Notes from the northern organ

a collection of thoughts thunked, stories narrated and witnessed everythings

[brianwnemeth]

Sparks of Triumph

I believe many of us have those moments where an idea or quick imprinted vision sets off a positive reaction throughout our bodies. Like an insight into who we are and what we are about. Peeking behind our own curtains to quickly snatch a glare of the glorious persons we are and will be. To illustrate this a little better I draw this comparison.

You know those shitty nights where your mind is racing about all the crap you’ve done to yourself and others? The shame and embarrassment of past words spoken and behaviors? Those sleepless episodes of anxiety suck terribly. 

Well the reverse side to that are the moment’s described when I opened this writing piece. Those clear peaceful relaxations about who we are and what we are doing and how to the world is operating. Small sparks of soft jubilee clear out into a calm realization and clarity of self-actualization. No self-doubt, no self-loathing, just peace and personal triumph.

Those are the moments I remember the most, not the bad ones that remember me. 

[brianwnemeth]

Gamble Writing 5

For a while now, my reflective writing has been at the surface of what I post on this blog. Besides this place, I write professionally for companies as a freelancer or offer writing services elsewhere. But once in a while, I like to sharpen this pretty blade of mine with some good old fashion gamble writing. The purpose is to keep the writing muscles strong with random prompts I find on the web. It’s a great way for me to get unstuck when I don’t know what to write or have been bogged down by too much mundane work. Anyways here we go.

For the three prompts below, I Googled “writing prompts for adults” and picked the first webpage. 53 options were presented. I took a quarter out of my pocket and spun it three times. I the seconds of counted each spin. Each count correlated to the prompt I picked. First spin gave me 5 seconds. Second spin gave me 9 seconds. The last spin gave me 34 seconds (I kid you not).

5. With great joy, I share with you what happened after…

Okay, right off the bat I am not a fan of this one. Joy is not a regular occurrence for me, so great joy isn’t going to happen. Perhaps excited? Yea, let go with excited. I am excited to share with you that when I played a scratch off the other day I won two bucks, well just got my money back. But honestly, just a small win like that is pretty joyful. Shit, I guess there is some joy in my life after all.

9. A taste she never knew before… 

Was gun metal right before she pulled the trigger. It was her last taste, that and the smoky flavor of blood mixed with gun powder.

34. It is the time of the year when…

People make babies. Come on folks, its March, and in NYC right now it’s snowing. Best time to stay under the covers, or on the couch, or on the kitchen floor just slapping skins. While we are on the subject of skin. You ever make yourself some loaded sweet potato skins with chicken and jalapenos? It’s really good, try it after the sex.

Tootles, folks.

[brianwnemeth]

Chase or trash yourself

Short and sweet to remind you and myself of the power of loving oneself. You either chase who you are and thrive knowing a better version of you is around every corner, or you trash your life by running after other people or things that certainly don’t fully give a fuck about you. 

With that said, go buy yourself some flowers, a nice meal, and make love to yourself today. Happy V. Day, folks. 

[brianwnemeth]

Submit or Produce

Life is going to suck in a variety of ways, but its also going to explode with a parade of jubilee that splashes color on our deep skin.

During the rise and fall of our character, I want to know something from myself and all of you.

Do you submit in life or do you hunger to produce? Do you want to be studied for the decisions you made in life, or spend your life studying those who lived?

You certainly can and will do both. But what is your driving force, what are the conditions you prescribe to?

I don’t think there is an clean answer here, but I hope we can agree that one brings a quicker and forgettable death. 

With that said, Happy Friday, folks.

[brianwnemeth]

No Comfort

If you spend your hours flirting with future dreams and comforts, you will never obtain them.

Hunger for what you want is wonderful, but don't fill up on the ideas only. You are occupying the space and energy that should be used for executing.

Want that cottage in the hills, the boat house on the Mediterranean, or simply that new car? 

Well bury that picture inside your head and get to work. Living only for luxury and comfort distorts our talents and potential. Get out and go do something with your time and mind.

[brianwnemeth]

No miracles, just work

Nothing works itself out on its own. There is always some sort of play involved. I have always despised people that forfeited hard work or action in favor of fate or hopefulness. Even worse, those who contribute their success to a divine being while blaming others for their short comings.

