Month: January 2002

Poor little Maarten is sick. He has the flu and has been lying in bed for two days now. While I feel sorry for him, at the same time I cannot help thinking to myself how cute he looks with his little sad, red face calling us once in awhile with his squeaky high-pitched voice. Of course, this means that at night he gets the honor of sleeping next to his mother (she insists) and I get banished to Maarten's bed. This is always an interesting experience, and I do not mind really. It is comforting being surrounded by his many stuffed animals, and there is a certain soft smell of his sheets and pillow that soothes me. Let's say it kind of reminds me of when I was little. A mental relapse triggered by smells and tactile softness bringing me back to the good old world of childhood. I slept deeply and woke up renewed, holding Maarten's favorite teddy bear in my arms cuddled to my chest. Now I have to go to work.

Speaking about junk mail, here's one I received early this morning which is completely off base:

Could this be another secret message? How does this person know that for the first twenty years of my life I wanted to become a doctor? Well, things turned out differently.

For the better.

Funny (and interesting) how in this email they wrote "patients" when they really meant "patience" instead.

Right around the age of about twelve to thirteen or thereabouts is the time in life when girls jump-start into puberty.

In a split-second flash and spurt of hormones, accelerated growth makes them tall and creates the spindliest legs around. Long, slender, very very skinny sticks upon which they walk and run, taking up about three-fourths the total length of their bodies. Or maybe even four-fifths so it seems. They can skip, jump and run very fast, that's for sure. Sometimes they skitter so fast in fact that the observer worries that these thinnest of spindles may bend and snap accidentally.

To imagine that in three or four or more years these bright little feminine spirits will have become blooming full-fledged sirens of the sea, making the naive and inexperienced boys of their age victims of random love and other chasing scenes. Survival of the fittest and the girls-become-women will win out, even if we men tend to fool ourselves into believing otherwise. Males meet their Anima, and females their Animus. Come together now and mix each other up.

As always, nothing less and nothing more. For the next adventure.

There I was standing in front of the crowd giving my presentation. The public consisted of the most important customers who were all candidates to be a partner of my company. My job was to blow them away with a fantastic presentation and in the end make them all come running to me to announce that they too would like to join the partner program. Everyone was watching me closely, and I was doing pretty well. First our company strategy and our unique approach in breaking open the lucrative market of mobile telecommunications...

You can imagine my dismay when I glanced down and noticed that I was still wearing my old jogging pants. I had been painting the new room we were building above the garage, and I had spent the day sandpapering and then painting the walls and ceiling with my jogging pants on. They were blotched with white paint and they sagged below my waist. In my haste to get to the presentation that evening at the last minute, I had completely forgotten to change my pants. Oh dear. Quite a unique combination I must admit: suit and tie and jogging pants underneath.

The worst part of it all was that the elastic strip around the waste had broken which caused my pants to hang low so that my behind was exposed. Nice white underwear would be visible if I turned around. Better not do that. Fortunately I had been trained well and through experience knew that one should never turn one's back to the audience while giving a presentation.

Funny thing was that none of the so-called important customers seemed to notice. Or did they? Maybe they did not want to embarrass me. Or perhaps my presentation was so inspirational and moving that not a single spectator noticed the slight detail. Paint-blotched jogging pants.

That's about all that I can remember. Dreams are known to mess you up while you sleep, but at the same time they make you aware of certain stranger-than-normal aspects of your personality.

Next Wednesday I will certainly be on guard. My presentation will come from my heart and there will be no need to play an act and hide from them the true person who I really am. Even if it means I wear my jogging pants to relax.

Just relax.

No there is nothing wrong with my mind. Nothing wrong at all. Mind, mind. What mind? I am not thinking.

Unfortunately, our dear friend Descartes got it all wrong. Too bad that the so-called modern civilization has been mislead for so many centuries. Sure I realize that his intentions were good, no disagreeing with that. But one still cannot stop wondering what misfortunes history could have avoided. How much more advanced we would have been if this shackle had been let loose long ago. Of course, spiritualism in its purest form, even religions of various sorts did not help out matters either.

