Imagine deep within your soul you want to give gifts to the world..but then life happens and you get tired.
Imagine having the passion of a Content Creator but not knowing how to put your thoughts into words.
What am I protecting? Is this modesty.. its own form of honesty?
In order to be a popular platform poster you need to “post every day” or at least a few times a week.
Ah
That might not work then.
Where is the passion I’m looking for? Where is the spirituality I once had or the zeal for living life as if this life is a rare commodity?
How do I take life for granted so much? How do I lounge in carefree boredom narcolepsy or not? Am I pregaming my midlife crises, getting ready for it, double fisting it?
Seems like a me thing to schedule such a thing rather than to be surprised by it.
Well why on earth am I surprised that there’s no element of surprise when I feel like I already know what the book of my life is about..like God and I deliberated and threw the book at me?
Sometimes I feel like I have some crystal ball or a blueprint to my life in my subconscious mind. I don’t want to see it. I don’t want the left hand to know what the right hand is doing. I’m tired of it. I’m tired of watching my movie from the outside.
Life and the enjoyment of life seems rather to be that the eyes and the ears and the nose would hear, see and smell what is here or at least whatever senses we have available to us. So strange that even Spiritual Doctors have remarked on sense “All knowledge comes through the senses.” Good job St. Thomas Aquinas for being like the Doubting apostle in your search for faith. I feel that heartily.
So there is that darkness in the soul of understanding (nous) to wit my life gives reference that I keep remembering that I don’t know and I do know. Part of me know my spirit though living in my body and not separate has separate agencies, faculties and ‘abilities’. I find it hard to be a gnostic because I’m an earthen vessel and yet though trying not to be “too heavenly minded to be of any earthly good” I find myself trapped between worlds, like a ghost with a preternatural stain on the ink blot tests of the collective unconscious of this age.
In my heart I watch kingdoms rise and fall revolutions turn and the sun set many a year. The ages of time acquiesce to an Apocalyptic dance that never seems to end. All of this is beautiful and is a verdict to my and the worlds mortality. I hope that I can learn lessons of this knowing that “the spirit gives life and the flesh is of no avail.” so that perhaps life can come to my dry bones again.
The usual trifle of a mastermind is their undoing but there is a mastermind of daunting courage, accidental lack of ego and yet an individualism that “seeks not its own.” yet “lacks nothing” and is “perfectly equipped for every good work.”
‘The usual trifle of the Mastermind is the ‘truffle’ of the Mastermind. Wishing to escape the watching eyes of commoners presumed swine that are in their common simplicity the sign and signat of that primeval connective singularity of all beings the mastermind alone presumes to be the all seeing eye..and yet..”the spiritual man judgeth all things and yet is judged by no one.”
This is Yin and Yang, Light and Dark, Batman and Robin.
Shadows have the tendency to reveal the truth.
Just as Sherlock Holmes might make a game of wits with a man of wits similar and the chess game that interweaves as we see consciousness show mysteries, that is the mystery of evil and the mystery of good.
How does one of similar temperament and comportment as another choose evil or good?
How many of us truly ever meet our archnemesis?
The arechtypical mastermind is not entirely evil and vile.
The Benevolent Ego of the good Mastermind absorbs into the all.
Whilst being an individual self he is at the service of all.
While being egoless he has become all.
While the evil mastermind secures his fortress the good mastermind makes a glass house.
Through accountability is wrot tranquility for accountability is “to be known” by another name.
The evil mastermind secures his own house. When the good leader rules he secures homes for all.
Two houses all and all and great the potential dirges for if either were to fall and yet one shares generosity with urgency the other clenches stones and gold alike.
Like a dark prince of shimmering, ethereal and uncreated light so is the rarity of this egoless gift to humanity.
He/she calls back the valor of the medieval knights of lore. He is victorious and powerful and has found the white stone with his name on it. His name will never be blotted out.
May we all strive for such egoless truth of existence.
In the wake of the hideous, evil and racially motivated shootings of Asian women that we have all seen in the news these past weeks I have an important message not about sex addiction and not solely about the primary issue here of racism (both important and necessary subjects to discuss but nonetheless) I am here to write about toxic masculinity vs true masculinity.
As my sources are eclectic and draw from many sources per usual I would like to talk about how the sexist and insecurity based instincts of toxic masculinity are opposed to genuine masculinity from a variety of sources both sacred and secular, how they feed into sexual neuroses and how they even feed into racism throughout history.
Toxic masculinity is proof in the pudding for where St. Peter in the Bible warned that certain passages of Paul the unstable of mind could contort, wrend and distort to their own destruction.