Your life is a product of your behavior. Everything you do, every action you perform, and every routine you practice makes you the current person you are.

No dream will be realized, no talent executed into skill could ever just show up at your feet.

While you were hoping and holding yourself back with “Oh gee golly, I need a miracle” someone out there is making it happen for themselves.

[brianwnemeth]

Manufacturing Yourself

I do not like the idea of finding yourself. As though some obscurity is going to present you a package of the person you were always meant to be, hidden away from your senses, unlocked by doing something crazy or bold or careless. No, this isn’t some “Eat Pray Love” shit. You are going to have to put in work, and create yourself.

We too often rely on the thought that there is some trick or shortcut to defining the self. But to actualize the person you want to be, you are going to have to leave your comfort zone, fall down, break bones, get your heart broken, suffer, and experience jubilee with the actions and decisions made throughout life. Inaction and doubt will leave you where you sit forever. To fully reach your potential, you cannot be you for too long, you are going to have to grow, create, and abandoned yesterday. You are going to have to get to work.

[brianwnemeth]

The importance of side quests.

We can easily get stumped during our main quest. Maybe we missed an opportunity to advance, or a certain part of the quest hasn’t opened up yet. Sometimes we aren’t that sure of the path we are currently traversing. 

That is why side quests are remarkably fulfilling.

Ultimately each avenue that your distract yourself with builds character and helps you along the way. It opens you up to worlds that haven’t yet existed in you. Think of it similar to a vein, or the roots of a plant. Those off shooting lines that reach away from the main path consume new areas of the world that bring replenishment back to central. If we continue on just the current path we ride, blinded to the right and left of us, we reach a destination we might not want anymore. Or may never reach it because we haven’t allowed for growth in other areas to feed our passions to push further.

I will give you an example. Say you’re a mental health specialist, have been in the field for years, and have lost your vision of what it is you’re to do in this particular vocation. You are mentally drained, and are feeling cognitively dreary the more you practice your craft. It might be helpful to take some gardening or cooking courses, enroll in a community college and take some engineering classes. They don’t necessary have to be life changing or career shifting decisions, it’s meant to breathe new information and life into you. 

And although you can start by investing your time in fields you find interesting, make it habit forming to reach into areas you know nothing about, even for a small time, to see what the world has to offer and how it can nourish you.

Side quests are that, they don’t have to be grandiose actions, they are meant to widen your breath and feed your character.

[brianwnemeth]

Gamble Writing 4

Here we go again with the gamble writing. If you haven’t read the previous entries with the similar title, I take this opportunity to pick random writing prompts or questions from around the web to keep the word sword sharpened.

As in the previous exercises I usually roll dice or drop objects on the floor as a sort of set up to how I choose my prompts. This time I just picked one prompt from three different websites. Enjoy, folks.

·         What is something scary that you would like to try? What makes it scary for you? How might you overcome that fear?

I thought about this question and wanted to first respond by writing my desire to do some dare devil shit. Jump off cliffs, skydive, swim with sharks, do a back flip on a bike, but what really sunk in the more I pondered over the word fear is this. Fear for me is not fulfilling my true potential and innate desires to be me. So with that in mind, I would love to drop everything and travel the world for a year. Learning from people, testing myself, and opening myself up the dangers and beauties of this planet. What makes it scary? Not knowing how I would survive. How might I overcome this fear? By doing it, maybe not a first for the whole year, but maybe a few months at a time.

·         Describe your ideal life 15 years from now. What is something you can do every day to reach that goal?

I honestly do not give a fuck about this question, but this is the prompt and we know the rules. I am not a big fan of looking too precisely into the future and living strictly by a plan I might not want 15 years from now. But in general I would say happier, healthier, and wealthier. And you know what else, make my own damn clothes. I am sick of how expensive shit is and then how poor quality garments are becoming. I bought a pair of jeans 4 months ago that are falling to pieces like your first shitty relationship in high school. Sheesh.

·         What would you do if a stranger was staring at you?