So what is the answer then, you may be asking? Don't know. Don't know even we even should know. No. The legacy of the mind/body duality.

The Pineal Gland? Now really. Hard to imagine that one could even consider this as remotely feasible. What is this so-called Pineal Gland anyway?

The third eye. The bridge between reality and spirituality. That mirror in the brain through which the pinpoint of light called our soul resides. Chemicals in the brain. Chemicals allowing and/or disallowing access to the mind's window.

Is perception the leading edge of memory? Find out the answer by clicking here.

Wandering down the street, I decided to turn the corner on my way to the grocery store. From the shadows an old man suddenly appeared. He held out his blotched hand to me and grabbed my collar. His face was completely wrinkled and he had two meager strands of gray hair dangling over his forehead.

"The human brain is nothing more than a bag of chemicals." His voice wavered ever so slightly.

He held his mouth wide open for a second or two and then continued. "A bag of chemicals."

I learched to the side and pulled myself loose from his grip, brushing his invisible impressions from my sleeve. Step, step, step on forward. The old man fell back into the shadows and disappeared completely. Except for his voice and the words he had spoken.

Even now they continue to ring inside my head. What could he have meant exactly? Surely he must be some crazy man, or was he? Perhaps this was some message, a warning to which I should heed. A bag of chemicals.

Later on I figured it out. What he was trying to tell me. What he really meant. The message.

Not so very long ago Albert Einstein said:

"The significant problems we face cannot be solved at the same level of thinking we were at when we created them."

The ironic thing is that we are quite unwilling and unable to do this, as if we do not really want to solve the problems in the first place. Hanging on to old traditions, resisting change, learning to coexist with problems we have created seem to be fundamental aspects of human nature. A small change here or a slight bending over there never seem to save us from this dilemma. Unless it leads to a major upheavel in the way we think.

When will the next quantum leap come?

It's all in the mind.

You may have never realized this, but it is true. Ninety-nine percent of the world around you is created by the mind. Your mind. Just thought you might be interested to hear this. Some more ideas:

• Sounds perceived are mostly made up of the many periods of silence inbetween the vibrations.
• Movement is defined in relation to what is standing still.
• Emotions are always triggered by thought patterns.
• A beautiful piece of art for one person is an ugly splashing of paint blobs for the other.
• Success cannot be measured by facts and events.

To make things even more confusing consider the fact that while the mind creates the world around it, the world is influenced by the act of creation and/or perceiving, and in the end, the mind is influenced by the world it perceives. This is the universe of entertwining circles of awareness.

Sadly to say, at present there is no known cure for Locked-in Syndrome...

What is Locked-in Syndrome?
"Locked-in syndrome is a rare neurological disorder characterized by complete paralysis of voluntary muscles in all parts of the body (except for those that control eye movement)."

If you are ever feeling sorry for yourself, then think deeply about this. What would you do if you woke up one day and found yourself suffering from this traumatizing experience?

If you are interested in this syndrome, then please have a look at one or more of the following links:

• NINDS Locked-In Syndrome Information Page


• Brain-stem stroke - locked-in syndrome


• Extraordinary people

I am NOT trying to be morbid nor depressing nor overly melodramatic in order to grab one's attention. Rather, I think it is good to thinks about such things sometimes in order to put oneself in the proper perspective of worldy happenings.

Normally I really hate getting junk emails all the time. It seems to be getting worse and worse lately. I am of the opinion that the perpetuators of this heinous Internet crime deserve the worst punishment imaginable. However, once in awhile a real gem comes through and makes me stop and think. What is the real message behind the advertisement? What does this symbolize regarding who I am and what I want to be. That is why I am including parts of a junk email advertisement I received this morning. For analysis. Check out the following:

So what is the secret meaning of all this you may ask? Most normal people (without back pains, that is) would not hesitate a millisecond before deleting such a useless message from their mailbox. Not me.

