The Canyon of Excuses

I newly heard an old tale today. It is about the Canyon of Excuses.

It is old, because the canyon had existed since the beginning of humanity. It sounds new, because most of us think of it as "the pit of harsh reality" or as some of us like to call it "the valley of perpetual unfairness." It is a canyon that has been passed by many travelers, some earlier than they were meant to. It is a place many travelers have fell into in the past and perished. Some have even never dared crossing it. (Un)lucky for us, the part of humanity that lives in developed countries can find the means to survive in the canyon, at the cost of only our dreams. At least, we get to keep our lives. Isn't that a good thing?

This is typically how the old story goes... New humans appear in the peaceful, but somewhat limited "Land of No Responsibility". In this land things are always simple and are full of guides and laws for every little thing. It sounds like the best place to be. However, as time goes on, humans get bored, as they generally do and start to have dreams of something more. At this point they are told of this land far and away where their dreams can come true. In fact, people from that land show up often in No Responsibility to tell everyone how they have managed to achieve their dreams. As with everything in this land, a path is also laid out to get to where this promised land is. Driven by dreams, or through sheer boredom, or perhaps driven by their ego, humans set off on this long journey to the promised land.

Things start to get very difficult for the young humans as they leave the land of No Responsibility. There are less and less guides and they are required to do more and more things on their own. Some of them manage to drag the guides along so that they can have everything taken care of along the way. The guides can go only so far though. And soon the humans find themselves on their own and having to rely on each other, if anyone at all.

The path eventually ends at an interesting place. In front of them in the distance the humans can see the wonderful land that they were promised. However the land looks devoid of any guides. As far the eyes can see, it is full of humans who are making their own efforts to take care of all their needs. And they look remarkable. Some of them appear to be creating food out of thin air. Some of them are dressed in clothes that were unimaginable in the land the young humans left behind. Some even appear to be creating buildings from the ground by just thinking about them. All appearing to be extraordinary, so much, that the young humans conclude that all those powerful humans were just lucky to be born with talents like that.

To add to their discouragement, there is a huge canyon in front of them. In order to reach the promised "Land of Maturity" they would have to jump over this canyon. Of course, many of them conclude, only talented and special individuals can achieve their dreams in that land. Some of the crazy humans do not wait. Leaving their guides and everything else behind, they run towards the canyon and jump, landing awkwardly on the other side, hurting themselves somewhat in the process. The "smarter" humans decide to examine the canyon. And even "smarter" ones, decide to turn around and go back.

The ones examining the canyon eventually discover that it also has humans down in it, some of whom even have guides with them. Its true that the guides look worn out but at least it is a familiar sight. And they seem to be not doing incredible tasks like the ones in the promised land. Some of them even call the young humans to come down into it. "Don't go to the promised land yet" they say, "You won't be able to handle it. Come down here where its safer." A lot of youngsters feel that the humans in the canyon just read their minds, and decide to go down there. A lot of them try to deny it and try a weak jump and fall into the canyon anyway.

The orientation is quite brief. It is very comfortable in the Canyon of Excuses. It is painful and dull but at least it is a comfortable kind of pain. And it is not like they are not planning to go into the land of Maturity eventually, once they are fit enough, thin enough, tall enough, smart enough, or get lucky with a superpower, they will climb back up. But until then, the canyon is comfortable. And it is comfortable for many for their whole lives.

Princess and Career

The following link raises an important point that there is more a girl can do than being a princess.
Supreme Court Justice Sonia Sotomayor Visits 'Sesame Street' To Talk About Careers (VIDEO)

Although it is a valid point, I would have to somewhat disagree with the approach. It really comes down to the definition of what a princess is, and there are many views on that. Although there are no organization that would hire you to be a princess, there is nothing wrong with being a princess and having a job that can be called a career.

I believe that when girls (including myself) say that we want to be a princess, we actually refer to a state of being rather than a job that you can get fired from or get promotions in. Even though it may not be an actual job, it still has an important role to play and it is much more than a reference to an outdated monarchy. A princess is someone who inspires others. They cause movements (like Princess Leia). They represent strength, like a warrior princess. They don't necessarily have to be born in a royal family (a lot of Disney Princesses were not and some had other jobs). Many princesses including the Disney ones fight for what they believe in and are willing to endure hardship for a cause they believe in. I would go as far as saying that many feminists are also princesses.

