Gavin Whyte's Blog, page 28

300 Words a Day - #8 - Rearview Mirror

When I was younger, I was prone to looking back.
It’s not a good habit to get into. 
It’s like keeping your eye on the rearview mirror, whilst driving.
You miss so much…
… not to mention how dangerous it is.
It’s different from keeping an eye on where we’re going. 
That’s safer.
But we still need to be aware of driving the vehicle.
Regardless of how habitual it is to identify with my past and the possibilities of my future, I know it’s my mind playing with itself.
I’m fully aware I’m not just my past. 
I’m fully aware I’m not where I’m heading, too, yet there’s a part of me that loves to cling to what isn’t.
A part of me loves to relive memories, saying, “This is what happened to me… this is who I was, back then.”
I am my past and yet I am not my past.
It is still very much a part of me; that is, it is the story I tell people when they ask: “Who are you?”
I can look back and be swept off my feet by nostalgia’s beauty. 
It can feel more magical than the present.
How can something that isn’t there fill me with more joy than where the magic takes place?
Quite simply, it can’t, and doesn’t.
It just seems to fill me with more joy because it gives me a break from a chain of unproductive thoughts. 
That’s why, when we hear this is all there is, we may feel a sense of disappointment.
“I thought there was more.”
Then we’re not seeing this for what this really is.
To identify with history so the history-making process gets pushed aside for the history it’s already created, is a mistake I’m sure we all make.
Drive safe.
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300 Words a Day - #8

When I was younger, I was prone to looking back.
It’s not a good habit to get into. 
It’s like keeping your eye on the rearview mirror, whilst driving.
You miss so much…
… not to mention how dangerous it is.
It’s different from keeping an eye on where we’re going. 
That’s safer.
But we still need to be aware of driving the vehicle.
Regardless of how habitual it is to identify with my past and the possibilities of my future, I know it’s my mind playing with itself.
I’m fully aware I’m not just my past. 
I’m fully aware I’m not where I’m heading, too, yet there’s a part of me that loves to cling to what isn’t.
A part of me loves to relive memories, saying, “This is what happened to me… this is who I was, back then.”
I am my past and yet I am not my past.
It is still very much a part of me; that is, it is the story I tell people when they ask: “Who are you?”
I can look back and be swept off my feet by nostalgia’s beauty. 
It can feel more magical than the present.
How can something that isn’t there fill me with more joy than where the magic takes place?
Quite simply, it can’t, and doesn’t.
It just seems to fill me with more joy because it gives me a break from a chain of unproductive thoughts. 
That’s why, when we hear this is all there is, we may feel a sense of disappointment.
“I thought there was more.”
Then we’re not seeing this for what this really is.
To identify with history so the history-making process gets pushed aside for the history it’s already created, is a mistake I’m sure we all make.
Drive safe.
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300 Words a Day - #7 - Caring about Time

My wife booked us cinema tickets to go and see a rerun of E.T, thinking it would be nice to watch it on the big screen.
We arrived at the cinema, got our tickets, and then was told they had changed the movie.
“So what’s showing instead?” asked my wife.
“Trainspotting,” came the nervous reply from the employee.
Luckily, all the Taiwanese children were at school. Instead of the cute alien in drag, wanting to phone home, they would’ve got a drug addict, diving down a toilet.
The film proved itself to be a timeless classic, making us thankful for the last minute swap.
(I was told, that because it was a film festival, they were allowed to change the movies as and when.)
Watching Trainspotting made me want to watch Trainspotting 2 . For some reason or another it wasn’t shown here, in Taiwan.
So when I got home, I watched the trailer and a ten-minute video, which had interviews with the director, Danny Boyle, and all the main actors.
He said something very interesting:
“When we’re teenagers, or in our early twenties, we don’t care about time. But when we grow up, we realize time doesn’t care about us.”
So true.
Although, in my case, when I was in my teens and early twenties, I did care about time.
Maybe too much.
An awareness of the impermanence of my body seemed to kick in rather early. 
I was writing ghost stories when I was six.
I would rush to the non-fiction section in the library to read books on ghost sightings and the paranormal.
My early interest in the unseen seemed to be preparing me for something.
Preparing me for the grand becoming.
Life.
The never-ending process of growth.
And the same applies to you.
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300 Words a Day - #7

