A Change IS Gonna Come

Last year Bob Dylan compiled a song list for Starbucks’ Artist Choice Series. In addition to offering up a keen selection of country, blues, and jazz, he also supplied notes and commentary as to why he held the songs in such regard. BUT, the best part was the forward.

He wrote, "When I was asked to put together this collection of songs, I wasn't sure what to do. So I just grabbed a bunch of things I was into recently. Some people have favorite songs, but I've got songs of the minute -- songs that I'm listening to right now. And if you ask me about one of those songs a year from now, I might not even remember who did it, but at the moment it's everything to me.”

I bring this up as today’s lesson: Nothing is final. One day you’re high. The next day you’re low. You might have a funky, expressive, or awful haircut today, but soon it will grow into something else, something new and random. Maybe you grew up liking pop music and boy bands, but now you like a specific mash up of Electronic & Classical. You might decide you don’t want to smoke cigarettes anymore; that it’s just not who you are. Maybe you were a staunch republican but now have curiosities about the well-spoken and well-organized Democratic nominee. Perhaps you were madly in love last week, but woke up today feeling comfort in solitude, without a desire to be held.

Everything is fine. Not finAL.

We tend to instantly identify with “things.” And we believe in so much, when in fact, a belief isn't known to be true. It's a hope for the truth. We hold grudges because of what someone said when we were young. We store hurtful words and replay them in our minds until we think it to be true. And some of us believe a TV commercial and think we need a faster computer, a smarter phone, a stronger pill, a more relaxed-fit jean, etc. We think that certain things, thoughts, or actions make us who we are and sometimes we become addicted to those thoughts or behaviors and then become too afraid to let them go.

I write (but don't post) a lot and many people may assume I have every self-published word memorized or that I live these shared thoughts constantly. This is not the case. My brain doesn’t reference myself very well actually, and I’m sure I contradict myself every other day in one way or another. One day I feel like I have all the wisdom of the world and the next day my soul wears thin and I stutter just ordering ice cream.

And everything is fine.

Because I trust in the ever-changing climate of the heart. (At least, today I feel that way.) I think it is necessary to have many experiences for the sake of feeling something; for the sake of being challenged, and for the sake of being expressive, to offer something to someone else, to learn what we are capable of. These meanderings, rants, and blogs for instance, provide a great deal of comfort just sharing it, even though I put a part of myself on the line to be criticized.

Oh well, Courage is triumph of the soul is guess.

So remember, You have the right to change your mind.

About anything.

Anytime.

This is not the ending.

P.S. – No doesn’t mean forever. It simply means, “Not right now.”

And on the topic of Not right now, whatever happened to you in the past is not happening now.

You will be safe behind your honest decisions and mood swings.

I promise.

-megz

I baci di cioccolato - A recipe for Chocomole

Grazie. I present you with a famously delicious recipe. Here I have simplified the portion for your convenience and practicality. Enjoy.

What you'll need in the bowl: 2 Ripe (soft) Avocados -- 20 yummy dates -- Some Coconut Oil, Agave Nectar, Vanilla Extract, and Raw Cacao.

What you'll need on the radio: I prefer Italian, Flamenco, or Reggae. Funiculi, Funicula always puts a bounce over the cutting board. However, Bob Marley goes well with this tropical delicacy.

Halve the two Avocados and mush up all the green goodness. You may throw away the seed but save the skins as those will be used as serving cups later.

Chop chop chop the dates again and again and again. About 8-10 dates per avocado should do the sticky trick. A food processor makes this task super easy, but doing it by hand can be meditative. Careful you don't zone out and add fingernail or blood to the recipe. There's already plenty of calcium in the pudding.


Squirt/Pour/Drizzle in as much Agave Nectar as you'd like. I like to do a few tablespoons to start and then add more at the end if the mousse isn't sweet enough.



Just a drop of Vanilla will do.

Then throw on a heaping spoonful of Coconut Oil. This is a must as it will really dress up the dessert and surprise the tastebuds with something more exotic than you'd anticipated. (On a side note, you can use cococut oil for cooking everything. It's a super healthy alternative, especially for those who still cook with left over bacon grease.)

Add one spoonful of raw Cacao PER avocado. Too much cacao could make the goo bitter, so be modest.

Now stir it up... little darlin' stir it up. If you have a kitchen mixer, try to harmonize with it. Otherwise mixing with a knife and fork will help you get those dates down to a smoother dimension.

