my experience from reviewing the Landmark Forum last weekend.  The truth is that the number of distinctions during the course would give us a whole year full of heresies.  So here goes one of these heretic distinctions: deciding is opting for an alternative after carefully considering the reasons we have or do not have, choosing is selecting an alternative based on freedom, based on Nothing, connecting to the core of our being, with our own essence, that is, choosing does not depend on reason, we choose simply because we choose to.

The thing with decisions is like Ruben Blades puts it, behind each decision, there is “someone who wins, someone who loses”, basically because my reasons will always be incomplete.  They will never be enough.  My reasons are my reasons and seen from another standpoint, there is a million more reasons.  That is to say, life is full of reasons, but they mean nothing.  Reasons are simply the product of the way you look at things.  That is why decisions are susceptible to questioning, that is why the result of such questioning is inevitably a judgment based on the perspective of existing reasons.

The heresy lies in the choice, as an alternative to the decision.  Choosing from on Nothing, choosing simply because you choose to.  We can make choices when we are really in tune with our self.  When we have greased the cable that connects us to our heart.  When we live knowing that our essence recognizes the alternative to our happiness.  The magic of choosing is that you don’t need a reason, or you can even go against all existing reasons.  The power is infinite because that choice comes from the deepest corners of our being, because it is our choice.

Choices may not be understood.  That’s okay. They don’t have to be understood.  The most important thing is to experience the power of choosing, because we are at liberty to do so, because our choices are the reflection of our intimacy with our own heart.

And, as Ruben Blades say: when we decide... "someone loses, someone wins, Hail Mary!"

                    

Fascination

I have had the calling to be a teacher ever since I can remember and I played teacher more that I played house; I was a teacher for my friends through school.  After that, I was a TA at college, I started out as a college professor even before I graduated from my Bachelors degree.  I have been a professor at the Universidad Javeriana Graduate School for almost seven years and I am still at awe over everything this experience has brought into my life, so many lessons learned that I am breathless every time I think of the faces of my students, with their names written in front of me, their questioning eyes, their comments, their doubts, their concerns, but above all, their presence in my life.  Feeling how they have become a part of me and they are going to live in my heart forever: they became my teachers, my friends… life has been so generous!

All my life, I have felt the judgment and the urge to “protect” myself, hiding to avoid more judgment and criticism; this has created walls built by the fear and the pain, and that made me create the image of a “witch” toward my students, until their generosity let them see the twinkle in my eyes, the sincerity of my smile and they came to embrace my soul.  I thank them for being so patient and for knowing how to discover me once and again.

My heresy is that we hurt ourselves even more by protecting ourselves.  Our idea of protection is a layer of selfishness that will not allow us to share the most beautiful thing we have: our own essence.  My heresy is that we should stand before the Universe with our soul exposed and offer our being with generosity: our brother and sister souls will come to us and we will receive the fascination of infinite love, acceptance, true friendship.

I cannot help but smile when I think of them.  We went out to eat a couple of days ago and I had a conversation I would have never dreamed of with them; we embraced each others’ souls, laughed, smiled and cried.  They spoke to me using words that only true friends use.  They questioned me like only love can question.  They embraced my essence and there were no spaces between us.  We were already a cosmic amalgamation that, regardless of the paths our lives may follow, will remain a part of our lives.  I am fascinated by this gift from the Universe.  I love them deeply and thank them for each moment shared.  These students, others, that I might never seen again, those who passed through my life many years ago and have never come around again, all the beautiful souls, thank you for making me grow.  I will say it again; I love you from the bottom of my heart and with all my insanity!

Here is a video that they, the ones from the dinner, will understand …

Niagara on a bike

It happens to all of us.  At some point in life, we feel like we are going over "the Niagara on a bicycle", like we are going down the wrong way on a one-way street, or vice versa, we feel like what we have at hand is not enough to deal with our current challenges, even the little ones, like our clothes don’t fit us...

