Posted by Raul on January 10, 2011
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When I see high school teenagers driving a fairly new sport car, having lunch at a restaurant, meeting at a Starbucks for a friendly chat while sipping a coffee or some surfing in a modern laptop, it makes me wonder how their lives will be in the future.
What would happen when, from an early age, a teenage kid gets accustomed to experience and enjoy some “pleasures” of life that are supposedly reserved for an adult that already have accomplished something in life?
The first time can be magic, but the time number twenty is not that much, and by the time number fifty, it has become a routine that classifies as a standard necessity instead of a pleasure to enjoy.
Parents provided and children had an easy life. Asking for a car at the age of fifteen; having money to eat at restaurants, having a coffee at Starbucks and using the latest cell phone in the market; living the life of a well paid professional when still going to High School and sometimes not even getting good grades!
How much money they will have to generate in the near future to sustain a higher life that has become just the base for them? What could be a nice honeymoon trip when graduation from high school with a “C” implies a cruise to the Bahamas?
I can understand the concept of giving the “taste” as a motivational way, but when the results in school don’t reflect constructing the base to reach the presented image and standard to achieve; then the good intentions become a misleading guidance.
Instead of earning every little advantage, that should create the mentality of working hard to supply the needs and enjoy a small luxury from time to time, the concept generated in teenagers these days is that they have to be surrounded by the expensive and the latest, and disregarded the part of generating the income necessary to supply such luxuries.
It is acquiring prestige by the possession and continual use of the latest material elements, rather than the pride of being good at something.
And then, what would happen when the material possessions are lost due to…let’s say…a falling economy. Those who have lived a life of pride based on owning material luxury would become lost and without identity when loosing the material elements; while those who acquired pride by the sense of knowledge and expertise will still have their pride, even if is under a new, deprived economic situation.
Something to think about…
Raul
Posted by Raul on December 23, 2010
She had a smile and bright eyes when walking the trail by my side. We didn’t know where we would end up…we just walked the trail with a faint idea of the journey, and some vague plans for the next steps and the days ahead.
The warm breeze of December in the south hemisphere gave the hopes for the unknown, while the holding hands the reassurance for the times to come.
But winter is always ahead, and although we did know, we kept the smile while feeling the breeze in our young faces, walking the path together to the horizon always farther away on the road.
And winter did come.
Then the trail turned from the colored flowers all around to the brownish land of sadness at fall; and the sun changed to a reddish color for the winter and snow ahead. So the walking became hard with the cold wind in the face and the snow on the ground; feeling how the warm days of summer went away to be replaced by the harsh times of the season that had to be gone through.
Did we have to? And the thoughts of going back the trail to the beginning started to take home. Yet the long distance already traveled and the thoughts of going back cold, tired and sad through the same place that was walked warm and with a smile before…
The beginning of the trail and the horizon at the other end, they both seemed the same. We where standing there, trying to find a reason to keep going.
Then the little bird…the unimaginable find in the middle of nowhere; almost buried in the snow, looking at us, waiting to take it with us in our journey; to protect it and grow it as our treasure for the years to come.
So one hand holding the little bird while another found the excuse to touch the now stranger other hand once again. The excuse of the little bird; the responsibility of taking care of it; helping it grow as a given task; while walking the path to nowhere; to the setting sun.
And the little bird did grow!
Protecting it with our cold hands, together from the wind and the snow, just to find later we couldn’t let it go. The growing little bird became the element that held us together while walking the trail without aim, hoping for the warm sun to come back once again in the sky.
Stopping for a moment to look back and find the long trail walked now, and the horizon at the other end, with the promise of spring ahead and warmer days to keep going in the journey started so long ago.
And while the little bird has grown and trying its wings to fly on its own, the sun of spring announces its return and the colored flowers make the promise of a wonderful path to walk once more.
So now the thoughts of letting the once little bird fly on its own, give us the memories of the times when we started this trail so long ago. The two of us, knowing now there’ll be a bird flying somewhere; happily finding his own path and flying through the seasons of life and the fields of love.
While we, confused by the changes ahead, continue to walk this trail, looking at the horizon, knowing spring is coming with its colored flowers in the field, to be followed by the warm breeze of summer, to be back at the beginning while reaching the end of the road.
