Memorial video

Since this blog is my personal recorder of information and my thoughts, I thought I'd post the memorial video of my grandmother that I created that was played at her memorial service.  How long will she be in my major thought pattern and dreams?  Likely till that trumpet sounds, a foundational figure in my childhood.  It's a video of pictures that tells the story of her life from her childhood days to her last Christmas in 2012.  I also included a video of the last five Iversons of my Grandma's generation taken in the early 2000s.  If only I had these kind of videos for my distant ancestors...oh wait, I do have one!  I'll also post a video showing my Great-Grandpa and Great-Grandma Rothwell, my Great-Great Grandma Lucy Hoch, and my Grandpa and Grandma Rothwell in their younger years.  The video was mostly filmed in the 1960s.

Reflections of the Upcoming Winter

The past few weeks have been progressively getting colder here in Choibalsan.  The green leaves of summer have turned their color, and nearly all of them have fallen.  The air is crisper, and the days are shortening.  Everyday I watch the sun set further and further southwest.  I remember in my Environmental Science class learning about the sun’s changing path in the sky, never fully moving east to west, outside of the equator.  The skies are full of wonders and endless discoveries.  The sensation of the approaching winter is growing day by day.  Winter brings a calmness to the environment, as both man and creature find their place in warmer shelter and plant growth halts.  It’s going to be a noteworthy winter, my first away from my family and close friends.  It’ll also be the first since the loss of my Grandmother.  The holiday season brought the many birthdays of my sister, my brother, my mom, and my Grandma, besides the family gatherings at Thanksgiving, Christmas and New Year’s.  This season will see a new memory with the reflection of the old.  When it’s over, previous traditions will be placed further back in the subconscious.  Memories are valuable.  They must not prevent us, though, from moving forward.  Today is a new day.

As the noise in the background turns to whispers the mind is left in an environment of vivid creativity.  The upcoming season is one with the highest depression rates amongst uncontrolled minds.  We can easily become addicted to negative thought patterns if negative thoughts dominate the silence of winter.  When one has taken control of the mind, dis-identifying with it, one has gained the power to manipulate their mind to the highest positive benefit.  With the events of the last year and the fact that I’m living alone, now is the time to put this truth to the test.  I have prepared for this experience. 

The last year or so I have discovered the power of thoughts upon first awakening in the early morning hours.  Things seem so clear to me, and my intuition is elevated.  One night last week I awoke in the middle of the night.  As soon as I awoke the reality of inevitable death fell upon my mind.  It scared me.  I’ve thought about it many times before, especially this last year with Grandma’s death.  I’ve always viewed death in a positive light, understanding the beauty of the circle of life.  But this night I experienced a darker reality:  someday I’m not going to exist, my thoughts, my feelings, my mind, and my body.  My memories will disappear.  It’s a relentless fate.  No one is spared.  This world will no longer be our home.  My Grandma left.  So did my Grandma Rothwell.  My Grandpa Iverson and many other friends and family throughout the years have left their loved ones behind.  The feeling of fear shook me.  Death felt like an overpowering source and I a helpless soul.  Thankfully, it didn’t last long.

I don’t wish to justify my belief in a “light at the end of the tunnel,” though I do have such a belief.  I wish instead to focus on what I do know through my own experience and be true to myself and what this night awakened in me:  a response.  I want to exist.  I want to live.  I want to breathe and experience and love.  The years will creep up on me.  Before I know it I’ll be laying in that bed, doped up on morphine and oxycodone, in labored breathing surrounded by my loved ones who will move on.  But that time is not now.

I am alive.  I am breathing.  I am not dead.  What am I supposed to experience in this life before I return to a non-physical, non-emotional, and non-thoughtful existence?  What do I want out of this life? 

I want to experience what I can’t experience when I’m dead.  I want to experience life at its extremes.  Whether it be the low negative occurrences or the high positive involvements, all are gifts to my self-inquiry.  There are many emotions to be lived:  happiness, joy, depression, anger, sadness, wonder, and falling in love (along with many others).  There’s no way of knowing these highs and lows unless we experience them for ourselves.  I read an article last week that said women fall in love on average seven times before they marry.  I don’t know where this information came from.  I assume if this is actually a fact that the same would apply to men.  The romantic view presented in Disney movies of falling in love once with our soul mate and living happily ever after is quickly removed through experience.  I can account for this myself, as I’ve experienced the emotional high of falling in love more than once.  Why is falling in love so appealing?  Because it tunes into one of the highest frequencies in our emotional self.  By leaving this frequency, of course, comes a rough decline that could easily send one into a low experience.  That is a chance lovers are willing to take.  

