The wages suck but the benefits with a labor of love are out of control...

As I sail off into the evening aboard a boat that offers very little in comfort or sophistication, I once again recite the morning muttered words that have become a mantra to me...

"YOU can do this".

A self-imposed and self-administered pep talk with which I relocate that place that once again attempts to scale up from the depths of my stomach and summit somewhere in my mind, a peak from which it can look down upon my optimism. This part of the world to which I am now living in offers space and natural beauty and beautiful condos and opportunity galore.

My bank account offers $000.81. Opportunity shall have to wait another day, it would seem.

"YOU were born to do this..."

I take pride and comfort in knowing that I have rid myself of the vices I once imbibed in, especially in a time such as this, and that it is indeed good fortune for me to no longer feel the need to practice them. However, I am not without fault, for there is still one vice I maintain with a junkie's fervor and depending on the circumstance, it can be the most dangerous of them all to dabble with.

And that vice is faith. Faith in one's own dream. I am unable to afford such a habit...having a dream to chase after is quite a costly affair, after all. Being unable to afford relationships, be they familial, platonic or romantic. Having a few pints with the lads at the pub or making love to a woman for an entire lazy weekend afternoon, having a cigarette with a coffee and a newspaper...all unattainable, all unappealing and all distracting.

"YOU'RE going to do this..."

It's back. THAT place. It appears that I am revisiting the tremulous place again where the fears and worries lurk about, thrashing about in a fevered and hungry frenzy, waiting to pounce and devour any and or all hope I hold on to as solace. Determination and resolve take their daily beating at this time of night, as the doubts and what-ifs butt into the queue just ahead of the pleasant thoughts and hopeful dreams, so they can be first to traipse into my subconscious.

"YOU can do this..."

Sacrifice is a mere pittance. It isn't what you give up that's costly, it's what you find yourself all of a sudden being able to place a value on that taxes you the most. Appraising the company of a friend, devaluing intimacy with a lover, determining the worth of a person...equations that can be figured out on the fly without the aid of a portfolio manager or investment advisor.

I am subsisting on borrowed time, time which isn't so much dwindling away as it is being taken back by those that proffered their arms, their homes, their larders and in some cases, their wallets, in gestures of goodwill and generosity. However, dreams rarely meet deadlines, follow itineraries or planned agendas and they most certainly do not obey the protocol of benevolence.

"you've GOT to do this..."

Every night I submit my confidence to a self-induced and rather thorough thrashing and every morning I stretch painfully and stiffly to rise up once again to receive criticism and praise, support and disdain, reassurance and scoffs. And then I leave the bedroom while muttering once again to myself and myself alone.

But first coffee and the daily horoscope...

It's a bitter brew that no amount of sugar will tame and the stars guidance for the day states "You may be cautious by nature but the planets are urging you to take the kind of risks that make things happen. Have faith in your own abilities and act as if there is a higher power guiding your actions. Never doubt that you are on the right path."

"YOU'VE had worse", I think as I raise the cup and wince down another sip, proving for yet another day, that although there may be an awful taste left behind, I can still stomach whatever may and will be coming my way.

"you HAVE to do this..."

When asked why he was running across Canada, Terry Fox replied "I'm not a dreamer but I believe in miracles. I have to."

From time to time, don't we all?

The Secret should have been a pop-up book...

The Law of Attraction...we've all heard it, read it, quoted it and bought it...and been victim to it as well as from it.


Social Psychology says that interpersonal attraction is a person's qualities appealing to another person's desires and to determine such attraction, personality and situation must be taken into account.


So if you're charming and in a crowded room...watch your ass.


Science aside, the metaphysicists or New Thinkers (one has a degree as opposed to a #1 bestseller...) feel that a person's conscious and unconscious thoughts, beliefs and emotions can cause change in the physical world that attracts positive or negative experiences that jive with said thoughts, beliefs and emotions, with or without the person taking action to cause such experiences.


So by doing nothing, you potentially could be doing the best/worst thing possible.


Hmmm...nice odds.


And to think I was sure we talking monkeys were on the cusp of a breakthrough.


Having no doctorate in Social Psychology nor 20 years experience of chewing cactus roots in the desert...well, a couple of summers but it was a beach and it wasn't cactus although after a period of time, I thought hard enough to TURN IT INTO cactus root on a few occasions...provides me with very little to present to the intellecuals and scholars in the form of credentials.


However...


I have been the refrigerator as well as being the magnet, I have had the fabric of my universe torn asunder, I have climbed inside a black hole and I've had my porridge too hot, too cold and just right.


Hhmph. What I've yet to figure out is the protocol to follow. The RULES.


A simple thing like attraction cannot be so simple, as to throw caution to the wind and say "Hey! Guess What? I'm not gonna do nuthin' and ya know what? It's all gonna happen anyway! HAHA SUCKERS!"


At the same time, something so complex as attraction cannot be THAT complex now, can it? Do I need my emotional calculator, my mental abacus and my spiritual tape measure in order to draw up a hunch? A what if? A maybe?


And then there is possibility. What is the possibility of your physical world, which according to one way of thought you can change; the same world in which everyone you know and have around you inhabits as well, bringing up the question of "just whose physical world is it, really?", just might have fallen under the wishes of someone else?


Have we discovered the land of stalkers? The infatuated? The uninterested? The future spouse?


Just where are we Toto?


Makes dressing up and going out on the town to meet people seem really freaky all of a sudden. Or a complete and utter waste of time. Rather a pity, wouldn't you say? Hopes and wishes stymied by others, whose hopes and wishes you are prey to without a clue.


As well as the unconscious guilt you will never deal with, stemming from wrecking someone's night you don't even know.


People like people, people want to be with people. People don't like people and people don't want to be with people. Absolutely exhilarating or certainly nothing reassuring, depending on what side of the cake your icing rests.


And as far as this magnet is concerned, I may know where North is but that doesn't mean
I know where I am going without a map to consult.

Go on and dip your toe in, it's not THAT cold...

The interesting thing about living on an island is that no matter which direction you choose to travel, you'll eventually reach the point where you can go no further. Unless a miracle occurs and then you find yourself walking on top rather than sinking below. Last time I checked, miracles were few and far in between unless I missed Oprah being cancelled...

Islands...riiiight.

So, the trick to living on an island is making sure you picked the right one, for if you have not, it doesn't matter where you go, you're not going to get very far, regardless of goals or determination. And if you do decide to brave the waters, then you have an awfully daunting task ahead...you can only swim for so long, then you're treading water. Spend too long getting nowhere and you'll find yourself sinking soon enough.


Thoreau wrote " Fools stand on their island opportunities and look toward another land. There is no other land, there is no other life but this."

uh oh...

Keep in mind that Thoreau once lived on an island and his dying last words were "Now comes good sailing..."

He also wrote "If one advances confidently in the direction of one's dreams, and endeavors to live the life which one has imagined, one will meet with a success unexpected in common hours."


phew...

Landlocked or not, if you're not braving the currents, one always runs the risk of being pulled under by the undertow of apathy, indecision or worse;

standing still...treading water...

You need not be an Olympic caliber swimmer to move forward nor do you need to take swimming lessons, after all, we're all born knowing how to swim, hell, we spent 9 months submerged.

Better to dogpaddle slowly than to stand on shore looking out.

If only they would make water wings that go with my shoes...

now THAT, is true confidence, my little fishies.