The Oasis

The Desert

Can You See Your Rainbow?

Driving my children to school this morning we saw a brightly coloured rainbow. As we drew closer we could see the end of the rainbow lighting up a house in beautiful rainbow colours. As we continued to get closer the rainbow faded away. I thought to myself that the people in the house would have had no idea that the rainbow was shining on them.

Perhaps from another's perspective the rainbow was now shining on us. We can never see a rainbow shining on ourselves with our eyes.

I thought about rainbows and their connotations of happiness and beauty and a sense of blessing and luck. I thought how chasing rainbows maybe like chasing happiness. Rainbows seem to shine on others and as we chase those rainbows they stay in the distance or fade away.

I thought perhaps rainbows are always shining on us and happiness is always within us. To see the rainbow however we must look within and to feel happiness we must look within.

All we are and can be is inside us. By chasing other's rainbows we are running away from ourselves and in doing so we are running away from the only place we can truly find happiness.

Unchanging Spirit

My mind and body grows and matures and ages. My spirit is a white light. My spirit is unchanging and unchangeable. My spirit is me. It is what it is from the moment of conception until death, and perhaps infinitely before and after.

Last Night's Dream

A small old house with a small front yard just large enough for two graves. On one side was my Father's Father's grave who had died 50 years before I was born. On the other side was my Father's Sister's grave who died around 10 years ago. I had only met her a couple of times when she was very old. She looked like a female version of my Father. Separating the two graves was a path leading to the front door of the house.

For some reason not in our control the house had to go and we had to move the graves. My Father who was standing with me had died 15 years ago. He made me feel some comfort as he always had despite this emotional task that we must undertake. Which involved me digging up his Father followed by his Sister.

I moved the flat smooth stones above my Grandfather's grave with a long handled spade. Carefully sliding the spade under the stones I lifted the stones exposing his bones like lifting an old slab exposing ant tunnels beneath.

I slid the spade under his skull and gently lifted it and placed it next the grave. Next was he rib cage and spine. I slid he spade under and lifted the bones and placed them next the skull. I was surprised by the stench and the mass of maggots squirming in his still decomposing back part of his chest.

I felt that I was being a little disrespectful by being slightly repulsed by the smell. I was also surprised that his body was still decomposing after so long.

I was then awoken by a noise.

The dream didn't feel like a nightmare. As always I feel comfort to dream of my Father. I also had a nice feeling about dreaming of my Grandfather who I had never met but still admire even though I know almost nothing about him.

I believe the dream was about me moving on in my life. The spade related to some gardening I had done at my house the day before to get it ready for sale. The still decomposing body related to the unpleasantness that still needs to be gone through before moving on and that I should not let that unpleasantness spoil my appreciation of what has already been a good life.

Behaviour, Thoughts and Feelings

I must have read it somewhere but had forgotten it. An idea that particular behaviours result in particular thoughts which in turn result in particular feelings. In theory therefore we can control our feelings because we can control our behaviour.

Conversely we have no control over how we feel if we believe that we are at the mercy of random feelings that seem to enter us without invitation. This is a scary situation if we believe this.

I believe we have control to an extent but with a bit of time lag. We often find ourselves feeling down but often we can quite quickly fix that.

Anyway this was something that came to my mind this morning when I was feeling "down".

Then this afternoon I took the kids rollerskating. We had a fantastic time and I felt so happy. We went to the "Rollerdrome". Their claim to fame is that they have been operating for 30 years. The place is so retro. But not the cool, clean, artificial retro. Its retro because there have been no upgrades or renovations for 30 years. That's the kind of retro I like.

There were great photos on the walls of skaters with trophies from the 80's. There also seems to be a rollerskating style of music which is so cool (while your rollerskating anyway). There were so many different people of all abilities and inabilities and styles and ages ranging from 4 to maybe nearly 80! Everyone had smiles on their faces. It was so much fun and I was feeling so "up". Such a contrast to how I was feeling in the morning.

After rollerskating we ended a great day by playing tennis.

Possession and Jealousy

Entering a relationship. Do you begin to see your woman as a possession to be jealously guarded? Do you worry that your woman is faithful to you? How can you enjoy your woman if you have feelings of mistrust? Our experiences from the past teach us about what may happen in the future. What if the previous experience teaches you mistrust? There can be no point in a relationship if there is mistrust because you would be less happy than being single. Can being in a relationship result in greater happiness than being single? Do the complications of a relationship outweigh the occasional feelings of loneliness of being single? The answer is I do not know. A solution can be to never enter a relationship. Another solution would be to be open to a relationship in the knowledge that you will not be dependent on that relationship for happiness and that you can end the relationship if it is not resulting in greater happiness than being single.