silent treatment

I’ll say it for the record. EVERYONE HAS THEIR OWN PATH. This is quite true but no more true than saying , “everyone will have to take a piss.” (Just keeping it real) “Taking a piss” does not however equate to “pissing on someone.”  Which is to say that even though we each have our own path, none of our paths have to be violent, lacking compassion or insensitive to someone else’s .  The presence of the individual path is basic an undifferentiated in the sense that we each have one. It is not however a license to ignore this necessary fact:  When we hold anyone in our presence we have just crossed paths with someone who, like us, has become a very necessary and immutable component of the path we are on. We are both critical to the journey.

A reader of mine sent this question to me last night. I thought I’d share with you with an expanded answer…

Question:
“I’m reading “Ghandi’s Way to God” and Gandhi says truth is the source of character...and that silence is a part of the spiritual discipline of a votary of truth? Proneness to exaggerate, suppress or modify truth is a natural weakness of man and silence is necessary to surmount it. Can't silence in relationships sometimes reveal the truth? “
Response:
In relationship, mutual respect is key, and individualism is not the impetus. Agreement is fundamental. “How can two walk together except they are agreed,” is the question offered in the ancient Hebrew tradition.  Even in music there are rests – pauses and moments of silence - to give space to breathe, listen and support. In music though, there is agreement on the silence. Where would the music be if one designated to offer voice chose to be or remain silent? Vice-versa, in the moment when one was designated to be silent and yet he or she chose to impose voice against the natural flow, where would be the order in that?

“Speak only if it improves the silence.” Mohandas Gandhi

Those who are leaders are keen to the value of silence as a tool to build character rather than a weapon to amass dominance and unnatural submission. There is great use of silence in relationship, to be sure, but  making good use of silence is not the same as what is known as, “the silent treatment,” which is  a hostile and violent act on any relationship. We use the silent treatment when we feel a loss of power or a perceived threat.  Silence can give light in relationship when the silence is not exaggerated. Conversely silence is useful when confusion is present and the opinions of the relating persons become exaggerated.  Silence is a way of hearing the music in our partner – the music.

You asked also, “Can a hiatus be just as truth revealing?

It’s perfectly alright to take “time off.” This is the purpose of a hiatus or sabbatical. They are temporary by design; they are not designed to be permanent or destructive. They are designed to be cathartic and restorative. The return is inherent and if it's healthy it should be communicated as such. We have examples of this with many or our service professionals - votaries, professors, doctors, judges, ministers, etc. It would be unkind and counter intuitive to just leave without notice or plan. The same is true in relationship. To just up and leave without notice is rude. To leave without mindfulness as to the effect of one’s presence is also rude and lacking compassion. Let’s be clear; a leave of absence is not the same as being AWOL.

This hiatus can be truth revealing. Is this the purpose though or are we just taking leave to get away from what is uncomfortable or inconvenient. The revelation if truth is present and available to those who are open to "see". It could quite easily elude any of us abusing silence or mistaking silence for a silent treatment. Silence is not the absence of communication; it is better seen as the absence of interruption to the natural flow and way of being. We choose silence as a preventive measure and as an answer to noise – cacophony, confusion, and catastrophe.

Do we take a sabbatical from our profession to get away from who we are or to become better at being who we are? Should we take hiatus from relationship as a ruse to abandonment? So how do we know when it’s time to step away or abandon a relationship? When is love not enough? When is it clear that there is no possible shred of hope to procure better ways of relating and being with partners, friends and lovers?

We have not stepped away from any relationship as long as we hold thoughts of our relating partners. If we have chosen to walk away, we have chosen to attempt an adjustment on how we actualize or bring body to that relationship. One needs to rethink this. We need to rethink this.  You’re partner is not your enemy and if this thought becomes all too pervasive, it may just be time for hiatus. Whenever we can be convinced that anyone is our enemy, (if we believe this) we will treat them like an enemy and confirm for ourselves that we are threatened and that we must take action against them. Often time the result is abandonment. This need not be.

Your capacity to Love is limitless, and if or when you are challenged to not believe this, Love Anyway.
Marquis

(Stay tuned and keep your eyes open for my book on Love & Relationships)

MOOD Monday

MarQuis &MOOD continue #MOODMadness in March going hardcore jazz at The Afterthough on Monday March 14, 2016.  The Mood Monday starts at 8:30pm. It's been a great month of music. MOODMonday comes just one day after MarQuis opens the Lalah Hathaway concert. On most days, MOOD's brand of jazz is soulful and spirited, sultry and smoldering. Monday they go hardcore featuring and teaming up with the incomparable Eric Ware, one of the finest guitarist this side of the Mason Dixon. Also joining them will be Dave Higginbothom on upright bass, Matt Treadway on jazz guitar, Joel 'Jammin JC' Crutcher on electric Bass and Paul Campbell on drums. This event showcases MOOD Expanded with even more guest appearances by some of the regions finest musicians. Make it a MOODMadness Moment. #feelthemoodment.

MarQuis & MOOD invites you to Valentine's Day at The Afterthought

Feel The Moodment

Beautiful People!!! Feel the Moodment
Lovely People!!! Join the Moodment

It's a special evening of Love, Music, and more with MarQuis & MOOD playing some of your favorite Love songs. Smooth Jazz is the perfect treat for you on Valentine's Day. If you've heard this band, you already know!!! MarQuis plays the most soulfully, exquisite, romantic soprano sax and you'll wanna feel that up close and personal. Come join the Moodment!

Every MOOD performance is a once in a lifetime event. You'll wanna be here for this one. To reserve a table, please call
501-663-1196.

Please feel free to post and share with your friends, along with #FeelTheMoodment

You Touched Me

There are things that go through me 

From way beyond what's not of me 

The tonal influence of symphony

Melodies that move us in harmony

Rhythms and rhymes 

Seasons and times 

Poise and reflection 

Tenuous selection 

The choice to be friends 

To brave the distance

To love with no end  and conquer resistance 

These are things that go through me

Your life from God then to me 

A life exchanged for new me 

And a world that's better because you touched me

You touched me...

