Category Archives: Philosophy

The Stars Are Aligning

I don’t know about anyone else, but for me and Britton, at least from our perspective, it seems that when we are going on the right path, we know it. We get signs that encourage us along the way. These can be simple, small things, or large statements. I know it sounds super superstitious, but it’s just been the way my life has always been. I get these serendipitous events that speak to an ever greater web of connections.

This is where one decision or choice or desire impacts another and so on and so forth down the line like a ripple. It’s where Karma and Coincidence meet. Much of these we can’t see too far off in the distance, but we might understand them to be occuring even if we can’t see them. Like the idea of six degrees of separation, or that Kevin Bacon game, or It’s a Wonderful Life -how many people could we track back to us? How many people and things have we impacted? What is our butterfly effect?

Britton and I often talk about the fact that on his and my Dad’s shared birthday when we were just little kids, we were probably in the same restaurant at the same time. Who knows why, but usually you are exactly where you need to be, right now.

Lately, Britton and I have been having all sorts of good signs coming our way. The rental being rented the same day -practically the same moment- it was vacated. The application being turned in just as we were walking out the door to walk Schnoodle. (We even joked that we should go on a walk just to have it happen sooner. ) The citrus trees arriving just as we were about to call the plant company to make sure they’d get there. (I’ll have to write about these new trees!)  That we have managed to arrange JUST enough money to cover buying the place in Rincon. That we have been having the most awesome vivid dreams of living in Puerto Rico. That we have had some advertising interest on our websites. That we have already had about three people who want to rent the place in Rincon from us! That we stumbled upon a really inexpensive management company for our properties here in Colorado.

The more credence we give to these “signs”, the more we seem to receive. We even get signs when we are doing the wrong thing. For example: We had to make some minor repairs in the walls of the rental after the previous tenants gouged them moving the couch out. We patched it and painted it. The color wasn’t quite right. Being perfectionists, we tried to get a closer color. Still not right. Then we found a paint chip for the hardware store to try and match. The person behind the counter had us wait around for like 20 minutes then disappeared. Someone else finally came to help, but the computer gave an error that it couldn’t read it. He tried about 5 more times. We thought, well we could go to the next store and try again. Just at that moment, the paint clerk accidently drops the paint chip into a dark void beneath the counter, never to be seen again. Britton then exclamed “Okay, universe, we got the message. We don’t need to worry about the paint.” 

I think since we are nearing our goal and after working so hard and struggling to get here, we are finally given some slack. Maybe it’s my dad watching out for us. Maybe we’re just being silly and reading into things that aren’t there. But I don’t think it hurts to hope and feel the magic. We never know what’s going on just under the surface. Who knows what might be in the works for us, if we just let it and ask for it. So, we thank you, our Lucky Stars, Dad, Karma, Determination, Serendipity and anything else we don’t quite fully understand! And we thank all the people whose lives have intersected with ours for the better good. We do appreciate it and look forward to more in the future unknown.

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Killing Bugs and Zombies

Well we’ve been busy lately killing all kinds of bugs and zombies. Once you’re done killing one, another takes its place.

Zombies are sometimes harder to kill and can be reoccurring.
Bugs aren’t serious but can be annoying and they grow in numbers.

Cassie and I use ‘bugs’ and ‘zombies’ as metaphors for errands or things that pop up from time to time that need attention. Like for instance my car needs work, and we are trying to find a renter. We also have minor things that get pushed to the background when we focus on these other things. Like in the zombie movies, there are usually a few that need tending too first -the ones about to bite you and eat your brains- and there are all the others that you can see in the distance lurching at you. Yes, and if you let them get to you, you will become one!

