The Rabbit Hole
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" The most important thing in life is love."
-Ozenoz Media
Arguably the most important person at any given time is the person in front of you.
The journey of life is long, and the experience of reality a varied and divinely complex concept that evolves as we do. For instance, when the week “goes by fast” or crawls like there is no end in sight to the hard work of overcoming mental, physical, and emotional barriers to success.
The journey of the spiritual traveler varies in its defined perspective as individually as a person is unique, like every snowflake that has ever fallen. The number of neurons in the brain are as many as the stars in the known universe, a fact that most describes the infinitely diverse duality between the concepts of “fate” and “free will”.
Often I reflect on times that were examples of powerful life events and look to explain, or relate to others what I most wish to be heard. “He who has ears, let him hear”, to me means that some will relate and share, with others the words will fall on deaf ears.
For instance, my life’s path has led me through the straights of the between on a path laden with pain that can only be described as almost “exquisite” in its truth.
As a young adult, I was ridden out of my comfortable upper middle class comfort and alienated from those who I was closest to, or had the most time with. Obviously we all feel like Bob Dylan’s song “Like a Rolling Stone” in this initial phase of being cast out into the world, pushed from the nest, and the song in its deep lyrics also goes on to talk of later situations that our lives can bring to us which push the boundaries of our strength and resolve.
"Once upon a time you dressed so fineYou threw the bums a dime in your prime, didn't you?
People'd call, say, "Beware doll, you're bound to fall"
You thought they were all kiddin' youYou used to laugh about
Everybody that was hangin' out
Now you don't talk so loud
Now you don't seem so proud
About having to be scrounging around
For your next mealHow does it feel?
How does it feel
To be without a home
With no direction home?
Like a complete unknown?
Like a rolling stone?"
-Bob Dylan from "Like a Rolling Stone"
Things that terrify us grow courage and pride, others that confuse us foster a deeper understanding in the broader scheme of things. Some are meant to test our physical limits and the degree we are capable of enduring the process of achieving higher capabilities. This lends itself to coordination in gifts of arts involving our bodies. Some are just mysteries that will carry with us until we reach our passing and what becomes of our spirits in the afterlife, so have it.
Obviously, as displayed by this site, one of my major obstacles is the culmination of mental illness, a specific behavioral categorization of my lifestyle, choices and my path in comparison to the groups or “classifications” of situations in society. Often I feel these things are unfair, but I suppose we all have our cross to bear.
For instance “hearing voices”. We all have this in our experience, as broadly displayed in popular lyrics, bestsellers discussions, religious texts, related stories and simply cognitive awareness. As a bi-polar person the “label” sticks a “delusional lack of understanding” on the most basic of life experiences.
These things are eventually formed into a biased view and a forced relinquishing of mental status, and ability to rationalize competently. Stigma follows with its stinging ridicule, and taunting aggravation, a demeaning and often “disabling” allowance of self confirmation.
Enough of this, and the individual is either feared a hindrance to positive growth for people in their lives, or even a danger to themselves and others.
These things are eventually formed into a biased view and a forced relinquishing of mental status, and ability to rationalize competently. Stigma follows with its stinging ridicule, and taunting aggravation, a demeaning and often “disabling” allowance of self confirmation.
Enough of this, and the individual is either feared a hindrance to positive growth for people in their lives, or even a danger to themselves and others.
Stigma actually kills people.
The end game for those most unfortunate is being cast out onto the streets. Reputation reveals a loaded deck in our lives, families and friends who disown, or attempt to control our lives, and leave us no choice but to struggle in gambling with a loaded deck of cards against us. This leads to a life of disability and lowering of social status and creation of staggeringly painful events.
Being homeless is an experience wrought with more pain and misery than most can even adequately relate.
I remember ending up in Los Angeles, without home, and going through more searing anguish than I thought existed, more every day exhaustion, extreme physical pain, real and near paralyzing fear, and situations I never in my wildest dreams thought I would see.
The first three days there felt like two weeks, the first two weeks like two months. I actually remember counting the days I felt had gone by and figuring it was probably almost eight weeks, later to ask and find that it was only less than two weeks.
The first three days there felt like two weeks, the first two weeks like two months. I actually remember counting the days I felt had gone by and figuring it was probably almost eight weeks, later to ask and find that it was only less than two weeks.