We have an opportunity to witness the thrills of life.  We create every experience.  Though certain emotions can lead to darker times, it is often through these experiences we gain the greatest realizations.  Before every mountain is a valley.  Through my darkest months many years back I awoke to a world I didn’t know existed, one grander and more beautiful.  Life became a mystical wonder.  I felt I shed the layer of a manmade view of God and came to know God myself.  “All things work together for good.” 

Two weeks ago I watched the movie “Yes Man.”  It’s about a man who was going through hopelessness after a divorce.  He always said “No” to new experiences.  He lost the respect of his friends and was living in a routine of grey.  After going to a self-help event that encouraged him to say “Yes” to new experiences, he began using the word when opportunities presented themselves.  His life soon transformed, and it became exciting.  He reached a new height of life.  I believe this movie had a great point:  saying “Yes” to experiences.  

Our bodies and our minds are mere vehicles for our experience here on earth.  The only constant is the soul or spirit, which is distinguishable from the mind and always present, always reliable, and always the same.  We must use our vehicles when they’re in good shape to maximize our life experience and travel to unmarked territories.

This winter I will go through a new experience of a similar holiday occurrence.  The winters get really cold here, and I’m curious to see how the Mongolians adapt.  They’ve been doing it for thousands of years.  I have started a new workout routine that I’ve maintained.  I’m constantly reading, writing, and preparing meals for myself.  I have new-found respect for my mother, seeing how she cooked for the family steadily for nearly thirty years.  If you want variety you have to put some effort into it.  It’s not easy to find a store that serves you hot food or already-made dishes around here.  I cook for myself out of natural ingredients, and I’ve developed the virtue of patience doing so.  With the developing skills of cooking and giving massages I may start the bidding for a wife here real soon.  Right!  So maybe that’s not a top priority right now.  “Boardwalk Empire” has become my new favorite show.  Nucky Thompson is my hero.  How he pulls off the long shots of survival leaves me in awe. 

I’m newly motivated with a five-year plan to pay off all my debts, buy a used vehicle and camper to where I can travel throughout the States, teach, make a trip to Minnesota/Wisconsin, traverse the mountains of Peru, begin my Masters degree, watch my brother play his last two years of high school sports, and buy a hostel in Central America.  I’m teaching 10 classes a week and have helped establish an English club with my Mongolian counterpart.  We are setting up an English competition and Halloween party next week.  I’m curious to see how Mongolians make this holiday.  Oh, and basketball will be starting next week.  I predict LeBron will win his fifth MVP trophy and another NBA championship.  It doesn’t matter to me, as long as OKC is beat.  I really wish Brandon Roy hadn’t had knee problems.  He would have probably been the top shooting guard in the NBA today.  Someday my Sonics will return.  I’ll be at their first home game at the new Sodo Arena when they retire Gary Payton, Shawn Kemp, and Ray Allen’s jerseys.  I’ll be holding up a sign acknowledging David Stern of his grand accomplishments and standing reputation in Seattle.

The Sound of the Universe

The Sound of the Universe
Song written October 2013

Verse 1
C                                      
The trembling thoughts they shake me
Em                    F              Am
The heart indeed breaks me down  hurls me around       
C               
The tears fall from my eyes
Em                     F               Am    G
Life gone breezing by and by   destined to fly
             
Pre-chorus
Dm                   Am
Ages passing me by   visions descend from the sky
G                              C
Dogmas evolving  words of the mind   seen through the eyes of the died
Dm                  Am
Eternal presence within  beneath the layers that been
G                               C
Rightly the witness  timeless existence  fading of illusion’s claim

Chorus
C                 G
Fall asleep      close your eyes    and keep
                     F
Your undying song    that will last through time
C                       G
Breathe in deep      free the thoughts that be
            F                            C
Attending the peace   the sound of the Universe

