Hyperion Zen-7

It does not do to leave a live dragon out of your calculations, if you live near them.

J.R.R. Tolkien, The Hobbit

Image Source: Pinterest

In the past, I talked and wrote often of my association with the Asian Dragon Society. The fictional stories came from their heritage spun out of the Three Kingdoms period of China and brought to full life during the grand exodus after the usurper Ching Empress was deposed by the Nationalists in 1912 who were in turn deposed by the communists. That exodus, which established colonies in Europe, Australia, America, and South America, forged a secret society that hides in plain sight. It is from the Dragon Sisters, I drew my strength as a Dragon brother and later a Dragon Master. I started as a Praetorian Guard to the Dragon Empress of Reason and evolved through study and practice to mastery.

The Society is benevolent, focusing on the true pillars of a just society; art, music, literature, metaphysical philosophy based on practicality, architecture, mathematics, civil responsibility, and science. You will see them often and can only tell them apart from other Asians by mastery of their trade and martial discipline. Non-Dragons often mistake their silence, dignity, and grace for submissive or weak behavior.

The difference most remarkable is the Society of Dragons do not force their views on an unbelieving population. There is no need to waste energy on that. Instead, they support each other unfailingly, work silently and resolutely to be the example of noble purpose, an example their children follow.

In this centuries long campaign, The Dragons know they can only save themselves from the trajectory of doom humankind has set for itself. They have worked tirelessly, and when they appear to be extinct, they will have achieved their noble purpose. At over 100 million strong world wide, they plan to survive and carry the seeds of true humanity and divinity with them. They are an ocean tide, the shores of discordant peoples cannot stop.

If you have never heard of them or seen them, talked with them, their mandate to hide in plain sight has achieved its purpose. But don’t despair my dear readers, you have not heard the last of the Dragons yet, nor of their good deeds. When you listen closely to popular chants of hate and violence or the voice against them, if you listen closely, you’ll hear a child playing a violin with mastery down the street from the hateful speech. You’ll see articles in the back pages of news, hidden behind Trump Butt-hurt, of a child receiving an honor impossible among his or her classmates. That is the Dragon’s roar.

In my enclave, Dragon Sisters tell their children, “An American A+ is a Dragons’ F-.” Noble purpose, like noble achievement, is not for those steeped in mediocrity or those who cry loudly and hold out their hand for some mysterious stranger or government to pay for their inability to see inside of themselves the power of self.

Recently a 68 yer old Dragon Master, whom I know personally, was attacked in his small sandwich shop that fed working class people with good food and low prices. The three men were career gang members out on bail for previous crimes of violence. The Dragon Brother killed two and permanently disabled the third with bare hands. He would have given them all they wanted but they threatened his grand daughter with unspeakable acts as a reward for his compliance. His grand daughter is a straight A student, concert pianist, and member of the Dragon Traditional Drum team. He could not allow her to be wasted by these men. He is mournful of his actions seeing his defense as a shameful act. His grand daughter goes to college soon having achieved a perfect score on her college entrance exam. The three thieves are no longer a threat to her or anyone.

No one could figure out how this 68 year old man, small in stature could manage what he did. It was the Dragon’s Roar and it was heard by many. Sadly, it is this difference in ability, this high achievement in all areas of society that is ultimately making the Dragons a target of hate and misinformation.

Like the image I used for this post, there is judgement predicated on ignorance, laziness, and prejudice. There is jealousy, resentment, and fundamental beliefs challenged by a presence misunderstood and so the need to remain hidden with only the interaction with carefully selected and worthy individuals. It is the only society that remains the same after more than 2000 years of change. We have a saying, be strong like water, be flexible like bamboo, be silent and hidden like the tiger. Sit down for tea and be welcomed. Attack and be destroyed. Such is the way of the Dragon.

Hyperion Zen-6

People go, but how they left always stays.

Rupi Kaur

Grey Girl by John Foley

Dreams Held in the void

There were so many things I didn’t know when we looked into each other’s eyes from across the room. We both knew we were plumbing the dark wells of a short future but it was best not to think of it. How many dreams drifted past her grey-green eyes, as they fell on my face and drifted down? She never told me.