You touched me...

You touched me...

A Mood

Standing on a Prayer: A Burden for People of Color

We are still looking for trusted answers and better pathways to vulnerability and empathy. A city collective is praying for answers. Vulnerability and empathy are virtues which are categorized and sometimes caricatured as formulations of “weakness”, a subset of fear. I don’t believe for a minute that empathy or vulnerability is a sign of weakness. On the contrary, these are virtues of the strong and wealthy. However the dominant culture seems to view these as weakness. As such, we tend to realize them almost exclusively as attributes of fear. We can trade on fear. It’s a viable commodity but this need not be.

http://www.thevillagecelebration.com/standing-on-a-prayer-a-burden-for-people-of-color-part-1/

Read Part 2 Here
http://www.thevillagecelebration.com/standing-on-a-prayer-a-burden-for-people-of-color-part-2/

Path To Love

…sometimes we can’t stop betrayal even when we love without condition and sometimes, just sometimes, we’re uninterested in knowing the shame that grips many of our friends. Sometimes their suspicions about us are correct. It’s the secret we have kept to ourselves. It’s the one that says, “I am likely to abandon you, if you disappoint me.”

I have very beautiful experiences living from moment to moment. I say “moment to moment” because I live that way – from moment to moment. I have upheld some moments as more beautiful and some as the most beautiful. I’m grateful for each of them. Maybe I should stay right here – You should know how beautiful life is and how beautiful life can be. You are also very beautiful and the most wonderful thing in your world. You are powerful beyond your imagination and nothing is impossible for you. Can you believe this? Can you now feel that feeling that encourages you to believe the BEST is rightfully yours? Believing these things empowers your person-self to go out and conquer the world and anything standing in your way. Can you see it?

You can conquer anything and anyone that stands in your way! This is your Divine right – the true depiction of your Authentic-Self.

We like statements like these. We like to be reminded of our goodness, our strength, and our power more than we like to know what’s actually true. Some of us believe that because we experience ourselves as wonderful, everyone else should. If they don’t, something has to be wrong with them. When this happens or it’s brought to our attention that we’re are not being seen in the way we see ourselves, terms like “true” and “truth” become relative. When the “truth” seems to threaten what any of us think of as “good for me”, then we’re cleverly directed to believe that there is really no truth unless it’s a personal truth. We hear things like, “my truth ain’t your truth and your truth ain’t my truth.” Those words have preempted the childhood song and melody – “my friends are YOUR friends and Your friends are MY friends. The more we get together…”

Now it’s, “the more we believe our OWN thoughts, the happier we’ll be.”

Happiness, though, is not about believing your own thoughts as much as it involves being honest about them when you’re actually awake enough to really see them. Often our thoughts are spot on and are good for one and for all but what happens when they’re not? Should we keep on believing things because they are ours?
Language is beautiful and seductive, and just because it’s sounds good, doesn’t make it true. And even if it is true, it doesn’t mean you believe it. (It may not sound good to you.) Even if you believe it, it doesn’t mean you know it, and just because it’s known, doesn’t make it understood. And just because it’s understood doesn’t make it practiced. Practicing truth takes more than seeing eyes and listening ears. It takes courage, faith, humility and a genuine choice to Love. And Loving this way takes a sincere and relentless practice of personal honesty. (to be distinguished from “my” personal truth.) Personal honesty asks that I look not only at how I experience myself but how the “myself” experience really affects the world and the people I touch.

I remember listening to a motivational speaker who encouraged her audience to imagine being wealthy and what that would feel like. She gave them a very simple instruction. “If you want to be wealthy you should hang around people who are wealthy and even wealthier than you.” The crowd was feeling this. She went on to tell them that if they were the most successful person in their crowd they should look for a crowd that could pull them up because their current clique would likely pull them away from what they truly wanted. The crowd went up in a roar after hearing this.

Can you imagine the encouragement this audience felt knowing the only thing they had to do to get better was to distance themselves from the people who were beneath them? The seduction of the statement wasn’t that there were people actually beneath them but that they could rise higher than they were. Sounds like good advice though doesn’t it?

Consider this...

What happens when the person that’s wealthier than you follows the same advice and keeps YOU out?

It sounds good but it really doesn’t work for anything but a good fix and unconscious movement toward further discrimination, war and dysfunction – the very things that a life of Love and true awareness are designed to render impotent.

Imagine someone – anyone – telling you that they have conquered everything standing in their way. This person could be your sister, your spouse, your father, your boss, or your best friend. You naturally want to celebrate with them. You go out and have a party and dance the victory dance. Life is beautiful and you rule the world. Later on as you both become high on life and drunk in your victory and the inhibitions become the free flowing celebration of uninhibited, raw naked boasting and you find out that not only have they conquered everything standing in their way they’ve also conquered “everyone” standing in their way -including YOU. You’ve been conquered too! You didn’t know that though, did you? Did you know you were the enemy of their personal truth, their personal path to freedom, their personal success story?

This is what betrayal looks like but betrayal is still an illusion.

I want you happy – for real. Bliss is my earnest desire for your life.

Truthfully, neither I, nor anyone else is responsible for your happiness. You’re not responsible for mine or ours either but we do participate in our joint experiences. We supply everyone in our lives with successive and sequential opportunities to consider whether we are really living our lives in ways that genuinely consider their presence in it.

We live in this age with so much talk of Self, YOU, Divinity, Authenticity, Transparency, Translucence, Source. It is perhaps more prominent than it’s ever been. It’s attractive, alluring and some of it is seducing us to avoid community while we think we are building safe ones. Waking to Self might be the most important thing any of us will ever do yet the movement toward "Self" should be synonymous with the movement toward "Source". That One who truly finds Self is progressively less interested in withholding and progressively more interested in extending. This is one way the Source-Self is distinguished from the false-self. It's not in the words or the platitudes we offer; It’s in the Love we are and choose to be.

Your capacity to love is limitless and when you are challenged to not believe this, Love Anyway.