Verse 2
C       
Each day a new appeal
Em                                      F                              Am
Fresh dreams appearing real so real   the world that will change
C       
Drift far beyond the night
Em                              F                   Am      G
Earth turns ever refined in time  and I am the same

My Vision

Some things are best kept quiet.  It’s better to just shut our mouths at times than fill the void with meaning-making blabber.  The Spartans lived by this rule.  They were warriors of doing rather than speaking.  This is what made them the fiercest city in Greece at one time.  Then they opened their mouths…

Theodore Roosevelt magnified the understanding to “speak softly and carry a big stick.”  King Solomon had three very powerful reflections of wisdom:

1)   “When there are many words, transgression is unavoidable, but he who restrains his lips is wise.” (Proverbs 10:19)

2)   “He who despises his neighbor lacks sense, but a man of understanding keeps silent.” (Proverbs 11:12)

3)   “Even a fool, when he keeps silent, is considered wise; when he closes his lips, he is considered prudent.” (Proverbs 17:28) 

I’ve been very careful about broadcasting my thoughts and intentions.  I know once I say something the words can't be taken back, and they could be used or abused as people please.  Maybe that’s not my problem.

As I’m progressing through my upper 20s and many may wonder why I’m not married, have any children, or am surrounded by my loved ones, I think this would be the ideal time to make my intentions known.  This is by no means a secret.  People have heard me talking about my vision for years.  It’s part of my everyday conversation.  As my grandest vision, it should be.  I’ve told many about my various dreams in life.  What I’m writing about in this post is my bigger dream, my calling, or what I’ve referred to before, my Personal Legend.

The Core of My Vision:

So, what is at the core of my life?  Firstly, I consider myself a Transcendentalist.  An even more accurate description, I consider myself a mystic.  Does being a mystic require public approval?  I don’t think so.  The belief that “the majority is always right,” is just that, a belief.  The greatest minds were first rejected by the majority.  They all experienced an inner awakening that got them laughed at, rejected and/or killed.  I believe that when people start to identify with groups or institutions, they put on invisible shades of perception that potentially blinds them of inner awareness.  They never lose individual awareness, it just gets suppressed.  Calling myself a “Transcendentalist” or a “mystic” is a sort of paradox.  When a mystical experience is institutionalized to a belief or an identity, the experience becomes less grand.  There is a difference between “belief” and “knowing.”  “Belief” is external, an expression of ones perceptions and views by words of mouth.  “Knowing” is an inner state of consciousness, a connection with the Divine.  Knowing is only experienced through the awakening of the inner self, resulting in the observation of the created self and the transcendence of suffering.  No authority but God can awaken this reality.  I want to stress:  my own truths are my own knowing.  Somebody may know something that I don’t, and in those cases, I’m unaware in that sphere of life.  The things I do know, however, the things that I’m awakened to, are what I want to express throughout my life.

I intend to be a teacher of wisdom and spirituality to the world, not coming as a figure of authority, but as someone who merely points the way for people to experience their own mystical awakening and therefore be empowered to live this gift of life at its grandest.  It hurts me to see so many people suffering.  This last year seems to have intensified that experience.  But it hurts me even more to see those who are suffering who aren’t aware of the power they have within themselves to change the pattern.  It hurts me when victimization has taken over the mind of those striving to “get out” of the life they continue to create.  They strive for happiness, but they just don’t seem to get there.  We’ve been taught over and over by original mystical thinkers that there is not a place in time or space but a place within the self.  The grass is not always greener on the other side; the grass is greener on the inside.  Maybe instead of striving for something more we need to let go.  Maybe instead of adding more baggage to the flight with the hopes of balancing the plane, we need to get rid of all the weight that’s keeping it grounded.

As I’m sitting here in Mongolia, I realize I’m actually living my dream.  I’m living in a foreign country, meeting tons of new people, learning a second language (sort of), living on my own on a quest for self-realization.  If I can live my dream, anybody could.  Don’t get me wrong: there are good days and bad days, just like back home.  Even the most enlightened and happiest people on earth have their down days.  We’re all human.  It’s the response to adversity that decides if an individual thrives or dies.   “Count it all joy, my brothers, when you meet trials of various kinds, for you know that the testing of your faith produces steadfastness.  And let steadfastness have its full effect, that you may be perfect and complete, lacking in nothing,” (James 1:2-4).  Adversity is our greatest teacher and our greatest chance of awakening.  When the response to adversity is to close oneself off and add more barriers between our minds and our inner selves, we’re denying our own truth.  In the end, all barriers will be removed, regardless of whether we’re awakened or continue to be sheep.  The goal is to experience awakening in this life.  Tick tick tick.