Back pain and sore muscles have little if not absolutely nothing to do with your physical condition. The origin of tenseness is purely mental, something the human mind fabricates in order to give itself the illusion that it is accomplishing something in a world that expects it. Acupoints.

SpineAlinePRO^TM. Nice name for a wonderful product. Take a look at that name more closely. Rearrange the words and you get: Aline, PRO, Spine. Mix up each individual word and you get: inAle, ORP, niSep. See anything interesting? Look more closely, meditate on that combination of sounds, hit true to those separate acupoints that come together and intertwine like pages of connect-the-point coloring books. Long enough and in silence. And then all of a sudden you will figure it all out, all of it, what it really means. The world is NOT what it seems.

Still fed up with all that SPAM despite this inspirational blog entry of mine? Then you might want to check out the Spam Fighter's Toolkit.

I have decided to try it out for myself and start my very own discussion forum dedicated to bloggers everywhere.
Therefore, I would like to invite all of you to join the Bloggers Galore forum.

Pretty much a newbie at this kind of stuff, I have attempted to create a minimal framework. As I have little experience, I hope that there are not too many problems.

I plan to support it with all my heart for willing bloggers around the world.

I really hope that it works out. Really, really. I wonder if anyone on the face of this earth will decide to even visit the forum. Sure, it is a bit of a risk in that yet again I am sticking my neck way out in life. Chop, chop, down falls the guillotine. Or something else, I could become famous.

Whatever way it goes, I figure that one of the following two possibilities will happen:

• Not a single person (or a dismal handful of stragglers) will show up. The forum would end up either completely empty or chalked in with nothing more than rambling dribble. I would be a loser (again).


• Hundreds if not thousands of dedicated bloggers from every crook and cranny show up. Thousands if not millions drop by and my forum overflows with a goldmine of wonderful and stimulating ideas, a mecca, the ultimate blogger source. My purpose in life would be achieved (again).

Sure there are life-threatening risks involved. My blogger image could be blemished badly, but I think it is worth the risk. Go for it, as they say. In the end I can always say with proud confidence that at least I had the courage to try.

I received an honorable mention in a recent blog by Gretchen entitled Oh Yeah! She even called it "another cool blog" so I am really tickled to death.

Actually, her blog is called Inside Gretchen's Head and it's not that bad at all. Might as well give her the credit she deserves also. That way we can generate even more hits for each other. Isn't that the purpose of life anyway?

What's really weird is that Gretchen looks exactly like my sister Kathleen. They both have that look, kind of sexy and distant if you know what I mean.

On my way to becoming a future famous blogger. Here we go.

I have fallen head-over-heels in love and my head is still spinning.

After more than three weeks of working hard in the evenings and sweating away into the wee hours of the morning, I did it. I have finally done it. My homepage has been completely converted into the purest form possible, thanks to the latest technology of CSS. That stands for Cascading Style Sheets, in case you were wondering. All of those awkward tables I had hacked into the pages to take care of the placement of margins, headers, pictures etc. have been replaced by div-tags and other layering techniques.

What a job, but it looks pretty good. At least now when I have to change something in the presentation like colors, borders, spacing or whatever I can do that easily and swiftly.

Check it out yourself here.

No I am not trying to brag. So you think I am some kind of computer nerd, do you? Well, then I have the following to say: you are absolutely right! But now for yet another funny story which follows.

"The ironic part of this whole story is the following. I was actually all ready for the big CSS kick-off yesterday, but I blew it. And I blew it real bad. You see, I had two separate development directories on my PC. One consisted of the original pages, and the second directory consisted of the newer CSS-enabled pages that had taken me so long to update from the originals. So there I was ready to upload these to my domain server. I was really excited and could not wait. Trembling a little like a small boy drooling in front of the candy store."