Loving Anyway is the act of Genius. It is the evidence of Authenticity and Mindfulness. It is the function of Brilliance. It is Who You Truly Are & if you ever want to know if you have truly discovered YOU...Love Anyway…

Marquis

(This is an excerpt from my upcoming book on Love and Relationships. Stay tuned as I follow up with the question:

So how do we know when it’s time to step away or abandon a relationship? When is love not enough? When is it clear that there is no possible shred of hope to procure better ways of relating and being with partners, friends and lovers?)

Still

I loved her and I saw her again

Still I love her

She didn’t look my way

Still I love her

She’s free… from Me…

Still I love her

Plant Me A Tree

Long time since I touched my Lover
Still the truth though
Love is and I think of her at every dawn
It’s different though in the evenings
There are no road trips
No sliding into smells and skin
But the truth Remains and Love still is…
Ever wonder where hope goes and if it ever returns
I’m told it’s a tree of Life when it shows up
Long time since I touched my Lover
Vanished
It was good though – not just the touch
The hand, Yes… but the words too with
Smile lines and glistening eyes
No more words – Just silence
No more moments – just memories
Plant me a tree

Process: The Paradox of the Divine Dialogue (Cont)

"Grief can take care of itself, but to get the full value of joy you must have somebody to divide it with."- Mark Twain.

I would say it, “…joy must have somebody to share it with.”

“Grief is selfish in nature, it centered around you. Joy is the enrichment of inner grace that cries out "Our Father." – Mark Eaton

I would say, “…joy is the enrichment of inner grace that cries out for community.”

It’s not that my edits are better, they’re just the way I see it. Either way, I’m convinced that joy has always dealt me a better dose of life than grief. The only thing separating grief from joy is a moment of awareness and this is what we want when we’re grieving. We won’t out of it; we want out of the pain and suffering. But how?

“Answers!!!! Give me answers.”

I suppose it would be simply easy to just tell the world the "Truth"(the answer) in its most sublime and complete form, although it eludes us what that is. Sometimes, though, there’s the push to do just that – speak of truth in the ultimate sense. It’s similar to planning a trip and knowing the destination, but knowing the destination is not the synonymous with actually getting there. Getting there is what I call “process”, and there is definitely “process”; however, there can be several ways or paths to getting “there” and each of them can and will carry its own discipline. These disciplines involve several mini-truths so to speak. Some of them are faster, some more tedious, but each with its own reason for being. Some of them are at times, timeless and seamless. In these moments (the timeless and seamless moments) we are more closely aware or awakened to that inescapable Oneness although it may be unknown to our amnesiatic “person self” that we are living in such sync or synchronicity.

Sometimes we like to “cheat” the process. We just want the answer without learning how to master the question. The problem with this is that we cheat ourselves of actually “knowing” our Divinehood (that powerful person-self) and we are stuck with only believing it. (Those of us who are lucky enough to even get that far. Some of us just remain illiterate). The process is there nonetheless to create for our person-self this dynamic experience of being human. Humanity is nothing if it is not designed as the consciousness of exploration; it IS the mastery of the question – Love/God/Universe asking itself, “who/what am I?” Not that we don’t really know but we want to SEE.

"I got what I asked for, the chance to love no matter what, and to see what that is gonna take."

Matthew Glenn Krepps

This is the brilliance of loving anyway. We get to remember and experience our limitless capacity to love, to emerge and to just BE. We, humanity, are still in the beginning stages of our self discovery and it is not a beginning to despise but rather one to explore. That’s it!!!!! The exploration takes time. Like the trip or the journey we are waiting to arrive so in the meantime we experience and we explore. This “meantime” though is better felt when we do it with joy rather than with grief. In grieving, yes, we DO feel alone. Sometimes we are convinced of this aloneness. It doesn’t matter that we “really” aren’t alone; we FEEL alone.

How can there be joy when we feel this way? But we don’t have to feel this way even if we are in the experience of solitude. We know that we are joined by the many – the ONE, and this reality will show itself as we share ourselves and withhold not. Joy is the hope of the shared experience; it is the remembering of our Divine selves and the discovery of nothing missing and nothing broken. God will not deny him/her/itself.

We know this and yet we are learning this.

My Redeemer Lives

You’ve believed you could only go so far. You’ve believed there was only so much you could take. You’ve been convinced you have an emotional cap that when reached will force you to explode, take prisoners and demand your right to freedom and power. You did not consider you could outlast your pain or be stronger than your grievance. You secretly gave what came to destroy you, the keys to your freedom. What you didn’t know, is your enemy is and always has been afraid of eviction. The enemy has always seen you as its Landlord. Your enemies have always known you have the power. The reason they relentlessly threaten you is to convince you that you are weaker than the Truth, insufficient to Love, and unqualified to Evolve.

The one who seeks to destroy you is paying tribute to your Power. How could someone feel threatened by weakness? If you would just see this, you would not believe their delusion but you would accept their Truth. To accept this honor would grant you the privilege of becoming THEIR Savior.

One day you will believe you do not have to forecast a limitation on to yourself. One day you will no longer use your imagination to contemplate the possibility of failure. If you do not like enemies, be only a friend and if you have difficulty believing you can be such a Redeemer, remember this: You have always been bigger than your experience and you have experienced no limitation which has nullified the “Beauty of Your Becoming.” You Are Here!!!!!!

Your capacity to Love is limitless and when you are challenged to not believe this, Love Anyway

Step into your life! Come out of the Shadows! Welcome to the LifeXchange!

Have this dialogue with me and many others Sundays @ 4p.m. when the LifeXchange gathers.

Mediums Art Lounge

516 Center Street,

Little Rock, AR

(501)749-2110

L2L,
The Seer.

New Year, New You, New Relationship

I enter each of my relationships with a unique understanding of this idea: “I am meeting someone who has secrets. I don’t know their secrets. Their secrets, if I were to discover them, could quite possibly convince me to distance myself from them. This person is not likely to tell me something they are ashamed of for fear of losing what potential he or she may have in having me as a friend.