I would catch an attitude. I don’t know if it’s my personality or a New Yorker thing, but do not stare. Especially on the subway, that is a rule from all New Yorkers to whoever you are, keep your shit to yourself on the train and bus. If we are walking in opposite directions down the street and you start to break your neck as we pass, please believe I’m breaking mine too with a caustic glare. But if you find me attractive and are just admiring me, that’s cool. But don’t stare too long I’ll get nervous and have upper lip sweat.

Well that’s it for the gamble writing. See you next time, lovers.

[brianwnemeth]

Wanderjahre

Yea its been a while, I've been on holiday, sort of....enough with the side eyes, lets just get this going.

As we grow older we are expected to become master of something, or Master of None (Hi Aziz)To have dedicated ourselves to a certain path, craft, educational vocation. To have achieved past the apprenticeship stage, through the journeymen arena of application and into the desired guild we worked towards. During your journeymen years the process of applying your craft and learning to enhance your skills is vital for development. To set out and test your mettle in new places, among new people, while experiencing yourself and your craft swell is a marvelous part of life. This is why I advocate for a Wanderjahre continuously throughout our existence.

Every 3 to 5 years, dedicate a large portion of your time to expanding yourself into new territories to test your worth as the person you are. And when I say a large portion of time, if you have the means, take weeks, months, a year to travel extensively, move to another part of your country or the world, get a second degree or start on one, transform your body and mind, do something with your life, with your limited time, to push your inner workings towards the individual you want to be. 

See, no matter our title, responsibilities, vocation, age or craft, we have to master ourselves. To apprentice new ideas and feelings and beliefs throughout our life's span. To then journey into something new, examining and applying who we have become against the vast beautiful unknown that is always in front of us.

[brianwnemeth]

Ways to go to war with oneself

Passive monitoring kills you. When we live in relative peace with our environment or have allowed routine to set in and the nebula of laziness to waltz with our days, we forget to challenge ourselves, to prune the dead from idleness.

Instead of blaming others for what you don't have and imagining obstacles that do not exist solely to continue lazy days uncomfortable to push yourself out of a boring life, I recommend the following; go to war with yourself every day. Because the only way to have a better life is to challenge yourself. You are your own hindrance.

Ways to go to war:

·         Pick an insecurity and tackle it, question it, write it down, stare at it, and bury it. Whether your behavior, appearance, or any other form of insecurity that you feel shame from, write down how you are going to improve, or learn how to love it.

·         If you dislike your job research new opportunities today and send out resumes to anything that grabs your attention. If you want to change careers completely, look to your friends, family, and social media contacts and start asking what other people do. Send a text/message and get to asking.

·         Do not eat lunch at your desk

·         Read something or listen to someone who has opposing views. Ask questions about why they feel that way. Do not judge, learn to listen.

·         Find a flight deal and book it. Take your life and time back and just book the cheapest flight you can find for whatever duration. You can worry about where to sleep later. Book the fucking flight.

·         Pick up any book and read it. Until you fall asleep tonight, take every spare moment and read it. If you like it, repeat the next day, if you do not, choose another book.

·         Do not order food or take out today. Cook something. Get in the kitchen and experiment.

·         Pick something of interest and start doing it. Interested in sewing? Scrap fabric and a simple sewing kit are very inexpensive. Want to learn how to make beer? There is an assortment of amateur beer kits available all over the web. Interested in language? Use your lunch break to download a free language app and spend that time learning.

·         Every night before bed, write down how you felt about the day. Then throw it away. Express yourself and leave it in the past.

·         Do something nice for someone. Call or see someone you love and tell them you appreciate them.

·         Lastly, every morning stretch, do push ups, sits ups, and eat fruit.

Now redeem your life and start a war.

[brianwnemeth]

Fear the end of Curiosity

At age 4, my older brother made a tomahawk on a field trip he went to in middle school. The way he shared his new toy with me was by throwing it at my face, splitting my upper and bottom lips. Seeing my blood pour from my face was the first time I simultaneously experienced pain and fear to a heightened degree.

Later in life I got over the fear of physical pain and feared more cognitive haunts, such as being alone for the rest of my life, and not making anything of myself. But those fears, too, have been handled and worked on with practice.

