May 23, 1998

Ups and Downs Even the most minimum noise distracts me. I don’t know what I’m going to write, words don’t come to me to describe the trip. I know that at every moment there are ups and downs. At the moment I feel as if there is a "down" where all the trip members are in disorder or muddled. This is because we don’t know what is going to happen or if this trip is going to take us anywhere. Was it ever different? Or have I just uncovered what was always there...

May 22, 1998

...even if your head gets hot! When a person does or says something with the intention of placing two persons against against each other, in good old Salvadorean it is called, "head warmer." About one month ago, during a long telephone conversation, somebody warned me: "Don’t let your head get hot!" Curiously, several days after, another person gave me the same advise: "...even if your head gets hot!!!". Listening to this for a second time made me question myself for several days about the origins of this saying: Why do they use the word "hot"? I would ask myself: What the hell are they referring to? The uncertainty seemed to loose vitality, and I slowly began to forget the matter. But it wasn’t until last night, when in a strange dream, I received what I could call the answer. The dream started with a voice that clearly said: "...even if it gets your head hot!" Without pronouncing a word I asked: "And what does that mean?" And the voice, which I later identified, answered: "When you want to eat a potato, you first warm it up, you let it soften and then you eat it"; immediately, in front of me appeared the image of a person eating the potato. The voice continued: "When some one wants to mold the glass, he or she first warms it up, because that is the only way in which the glass flexible." Again, another image formed, and this time it was that of somebody working in a workshop. In this moment is seemed to me that I understood everything, and I said: "Ha, heat makes the food eatable and the glass flexible." This was the whole dream, at least as far as I remember. This afternoon, returning from work, I passed in front of a clothing store that was announcing big savings for mother’s day. I saw many people crowded within the store, and some other few people coming in and out, without stooping. Suddenly, an image came to me that the store was an enormous monster, feeding itself with warm food, soft food, easy to chew and to swallow. "Hot heads," I thought, "these people got their head warmed-up." I walked a little more, and everywhere I turned, I found myself with "the hot heads".

May 20, 1998

FISH This is not a very normal day, the best thing to do is not to think. From this side something could occur and I don’t know if I will resist. I feel that they have chosen me, for eyes follow me. This, someone already told me about it, that when one goes out one feels asphyxiation. But this, I never waited for: who can live in this pressure? Again in my element, but in a small space, there is no above, there is no below, everything is movement. And now, I believe I know that some being takes me to a great place. I think that I am about to go out, for the asphyxiation I feel again, and my body falls on something gray and the water begins to drain. Hasn’t anybody noticed? or is it my new home... Hasn’t anybody noticed? or is it my end...

May 19, 1998

Flying Together Do you remember when we flew on top of the world? Over those green hills, feeling the air against our faces and the sun on our backs? I the guide, and you the voyager – free of spirit, like the eagle, you flew as I held your hand. Do you remember the cave? That dark, obscure and mysterious entrance into who knows what (the unknown!) on the side of a lusciously green hill – majestic mounds baking under the unrelenting blasts of light from the sun (do you remember the green…the blue…the yellowness of it all?). Remember how it appeared all of a sudden…just when you thought you had seen it all…when you thought there was nothing more to see in this world? What did our guide say? "Go to it," she said. "Go to the cave and see what’s in it." And then what happened? Remember? Did you make it? Did you get to see what was in that cave? I once had my own little cricket. It would always check-up on me, asking if I had done this and if had done that, always making sure I was on the right track… "Pure intention"? What about "commitment? Does that count? I mean, you talk about there being "other, higher" (more advanced?) beings in this Business, and you talk about things that happened to you while you were there, and about these "currents" that are moving you towards where you’re going; but it feels to me as if though you’re just leaving everything behind for a mad jump into something that may or may not lead you to an abyss not unlike the one you experienced before. It feels as if the Center never meant anything to you, or at least as if it had stopped meaning something to you at some point. "Maybe he’s still searching." Maybe you are. "Maybe he hasn’t found his Work yet." "The whole trip, everything…ever since I got on that plane, it felt as if though I was going home…" Do you know how many times I’ve heard you say just that on many different occasions while on our way to the Institute? Where are you, bro.? Where are you going? What are you looking for? Just now, too, when this Center is being put to the test to see if it really provides the Training necessary to do the Job… We were flying together for a while, there, vato!

