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  <a href="/blog/blog/4480466/memories-of-the-8-weeks-when-i-worked-at-a-brothel">Memories of the 8 weeks when I worked at a brothel. </a>&nbsp;
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<div class="post">
  <div class="message"><p><img src="//images.zoogletools.com/u/14415/070118f4320c76663a98288e11af339f9755efdb/original/sexworker.jpg?1479877723" class="size_l justify_center border_" /><span class="font_large">Montana was a sex worker I met in when I lived in Brisbane. Montana wasn’t her real name; I don’t remember what her real name was. A few of the women working at 88 had names based on American states; Indiana, Arizona and Dakota, there wasn’t however an Arkansas. Names ending in A seemed to be the flavour there. <br>Montana was a sunny 40ish generous woman with a softly worn face, sparkling eyes and a bright, easy smile. Maybe like Montana the state is, I wouldn’t know I’ve never been there. <br>Montana was good to me when I first started working at 88. <br>88 on Logan is a brothel in Wollongabba, Brisbane. An old hippy friend of mine was a sex worker and told me they needed a receptionist and although this was the butt of many ‘yeah sure’ jokes and I’m sure a few judgmental comments, I didn’t often qualify that I was only on the desk, when people asked where I worked. <br>I enjoyed watching the conservative Brisbaneites squirm nonplussed </span><span class="font_large">as I simply carried on with the conversation, as if I said I was a waitress. <br>I also wasn’t adverse to the idea the idea of a little notoriety and being a woman of ill repute. <br>I love the words jezebel and harlot.<br>My muso boyfriend thought it was cool and dropped me off a few times in his beloved rusted Kingswood.<br>Years later he told me that when we broke up, he went back one night at 2am drunk and sad but wasn’t able to go through with anything. <br>Poor chap, he did take a long time to work out the difference between love and sex. <br>88 was the first legal brothel in QLD and even had a S’n’M room. Initially, I thought I could do that, you know, whip blokes wearing black latex, without having to have sex with them. After all, I’d been hit enough by a few men and I thought maybe I could get my own back a little. <br>The first night I worked there, I realised, I couldn’t be a sex worker, even taking my revenge on poor submissive men. <br>It was a very full on job and I was, and maybe still am, too lazy to commit to making others happy at the expense of my own comfort. <br>What if I got RSI from cracking a whip all day? <br>  <br>The women who did work there were my heroines; they still are, to be honest. <br>They would sit around watching DVD’s in chunky terry toweling robes over silk evening gowns and then the doorbell would ring and they would all look at the camera to see if they knew the gentleman caller. <br>Sometimes it might be someone they knew, Brisbane is still a big country town after all. <br>Then the door would open and the man/men would come and be greeted by me. <br>Strangely I never saw a woman come in, though i was told there were women who did.<br>I called myself Helen and I always wore glasses (this was before I wore them fulltime) and a white shirt.<br>My job was to welcome the guest, offer them a beverage (no booze just tea, coffee and softdrinks) and then explain the process. <br>88 was the first ‘legal’ brothel and had only been open a few months at this stage. <br>The men were usually really shy and awkward. <br>There was only once that I felt a man was really fucking dodgy and he left without staying, so that was a relief. <br>The women were professionals and knew how to deal with fucked up shit and they had panic bracelets to call security of need be. <br>After I had explained the prices and process, I’d call the girls down and they would descend in their heels, dresses and bathrobes, shrug the robe off, hang it up, looking tired then open the door and transform their faces into beatific smiles. <br>It was always amazing to watch the women I knew as mums, student and friends, change into professional sex workers.<br>It was Oscar worthy. <br>They would saunter like cats to meet the guests and then walk one at a time, back up the stairs till the punter had met all the workers and either choosen one or left. <br>They were so many varied types of women and often the most ‘beautiful’ or ‘youngest’ or ‘thinnest’ weren’t chosen. <br>Most consistently popular were, surprisingly, the plainer women who had curves.