Toxic masculinity is easy to see.
How many times in a tragic southern gothic did the abusive alcoholic husband demand unflinching loyalty from his wife out of the piecemeal interpretation of “Wives submit yourselves unto your husband. ” and entirely did that character also ‘ignore’ “Husbands love your wives even as Christ loved the Church giving Himself up for her. “?
How many times in history did we hear of the southern plantation owner who was already treating humans like cattle also treating the women as his objects of sexual gratification as well?
People like to try and neatly separate different qualities of moral/ ethical or phenomenological experience as if all causality is referential and scientific. There may be reason for deep thinking about this but existentially one must learn to discern the difference of good will and corrupted or bad will.
To explain I might say it simply. I believe the shootings were racially motivated that happened recently.
However some opposite my opinion might object that the person “was not right in the head”, “sexually addicted” and “deranged”.
Ok well I’d respond that I think every person who is racist IS deranged but I don’t think everyone who mentally has difficulties or perhaps even who struggles with ‘sexual compulsive behavior disorder’ is of a necessity a bad person or even deranged for that matter. Many people of good will fight imbalanced and excessive sexual urges and impulses or negative thought patterns without murdering people or sexually harassing others..the difference shouldn’t be too hard to highlight.
Where are you going on with this sir?
~To the roots.~
In my opinion racism and even much of the problems of sexual addiction can be traced to wounded or toxic masculinity.
The stigma towards those struggling with mental illness or merely experiencing non neurotypical wiring is already too overkill. In the experience of many kind nonneurotypical people the excuse of insanity is used far too many times by someone who shot a bunch of innocent people while the usual person with mental struggles is struggling with decision making, sensory issues and inhibitions to executive function in the negative or obsessively applying their mind to a project, special skill, radically excessive moralization or special interest in the positive. The average neurodiverse person or the person with mental illnesses is usually actually a person with ‘exacting’ fortitude of moral will. That is why so many of us don’t easily buy it when someone with much premeditation uses their will to breathe terror upon the innocent.
Racism is often a generational curse. It’s passed down through effigies, epithets, tits for tats, nic nacs, this and thats ‘and all that’s and I’ve rarely seen racism come without toxic masculinity.
{Photo: “Could there be Earth” by me James Dillon Broxson all rights reserved. Email shastat78@gmail.com for more info. }
“I’ve rarely seen racism come without toxic masculinity. “
What could be more toxic than seeing your ethnic conception of being a man as the absolute center in a universe/ potential multiverse so vast? David the Jewish king and prophet said it well “What is man that you think of him or the Son of Man that you pay him mind?” and continuing on paying homage to the Hebraic conception of angelic beings he states that man ‘one of whom he is’ is a little lower than they.
So here is David, extremely imperfect man that he is who had indeed also participated in intertribal wars and adultery and who handed more hides to the men that owned them than Gaston.. and yet even he at the depths when confronted with a holy G-d realizes that he is not all that matters. Far from it David the sexual deviant, patriarch and saint realises a truth that not only desecrates the mores of tribe central religious nationalism but even attacks man’s inherent speciestic religious bias.
Respect, for those who tread litely in this life so subsists in treating the other as a messenger of God and even perhaps other creatures like Balaams donkey or even as much as to be healed by a serpent on a pole.
How much more must we then intrepidly, as if we were communicating with ultra powerful spiritual beings be reverent and still in the presence of other humans of the many beautiful and varied ethnicities and cultures!?
And yet still many go astray. They ignore that the scriptures were written for our instruction so that we may not sin like our fathers did.
And of course many, falsely construing respect for their fathers as ignoring their fathers sin have decided not to shake that which underpins toxic streams in life which perhaps Source, ergo G-d would be willing to shake. Wrongly covering others sins often is equivalent to hiding a spiritual cancer diagnosis.
Jesus my Hebrew messiah as I believe Him to be was admittedly anti racist and I would definitely say He came to destroy toxic masculinity at its depths.
In Christ we see a tender father son relationship.. one that many men only crave and think is untenable if not contradictory to the faux masculinity hazing they received from their fathers
In Christ the celibate male preacher, Prophet and Teacher we see one so solidly rooted in his identity and intimacy with His Father that he was intellectually, emotionally and sensitively fulfilled, satiated and centered in righteous masculinity as opposed to toxic masculinity.
Me and my daughter.
