Strings...

plucked, a guitar held, and words flowing. It's a song about love, love lost, love beyond words, love above all else, and the lover sings, and the guitar, the guitar follows... A dream is made into words, lyrics that flow, gather and become an expression of love, of passion, unrestrained, unhinged, and I, I, I feel it deep, deep inside what I call my heart.

Meanwhile, a couple of questions were awaiting, and they went like this: How can I dream like I mean it? How could I ever have all, or merely a piece, of that which I crave, when it is becoming so very clear to me that what I truly yearn for may forever be just out of reach?

I sat, bathing in the rhythms of Flamenco, and thought and thought, and although I know that no answer was necessary in this case, I couldn't resist the temptation to follow suit and seek my own version of a truth. But, before I speak of my own views, I'll take a detour and visit that of others...

And so, there are some who believe, and I'll be succinct here, that we are Spiritual beings, experiencing life, over and over, in a physical way as a means to learn, evolve, and move toward a certain Greatness of Spirit that is inherent in our own Divine Source.

Thus we are born, cycle after cycle, with the most appropriate challenges, desires, fears, weaknesses and dreams, in order for us to learn the lesson(s) that is/are ours to learn in a given lifetime. Layer after layer, we shed the negative, the restrictive, the constrictive, and embrace love, selflessness, compassion, kindness -if you are interested in finding out more, I invite you to google, for example, 'Allan Kardec.'

As for myself, I am, unfortunately, a born skeptic, a part-time seeker of spiritual truths at best. What I know is that I do not know. Yet, what I believe is grand and limitless, and it's been this way as far as I can remember. Yes, I've learned a couple things here and there, mostly while I was surfing. I've traveled, shedding volumes worth of confining skin as I went. I've met pain, suffering, hopelessness. I've been touched by runaway slaves, refugees, children with machine guns too high to distinguish between what is right and what is oh so wrong, inspired nuns worth a hundred mercenaries, beautiful souls shining at the heart of ugliness, warm hearts doing their best against the most overwhelming of odds. I've met death, three times, and relinquished my desire to hang on to life, too easily, that many times.

But, I am still the same. The same child with dreams so elaborate it would take Hollywood's, or maybe Bollywood's, best production team to recreate even one scene. And so, I dream with the same dogged intensity, because doing otherwise simply wouldn't cut it. The dream is part of who I am. It doesn't matter if it is realized or not -I think. What truly matters is truthfulness to what is inside, that dream we've been carrying, that passion we've feeling, that story we've been living for. What truly matters is the journey and how we embrace it, because without it, the destination isn't really worth much.

But then again, I might just be a fool, lost in his own dreams, someone you really should be paying too much attention to...

Gratefully inspired by the exchange.