I was thinking about it and to me it seems that we seek these things out. My brain(s!) at least tends to find things that need fixing. The problem with this is that something ALWAYS needs to be fixed. I complain about it, but I constantly search these things out and would be bored if I didn’t have them. Kind of a catch 22. In fact that’s all I do at work everyday, kill bugs! (system/application admistration..computer bugs)

There is a Pearl Jam video at the bottom of the post. I remember it from when I was growing up. The lyrics are pretty spot on:

I got bugs
I got bugs in my room
Bugs in my bed
Bugs in my ears
Their eggs in my head
Bugs in my pockets
Bugs in my shoes
Bugs in the way I feel about you

It’s funny but I distinctly remember identifying with this song when I was 18 years old. So this whole ‘bugs’ thing isn’t new to my world. I just have more of them and have become better at killing them so the ones I complain about tend to be bigger.

Bugs on my window
Trying to get in
They don’t go nowhere
Waiting, waiting…
Bugs on my ceiling
Crowded the floor
Standing, sitting, kneeling…
A few block the door

No matter what, you can’t get away from them. They are literally everywhere! The paint isn’t right, the wood needs sanded, the hedge needs trimmed, the car needs vacuumed, the pets need fed and on and on and on.

And now the questions:
Do I kill them?
Become their friend?
Do I eat them?
Raw or well done?
Do I trick them?
I don’t think they’re that dumb
Do I join them?
Looks like that’s the one

I kill quite a few of them but there are some you just have to be at peace with. Things you can’t really do anything about. The funny part of this video is that he totally screws it up at the start. Bugs….

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The Purge Surge

Britton and I have been going systematically through our house trying to purge ourselves of everything that is unnecessary. I’ve found a huge amount of junk that I have no idea why we have kept all these years except maybe that they were our favorites or useful at one point: T-shirts with holes in them, shoes that are falling apart, old bills and papers. I’ve also found some things that are harder to let go like my porcelain doll collection from when I was a kid (that I haven’t looked at in about 8 years!) or some of our furniture (like “Schnoodle’s” couch -we call it that because it is so worn out it is embarrassing to have humans use it but Schnoodle doesn’t mind). But progress and thoughts of Puerto Rico keep the purge surging.


Just one of many bags of old ripped clothes

Each weekend we pick an area or two to focus on. And we’re almost done. We’ve gone through the spare bedroom upstairs. We’ve gone through our bathrooms’ (all three) shelves and cabinets (and threw out a huge pile of old nail polishes and expired vitamins!).  We went through the coat closet and under the kitchen sink. We’ve sorted through the kitchen drawers (a couple of times, because things seem to just get drawn there). We’ve gone through all the Christmas stuff in the basement and under the stairs. We cleaned out the garage. Under the bed. In the cars. It’s amazing how much junk accumulates and all the dust and grime that settles there.


These shoes have got to go!

We’ve thrown out about 8 black hefty bags of stuff that was just pushed to the corners in our house. Stuff that used to be a part of our lives, but now we’ve grown out of so it needs to be thrown out. Other stuff  will be either sold on Craigslist, Ebay or at a garage sale or given to a thrift store.  The standard for keeping something is pretty high. We have to use it fairly often. We have to like it. It has to be in good shape. Or it has to have very high sentimentality. Basically, there has to be a real purpose to it. Otherwise, out!


Still have a ways to go, but at least we can see the floor unlike before!

I have a theory that everything that we do or that happens to us externally is a reflection of our inner world for better or for worse. Really, everything around us is a reflection of us. We created this! So I think that not only are we purging out our junk but also some of the drama in our lives. The drama that builds up in the corners of our minds. Those certain weird vibes that reside in certain people and things. The drama that serves no real purpose but for some odd reason we have a hard time letting go.

All this junk can leave our house, and also our mind.  We will see much more clearly and feel so much better. To me, I have high standards for my home. It’s not that it is the cleanest in the world, but it’s also not a mess. It has a lot of open space for possibilities to come in. But I also want to be selective of what comes into my life. I want to make sure it creates the best chance for success. Your home could be seen as a reflection of your mind. Is it cluttered or neat? Creative or boring? A sanctuary of positivity or a dark den of despair? It’s up to you to create boundaries and kick out the junk when it no longer serves its purpose. Control of your mind…and sometimes even your home can be tough, but you have to stick to your rules and periodically purge. And when all’s said and done, it feels good to get it out!