My wife booked us cinema tickets to go and see a rerun of E.T, thinking it would be nice to watch it on the big screen.
We arrived at the cinema, got our tickets, and then was told they had changed the movie.
“So what’s showing instead?” asked my wife.
“Trainspotting,” came the nervous reply from the employee.
Luckily, all the Taiwanese children were at school. Instead of the cute alien in drag, wanting to phone home, they would’ve got a drug addict, diving down a toilet.
The film proved itself to be a timeless classic, making us thankful for the last minute swap.
(I was told, that because it was a film festival, they were allowed to change the movies as and when.)
Watching Trainspotting made me want to watch Trainspotting 2 . For some reason or another it wasn’t shown here, in Taiwan.
So when I got home, I watched the trailer and a ten-minute video, which had interviews with the director, Danny Boyle, and all the main actors.
He said something very interesting:
“When we’re teenagers, or in our early twenties, we don’t care about time. But when we grow up, we realize time doesn’t care about us.”
So true.
Although, in my case, when I was in my teens and early twenties, I did care about time.
Maybe too much.
An awareness of the impermanence of my body seemed to kick in rather early. 
I was writing ghost stories when I was six.
I would rush to the non-fiction section in the library to read books on ghost sightings and the paranormal.
My early interest in the unseen seemed to be preparing me for something.
Preparing me for the grand becoming.
Life.
The never-ending process of growth.
And the same applies to you.
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>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>Please visit and Like my Facebook Author Page<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<< Image info

300 Words a Day - #6 - Collecting Experiences

I’m not an experience-collector.
Experiencing new things doesn’t make life richer, for my attention is not in the experience, but on the experiencer, therefore the constant flow of experiencing fills my cup rather beautifully, without the need to venture off onto a road less travelled. 
Surely anything that is here one moment and gone the next doesn't qualify as a safe investment of our wellbeing.
Yet I find that’s how the majority of us live.
No singled out experience can top being in unconditional love. 
No desire... no fear.
All experience is made out of the same stuff.
See it, and you’ll never feel the urge to “experience something new” ever again.
Don’t see it, and book that cruise in that faraway destination, that you’ve always wanted to see.
When a dog catches its tail, the wagging stops.
Until it starts again.
We don’t need to go anywhere or do anything to feel alive.
It’s all in the being. 
A friend who was diagnosed with cancer told me, “Today, I saw the trees.”
They were always there.
Brandon Lee, in his last interview, before being shot and killed, whilst filming The Crow , quoted a book called The Sheltering Sky. 
It goes:
“Because we don't know when we will die, we get to think of life as an inexhaustible well. Yet everything happens only a certain number of times, and a very small number really. How many more times will you remember a certain afternoon of your childhood, an afternoon that is so deeply a part of your being that you can't even conceive of your life without it? Perhaps four, five times more, perhaps not even that. How many more times will you watch the full moon rise? Perhaps 20. And yet it all seems limitless.” 
It’s all here.
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300 Words a Day - #6

I’m not an experience-collector.
Experiencing new things doesn’t make life richer, for my attention is not in the experience, but on the experiencer, therefore the constant flow of experiencing fills my cup rather beautifully, without the need to venture off onto a road less travelled. 
Surely anything that is here one moment and gone the next doesn't qualify as a safe investment of our wellbeing.
Yet I find that’s how the majority of us live.
No singled out experience can top being in unconditional love. 
No desire... no fear.
All experience is made out of the same stuff.
See it, and you’ll never feel the urge to “experience something new” ever again.
Don’t see it, and book that cruise in that faraway destination, that you’ve always wanted to see.
When a dog catches its tail, the wagging stops.
Until it starts again.
We don’t need to go anywhere or do anything to feel alive.
It’s all in the being. 
A friend who was diagnosed with cancer told me, “Today, I saw the trees.”
They were always there.
Brandon Lee, in his last interview, before being shot and killed, whilst filming The Crow , quoted a book called The Sheltering Sky. 
It goes:
“Because we don't know when we will die, we get to think of life as an inexhaustible well. Yet everything happens only a certain number of times, and a very small number really. How many more times will you remember a certain afternoon of your childhood, an afternoon that is so deeply a part of your being that you can't even conceive of your life without it? Perhaps four, five times more, perhaps not even that. How many more times will you watch the full moon rise? Perhaps 20. And yet it all seems limitless.” 
It’s all here.
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300 Words a Day - #5 - Stubborn Little Ant

It’s morning. 
I’m in Taipei’s subway.
I’ve just squeezed out of the train.
I’m enjoying breathing and moving my limbs.
So many people. I swear there’re more and more of us.
I’ve been in Taiwan for two and a half years and I find myself thinking, “It wasn’t like this when I first came here.”
It probably was.
I’m walking towards my exit, then something happens.
A shift.
I feel like I’m the only person walking in this direction. 
I’m the stubborn ant, refusing to fall in line.
The wave going against the tide.
An ocean of bodies, waves and waves of them, appear in my field of vision.
Where did you all come from?
I’m in awe.
People.
There are people here.
I can see them.
I can really see them.
“Look at you all.”
…
I can feel a liquid heat rising, from my feet to my chest.
To my throat.
I swallow and bite my lip and suppress a smile.
I’ve seen those who are smiling for no apparent reason; passersby stare at them from the corners of their eyes.
“Just ignore them… don’t stare.”
I’ve even done that myself. 
No trust in a causeless love.
But people aren’t noticing me.
I’m hiding this swelling of emotion like a pro.
Every movement made, every blink, smile, frown, crease of the forehead, you name it, it all absorbs my attention, like I’m watching a flower bloom for the first and last time.
I’m in love.
An inexhaustible ocean of it.
The lump in the throat moves north.
I need to control this.
It’s in the eyes now.
I take a deep inhale, and an extra long exhale.
Now I’m outside, still swimming. 
So is everybody else…
But they don’t know it.
Somebody smiles at me.
Keep walking, don’t stare.