"Stop, be careful, think and proceed with caution, extreme caution. How often in the past had I messed things up terribly in my haste and excitement. Okay, first we have to make a copy of what is on the server, just in case something goes wrong during the process of uploading. STEP 1. I copy all these remote files to my PC. No problem. Now I have to transport my newer files to the original directory. But first, let's make up a backup of the original files. Just in case, it never hurts to be doubly sure. STEP 2. Made a backup, fine. STEP 3. Now I copy the new-and-improved CSS-enabled pages to the original directory. Okay, next step. Be careful and think. Simple, just upload these newer files to the remote machine. I have made a backup of these, and a backup of a backup. Perfect. STEP 4. I then copy the newer files to the remote server. Chug-a-lug-a-lug, and after around five minutes it has completed without a single hitch. I cannot wait to look at it. So I hit the refresh button on my favorite browser and... and... and... Nothing happens. It looks exactly the same as it used to be, nothing has changed! How is that possible? Okay do NOT panic! #$@!!&%$#!!!"

Now, what had happened, you may ask? Something terrible, something terribly terrible. Awful. More terrible than terrible. The Mummy was nothing compared to the plague I had let loose on my environment. The pages I had so lovingly worked on had completely disappeared from the face of the Earth. I had lost a family, forty-seven lovely children."

Here is what had happened. Remember STEP 1? Well that is where I blew it all up. I had in my extreme and exaggerated caution carefully and unknowingly copied the original remote files OVER the newer files, thus completely and unforgivingly deleted them from the face of the Earth. Pretty stupid, huh?

I had broken all of the furniture, stamped up and down on the floor, pounded my fist against the wall until it broke (the wall that is), cussed out the world around me, and then had a good sobbing fit for an hour. I had hung up the rope nicely from the light fixture and was ready to place my head through the noose when a spark caught me somewhere inside of my head. Yes? Yes. YES! Y-E-S ! YESSSSSSSSSSS!

Saved by the spark, again. I remembered having read somewhere in the user's guide of Homesite (my HTML-editor) that it automatically kept copies of the edited files somewhere. Yes, I am one of those fools who always reads the documentation to figure things out first before trying and getting lost like most other people do. This time it came to my rescue. I checked the directory called AutoBackup and yes, there they all were! And in perfect shape. I could not believe it. I was saved. Dear Lord forgive me for my sins.

When my wife walked inside the room, she asked me what that piece of rope was doing there dangling from the ceiling. Oh, just part of the game. An experiment in reality. A change of mind. She understood and left with a slightly confused and concerned expression on her face.

So that's another page in the long and interesting autobiography of yet another down-to-earth kind of guy looking for trouble AND always finding it. Life continues. Falling in love with CSS was almost not worth it.

Gloria in excelsis Deo,
et in terra pax hominibus
bonae voluntatis.

Does anyone out there know what this means?

Vivaldi produced the most wonderful piece of music commemorating this simple statement. Not that I am such a religious person, not really. Two years ago on my way driving down to Luxeuil-les-Bains in France, I must have listened to the piece about a hundred times, over and over and over again, six hours in a row. Truly inspirational music which made me feel good. Check out some more historical information about what "gloria in excelsis deo" actually means and/or comes from by clicking here. No, I am not a Bible-thumper, only a pursuer of knowledge wherever that may lead me.

Wanna hear a really funny story?

Well, in the morning I was hastily working behind my computer trying to get some last-minute work done. Rush, rush, rush. The construction folks were working hard in the garage, hammering, drilling, sawing and other kinds of noises. Rush, rush, rush. Got called a couple of times. Almost done? Finished yet? Yeah, yeah, don't worry. No problem. Rush, rush. Downstairs I heard the front door open, and the workers came in with their overalls on, tramping their dusty boots on the ground. Almost finished? Okay, okay. One more page and it's off we go. Rush, rush...

Click. Black screen. Silence and nothingness. Pure nothingness.

With a shudder I realized what had happened. Oops, sorry about that, the guy yelled up to me. He had been messing around with the electricity, and poof it was done in a second. Something had short-circuited and the electricity had gone out. All gone. Two hours of work, for nothing.

I didn't get mad. I didn't even care. I just chuckled. Am I getting crazy? Or just overly relaxed? Much too relaxed about life. When I walked down the stairs, the poor guy squinted his eyes at me trembling ever so slightly, afraid I was going to beat him up or something. Everything going okay? I asked in an overly friendly tone of voice. Had to go to work (empty-handed).

