Compulsion Rules:

1.) It has to happen.

2.) There isn’t any option.

3.) Compulsion rules.

4.) Writing rules the compulsion.

Too bad the writing isn’t compelling.

Perhaps any compulsion is compelling, as compulsion propels the actions. The study of compulsion is compelling, even if the compulsion itself is not.

Take the hand-washing obsessionist. This isn’t a very compelling compulsion, though the fact that he washes his hands – to free the dirt which was picked up from the towel he used to dry his hands after washing them – is rather compelling. But writing is different. Writing is supposed to have meaning. Even those who write for no specific reason must find there is a meaning in putting it down. Otherwise, why would they bother?

I have read some really fascinating stuff recently. Much of it was from people who were inspired by Yaweh, while some was from the Good Book itself.

Parables are used in the holiest of places, and they touch all our lives. Still, I am left to wonder how a story extracts itself from parablism. Seemingly, every story contains a parable. Star Wars is a classic story of good and evil. It is a parable, is it not? Is it the complexity of a tale which wrests a story from potential Parable genreality?

The writing flies out of me, at times. Sometimes I am driving down the road at 70 miles an hour and I feel the compulsion to stop, find a coffee shop, pull out my journal and jog down the thoughts. They are always different once situated, but if they were strong enough, a skewed version bleeds out from the pen.

There is so much happening – right now – it seems. I am unaware of whether there is a shift in the makeup of the world at large, or whether my perspective is shifting, which is opening up possibilities all around me. One way or another things are great, and getting better all the time.

Have I have been distancing myself from the news that much?

I have been formulating a perspective paradigm, and trying it out in the real world. So far, it seems to be proving itself. Not that there is any other possibility. The premise is simple, and easily translatable to your life: Personal experience trumps information gleaned from any other source. It doesn’t matter what the source is, or how reliable you believe it to be.

Think about it. How often do you hear information from a newspaper, television or radio which compels your opinion? Your opinion gets filtered by external sources, then your experience is compelled to match that which you already believe. But what if you believed a certain thing, then tried to find sources which matched them, and discarded those that didn’t? While most people tend to keep pushing the buttons of information they favor, they fail to grasp the most critical part of this relationship:

The sources – not yourself – control your life perspective!

Taryn and I went to a Seventh Day Adventist Church a couple of weeks ago. There was a bible study, followed by the service. 4 and a half hours later we emerged. Wow.

This church felt very spiritual. We met many loving people who believe in God. Taryn and I are merely Christians. We have practiced our various ‘religions’, but we believe in essentially the same thing. She was brought up Baptist. I am a recovering Catholic. While we can engage in heated debate over The Word – it’s meaning and literary literality – we still fall under the jurisdiction of Christ. When you read The Book, you discover multifaceted, heavily documented discourse. There are wars. There is anger, pain and deceit.

Ultimately, there is love.

Yaweh is Spirit. The Spirit is Love. Jesus is Love Incarnate. The spirit of Jesus is in our blood. It goes round and round like that forever. (Hold onto your seat: here it comes again.)

When we pulled into the parking lot of the Adventist Church, there was a disheveled, middle aged man who appeared to be holding a joint. He asked if we had a bible, and Taryn handed him the one in her hand. I thought: This should be an interesting experience. I’ve never know anyone to get stoned and get high on Jesus. I had always separated them in my own life, but that is me. Jesus doesn’t make this divide.

He thanked us profusely, walked away with the bible, and lit up his hand-rolled cigarette. Taryn and I probably own a half-dozen bibles. I said to Taryn: “If we give away all of our bibles, I will keep buying them. It is well worth the money.”

The price of a bible is the antithesis of it’s value.

Having sought to write about the compulsion of writing itself, today I was compelled to write about God. As a missed assignment, it still gets credit. That is the beauty of writing. It all counts, no matter what happens. I am not dismayed over the divergence in direction. The fork has brought me here, and by that criteria alone, this is where I need to be.

I need to write more than I do, even though I write more than anyone I know. It is bursting out, now. There is my journal, my book, and my blog. Then there is all the meandering thoughts which still haven’t made their way onto the page, pushing to get out. They are incubations waiting for me to give them life. I am feeling a bit overwhelmed by them all, but living Christianity puts things into focus. When love is the overriding message, the energy can be a bit much at times. These are the times you know it is real, so you can’t ignore the feeling. Why would you? So you share it, pass it on.

Here’s the bible, dude.