Then the dominos start to fall, one after another, more difficulties arise, there is always more bad news, like Juan Luis Guerra says: "...don’t tell me the doctors left, don’t tell me there’s no anesthetic, don’t tell me they drank all the alcohol and the thread was sewn onto a tablecloth...". Don’t tell me, but they tell me.

The musical heresy for today is meant to find the positive effect that we need in Juan Luis’ cheerful notes, when the only thing we have is a bicycle and we are going over the Niagara Falls, and finally, the wisest part of the song, “take it easy Bobby, take it easy”.  My heresy is that no matter how great the challenge and how absurd the situation we are in, we have to keep in mind the words of the “nurse with Ben-Gay hands” and find peace in our soul, simply “knowing” that everything is going to be all right.  Because it is all right.  At the end of the day, today is perfect and so will be tomorrow.

When you least expect it, we will have the Niagara behind us, perhaps the bicycle will be there too, and we will be fully empowered by the experience, with the tools for the next Niagara that gets in our way!

Translation Note:  This heresy takes the lyrics of the song “El Niagara en Bicicleta” and interprets them into life. To fully understand it you should listen to the song and translate the lyrics. 

                        

Our souls in the air

A commonly accepted paradigm is that we have to live “with our feet on the ground”.  This way we think we are acting like the adults we are supposed to be, many times choosing “our feet on the ground” (our interpretation of whatever that may mean) over the alternative of what it would be like living in our own freedom, practically choosing what is accepted because we think that is the right way to do things…

I have an idea.  Let’s live life “with our soul exposed”.  I mean, let’s live like we want to live, not like we are “supposed” to live.  Let’s live unprotected, without the restrictions of caveman ideas that limit our essence; live and gamble our existence because our own happiness is worth it; live fully aware of the fact that each smile is the best reward for the risk we take when we simply do not prefer other people’s criteria over our own vibes.

My heresy?  In the end, truly living “with your feet on the ground” should not mean that we have to please a society that is alien to us, but rather that we should take responsibility for our own happiness and simply live "with our soul exposed".  My heresy is that the most intense act of personal responsibility, maturity and good sense is precisely a life lived without the limits of our skin, fully committed to our essence.  If you want to have your feet on the ground, you have to learn to let your soul free, you have to feel the adrenaline from taking the most heavenly risk: giving your all for your own happiness.

Here is Alejandro Sanz and his “Alma al aire” [Soul in the air].

     

When nobody is watching me

Who are you when nobody is watching? With whom in your life can you be whom you are when no one is looking?  I bet in most cases you are yourself with one or two people, and I wonder what keeps you from simply being yourself, as if no one was watching, but when everyone’s eyes are on us?

My heresy today is an invitation to try to be whom we are when no one is watching, our authentic self, with no makeup, masks, chains, walls, brakes, fears. Because in the end, what keeps us from being ourselves is actually the fear of what others think of our true, naked self, and the irony of it is why be afraid if the others will never be completely pleased.  There will always be those who do not like the way we are or who we are pretending to be.  In our yearning for approval, we loose ourselves.  We loose that wonderful, fun being that we are when nobody is watching.

I say fun because I also bet that when we think of whom we are when we are ourselves, it puts a smile on our face.  Perhaps we talk to ourselves, sing or dance… Whatever we are, there is sure to be a smile behind the mask.  So why not let it show?  Why not give the world the most extraordinary being we have inside, who we are when, like Alejandro Sanz put it, “our skin is no limit". 

So let’s live as if our skin was not the limit to our being.  This leads me to some words that I love and I believe are anonymous wisdom:

 

            "Work like you don’t need the money,

            Love like you’ve never been hurt and

            Dance like there’s no one watching"

Me and I

It’s that simple: me and I.  The primary, ultimate reality, the perennial truth. Existential loneliness is feared by most of us off-guard pedestrians on this planet, and to avoid it, we have invented a number of frankly unnecessary stimuli, in an attempt to disconnect for a moment from the mirror of our soul, from which we cannot disconnect: our own selves.