In my life the pandemic turning me into a full time stay at home dad has felt like putting me on the frontlines in the war on toxic masculinity. Though the stigma of being the stay at home dad is lessening compared to 8 to 10 years ago it still exists and many men are made to feel less than masculine because they are not the ordinary bread winner or because they embody qualities that traditional mysogony see as feminine estate (kindness, compassion, child rearing and teaching etc). I would be lying if my personal encounter/ battle with the subliminal messages of the surrounding culture of said toxic masculinity has never been mentally draining. It takes a lot of security to be secure in your self and having your security based in Christ like virtues of mercy and compassion rather than might makes right and subsequent rejoicing in social darwinism.
During this Lenten season whether you are Christian or not or even perhaps a secular minded person, please join in with me in eschewing evil paths that toxic masculinity plows. It is not the path to the cultivation of manhood! It is not the sacred initiatory rites which our souls rightfully crave! Toxic masculinity is a vicious cycle that supports racism, objectification of women and others in general. If we want to truly make a better world as men we need to stake our masculinity in the Christ like virtues of compassion and mercy and listen to the words of Mary and ” Do whatever He tells you.”
Sometimes it takes an inspiring Facebook post to springboard my own Blog post writers block out of commision that unavoidably I will have to post onto my own blog.
I saw a post contrasting the differences between neurotypical communication and ~I’ll just call us~ “Spectrumites!”
It described the difference been an autistics sharing of literal statements (and taking thereof) and the neurotypical tendency to analyze all of this through metadata to which us Spectrumites are not usually privvy.
I would like to mention that though at the age of 32 I went to an autism center for children and was tested and was not then afforded a diagnosis of ASD.. I did however come out with a diagnosis of STPD and only ‘further questions’.
Though I do plan on eventually getting another (and more in depth) testing done at a facility that specializes in late diagnoses of adults, after 2 years of grueling thoughts on the matter I have essentially comfortably settled into autistic self identification.
Some might say “What’s the point?” but for me it is a lifestyle medication that ‘does the magic’ even though I don’t necessarily disagree with the diagnosis traits given in the ‘positive’ but only what I feel was overlooked.
I know many who are quite sure that they are on the spectrum. Some eventually get a diagnosis from a professional. Others forego that route and self identify perpetually. I’m sort of in the middle myself. However here is what I said in response to the Facebook post as my personal commentary.. but likewise one out of a myriad things that makes sense of my experiences of existing as me. But first an awkward picture..
“Even though I am left in the arena of “self identification” in this subject.. this is a good description of one of my primary communication issues. Though I will say it makes me good at puns and good as a helper because of hyperliteralism.
As a strength on the other hand it also makes me pretty good at steamrolling through opposition on a pioneering path because I can see templates and figurative blueprints, ‘as it were’ almost like the casting process for a theatrical production and take action for results without immediate respect to risks or without considering the obstacles ahead of time.
However as I have grown up and faced various obstacles the obstacles themselves became invariably like bosses in a video game and semirobotically by instinctual irascible desire for serotonin and for the fulfillment of a hypothesis I banged my head into mushy ‘virtually digital walls’ until I defeated them.
I acted like a consultant and a hole filler because I realised boats sink not always starting with big holes but by a few small or very many smaller holes. This also effects communication. I’m good at telling jokes all day. I am terrible at receiving them unless we already share a very similar sense of humor, another commodity that my version thereof doesn’t always normally have a match.
This is actually good. I have had to use things that I enjoy to help me enjoy things I don’t. I have had to use acting (perhaps a more fun manner of ‘masking’ per se) to enter into some of the results world of the everyday world..
a world that teaches and takes incessantly for granted that results happen and that’s all there is to it.
One time in Italy on a mission trip a homeless man told me “You think too much. “. At the time I took it as some life thwarting, esoteric entrapment of an omen.
Now I just realise that it is a harmless reality of my being and existence. It is not a curse. It is a blessing with challenges though.
Computers do think too much.. that’s what they do. I’m not afraid of that and by mercy I too believe I might be grasped by the Mind of Christ.”
I hope you can be inspired to be the captain of your ship as God is also teaching me. Take Care, The Picture Frame Conversationalist.
(A little poem comment I wrote for y’all antimaskers. )
The fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom. So the fear of the Lord isn’t an end in itself. Is it fear to avoid hell which is worthy to fear and then say to the sick..go now physician and heal thyself?
Jesus said preach and heal is thy task. Where many words are -sin will not be lacking..so why oh erudite soul wont you please wear a mask?
If the Lord is to fear and the punishments of hell and to heal and to preach is thy mission pray tell..can you not also protect another’s mortal shell?
You know it is written as has been duly known by the beautiful Jewish messiah bethroned that what’s done to the least of these is done to His own.