May 18, 1998

Taste the Difference As the final light caressed her frightened face a lone dog was barking in the distance. "Help Me, Help Me!" I could still hear her desperate cries for a path away from the one she was headed down. And down. Drowning and drowning in a liquid sea of memories and fantasy. What would her final breath taste like as it floated past her soft lips? I could do nothing to help. I could only watch as that unseen hand pulled her farther and farther under, deeper into the watery grave. There was a desire to swim only a moment earlier. A way of traveling so much more direct than those crazy footpaths leading back upon themselves. Then I was stunned by her cries, stunned by my desire to watch this illusion unfolding before my hungry eyes. There were voices here, parts in a play that I had lived but now was seeing acted out in front of me. I passively remembered the confusion I had felt when those scenes were real to me. The sunlight is shattered into a million beautiful fragments as her hand reaches upward for another trip down memory lane. The rings on her hand are reflected in solitary droplets of water, the thrashing for survival goes on and on. The sky is so completely blue right at this moment. I can see for miles until the dream of water comes close enough to land on my tongue and I can taste the closeness of death. A sweet taste it is.

May 17, 1998

What do we learn in school? I ask my college students: "What’s the purpose of a higher education school? What do they teach you?" I wait for the initial wave of mechanical answers; those that come out of their mouths before they have had time to digest the question. They recite all schools’ propaganda. "We are here to learn to be productive citizens," "we learn how to think", "to solve problems," "to earn a living," "to be inquisitive," "to do research," "to know," "to question authority," and many more. I explain. I try to show that most of them don’t really come out of school knowing these things; that, in fact, there are some people who manage to learn some of these things despite the schools. I then give them a hint. I ask them to pay attention to those things that they actually do. I ask them to be specific. They decide that schools teach them to read and write. They also teach some mathematics, and some basic history. In the more advance levels, they also teach the students to argue, to appear important, to convince others that they know something, and to find out data. These, they all agree, are the basic skills that actually make them capable to make a more or less profitable living. I agree with them on this point. I concede that, if they stick with higher education, a lot of these characteristics will rub off on them. However, I also point out that all these things could be taught much more effectively at an earlier age. Also, I argue with them that there are techniques that would allow them all to do all these things without having to go through so many years of anguish and stress. We would then be done with higher education in much less time. They argue that we don’t just want to learn these vague skills. We also want to learn a trade, they say. That’s why they agree with the necessity of learning so many facts, of memorizing so much, of passing so many exams. There is an embarrassed silence when I point out that all these things they’ll really forget, and that all working skills will have to be relearned over and over when they are actually working. I give them another hint. I suggest that perhaps the basics (reading, writing, arguing, etc.) are the necessary building blocks through which the university can pass on a way of acting, a way of being, and a mood. I further suggest, quite unsuccessfully, that the skills taught in higher education were the cement with which the school solidified and made these acts, postures, and moods a permanent fixture in the lives of the students—who later would become the building blocks of society. Finally, I ask them to see, to pay attention, to what they actually do. I ask them what is in fact the state of being in which they find themselves more often. I suggest that it is not really a state of knowing, or a state of questioning, or of enlightenment, or of wonderment, or of performing a working skill. What they do, in fact, is to live in a state of constant worry, stress, competition, fear. They learn that exams are important, that convincing others of your knowledge is essential, that they need to stress about the future, and constantly hang on to the past. Above all, they learn to live in a state of periodic stress. This is when they all tune out, exactly when I tell them that all of this is not for their benefit. They no longer want to hear that all their trouble is not making them better in any sense, except as cattle. That what they do, what they are becoming, if for the benefit of something else. They reject the notion, as expected, that they are being created, molded, and placed in specific positions to serve as food and clothing for beings who have nothing to do with the student’s enlightenment, knowledge, and work.

May 16, 1998

Waking up in a dream I’m dreaming the usual dreams of night sleep which will be forgotten before the dreams of waking sleep come to replace them. Intoxicated dreams, unconscious dreams. I don’t know how it happens, but four officers catch me holding an illegal substance and put me in the back of their car. Why such bad luck? I can’t believe this is happening. I am absolutely terrified, and try to hide the stuff which will surely send me to jail. I know they are observing me, but they do not seem to care that I am trying to hide something. I know that they are communicating with one another in a way that I do not understand. Then it dawns on me that these are not ordinary police. They are short, slight, dressed in black. I cannot tell if they are men or women; they do not seem human. Realizing that they are not from this planet, I wake up in the dream. The dream assumes a quality that is somehow more real, more intense and vivid, than ordinary life. My fear becomes even stronger. When they stop the car and let me out of it, the energy around my body is so intense that I am vibrating back and forth, around and around. I am powerless to stop this movement. They hold me in place, and I understand that I am to look ahead. In an ordinary road at night, a golden, glowing bridge opens. I feel that walking over the bridge would lead me to other worlds. Why am I so afraid? As a child, I felt that I was living on the wrong planet, like an alien in human skin, and longed to return to a home I could not remember. Could this be the bridge to that world? Wordlessly, the aliens communicate to me that they have brought me there to show me the bridge. Now I remember that I have forgotten being here before. I am not ready to walk across it, but this time I will not forget that it exists; I will remember this experience. I understand that this is an important moment, and reflect on it after returning to ordinary waking consciousness. Today, I wonder what the bridge was. A bridge to other worlds? Dimensions? Levels of existence? Who were the alien police, and why did they come for me? Was the dream actually more real than waking life? Was it metaphorical? Or was the dream just the product of a random firing of synapses? What does it all mean? These are questions I cannot answer, but perhaps the answer is somewhere within the process of asking the question, of remembering it and living with it. Perhaps it is better not to have a definitive answer, for I would become content with such an answer and perhaps even forget the question existed. An answer given as definitive could all too easily become fossilized and dogmatic. Acknowledging that any answers will be incomplete allows for openness and flexibility, opening the door for continuous growth and transformation, for infinite possibilities.

