pendarksmindandmadness

[pendarksmindandmadness]

Every day of my existence,

This madness threatened to consume me.

Until the day I reached out and embraced it,

And we simply let one another be.

(Prof. Pendark)

[pendarksmindandmadness]

#Keeping it REAL

[pendarksmindandmadness]

There are times when it feels as if my life is a continuous cycle of "what-if," "might have," and "could have been." I sometimes struggle to believe that whatever is in charge of the universe is doing more than using me as a source of amusement. My life feels like one of those old hidden camera shows where they follow some unsuspecting guy around just to see how long it takes him to realize that it has all been a setup.

So far, it has been 35 years of adulthood. I've been through no less than 6 religions, 4 marriages, 8 other non-marriage relationships, 2 kids (that I know of), 17 jobs I remember clearly, and a few periods of homelessness. Surely whomever is collecting the footage has enough for the "don't be like this guy" segment of the program.

I have stubbornly refused to deprive the world of my pressence, even after two bouts of deep depression, one of which found me with both the means and the opportunity to do so with a simple flick of my pointer finger. I don't even remember what stopped me then, but that was 27 years ago.

Somehow, I have held onto some semblance of sanity, my basic talents, a few added skills, and kept myself from the desperation that leads to prison time or worse. Alcohol and I have a love-hate relationship. Drugs and I never got along. Although I am not totally averse to a holiday shot or puff of a good pipe on a rare occasion, if you catch my meaning. I refrain from both, though, because my "day job" involves kids. And what kind of a crap example would I be?

I have never traveled outside the United States. I've taken a few really long trips along highways within them, however. I may never see some of the places I'd like to except on television or the internet. And, strangely, I'm pretty okay with that. I don't feel like I need to travel to be completed. I do enjoy reading or listening to other people's stories of places they've been. And, admittedly, there is an occasional pang of "that must have been nice."

I've been on a few adventures. Vegas a few times, hikes in mountain passes, ocean beaches, important landmarks such as The Alamo, The Golden Spike Railroad, Roswell, The Grand Canyon, Graceland, as well as all manner of weird little hole in the wall museums on back highways. I've had memories and keepsakes. Some of them are more fondly remembered than others. In the end, I'm certain that I will have far more good memories than bad.

I look back now and wonder how many of the people that were there along the course of this life such as it has been, will remember me being there. I can't help wondering how many people along my 25 or so years in various parts of "B-level" theater will remember I was even there. Does it really matter? Did the productions really matter? I retain skills learned, so in that regard, perhaps the purpose of my being there was served.

I have few lasting regrets. I've learned the hardest way possible, that mistakes can be outlived, that hardships can be overcome, and that fear serves no purpose beyond keeping one cautious. I have also learned that sometimes caution must be thrown to the wind. I've only been in mortal danger once that I remember. That's a story for another day. I've seen creepy times, had weird things happen, and suffered some ugly consequences for ill-planned actions.

But even when I wasn't at my best, nor acting as a shining example of the potential of humanity, I have always found a way. I've never totally been without help or without hope. There are a great many people I remember along the way, who did things as simple as offer me a bottle of water or a sandwich. People that loaned me a few bucks, or a couple hundred. People that gave me a chance to learn a new skill or work a new job. People that gave me a place to stay.

I've tried to repay that to the universe. I have shoveled walks, pulled tree stumps, spent hundreds of sleepless nights watching over kids in some capacity, handed out change to beggars, and even paid for other people's gas or food. Little acts that I can only hope have made a difference.

I don't know how long I have left. I could walk into a bullet or get hit by a bus. I might get cancer or a tumor. Barring any of that, I might live to be 100, which is actually much closer now than I like to believe. What I will not do is fail to live while I'm here. I'm actually curious to see how this show ends. I am interested in what events are still to come in this story. So, I read on.

[pendarksmindandmadness]

[pendarksmindandmadness]

In this dreamlike state, I have flown across the sky, looking down on cities and people. I see them from a different perspective here. Where the noise and tumult of humanity was capable of utterly shutting down my ability to think, I can rise above it and escape it now.

The cool night air washes over me and I feel free. Free of the madness. Free of the anger. Free of the noise. Free of the emotions and machinations of humankind that pierce my calm with needles of over-awareness.

I float for a while over and ocean, deathly afraid that if I fall, I will be drowning. I can imagine no more dreadful an end, than to be drowned in the sargasso of hate, spite, fear, intolerance of my fellow human beings. To die having been no more than a drop of insignificance in the vast ocean of indifference.

So I force myself to rise above, to fly, and to search the air for calm and peace. I have attempted on several occasions to swoop in and be a hero in someone's life. Whether it ultimately mattered, I can never know. So I float and I ponder.

The words of Shakespeare come to my mind. To be or not to be? To suffer the slings and arrows of outrageous fortune, or to take up arms against a sea of troubles.