Well, but that's life. Always so unpredictable that some of us cannot stand it. Not me. I flow with the stream and take it day-by-day.

Too bad I am going to get fired, though.

Okay, so what have I been doing lately that has been so important that I have ignored my poor blog? Poor, poor blog. No time to think and relax: busy, busy, busy. There is panic in the tent, meaning that I have spent most of my waking hours the last week finishing off an important piece of work. What, you may ask?

It is called an RFI which stands for Request For Information, and it is from a major telecom company in Europe. Better not mention any names in case I get in trouble. Anyway, it is a thick document with millions of questions. Well, maybe not millions, but at least a hundred and fifty. It had to be done in English, and some of the Dutch members of the team gnarled up there terminology enough that it did not look perfectly professional. Meaning that I was requested to do all the translating since English is my mother tongue. An easy excuse for the others to avoid work? Could be. Well it is now down and over with. I hope. So now it is time to get back to some serious blogging. Make up for lost time.

Oh yeah, I almost forgot. I got reviewed today on the weblog review. As proof for this amazing accomplishment, you can check it out yourself by clicking here. Or for those lazier folks out there who are not so much into the clicking mood, I have taken the liberty to copy it below:

Thanks alot for the kind words Wendy.

Feeling. Feeling is. Feeling is a. Feeling is a higher state of consciousness. By following it we will be lead to the place we were always meant to be. Meant to be. To be. Be.

With feeling we will get it right.

Q: What is a fart and why does it smell?

A: A fart is a combination of gases (nitrogen, carbon dioxide, oxygen, methane, and hydrogen sulfide) that travels from a person's stomach to their anus. When a person swallows too much air or eats foods that the human digestive system cannot digest easily gas becomes trapped in his/her stomach. The only way for this excess gas to exit the body is through the anus.

The gas that makes your farts stink is the hydrogen sulfide gas. This gas contains sulfur which causes farts to have a smelly odor. The more sulfur rich your diet, the more your farts will stink. Some foods that cause really smelly farts include: beans, cabbage, cheese, soda, and eggs.

Taken from Infobeat which last year was taken over by Flowgo.

For today I needed just the right balance between the spiritual and the less-spiritual and that is why I decided to add this seemingly bizarre entry. If you do not mind, that is.

When I woke up, I found myself lying on the ground somewhere hidden in an endless grassy meadow. With the sun shining down on my face. Warm sunlight, a gentle spring breeze, way out in the middle of nowhere. Nowhere in particular. The grass was swaying in the light, and it had grown much higher since I had lain down there earlier. Earlier some time who knows when. A swaying green enclosure of thick blades, high, higher and higher. Blue sky and one fluff of white stringy threads of elongated cotton passing by. A cloud all alone over there. I stood up and brushed the dust from my pants. Way off in the distance there was this grassy knoll, sloping gently upwards until it met the horizon. A glare, a white speck, something interesting I had to see. Discover it for myself.

What could that be? I stretched my arms and legs, and I decided to make the long journey. Might as well start now, I thought. Now or never. About a kilometer or two or it could even be three, I estimated. Or so I thought. At a gentle and easy pace I made it up the grassy knoll, and the breeze blew across my face, a bit harder but still not too hard. The waft of a cloud had disappeared over to the east, and the afternoon sky was getting slightly darker, ever so slightly. Shadows forming, low and stretched to the side and in front of me. Where I was going.

I approached the white speck and it grew to a block, a slab of sun bleached stone. It appeared to be growing out of the top of the tall blades of grass. Growing upwards, barely emerging. Solid but moving at the same time. A slab of stone, rounded at the top, thicker at the bottom or so it seemed and just about that thick or maybe thicker or this thick.

