“Never look up to anybody; never look down at anybody. Just see everything the way it is.”
– Sadhguru
Fundamentals
love
Attention From Another
“One day I walk up to this group of gang members, with Cricket among them, and he doesn’t disappear on me. I shake hands with all of them, and when I get to Cricket, he actually lets me shake his hand. “William,” I say to him, “How you doin’? It’s good to see ya.” William says nothing. But as I walk away (I always made a point of not staying very long), I can hear William in a very breathy, age-appropriate voice, say to the others, “Hey, the priest knows my name.”
“I have called you by your name. You are mine,” is how Isaiah gets God to articulate this truth. Who doesn’t want to be called by name, known? The “knowing” and the “naming” seem to get at what Anne Lamott calls our “inner sense of disfigurement.” As misshapen as we feel ourselves to be, attention from another reminds us of our true shape in God.”
-Father Gregory Boyle, Tattoos on the Heart
Pig
I can’t heap enough praise on the film Pig, directed by Michael Sarnoski and starring Nicholas Cage. I also am not interested in writing a real review for a couple of reasons, mostly because I think film critics generally poison your mind and ruin the initial filmgoing experience. I would rather point toward a movie and aspects that I really enjoyed. You take it from there if you want to. We can dive into it later.
It is a film that will surprise you. It’s beautifully shot and acted. It has many layers beneath its simpleness.
If you are someone who is hesitant about dipping into a Nic Cage movie based on his filmography in the past decade, take a chance.
Pig is one of my favorite films of the year and further proof you don’t need a billion dollars to make a masterpiece.
Permission To Move About The Cabin
What to say? Give yourself permission to be a person. Say it out loud or in your head. The things that trip you up. The things you never noticed. The things that hold you back. It helps to notice the feeling. It’s okay.
Maybe even saying it here might help someone else. You never know how far your words can reach.
So if you see future posts with lots of seemingly random permissions, it’s okay to wonder why.
It’s okay to be late.
It’s okay to be early.
It’s okay to not know.
It’s okay to forget.
It’s okay to ask questions.
It’s okay to ask the same question more than once.
It’s okay to spill your drink.
It’s okay to take a nap.
It’s okay to be nervous.
It’s okay to ask for help.
It’s okay to feel sad.
It’s okay to lose something.
It’s okay to get angry.
It’s okay to let it go.
It’s okay to be scared.
It’s okay to want more.
It’s okay to have a dirty car.
It’s okay to smile.
It’s okay to leave the dishes in the sink.
It’s okay to just listen.
It’s okay to make mistakes.
It’s okay to feel overwhlemed.
It’s okay to burp loudly.
It’s okay to fart.
It’s okay to enjoy bad movies.
It’s okay to fail.
It’s okay to try a new way.
It’s okay to be wrong.
It’s okay to not believe in God.
It’s okay to believe in God.
It’s okay to punch nazis.
It’s okay to walk away from a fight.
It’s okay to do nothing.
It’s okay to stand up for your beliefs.
It’s okay to talk to random people.
It’s okay to laugh about yourself.
It’s okay to feel proud.
It’s okay to stay up late.
It’s okay to oversleep.
It’s okay to feel embarrassed.
It’s okay to miss people.
It’s okay to see things differently.
It’s okay to talk for hours.
It’s okay to laugh loudly in public.
It’s okay to trip and fall.
It’s okay to cry.
It’s okay say yes.
It’s okay to say no.
It’s okay to get in the way.
It’s okay to feel anxious.
It’s okay to be afraid.
It’s okay to feel alone.
It’s okay to wait.
It’s okay to do it later.
It’s okay to feel hurt.
It’s okay to stop and help.
It’s okay to see the positive.
It’s okay to be okay.
It’s okay to stop here.
Do Something Wonderful
“Do something wonderful, people may imitate it.”
– Albert Schweitzer.
Educate Yourself
“To educate yourself for the feeling of gratitude means to take nothing for granted, but to always seek out and value the kind that will stand behind the action. Nothing that is done for you is a matter of course. Everything originates in a will for the good, which is directed at you. Train yourself never to put off the word or action for the expression of gratitude.”
― Albert Schweitzer
Patience
“Patience, in the last analysis, is only partially concerned with time, with waiting; it includes also the quality of relentlessness, ceaselessness and constancy. It is a mood of deliberate calm that is the distilled result of confidence. One works at the task intensely even as one realizes that to become impatient is to yield the decision to the adversary. Live life seriously; it is a mistake to take it seriously.”
-Howard Thurman, Deep is the Hunger
Ideal Artists
“We are all artists in the sense that we are all engaged in some kind of activity by which we are realizing our ideals. What kind of ideals are you realizing?”
-Howard Thurman, Deep is the Hunger
That’s It
Not a sound.
Left alone.
And then
You let go
And release
Little things
In a big way.
Nothing else
To do.
Just you.
Andrey Zvyagintsev’s Leviathan
This review contains SPOILERS for director Andrey Zvyagintsev’s film “Leviathan.” This isn’t a fairytale.
A man lives in a coastal village near the Barents Sea in Northern Russia, running an auto-repair shop from the garage of his childhood home, shared with wife Lilya and his teenage son from a previous marriage.
The family’s world is under threat: The town Mayor, has slapped a compulsory acquisition order on their land, earmarking the site for a development. To the Mayor’s surprise, the husband enlists the help of ex-army friend, now a hotshot lawyer from Moscow. Soon tempers and passions are inflamed, events spiral out of control, and lives are placed at stake.
The film sets up a story you’ve watched or read about many times. Someone has valuable land. A powerful person wants that land at any cost. David versus Goliath.
This is not a film for everyone but one everyone should see this film. You need to be in the right mood to watch it. It is beautifully shot and acted. It moves at the pace of life. There is adult content but it’s shot and edited in a way that isn’t exploitative. It’s all very matter of fact and real.
People try to do what’s right. People make bad choices. Trusts are broken. Friendships and families crumble. The justice system isn’t justice. Power prevails.
The world continues to spin.
The marketing for the film talks about how it portrays a new corrupt Russia. Oh marketing. This story happens all the time all over the world. Hardly limited to Russia.
It’s a story happening right now and we will never hear about it.
It’s a masterpiece of filmmaking. It stays with you and leaves you thinking.
Open Life Up 