The Dao of Drama

Drama sucks. It sucks to deal with, it sucks to have it thrust upon you, but above all, it sucks to have a bad habit of starting it.

Bowling for Soup, a punk band from the throes of the early 2000s, has a song called "High School Never Ends". When I first heard it, the chorus seemed poppy and easygoing.

"The whole damn world is just as obsessed
With who‘s the best dressed and who‘s having sex,
Who‘s got the money, who gets the honeys,
Who‘s kinda cute and who‘s just a mess
And you still don’t have the right look
And you don’t have the right friends
Nothing changes but the faces, the names, and the trends
High school never ends"

 Then, upon further inspection, I realized they were making a really depressing subtle claim about the way people seem to get stuck in that sort of paradigm. 

Now, I'm convinced that that paradigm is the source of most disagreements in high school, and a lot of the drama that people experience in every day life and relationships ends up boiling down to an extension of that way of thinking.

I won't sugarcoat it. The reason I am writing this post is because there is a lot of useless drama going on with a certain circle of my friends. All I'm going to say is that I kept a secret that I shouldn't have kept and it ended up putting a huge fissure between one of my best friends and myself. I'm trying to evaluate the situation and look at it mindfully, but it's becoming harder to do that with every passing day. I'm losing sight of the Dao, so writing this is post is a bit of an effort to rediscover it. I need to give it time to heal.

Now, I'll be the first to say that I'm definitely one to blame, but this whole situation was bad to begin with and has been slowly spiraling out of control. I really wish I could do something about it, but I get the strong feeling that taking direct action would just agitate the waters further. To quote my favorite passage from the Dao De Jing,

"Muddy water, let stand, becomes clear."

I have to give it time to heal.

So, this drama is a product of that fore-mentioned thinking and I need to find a way to get out of high school and deal with this bullshit. What I'm planning on doing is just letting the tension settle and wait for a while. If I don't hear back from my good friend after a few days, I'm going to go to him and explain to him why I kept that terrible secret from him.

Now, readers, I'm going to share something incredibly personal with you (and this is very hard for me to do, so... be gentle.) The reason I had to keep that secret is because I have a hard time balancing my introversion with something called Histrionic Personality Disorder. Not even a few members of my own family know I have it. 

Histrionic Personality Disorder is a personality disorder that manifests itself as a never-ending desire for attention, approval, and drama. People who have trouble dealing with it can be "lively, dramatic, vivacious, enthusiastic, and flirtatious". Not many of my friends know that I suffer from it, but I think it's about time I come to terms with it.

I know I have issues I need to resolve, but I will not continue to hide from it. Neither will I use it as an excuse. 

It's time to heal.

If you like my writing, you can join the site to the right of the page, like Speaking with Storms on Facebook or follow me on Twitter and Google+ . If you have questions or just want to chat, I'm on Formspring too!

Thanks for reading. Stay human, my friends.

Ash

I've been away for a long, long time, and I'm sorry you all have been waiting for so long. I'll be more regular in the future. (I say that, but I don't know that for sure. Oh well.)

On a previous post, Burning Letters, I posted a piece called (You guessed it) Burning Letters that I said wasn't finished. I recently fixed it up, gave it a few new themes, a new ending, and a new title and all of this plastic surgery has (hopefully) created a better piece! Tell me what you think in the comments.

Ash

I liked you better when you were alive.
I'm pretty sure you would say the same about me, but
You've been gone for so long that I would rather remember you with a heartbeat
Than with ash slowly drifting up from within your throat,
Caught by the late autumn whispers.
I've burned a few letters to send to you, but I know I won't get a reply.
Turning cinders to paper is harder than the reverse.
I remembered your name today, after weeks of forgetfulness.
I took a sip of water to wash it down, but it got caught on the knot in my stomach.
I tried to wash away the soot but I couldn’t get rid of it,
You’re like smoke from a cigarette that I just can’t exhale.
So I’ll work to sweat you out,
I’ll stamp out the butt of the cig,
I’ll strengthen my lungs,
I’ll write about you and spit about you and tell everyone what happened to you
And I'll burn one last letter for you before I wash you down for good.