Raul
Posted by Raul on October 28, 2010
Dark clouds will come to stay and it’ll rain everyday
A chilly breeze will take home and remain
Birds will lower their voices and no singing will be heard again
And all the material toys will become stone and collect dust as their only purpose
And home will become a box
And sunshine just a memory
And laughter will migrate to an unknown place
And the sense of reality will fade
And every road will loose its end
A dark, silent creature standing in the middle of nowhere
Surrounded by an unseen, vibrant, alive world
Haunted by memories and feelings
But only tears will flourish
And a long forgotten smile will stay away
From one reality to another
Like an instant travel between two different worlds
So lost, so confused!
After you die…
Posted by Raul on October 25, 2010
What I Believe a Love Relationship Should Be
-What we could expect from a love relationship.
(What each one should do to accomplish the goal)
—–
-Friendship: Someone with whom we can talk honestly, share our dreams and fears and find mutual, honest support. Someone with whom we can trust each other as the only one in the world that will never fail to help and be there for the other.
(Learning to give ourselves with honest interest and dedication; to become the “place to rest and recharge” for our loved one without any doubt of being safe, understood and supported; without criticism in the back, but honest talk with a genuine good intention instead)
-Commitment: Someone with whom we can build something together; sharing the loads and the benefits of any enterprise we together decided to pursue.
(Learning to play our cards for the other, and take any necessary risks involved without doubts and recriminations)
-Sexuality: Someone with whom we can share sex, sweet touch and the physical pleasures of the human body, without societal restrictions when we are the two of us alone.
(Learning that there’s a difference between public and private behavior and self expression, so being alone we don’t bring with us commonly accepted customs, but give ourselves openly and with care for the other’s needs and desires)
-Pride: Someone with whom we can feel proud of being with in front of others in any situation that arises.
(Learning to continually improve ourselves physically, mentally, knowledge, manners, etc, so to become a reason of pride to be with)
—–
My guess is that most people would agree with these points; but how many of us are working continually in our part, mentioned in parenthesis?
To give love and to receive love there’s only one needed, but to keep love alive and growing, as for the existence of a relationship, there’s the need of two, and that implies the search is not only to find from who we can receive, but also to find to whom we can give and dedicate ourselves too.
It seems to me it is “established” that finding love is about to find from whom we will receive, but disregarded the part where we give, which implies working hard and continually self pushing to be the one for the other….too common to say “This is the way I am” instead of thinking “What else could I do?”
Continually working to be the kind of person our loved one need implies dedication and many times adaptation and even transformation.
As long as love remains considered a “commodity” that we acquire to have the same way we have a fancy car: to have fun with; to look good with; to know it’s there for us when we need it, but forgotten when we are in “our stuff”, we will never create a relationship that works both ways; and just like one day the car simply won’t start or die on us while on the road, our love relationship will be gone.
These are my conclusion from a “robotic” way of thinking 
Raul
Posted by Raul on October 11, 2010
They built machines that can hold Consciousness.
These machines are not made of plastic and metal but flesh and blood.
These machines have a Primary Program that allows them to sustain their own life.
This Program maintains the internal components working automatically.
This Program pushes the machine Operating System called brain into working towards physical self rewarding as an automated safety precaution of survival.
These machines also have a Secondary Program for search and acquirement of knowledge.
This Secondary Program allows the Operating System to control the machine so it can move, develop and participate, interacting with the surrounding environment.
But the final purpose of these machines is to hold Consciousness.
Then they are released to the physical world where they were created.
The purpose of the process is to allow the Consciousness to grow using the machine’s Operating System for knowledge search and acquirement and the machine itself as a traveling vessel, a starting point and a tool.
Once the growth is achieved the Consciousness leaves the bio-degradable machine behind to become part of the universe, the whole, the main Consciousness…the creators.
But the Consciousness must travel first the physical world in a physical body, a machine, to learn and develop as a process to grow.
And there is no guidance or instructions for this process, so the Consciousness must find the path on its own as part of the growing process.
And throughout this process, and pushed by the Primary Program of the machine, many times the Consciousness loose direction and dedicate the powerful capabilities of the Secondary Program of the machine and it’s Operating System just to fulfill the physical requirements the machine has.
So the journey of growth is turned into a process of acquiring the elements that will provide well being to the machine according to the Primary Program, instead of using that Secondary Program and the Operating System to control the machine at the service of the Consciousness in the process of growth.
A machine lost!