But there is one fear I am aware will bury you beyond remembrance and existence. That is the fear of losing curiosity.

Often we can become mundane. Our weekly schedule routine, of behavior practicable, our environment stale. The person that got us to where we are today has changed, but we play the same familiar tune for ourselves. I believe this happens more as you age but it also happens when we just stop doing; doing anything, anything that excites us, anything that fuels our internal fires. We accept our fate, and leave it at that.

If your curiosity goes, you become nothing. You will stop learning, stop participating in life, you die and just simply disappear into the world of forgotten no bodies.

Not everything you do has to provide full meaning before you accept it. Let all those little whispers that electrify your attention become your constant goal; the goal to realizing that every curiosity amplified and fulfilled ignites your life.

Let the fear of losing your curiosity push you into discovering something new today; your life needs it.

[brianwnemeth]

How things work out.

I love that feeling of fear in the throat. No being in control in situations that could be deadly; my life not in my hands thrills me. Such as the taking off and landing of a plane, being over 900 feet in the air in a small elevator climbing upwards, and free falling. That sense of fear when I cannot not govern the decisions on life and death is almost empowering.

But this story is of another type of fear.

Last week, I was in Paris for about 8 days. It was a lovely time. But that first night was a bit frightening, or rather that next morning. In fact that night before was great. Landed smoothly, headed to the hotel, unpacked, and went out for duck and wine and beef tartar. Then back to the hotel (I don’t sleep on planes) took a nap, woke up, ate crepes and hit the streets of Paris all night drinking and eating while making new friends. As I lay back in my hotel bed, although a very small room with a toilet I had to sit sideways on, I thought my first night in Paris couldn’t have been better. That shit was splendid but what happened morning time was shit.

I set an alarm and woke up around 8am a little groggy. Stretching and yawning and tasting copper dryness in my mouth I pulled back the sheets. Stroked my legs while sitting up and felt a pinch on my ankle, a quick scratch handled that and I motioned out of bed. But then I stopped. I returned my hand back my left leg and sense a few uneasy bumps where I scratched. I looked down and under my ankle saw a bed bug.

A bed bug.

For me, the sense of fear and dread and disappointed all hit at once. I didn’t touch the sheets, I left everything as it were, took a picture and got clothed. I went down to the front desk explained what happened and the head of housekeeping came to inspect. She said no words to me, looked at the little red criminal who had been feasting on me and carefully rolled it into a napkin, then walked out of the room. At this moment I knew I had been slightly defeated. I was going to be a bit off the rest of the trip knowing these minuscule vampires would be getting at me at night in bed and in my psych during the day. After a few minutes of not hearing anything from reception I went downstairs and was met with sincere apologies. I was offered free breakfast and was asked to wait while they cleaned the room. Not wanting the same room I asked if they could move me to something else. They obliged. But was told that I needed to wait until those guests checked out and the room was cleaned before they could accommodate me. So I went out all morning until mid-afternoon still feeling that cognitive itch all over my body and wondering what slab on skin would be eaten next.

When I did arrive back at the hotel, I was given a room on the first floor. Sort of disappointed being so close to the reception and bar area, I just wanted to get into the room and inspect it myself. When I first opened the door I went straight for the bed taking off the sheets and looking along all the seams of the mattress, nothing. When I finally reassured myself everything was okay, I looked up and saw how stunning my new room was.

It had a balcony that overlooked a fountain, and a beautiful large bathroom with a tub peering at gorgeous windows that opened up into a court yard. This room was a mini piece of Paris all to myself. It wasn’t a hotel room anymore, but a scene from a René-Xavier Prinet painting. Damn, I was happy as fuck.

And having to deal with a bed beg and a few following nights dreaming about them got me here. So it all worked out, fear and all.

[brianwnemeth]

I worked hard..