<br>Oh and Jade who was Thai. She was popular too. <br>Some of the customers, of course, had their favourites and would book them or come in when they were working. <br>The gauche neon pomp and ceremony of the parade wouldn’t happen then and even though it meant no booking, the other workers wouldn’t care that much, often they were ensconced in what movie was playing in the green room or they were asleep. <br>  <br>The ‘john’ always had the health check. <br>That was done by the workers. <br>It was called the stinky dick check. Or the sticky dick check, I never wanted to know too much about that. <br>Although it was a requirement to always wear a condom, disease can be all over, so the women would don gloves commence the check, after the obligatory shower. <br>I thought it was quite clever because if they booked in ½ an hour. That was at least 5 mins taken up with hygiene. <br>As a fan of cleanliness for bits, I liked this. <br>Then the workers worked and after I’d charge his card, the chap would leave, usually quite happy. <br>There were always funny stories and sometimes they’d run comps, like who could fake the loudest and you’d be trying not to laugh hearing a zoo of loud mad sounds emanating from the velvety rooms. <br>I also had to do laundry. I hated doing the laundry. <br>One very camp cleaner told me I could get herpes in my eye and from that point on I put the sheets in with my eyes closed. <br>I never did get herpes in my eye and to be honest I’ve never even googled it. <br>I will now.  Um, yes you can. Thanks camp cleaner. <br><br>The regulars were all pretty cool, one was called The General who was quite deaf. He just liked women jumping naked on the bed and playing cards with him. He was spending all this money on credit cards because he was dying and he hated his kids. <br>He had a very proper English accent and I always teased him about how hard the Boer War must have been on him. <br>Another was this very handsome, young, well built doctor who kept his head down coming in and out and never smiled.<br><br>One bloke, who wasn't a regular, I remember well, was terribly shy, he was a truck driver and he was in his late 50’s, I reckon. I did the meet ‘n’ greet and went through the process and we started talking, I was trying to make him as comfortable as possible. I found out his wife had died a few years ago and he’d never been in a brothel before. He started crying and I said it was OK and that we were here to help. He said he was just really lonely and needed a chat. He left without seeing anyone but thanked me for the conversation.<br>I think about him sometimes, especially when I meet elderly men who are terribly isolated and lonely in aged care. I think about them being held by a women and how much that would make them feel human again.<br>I think about how if I ran the country I’d have prostitution on medicare for the disabled and those who are lonely.<br>I think about Montana and the other wonderful women who literally put their bodies on the line to fill such an important need in our communities. <br>These women are the healers, and care givers of a generation of men who were taught to not feel.<br>These women are the real goddesses. <br>Oh and I also see men who work in this industry as just as important. <br>And I’d fucking love to see this industry taken from the hidden brick suburban only taxi known brothels of the outer suburbs and low lit smut filled dens of the cities and be put where they should be, in hospitals and in aged cared facilities and homes for the disabled. <br>I’d like to see these sex workers honoured. <br>I’d like us all to not be so damn uptight about it all and see it for what it is. <br>It’s just sex! <br>And it’s a really important part of being human and alive. <br>As for Montana, I ran into her at a Japanese restaurant a few years after leaving Brisbane, she have me a huge hug and told me one of her customers now paid her to travel with him exclusively and they get along wonderfully. She looked happy and said, 'I never imagined I’d have the life I’m now having. Aren’t I lucky'. <br>I smiled and hugged her back for her good fortune and reminded her, ‘He’s lucky to have you’ <br>‘Oh, he knows it.’ Then she giggled and said goodbye. <br>As for the other women, my hippy friend is a doctor now and doesn’t really talk about her past, the others I lost touch with.<br>I imagine some are still working, it’s easy money after all. <br>I don’t think all were as lucky as Montana. <br>It would be a tricky world to navigate being a sex worker in this judgmental and sex repressed world but I hope with all my heart they are happy. <br>As happy as Montana was when I last saw her.</span></p></div>
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  <a href="/blog/blog/4469405/silver-lining-suicide">Silver-lining suicide.</a>&nbsp;
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  <div class="message"><p><span class="font_large">It usually happens around 3-4am. <br>The waking with a dead heaviness and then remembering. <br>Remembering everything all at once.<br>A deluge of rotten debris and there you are, instantly wide-awake, heart hurting awake. <br>Like demented and panicked children running in your head, thoughts scatter and scream.<br><br><em>Why did you say that to the woman in the chemist today? Don’t you think your sister is right? You're an attention seeker who uses people. Why do you always fuck everything up? Why can’t you just sort your shit out? You know people think you’re a joke? Why did you even go into that last relationship? You fucked up again. You always fuck up. Yes, I know you are doing well at work but it’s only time before you fuck it up, like you fuck everything up. Now you’re about to be homeless again and the real estate thinks you’re a piece of shit and worth nothing. Maybe you are worth nothing. Your son isn’t talking to you, your friends aren’t calling or even there to help you because you are pathetic and a loser, just like your sister said. That last attempt at your album proves it. Didn’t even get a contract? Who the fuck does that? It’s simple, you annoy people and it’s best you stay away because you are horribly uncomfortable and you look like shit anyway. Nice job on forgetting to brush your teeth again before you went to bed. <br>Why are you even alive? Why do you bother, Ilona? You are dead in so many ways.