May 15, 1998

Treasures Deep endless waves of blue and black Electric energy captured in red A Polaroid of my soul on canvas In many colored beads upon a golden thread The doors to many travels, dreams And waking moments in a voyage Are strung By little pudgy fingers from those not yet asleep Are created Multi colored masterpieces in crayon

May 14, 1998

Dark Spaces A dangerous space made of turbulence, unpredictability and chaos may be a path that you might travel in. Moving particles forming currents, deforming currents, clashing against each other, and in all directions, would easily decompose the particles you are made of and scatter you all over with its force. Such a space does not consider stiffness, or any stable morphology; it will simply tear you to pieces. It seems that one must blend in so as to become transparent, shapeshifting to be able to cross such dark transitions. Discipline is of utmost importance to hope to last through the start of such path. Attention and presence are the only tools you really have, and the only ones that can save you from disintegration. Being repelled or attracted by anything, even a tiny bit, means "good bye cruel world." To light your course you must have purity of intention. Otherwise you will get lost, until the game is over (meaning, no more player). Aren’t you curious what you will find on the other side?

May 13, 1998

What do we do? I am very often asked this question. In many forms and with many connotations or assumptions, the question keeps on reappearing. Sometimes it implies a result: what do we accomplish? What is there to gain? What's in it for me? When does the reward show up? Other times it implies simple curiosity: What happens when you're together with the others? What does it look like when you're alone? What is in your hands? What goes through your mind? What do you repeat softly under your breath? Yet other times it implies a quest for historical knowledge: What words do you use? What gods do you follow? What rituals do you keep? What lineage do you come from? What influences your practices? Who taught you what you know? Who taught them? Where does it all begin? How can such a question be truly answered? Move sideways with me and stare out into emptiness, just as your eyes open for the first time on a world of serious faces and a woman's tears of joy. Look at all the eyes that surround you, all the ones who are there throughout the day and the ones who come to visit the new one, the tiny little body that was just expelled from the comfort of your mother's belly. Look at the straight lines of the roads, the curves of the trees, the distance of the clouds, the warmth of the sun. Feel the edge of old ice as you slip into a desk, as you hear ancient sounds repeating in your ears and chalk moving over blackboard, as you slowly learn to repeat the sounds, to code them on paper and dream them at night. Sense the midnight passing of innocence and the quick descent into sureness and boredom, into "things have been settled and now it's time for action". Hear again the counselor's voice and point at one word over another as you take the long trip into adult training that will culminate in a piece of paper and a solid block against starvation and the cold of the rain and the wind of the streets. Open your eyes to the alarm and slide softly into the endless rhythm of the office, the gossip of your officemates and the monthly rush of an envelope with frozen energy inside. And then feel again the late remembrances, the sweet painful nostalgia for what has passed and the old questions resurfacing just as the brain is about to stop and the ancient codes are breaking down within you. Then close you eyes for the darkness comes. Now tell me: What do you do?

May 11, 1998

Lost in Space? Where was it that I was headed when I passed through that last doorway? I scratch my head again, feeling the familiar confusion well up inside me. It is a comforting feeling to the machine, visions of cherry plums dancing through my head. A distraction that seduces me slowly and patiently. "I remember myself as the voyager whose deepest nature is the Clear Light itself." I repeat these words as I pass through the next doorway and then (like the last time) I crash my head painfully on the door frame that’s a few inches lower than I am expecting. That hurts. I stagger forward and wonder why this keeps happening. I remember now that there are forces at work that are focused on keeping the machine asleep. The longer I hold them back the stronger they push, and this won’t change for a very long time. If I am looking for rest it isn’t through that doorway. The pain increases before it subsides. Can I hold it back? Now it presses down on me, mercilessly flattening my efforts. The resistance. Why do I eternally resist? Why do I say "tomorrow" when I am asked to work today? Why do I deny the help that waits in front of me? There are simple answers waiting in the silence. But as a thousand psychotic madmen chase me into the abyss I am having trouble finding the silence. Is it there? Or there? I missed it again. Choosing the first open door and running frantically down the stairs I am alone in the dark. In this momentary space of rest I now that it is time to start over once again.