This may all seem normal, but it suggests something that could easily inject poison into any potential relationship. The person who hides from me is inclined to believe that I have contingencies on my love. In other words, they are pretty sure love will fail them. What could be left after such a sentence is passed and why is this? It is because we walk into each relationship first as an “other”. We are presumed to be potential enemies. I could turn on you or you on me. This possibility exists.


I have a remedy for this, but it doesn’t always go over so well. I might say to you, “Tell me a secret and tell me something you don’t want me to know.” I’m usually met with a startling look of bewilderment. Surprise follows and sometimes with the same question asked of me – but before they, themselves, will answer. I smile and attempt to give them something of shock value just to see if they will remain. I am often times disappointed. Because when I tell my secret, I find that more than love was needed. I didn’t know it before, but this reaction suggests that in order for me to sustain a relationship for any length of time, I must live, untrue to myself, but true to yours or somebody’s idea of me.

Sometimes, though we give into our desire to be accepted and we play along. We don’t lie, but we do shield our friendship potentials from our darker side.


This does not suggest that our wonderful selves are misleading or unreal, but it does suggest that we want to be perceived as perfect and lack the potential to do bad. It suggests to our friendship potentials that they are not likely to be disappointed or betrayed by us. It gives them permission to continue to project onto us their noble idea of who we are and why they were smart, blessed, or altruistic to include us into their space. We won’t readily admit that we fear rejection as it is the impetus behind why we shroud ourselves in this illusion of perfection. The problem though is that we are all apt to give into our fear especially if fear becomes so compelling that it evidences itself as the only way to preserve what we value. And one such fear realizes itself by leading someone to believe or helping them believe that you are fully responsible for their idea of you.


I write this to you to help you see that those in your life who have betrayed you have done so because they were afraid. Their fear does not justify the betrayal. I am hoping it serves to help you understand that betrayal does not have to offend you. If I were to tell you when you asked me to tell you a secret or something I didn’t want you to know, “I'm not always honest, I have wayward thoughts which could easily undermine your generosity,” would you distance yourself or help me heal? The point being, sometimes we can’t stop betrayal even when we love without condition and sometimes, just sometimes, we’re uninterested in knowing the shame that grips many of our friends. Sometimes their suspicions about us are correct. It’s the secret we have kept to ourselves. It’s the one that says, “I am likely to abandon you, if you disappoint me.”


Can we change the way we see it?

Marquis

Love or Money?

Question:

Not sure how to word this but I will attempt to. Money over love or love over money? A man's desire for love is powerful & so his his desire to be a provider so what happen when a man chooses a woman who has money over one he has this deep love for? The desire for love is great so will he have to eventually heed to the call of love??

Love or money??

Dear Love or Money,

Anyone embarking upon a relationship because of the desire for love is living from a posture of insufficiency. The question also begs consideration of the woman who reaches for a man who can provide economic security rather than one with whom she finds "love". Either way insufficiency seems to be what drives the individual's desire for relationship.

The desire of a man to provide is somewhat of a socia/cultural* stereotype. The man who is compelled to live with this value system may feel the pressure to believe himself inadequate and undeserving of his preferred love interest if he cannot meet social standards of worth. When this happens, the relationship will be overshadowed by shame. He will find ways to recover a sense of dignity. He will not find it as long as he lives believing in his insufficiency. Shame leads to dishonesty and dishonesty leads to the cover-up. It is very difficult to build a healthy relationship under these circumstances. Disappointment will be unavoidable.

We all choose according to our value system. We cannot avoid this. If we live believing in insufficiency, we will live with an inclination toward possessiveness couched in the mask of security. We will value security over the threat of loss. Mind you, the threat of loss is not proof of loss. All that is necessary however is the belief in loss to increase and solidify the value for security. Money will be more valuable than Love when Money is believed to provide more security than Love. If this is the case whether revealed in the man or the woman, Security will win. All you can do is observe this truth and observe the truth a person shows you.

"When a person shows you their true colors, believe them the first time." ~Maya Angelou

Deep love has no value except to the person with the deep love. Sometimes deep love has more value than deep pockets, vice-versa. Love demonstrates its greatest value when it evidences the need for nothing. In this it is free to give everything without losing anything.

We all will heed the call to Love. It is our true nature. There is only one true security --- Love. It has been said, "perfect Love casts out all fear." If this is true, then where love perfects itself, there is no fear. If there is no fear, there is no need for security. Security eludes the need for conversation because it is not a plausible conception.

When the Lover lost in his/her desire for love realizes this, there will not be a question of Love over Money or Money over Love. There will only be the question of...

"How can I use my life to Amplify the Volume of Love in all moments?"

Marquis

*"socio/cultural was Borrowed from Kevin A Johnson (Facebook Friend)

Still Questioning Love... On Faithfulness

I’m still heavily invested in writing. I’m excited about offering these innovative perspectives on love and relationship. As you wait for the book to be completed, I am extremely grateful for your choice to read me through this medium. Please keep the questions coming and thanks for all your support. The following is an excerpt from my current work in progress.

After publishing my recent article, Flirting or Not…. Can We Talk, I entertained several questions asking for a more in depth discovery into relationship. It’s difficult to discuss flirting without fidelity coming into radiating focus. Many of us are sorely afraid to open this door for fear that it will lead to a matrix of infidelity --- one from which we cannot return. Set your heart at ease, your current love interest is not likely to be your last and you can be thankful for this. That thing you felt when you fell in love? You had nothing to do with it and there is no sense in trying to fool yourself into believing you did. It happened and if you could stop, it is likely you would. Love cannot be controlled. It has a mind of its own and thankfully so---Love knows much better than any of us what is best for all of us.

Being that many of us in the western world have taken our cue for moral and behavior from some concept of religion, it would be a welcomed event to see our leading religious voices explore this topic with respect and deference. This may be difficult though because many of us who lead the way (religiously speaking) are oblivious to our own presuppositions and prejudices on issues of sexuality and any of its corollaries. Immorality is one such corollary flowing from the lack of depth in this conversation. Religion often blames science and entertainment for this alleged deviance but this is a misguided projection. I have been a religious voice and I work feverishly to speak more relevantly to society and to the intricately subtle concerns that affect us daily.

