you’re Such An Amateur! I’ve heard it used as an insult. I’ve heard it used to belittle someone’s effort. More importantly, people use it on themselves, to describe their own beginning efforts, and not always with personal kindness.

“Oh you’re into photography?”

“Yes… But, I’m just an amateur.”

We often forget that amateur is a required state. You can’t start anything as a professional, you have to work to get there.

I’m learning to play the guitar… Again.

I had an electric guitar for most of my late teen years and college years. I’d putter around and learn a few guitar licks here and there. I played at playing guitar. I was an amateur.

I was always discouraged when I’d look at people around me learning to play, because they could always do something better than me. And professional musicians! Oy, forget about it! They were on a whole other plain. How could I even compete with that? So after a time, and a fair bit of not practicing. I gave up and sold my guitar.

She was a beauty too.

We live in such an exposed world. At the click of a button we can see anyone doing almost anything. And usually to go viral, and get attention, you have to do it exceptionally well (or very, very, very poorly). It can easily put you in a mindset that there isn’t room for an amateur anymore. There are so many people that are so good at what you want to do, why bother?

There is no space for someone to begin and practice slowly moving up the ladder of progress. Or so it appears.

The truth is that amateur isn’t a dirty word, and it’s not a negative state. Being an amateur is a wonderful thing. It’s a crucial rung on the ladder of progress.

There is alway room in any practice for passionate people to enjoy themselves. Whether that be playing guitar, making baskets, or writing a blog.

So now 20 some odd years later, I’ve remembered how much I enjoy music. And I’m at it again. Learning a few new guitar licks, playing some music, and getting discouraged. My how the cycles love to repeat. My primary advantage this time is, that I’m a little wiser than I was. There is always room at the top, and there is always room at the bottom, and there is plenty of room for me.

There is also, plenty of room for you. You bring something to the game that nobody else can, yourself and your energy. I encourage you to find something you love, and embrace doing it. Don’t worry about how good someone else is at it. Try not to get discouraged. And remember, it’s about the journey, not the destination.

Though it doesn’t hurt to have a few kick ass guitars along the path.

Namaste,

Kevin

“Remember the pledge you took, when they let you off the hook, and sent you spinning away, back into yourself.” – Human Rocket – Devo 2010

Okay, I’ll be honest, I’ve gotten several ideas for blogs from Devo’s album Something for Everybody. I just discovered it recently. Devo released an album of entirely new music in 2010 and I love it.

As I was listening to the lyrics of human rocket, cited above, an idea came to me. “Remember the pledge you took, when they let you off the hook”.

What if we’re on vacation?

What if we took a pledge to take a break from our spiritual path and this life is actually our break?

Some would argue a vacation gone miserably wrong.

Sort of like having a hurricane hit while you’re on your honeymoon in Cancun. (Yes, this happened to my wife and I)

None the less a vacation, if you will, from our cosmic responsibilities.

Bare with me for a moment, because the idea requires a few building blocks to take shape.

Assume for a moment that reincarnation is real. At least in some form. This may not mean that we keep repeating a life here on earth over and over, but that this life is part of a progression of experience, as opposed to being the alpha and omega of our existence. This would imply that there is a continuity to our existence. A narrative linked together by a common spirit. Each incarnation could seen as a chapter in that existence.

Now consider a book metaphor for a moment. What if you were reading a book, following the thread of the story, and then you get to chapter 18 and, as the result of a sudden and unexpected head injury, forget the first 17 chapters of the book.

You are quite tenacious, so you keep reading the book even though you have no idea who you’re reading about or what’s going on. You lose the continuity of the story.

Luckily for you the book is well written so you are able to read chapter 18 without getting entirely lost, even though you don’t know the back story. Then as you’re finishing chapter 18 your memory starts to return. You remember everything that happened in the first part of the book and can piece it all together. You start to integrate, in your mind, whatever you read in 18 with the previous chapters.

What if, by being here, we’re in our chapter 18? We’ve entered a knowledge void where we’ve lost the thread of the prior narrative. We don’t know what happened before. But we’re given enough to keep reading. The story keeps unfolding.

What if, this wasn’t the result of some cosmic head injury? But in fact a calculated break, offered by the universe, a vacation from our cosmic trajectory. Without the burden of knowledge of everything that we knew before.