May 10, 1998

Haiku Dark, white, and golden clouds gliding between earth and sky, How difficult, to work at night!

May 8, 1998

Games without frontiers It is a festival. A large crowd of people, some almost naked, some dressed in all kinds of colorful paraphernalia, dance around the band which has been playing for the last several hours. In fact, they haven't stopped at all for the last two hours. Songs around here start with verses and lines, but end with one single line repeated over and over, while there is running commentary from the main singer, the instruments and the crowd. The line is simple, direct, profound and almost ungraspable: "Sadness has no end, happiness does." As the line repeats, the crowd becomes more and more hysterical, the dances more intricate, the sweat proliferates and the screams grow louder. It is as if with each passing through the barrier of the mind, with each slight memory of the reality being sung before them, the truth penetrates a little bit deeper, just a little, and the brains stop their chatter, the bodies stop their refusal and the heart opens up to the infinite possibilities before them, the endless voyaging through the light, in spiraling confusions and intricate imaginations. And whatever wasn't happening before, probably won't be happening later. And nothing was happening before. And everything has already happened. And the truth of it finds another foothold and digs even deeper. "Sadness has no end" Forever within time. "Happiness does" Eternally outside of time. The drums keep on beating. The dancers keep on moving. The tears keep on flowing. There is no end in sight.

May 7, 1998

Inside or outside? There are so many people who are truly looking for a spiritual path. Somehow, perhaps intuitively, they know or they sense that spirituality is connected to the non-phenomenal nature of reality. As a consequence, what they do is exercise, practice, pray, etc., from within their mental centrum. Catch my drift? It’s all imagined, holographically created by the head brain. Ironically, this is what keeps them from actually doing something that will help them spiritually. There must be a connection, a bridge, or a fusion between the outer and the inner worlds. This can only be accomplished by using the brain as a moving centrum. In other words, the head brain should not be producing involuntary thoughts but rather focusing and concentrating attention, and therefore bringing the awareness to the present. Only in this state it is possible to work in a spiritual path, whatever the form or means happens to be (through prayer beads, going to church, cleaning the house, combing the hair, eating, etc.). This is the key to DOING something real for spiritual work.

May 6, 1998

Little Old Man What I've come to realize is that every night I go to the same places, only in different configurations and sequences. Yep, there's the long shadowy corridor, and there's the big houses with white walls, and over there are the spare trees with kids playing underneath. I could even venture to say that it has been the same places all along, but I've simply failed to recognize them in my drunk reconstruction of the events, early in the morning. But lately I've had a visitor. It is a little old man, dressed in some kind of bright robe. He is probably about half my height, with a long nose and lively eyes. All he does is follow me around from space to space, room to room, situation to situation. He never questions my decisions, never disagrees with my choices. He just smiles and echoes my visions. "Oh, yes! Time to step into the garden!" "Alright! It's time for the long corridor!" "Okay! Let's go to the houses!" It is somehow reassuring to have him there, always so happy to follow me into any situation, no matter how strange or troublesome. He has made me realize that I've taken all the options before. He obviously has them all memorized, and he enjoys them in the way you or I would enjoy a good song that we've heard a thousand times before. His running commentary is having a secondary effect though. Suddenly I feel an urge to surprise him, to show him places he's never seen. And so I walk into the old corridor, but turn at the wrong moment to find a door that was never there before. "Let's go through here!" The little man smiles.