Zofia was an innocent girl from a small village in Poland, she was 19 and already earning her keep far from home as a cleaning girl in the gasthaus I stayed in. I was the mysterious American the girls whispered about as they glanced shamelessly my way and giggled. I was not the typical guest in those days.

The thin and girlish maiden held her gaze and I held mine far too long. There was the pull of ancient memories that didn’t belong in this life, a magnetic energy that filled my chest with an aching need. I felt her destiny under my finger tips and from the look on her face those fingertips were from a ghost she knew.

She was forbidden to mingle with the guests and so we kept our distance until one weekend she had the day off and she appeared in the small club I was in sipping my beer and observing the locals. It was my job to gather information about the area and it’s people. I liked my job. I always hoped our plans to roll through the countryside in the machinery of war in conquest of a Soviet boogie man never came true.

Her legs gave away her social status. They were well muscled from hard farm labor. That hard work had kept her rail thin but fit and strong. She saw me and quickly turned away. Oh well, I thought. I’ll not pressure her. When she turned again to see if I was still looking at her, the high cheeks on her Slavic features were flush with an apple red and my gut ached to feel her silky long hair on my chest. Damn this torture. Why must we play this game? I asked myself. No answer came from the dark pit I shouted my thoughts into.

She danced with her girlfriends and made herself busy. I could see her nervousness growing. The wringing hands. The sweat arching down the armpits of her simple East European dress. Her glances became more fervent and frequent. When I stood and walked slowly to her table she physically scooted back from the edge of the bench as if pushed by some invisible force.

The table of girls watched me intently and no one said a word. I greeted them properly making eye contact with each one, ignoring Zofia. Then I looked at her and offered my hand and asked her to dance. There was a nervous chatter of laughter and kidding Zofia to go, go with him. They assumed I didn’t understand their language. That assumption always worked in my favor. Intelligence gathering is easier when people speak freely.

We danced the night away. She seemed to like the slow dances pressed against me. I definitely preferred her warmth shared so freely. We could not return to the gasthaus together. Zofia feared more for her job, room and board, than she did the risk of a missed romance. That night I lay awake in my bed and thought about the girl who slept in the attic room above. I had never felt such a deep familiarity and comfort with someone I didn’t know before. Soulmates, perhaps. I didn’t know, but I was determined to find out.

Days passed into weeks and I always met Zofia on her one day a week off. To address her fears of being seen or ratted out to the Gasthaus owners, I moved to the next village some 10 kilometers away and it was then that we started our relationship.

She was everything I had dreamed of. I was her first and she gave herself completely to me. When we made love, she had nothing left to give when the cool and quiet of night settled over us under the comforter as we slept like the dead entwined like roots in hard packed soil. I was 8 years older and she accepted me as the one who knew the world and she was eager to learn.

How passionate and desirous we were in the beginning. She liked nothing better than to find a moment to open her heart, mind, and knees to all the new pleasures and mystery that love brought to her life. To kiss endlessly in a wild passion was a bonding tighter and more joyful than any we had known before.

Our affair, hidden in plain sight, was a welcomed relief from her servitude to the dirt and detritus of cleaning floors, toilets, and beds day after day. What decadent delights did I desire of her? I only had to tell her and show her then the journey to mastery was swift and sure.

Zofia was my dedicated spirit of the divine feminine and I the willing recipient of all her earthly and heavenly desires. I wanted to fulfill her dreams. I wanted to be her dreams. She was certainly mine.

As I moved on in my assignments, she came on the train to visit. She had gained a promotion from her hard work and joyful demeanor. She had more money and free time. Holidays and weekends were spent in a fugue of endless adventure by day and the symphony of passion by night. We began to plan our future together.

Somewhere in that detailed plan of making our life together, Zofia disappeared. I called her best friend to find out if all was well. I learned she had gone back to her village unexpectedly because her father was quite ill. They expected her to return.

We discovered that old secrecy behind the East German Wall had prevented us from finding out how to contact her. There were no cell phones in that day. We wrote letters and there were no useful phone connections across the East and West border. Not yet anyway.

