The fourth chakra is green, verdant, and located at the chest, the sternum. It controls love and empathy, charity and catharsis, fraternity and belonging, jealousy and contempt. Its energy can be controlled by the stones Jade, Rose Quartz, and Malachite. After the being accepts that, even with all its faults and benefits, it is a complete and whole entity, it looks out into the rest of the world and sees Every Other Being. Every Other Being, like the first being, has gone through the exact same struggle: Primal creation to passion to contentment, and must be respected as much as the first being respects itself, no matter how much Every Other Being might differ from first being in appearance, personality, or disposition.
A parable was created this year to help in explaining the Fourth Chakra process:
1. One Fires, They All Fire: The Fourth Chakra operates like cardiac muscle. Unlike smooth muscle, which is basically just tubular sphincters used to transport fluid and whatever down a corridor, and although very similar to striated muscle, which contains protein striations which attach to each other and push and pull against each other to manipulate bones and extrabodily matter, the striations in cardiac muscle go in-between muscle cells so that the striations of one cell connect to every other cell in the heart. When electrical impulses transfer from the SA node to the AV node, the spark hits one cardiac muscle cell and sets off a chain reaction to the others like a ping-pong ball in a mousetrap factory. This synchronized display of strength generates the energy needed for the heart to pump blood throughout the entire body through miles of vascular tubing. In other words, when your Fourth Chakra is open, the love you feel for the world goes out to everyone in the world. You cannot hold back because of one person or group of people. It doesn't work that way. Even the most despicable, odious person who maligned you the the worst way possible deserves your time and attention and love. You love one, you love all. Or you love none.
I'm supposed to be writing about Tchotchke, the girl who permeates most of the second half of this journey. I'm supposed to be writing about the many trips we had this year, road trips and flights, Arizona and St. Louis, and oh so many to her alma mater in Milwaukee. Supposed to be waxing nostalgic about our Tuesday Date Nights in the Glen, appetizers and a Six Pack, sneaking candy into the movies for the double features at the Wilmette Theater, cooking "Zucch-anoes" for me, and dinner at Culver's every chance we could. Supposed to be writing about her battle with endometriosis, going to support groups together, my reaction after her decisive laparotomy, and her, bandaged and recovering, sitting front row at one of my shows. Writing about the epic arguments, the phone calls three, four, five, six times a day, the constant fact-checking behind every decision I made, her intense reactionary temper and fabled Irish drinking skills. About family gatherings, her golden impression upon my huge family, her small, intimate holiday affairs, her genuine interest into the world of the Deaf, and what to do when the vegetarian has to carve the Thanksgiving turkey. And too much more to give her complete justice on paper.
But I'm not ready to do that right now.
This year was my most successful as a professional actor. Six auditions, four gigs, two of them paid, and one allowed me to travel. First was an improv show through Second City. I hesitate to mention it was through the Training Center, as most people stop caring after they hear that. At audition we had one scene where we reacted to a run-over cat, and dear me, someone had to play the cat, right? Damn skippy! Second, a horror movie shot out of Milwaukee. One of the few gigs I knew I had nailed right from the audition. The commute was purgatory, shooting schedule worse than hell, but I had my first feature film under my belt less than two years out of school, and I was proud. There was that fruity little insect parade for some small theater downtown, but that's not really worth regurgitating, at least not in great detail. Third was a script my then-roommate wrote and self-produced. I don't get many leading roles and was damn happy to oblige, yet I yearned for something edgier than a story straight out of DC's Elseworlds universe. Held a summer internship with a monologue festival where I got to work with Frank Caliendo's girlfriend, hold the keys for the old ComedySportz theater, and had my bike stolen. Fourth and finally was a three-month, nine-state, ten-thousand mile excursion through the Midwest playing Huckleberry Finn for grade schools everywhere. My childhood dream of doing vaudeville was finally coming true, slowly and painfully, one dank rural elementary school basement after another.