May 5, 1998

The Saga Continues Sometimes I find myself riding in my car, wearing a prisoner’s outfit. All by myself, riding in my car, I usually forget that I’m in prison. This time I find myself in a different kind of cell. I find myself inside of a huge prison, a prison with no walls and no bars, just an endless landscape of mountains, cities, oceans and skies. As I park my car on the edge of a cliff, overlooking some mountains and a sunrise behind them, I somehow realize that I am the only prisoner in this place; everyone else forms the guards and the police. The whole world is made up of thousands of guards and one prisoner, me. And much to my surprise and somewhat to my relief, I can see that the guards don’t know that I’m a prisoner. They are just like robots, going from place to place yet always remaining in the same spot. Me, I can move. I am the only one that can move through them while remaining invisible in this place. They just perform their duties day in, day out, always believing that they are genuine living beings, never realizing that they are just robots programmed to keep me and those of my kind – my brothers – prisoners, here, to be slaves. They must be mistaking me for one of their own, because they’re not looking at me the way they should be. They just pass me by without the smallest concern for my actions and intentions, as if I were just one of the many thousands of robots forming their community. That is why I am able to move so swiftly, because everywhere I go, in every short moment, everyone who sees me believes that they are looking at something ordinary, for they are machines unable to distinguish anything out of the ordinary. So I get out of the car and walk downhill, hoping to find a way out of here, hoping to not be recognized by the guards, and hoping to find my freedom once more. I reach the bottom to find myself in the middle of an immense clearing, with the cliff to my back and a small river with a little bridge in front of me. On either side of me, on the edge of the clearing, there are trees. Beyond the river in front of me, far away into the horizon, there is a gigantic city, with skyscrapers and complex highways and freeways and streets and alleys. The whole city is full of concrete, asphalt, machines of all sorts, wires and tubes, full of cockroaches and rats and birds and humans, animals, monsters, demons. The city roars louder that all the beasts that have ever lived in this place put together. All throughout and within the green, grassy clearing in which I am , there are police men and police women, with their furious police dogs (nasty, bloody teeth always showing as they snarl) sniffing away at everything, trying to find those "on the loose" prisoners like myself. Here I awaken, and I remember the bridge again. I move towards the bridge, maybe a little too fast and too suddenly, for the dogs immediately recognize the scent of the footsteps of an awakened being, and they turn to look in my direction, but they still haven’t seen me. The guards act as if nothing unusual has happened, but I freeze in place nonetheless, for the dogs always recognize me when I move fast. This time I seem to have moved a little bit closer to the bridge than last time (or do I always believe so?) and I can see a doorway in the middle of the bridge, a dimensional doorway out of this world, out of this prison of mine. But the dogs are not as stupid as their "masters" and they can always detect unnatural phenomena; they sensed my move towards the bridge and they come in my direction, sniffing everything in their path all the while, getting closer and closer to me, still unable to see me. I look towards the bridge once again; the doorway is still open, inviting me with its promise of freedom. Many more guards than before are now, all of a sudden, closer to the bridge, moving fast from one spot to another, reminding me of a busy anthill just after someone has stepped on it, making it harder for me to move. I’m frozen, and I don’t know what to do. Intense vibrations run all through me on this moment as I try to decide what to do. If I run towards to bridge now, I might make it (I’m sure I’m closer than last time). The dogs are now much closer, and they have smelled me – they know who I am. Terrible, loud barking from the dogs reaps through the air like the alarm at the prison hall within which I now sleep. The cops let the dogs loose and they dash towards me; they will tear me apart again the second they catch me if I try to run. If I remain still, they will wait for their masters to grab me and chain me up – taking me then back to my cell, to wait forever again for another chance… Well how could I not hesitate upon recognizing the doorway? For all I know, that doorway could always lead to a lower dimension, where it is harder to escape. And where the heck is the guide, anyway? Where are they when you need them? How come I can’t recognize the guide? Is there a guide? I remember the book, what did it say on the book? What were the instructions I read so much? Where is my memory now, when I need it to remember the descriptions, the instructions? If only the guide would tell me what to do, where to go... Where is the guide?…

May 4, 1998

Traffic Bardo I find myself in the same room once again. There are no windows.There are drapes in front of these non-existent windows. Fluorescent beams reflect flatly off of the forest green carpet and the peach walls. The smell is familiar, the smell of death? or is it just a broken air conditioner? Around me are many others, I sense their machines crowding this little space, their minds running wildly from thought to thought, their agitation annoys me. In front of us a woman spews words. She cackles like a fire with only a few remaining embers, one that refuses to be extinguished completely. She is anxious to leave, to be free of this room, to return to the spacious sky and sea of her Santa Cruz refuge. I am doodling. Dragging the black ink around the white paper until I see something interesting. I proceed as usual and start sketching an eye, then another eye, and then a nose, and soon some sort of alien face appears on the page. It looks back at me with a curious gaze. "Who put you in this room?", I hear the alien say, "Why did you just create me?" I start to answer but am distracted by the sound of cars crashing on the television set, a symphony of crushing metal and twisted iron. I look up to see the face of a woman, she is trapped in her smashed vehicle, her mouth is full of blood, there are police officers surrounding her. They are trying desperately to cut her out of the car using the "jaws of life". Her eyes are full of pain, dazed by the split second change, one moment a waitress returning home from the night shift, the next a broken machine inside of a broken machine. "It happened so fast, I just want to get back to my life," she says later from her hospital bed. As the TV reluctantly releases my attention I return to the stale smell of this eternal chamber once again. The alien has leaped off of the page and is jumping excitedly about the room, disrupting everyone's attention from the TV set. "Wake up, Wake UP!", he yells loudly but to no avail. The people are running away. They search franticly for the jaws of life, some magical weapon that can cut them free from this chaos of twisted memories, shattered illusions and broken dreams that fill the lives of those trapped in the human dimension. But if the jaws of life were suddenly to appear in front of them, its sharp teeth snapping wildly for fresh meat, they would probably run away in search of a room with a TV set and a man doodling small characters in sketch book. Back and forth and forth and back we go eternally in search of the end.