Life went on without Zofia. In those endless nights spent in jungles, deserts, and other inhospitable places doing things I could never share with good people, I dreamed of her. The dreams lasted until hope died and life restarted again more cautious, protected, and never again was my heart complete and opened fully, until now.

Lao Tzu wrote of the Dao in, The Spirit of the Valley

The Spirit of the Valley is the sacred feminine principle
 Its gateway is the root of the cosmos 
Like an unbroken silk thread, it is inexhaustible

Zofia took me through the Spirit of the Valley and when that sojourn was complete, like so many others, she was gone and I was left to make sense of it all. I never forgot that she dreamed as well and that we shared something otherworldly brought forth from distant times and places. If it is true a woman never forgets her first love, we were fortunate that life together was too short to ruin the youthful belief in a deep and all consuming love.

I’m sure if her memories are like mine, it was a once in a life love in a never ending sea of tears that time and time again offered safe refuge in the remembrance of a face that never grew old and never uttered a harsh word. There is the scent of powder fresh skin, warm, inviting, and luxurious to the touch. There are those soft words spoken in an accent that was unsure except in the expression of love, desire, and passion intermingled with exclamation and cooing as we shopped, attended outdoor events and music festivals. There was the awe of the mountains, the hurry to the car to warm up, and Picnics with lazy cloud watching under a friendly sky. Such memories inspire a joyful life even as darkness descends and the fog of life envelops the daydreams of artful souls created long ago.

Hyperion Zen-5

I am certain of nothing but the holiness of the Heart’s affections and the truth of the Imagination.

John Keats

Image Source: Pinterest

The quote above is another of my favorites. The image is of the feminine beauty I see, adore, and wish was set free on this planet of repression and violent expression. My nom de guerre, Hyperion is the father of Selene, the goddess of the moon. There is affection there for me in my desire to see Selene succeed.

I pretty much live my life navigating the strong currents of my affection for others and the natural world. This white water rafting of emotions requires a healthy imagination to navigate the hazards of love in all its forms without stringent conditions, constraints, boundaries, and good social grace. I tend to struggle with all of it.

My safety net is my life lived almost wholly inside my head in a world of my own creation. I like it there. If I limit my external self, known for its hyperbole and endless bloviation, I limit my regret, shame, and disappointment. I suppress that sense of outer ugliness to a point, but not entirely, ever.

I recently began training for a cross country hike, a sort of cleansing of my life to something more earth-friendly, an attempt at reconnecting with the nature I was raised in as a youth. Leave no trace means something much more to me than the definition of treading lightly in nature. I intend to leave no trace of my past in my future.

Last weekend up in the mountains, It rained and I slipped on the rocks and fell to the path below. Thank the nature gods, I landed on my belly instead of my narrow butt or I might have been hurt more seriously. I’ve accumulated a lot of spare groceries in my belly to get me through hard times on the trail and that extra cushion saved me. My trail name was Lord Geezer, 9th Earl of Huff-N-Puff but I’m thinking Belly Flop might be more appropriate.

So, this Saturday, I went out again only this time it stormed like Hell’s half-acre due to the tropical storm moving inland from the gulf. I found such peace in the wind blowing the crowns of a great forest in jubilant waves to the heavens. All the creatures were bedded down to wait for the storm’s passing. Only my ignorant ass was out there defying the laws of nature and good sense. I have to take the good with the bad if I’m going to walk the 3000 miles across America’s mountain ranges. So, there I was.

It rained again. The path was slippery and covered in the wet leaves of early fall. Leaves are well known for hiding your next fall from you. I moved cautiously, listening to the symphony of wind and trees. The rain kept a pitter-patter of timing for the chorus. My zen bucket filled rapidly and I made my way back home in time to avoid the worst of it.

The lesson I take from this challenge of me against nature and recovering from a broken back, impinged nerves and the ravages of age is that all my life, I have fallen in every way and gotten back up again. Life, for me, has always been the agony of ecstasy. No amount of horror, violence, degradation, falls from grace, or denuded dignity has stopped me from the struggle I call my life.