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It’s a Matter of Life and Death

Usually when we hear that expression we think it must be urgent, it’s an emergency. But really everything we do is a matter of life and death one way or another. I’ve been thinking of the impermanence of our existence (or the seeming permanence of death) and it overwhelms me. I’ve never really thought too much about death before. It just seemed like it was supposed to occur occassionally and so it did. And the people and pets I’d lost to it before my dad had felt like they were going on a long vacation or moving away. They were acquaintances or even with my grandpa, I never knew him that well. I wasn’t as deeply connected as I was with my dad. And so the loss seems so huge.


Is there a light at the end of the tunnel?

With my dad, everything seems to have changed. I just want to know what happened to him. Where he is now. What is going on. How can someone be here with us in this plane of existence and then suddening is not?! And if that is it -we exist and then we don’t-, then what’s the purpose? What’s the purpose of all of this in the first place? There is so much life all across the planet -lifetransplanet if you will 😉 but no one truly understands it.

It’s like we (kind of) understand the biological processes and the chemicals and minerals and all sorts of things, but we don’t understand what that spark is in the beginning or that flame that we carry with us until we die. That same spark that must be in seeds to germinate into trees and plants, frogs, mosquitos, Schnoodle. It’s why we eat food- that spark that sustains our flame. And it’s that same spark that makes us create something out of the “thought realm” like building or remodeling a house, writing a book (or blog!), or creating a data file.

Because what are thoughts? Are they simply the chemical results of our brains’ activity? And if so, why would this thinking create so much of what we see as reality in this world? Every building we see, every car on the road, every THING we have started at some point as a thought-a spark of creativity.

And then, what are memories? Mind travel machines? Why do we yearn to learn so much? Why is so much of our lives spent trying to figure stuff out? To remember so we don’t have to repeat mistakes? To have some connection to those who no longer exist?

And so, if only to confuse us more, then what are dreams? Could our sleeping world be parralelled with the death world as many suppose? Are dreams just there to help us sort out our days and process the things we didn’t have time to process while awake (or alive)? What is our subconscious? We understand so little about our conscious life, but our subconscious? We know even less.

I’ve been having dreams almost every night where my dad either hasn’t died yet or has come back and everyone says “you gave us a big scare” and he just chuckles as he would. I had another dream where we were waiting in the hospital but it was more like an airport -a soul port- and he was a departure (if you think about a hospital, it is kind of like that -people dying are departing and people being born are arriving at the same centralized place).

I didn’t want him to go wherever he was going. I wanted him to stay with me. So we could just hang out and plan the future. So we could talk about things like this -the philosophy of what life and death are without actually having to experience it deep within my being. In my dream when he saw me start to cry, he also began to cry to see me so sad. And I awoke from the dream shaking and crying in “actuality”.

So what is going on here? Why is it that we just walk around our lives completely oblivious to the most important thing: that we only have so long in this form. We do so many things in our lives that are meaningless, or worse: mean! And I suppose we are lucky that we don’t have to think about death all the time or our lives would be weighed down and so heavy we wouldn’t even want to get out there and make something of it. But we have the perfect balance (usually): we understand the impermanence of our situation, and yet we have enough time to create the world we want to see -even if it is just in our home and backyard. And in the process we can change society as a whole for the better. And granted, that is subjective, but I think most people could agree that we want peace, love, joy and cooperation. We want to be treated as good people with something to contribute.

I think it starts with that realization, and it ends when you have fufilled some sort of purpose (or get taken out of the game too early). And it should not just be a realization of ourselves, but of others. Of treating others with respect as the beings that they are on this planet whether animal, plant or human. It is about being kind and also about forgiving.

But in the end, I really don’t know. This matter of life and death is just as mysterious as ever. It’s a puzzle that we’ve been asking throughout the ages over and over again: why am I here? …And where do we go after? Where are you, Dad?

I keep hearing this song lately and feel compelled to listen carefully to it

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