I was walking near thirty miles a day to learn the city, get fresh food, avoid gambles of safety, run from being jumped, hurt, or even killed. I remember hiding in a doorway in Venice Beach listening to the police helicopter overhead stating that they were hunting a murder suspect who was running the beach, and to “stay indoors”.
Once I turned a corner in downtown and found myself faced with a man with a fist sized crack rock he was smoking in a lead pipe with a blowtorch. He was accompanied by a man with an AK47 slung on his shoulder who pointed it at me the entire encounter.
Nearly shot, stabbed, poisoned or falsely charged, the list goes on and on. I didn’t sign up for the job, and it didn’t pay out. There was no safety for me to be found. You are welcome nowhere, and lying down is seen as trespassing, illegal lodging, or worse.
Even when you do lay down, the cold of the concrete sucks the heat from your body, the beach will torment with sand fleas and grit and wind, the grass will have you crawling with spiders and bugs, the sprinklers will douse you and freeze you in the early morning. Save any reprieve in the day, lying down is almost not an option, and when you do, it is at risk of being preyed on.
Once I turned a corner in downtown and found myself faced with a man with a fist sized crack rock he was smoking in a lead pipe with a blowtorch. He was accompanied by a man with an AK47 slung on his shoulder who pointed it at me the entire encounter.
Nearly shot, stabbed, poisoned or falsely charged, the list goes on and on. I didn’t sign up for the job, and it didn’t pay out. There was no safety for me to be found. You are welcome nowhere, and lying down is seen as trespassing, illegal lodging, or worse.
Even when you do lay down, the cold of the concrete sucks the heat from your body, the beach will torment with sand fleas and grit and wind, the grass will have you crawling with spiders and bugs, the sprinklers will douse you and freeze you in the early morning. Save any reprieve in the day, lying down is almost not an option, and when you do, it is at risk of being preyed on.
Walking and physical hardships will put you through more cramping, muscle and ligament straining, bruising, your feet become molded blocks of gnarled and gnarly knots of torture. The heightened mental awareness necessary to be conscious of local events wherever you are, creates a surreal effect on one’s vision and limits the association or ability often to relate to others.
Not to mention the avoidance of suffering through drugs and alcohol.
Finding refuge in this can create inconsolable permanent damage in the course of the life of the “abuser”.
Shelters offer an escape, but come with pitfalls of their own. Disease, and forced compliance to “…program requirements,” make working or outside improvements to escape the system near impossible. Some shelters take away phone priveleges, don’t allow you leave, trapping you in their efforts to get government funds to make money for their “NOT FOR PROFIT” jobs.
Friends become strangers, family become biased tormentors, and gains of monetary and status elevation are almost a lost cause.
I am fortunate, I am pretty sure of it.
The things I have gained in my life are far from the dreams I knew as a young man, but the experiences and strength is a reward which I could not even begin to consider I would have today.
I have a family in my life, I have love in my life, I have peace of mind that I can and will always take heed of the signs that my independent rights are being compromised, my strengths narrowed in perspective.
Never suicidal or homicidal, I have been hospitalized over fifty times for mental illness, forcibly in many ways. I have lived in fifty different shelters, homes, and apartments. I have held fifty jobs, and never once been fired.
How do I feel about my life now?
I feel that these appearances are just that, image. I have the benefit of priding myself in my achievements just as any other person. Because I assert my independence now at all costs.
I feel like I struggle every day still to survive, like the rest of us, but I maintain the belief that we are all truly created equal, and that all lives as humans, are relative.
I realize as I collect further comforts and success, that these hardships will never cease, these hazards will never completely be extinguished. Though they are different in specifics, they are as threatening and willfully hard in experience, they aid the progression of my evolution throughout life.
Never stand for stigma, status rejection, demoralization, or unjust circumstance going ignored.
Stand by you, stand by your time here on Earth, stand by your love, and revel in every loss or triumph as equal gains in the bigger scheme of things. The only constant in life is change, and change the only guarantee. Living for love, and loving yourself both as monster, and model, is the key to wisdom. And wisdom is a gift from above.
You are a gift that you give yourself every day.
"Don’t forget to unwrap it."
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