This is the year I started on-line journaling. I hate the word "blog"; prefer to call it my "website", as if the term alone gave it more credentials. Created one for Uncle Freddy as well. Wrote, recorded, edited, and produced three episodes of the radio show this year alone, including one completely on tour from hotel rooms, just because I could. Used the open forum of the website to start burying the hatchet with the girl I divorced three years earlier, and she responded in kind. All of this stuff, the original writings and audio clips, still exist online and are easy enough to find. My dayplanner writings get very ornate and condensed. I record all 175 shows on the road, with individual snippets about each. My Sunday pilgrimages in Humboldt Park, although sweet and picturesque, with a brisk walk through the PR barrio, pale in comparison to everywhere else I've trekked. I pick up a string of jadelike beads in Sedona and construct my own 4th chakra mala along with the developing patchwork stalwart, but being on the road and low on funds gets me experimenting with different materials, wire and hemp twine, for Year Five.
----------------
Now playing: The Killers - All These Things That I've Done
21 September 2008
20 September 2008
10 September 2008
Eulogy: Everything Must Go
You will leave unfinished business.
This is one of the hardest lessons you will have to accept.
Plans will be left undone. People will be left hanging.
You will not meet expectations.
Accept this:
At one point in your life,
the end,
the people who cared about you most,
who put up with you through everything,
will wish you could have done just a little bit more.
More oomph.
More wow.
They saw so much light in you,
but now you can't give enough.
No matter how much you've done,
they want to see what you can do
tomorrow.
Disappointing.
Disillusioning.
Sad.
Nothing is ever enough.
You give and give
and they remain insatiable.
Makes it seem not worth your time
to do anything.
You're not happy
And they'll never be happy.
Besides,
you do less damage
when you do nothing.
If you don't affect anything,
you can't make it worse.
You can remain
impartial
a benchmark
an oasis
Someone people come to
for comparison
measurement
comfort
It's not a bad existence.
But
A life without effect equals a life inert.
No friction, no movement, no noise.
In the grand microcosm of you,
all your greatest accomplishments
resonate
only within the shell of yourself.
Resigned to the will
of others' perception.
You are solely
what they make of you.
And sometimes they get the message wrong.
You say, "I love you."
They read, "Olive loaf."
And you wonder why that happened.
Impartial, nonjudgmental
becomes
Unfair, self-imprisoned
Crossed wires blocking all,
straining out the meaning
and killing this link between us.
With a life like this,
who needs to live?
The last page in our books
all read the same.
Might as well go peacefully
and without struggle.
Until
the miscommunication gets edgy
peevish
a boil.
Not only do they misread,
they spit back
the same thing
they swore they got from you.
And it stings.
You've lost who you are,
and they don't know you.
As hermetically sealed
as you are,
it's enough to make you implode
Outward.
They cannot take this from you.
You are someone.
You stand for something
honest and vibrant
hard-fought, resounding
worthy of someone's time
for all time.
They better damn well get the story right
and enough with the bloody spitback.
So
with every faculty at your disposal
with any ability you can conjure
with whatever method you still have left
you must
build those bridges
unsnap those gates
break through those walls
even on the brink of extinction.
You were made in the image
of Divine Inspiration
and your name must not be taken
in vain.
Tell the world.
Show them all.
Rouse up their ires with your
flippant stylistics
extensive verbosity
and a smile that leaves 'em simmerin'.
And although
the countdown keeps tickin',
the deadline approaches,
and total system failure is imminent,
to make sure you and I
see eye to eye,
I will continue to make plans,
agree to meet up,
and shatter your mind with my cause
well after I've worn out my welcome
even though every step
takes me closer to the void.
At the end of it all,
even in the face of losing everything,
you must have unfinished business.
'Tis the only way to truly live.
----------------
Now playing: Muse - Sing for Absolution
This is one of the hardest lessons you will have to accept.
Plans will be left undone. People will be left hanging.
You will not meet expectations.
Accept this:
At one point in your life,
the end,
the people who cared about you most,
who put up with you through everything,
will wish you could have done just a little bit more.
More oomph.
More wow.
They saw so much light in you,
but now you can't give enough.
No matter how much you've done,
they want to see what you can do
tomorrow.
Disappointing.
Disillusioning.
Sad.
Nothing is ever enough.
You give and give
and they remain insatiable.
Makes it seem not worth your time
to do anything.
You're not happy
And they'll never be happy.
Besides,
you do less damage
when you do nothing.