Therefore if you quibble at a small ethical task …can your master charge you in the big if you can’t wear a mask?
Wear a mask ,wear a mask is all that they ask during pandemic plagues do the wise “cancel’ that?
Elephants work for peanuts and GOPple them fast..if it could save some one you know WHO’d appreciate that…
Most kindly then till the coast clears .. for the least of these “that” will you do them a favor.. wont you please wear a mask?!
This message is approved by James Dillon Broxson. Thank you Kay Ivey for extending the mask mandate and listening to our public health officials. It means the world to us that you are trying your best to put people before politics on this issue. A good and ethical bipartisan and science following move. Legacy comes from doing the right thing over merely following a brand. We appreciate it.
UPDATE { I SPOKE TO FAST… SHE CHANGED THE MASK ORDER TO A CHOICE THING. GOOD GRIEF!!!}
P.S. I’m glad she did the right thing for a while but I guess politicking is an endless pressure. “Shaking my head. “
So I think it is advantageous to start my relationship with you the reader to know..my name.
My name is James Dillon Broxson and I’ve been told that was my signifier all my life.
For some reason I answer to it so I guess it has some sort of relevance to me.
Issues of politics seem to take up everyone’s general everyday discourse these days and I am often just as guilty but many are also guilty of doing nothing to better the situation. They are political in word but not in deed. It is important you know I don’t wish for people to be a-political. I just want them to be political in word and in deed.
From the day I was born I was a protest. I had sleep disorders that made me sleepy when everyone was waky and waky when everyone was sleepy. I wasn’t just beating to my own drum all “Dilly-Nilly” but rather it was foisted on me by that miracle called birth.
I understood things differently, I acted differently I believed differently. I was born my own political party.
I was like a missionary to all but all saw it their mission to be missionaries to me…
but alas I was hard hearted and couldn’t swallow the pill. Perhaps my natural immunities made medicine my mutinies!
It’s hard to swallow a pill when you are born with the natural tendency to believe you are a doctor.
It might take you years to hear the other and selective hearing doesn’t make that much better.
To be normal was oft an envy; though in these years, in my thirties, Iv’e began to ‘trust’ the directions my neuro-divergences often suggest as plans of action. To survive in this world whilst owning childlike naivety and awe is dangerous unless you learn to be strong ‘trusting your guns’.
I decided to start blogging again and this time to try to make a run of it as the beginnings of my online business, as a way for you the reader to follow the trains of thought I’m conducting and perhaps hop on and enjoy the ride and for me to etch out a living doing what I always wanted to do ..being a writer.
My mind is so full that it is exhausting at times but my hidden rigidities of thought are so all encompassing that good habits are hard to inculcate without a sense of deep meaning and ‘ritual’.
I have had a strange gift in my life of full dedication to very particular seemingly minuscule ‘things’ or some pet social goal to help better mankind. The particularity is important as the meaning is necessary and the ritual is soothing.
When Adam and Eve were put in the Garden of Eden the work of tending it was meant to be a pleasure and not a chore.
That is a good exemplification of how my mind works. I have very important work to do but it has to be that work ‘I am meant to do.’
In grade school my teachers would often say to my mother. “If Dillon likes something he will be better at it than anything else. If he doesn’t like it he is going to have many challenges.”
My life I have struggled with focus, with drive, with the exhaustion of years upon years of un-diagnosed sleep disorders as well as various maladies of mental and emotional exhaustion but still I remember being told I was brilliant by teachers in school, winning spelling bees, being very proficient in English and writing as well as regularly confusing adults by how astute, well read and eruditely questioning I was.
High functionality made my liabilities seem faked and that I was playing the victim even if that was furthest from the truth.
High abilities masked my high challenges.
The desire to emulate some of the giftings of the professionally extroverted of the world along with the love for performance, acting and creativity gave a certain degree of childlike normalcy to me whereby I could mask the challenges of me attempting to catch up with the supposed ‘dance of reality’ and the supposed ‘rules of engagement’.
I was an Android Phone in an Iphone world and I did not readily have the software to interpret ‘their’ programs.
A fish out of water.
A star without sky.
Man lone in the woods. That was this guy.
I won’t immediately tell you what this means to me or what I think it means but I will use it as an opportunity to encourage.
I still don’t really know what I am doing.
Even my faith doesn’t necessarily change that… and I think thats ok!
I still don’t really know what I’m doing… I’m learning everyday.
I still don’t really know what I’m trying to do… but I’m still trying to too!
I still don’treally know what I’m doing… and so can you!
Musings of a Picture Frame Conversationalist. 