I have asked this in some form many times in life. Is this all I am? Is there nothing more? Should I keep living here, now, in this place? Should I seek a new carreer? Should I stay married? Should I try to learn new talents? Should I just shut up and be content?

The answer is never the same from one situation to the next. And sometimes when I am trying to find the answer, the world crashes in and the sound of a billion minds all shouting pierces my sanity. Humans are singular in their ability to sound alarms over nothing and scream for no reason.

And, so, to keep my mind from imploding, I look to the sky. I leap, I rise, I fly.

[pendarksmindandmadness]

Time is a creation of humankind. The way it is measured is an arbitrary arrangement of the progress of events. HAD mathematics and mathematicians not existed, then likely, neither would time.

We had to have a way to explain the flow of one moment to the next. But, then again, even moments are a construct. We exist. We move. We progress. Or, at least, we believe we do.

When a thing occurs, it affects what happens next. But the thing that happens from the original occurrence, could vary according to the intensity, type, and level of of the original occurrence.

Yeah... sorry... I'm not entirely sure I get it either. Reality, though, is actually divisible by multiple quantum realities. Much like the atoms that create a thing, being made up of protons, neutrons, and electrons; every reality has molecular parts.

So, our concept of the "butterfly effect" is even far too limited to explain the full scope of the effect of one tiny movement of one tiny being on the entirety of what we call reality.

Each of us is a compilation of parts, which are in turn a compilation of smaller parts. A change in any one of the tiniest parts of a being, can affect an entire being. That effect in turn creates a condition by which the whole being reacts and interacts with everything around it.

That affects the society, which affects the city, which affects the country, which affects the world, which affects the galaxy, and so on.

[pendarksmindandmadness]

In many of the various other reality streams, each of us is different but similar. I was much older and smarter in one of them. Somehow, I even knew I was coming.

I met myself as I appeared in the corner of a discount book store. I was sitting in one of the well worn lounge chairs next to the ancient philosophy section.

"You're thirty seconds late," I said to myself and smiled through a long, white beard.

"As far as I can tell, I'm right on time," I quipped.

"Before you say anything to me about your journey, you should know that I am the version of us that chose to sit it out and just watch the rest of you."

His... my aged hand reached into the pocket of a blue coat. "You already know that I can't give you this."

He held up a glowing purple orb as I asked, "then why draw me here?"

He raised a bushy white eyebrow. "Then you know which of us I am. Good. That will save time." He put down his copy of the writings of Descartes.

"Where you are from, you won't be your version of me until after you have been to all of the places you are about to see."

"So, who am I now?"

"You are a spark of the energy of creation. And each version of you is a spark of the original. You have been viewing these timelines and dimensions as separate. The fact is, they are all threads in a greater fabric. A tapestry."

"Then, how do we exist as similar in each of them? Wouldn't there just be a single version of us divided into parts?"

"You will understand in... he paused... in time."

[pendarksmindandmadness]

If I told you that there was a place where those who truly deserve to govern others where placed in positions of power, you would question whether it was even possible, let alone Constitutional. But Tera 8 is just such a place.

Those called to serve are among the most representative of each community. They are called to serve by a committee of citizens. They are chosen from the ranks of those most engulfed in the daily struggle of a particular community. They are what might be called "commoners."

Some of these are blue collar, some white collar, and some are what we understand to be "the lower class." Theae are the very people that the policies of government affect most.

Some are college educated and some are not. Some are business people. Some are farmers, and some are mechanics. These individuals represent the society from which they come. And none of them are lawyers.

[pendarksmindandmadness]

Some of you will believe these to be no more than the fancies of an abnormal mind. Some will say these are no more than fevered dreams. Still others of you will believe me a psychic or some other kind of seer.

All I can do is tell you what I know and what I have seen. I leave it to you to decide whether they are fiction or fact. There are times when I am not absolutely sure myself. But if these are no more than the machinations of madness, they would not have left such an impression on my soul.

I have been changed by what I have seen. I have been altered by what I know. And I have no choice but to put these things in writing.

[pendarksmindandmadness]

As I have traveled these planes of existence, I have discovered a great many things I had never before imagined possible. I have seen that we are not alone in the universe. And, we are far from alone in the grand scheme of reality.

There are beings of similar but different composition in every timeline and every one of the planes of existence that I have come to see as streams flowing through a great forest. They wind and flow in many different directions. And through them swim a billion billion forms of life.

Each and every form of existence is a spark of the original I am. When the first one declared "I am" and centuries later Rene Descarte said, "I think therefore I am," it was determined that thought and mind were the beginning of existence. To know is to be.

[pendarksmindandmadness]

The "multiverse" theory isn't new. It has been around for some time. Speculation that multiple parallel universes and timelines exist has been around since shortly after the birth of the sci-fi genre.

But what if those varied planes of reality are really states of consciousness? What if the alternative worlds only exist in the mind? Does that make them any less real or valid?