The recipe should fit perfectly back into the Avocado Skins. Whatever's left over you should eat with your fingers right then and there.

Add your favorite garnish and let cool in the fridge. Some prefer this dessert the day after as all the flavors congeal and the whole thing becomes more like a pudding.



Have fun. Get messy. Be creative. And if this can be done in a hotel room, you can certainly pull it off in your own Cucina.

Ciao. Arrivederci gente bella.

Chomsky would be proud

This is the ad that won the gold medal in the print ads category at Cannes Lion, and quite rightly. It's powerful for sure and hopefully effective.

The fine print that you probably can't see at the bottom reads: "In India, every year 1.1 million unborn baby girls die before they're born. To stop female foeticide, contact... "

In this country abortion is practically celebrated. The battle for the woman's right to choose has overshadowed the very definition of the act. Fetal homicide.

When the procedure is explained so bluntly in an ad like this, it sounds horrifying. When they mention that a specific sex is being targeted, it sounds even worse.

You could argue that this is certainly outrageous in that it is happening without question or choice. But would giving the woman the opportunity to choose to have the same procedure done make it any less outrageous? Would it make the unborn child any less mutilated? Any less dead?

This is certianly a touchy subject for a lot of people, but it has never been one that I've shied away from. I've gone back and forth between being totally against the idea of abortion to being certain that I am not one to tell anyone else what to do or how to live. The middle for me is hoping that with the choice or not, people would come to a common understanding that it is killing, that it is wrong, and that it shouldn't be done.

Now it may seem a bit naive or utopian to describe or even hope for something like that to happen. God did give us free will, but look what we've done with it. All I'm saying, free will or not, is that I think God had in mind a better way for us to live and, given the choice, we're not choosing the better way.

While I have seen the likes of this ad before, reading it still upset me. My question is, can anyone who supports abortion in America, or anywhere, really have the audacity to be outraged by this ad and what is going on in India and elsewhere?


http://commercial-archive.com/d138bfd7bb6f0663dcc71c6b82557c00/2008/mayjpgs/Aadhar.jpg

happy thursday

the tradition is that st. valentine is honored for continuing to marry lovers without the approval of the church. he was busted and beheaded on the 14th of february. supposedly he wrote letters to his jailer’s daughter and his last one was cleverly signed, “love, your Valentine.” years later, a king recognized this and sent the first love letter on this day.

centuries after that, someone got smart in the americas and copied the cause for correspondence for their own coital curiosities, thus giving hallmark something positive to cash in on.

if you're wondering what hallmark-ish gift to get for your significant other, you're wasting your time. valentine’s day is to be shared and if your partner is expecting something from you to keep the game going then they suck. if you’ve done something wrong and you think your big dinner plans are going to save your relationship then you’re still wrong. valentine's day should be about the celebration between two people and everything they understand about each other.

i become sympathetic for my old friends, who i still look up to and bless and love the best i can without contact, being as time apart has created in them a resentment and a misunderstanding, confusing their past with their present and has put faces on their pains rather than allowing themselves to simply be, create and grow, and not deny themselves anything. i hug them in my thoughts as i do all the people who’ve turned on me over the years, for reasons often unexplained and unexplored on my part. i’m reminded that it’s rarely me who changes, but my friends, and love must go on in directions where it’s needed and where it gives me the greatest joy when i share it.

i like to think of this calendar event occurring because of birds. birds choose their mates in mid-february. we look up to birds. we envy them. so, we eat candy in hopes of getting some kind of a lift.

it must be in my blood to go back and forth with what this day of love means to me. i make it the best of both the beheading and the beloved to be.

happy beheading to you and yours, may you be successful in finding your bird...

peace and love and better understanding
your valentine if you don’t have one
megs

Nope, and i'll tell you why...

#1 - most of the people in this country vote without knowing thing one about the person they're voting for or why they should/should not be elected into office.

#2 - a lot of people vote based on name recognition alone, which is one reason why i believe that a vote for hilary is a vote for bill; invariably from someone who knows the last name and thinks he ran the ish out of this country and will do it again, if only behind the guise of his wife.

#3 - i'm not too sure i want to choose sides in a voting match to determine whether a BLACK man or a white WOMAN gets to be the first first.

#4 - i think the media chooses the president; simply based on who they choose to talk about, how much, and in what way. they describe people who might have a good chance at changing things as radical and they build up those who will only maintain the status quo; practically supporting just another form of dynasty. the presidency is being passed around like a party joint from the Bushes to the Clintons to the Bushes and maybe back again.