May 3, 1998

ARRESTED! Exhausted after pulling an all-nighter I decide to take a walk outside my hotel room. My head is full of noise. All the details of the current work projects keep repeating themselves, alternating with financial worries, intermixing with thoughts of loneliness for being far away from the family and the fear of not having enough time to write my dissertation. To this increasing cacophony the mind adds thoughts of work on self, of spiritual possibilities and speculation. Thoughts become plans. New, exiting possibilities appear before me, making me forget all worries. Even the tiredness from last night vanishes in the excitement of future possibilities, as if by my planning them they had all become a fact. All worries and loneliness give way to fantasy work, to imaginary fulfillment, and to a mechanical way of dealing with pain by replacing it with compulsive planning. It is in the midst of this turbulence, when I am too identified with my monkey mind to even notice the silliness of it, the pain within, the fear... it is in the midst of all this that a most magnificent desert sunrise stops me in my tracks. It comes unexpectedly, as if I just walked into its space. In this space, I find myself surrounded by the powerful beauty of the Arizona desert, the clear air, the colors, and the sun. The sun! As the expression goes, I was arrested. Then I wondered. Is this what the fugitive, the criminal, the illegal alien, the drugged adolescent, and the sex offender feel when they are first arrested? I wonder if there is that moment of silence for them, when all previous machinations of the ego come to a sudden and full stop, and nothing remains but the silent presence of self in the midst of a powerfully charged space. I also wonder. Is this the true reason why we keep violating the Law (human, natural, or divine), just so that we can relive that one moment, however brief? Do we all betray our essence over and over, only because we have found no other way of regaining it?

May 2, 1998

The Strange Case of Mr. M Within the garage, there is a medium sized freezer. At some forgotten point in the past, he found his way into it and forgot the way out. Now he dreams of the dim places he remembers, the forests, the valleys, the streets, the people. Sometimes kids play outside and the noise awakens certain yearnings within him, a darkness falls upon him, a feeling of certain doom, of being forgotten and of having left so much behind. But then the kids leave and he can rest. "Mr. M, are you in there?" "Yes, still here." The lid opens and a tray of cold food is dropped inside. The hand is soft and slender, the voice is kind and sweet. He bites through the soft, slightly rotten sandwich and the drinks the stale milk, while hears the footsteps moving away. Then sleep comes again and the voice is confused with the sounds of electricity and dripping water. In the midst of the dream, he is transported to the day when he opens the lid and stands up, his eyes exploding in tears as a reaction to the strong light. It is too much and he is back to that day when he looked all around him, made sure nobody was following, walked quietly into the garage and allowed himself to drop into the little freezer, away from fear, away from danger, away from the light. "Maybe someday."

May 1, 1998

Interruptions "Will you give me a sheet of paper to paint something?" "And I want another one…well, if there is more." The table smelled of acrylic and sweat. We moved frantically, interchanging colors and brushes. I concentrated on painting, but at the same time, I observed all the concentrated energy at that moment. I was filled with enthusiasm and I moved with a lot more liberty, letting my brush strokes move fluidly and spontaneously. We were creating  one only being,  one thing, one invocation, and I could see that, until… "Listen, what you’re painting appears to have a lot of influence from mister Gold – I can also see a lot of influence from your mother in law." I spoke without ever lifting my face from the paper: "Yeah, and what’s wrong with that?" "Well, you should have your own style." "Do you mean like EJ’s and my mother in law’s own style?" "Exactly." I laughed sarcastically and said: "Well, let me tell you, that EJ does not have only one form or style of painting, and that my mother in law’s style has been affected by the style of other painters, who have, in turn, been influenced by others and on and on it goes…which said fact indicates, at least to me, that all painters are the same. In other words: There is only one painter." I continued working, assuming that the conversation had finished, feeling a little less concentrated and out of place. The conversation continued. I asked for silence because I wished to continue painting, but I was talking to the void, and it won’t ever keep quiet.

