Arteyeiii

Waiting until you meet beings and situations that provoke your love is like waiting until you are being chased by a tiger before using your hamstrings.

You can lift weights and exercise and strengthen your muscles instead of waiting for the specific circumstances in which you’d use them. That way when those circumstances arise, you’ll be fit as fuck to meet them.

The same goes for love. Practicing love deepens love. Like exercise, it isn’t always easy and maintaining motivation is necessary at times. But it is how you will grow into your reality as an organic fractal.

An emotion is a feeling that occurs in the moment and then dissipates. Once it becomes stuck it is no longer, strictly speaking, an emotion. It is a karma, a distortion within your subtle mind/body. You could call it an imprint.

The essential mechanism that occurs when an emotion becomes stuck is identification. Your selfing mechanism, the ego, grabs onto the emotion and brings it into itself. Then, similar to what a fossil is to a living organism, that thing is no longer the emotion that gave rise to it. It is an imprint.

In most instances, expressing the emotion doesn't help. In fact, it is the attempt to get rid of the emotion by expressing it that often inflicts suffering on others. Think about anger, hate, jealousy, fear, and how if any of those become stuck then people will often find themselves expressing those sentiments over and over. It doesn't free them.

There are many practices and approaches when it comes to addressing karmas and imprints stuck within us. Daily meditation, specific yogic or tantric techniques, physical exercise, and psychological therapy all all known methods.

The thing they all tend to have in common is learning how to not shut down in the face of difficult and confusing feelings. A book I highly recommend on all of this is The Places That Scare You by Pema Chodron. It is a short book to read but it will challenge you deeply.

May you be free.

as requested by quite a few people - a masterpost of educational podcasts. links go to either the site or the itunes podcast store. an excerpt of the description is included with each.

* indicates a podcast that i listen to regularly

entertainment

*welcome to night vale - twice-monthly updates for the small desert town of night vale

*muggle cast - everything harry potter

general information 

radiolab - investigation told through sounds and stories, and centered around one big idea

*stuff you should know - about everything from genes to the galapagos

*stuff mom never told you - the business of being women 

tedtalks

good job, brain - part pub quiz show, part offbeat news

news

no one knows anything - the politics podcast from buzzfeed news

wait wait…don’t tell me - weekly current events quiz

college

*college info geek - the strategies and tactics the best students use

*getting in - your college admissions companion

math

math for primates - a couple of monkeys who decided that arguing about mathematics was a better use of their time than throwing poo at one another

math mutation - fun, interesting, or just plain weird corners of mathematics

science

60 second health - latest health and medical news

the naked scientists - interviews with top scientists, hands-on science experiments

60 second science - the most interesting developments in the world of science

startalk - astronomy, physics, and everything else about life in the universe

nasa science cast - science behind discoveries on earth, the solar system, and beyond

history

*myths and legends - myths, legends, and folklore that have shaped cultures

stuff you missed in history class - the greatest and strangest stuff you missed

the podcast history of our world - from the big bang to the modern age! …eventually

witness - the story of our times told by the people who were there

the history chicks - two women. half the population. several thousands years of history.

entrepreneurship & finances

practical money matters - better managing their finances

the internet business mastery - learn how to create an internet based business

social triggers insider - the fields of psychology and human behavior

listen money matters - honest and uncensored, this is not your father’s boring finance show

writing & literature

professional book nerds - it’s our job to discuss books all day long

a way with words - words, language, and how we use them

grammar girl - short, friendly tips to improve your writing

classic poetry aloud - recordings of the greats poems of the past

language

esl (english) - improve english speaking and listening skills

language pod

coffee break

search in your podcast app for specific languages!

art

99% invisible - exploration of the process and power of design

tips and tricks photography 

the arts roundtable

hobbies & other

stash & burn (knitting)

practical defense - staying safe in our increasingly dangerous urban environments

zen and the art of triathlon - a triathlete’s view on living the multisport life

the art of charm - make you a better networker, connecter, and thinker

the indoor kids - isn’t just about video games, isn’t not about video games

rationally speaking - explore the borderlands between reason and nonsense

the dice tower - board games, card games, and the people who design and play them

motivational & inspirational

back to work - productivity, communication, work, barriers, constraints, tools, and more

personal growth podcast - classic and contemporary self development audio

what it takes - conversations with towering figures in almost every field

here be monsters - exploring the dark corners of the human mind