If you don't affect anything,
you can't make it worse.
You can remain
impartial
a benchmark
an oasis
Someone people come to
for comparison
measurement
comfort
It's not a bad existence.
But
A life without effect equals a life inert.
No friction, no movement, no noise.
In the grand microcosm of you,
all your greatest accomplishments
resonate
only within the shell of yourself.
Resigned to the will
of others' perception.
You are solely
what they make of you.
And sometimes they get the message wrong.
You say, "I love you."
They read, "Olive loaf."
And you wonder why that happened.
Impartial, nonjudgmental
becomes
Unfair, self-imprisoned
Crossed wires blocking all,
straining out the meaning
and killing this link between us.
With a life like this,
who needs to live?
The last page in our books
all read the same.
Might as well go peacefully
and without struggle.
Until
the miscommunication gets edgy
peevish
a boil.
Not only do they misread,
they spit back
the same thing
they swore they got from you.
And it stings.
You've lost who you are,
and they don't know you.
As hermetically sealed
as you are,
it's enough to make you implode
Outward.
They cannot take this from you.
You are someone.
You stand for something
honest and vibrant
hard-fought, resounding
worthy of someone's time
for all time.
They better damn well get the story right
and enough with the bloody spitback.
So
with every faculty at your disposal
with any ability you can conjure
with whatever method you still have left
you must
build those bridges
unsnap those gates
break through those walls
even on the brink of extinction.
You were made in the image
of Divine Inspiration
and your name must not be taken
in vain.
Tell the world.
Show them all.
Rouse up their ires with your
flippant stylistics
extensive verbosity
and a smile that leaves 'em simmerin'.
And although
the countdown keeps tickin',
the deadline approaches,
and total system failure is imminent,
to make sure you and I
see eye to eye,
I will continue to make plans,
agree to meet up,
and shatter your mind with my cause
well after I've worn out my welcome
even though every step
takes me closer to the void.
At the end of it all,
even in the face of losing everything,
you must have unfinished business.
'Tis the only way to truly live.
----------------
Now playing: Muse - Sing for Absolution
04 September 2008
Third Chakra: Sketchpad
2004. I returned home from Vancouver back to my parents' basement. Again. Sorta had to. Ran out of money 9 months in and had to radio home for more. Cashed in my 401k from Iowa, too. Flat broke. Drew a hard line for myself. From here on out, there's just some things I wouldn't do. I can't always end up like this. Once I leave, I have to be gone. I can't get as sick as I was last year, again, either. I wasn't gonna stick around here long. It was up, up, and gone.
Last year's caper should've put me in jail. A cop stop early in the year should've kept me there. Cosmically driven story: Workouts equalled Randhurst equalled reunion equalled Our Town equalled absinthe equalled contraband. Squeaked out cleaner than expected. Met the girl who broke my dry spell through all that. A calendar year to the day, and a Full Moon to boot. In fact, this was my most promiscuous chakra. Only three women, but the quality of sex was par excellance. Two were Wiccan feminists, two were Irish princesses, two were professional intellectuals, two were S&M fethishists. That summer was the teenage rebellion I never had. First started working for corporate coffee. Broke my own rule about relationships at work. What started as an easy catch and a playful fling became the start of a 2-year testament to romantic endurance and a taste of a more privileged life.
Actingwise I was just starting out. Film fans found each other over coffee and American Prophet was born. Rolling Thunder at Roosevelt University. Mid-year I moved downtown and was itching to get my feet wet. An essay by David Mamet and good friends gone by gave birth to Uncle Freddy. Lent my voice to the Mad Hatter and my magic hands to the menorah. Shopping for headshots and searching the web for publicity. None of this stuff pays, just a labor of love.
Spiritually I was all over the map. Spent half of New Years' Eve at an OTO gnostic ceremony. Later I experienced a Wiccan New Moon. A brief stint at Trader Joe's taught me Kai-zen. Actually attended a nearby Buddhist center, an attempt at organized religion. Vancouver infected me with the knowledge of Sacred Geometry. Along with my patchwork mala, I wear a yellow jade one from the Buddhist Temple. My incense, my Avalokitesvara Bodhisattva pendant, my cosmic radio, all remnants of Richmond pilgrimages.
