A perspective on truth.

The last 24 hours or so have been the kind of moments I truely live for. I was watching devils advocate last night, and afterwards had a wonderful conversation with an old friend whom i'd had feelings for at one point. This morning I wandered up to the computer and decided to do some reading on one of my favorite guitar players - Jason Becker. Then I realized I had one of his CD's on order at the music store. I wasn't feeling particularly guilty about it, so i opened up a file sharing program and looked the man up and started listening to the music on that cd.

The reason I'm writing now is because after talking with my friend and reading about Jason and his life, listening to his music and that of his colleagues I felt something that I don't often feel - connected.

I've changed so much recently. Iraq really did change me. The way I see things, do things - all my habits don't make a lot of sense anymore. I remember when I first started this blog and named it Zen. I thought somehow I'd master zen and use it as a tool to administer change in my life. One does not master zen, let alone anything. If anything, it masters you, puts you back in your place, helps you see thats where you've been the whole time anyway.

I've listened today to Jason becker, Vinnie Moore, Steve Vai, Joe Satriani and John Petrucci, and I can see the direction they went, and how they went about it, but none of them went straight to the source, because it's not possible. Instead they just be as they are, let the sourceless come and go as it pleases. Each of them in their own time and manner. But their message is the same, even though their voices and words as it were differ quite a bit.

I've noticed though, that it's the recipiant that has to do with the quality of ones grasp on truth, ones understanding of knowledge. Seeing things in such a manner makes it seem pretty daunting, but i suppose once you move passed all of the wonder and amazement, the blissful feelings and rays of golden sunshine, really, no matter how wonderful it is, you're going to have to clean up after it.

I used to look for the perfect girl to fall in love with, thinking life would finally live on it's own. What a joke. No kidding, life is work, it doesn't need you to live on, you need it to live on. You're either with it, or against it, theres no middle ground. It's a tad stark at first, but eventually you'll realize if you want to be happy you have to be deluded. If you want to be enlightened you have to be deluded. There is no enlightenment, not that i've found. Koan after koan only leads you back to nowhere. Only teaches you nothing. If you take anything from it passed that, you're only deluding yourself.

Reading about Jason's spiritual beliefs and hearing his music makes me wonder about alot of things, but what struck me the most was that I've had similar experiences with out half the hell he's had. If i've got the kind of insight he has now, he being many years my senior and lacking his physical disability, it dawned on me today that no kidding, i'm wasting my life. But as wonderful and awe inspiring as that was, and how badly i wanted to pick up a guitar and play i knew that was more delusion. Music isn't the answer, it's the means. what i need to do is zazen. I need to be like Jason - he's a vegitable in a wheel chair, but a wonderful man all the same.

Never would have thought life as seen through the eyes of a man in a wheel chair would be the one thing that put a fire under my ass. Go figure.