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300 Words a Day - #5

It’s morning. 
I’m in Taipei’s subway.
I’ve just squeezed out of the train.
I’m enjoying breathing and moving my limbs.
So many people. I swear there’re more and more of us.
I’ve been in Taiwan for two and a half years and I find myself thinking, “It wasn’t like this when I first came here.”
It probably was.
I’m walking towards my exit, then something happens.
A shift.
I feel like I’m the only person walking in this direction. 
I’m the stubborn ant, refusing to fall in line.
The wave going against the tide.
An ocean of bodies, waves and waves of them, appear in my field of vision.
Where did you all come from?
I’m in awe.
People.
There are people here.
I can see them.
I can really see them.
“Look at you all.”
…
I can feel a liquid heat rising, from my feet to my chest.
To my throat.
I swallow and bite my lip and suppress a smile.
I’ve seen those who are smiling for no apparent reason; passersby stare at them from the corners of their eyes.
“Just ignore them… don’t stare.”
I’ve even done that myself. 
No trust in a causeless love.
But people aren’t noticing me.
I’m hiding this swelling of emotion like a pro.
Every movement made, every blink, smile, frown, crease of the forehead, you name it, it all absorbs my attention, like I’m watching a flower bloom for the first and last time.
I’m in love.
An inexhaustible ocean of it.
The lump in the throat moves north.
I need to control this.
It’s in the eyes now.
I take a deep inhale, and an extra long exhale.
Now I’m outside, still swimming. 
So is everybody else…
But they don’t know it.
Somebody smiles at me.
Keep walking, don’t stare.

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300 Words a Day - #4 - What Would You Do?

Do you allow yourself to relax?
I like to think I do.
I know the importance of relaxation, and I can so easily dish out the advice to a rushing-Ronny to chill out.
I’m certain there’s something in one or more of my own books about how rushing doesn’t get us anywhere, and how “there’s not enough time to rush.” 
And yet how easily I fall into the trap of rushing away the magic.
Rushing out of panic - out of fear.
I’ve always felt like I’m running out of time.
I’ve spoken to others who share the same concern.
(One of whom died at the age of 22 - cancer’s work.)
We feel we need to do all we can, because life is a slippery ordeal.
What’s around the corner?
Knowing would spoil the surprise.
(Can I have a clue?)
Many years ago, a friend asked me, “Gav, what would you do if you were diagnosed with cancer?”
“Smile and say thanks,” I said.
Such a smooth talker.
The truth is, how on earth would I know how I would react to such news?
I’m reminded of a story Ram Dass shared:
A warlord comes to a village and kills everyone. There’s news of an old monk who won’t leave his temple. The warlord storms over to the temple and approaches him.
“Don’t you know who I am?” cries the warlord. “I could run this sword straight through you, without blinking an eye.” 
The small, old monk looks up at the warlord, smiles and says, “Don’t you know who I am? I could have your sword run through my body and not blink an eye.”
The warlord, amazed and speechless, bows and leaves.
Do I fear the warlord’s sword?
If so, who does that fear belong to?
The monk knew.
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>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>Please visit and Like my Facebook Author Page<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<
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300 Words a Day - #4

Do you allow yourself to relax?
I like to think I do.
I know the importance of relaxation, and I can so easily dish out the advice to a rushing-Ronny to chill out.
I’m certain there’s something in one or more of my own books about how rushing doesn’t get us anywhere, and how “there’s not enough time to rush.” 
And yet how easily I fall into the trap of rushing away the magic.
Rushing out of panic - out of fear.
I’ve always felt like I’m running out of time.
I’ve spoken to others who share the same concern.
(One of whom died at the age of 22 - cancer’s work.)
We feel we need to do all we can, because life is a slippery ordeal.
What’s around the corner?
Knowing would spoil the surprise.
(Can I have a clue?)
Many years ago, a friend asked me, “Gav, what would you do if you were diagnosed with cancer?”
“Smile and say thanks,” I said.
Such a smooth talker.
The truth is, how on earth would I know how I would react to such news?
I’m reminded of a story Ram Dass shared:
A warlord comes to a village and kills everyone. There’s news of an old monk who won’t leave his temple. The warlord storms over to the temple and approaches him.
“Don’t you know who I am?” cries the warlord. “I could run this sword straight through you, without blinking an eye.” 
The small, old monk looks up at the warlord, smiles and says, “Don’t you know who I am? I could have your sword run through my body and not blink an eye.”
The warlord, amazed and speechless, bows and leaves.
Do I fear the warlord’s sword?
If so, who does that fear belong to?
The monk knew.
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