I know a lot of the characters I am referring to are fictional but it is the spirit behind the character that is important. The power of fiction is sometimes overlooked and often misused in our society.

There are challenges to being a princess as well. For example, the "title" can often make someone become egotistical. And they have to do the work needed to realize that a princess does not have a function without the other people she interacts with. And in addition to that many businesses may exploit this desire of young girls to be a princess by selling to them the "right way" of being a princess.

I think it would be better to point out to the young girl (or boy) that that they can be whoever they want to be, even a princess, regardless of their career which is a separate thing. And that they can also be a "grown up" princess and it is also fun.

One Billion Rising on the Day of Love

On the 14th of February 2013, one billion people worldwide will rise to show that they represent the part of humanity that has decided to stop gender based violence. I think it is a significant event that is part of humanity's puberty and its eventual maturity.

As far as I know, on average females go through puberty earlier than males. This event will contain the women and men ("early bloomers" one might call them) and people from the various points in the gender spectrum who are ready to go through one of the next steps of humanity's maturity. They are the ones who are willing to take the step to asserting that gender is not an excuse for violence and that at least this one-third of humanity will not consciously participate in any violence anymore and will not tolerate the existence of violence in our space.

It is part of our conscious puberty. Love, which is also by its nature incompatible with violence, will be celebrated towards the goal of the non-existence of violence. As the sun rises in each country on the 14th of February, the wave of our conscious intent to cease the existence of violence, will sweep across the planet one longitude at a time.

And I hope that it will continue to do so until the remaining two-thirds of humanity catches up with us.

I will be in Victoria at the time and so I will celebrate it there through my physical form. In spirit I will be there with all of humanity all over the world.

Here are the events in Victoria:
https://www.facebook.com/events/498439303528919/
https://www.facebook.com/events/418579004863377/
https://www.facebook.com/SacredCircleRising

Here is the main global website:
http://onebillionrising.org/

Young Princess and Presents

I love presents. I love birthdays, Christmas, Valentines, Eid, Just-because-I-felt-like-it days and many other occasions that creates an excuse to give and receive presents.

Presents are pretty. When I receive them, my treasury gets bigger and new colors and shapes get added to its picture. I like them for a few seconds while receiving it, and a few seconds before and after using it, if they are usable. I love them while using them. I love them while talking about them to other people, including the one who gave it to me. Talking about it allows me to relive the moment of happiness that I experienced when I first got it. That moment which made me feel as if I just expanded to include one more item into my identity. It is that moment, when I am not just a princess with a 1,000 presents, but a princess with a 1,001 presents. Its an occasion to celebrate, because I just grew. Hopefully I'll get more presents as a result of the celebration and grow more. Maybe if I keep receiving presents, I will grow bigger than everyone else and I can be a princess with 10,000 presents someday, and then have a celebration to make it into 10,001.

Sometimes I give myself presents too. I go to a store and see something on sale or something that can be fit nicely into my treasury. Being really really smart, I also can find many ways to fit a simple thing into my complex castle system. Stores are really nice sometimes. They package things together to give me all the products I need to oppose those mirrors that tell me that I am ugly and cursed. Some presents are so useful, that they can distract me for hours so that I do not even have to look at mirrors. I can look at a TV screen instead that contain people who are prettier than the images I see in the mirror.

There is another kind of excitement that comes from presents and this takes even less work. This one is the happiness of giving presents. I love giving presents, especially to the human mirrors. These human mirrors are much nicer than the glass mirrors. They say much nicer things to me and sometimes I feel that half of my treasury should go to them, but then again they seem to be way more powerful and awesome without a huge treasury. I find it surprising that they still get so happy from getting presents from me, even after being so awesome themselves. Its so much fun. All I have to do is find something that I think will match with their colors and it doesn't even have to be as perfect as my presents. And the best part is that I don't have to do ANY work to create the emotion of happiness when the present is given. All I do is give the present and the person receiving it does ALL the work of creating the emotion all by themselves. And then I can feel the emotion by proxy. It is so much easier than having to do the work of liking my own presents by myself.

I wish I could learn how they create happiness for the present. Shhhh... don't tell them that I don't know how. Maybe if I stay around them long enough and they give me enough presents to practice on, I will eventually learn how to be happy with the present itself and not just with myself for having 1,001 presents.