Suffering has taught me to love you without telling you because to protect myself from the love I feel for my friends and family only brings regret when they are taken from me. I prefer aloneness and eschew loneliness and that requires a certain silent and chaste love that I extend to everything in my environment, especially in that inner world I live so happily in.

To be honest, I’m not ready for the big challenge. I’m not strong enough yet. I’ve had to postpone my start twice already. Physical and mental strength and toughness require a strong will and a strong regimen of health and fitness. One must never neglect spiritual fitness in any plan.

These are the things I struggle with as I push myself through the limitations of my mind, body, and spirit. Age provides wisdom as long as I remain aware of the hard lessons imparted. In the same equation, age strips away all one holds dear. It is a cleansing of the detritus of life. I am stripped of friends, family, ability, and clear thoughts. I am stripped of the power and passion of youth. I am stripped of acceptance, intimacy, accomplishment, and nearly all of those things I previously held as the hallmarks of a good life and yet, it’s only a cleansing preparing me for greater things.

Without the ties to the Samsara of life and death, I am finally free and yet that freedom can often be a deeply feared thing. It forces me to look into myself and regain my path without any burdens of the past and without fear of the future. I must live well with myself and find a path to peace. As I have learned, it is frightening to be so small and alone in a fierce world.

Nature is a beautiful and spiritual connection, but it is merciless and unemotional unless I can navigate through it carefully aware of my connection to the tiniest entity of living things and the enormous power nature possesses. I’m still learning. It’s painful, yet I haven’t given up. I get back up until it is no longer necessary. I can rest eternally, and my time in the Samara of endless awareness and effort is over.

Through it all, I do not lose my reverence for my Heart’s affections and never deny the truth of my Imagination. I am indebted to the kindness you, dear reader, have shared and brightened uncountable days. There are strength and peace in what you give so freely. I shall draw strength and courage from that kindness as I turn to the next bend on the path.

Hyperion Zen-4

“If I am really a part of your dream, you’ll come back one day.”

Paulo Coelho

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Hyperion Zen-3

Countless words count less than the silent balance between yin and yang

Lao Tzu, Tao Te Ching

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Not Doing

A long time ago, the Old Master told his disciples, if they understood what makes something beautiful, they could recognize ugliness. If we understand goodness, we recognize bad. The Void and Amplitude have the same origin in the Yin and Yang of all things.

Difficulty and Ease beget each other
Long and Short define each other
High and Low support each other
Music and Voice harmonize with each other - Lao Tzu

The Yin and Yang of all things are a constant like the speed of light. From this, the Old Master taught that the wise person acts through Not Doing. Wisdom teaches without words (teach by example) and interacts with creation and initiating. Wisdom does not own, acts but does not rely on results, achieves but does not linger for recognition. In not seeking recognition one’s credit becomes enduring.

The concept of Yin and Yang of all things and our navigation through it is a difficult concept to internalize in our modern world. It was born in the time when humans were tied to their natural world as a language to express all things in the consciousness.

The use of symbology, such as real and mythical creatures like dragons, and turtles, or elements like earth and sky, fire and water, and deities like gods and demons are hard to internalize as symbols of the interconnection among humans, the environment, and the spiritual universe. Symbology of Yin and Yang is a dead language like Latin, but that doesn’t mean that the underlying circle of life is dead, it’s just misunderstood. Our universe and all it’s mystery of the Void is alive and active, but hidden to most of us by choice.

To understand the Yin and Yang of all things, I’d like to use a more up to date explanation, which starts with the parts that make up an atomic structure.

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Don’t hit that navigation button in a panic to avoid a science lesson. This isn’t that kind of post. Hang in there. I may eventually make some kind of nebulous point.

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The Atom has three main components that have an electrical charge or energy. The Proton resides in the nucleus with it’s best buddy in the whole wide world, the Neutron. The proton is a positive charge and represents Yang or male energy. The Neutron has no charge but is a binding force in the universe. It keeps the nucleus of all Amplitudes together. Whipping around and vibrating like a mad squirrel in a peanut factory is the electron, which is negative female Yin energy (negative is an energy charge not an attitude). Now one step further. Proton-Male. Electron-Female. Neutron-Binding Force (love, compassion, empathy, identification, genderless endeavor, etc.)