What? There was this pit in front of it, recently dug out and all ready waiting to be filled again. While the soil was still moist and soft and curled over to the sides. Huh? It was a tombstone and it was waiting for someone. Who could that be? Wait a minute. I realized in an instant that that someone was me, me! Realized with a start, with a shock, a skip of a beat of the heart. I peered in closely at the recently dug out pit, and then at the bleached and scratched surface. There was something engraved in the stone, some words or a saying of some sort or other. And it said, it said, it said. I could not quite make it out, but I was certain what the message was. Something deep and meaningful, a celebration, that my life had been worth it all, that I had accomplished what I was born and set out to do. That I had gotten to know myself and the world around me better, true knowledge and intuition and feeling all combined within a perfect mix. The perfect liquid mix whatever that could be.

Worth it all, worth it all. The perfect liquid mix.

When I closed my eyes I then woke up again. This time in the very same spot where this adventure had first started two kilometers or so earlier. The grassy meadow, the cloud in the sky at the very same spot it had been at first, the soft breeze exactly as soft and gentle as it had been back then. But this time I knew. I knew better. When I stood up and brushed the dust for the second time from my pants, or was it really the first time again, I knew. I knew. There was still a long way to go, and there was enough time to think, to prepare myself and to figure out what those words were, what they would become, what they would be, my life encompassed on a sun bleached surface of stone. Just words, but nonetheless.

There was still a long ways to go, but there would be time. Time enough. Time enough before I reached the sun bleached surface again.

I won, I won. I cannot believe it. I won!

"Our Space Heroes competition is now over. We had a mailbox bursting with entries, and lots of fun reading about your favourite space celebrities..."

Well as it turns out, my essay was actually chosen as one of the best essays. Who, me? Wow, it is even listed at the very top. I feel good. I feel really great. What an accomplishment.

I guess I was able to impress them enough with my short piece about Richard Feynman who I have always admired dearly. And it means that I win a Space DVD. Funny how in an earlier blog entry I gave up all hope that I could possibly win. Never give up.

Check it out for yourself at the BBC Space Interactive Competition.

every time I see you
something happens to me
like a chain reaction
between you and me
my heart stops missing a beat
my heart stops missing a beat
everytime
aha everytime
aha everytime

Pet Shop Boys
Heart

The song is simply a confession, quite sweet and sincere, of how deeply in love the singer is—his heart starts missing a beat every time he sees the object of his affections. Created with Madonna in mind, they even considered submitting it to her. In the end they didn't have the nerve, which is a shame. While in the United Kingdom it become a number one hit, it never even reached the singles charts in America. - Pet Shop Boys web site.

This is why I am here. Through the world, and therefore ultimately through me, the "unmanifested" will be able to know itself. I am here to enable the divine purpose of the universe to unfold. Sounds pretty heavy, but it is true. Not that I am any better than the rest, because this rule of the universe applies equally well to everyone. To every living organism. To every single object. Rocks and stones and bones and all kinds of other seemingly dead matter from here to there, all ends of the universe. Each one of us is important in a very special way. Very important. More important than you can ever fathom or conceive.

This is more serious than one may realize and should not be taken lightly. So this is my wise saying for today: "Never, ever, ever take this lightly, ever. Never."

So here I am again getting all choked up in spiritual stuff again. How come?

"From the unmanifested, all the manifestations proceed at the dawn of the day; and at the coming of night they dissolve there only, in what is called the Unmanifested." - Bhagavad Gita (18-VIII), see also discourses of Pujya Sri Swamiji

Once in awhile it is necessary to surrender yourself. Completely and unconditionally.

This does not mean giving up and becoming a lazy bum, not caring about anything and passively accepting whatever comes along your way. Surrender is profound wisdom of yielding to rather than resisting the flow of life. While this surrender-feeling should be ingrained in our daily pattern of activities, it is usually forced upon us out of necessity in order to survive. Extreme moments of despair. There are situations in life which become unsatisfactory over time or even completely intolerable. The only way to get through this then is by surrendering, that is "breaking up that unconscious resistance pattern that keeps perpetuating the situation."

Surrender is an inner process, and you only have to concern yourself with the energy of friction arising from the inside. Acquiring the suitable match with the outer, with little or no resistance.