</em><br>  <br>All this hits in a chaotic word bomb and smashes me awake and smashes into my heart and smashes my head and I start to cry. <br>My heart hurts so much, my body feels like I’ve been run over. <br>I try breathing and focusing on the positive. <br>The avalanche of wounded children crying out drowns my reason. <br>So I just keep crying and try to get my thoughts ordered. <br><br>It’s then I see a way out. <br>The solution. It would be so much easier if I just disappeared. <br>The images of my veins opening starts and it feels like a way out. <br>Like maybe I can be free of this horrible terror in my head.                  <br>It all just hurts so terribly. I can’t see the way out and the calming thought that I can die, soothes the thousand broken children squash game in my head and I start planning. <br>And then I stop. I realise I can’t kill myself. It's a fucking stupid idea. Not ever. It will hurt the people I love. The same people I can’t seem to connect with now as they don't seem to see how broken I am and maybe they will never understand how hard I am fighting to keep going but I love them and I don't want to hurt them.<br><br>So after an hour or two of negotiating with my infantile anxiety I start to calm down, I make plans for tomorrow and groan, knowing I will be exhausted again from lack of sleep. I soothe myself like a mother would calm a distressed child.<br>'It's ok, it's going to ok, you are tired, you have had a big day.. hush little one, hush'<br>I see how childlike these thoughts are yet how big the feelings that accompany them also are. <br>I fall asleep, the alarm rings. I half wake and the day time starts with anxiety, then after I listen to the 'sound of silence' three times while drinking strong black coffee, I start to feel better.<br>I do shit.<br>I cook, clean, work, write reports continue another day, sometimes I cry in my car on the way to work frustrated at the stupidity of my illness but mostly I just listen to audio books to distract myself from my thoughts. <br>Work is fine. Work is always fine, I drink coffee, I love my job, I am good, no, I am great at my job.<br>I spend beautiful rich and full time with people close to death, people with depth and understanding more than I know and they really like me and I really like them. <br>I don’t think a few folks at head office like me much but I think they respect the work I do.<br>Work has been the only thing apart from coffee that has kept me focused since the accident. <br><br>The fucking accident. I've been depressed before, I've had 5 depressive episodes but not like this. <br>Nothing like this. I’ve wanted to not be alive before, in the black hole of depression but only as a vague concept, I've never wanted to die.<br>I’ve never planned ways to kill myself and found it to be a relief. <br>The first night I had suicidal thoughts after my accident I nearly called the hospital at 2am to get locked up, but instead I contacted my therapist and told her.<br>She monitored me closely for a few weeks. I became less suicidal and start planning my path to recovery but I noticed something has shifted in me. <br><br><img src="//images.zoogletools.com/u/14415/0493cdb3dfc5368eaef0f9602a5502d536a4fa0b/medium/darkbeach.jpg?1479296402" class="size_m justify_left border_" />So what happened to me? I just don’t care about the things I used to. <br>Status, money, beauty, fame and designer food seem to be the staples of the world I am staying in and I don't want to be in it.  Still I look for a new home so I can burrow in and hide but the world seems to be filled with money sick real estate mongrels wanting to take all they can from you.<br>It’s fucking sick. I’m fucking sick. The world is fucking sick.<br>I go to the beach to sit and think and try and make sense of the senselessness. <br>I make a deal with the sea, I won't take my life until I write the worlds greatest book about pain, redemption, compassion, forgiveness and real estate agents.<br>I laugh at my genius, even this fucked in the head I can still trick my death wish brain. <br><br>Then I go and see my friend Jase to boast of my sea conversation accomplishment.<br>I think he's impressed.<br>He is also fucking tired of it all. <br>He’s fucked in the head like me but his is different. <br>Because he is different. </span></p>