When the atom is stable it is bound tightly to it’s Yin and Yang energies like a magnet and is eternal. It does not subscribe to change within itself. It can combine with other atoms to make up any entity of the universe and it can break away to bind in a new structure or amplitude, but it is unchanged. If an atom is unstable, it becomes radioactive and sends parts of itself flying off into the void to recombine with other rogue parts into a brand new atom elsewhere. This casting off returns the atom to a stable state but it is no longer what it was before. The atom is now a new element on the Periodic Table.

Balance of energy, vibration, and the void is static and it is the state all humans seek but rarely obtain. Balance is the Not Doing. I find that slightly left or right of center balance is where life is at it’s best for me. I have sought the unbalance in order to create that fission and fusion of experiences in the extreme.

I don’t recommend anyone try to live their life like I have. Suicide and insanity are real and can only be avoided with a certain psyche that thrives in the chaos of the Void. In other words, you have to enjoy being batshit crazy and bad stuff doesn’t bother you while good stuff causes face busting smiles and a hyperbole of joy. If the above doesn’t describe you, then you are normal and well adjusted and your lineage will thrive in the future.

What I do recommend is that we not turn against the stability of our bond with one another. We are designed by the forces of the universe to bind, recombine, and interact with each other and our environment in healthy, happy, and sustaining ways. The discordant world of today is a symptom of our imbalance and destruction of the existing structure is the only way to achieve balance and so that will happen like soap bubbles bursting until balance is achieved.

Like the universe, this balance, unbalance, and re-balance is exactly what the Void and Amplitude is, from a modern perspective. We know that Black Holes are at the center of nearly every galaxy we can observe. We know that Black Holes are enormous beyond our ability to fathom, that they consume all matter that ventures too close to the event horizon. Recently, we discovered that Black holes also eject matter and energy across the universe and the forces of the universe then creates new suns, planets, gases, and so on. Black Holes are one heck of a recycle program.

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Okay, so nothing new here except the rather boisterous yawning going on out there in the audience. I’ll switch this up a little to cover what is going on in my search for Not Doing by Doing.

This past Friday was the date I set to strike out into the wilderness of northwest North Carolina to venture up the Appalachian Trail. My hiking buddies did indeed start that journey, but without me. This is the badshit part.

Two weeks ago, I re-injured my back once again by tying the shoelaces on my trail runners. Um, yea. I say I’m going on a walk-about to find my midpoint in the inner Yin and Yang and I can’t tie my shoes without becoming a worm-like cripple. It truly is a weird life when everything below your belly button acts like a teenager and doesn’t listen to commands from central control.

I remain optimistic and work hard to regain my strength and endurance using alternatives to pain drugs and surgery. It’s an intense schedule of therapy and it works but without the instant gratification I would get if I could just blast off a few million cells to rebalance my core to a proper male enigma.

I also view this new development as a way of telling me that to properly begin my much desired sojourn, I need more work on the me parts to get real results, not just live by determination alone. Many of you, my dear readers, have inspired me to drive on by simply sharing your incredible talents and encouraging comments. I am eternally grateful for that. And this is the good stuff we talked about somewhere at the top of this post.

I’ve decided I won’t be denied. I’ll get back up. I’ll continue to tie my trail runners if only a little bit more carefully, and I’ll run through the forest, the mountains, and everything in between until this particular amplitude is recycled in the great chaos of the Void.

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In other news, based on editorial feedback I received on The Agony of Ecstasy novel, I’m undertaking some significant revisions which I do believe will make it a better story that moves forward with clear continuity and less rabbit holes to navigate. It’s a work in progress and eventually it will be available here for anyone to download and read if they like.

Next time you are near your Yin or Yang friend, investigate the electromagnetic pull the other person has on you and explore the power your kindness has on them. You just might feel a little tingle from the Void.