Snippets By Jonathan Berman

December 28, 2013

The heart sings its praises over the water of the tumultuous mind. It has always been so... so it shall always be. The soul is bathed in emotion, and the earth gives rise to new life with such a watering of tears. Without sorrow, there is nothing to reflect hidden courage, no path out of darkness.

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For I have not nor ever shall I meet a living soul who does not deserve compassion.

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There is love to be found in the unlikeliest of places
But sometimes obscured like shadows on faces
For I have seen darkness much darker than pitch
And I have seen walls so high as to be endless
My vision has been clouded as if I were blind
My thoughts building prisons of the things I've defined
But while terror kept me cowered in the halls of the dead
I found light in the darkness, like a path through my head

A wave of my hand
like a leaf on the stream
I empty myself like it was only a dream

December 22, 2013

Do what thou love, and let it be like the sunrise that awakens the dawn, for that which is not seen or heard still is, and sweet melodies like rivers must ever roll on.

December 18, 2013

We are not one thing or static path... but an ever winding, ever deepening journey towards a something beautiful. Blossoming, expansive, uncovering inclusion, compassion, and love.

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Merrily, merrily, down a stream of consciousness...

So apparently, Jesus was this sorcerer guy who stole the teachings from Jehovah, which gave him super powers, it's kind of like when you take LSD and break down God's door and he's busy drinking tea with his son, and you're all, show me the way! and like you don't have an appointment, and you haven't really done the work to peacefully arrive in the heavenly abode during visting hours and such... ya, it's like that, only warmer... a hell of a lot of warmer, and you're doing the backstroke through GMOceans, while three-eyed mermaid pirahna are chasing you back to terra firma... ya, it's like that, only weirder... but that's just how it goes when you're halfway between night and morning and the wormholes of a navajo drum beat has you crashing through the magical mushroom tip on the shooting star express, floating and diving, living and dying over hot stone, reborn like an ancient lava you come pouring yourself headlong and unfastened, through the soil, breaking all the speed limits back home, and home? Home is the existential everywhere at the eternal now. Tao now brown cow, and how! Sipping water from a drop of sweat on your palm, feeding the microbes, man, feeding them like pups, that's what it's all about... that's what you are, the drop of water, fulness of the cosmos, emptying yourself for the rivers to carry the child safely downstream, and into the loving arms of mother earth.

December 17, 2013

The brain holds the map, the heart holds the compass.

December 15, 2013

Some people just want to be entertained, they don't even have to pay attention, their lives are background noise, but me? I want art to change me. I want to walk through the fire of my experiences and afterward, look back and see a part of me smoldering on the floor.

December 13, 2013

We are birds flying around in the illusion of cages we've built for ourselves, and sometimes we catch a glimpse of freedom, which is merely the realization that the bars of those cages had never been real at all.

December 10, 2013

God does not forgive anything and it matters not, for our will is our own, thus forgiveness must also be our burden.

December 9, 2013

What if the melody we know so well and guide our lives by is the memory of the sound of our mother's heart beating before we were born?

December 8, 2013

I knew a girl, years ago, she drew me things, we talked all night, her name was Sheuri Chiaroscuro, but that won't help me find her, it's not her real name, it's the name of the girl from the movie Stargate... some mysteries are meant to stay that way... hidden, lost beneath the waves of time, like the words of a poem whose only reminder is a melody, an old man whose words are gone, and only the echo of a feeling remains.

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The mind is like a bag of unpopped corn to which we must apply the fire of imagination.
(Possible drawing from Monica coming soon!)

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Happiness is a complex word. It's an illusion... a trickster, a siren calling you forward, saying come to me... run to me... forsake all else, a mirage in the desert. When I see the word happiness, I see the laughing hyena behind the mask... and its name is balance. Balance in giving, understanding what one needs, what is too much, gratitude for what one has, and an appreciation so deep that it never supercedes the needs of others or the heart of compassion. Happiness holds out a jewel of judgment, that there are emotions that must be shunned, shamed, and condemned... but balance enjoys all emotions, sees the beauty in them all, particularly the difficult ones, they are our teachers, and as I bow in grace, embraced by this reality, it is not happiness I seek, but peace I find there.

December 7, 2013

Finding something to give to others is easy for me, finding it within to give to myself? Not as much. Some days I find a little silliness, a little sharing, a little creativity goes a long way, for the day, others are drowned in loneliness that these cannot take away. They float above me like wind over water, while I am deep, deep under water in my private, silent ocean prison looking at reflections, trying to remember the sun.

December 6, 2013

A string and a rubik's style cube
But each color speaks an emotional discharge based on the reflection of the personality
What does the string do?
A snake, tongue dancing, breathing the momentum of life's rich currents

December 4, 2013

Sharing wisdom is like pointing to the moon to those who don't even know there's a sky.

December 3, 2013

Always learning, no certainty but believing in the path of breath, passions to follow, unattached, teetering often, I am ever in love and uncomfortable. Seeing the universe in the palm of my hand, an explorer... I speak my words more often than others, I spend more time letting go then seeking answers. The moment is beautiful, life is short. I enjoy you.

Let go to the moment, in appreciation, humility and gratitude. The diagnostics of alignment