I have recently broken out and dusted off the old Christmas tunes, coulda sworn it was just summer!  If any one is in need of some holiday tunes to accompany any holiday parties please give me a shout (creepy Santa not included).

If I don’t see you before the big days, Happy Holidays!

“….in practice we are all bewitched by words. We confuse them with the real world as if it were the world of words. As a consequence we are dismayed and dumbfounded when they do not fit. The more we try to live in the world of words, …the more we feel isolated and alone, the more all the joy and liveliness of things is exchanged for mere certainty and security.”
-Alan Watts, This Wisdom of Insecurity

“It is convention alone which persuades me that I am simply this body bounded by a skin in space, and by birth and death in time. Where do I begin and end in space? I have relations to the sun and air which are just as vital parts of my existence as my heart. The movement in which I am a pattern or convolution began incalculable ages before the (conventionally isolated) event called birth, and will continue long after the event called death. Only words and conventions can isolate us from the entirely undefinable something which is everything.”
-Alan Watts, The Wisdom of Insecurity

“And I say to mankind, Be not curious about God,
For I who am curious about each am not curious about God,
(No array of terms can say how much I am at peace about God and death.)

I hear and behold God in every object, yet understand
God not in the least,
Nor do I understand who there can be more wonderful
than myself.

Why should I wish to see God better than this day?
I see something of God each hour of the twenty-four, and
each moment then,
In the faces of men and women I see God, and in my own
face in the glass,
I find letters from God dropt in the street, and every one
is sign’d by God’s name,
And I leave them where they are, for I know that where-
soe’er I go,
Others will punctually come for ever and ever”
-Walt Whitman, Song of Myself

no more words need to be said today…
until next time,
Ryan

As I watched her perform, I came to see that Meiko’s melodic, insightful, interesting songs and charming storytelling, her beautiful, breathy, feminine voice, her clean guitar playing and magnetic stage presence were all attractive details that stemmed from one fundamental thing about her: she is completely herself. She bares herself onstage unashamedly without apology, adjustment, or fear. In sum, she is vulnerable. I realized while watching her that I, along with over a hundred other people, were getting a special, intimate glimpse of somebody being free. I also realized that we were all so drawn to this energy because this is what we all want.

For so many years I have resented society and its social norms and niceties seeing them as spaces where I had to restrict myself. Only in recent years have I started separating the people from the system by realizing that no matter how seduced into society games and fears one is, down deep inside we all want to be free to flow, uninhibited, unmasked, like children do. Nobody likes the obligation of upholding a role and nobody enjoys bullshitting. This is why drinking (and beyond) is so popular in social situations. We want to bring down the walls and connect. We long for intimacy with others, intimacy with our world and intimacy with ourselves. It is our fear that brings us to doubt that something real is going on all around, within, and between us, all of the time, tucked away inside the folds and depths of reality like buried treasure chests. We doubt that it’s “all here”, so we tune out of “here”. We drink, we numb, our eyes wander, our ears hear but dont listen, our minds chatter, our iphones buzz , all calling us somewhere else, sometime else. We are restless and future fixed.

What makes a great artist? Why are people drawn to certain artists? A great artist is someone who is freely themselves and fully present. We are drawn to people and performances where we can get a glimpse of someone losing “themselves” (their ego i.e. fear) and finding “themselves” (their nature i.e. freedom) inside the moment. We all want this and these people and moments give us hope and inspiration that we too can shed our weighty costumes and dance naked.

It is in this sense of costuming or covering ourselves that we have indeed “left Eden”. We have eaten from the fruit of the tree of knowledge of “good” and “evil” (judgments), and have therefore become aware (or self-conscious) of our “nakedness”. I’m convinced, Eden is right here. The irony may be the joke that gave birth to all jokes; The Gate keeping us from returning is self imposed and illusory.

Thank you to those, like Meiko and many other artists of life I call friends, who make themselves vulnerable first. They recognize the grand-scheme importance of their sacrifice, which allows them to tolerate possible judgment, rejection, or misunderstanding of their most precious, sensitive parts. We are perfect and miraculous as we are, right now. Come children, come outside and play!

Great TED Talk on Vulnerability

http://www.ted.com/talks/brene_brown_on_vulnerability.html

Meiko

http://www.myspace.com/meiko

Saint Rocke Concert Venue
www.saintrocke.com

Some of my favorite moments of performing are when little kids come up and watch.  I believe that little kids are tripping out on life all of the time because they are not desensitized like adults and are fully perceptive of how miraculous and wondrous everything is.  I strive to always see wonder in all the little things that surround us.  Music is a vivid way to have this awakened in all of us.  It passes the logic and goes straight to the heart.  This is why art will always speak more powerfully to people then government or science.  Art reminds us of what we have forgotten: we are infinite; we are the gods and goddesses of our own reality, able to manifest, create, whatever we ideate.

http://www.yelp.com/biz/quench-bar-and-bistro-dana-point