Sex isn't a dirty word, but because it's so misunderstood we often replicate misguided attempts at chastity and morality. Sex is powerful especially when it's done right or righteously. By righteous, I don't mean anything conventional. I'm Marquis and chancing convention is not easy for me. Sexuality is a necessary fuel in building thriving and vital relationships. But to be sexual is not necessarily a matter of copulating; it is a matter of intimating. (flirting)

One of my first messages as a burgeoning “religious” voice was a sermon I titled, “The Comic Strip Character.” Over 20 years ago I preached this. What was true then is astoundingly true now. My lead character was Dennis the Menace. I discovered as a young adult that I had been reading about Dennis’s life from my childhood. It “finally” struck me that while I had grown both physically and emotionally, Dennis had not. He was s till a little boy. Now, over 20 years later, Dennis is still the same age exhibiting the same childish machinations. Life is not a comic strip, things do change and so do we. Regardless of the illusion of Sunday comedy, everything about us is different – especially the way evolution asks us to be in relationship.

We like things quick and simple. Quick seems better because it alleviates the pain associated with waiting – we’re just impatient most of the time. Simple is desired because we think it takes less mental work. This just translates into us not really wanting to think. We like being spoon or bottle fed and that’s okay if remaining and infant or toddler is the unspoken ambition. What most of us call simple, is usually an exercise in vagueness and ambiguity. Simplicity is found in presence of detail. We simplify by breaking things down. We like to group, collude, and fuse together conversations of Love, Relationship, Sexuality, and even belief. While these subjects are connected they are not interchangeable. This is very important.

Couched in our language, we can see that Love functions in at least three distinct ways. Love finds its way to us through the function of what I will call the Love Triad – Phileo, Agape, and Eros. We see these loves operating in all of our relationships. The mistake we make is in thinking that we actually should love some people differently than others. The surface understanding says Phileo is brotherly love – the love of friends or friendship. Agape is unconditional love or benevolent love – we should love even those who don’t deserve it. Eros is erotic or romantic love – we can only have this love for someone special. Every now and again we feel romance for more than one but that is entirely inappropriate. Only one person can have your share of romance. These connotations are all grossly misrepresented and oversimplified. In truth, these loves should work interactively in ALL relationships.

The notion of "being in love", ambiguously identified as ‘eros’is in and of itself a very selfish operation. Usually we fall in love with someone we call “lover.” The term has expanded over the years but it essentially suggests that we are in love with someone who loves us rather than someone we love. It is true that your lover may see you as you see him or her, but at this point, the relationship is being defined by what is received rather than what is given. Being in love is not to be confused with Love or loving. Being in love is the tendency of an individual to be intoxicatingly consumed with the euphoric feeling he or she gets when having the experience of someone else. It totally concerns itself with attempting to require the object of affection to guarantee himself, herself, or themselves for the sake of that individual's personal satisfaction.

Love is like water; it seeks its own level. There are times we attempt to control this love triad. We have attempted the same with water --- our irrigation systems or our dams. These are our creations to make water obey our will. We buy into the illusion that we can also dam up love, but that’s a damn lie. For some reason we think we can stop its flow and we can for a while but only for a while. Eventually love like water will have to flow through or some major dam/age will occur. Sometimes our families are relational dams or it could be our friendships, our ideas, our beliefs, our past success and even our marriages. In other words, the way we have relationships is our way of trying to control love but do we really need to do this? Can we learn a better way?

Still... Working You Out

L2L,
Marquis

Flirting or Not... Can We Talk?

Girl, if I could, I would just...

I love conversation --- impassioned by conversation to say the least. I like to see the mind at work and conversation, for me, is an invitation into someone’s soul. And for those of us who are not so intuitive, it is perhaps the most viable way to develop an interpersonal relationship.

Often in doing consultations, I may have a potential client ask me, “What will I get from talking with you?” My standard response is, “I will take your conversation and give it back to you.” We could often answer our own questions if we would just dare listen to our conversation and courageously examine the subtle nuance of it.

Because of our most recent dialogues, I am experiencing my conversation(s) come back to me. I am remembering myself. My reflections emerge with a realization of how my activism is not as silent as I imagined. I am an activist but not only that; I’m a poet, a musician, a writer, a friend, a lover, teacher, a father, a husband, among so many other things. I am not just one of these things and none of these roles are always relevant. (I should repeat that.) I do love beauty and sometimes consider myself to be a “beauty” activist. I am not trying to be a martyr. I have no interest in that. I don’t want to kill relationships because of my love for beauty or my willingness to demonstrate appreciation for it. To be clear, I find no beauty in disrespect. Neither do I find beauty in the need or desire to dominate someone or require them to accept me or my ways. I genuinely desire friendship and relationship.

Our society is changing. Concomitant to this is also the rhythm of changing relationships. Contrary to what romance tells us, there has never existed a perfect relationship. We have been learning how to relate since we have awakened to the consciousness of our humanity. None of us really know what the ideal relationship looks like. There is no pattern or cookie cutter image we can translate into the perfect statement. How do we actually manage this? The lines are getting blurred and defining appropriateness is more and more nuanced. For instance:

Who determines if we greet with a handshake, hug, or kiss? Is it the man or the woman?
If it’s a hug, is it a shoulder hug, a two-handed shoulder hug, a handshake- shoulder bump- slap the back hug, a slight body hug with the obligatory pat(s) on the back, or is it a full-on -body hug?
If it’s a kiss, is it on the cheek, on the head, on the lips, or on the neck? Who makes the choice to initiate this? How do we figure this out?

If I’m kissed on the lips by a woman who initiates it, am I to assume she wants me? When do I self investigate? Do I question my own perceptions, presuppositions, preconceived notions, motives, inhibitions or lack of them? Vice-versa, if it’s the man initiating, how do we figure this out?

Is there any innocence?

Why do people tell me I have a beautiful wife? Did I have anything to do with it? Are they telling me I’m lucky? I’m smart? Shouldn’t they tell her? Can a man feel comfortable saying it? If the woman’s a lesbian, is she allowed?