Paris occurred this year. I can't come up with enough flowery words to lavish upon this experience. Most awesomest tour guide ever-est. "Where do you want to go today?" And she took my hand and we went. I'm cogitating verbs in my head while she walks right up and starts conversations. She knows the hidden spots, little cafes and the right times to do when. Something got stolen from the Louvre while we were there, but 'twasn't La Giaconda. Dirty Sanchez on TV and francais-chinois cuisine. The sewer system, carriage ride at Versailles, and Naked and A Sartori in Paris at Shakespeare's. Got myself lost on my Sunday Morning excursion, and she was so wonderful to return to. My sparkly lighter got confiscated on our layover at Georgia. Couldn't replicate that experience with anyone else, ever. Thank you, Tchotchke.
There's lots more for this year, but I'm impatient to get this one out.
The third chakra is yellow, sunny, and located at the solar plexus, the diaphragm. It controls breathing and relaxation, happiness and contentment, center and balance. Its energy can be controlled by the stone Citrine. After the being has considered the consequences of its actions, it must accept its capabilities and shortcomings and learn to see itself as complete and whole. It must harness tolerance, patience, and steady nurturing in order to support the potential which lies inside.
----------------
Now playing: Better Than Ezra - A Lifetime
Last year's caper should've put me in jail. A cop stop early in the year should've kept me there. Cosmically driven story: Workouts equalled Randhurst equalled reunion equalled Our Town equalled absinthe equalled contraband. Squeaked out cleaner than expected. Met the girl who broke my dry spell through all that. A calendar year to the day, and a Full Moon to boot. In fact, this was my most promiscuous chakra. Only three women, but the quality of sex was par excellance. Two were Wiccan feminists, two were Irish princesses, two were professional intellectuals, two were S&M fethishists. That summer was the teenage rebellion I never had. First started working for corporate coffee. Broke my own rule about relationships at work. What started as an easy catch and a playful fling became the start of a 2-year testament to romantic endurance and a taste of a more privileged life.
Actingwise I was just starting out. Film fans found each other over coffee and American Prophet was born. Rolling Thunder at Roosevelt University. Mid-year I moved downtown and was itching to get my feet wet. An essay by David Mamet and good friends gone by gave birth to Uncle Freddy. Lent my voice to the Mad Hatter and my magic hands to the menorah. Shopping for headshots and searching the web for publicity. None of this stuff pays, just a labor of love.
Spiritually I was all over the map. Spent half of New Years' Eve at an OTO gnostic ceremony. Later I experienced a Wiccan New Moon. A brief stint at Trader Joe's taught me Kai-zen. Actually attended a nearby Buddhist center, an attempt at organized religion. Vancouver infected me with the knowledge of Sacred Geometry. Along with my patchwork mala, I wear a yellow jade one from the Buddhist Temple. My incense, my Avalokitesvara Bodhisattva pendant, my cosmic radio, all remnants of Richmond pilgrimages.
Paris occurred this year. I can't come up with enough flowery words to lavish upon this experience. Most awesomest tour guide ever-est. "Where do you want to go today?" And she took my hand and we went. I'm cogitating verbs in my head while she walks right up and starts conversations. She knows the hidden spots, little cafes and the right times to do when. Something got stolen from the Louvre while we were there, but 'twasn't La Giaconda. Dirty Sanchez on TV and francais-chinois cuisine. The sewer system, carriage ride at Versailles, and Naked and A Sartori in Paris at Shakespeare's. Got myself lost on my Sunday Morning excursion, and she was so wonderful to return to. My sparkly lighter got confiscated on our layover at Georgia. Couldn't replicate that experience with anyone else, ever. Thank you, Tchotchke.
There's lots more for this year, but I'm impatient to get this one out.
The third chakra is yellow, sunny, and located at the solar plexus, the diaphragm. It controls breathing and relaxation, happiness and contentment, center and balance. Its energy can be controlled by the stone Citrine. After the being has considered the consequences of its actions, it must accept its capabilities and shortcomings and learn to see itself as complete and whole. It must harness tolerance, patience, and steady nurturing in order to support the potential which lies inside.
----------------
Now playing: Better Than Ezra - A Lifetime
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