Of course, there’s more that I want.  Back in the States, I wanted this international experience.  Here, I want even more.  That is the American ideal and upbringing of greed.  But I’m realizing this is it.  This present moment I’ve been blessed with.  It doesn’t matter if I’m here, in Washington, or in the mountains of Tibet.  I’m living my vision now.  That’s all that exist.  I don’t want to waste one second thinking of it as something to be achieved or put off for a future date.  Life is short, and I intend to see the whole universe in every second.  Now for my individual dreams within my vision.

MY VISION:  TO BE A WORLD-RENOWN TEACHER OF WISDOM AND SPIRITUALITY, NOT AS A FIGURE OF AUTHORITY, BUT AS SOMEONE WHO POINTS THE WAY FOR PEOPLE TO EXPERIENCE THEIR OWN MYSTICAL AWAKENING AND BE EMPOWERED TO LIVE LIFE AT ITS GRANDEST.

Dreams to enhance my vision:

1.     Peace Corps/International experience.  On a journey of self-realization and self-actualization.  Continuing to learn more about myself and the world beyond America.

2.     Publication of numerous books, articles and blogs.  Become a Best-Selling author.  Draw interest from numerous radio stations, television broadcasts and talk shows to magnify my vision.  Have a large personal library where I continuously study.  Have a grand piano in the study where I can contemplate.

3.     Getting two Masters degrees in Transpersonal Psychology and Education and Leadership.  Raise my credibility to the public eye (though I’m forking thousands into the hands of the already-wealthy).

4.     Teaching experience/coaching experience.  Involvement and teaching of the young generation.  They’re the world’s next leaders.  What better way to implement change than to inspire the next generation’s leaders?  As a school administrator, leading a revolution of transformative education (holistic/whole brain education).

5.     Buying, owning and running a hostel in Central America.  This is not only a vacation spot during the summer months where I’ll meet people from all over the world; it’s a place where I will do the majority of my writings for my books.  As a family business, we’ll all continue to have countless experiences together.

6.     International speaker and life coach.  I will teach on the principles presented in my books, which stem from my vision.  Schools, seminars, conferences.

7.     Anna’s Kin Ministry.  Continuous writing of songs and holding concerts.  The continuation of a legacy left by my Great-Grandmother of bringing love to the world.

8.     Family historian and keeper of family relics. Preserving the memories of the past.  We are our ancestors.  Family is not necessarily blood-related.  It’s those who have helped us uncover our own truths.  For me, it is my family.

9.     Alternative living.  Little desire of being indebted for the rest of my life in a housing payment, which is temporarily owned and continues to be thrown into the vicious cycle of buying and selling.  There is no real ownership in the physical realm, just shared space.  What is my choice for alternative living?  That is yet to be clarified.

10. Family.  The value of family, my strongest relationships and my greatest feelings and expressions of love.  I intend to get married and have kids- someday.  The possibility is not something I fear of losing the older I get. 

I have lived a great life.  The transitions have been tough.  It’s those tough times that I value the most and have taught me the greatest truths about myself.  I am on a journey, and every day is a new step on that journey. 

Are you living life to its fullest?  Are you focused on every step that you’re taking?  If you have spent years in restlessness, torment, and/or suffering, are you ready to let go of those bags you’ve been carrying around and embrace the beauty and grandness of life that is right in front of you?  Don’t wait; do it now.

100 Days in Mongolia

Today marks my 100^th day in Mongolia.  Wow!  How the days have flown by.  I thought it would be fun to post a list of 100 things I’ve done since being here in Mongolia. 