..I don't deserve this. Cried a student to her friend over a grade she received in class;she repeated "I don't deserve this, I worked really hard, I don't deserve a C"

And it got me thinking

Does hard work equate to being rewarded with something? Maybe she was busy working hard at the same old way of doing things and not progressing. The way she was speaking, and I have been there at certain crucial moments in college, was that she deserved an outcome more favorable to her because she worked hard. But perhaps it wasn't the effort of work put forward but maybe the quality. As I mentioned,  maybe she wasn't moving forward, she was just running laps in the same old habitual way while not actually getting anywhere

I'll give you an example from a similar situation in my life. I love poetry and prior to attending college I wrote feverishly every chance I got. I published a small book of poems, did open mics, and even wrote for others and got paid for it. When I entered my first poetry course in higher education, I thought "this instructor as no idea who I am, I'm a goddamn poet, they will be studying me one day." Every assignment and paper allocated to us I wrote with vigor and passion, creating long in-depth research papers comparing various poets, their lives, their ways of thinking, but every paper was returned with a terrible grade. I couldn't understand why. Around midterm time I walked over to my professor and asked what the problem was. I pleaded that I knew poetry, I understood it and it boiled in my blood, why was I so harshly graded on something I'm good at. I worked hard.  

She look at me and told me this "Every time you have submitted a paper, I enjoyed the content, but this is college, you do not seem to understand how to write a collegiate paper, use quotes, cite properly or take advice" Advice? I jumped in with defense. "Yes advice, every paper I gave back had criticism that could have helped you but you repeatedly garnished the same mistakes over and over. I can see you worked hard at the content, but you ignored to labor over the advice I noted each assignment with."

I had nothing else to say. Thank you I said and walked away.

Hard work should be recognized, but working hard doesn't always pay out the way we want it to.

[brianwnemeth]

A killing in the mirror

My last post spoke to your emptiness. Did you investigate the whispers? No? Well let me serve another course of nourishing words.

Every battle we have comes from within. Every negative thought, behavior, habit is us losing a battle. Every positive response from cognition is us winning. Sometimes we lose sight to what wars on inside.

One of the biggest challenges we will continuously face and battle over is the perception of self and future. When we were children, our imaginations were kingdoms where we actively lived out our curiosities and wants. Each moment we feasted upon images in our head, we become closer to reaching our unique potential. Unfortunately, we all struggle with what it takes to tap into our potential. Shit happens, like growing up and having to decide what rules we set ourselves as we mature. Do we silence the child and listen to other adults? Or do we mark our guidance from within, understanding that all those around us are not wise.

This is a killing in the mirror. That emptiness is the unfilled dreams and nature of our cosmic existence. You can easily say the particles that inherently defined our being is calling for us to act upon it. But daily we fill in the blanks that society, and our parents, and our culture wrote the script for.

We kill ourselves every day to save face with those who couldn’t care about our quest either way.

[brianwnemeth]

Empty Thirst

I’m sure you are all aware of that empty feeling inside,

If you have never felt it, fucking lucky you.

That unceasing emptiness that infests parts of our waking hours. For some time to time, for others more routinely. Of course there are plenty ways to fill that hole; religion, work, spiritually, sex, food, drugs and so on, but regardless of the plug you subscribe to, have you ever embraced that longing, that suffering, to learn to listen to it, to its calling?

Understanding/misunderstanding the reasons we feel this emptiness and whether or not we enlarge it, is a huge catalyst for why we do everything in life.

It’s a strange combination of feeling empty and not knowing how to quench that thirst our being craves.

It’s the starving, the famine, the malnourished part of us that never dies, rather increases in strength the less we find ways to listen to its grumble. A stubborn twin that lives inside of us, childlike, that we roam to feed. Finding what we and it needs to be quieted.  

[brianwnemeth]

Get dirty, its only life after all.

I love being comfortable; but it’s not going to water the plants.

Desensitizing yourself to uncomfortable situations is where we wet ourselves

And where the idea of “finding yourself” is being created in the unknown, planning your next move is paramount for who you want to become, even if you do not know who that is yet.

And certainly not knowing is fine, but setting up for small projects and feeding off curiosity will continuously help the invention of you, no matter how prickly.

Do not allow for future growth to be stunted by the relief of now. If you are the same individual, with the same ideas, same index of knowledge, conquered by pains past, you will freeze your potential and live the rest of your life stuck in the rerun of where you surrendered. Tread and climb in any direction, keep moving, and keep demanding more of yourself for you.