What to do?

I have a couple of people in my life who feel they can adjust certain wardrobe malfunctions I may exhibit---a dangling string either on my cap or shirt, a piece of lint on my eye, etc. I don’t like it; I think it makes me feel like a child. They mean well but my ego gets in the way. Recently I went into a restaurant. The owner is a lady who I find quite attractive. She has the most gorgeous eyes and hair. After I was seated, she came over and began dialogue. In the midst of the conversation, she reached for my face. I slightly pulled back thinking I had a wardrobe quagmire. I was so wrong. She said, “Would it be okay if I touched your face? I think you have beautiful skin.” I was like “SURE!” It was nice and I was glad I was wrong. Was it inappropriate? I don’t know. I was appreciative to be, at least at this moment, admired. Maybe I felt it was okay because the lady/owner is a lesbian. I knew she didn’t want me. Is that it? When I think someone doesn’t want ME, I assess it as okay to be touched. But what if I think they want me and they don’t? What if I hadn’t known the lady/owner was a lesbian and just mis/took her admiration as an advance?

Every now and again I’ll have a small child come up to me and say, “You got a tooth sticking up.” I’m thinking in my head, “as if I didn’t know! I’ve known for years and longer than you’ve been alive.” Depending on how it rubs me, I might end that exclamation with a resounding, “BOY!!!!!!” Again… that’s all in my head. I will usually just smile for the record and quietly say, “I know.” I try to take into account the child’s age. He or she is usually no older than 6 and perhaps no younger than 2. They are children and they say the darndest things. It usually can’t be helped so I do my best to just let it go.
Adults on the other hand--- we should know better. I think the expectation is that we speak with much more sobriety and/or respect. I don’t know if I know what that really means but I often hear more insults than compliments. “Look at you. You’ve gained weight haven’t you?” “Where did all that gray come from? Boy you’re getting old.” “I don’t like your hair like that.”

Maybe we don’t know how to receive a compliment. I’ve told a woman before, “I like your nose.” She retorts, “This nose? I hate it.” I might say, “Hey gorgeous.” The response might be, “no way… not today I’m not.” We are very good at insulting each other and ourselves. I think it’s how we showcase humility. But in the spirit of the “outstanding” tooth, I do my best to direct someone’s attention toward those things I find beautiful. The attempt is to do this without discrimination. I usually have success with this but there are times when my attempts at complimenting beauty become viewed as something wholly other--- or what some may just call “unholy.” :(

I like compliments, especially if they are true. When it's a good day and someone's feeling generous, I might hear, “Boy, you got some nice legs.” Admittedly, that’s much more appealing to me than the tooth thing. I’ve never been insulted by someone admiring my legs. It’s quite euphoric. I have a runner’s legs, or so I’ve been told. I’m really not a runner but I’ll take the compliment. I’ve never been an athlete, and I’ve never been the poster boy for fitness, so for me to having something good looking on my body is like a miracle and to have someone notice is like double play. I’ll take the good with the bad. Not much choice in that anyway.

The world I live in perhaps isn’t so simple. We have rules around practically everything. A single man can compliment a single woman (giving referent deference toward same gendered affections). A married woman can compliment a married woman – vice-versa for the men. Things get a little tricky when a single person speaks to someone who is “spoken for.” It’s a magician’s feat to pull off and get it right. But by all means, people who are spoken for should never be too generous with someone who has been spoken for. ..Enough said (shhhh)---but for real!!!!!!

I’ve been adventurous enough to try it though. I’ve tried to speak of beauty, speak on beauty, speak to beauty when it is politically incorrect and unbeknownst to me, relational suicide. I’ve gotta get this right. I have to do better. Can we be a society that sees acknowledgments of beauty and charm as something other than a necessary grievance.

That’s a beautiful dress and you look good in it. Wow! What wonderful hair. You got some nice legs; you should show them. Did you see those pecks? Tall, dark, and Handsome. I simply love looking at you. Thanks for being. Thanks for being beautiful. You have the most gorgeous eyes. Succulent lips. That famous rude whistle. I love a man in uniform.

Haven’t we had secret conversations either with friends or within ourselves where we say these things and more than this wish someone would just say them to us? The world has practiced being cruel too long. Can we not find a way to be comfortable with beautiful sentiments? It’s not all sexual even if the hearer hears it as such, but what if it is sexual? Sex is not a sin, neither is it a dirty word.

Relationships are tricky and when it becomes more important to get from the relationship more than we give to it, the relationship is approaching sickness and could easily die. I do not want this to be the case with any of us. There are times when I find myself wondering if I am outliving my usefulness. This is not my desire and when this happens, I look into myself to see what I might have to offer. I desire to create a useful presence for you and those who have been affected by my way of being. We can learn to love---really love and this can only happen if we choose not to fear… ANYTHING.

Tell Me Have You Seen Her

We can get this right. We can live in a world we love to wake up to and that reassures us of our peace as we slumber. We have been told of a Presence, a Being that neither sleeps nor slumbers. The general practice is to call him God but it may be more palatable if we could see this Presence as Love. Could we imagine a world in which none of us finds a legitimate reason to excuse Love from our choosing? The hope for peace is meaningless unless we will concede to Love’s inclination. It is the inclination that never sleeps nor slumbers. She, Love, is always present to gift herself to any moment when there are people just like you willing to recognize her gift.

Could we change the way we see it --- the way we see everything? Could we revisit our beginning and attempt a refresh, a rebirth? Can we just be born again? Have you ever wondered why the sacred story used a virgin to introduce the divine? Turn your neck just a little to the left. Lean back ever so slightly. Now tilt your head to the right. This picture is just over your shoulder. It’s been there all along and we’re finally opening out eyes.