I say we should celebrate it.  I propose a heresy of celebration for our own individuality.  At any time, even the muddiest of times, we are whole, perfect and complete.  At any time, we can have the universe inside our heart, if we stop to listen to ourselves, celebrate ourselves, embrace ourselves, live the "me and I" intensely.

And just how do you celebrate the blessed experience of existential loneliness?  Silence is your best ally in listening to your own thoughts with clarity, because at times, you are so caught up in getting away from yourself that you mistake the voices of the world with your own and you believe you are thinking when, in reality, all you are doing is repeating.  Space, nothing and “Me and I”;  at the beginning, it will be awkward, but when you find in the nothingness the perfect space for your own communion, you will feel the grandeur of living under your own skin.

I give to you the timeless wonder of ABBA, singing "Me and I", which is nothing more than me and I...

Making love out of nothing at all

I was lucky to live and enjoy the 80s in my 20s (like the Pareto Principle); the Alf hairdo, the ridiculous pink and light blue eye shadow, the leggings with heavy socks on the outside (like a rainbow of colors), MTV’s newly invented videos, the belt falling to one side on top of a long shirt, the long messy hair and, of course, Air Supply singing the unintelligible lyrics (because we couldn't speak English) that we loved to death, all the absurdly intense, platonic romance that was even impersonal at the time, because rather than being in love with someone, we were in love with love.

One of the biggest hits of the decade was "Making love out of nothing at all".  I think I have sung the song about one thousand, three hundred and eighty seven times, but just now am I beginning to understand its true meaning and I have brought it into this sacred heresy: we are powerful because we come from love, we were created in a moment of infinite love and our unlimited power consists of the fact that we are capable of creating love in an instant, out of nothing, that is our choice.  In an instant, we can turn day into night if we give enough love to our purpose.  In an instant, we can connect to an unknown soul and build a bridge that will take us into infinity, build love, make love.  

In an instant, we can give all our light and create a dream of love that will make us infinitely happy.  In an instant, we can even decide to make love to our own soul and love ourselves in such a way that it will make us ONE with our own essence, with our own light, in an instant, if that's what we want, if that's what we choose to do.

Today, my request and personal exercise is to make love out of nothing, particularly to me, give my unlimited love to the light of my own soul, in an instant that will stay alive, that will re-create itself for all eternity.  Today, the invitation is to exercise the unlimited power of our love, to start from nothing and give the generosity of our love to everyone and to ourselves.  Today, my invitation is to make love.

Here is MTV’s Air Supply video… I hope you enjoy it as much as we enjoyed it back then!

Are we human or are we dancers?

"The Killers" raise an interesting question in their song titled "Human": are we human or are we dancers? What do we do after our umbilical cord is cut? What do we do when we're in front of an open door? Are we human and do we have normal, proper, and expected responses? or are we dancers and take a risk and look for our own pace and even dare to make our own music?

Today my Heresy is based on the premise that life does not evolve around the destination we have set ourselves, but around completing our journey towards that destination, around the experiences we live, the doors we open, and the music in which we believe. Today my Heresy is an invitation to be less "humans" and more "dancers". I love imagining that the universe is playing the tune of a song that I do not get to hear, and yet drives me to dance. A song that slowly takes me to unexpected roads filled with challenges, questions, and learnings. At each station there is an obligatory stop to explore and dance for a while before continuing our journey carrying a suitcase full of questions and our soul enriched with experiences.

And you?, are you human or are you dancer?

P.S. I must admit that there's been a lot of controversy and different opinions about this song. Some interpret dancers as someone who must be part of a well orchestrated choreography and moves like everybody else. Human, on the contrary, is someone whose heart beats with its individuality. A dancer is a puppet and is encouraged to "cut off the strings". I have a different interpretation. Despite this, I present this heresy for your reflection and comments.