If you like my writing, you can join the site to the right of the page, like Speaking with Storms on Facebook or follow me on Twitter and Google+ . If you have questions or just want to chat, I'm on Formspring too!

Thanks for reading. Stay human, my friends.

The Trial

My friend called me up
and said that she had been attacked.
He came at her with a knife
And pushed up on her back

He forced her up against a wall,
Took her purse, ripped her blouse
And she screamed til she felt the edge
Of a knife against her mouth

And he said “Hey little girl, don’t worry now
You’re in good hands”
That’s when he licked his lips
And started unzipping his pants

You can see where this is going,
So I’ll spare you all the shit
But just know that when I see him
I’ma throw a fucking fit

!So I did what I never thought I’d do:
I went out,
And bought a gun—and tons of bullets,
Though I planned on running out

.“I’ma fill his body up with pain
The way he did to you.
Nothing you say can stop me,
This is what I have to do.”

She didn’t want me to go through with it
But I was in a trance
So I walked right out the door
To kill him with my own two hands.

And I walked out to find him
With the piece tucked in my jeans
And I found him in a driveway
Workin’ on his machine.

He saw me comin’, asked me
“Hey, what can I do for you?”
So I brought out the gun and said
“Here’s what I’m gonna do.

I’m gonna count to three, and in that time
You’re gonna say to me
How you could do just what you did
So fuckin’ easily.”

He knew why I was there
So he put his hands down
And stared at me, As his eyes crunched up
And lips turned to a frown.

It was then I saw the tears
coming down from his eyes,
But I could never cut him slack
No matter how hard he cried

.“It was fucking awful, man,
I can’t fuckin’ sleep at night.
I was drunk and angry at my ex
She was just in sight,

I was so far fucking gone
That I hardly remember shit
But I do know what I did
And I know I deserve this.”

Then an old man behind me
On the sidewalk stopped in shock.
“Young man, you do not want this.
Put it down, let’s just talk.”

But I was so far into it
That I couldn’t hear him speak
All I wanted was this fucker’s brain
Splattered against the street.

Then the old man put his hand
On top of my shoulder,
And said “Put it down, son.
This act is even colder.

What he did is awful, yes.
He was drunk in wrath
But are you any different?
Do we need a bloodbath?”

I was thinking miles in minutes
“I don’t give a fuck, Mister!”
I was not gonna listen,
Cause I know he hurt my sister!

I know he’s a terror
And he knows he’s got a twister
Coming his way, man,
Now let me bust this fucking blister!

Then the man looked at my gun
and yelled “GO ON AND DO IT!
I deserve this, and you’re the only one
To put me through it!”

And he cried and cried and sobbed and sobbed
and lost all of his shit
But I couldn’t pull the trigger
And go through with it.

I felt the old man smile at me.
“You know how strong the rage is.
But now that’s all over, yes?
It’s in history’s pages.”

I turned around to face him,
But there was no one to see.
So I turned back to the man and saw him
Staring back at me.“

You’re a lucky man, you know.
I was going to pull the trigger.
But I think it was an angel that
Told me I could be bigger.”

So I threw the gun into a drain
When I was walking back
And I realized the kind of pain
That went into that attack.

I found her back at my place,
asking, “Please, don’t say it’s true.”
I shook my head without a word
And hugged her so she knew.

If you like my writing, you can join the site to the right of the page, like Speaking with Storms on Facebook or follow me on Twitter and Google+ . If you have questions or just want to chat, I'm on Formspring too!

Burning Letters

Just a rough draft of something that's been swimming in my head for a few days. Tell me what you think in the comments!