The Orgy of Countless Particles

It started with a soft but firm caress, my head following her gravitational lure and then caught in his comforting grasp. Her soft furry embrace was surrounding me in an instant, while his firm stance ensured that none of us would fall away freely.

To say that it "started" that way is speaking loosely. It is the pre-pubescent princess trying to assert that things do not exist until she acknowledges their beginnings. Perhaps it had started way before that, much longer ago than I can fathom. Maybe it was planned for eons without my knowledge. Or perhaps it was decided impulsively. Regardless, by the time I became aware of it, there was no way of stopping it.

Before I could finish my thoughts of asking myself what was going on, the sensations were all over me. Simple signals going along my nervous systems carried by cells that are changing some sort of electrical potentials across some membranes (or what not), were enough to make me moan shamelessly at every sensation. No warnings, no preparation, just one massive orgy manifesting like a flame that I wish could blaze on forever. Only after the waning of the initial shock, I had realized that the foreplay had happened earlier disguised as something very innocent, and the consent had already been taken, or else the flame wouldn't have even manifested.

I thrashed around in their embrace as they overwhelmed me. They held me as they usually do every night, seemingly lifelessly, but something had happened today. The disguised lifeless objects have suddenly transformed into a harem of lovers. But perhaps they always were like that, and it was I who was too far removed from reality to know who I was. I was too busy ignoring the signals that went through my nervous system to realize that they have been patient lovers for years, just waiting for me to love them back.

While my body rocked in an orgasm, still being held in their loving grasp, I started seeing them for who they truly are. While my genitalia wondered how it was even possible that it had been left out of the loop of such an epic event, my mouth uttered the words "Oh... My... God..." There was no end to that phrase. I am not used to calling out the names of my lovers during sex. Also, I did not think that labels such as pillows, bedsheets or blankets were good enough words to express the depth of who or what those forms represented now. In hindsight, "...they are full of stars" could have been a good ending to that phrase, but even that wouldn't have captured the truth of it. So I kept repeating the conditioned incomplete phrase as I was carried away in the waves of pleasure.

In between the waves, I wondered about the humans involved with the creation of the forms that were surrounding me: The one who invented the process for making the blanket, the one who designed the fabric of the bedsheets, the one who decided on the softness of the pillow. Did they have any idea how much pleasure their actions have led to? And then there were the people involved in the various industries that made it possible to create such forms. I only knew the name of one of the humans involved, other than myself, but only because he wrote the book that played a major role in the foreplay. Then there was the question of my own form, my own body with this specific genetic code. Whether its creationism or evolution, there was an unimaginable amount of sex and survival that happened from that time to now, which had created me in this form to experience this moment of ecstasy.

The ecstasy and joy of particles, is what it was. The blankets, bedsheets, pillows, body, gravity, air, sensations, everything were particles and the space between them. "Objects" in space. The particles that make up my body may have rushed passed the particles that make up the pillow on their way out of the Big Bang. They may have said hi to each other on the way and they are meeting again after eons. Has the orgy happened only last night or has it always been happening since the beginning of everything? After all, all the particles were once in there before the bang. Did people put that much thought into the name "Big Bang"?

Tears started streaming down to my ears as I laid there and laughed. Tears of joy, made of particles and space yet again. It was funny that I didn't see this before. It was funny that I could be such a slut and a pervert in some areas of life, but such a prude to not participate in the most awesome orgy that there is: the expansion and contraction of the universe. The expansion and collapse of life and existence. The emergence of particles from space and its eventual return to space. Its like turning down the invitation to the biggest party in existence, just to look in vain for permanence in things whose very beauty is dependent on their impermanence.

But perhaps I was being too harsh. I am only a little girl going through a second puberty of physical and spiritual nature, who is part of the large collective child species known as humanity. I needed to feel the desire first and then build the trust to step outside of my tower. I needed to fully experience childhood before taking the steps towards being a teenager. And I needed the foreplay. I needed the guidance of an experienced being to assure me that it was ok to reach for what I desire. I needed to trust that it was alright to see beyond the surface of things even when the rest of the kids don't seem to do it. I needed to be kissed gently, taught to love myself, allowed to establish harmony in my entire being before being part of the orgy.

Then again, the most important piece was perhaps the fact that I wanted to be one with my lover(s). And "my" lover(s) wanted to be one with themselves through "me".