Call it finding God or Allah, call it being happy with yourself, call it feeling "cool, calm and collected," call it being one with yourself, call it a state of pure thoughtlessness, call it energy and warmth, call it floating on a raft in the middle of the ocean somewhere, call it whatever.

Here is the (boring) official dictionary definition:

sur·ren·der (s-rndr) v. sur·ren·dered, sur·ren·der·ing, sur·ren·ders v. tr.

1. To relinquish possession or control of to another because of demand or compulsion.
2. To give up in favor of another.


3. To give up or give back (something that has been granted): surrender a contractual right.
4. To give up or abandon: surrender all hope.
5. To give over or resign (oneself) to something, as to an emotion: surrendered himself to grief.
6. Law. To restore (an estate, for example), especially to give up (a lease) before expiration of the term.

And here is a really nice description of surrender as given by Karma Klutz in his essay Darma Talk.

"The courage that you must manifest on the cushion is the courage of the supplicant who is willing to surrender completely to the experience of becoming absorbed into Fundamental Nature or into whatever name you choose to call Fundamental Nature..."

"...You must surrender yourself to the experience of sitting and open yourself to whatever happens, not what you hope, expect, think, have read or heard, or anticipated will happen. A Christian prayer is "Let thy will be done." This is the attitude of surrender you must have. Not surrender to a person or a tradition but to your own nature. Persons are part of this world of samsara or delusion, they are the fingers pointing at the moon. Traditions can be corrupted. Surrender to the truth of your own nature..."

"...When you surrender yourself to God you surrender yourself to your original nature which is universal compassion. You empty yourself so that you can become an instrument of compassion, so that you can fulfill your purpose which is to be of real service to other sentient beings..."

"...When we sit on the cushion in complete surrender to the absolute, by forgetting ourselves and surrendering to the moment, we place ourselves in close proximity to the object of our affection."

Hopefully this passage will offer some one out there some kind of guidance. It certainly has helped me alot and changed my way of viewing life greatly. Though I was born this way and have had the surrender-feeling inside of me from the very beginning.

Ever wondered how people end up finding you on the Internet? No, well I do. I mean what kind of searches they are doing which result in them some way or the other landing on your web site, generating yet another hit? Every blogger worth his or her weight in salt secretly yearns for more hits. More hits, more, more! Afterall, isn't that what the purpose of blogging is anyway? Besided passing your time pseudo-worthwhile, that is.

Well, I was "really" bored today, and I had absolutely nothing new and interesting to add to my already impression blog. Panick, what to do? Did not want to disappoint my thousands of fans. So I took all of the search strings referred from Google, and I listed them alphabetically. Just for a new kind of insight. And here they are:

"1957 buick pic, Alfred Nakatsuma, aplushosting ratings, arlington cemetery webcam, beards look old, buried beach sand album, by F.G. Rockwell, Clown PICTURE GALLERY, cuffin williams art, Cyberspace definition, deepak chopra, definition supercalifragilisticexpialidocious, diploma in life and business coaching ireland, do something with your life, dragonballz wallpapers for windows explorer toolbar, eyeball chat, Famous thoughts, Father's birthday, folding the flag honor guard, four piper destroyers, france map, gouda summer camp, Greg Gish, growing a beard, Growing a beard, growing beard, ice inside car windows, itch beard, James Jones BOOK THe thin red line summary, javascript webcam picture refresh time, kabalarian philosophy, Kabalarian Philosophy name, kiffin, life webcam, Lockergnome is Coming to Town, logitech webcam pic, Marlies Maarten, moveable type, my father's birthday, my yellow rose of texas, number eleven in numerology, Orion constellation information, quotations scrolling, Ramana Maharshi video clips, random thoughts, Random thoughts, random thoughts of computer people, retainer containers, ronsard, secretly watch webcam, shadow waxwing slain, speedy und tricycle, Stanford university webcam, stoney point target turrets, summary of the Rainmaker (book), supercalifragilisticexpialidocious,
Supercalifragilisticexpialidocious definition, thoughts+sad+famous, valras plage, valras-plage, web cam hardcore visitor free, webcam, webcam refresh javascript, yellow rose +pic, yellow rose of texas..." and more.