“Remember the pledge you took, when they let you off the hook.”

So what pledge did you take?

Be true to thine self, and to thine own self be true.

Do onto others as they would have them do onto you.

Or simply, I promise to enjoy myself.

So what if you were in fact, let off the hook, for this life? Would it change your attitude about your experiences if you found out that this was your rest and recuperation before you get back to work?

What would you do differently with your day, or with your life, if you realized you’re on vacation?

Namaste,

Kevin

I don’t know how this is going to turn out. Or what I’m going to write. I don’t even know what’s on my mind. I want the results to be something impressive. I want everything I write to be the most amazing thing that anyone has ever read. But that’s the ego talking. That’s my desire to be special. It’s well known that if everything is above average then that average is wrong. On average the average is in the middle and the outliers are on the edges. So most of what I write will be average and some of what I write will be spectacular and some of what I write will be really pathetic. So how can I hope to achieve my goal? How can any of us achieve our goal of excelling when the end result, if we truly do raise the bar, is to obliterate our previous activities and mar them as below average, because we have raised the average. So what was acceptable before is just crap. And all I’ve really been doing the whole time is spinning my wheels trying to gain traction, trying to find something to grab onto to dig me out of this pit so that I can be the light at the end of the tunnel to guide people. To provide hope in a world of darkness to provide a glimmer of the future that could be… But what if I’m fooling myself. When I turn my light on thinking I’m near the end of the tunnel, but in reality I’m still near the bottom of the pit. And like my shifting metaphor I start dragging people who were near the top down into the mire because they see my light and see seek for hope even though it’s in the wrong direction. What if I guide people in the wrong direction? What if everything I share is just the wallowing thoughts of a pig in the muck trying to cool off and not really accomplishing much but getting dirty. Would I hope that my thoughts lead me to a place of joy or a place of sadness. Do I do justice to the world and my path to force the outcome, to make the results be positive when I feel negative. To make someone smile even though I feel sad. Does projecting joy in a world of darkness lead to joy? Yes. It does. If you start with two sad people and a happy thought, one can fake it and if the other latches on and smiles then the smile is real and the faker will then smile back and suddenly in a world of sadness you have two people smiling at each other and the tables have suddenly turned. And so my sincere hope for you, regardless of my personal mood, is that you find a way to smile today, for the world is smile worthy. And your light will shine back to me and I will smile and we’ll find that there really was happiness at our cores but we weren’t sure how to get it out. And here it is. 🙂

Namaste,

Kevin

About a month ago, I was walking through the woods in an isolated part of California. It was just me and the dogs on an old fire trail. The further I walked from camp the more isolated from people I felt. But I didn’t feel alone. If anything I felt the presence of observers, of some sort of benevolent energy watching over me and observing, as if curious to see what will happen next.

It was probably just my imagination. After all, of what interest is Kevin out on a dog walk? Not exactly the moral dilema that make for a good psychological thriller, or the struggle for life and death that captivates us when a team scales Mount Everest. Just me, and my dogs, out for a walk.

Never the less, I felt something. So on a lark, I called out, “If you can hear me, please show yourself, I’d like to meet you.”… I waited, and waited… Nothing.

Nothing manifested in a dimensional fracturing field of light. No entities walked down as if on an invisible staircase. It was just me and the dogs calling out to the emptiness. Well the dogs weren’t calling out, they were just looking at me funny trying to figure out who I was talking to.

I wondered as I stood there. Are they perhaps prohibited from interfering? Maybe they have some sort of law prevent them from interacting with mortals on a whim.

But then it occurred to me. What if they couldn’t hear me. What if there were some physical law that allowed them to observe me, but not hear me or speak to me. What if there were no rules in the way, what if it was simply a limitation of the observation medium.

This of course lead to my next thought. What if God couldn’t hear me?

For most people talking to God through prayer is a fundamental part of their relationship with God. But what if God couldn’t hear you?

What if the only way you had to truly interact with God and send a message was through your actions? What kind of message would you be sending?

We live in such a legalistic world that in many situations your actions aren’t judged as much as you are judged on your ability to explain your actions. With good verbal skills you can explain away almost anything, look at our politicians. What would the world be like if people never had the chance to explain themselves, they were simply measured by their actions.

Perhaps we would start to act very differently.

Namaste,

Kevin