#5 - to illuminate the quasi-apathetic take i have on the whole thing; i just don't feel like driving all the way to the island to cast a vote that, at this point, won't really make a difference as far as i'm concerned.


no sense in complaining if you're not doing anything to try and change what you're complaining about. but if someone that i don't like gets elected i'm not going to feel better knowing that i didn't vote for them nor am i going to feel bad thinking that my one vote would've gotten someone else into office. not entirely selfish either as i don't put much weight in my one vote affecting anything for the greater good, or worse. not complaining, just throwing my two cents around. at least, what my two cents happens to be for the moment.

Best Society - Philip Larkin

When I was a child, I thought,
Casually, that solitude
Never needed to be sought.
Something everybody had,
Like nakedness, it lay at hand,
Not specially right or specially wrong,
A plentiful and obvious thing
Not at all hard to understand.

Then, after twenty, it became
At once more difficult to get
And more desired - though all the same
More undesirable; for what
You are alone has, to achieve
The rank of fact, to be expressed
In terms of others, or it's just
A compensating make-believe.

Much better stay in company!
To love you must have someone else,
Giving requires a legatee,
Good neighbours need whole parishfuls
Of folk to do it on - in short,
Our virtues are all social; if,
Deprived of solitude, you chafe,
It's clear you're not the virtuous sort.

Viciously, then, I lock my door.
The gas-fire breathes. The wind outside
Ushers in evening rain. Once more
Uncontradicting solitude
Supports me on its giant palm;
And like a sea-anemone
Or simple snail, there cautiously
Unfolds, emerges, what I am.


... i could post his poetry all day long

the importance of this should not be underestimated...

Top 5 Things Every Extrovert Should Know About Introverts

First off, there are those who are reading this who might not know which camp they fall into, the extrovert or the introvert. Chances are, the majority of those reading this will know, but for those who don’t, let’s define those two terms here very broadly.

Extroverts tend to be those who are more energized when around other people. They are the ones who will reach for the cell phone when alone for more than a minute, the ones who love to go out every weekend, the ones who love to chit chat, mingle, and socialize.

Introverts tend to be those who are more energized when alone with themselves. They are the ones who have to be dragged to parties, who are the first ones ready to leave after a short period of time, and who generally enjoy solitary activities such as reading, writing, and daydreaming.

The qualities and characteristics of introverts are often held in a negative light in today’s world, so it’s only natural that the majority of people seem to think that there’s something wrong with them

The reason why the majority of people think that there’s something wrong with introverts is because the majority of people aren’t very knowledgeable when it comes to introverts, in terms of why they are the way they are and why they do the things they do.

Many people tend to hold several potentially damaging misconceptions about introverts, but through no fault of their own.

I’ve been on both sides of the extrovert/introvert fence, and I can understand why extroverts tend to view introverts in a negative light, socially speaking, so I thought it would be best to write an article dedicated to helping extroverts understand their often very misunderstood introvert counterparts.

My hope is this article will help solve that problem by shedding some light as to why introverts are the way they are and do the things they do, so here are 5 things every extrovert should know about introverts.

1. If a person is introverted, it does NOT mean they are shy or anti-social.

This is probably THE biggest misconception that extroverts tend to have when it comes to introverts. And you can’t really blame them for having that kind of misconception. Extroverts tend to have to drag introverts to parties, to convince them to go and sell them on attending social engagements. When introverts politely decline, extroverts automatically assume that something might be wrong so they always ask if everything’s all right and of course, everything is all right. It’s just a common misunderstanding. When extroverts see a pattern like this developing, they automatically assume that introverts are shy or anti-social as that can be the only logical explanation to them. What’s more, when extroverts try to engage introverts in small talk, it seems like they hit a brick wall. Add to that, most extroverts see that introverts tend to be fond of engaging in solitary activities such as reading, writing, and daydreaming.
Well, if it walks like a duck, talks like a duck, it must be a duck right? Wrong.
Introverts have more brain activity in their frontal lobes and when these areas are activated through solitary activity, introverts become energized through processes such as problem solving, introspection, and complex thinking. Extroverts on the other hand tend to have more activity in the back of their brain, areas that deal with processing sensory information from the external world, so they tend to search for external stimuli in the form of interacting with other people and the outside world to energize them. There’s a deeper science to this that involves differences in the levels of brain chemicals such as acetylcholine and dopamine in extroverts and introverts, but I won’t get into that. The bottom line is that introverts are just wired differently than extroverts. There’s nothing “wrong” with them. They just become energized through different processes depending on where the majority of their brain activity takes place.
Granted there are introverts who may be shy and anti-social, but that’s just a coincidence that perpetuates the myth that ALL introverts are like that. You’ll find that all introverts are fine just the way they are until people begin to subtly suggest otherwise.