What I’ve Done Since Being In Mongolia

1.     Lived with a Mongolian host family

2.     Took a hot shower in a South Korean airport

3.     Made new American and Mongolian friends

4.     Had three months of training in the Mongolian language

5.     Walked to and from school an hour each day

6.     Always getting challenged by Mongolian drunk men

7.     Squatted to use the toilet (jorslung)

8.     Hand-washed my clothes

9.     Made a Mongolian meal

10. Made an American meal for my host family

11. Had my Mongolian brother try to hook me up with a Mongolian woman

12. Witnessed Mongolian nursing at the dinner table

13. Went to the Mother Tree

14. Walked around Ulaanbaatar

15. Watched a goat butchering

16. Witnessed two Mongolian fights

17. Had a photo-shoot one night with another volunteer’s host family

18. Had a “Sunny in Philly” marathon with my site mates

19. Taught English to Mongolian students

20. Crammed many bodies into one taxi

21. Saw a middle school student get punched in the face by another middle school student

22. Partied for a week straight in Darkhan

23. Got the flu during Mid-Center Days

24. Played basketball with Americans and Mongolians

25. Drank airag, fermented horse milk

26. Ate giddis, goat guts

27. Spectated the Mongolian Annual Olympics (Naadam)

28. Let my host brother borrow 20,000 tugriks, which I never saw again

29. Walked in on that same host brother and his wife at their most intimate

30. Almost got bit by a dog

31. Got lots of shots

32. Almost got charged by an angry calf

33. Saw a goat running on top of the other goats to get towards the front of the herd

34. Played soccer with Mongolian children

35. Played guitar and sang for my school’s opening ceremony

36. Gave a speech for my school’s opening ceremony

37. Wrote two new songs

38. Read two books

39. Had a gossip night with…dudes

40. Helped create and facilitate an English conference in Darkhan

41. Rode on part of the Trans-Siberian railway

42. Drove to the Mongolian-Russian border

43. Got called a “Ruski”

44. Experimented soaking cowberries in vodka to find out it was disgusting

45. Went to a Mongolian dance club

46. Sang karaoke

47. Learned and sang four Mongolian songs

48. Stayed out past three with my host brother to witness my host mom angry and hitting him

49. Found Jamaican rum and drank it

50. Discovered that my favorite pivo in Mongolia is “Khar Khorum”

51. Gave a massage (and sort of got one back in return)

52. Held a rabbit

53. Dug a well

54. Fetched water out of a well

55. Took a bucket bath

56. Got made fun of for saying “baas” (which means poop) instead of “bas” (which means and).

57. Got invited in by a Buddhist monk to his study

58. Got cleansed by a Shaman

59. Drank water from a natural spring

60. Jumped off a giant sand dune

61. Sat next to a pretty girl on the airplane

62. Stayed in three different aimags

63. Won a volunteer trivia night

64. Actually won in site-vs.-site dodge ball

65. Dressed in a Mongolian traditional dell

66. Held a baby for the first time in 14 years

67. Ate mutton cooked by hot rocks

68. Visited a ger

69. Lived in solitude in a Soviet apartment

70. Milked a cow

71. Got a piggy-back ride from my small Mongolian host dad, who ended up with a strained lower back

72. Debated Ron Paul and politics with fellow volunteers

73. Wrestled Mongolian-style (sort of)

74. Hiked a mountain

75. Woke up out of a dream screaming

76. Had a sleepless night caused by a rooster crowing

77. Had weekly campfires with the other PCVs

78. Played ping-pong against a Mongolian elder

79. Discovered that Snickers and Twix are bomb-diggity

80. Found a dead decomposing bird in the clean water source which I usually drank out of

81. Won at beer pong and then lost the next match to two girls

82. Was in the same room as two people getting it on

83. Lived out a “King of the Hill” moment, drinking a pivo outside the delgur with my friends

84. Ate at an Irish-American pub, which was not so Irish

85. Shopped at three different black markets

86. Flew in a tiny airplane across the country

87. Watched the Heat defeat the Spurs in the NBA Finals

88. Taught Darkhan teachers about different ways to use the Internet as a resource

89. Discovered that mustard is great with spaghetti

90. Learned the Cyrillic alphabet

91. Joined a fantasy football league

92. Recorded a song sung and played by a Mongolian family

93. Met the American Ambassador to Mongolia

94. Experienced the freezing cold of an early June night

95. Went to Caikhan Uul

96. Ate hosher at Naadam

97. Drank gin with tang

98. Joined the “Game of life”

99. Was part of an act at a Mongolian circus

100. Sat next to the Mongolian version of Mac’s mom (Sunny in Philly) in the taxi

My Journey Continues in Choibalsan