If we can use thought to travel to infinite worlds, infinite times, and infinite levels of existence; does that mean that our thoughts create the reality in which we reside? If we can traverse realities in theory, and theory is thought placed under analysis; does that mean that we are the architects of reality itself?

I have experienced things that led me to believe it is possible. Contrary to the objections of the ultra-religious; this line of thought does not negate the possibility of a God or creator force. I simply suggest that we are more than we have led ourselves to believe.

Whatever created us gave us specific capabilities. And I believe we have only begun to unlock them. Note that I am not telling you what to believe in regard to our creation. That is for you to decide. But I am telling you that we are far more than the some of our physical parts or even the sum of our thoughts.

[pendarksmindandmadness]

I do not believe in fate. I believe in preordained plans, within which we use our free agency to either follow or ignore that plan. Though it cannot be denied that both pain and death are inevitable, what we do with and how we react to pain is within our control.

Death will come to us in its own time. It is the only fixed point on our timeline. But the myriad of small events leading to it are ours to control. How we live until that moment comes, is determined by our own intent turned to action.

Our real dilemma is how to live our lives while we are here. What energies and actions will we put into the universe between birth and death? How will we act, react, interact, and affect those who are on this timeline and in this plane of reality with us?

That is always ours to choose, regardless of what the universe, or the creator, or what we choose to belive is fate, may direct us to do.

[pendarksmindandmadness]

The swirl of colors passed before my gaze. I saw colors that were never before given a name. And, in each of those colors was an entire civilization of beings not unlike our human selves. Each of those beings represented a spec or a pixel in a gigantic canvas of reality.

It was too ordered and there were too many patterns able to be calculated by math for it to be merely an accident of random collision. Even if this was the result of chaos acting upon a collection of single cell organisms, the fact that they had all evolved into similar forms seemed more significant.

As I drifted further away from the swirl of color, I saw that it was just one ever turning cycle of life within an infinite sea of swirls that fed into a greater flow and cycle. Whirlpools within a whirlpool. Is this existence? To be a mere speck of color in an ocean?

[pendarksmindandmadness]

Time is a manufactured measurement of the passage of events. It is perceived differently by those traveling through events in this plane of reality than it is in another.

Age is a further division of a manufactured measurement. It does not have to mean what we believe it means. Age is given a number based on the revolutions of our planet around the sun. The numbers are arbitrary.

Yes, there are things that occur to the physical body, which verify the amount of wear the soul has put on the bag of flesh that surrounds it. But there are various means to counter the ravages of what we call time.

Just as animals age differently than humans, we on this plane of reality age more quickly than do those of other planes of reality. There were those that walked this sphere we call earth, who lived to be three times as old as modern humans.

There were also those that vibrated on different levels of this reality. There were what we call giants. There were little people. There were cousins of what we call human, that were of every possible description. Some, we have come to call angels, some demons, some fairies, elves, and so on.

We choose to believe that these were inventions of writers and story tellers. But I have seen them. I have seen ghosts, angels, demons, and what we call aliens. All of them are as real as you and I, but are variations of the same form we now hold and not the beastlike things we have come to imagine.

I will tell you of my travels and leave it to you as to what to believe.

[pendarksmindandmadness]

Rumor has it there are multiple timeliness and many reality streams. Some say there are infinite possible worlds, all moving at the same time but in a different stream of reality. I believe that I may have glimpsed a few of them.

Whether you believe that I am merely a dreamer, whose imagination is working overtime; or a neurodivergent man bordering on insanity; I know what I have seen.

If you personally subscribe to the infinite realities theory, then by the very basis of that theory, what I have seen is no less possible than you reading these words right now. If you don't, then to you the things I write will be no more than the fancies of a fevered mind.

I shall endeavor to relate them to you nonetheless. Because the things I have seen have left an impression upon my very soul and I can no more deny them than...

I was going to say no more than I can fly. But in one of the various streams of time/space/reality I visited; I did just that. So, I will simply say, I cannot deny what I have seen and experienced.

[pendarksmindandmadness]

In those times when sadness, anger, or depression seem to be your strongest emotions; it is best to step away from what is aggravating your negative emotions. Breathe.

Center yourself. Turn inward and remember what brings you peace. Acknowledge that the negative feelings exist. Recognize that they are not your only choices. And make a new choice.

Through that choice, you create a new reality in that moment and can return to what needs to be done. With this calm, centered approach, you will make better decisions that affect the rest of your day.

(Professor Pendark)

[pendarksmindandmadness]

The universe doesn't dictate your actions. Life circumstances do not dictate what is possible. And our human condition isn't an excuse for lack of action on our part. Every individual has free will and the ability to reason. It is up to you to find what it is you want to be, do, or have then reason out the action needed to get it. You are the wizard of your own life. Create magic.

(Professor Pendark)