Strange. What complete coincidences lead one person to the other over the Internet. I was especially amazed by the strings: "supercalifragilisticexpialidocious", "secretly watch webcam" and "thoughts+sad+famous", can you believe that?!

Isn't that what life is all about anyway? Connecting and improving, connecting and doing more, connecting and going on and on. Yet another productive Sunday afternoon. And I thought I was really bored.

Today marks exactly ten years ago since God gave us that wonderful gift we now are blessed with: Sabien. She is our youngest daughter and the third out of four wild-and-crazy children. Ten years ago exactly, that is hard to believe. I can still remember it as clearly as if it were yesterday. For her party I took a group of her friends, five girls and one boy who lives across the street, to Ayers Rock in Zoetermeer where you can learn climbing. Boy, what a handful of spontaneous energy kids of that age have. So very refreshing and happy. Of course it was a birthday party, so I guess it is perfectly normal that everyone is in a good mood. Yet there is some wonderful quality of children which cause sparks in my mind to alight, a grin on my face and a feeling of thankfulness that I can observe all of this.

We were all once that age (except for those readers that may happen to have been born later of course, not that many I believe). It is refreshing to absorb the warmth once in awhile to gain insights into human behavior. How we as boring adults can be more playful, open and spontaneous. Let's not get too boring in our old age. Do not forget the small child who was you and who is still within you somewhere deep inside. He still needs enough attention, the child inside of us.

I happened to come across this quotation and liked it so much that I felt it would be good inspiration for my blog. Says alot about the future of the Internet and how we can all influence it's development in a positive way.

Restless in 2002
"Our memories of being world-changing pioneers are now littered with messy debris from the punctured Internet bubble, and the Web seems to have settled into a few set types of sites. Commercial interests now define most of the Web's activity, and we're just waiting to see whether Microsoft manages to take over as we humbly accept our positions in the status quo, building Web services or whatever Gartner's going on about lately."

"Resist such notions. Those who built the Web should never have to settle. Though its scale brings new challenges, this is still a uniquely fertile medium for gainful chaos. The Web grew as it did not by careful forethought, but because people put it to uses for which it was never intended. However 2002 may proceed, find chances to apply your skills creating something--a design, an interface, an application, a purpose--that no one has anticipated. Your spark of imagination just might once again set the Web on fire." - Paul Anderson, technical editor at CNET Builder.com

I believe we can do it, each individual in his/her own small way and the collective effort pushing us all as a group into new heights.

Hey, look what I discovered at Lockergnome in the GnomeREPORT 01.02.2002:

And that Gnomie person he is referring to is me! Wow, what an honor and a priviledge to have been able to correspond to such a so-called famous person. Neat, this Internet and blogging stuff. In the past we had to write nice letters and wait many days for a response. Now life is faster and response is immediate. Future-famous people all over the place.

Picked up my first euros this morning at the atm in front of the post office on my way to work. "This is a historical moment," I was thinking. I will never ever forget this important moment as long as I live. Decided to take out seventy euros, one bill of fifty and one bill of twenty. Suspense as the money flapper rumbled round and round, and then it spit out the two crackly-new monetary surprises into my greedy palm. Wow, I did it. Nothing really fancy-looking, just two plain bills. Smaller than I expected, and not that colorful. Thin to the feel. One of fifty and one of twenty. Paper money. Folded the two together and put them in my wallet. The Dutch gulder has been around since 1335 and has survived many generations. And now it is gone. That was the end of yet another historical moment in my life.

To every single one of you out there in blogger land (and elsewhere on this planet) this wish goes to you all:

I have been told in a whisper that it will be a very symmetrical year, in many and all respects: two-thousand-and-two. Very symmetrical. Meaning just that: balance, equality, the middle path, two twos on either side escorted by two zeroes inbetween.

Ever wondered how fireworks work? Or where "Old Lang Sign" comes from?

Enjoy and peace on Earth.