Waltzing Through Mine Fields

“The place to improve the world is first in one’s own heart and head and hands, and then work outward from there.” - Robert Pirsig, Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance

“The place to improve the world is first in one’s own heart and head and hands, and then work outward from there.”

- Robert Pirsig, Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance

(Source: mcdona)

inappropriateraptor: The Sleep of Reason Produces Monsters: Plate 43 of Los Caprichos-Francisco Goya (1799)I have a print of this in my bedroom above my bookcase. I spent a lot of time staring at it this morning before I got out of bed. There are a lot of possible meanings behind it. I tend to favor the thought that it’s an allegorical explanation of the creative process or imagination. In sleep, your imagination is without rationality so it takes over (causing all sorts of wacky stuff). When reason and imagination work hand in hand during the waking hours, it equals the creative process. Considering that the Los Caprichos prints were Goya’s commentary on Spanish society, it can probably just be said that when you lose a foundation of rationality, all kinds of annoying things can happen.Like the scenario where you get attacked by owls and bats when you’re trying to take a fucking nap.

inappropriateraptor:

The Sleep of Reason Produces Monsters: Plate 43 of Los Caprichos
-Francisco Goya (1799)

I have a print of this in my bedroom above my bookcase. I spent a lot of time staring at it this morning before I got out of bed. There are a lot of possible meanings behind it. I tend to favor the thought that it’s an allegorical explanation of the creative process or imagination. In sleep, your imagination is without rationality so it takes over (causing all sorts of wacky stuff). When reason and imagination work hand in hand during the waking hours, it equals the creative process. Considering that the Los Caprichos prints were Goya’s commentary on Spanish society, it can probably just be said that when you lose a foundation of rationality, all kinds of annoying things can happen.

Like the scenario where you get attacked by owls and bats when you’re trying to take a fucking nap.

I’m god’s lonely man.

I’m god’s lonely man.

“O Lord our Father, our young patriots, idols of our hearts, go forth to battle – be Thou near them! With them – in spirit – we also go forth from the sweet peace of our beloved firesides to smite the foe. O Lord our God, help us to tear their soldiers to bloody shreds with our shells; help us to cover their smiling fields with the pale forms of their patriot dead; help us to drown the thunder of the guns with shrieks of their wounded, writhing in pain; help us to lay waste their humble homes with hurricanes of fire; help us to wring the hearts of their unoffending widows with unavailing grief; help us to turn them out roofless with their little children to wander unfriended the wastes of their desolated land in rags and hunger and thirst, sports of the sun flames of summer and the icy winds of winter, broken in spirit, worn with travail, imploring Thee for the refuge of the grave and denied it – for our sakes who adore Thee, Lord, blast their hopes, blight their lives, protract their bitter pilgrimage, make heavy their steps, water their way with tears, stain the white snow with the blood of their wounded feet! We ask it, in the spirit of love, of Him Who is the Source of Love, and Who is the ever-faithful refuge and friend of all that are sore beset and seek His aid with humble and contrite hearts. Amen.”

“O Lord our Father, our young patriots, idols of our hearts, go forth to battle – be Thou near them! With them – in spirit – we also go forth from the sweet peace of our beloved firesides to smite the foe. O Lord our God, help us to tear their soldiers to bloody shreds with our shells; help us to cover their smiling fields with the pale forms of their patriot dead; help us to drown the thunder of the guns with shrieks of their wounded, writhing in pain; help us to lay waste their humble homes with hurricanes of fire; help us to wring the hearts of their unoffending widows with unavailing grief; help us to turn them out roofless with their little children to wander unfriended the wastes of their desolated land in rags and hunger and thirst, sports of the sun flames of summer and the icy winds of winter, broken in spirit, worn with travail, imploring Thee for the refuge of the grave and denied it – for our sakes who adore Thee, Lord, blast their hopes, blight their lives, protract their bitter pilgrimage, make heavy their steps, water their way with tears, stain the white snow with the blood of their wounded feet! We ask it, in the spirit of love, of Him Who is the Source of Love, and Who is the ever-faithful refuge and friend of all that are sore beset and seek His aid with humble and contrite hearts. Amen.”