Each of us has this common experience in our introduction to humanity. I don’t know where science will lead us or when we might have a plausible way of changing our narrative. As it stands, this phenomenon is inescapable and perhaps underappreciated and malnourished. It is perhaps the most sacred trust offered to any one person --- the first voice, the first touch, the first relationship, the first life exchange with the capacity to build a context of consciousness. It is our first human opportunity to find our way to autonomy and to enter a world where we can discover our own beauty and actualize our forgotten divinity. Beautiful is insufficient to capture the appearance. Enduring does not speak efficiently to the staying power. We cannot revoke this privilege. It is sustained by the power of the Universe. The power of such a life is immutable yet we have built a living narrative on a theme attempting to infer undeniable weakness. She is not the weaker vessel. She is not in constant need of a protector. She is not as fragile as our flirt with romance relentlessly fabricates. She is Sophia, Sacred Feminine, Nefertiti, Goddess, Diana, Theresa, Mary, Mother, Sister, and Daughter. She is the flower and crown of humanity.

She is Woman...

Questioning Love

Recently, one of my readers wrote to me. This is what she said.

“You make love seem like the most powerful force in the universe. If it is, why are we so prone to getting it wrong or running away from it and not to it as often as we breathe?”

I’m grateful she asked and would encourage you as well to write to me and ask or speak what is on your mind. I’ve learned many people have similar questions and concerns but are often afraid to give voice to them. It is my desire to comfort you and to offer you ways to see life that aid in your ability to see much more of yourself. You are loves desire and you are worthy of love. Of this I am sure.

My response to her is as follows:
I’ve been married to the same woman for over20 years and I have been in several relationships throughout my life. This by no means makes me a relationship expert any more than eating for a lifetime makes me a chef. Have I been successful at marriage? I, along with many onlookers seem to think so. What means more to me, though, is that I’ve been successful at relationships and I have many of them. To be clear, my use of the word “relationship” is not meant on any level to be synonymous with “sexual” relationship. A sexual relationship is a type of relationship but it is not the most important type. It is vital that I make this distinction so that you can take my writing in the spirit it is intended.

Relationships are not successful because they last; they are successful because they mature, grow, expand, extend and reproduce. They become remarkable as they make room for more relating without prejudice or possessiveness. The 20 year mark may seem impressive but that is merely a distraction. What’s really impressive is that it didn’t take 20 years for either of us to see the value in a moment which was worthy of a lifetime. And if I look at the 20 years alone, I just might miss the power of each new relationship. Each successful relationship starts at the first encounter, the meet. The moment we see beauty in someone is the moment we decide to make space and permit him or her to alter our existence.

Some marriages didn’t last 20 years. They either ended in death or divorce. Sometimes they are the same. Some marriages are still in their youth and are finding their way. Hopefully I can help you with this next statement. Your marriage is never as important as your relationship. Marriage is a step we introduce into relationship in an attempt to guarantee or require someone to remain with us. To remain is a matter of Love and never law. Valuing law over love is a death sentence. Knowing this will help you succeed. And if divorce is necessary to help you see the beauty of relating then see it as a gift and let Love take you higher and escape the clutches of death.

I believe love is the most powerful force in the universe. Love is always present as is truth and like truth we don't always see it. In these moments, when we don't see truth, we see its alternative --- as if there really is such. What we see is an illusion and depending on the degree of that illusion, it mutates into delusion. Either way deception dominates and we are prone to demonstrate or act out in fear. Fear is what happens when we see love as absent or threatened. Truth and Love go hand in hand. They are both present---omnipresent even.

Why are we prone to running away? Fear incites flight. Why are we prone to getting it wrong? Deception and/or illusion nurtures misunderstanding. These go hand in hand as well. Misunderstanding is the prelude to fear and if we misunderstand what is true, we will run away from Love.

Breathing should demonstrate to us that breath is ever present, always around, always here. In all moments we are breathing and in these moments we are living. None of us like to have our breathing obstructed but sometimes it is. Maybe this is due to allergens, colds, flues, or maybe someone is just suffocating you. This is sometimes called asphyxiation meaning the absence of a pulse. We have no sign of life. Wow, imagine that? No love, no life, No truth, no life, No Life, No love. It just goes on and on and on and on...

So why then do we choose to run? We think it's the fastest way to get away from what we think causes our pain not realizing it's always been the illusion that does it. We can't run from truth. Where would we go? A place where truth is not? There is no place where truth is absent, no place where love is absent. If truth or love is unapparent it is just simply unseen. But when we discover truth and uncover love what we come to realize is this:

All we ever learn is that we misunderstood before.

Love will always give us more than we can give to it. Love is larger than any one of us. It is larger than our desires. Love is inexhaustible and unrepentant in its willingness to extend continuously. Yet when we want more from love than we are willing to give to it, love seems to retreat into scarcity. Love does not really hide from us but this illusion of scarcity and loss is cast when we find ourselves believing we “need” more love. Love does not offer itself in diminished capacity; it is intent upon giving fully withholding nothing. This is a difficult cycle to overcome when we think having more love is the same as seeing more love.
Love by design hides from the blind, but it’s easier to see it when you choose to be it.

It’s reflexive. Love is. It has an involuntary response directly resulting from a sponsoring action. Respond simply means to answer. Love listens and observes with careful attention so as to extend to the object of affection exactly what is necessary to sponsor an elevated sense of consciousness. Love is also reflective. It will mirror truthfully at the angle of incidence. Another way of saying this, “whatever measure you meet, the same measure will be measured back to you.” (a passage taken from a ancient text) Remember, love’s intention is liberation through truthful and authentic relations. Love will mirror to us in a way we demonstrate it. If we find ourselves restricting love’s flow then we imagine and believe that love is limiting. Love will in turn respond with a reflection necessitating an event asking you to choose whether this is really your preference.

When we find ourselves open to a limitless expression of love, Love responds to us with a reflection of streaming possibilities. Love will blossom, expand, and extend herself in unimaginable ways exceeding anything we could ask or think. This is really the love we seek but are often afraid to quest.

There are so many variations and styles of people in the world and when love demonstrates her limitlessness, it does it through the myriad of people possibilities. Each person represents a different love possibility but not only that, each person provides a unique and distinct way for us to see ourselves in brand new dimensions. Seeking or questing for new ways to see and experience life, necessitates the entrance of new people possibility. These are conquests --- our ever expanding opportunities to pursue love through the unfolding potential of our humanity. This is dynamically beautiful, non-repetitive ecstasy in revolution.