April 30, 1998

Communication I looked up the word communication in the dictionary. The dictionary definition is as follows: the exchange of ideas, messages, or information, as by speech, signals, or writing. The definition, however, is incomplete, lacking its true meaning. I don’t believe communication is only achieved through speech, signals, or writing, those are just some of the forms used to communicate. There may be forms of communication that are deeper and far more reaching than that which we have become accustomed to. I’ve had the sense many times that true communication is not through speech itself but through a form that most of us dismiss because we are simply unable to describe or perceive. For example, have you ever been in the company of a close friend, and every time you open your mouth to say something your friend beats you to the punch and says exactly what you were just about to say? This is just one of many examples of those other types of communication that require no words, physical signals or writing. This type of communication is achieved with a special kind of attention that I’m not yet certain of but may have used, since I feel it is the form of communication all beings are by nature designed to use. This method of communication may be transmitted through many vehicles and takes on many mysterious forms. For example, about a month ago I was doing a project where I was supposed to pick a name for a character that was going to represent me; I chose the name Solimar. Two days ago my sister was born. They named her Marisol. Coincidence? I think not. I believe there is actually a connection between the birth and the name picking of my character and of my sister. It is too bad that most of us limit ourselves to the incomplete definition given in the dictionary and take for granted the real art of communication.

April 29, 1998

Decisions ...But, where am I going? Why should you go anywhere? I seek,... yes, I'm seeking, but here, something isn’t working, it’s very easy to fall asleep,..., I need a strong push, a situation in which my attention is demanded. So, that at the same time as I demand my own attention, this becomes a necessity for me. ...But, then, where am I going? I’m looking for somewhere, where I can express. A place where madness has a space... here where I live, the "insane" are locked up. "You’re crazy!, how can you think about leaving all that you have to go to nothing? Here you have it all, how can you just waste it all ...and, so young, with a lifetime ahead of you! ... going there, where people live so badly, they are poor, what misery!!, and you’re going there? I don’t understand you." "Why have you got to go so far? That’s what I can’t understand. And just at this moment, just when things are as they are and we haven’t made up, I feel you are so far away and now...even further." There is no communication, things will never change just because I try and wait for the best moment, the best moment is only in the present, and if you understand this, that is all you need to know, you will never go anywhere... So, I left my small island to understand the importance of the present, and here I am in a situation where I am having to live the present. It’s certainly stimulating. I try and feel myself, it’s difficult, but the truth is I have come all the way to San Francisco , after spending two weeks, living from day to day through events that are cleaner than ever, I have been able to see how every decision (no matter how small) I make ( or they just happen in the worst of cases) changes my direction on a road full of crossroads. This also happens in ordinary life, but in a situation where one is so "comfortable" one can’t be so aware because there isn't a need for it. These last two weeks, externally, have just been passing by like a film sequence (possibly, as the impressions are so strong, one tends to embrace one self in a kind of a shell) where I didn’t feel I suffered from a great inflation from all the new things I came across, and this is certainly not normal in me when I travel (even though sometimes something jumps out to feel more). But I believe that the reason why there is that dispassion (externally) is because inside the movement is stronger, attention is required from me, and that is a job that has a great effect on one. Even though there might be many moments where it’s not possible to do, the perturbation or upset is still working its way, and the sensation of anguish still remains. So, a trip to find one’s self means that one comes across situations where one mustn't control. In a state where one could be in front of a mirror and not see it (like in ordinary life), and one must be responsible and consequent when one recognizes himself and can see. That’s the point!!! It’s way more dangerous than anything the people I left behind could think of, when they worried about my economic situation in a foreign country...will I really be able to confront this that I am seeking, when it’s face to face with me? I’m looking for a place where madness isn’t covered up, because I believe that in a moment of transformation, madness shouldn’t be covered up. And I need a place where nothing and nobody will slice in half this moment of transition. To only get half way through would be a total failure. So, then, where am I going? Whatever direction I make, the decisions, made from moment to moment, will take me.