I liked you better when you were alive.
I'm pretty sure you would say the same about me, but
You've been gone for so long that I would rather remember you with a heartbeat
Than with a grandfather clock's last chime in your throat.
I've burned a few letters to send to you, but I know I won't get a reply.
Turning ash to paper is harder than the reverse.
I remembered your name today, at a baseball game.
I took a sip of water to wash it down, but it got caught on the knot in my stomach.
Maybe you needed your own Rikki-Tikki to fight the cobras slithering across your scalp,
But in the end you were poisoned by your own locks, the way you wanted.
You petrified all of the mongooses with your gaze intentionally.
So I'll burn one last letter for you before I wash you down for good.

I know it ends a bit abruptly, that's something I'm planning on fixing. This is one I'm going to be working on in the future, and I'll post the latest draft (can't surely say 'final') when I feel like taking a break from it.

If you like my writing, you can join the site to the right of the page, like Speaking with Storms on Facebook or follow me on Twitter. If you have questions or just want to chat, I'm on Formspring, too!

Peace and Love, thank you for reading. Stay Human.

Ecstasy is Torment

I really don't like hard drugs. Now, before you go into the whole "Straight-edge" thing (a movement I dislike for other reasons), let me explain.

I really don't like hard drugs. I don't have an issue with cannabis because it doesn't really have any life-endangering elements to it. As far as I can tell, you have to be a complete bum with really nothing better to do with your time in order to let cannabis damage your life. I mean, by the time you've smoked enough weed in one sitting for it to become dangerous, you wouldn't have even gotten that far in the first place because you would have been distracted by the pizza guy or by the XBox. Stoners don't have the willpower or attention span to let leaf consume them. Which is fine with me. Weed isn't my thing, but so long as you aren't hurting anyone, go for it.

That being said, anything harder than that is an area that I have a lot of fear about. I've seen what kind of havoc cocaine, heroine, and ecstasy can wreak.

A lot of people ask me if that fear stems from any religious aspect. It's kind of like that... I suppose my Buddhist philosophy does influence that viewpoint. There is a parable in Buddhism about a monk who came across a woman who told him that he must either a) kill her goat b) sleep with her, or c) drink a mug of beer (all of which are against the vows taken by Buddhist monks).

He thought to himself, well, surely if I kill the goat, then I will be causing great suffering since a living being will die. If I sleep with the woman, I will have broken another great vow of a monk and will surely be lost to the ways of the world. Lastly, if I drink the beer then perhaps no great harm will come and I will only be intoxicated for a while, and most importantly I will only be hurting myself (this is significant because monks try to help others on the way to enlightenment).

So the monk drank the mug of beer and then he became very drunk. In his drunkenness he proceeded to kill the goat and sleep with the woman, breaking all three vows and, at least in his eyes, doing much harm in the world.

Now, I don't have anything against alcohol either so long as it's used with utmost care. The purpose of this parable is to illustrate that substances carry a grave danger of breaking all of one's vows. In a sense, we could say the intoxicant in the parable is the cause of all other harmful deeds. If we break our vows, we break a part of ourselves, we lose a part of ourselves, we kill a part of ourselves.

Not My Thing

A friend of mine hit me up one day.
She said, "Hey, I got some X I'm tryin to get rid of. You want some?"
I said, "No thanks, that's not my thing."
She asked me "Then what is your thing?"
Memories came back, and I went silent for a moment.
What is my thing? I know.
I wanted to hold the phone straight in front of my face,
And scream at it until I broke the microphone,
"You want to know what my thing is?
My thing is having a clear mind.
My thing is being able to tell what time of day it is, or what day it is, or FUCK, what my NAME is.
My thing is having a steady heartbeat,
My thing is being able to pass background checks,
My thing is being able to take a deep breath,
My thing is having friends with whom I can outlive the 27 Club,
My thing is putting my money and time toward something or someone that's valuable,
My thing is not losing my life because of a single pill, because of a line of dust, because of a needle,
My thing is keeping my soul and sanity and stamina!
My thing is saying I have friends who died a year, a month, a fucking week after I met them because of YOUR thing!"
But I took a deep breath.
"My thing is saying 'No thanks, that's not my thing'."