2. Introverts tend to dislike small talk.

If you really want to engage an introvert in conversation, skip the small talk. Introverts tend to love deep conversations on subjects that interest them. They love to debate, go past the superficial and poke around the depths in people’s minds to see what’s really going on in there. Most, if not all introverts tend to regard small talk as a waste of time, unless it’s with someone new they just met. This characteristic probably contributes to another misconception that extroverts have of introverts - the misconception that all introverts are arrogant. Why?
Because extroverts notice that introverts don’t talk that much with other people. Therefore, extroverts assume that introverts think they’re too good to talk to others, hence arrogant and that’s hardly the case. It’s just a matter of preference. Extroverts thrive on small talk.Introverts abhor it. There’s nothing wrong with either choice, it’s just a matter of preference. This brings us to the third point.

3. Introverts do like to socialize – only in a different manner and less frequently than extroverts.

Yes, it’s true. Contrary to the majority of public opinion, introverts do like to socialize, but again, only in a different manner and less frequently than extroverts. Introverts love anything that involves deep conversation. They get energized by discussing subjects that are important to them and they love see what and how other people think, to connect the dots, to dig deep, to find root causes, to use logical thinking via debate in conversation, etc. And what’s more, introverts can do a lot of things extroverts are naturally good at - give great speeches, schmooze with everyone, be the life of the party, charm the socks off of total strangers - but only for a short period of time. After that, they need time for themselves which brings us to the fourth point.

4. Introverts need time alone to recharge.

Extroverts tend to think introverts have something against them as they constantly seem to refuse generous invites to social engagements. Introverts do appreciate the offers, but it’s just that they know it will take a lot of energy out of them if they pursue these social functions.
They need time alone like they need food and water. Give them their space. There’s nothing wrong with them. They’re not depressed and they’re not sad. They just need time alone to recharge their batteries.

5. Introverts are socially well adjusted.

Most introverts are well aware of all the social nuances, customs, and mannerisms when it comes to interacting with other people, but they simply don’t socialize as much as extroverts, which makes it easy for extroverts to assume that introverts are not socially well adjusted, as they have not seen much evidence of them interacting with other people. This just exacerbates previous misconceptions and gives way to labeling introverts as nerds, geeks, loners, etc.
It’s easy to understand why society tends to value extroverts over introverts. Human beings have lived in a tribal society so having to interact frequently with people came to be a regarded as a very good skill when it came to survival. But because of this high value placed on extroversion, introverts tend to feel trapped and find themselves in a catch 22 situation.

Do introverts stay true to who they are and risk social alienation and isolation or do introverts conform and join the extroverted side, pretending to be somebody they’re not just to fit in?
This is precisely why I wrote this article, because if the extroverts can become more educated about introverts, introverts will be able to feel free to stay true to who they are, and that’s a good thing from society’s point of view. Trying to “turn” an introverted person into an extroverted person is detrimental because it gives off a subtle suggestion that there is something wrong with them, hampering their self worth and esteem when there is absolutely nothing wrong in the first place. There’s nothing wrong with introverts.

In fact, introverts are the leading pioneers of advancements in human civilization. Albert Einstein, Issac Newton, Charles Darwin are a few introverts that come to mind, just to name a few. And for those of you not interested in science, but pop culture, you’ll be surprised to see a lot of well known names in Hollywood are introverts as well. Julia Roberts, Steven Spielberg, Tom Cruise to name a few as well. And for those interested in sports, Michael Jordan and Tiger Woods come to mind as athletes who are introverts as well. Introverts have a lot to bring to the table. They have an amazing ability to discover new thoughts, an uncanny ability to focus, to concentrate, to connect the dots, to observe and note things that most people miss, to listen extremely well and are often found having a rich and vivid imagination as well.

The more extroverts become knowledgeable about introverts, the less tension and misunderstanding there will be among the two. So if you’re an introvert reading this, send a copy of this article to all your extrovert friends so they can get a better idea of what you’re all about.
It’s time to finally clear the air.