April 28, 1998

The Prince's Necessity The young prince sat on top of a rock in the middle of space. Far in the horizon and all around the young prince’s little sitting rock, the mountains and castles and forests of the King’s domain could be seen resting on top of a flat world – more like a flat, ring shaped rock floating in infinite space. Other than the flat world and the young prince and his little sitting rock, only billions of brilliant specks of light being vacuumed at the speed of light within a black, empty, and infinite space could be seen. The young prince was thoughtful; he looked a little troubled. His father, the King, who, except as a presence, was really an altogether non-existent being by nature, came to the young prince. On that cold, lonely moment, the King gave his son all of his attention… "Dad, suppose you had been part of a Working group for almost two years now, and that, for the past month, month-and-a-half, for some reason, you had been trying your hardest to avoid the ever-increasing work that had been given to you," said the little prince, creating thunderous ripples of sound that would fly forever through never-ending space. "Suppose, dad, that for about a month-and-a-half you’ve been pretending to go to your ‘on-call’ job at least three times a week, wasting valuable time and energy in endless, worthless pursuits of personal pleasure, knowing damned well that the job does not exist any more," the young prince said, only this time in thought. "Let’s also pretend that you have been purposely getting involved in your family’s drama and have been spending many days draining the energy of your group. You’ve been wasting it in worthless attempts at trying to (in a very ordinary and illusionary way) fix your family’s insignificant, trivial little problems of daily, contemporary, monkey existence," dreamed the young prince. "Wow, wait a minute there, son," the King intentionally interrupted at a strategic moment in the young prince’s existence. "That’s enough dreaming and pretending there. We have the famous Five Spaniard Workers coming to visit, and there’s just no more time for illusion right now." "But we’ll just be pretending, dad, like always," insisted the young prince. "We’ll just pretend that you became one of the most useless and worthless little pieces of crap that have ever walked the face of your world, dad. And that, as a result, for the last month-and-a-half, you wasted valuable time and effort which could have otherwise been used for the benefit of all beings everywhere," the young prince dreamt once more. "Let us just pretend that you have been avoiding all of your responsibilities as a labyrinth guide apprentice, as a Reader for the dead, as a representative of your School and of your group. Let’s just say, dad, that, worst of all, you have been putting no effort what so ever into making any sort of sacrifice or intention towards waking up from your messed up state," he just would not stop dreaming. "Let us pretend, dad," the young prince, this time in a nightmare, suddenly experienced, "that, you completely identified with your machine, giving yourself pleasure for lifetimes at a time in front of your life theater – every day hiding from all of your group members behind a wall of lies." The whole illusion could very easily have been seen as a phenomenon that could just as easily keep the young, inattentive prince asleep forever. But then, at the same time that a rush of electricity that felt as if he were being given a jump start, the young prince received a special surprise of the coincidental variety from a "Galactic Department" or a "Planetary Office" of some sort or another. And also at the same time, "Joder!" was heard across the universe – in a Spaniard’s accent…the visitors had arrived! That whole incident incidentally caused the young prince to momentarily wake up, and that was much to the King’s relief, since there was now a lot of work to do. The young prince, taking advantage of his seemingly accidental but actually coincidental awakening, pondered, "Dad, is it true that there are certain octaves during which one might need a little ‘outside help’?" "Well, sure there are, son," informed the King. "Why do you ask?" "Dad?" the young prince automatically ignored. "Yes son?" the King attended. "I just received a gift, and I must immediately return to the kingdom if I am to have it – it is necessity…oops, hehe, I meant to say ‘necessary’," the young prince, a little embarrassed, puffed-off into nothingness.

April 27, 1998

The Quest For Questions Why are we here? What happens when we die? How can I serve other beings? Many questions fill my head but I am thinking about the nature of the question. Could it be that a question is a living being, full of life and wonder. Feeding on many things, curiosity, confusion, and occasionally actually something real. The essence questions are what I am talking about. The ones that come from the heart, from the deep places of our beings. The habit most people have when they are asked a question is to answer it. A question carries a charge with it, a charge most people want to shake off as quickly as possible. The deeper the question is the stronger its related charge. The charge isn’t in the content of the questions though, it comes from the place where the question emanates. The impulse to answer and be done with a question as quickly as possible is a step toward death. The question is alive, its answer rarely can be so vibrant. A teacher knows how to give an answer without killing the question completely, leaving a space for the questioner to quest for his own answer. The only answers that really matter are those that we have come upon through experience and vigilance, those that we have discovered through our own efforts.

April 26, 1998

How to remember In the comic strip BEETLE BAILEY, the general entered a room, and asked this question: "Why did I enter here?" Then he thought: "I should maybe go out and maybe I’ll remember why I entered," and when he got out, he wondered: "Why did I come out here?". This is what happens in life to most people. They get a life to do something for a particular reason, possibly to learn a valuable lesson, or have a special experience, then they wonder why they took on life. Then you turn into an angel again, only to wonder, like the general, "Why did I get here?" Then an angel/person does the same thing yet again. The angel/person doesn’t remember why he is where he is. He then decides to take on a life to find out, to remember. This will keep happening until one receives the power of awakening. To be awake will make you remember why you entered life because when you are awake, it makes your mind quiet, and you remember what it was like when you were a baby, and that was the moment after you decided what your purpose in life would be. You will keep going in and out wondering why you entered here and why you left there, thinking that the next room will remind you of why you entered the last room. And when you do enter the next room, you will forget this, and this shall keep happening until you acquire the special attention that allows you to remember yourself as you enter each room.

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