Substances such as cocaine, heroin, and ecstasy are incredibly addictive, consuming, and destructive. Many of their users who think they're "in control" are sadly mistaken. If you are struggling or know someone who is, call a doctor immediately, call (866) 558-9817 for addiction help or click here to find treatment facilities near you.
 

If you like my writing, you can join the site to the right of the page, like Speaking with Storms on Facebook or follow me on Twitter. If you have questions or just want to chat, I'm on Formspring, too!

Peace and Love, thank you for reading.

“For every minute you are angry you lose sixty seconds of happiness.”

Ralph Waldo Emerson is the author that wrote the words of this post's title, and I believe that they ring quite true, even after over 100 years.

Like any other emotion, anger is a response. Our soul reacts to stimuli from outside sources, and anger is just as natural as fear, compassion, greed, and love. Anger is a way to express ourselves! It's not a bad thing. However, how we deal with it can be either constructive or catastrophic.

Anger can be good when we channel it to find results, solutions, or new abilities, but it takes real self control and a strong willpower to know exactly how to forge it into something constructive. I've heard a lot of people say "What would Jesus do? Would Jesus be angry?" Chances are, yeah, Jesus would be really freaking angry. The Bible has numerous accounts (in Matthew 21, Mark 3, Mark 11, and John 2) of Jesus becoming angry with certain people for cheating, and for refusing to answer his questions. What makes his anger justified is the fact that it's not directed at the weakness of another, and it's targeting injustice.

That being said, anger can be (and most often is) very very dangerous when, instead of mastering it, we allow it to master us. When we lose control of ourselves and turn to infighting, violence, and hatred, and when we refuse to deal with it and throw it away, it begins to burn us. When we try to deal with it by becoming reckless, destructive, and unwise, it does damage not only to us but also to the ones that love us.

I asked a handful of friends, "What really makes you angry?" One person answered

"For me Anger results from hindrance and ignorance. It enrages me when people do not put in the same amount of effort as I do, whether it is a relationship or a work project."

Another said

"I become angry when people don't follow through on their promises and when they go out of their way to cause harm to other people."

Neither of these feelings are bad, but dealing with them wisely is crucial. The Buddha said,

“Holding on to anger is like grasping a hot coal with the intent of throwing it at someone else; you are the one who gets burned.”

 So, what's an effective way of handling anger? www.PersonalTao.com gives a simple, yet surprisingly effective list:

1. Take a breath, and just feel it.
2. Look at it, don’t try to answer it, just look at it.
3. Accept it, and then release it as a long exhale.
4. Imagine it going into the earth as compost.
5. With your arms sweep it away: Literally use your arm like a sword to cut through the feelings of anger to say I see the anger: and it is as it was.

The first step is actually all that meditation, in its core, truly is: awareness of breathing. Being conscious of breathing is a way to slow the heart rate, to relax muscles, and to promote mental stability and calm. The second step stems from the fact that rushing to solve a problem too soon might make it worse. As Lao Tzu says in the Dao De Jing,

"Muddy water, let stand, becomes clear."

The third is the core of dealing with anger healthily: acceptance. Seeing as anger is neither positive nor negative, simply accepting it for what it is helps us to see past the anger into the real mind of the situation. The fourth step, at first glance, might seem a bit strange. However, looking mindfully into it, we see that everything comes from the earth and  returns to it in the same way. Our anger comes from our soul, from our core, and accepted, it returns, having served its purpose. The final step seals the acceptance. "It is as it was", before the anger boiled up.

"Do not be deceived by your senses, your feelings of fear and uncertainty, for even as the tempest may howl, just beyond lies a serenity that you would otherwise not have experienced."

Anger is not a bad thing, it is simply very powerful. How we use it decides everything, and when we truly look mindfully into the present situation, we are able to use it to benefit ourselves and those important to us.