These last three months have witnessed a transition phase from certain American living to a less definite foreign engagement.  I have traveled to several continents before:  Europe, Africa and Central America.  I have connected with certain places more than others.  I often reflect on my connection to the Caribbean lifestyle:  the people, the food, the culture, the region.  The connection is so strong that I intend on buying and running a hostel in Belize, Panama or Costa Rica sometime in the next few years, along with my brother and dad.  Does this mean the experiences of Europe, Africa and Asia are of any less value?  Of course not.  It shows that we are all individuals that have deeper connections with certain people, places and objects, some more than others.  I never expected to be living in Mongolia at this time of my life; I never expected to be living in Mongolia at all.  But God has a way of laying out our life path.

On August 12 we found out where we would be working the next two years in Mongolia.  Over the last three months, I made many close friends and acquaintances.  When I left Washington I didn’t know how I would respond to being away from those I’ve been closest to my whole life.  I hadn’t ever left my close ties for longer than a month and a half.  This, to me, was my biggest challenge going into the Peace Corps.  When we had our orientation days back in Washington D.C. in May, we met the rest of the M24s we would be connected to for the rest of our service.  I didn’t know who I would meet or what to expect.  I came in with a very individualized mindset of personal evolution, seeing new relationships as pawns to my own chess game of experience.  I remember going out the night of May 29^th with Adam, Ben, Aaron, Cal and Karissa to a bar in D.C. where there was a trivia night.  Adam was my roommate, and I remember having a discussion with Cal about Wyoming and Karissa about something else.  I remember getting sliders and fries that night, along with a few cervesas.  That entire time I was thinking of the adventure ahead and about the relationships I had left behind.  But I started to connect with the M24s around me, grasping onto common goals and aspirations.  The relationships only grew stronger from the flight over to Final Center Days.

The next three months I drew close to several M24s, and as an entire group, all of us came to know each other quite well.  We didn’t bring up the past too often.  I barely know the history of those I claim closest to me.  But we had a connection, one of adventure, of transformation, of leaving home to embrace the unknown.  All of us were in this together, no matter our past.  It was relieving, the fact that we could start over how we wanted and not get caught up in previous barriers.  We could create who we wanted to be the next two years, without any expectations, and with a blank slate.  These last three months saw new connections with people I had never met before, with past lives spread throughout America.  It now seems like I’ve known these guys for a lifetime.  I consider myself primarily an intrapersonal person, on a goal of self-discovery that has been and is the focus of my worldview.  It takes time for people to become defining figures in my life.  Every person I value as being part of my journey and is supposed to be with me at a particular time.  I don’t lose friendships gained, but the connections that were defining and strong in the past may not be as defining and strong in the present.  My high school and college friends can account for this.   Any individual can account for this, as our relationships are constantly evolving around our personal destiny.  The new relationships I formed in the Peace Corps account for a new era of relationships.  Will the strong connections last?  This is time’s judgment.  I have a few strong connections I’ve kept since high school. 

I am now living on my own, in a Soviet-styled apartment.  I have visualized living on my own the last 3-4 years since my graduation from college.  My parents can verify.  I’ve strived for independence, for that day that I can focus my attention on creating the life and destiny that I want.  Now I have it.  I have it all.  I’m in a foreign country, independent on my own, contemplating reality.  I am on my own with those closest to me at a distance away.  The safety net of relying on anybody has now disappeared.  Who do I turn to when troubles arise?  Where is my safe haven?  That will be part of my discovery.  I thank God for the Internet, for being able to communicate with those who most know me.  Is this what I wanted in the first place?  Yes.  How can I expand?  Expand into the darkness, into the depths of my own soul and the cloud of the unknowing.  The battle is between fear and love.  Fear we learned here.  Love we were born with.  We don’t remember the first three years of our life, yet the entirety of those years was spent hovering in the unknown.  Why do we fear the unknown?  Because our egos want something consistent to hold onto to increase the duration of their life.  Our identities seek to live on.  When we have no consistency to hold onto, we have to embrace the present moment, the only thing that exists.

This is an amazing journey.  I embrace every single second that presents itself.  I came here to evolve and experience truths.  This has now represented itself in a new way.  I’m in the front seat, waiting for these revelations.