Working You Out,
Marquis

PS. I am writing much more on these subjects in an expanded form in my upcoming book. I hope you stay tuned and engaged in this conversation.

Losing My Skill for Fear

Hey In There,

You’ve practiced being afraid for so long, you’ve become good at it. So good that it’s easy. So easy, that you don’t even know you’re doing it and the only evidence you have for your fear is that you don’t know if you’re right or wrong. You’re afraid of being alone and afraid of finding the right person. You’re afraid of changing and afraid if you do something different, you will have abandoned something meaningful. You’re afraid lying and also afraid of being so honest that you’ll believe what you‘ve rejected for so long --- the obvious. You’re afraid of loving completely and totally unsure if your love is sufficient. You’re afraid of being wrong and you’re afraid if you’re right you’ll lose everything you value. You’re afraid of questioning God and afraid to admit your ignorance. You’re afraid of living effortlessly and afraid of working so hard you’ll miss your life. You’re afraid to admit you don’t have it all and afraid to admit you don’t need it all. You’ve actually believed you can go or be somewhere ---ANYWHERE and find God missing so that just makes you afraid to show up.

The evidence for this is clear whenever you are not present. Fear perhaps is not just simply false evidence appearing real. It is proof you have projected and tried to live somewhere in your future. It doesn’t matter how near or distant that future is. Any attempt to excavate yourself from the present moment is proof that you are good at being afraid. It doesn’t matter that you are planning your future. That’s easily a noble excuse just to be distracted and miss who you are and the beauty of what is being. The most efficient way to plan for the future is in the present moment. So rather than focusing on any other moment, why not just optimize being in this one and the necessary resources will find you in each moment just as they have in this one. Trust it. Trust this and fear not.

Fear is senseless…

If you fear death and your death is imminent, what profit is it for you to fear the inevitable? Would that not just cause you to waste the moments of your viability? Your viability, by the way, is irrefutably immanent. You ARE alive NOW. So could death really be upon you? Really? And if you’re afraid of someone other than yourself dying, it’s because you are afraid of missing what you think you COULD have. You can’t lose a past that’s non-negotiable and changeless. All your memories are secure even if you forget them and any future moment can only live in a fantasy. Pay attention NOW and love living.

What was the last thing you were afraid of that destroyed you?

The answer? NOTHING!

Have you become so good at being afraid that you have failed to see your success in simply remaining… being… lasting… continuing… expanding… evolving?

You could just as easily practice being fearless. You do this by just simply loving. You do this by accepting. You do this by choosing not to argue with truth. The truth is here to serve you---serve us. It’s been said, “You will know the truth and the truth will make you free.” If this is true then embracing any truth is the pathway to freedom. Do you think you could not use your fear to judge the truth? Any attempt to judge the truth is an attempt to evidence or give proof to the lie. There is no lie which has proof to it. There is no truth which has the power to harm you. All truth has the power to free you if you “know” it. And if you know something other than the truth, it’s just simply a lie. Don’t believe it; don’t practice the lie anymore. Lose your skill for fear.

The truth is real.
The lie is false.
What is real exists-
What is false does not exist.
The lie does not exist.
Only Truth

Working You Out,

Marquis

The Lover

It’s the one who helps you believe what you didn’t believe before

Even if that means you rethinking you

It’s the one who, though you keep breathing, continues to take your breath away

It’s the one who, without disturbance, wakes you while you sleep

The Dream…

It’s the one who caused you to forget your beginning while giving you forever

You can let it all go…

And just Be

It’s the one who, without words, convinced you of your beauty

They didn’t hide their eyes

They didn’t believe the lies – not even yours

It’s the one who gives you the gift of time and doesn’t make you wait

It’s the one who ‘watches’ you change

Like time, it’s a REVOLution –

The Lover in EVOLution

It’s the One…

Whoever, Whenever, Wherever

It’s the One

However Many

It’s the One

Shaddows

To be hidden in the shadow does not erase my existence. If the shadow is there, it will last until a light is cast in a different direction so that the shadow remains but covers me not. Would you shine your light and bring me out of hiding? Would you kiss the frog? Would you...

Love Anyway

Simply Because I Can

“Withhold not good from who it is due when it is in the power of your hand to do it.”

A wisdom charm and an ancient Hebrew proverb – I like looking at it. Meditating on it. It speaks to me; it makes me think - What makes something good? To who is it owed? Do I owe it!?! Do I have the power to deliver it? Why should I do anything for anybody? Makes me wonder why anybody does anything for anybody.

The one who knows him or herself to be powerful is fully invested in sharing their power. It is only those who believe themselves to be weak, who cultivate weakness or allow it to remain.

I was born into this world as a child who could do nothing for himself. Someone changed my diaper and dirtied their hands. I had done nothing to deserve such favor but they had the power to not leave me dirty. I became hungry. I did nothing to work for my bread and yet they fed me with their power to take away my pangs. Somewhere along the way, I decided I did not want to do what was done for me. I did not want to simply give my good away unless it was to someone who had delivered good to me first. In those moments I believed in my weakness. In those moments I lost my way. My first experience in this world taught me to give where goodness was needed and not necessarily where it was afforded.

I listen for those who cannot hear without me. I write the songs for those who cannot feel the music without me. I write the truth for those who could not identify the lie without me. I take away pain for those who can’t find their comfort without me never wanting to count man’s sins or weakness against them.

Those who have lost their way are overdue for direction. The person lost in grief is overdue for joy. The person lost in confusion is overdue for understanding. The person befuddled in conflict is overdue for peace. Those who are overwhelmed with despair are overdue for hope. Those who carry the burden of their fellow man are always due help to lighten the load.

Those who are lost simply need a Savior. The people we save are not always the people we owe but all of them are due it. There are those who cannot afford my help but what I cannot afford is to leave them without it. Love Anyway

From My Heart

Join Me,

Marquis