<p><span class="font_large">I tell him I’ve been seriously thinking about killing myself. <br>‘Me too’ he says. <br>‘Fuck you’ I say, smiling wryly, ‘It’s not about you, it about me.’ <br>‘Darling’ he drones, ‘It’s always about me more.’ <br>‘Are you being competitive about suicide with me Jase?’ <br>‘Of course, it’s my nature’ <br>  <br>I am safe with Jase, he won’t judge and won’t over react nor under react. <br>Actually he will, then he will admit he has then listen for a bit then just say, ‘I love you, Harker’ then we will begin to talk.<br>The hell nights, we both know them well. <br>I feel better having said something.<br>I have named the opiate dripping monster of my death calling. <br>  <br>The last week before I go outback for work, I move house, fly to see my dad who’s having another psychotic episode and weirdly is suicidal on top of his delusion (I know right?) but families that suicide together don’t stay together... remember that kids. I do two Johnny Cash QLD shows and sing at a very big wedding and my car is broken down. <br>Jase calls to check in. <br>I explain I won't suicide because although I am on my own at the moment, I know people love me so I am not going to add to the worlds pain, however I am going to go to the garage and perch myself on top of the pile of enormous shit I own and jump till I break my face and or leg.<br>He tells me I am an idiot and because as I am currently beleaguered with bad luck, I’ll probably fuck it up and end a quadriplegic. <br>‘Ah but then I can at least get sympathy sex and there are loads of really kinky guys who’d pay to have sex with a quad and then I’ll become an addict and after rehab write a book then retire on the proceeds.’ I retort triumphantly. <br>I’ll do anything to not have to do the next week. <br>He said my plan had flaws and lacked strategy. <br>I explained it was solid and I needed encouragement. <br>He said, ‘No darling, you need to work something else out, your plan is shit.’ <br>‘Well do YOU have any ideas?’ <br>‘I’ve got nothing, you’ll work it out, you always seem to’ </span></p>
<p><span class="font_large">I do the week.<br>I don’t smash my face but I also don’t sleep much due to anxiety, driving to fucking QLD and moving home. <br>I leave on a Sunday with a broken car, a thousand cups of coffee and a great relief that I made it, the classic foster lager ad as my inner ear driving song.<br>  <br>I go away for over a month for work, all is well when I am away. I love the road. It’s just me and no one I know, no one I have to pretend like I’m ok. <br>I had asked for help on my facebook, and although people responded, they did it online. It felt cold. I needed to be held.<br>One very nice drunk poet held me and said I was a sweet little thing. It was one of the most tender moments I had.<br>A few people called when I asked if I could be checked on. I asked because I was so desperate and I was hurting. <br>I stopped trying to reach out and just went away. <br>  <br>I came back to my home excited to rest for a few months after driving 15,000k’s breaking down three times, seeing my dad and helping him after the psych hospital and his mental health community treatment order and a weekend work conference, I find out I’m being thrown out of the home I just moved 6 weeks earlier. My sister has been contacting friends of mine on FB, as she is unhappy about what happened with my dads intervention and tells them what a terrible person I am.<br>She continues to send me emails saying things like how disgusted our dead mother would be about me. <br>  <br>The anxiety starts again. Like der! <br>  <br>The home I set up crumbles, I can’t find a place to live and I am crumbling again. <br>So I go to the fucking beach, the same beach that I made a deal with the first fucking time I was suicidal, all those months ago. <br>She greets me like an old friend, soft and enormous. <br>‘Ah, I’ve missed you’<br>We both sigh to each other. <br>Her skirts smash against me in delight and I fall into her. <br>I walk back onto land and as I’m drying myself, I feel all of her in me. <br>Her vast unknown depths and terror and her quiet beauty.<br>She kisses me with salt spray and asks how the book is going. <br>I smile. </span></p>
<p><span class="font_large">  <br>  <br>  </span></p>
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  <a href="/blog/blog/4342778/the-magic-of-men">The magic of men</a>&nbsp;
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  <div class="message"><p>I post often about what gender inequality does to women but I am increasingly more aware of how this imbalance affects men, especially as I am really concerned about the devastating rise of male suicide. </p>
<p>I’m writing this in the middle of the night, after waking with insomnia, aware that I needed to work through some feelings that are bothering me. <br>I’m not that worried about not sleeping and am just using the cover of darkness to sort through some disorganised files in my heart and mind. <br>I have an implicit trust in my abilities to navigate my feelings. I am good at knowing what my feelings are and how to talk about my feelings with friends or a therapist or to my guitar. <br>I was lucky enough to be given this as part of my gender identity. <br>We all know women are more emotional and therefore able to express their feelings better than men. It’s a given. Men are just not as emotional right? </p>
<p>Yeah, nah. <br>Therein lies a big fat lie and a more frighteningly, a dangerous one. <br>A lie that is not just hurting men, it’s killing them or to be more precise, it’s making them kill themselves. <br>My female ‘privilege’ of being given the emotion portfolio over, say, the treasury portfolio doesn’t seem so crash hot, after all I also get stuck with the ‘overly emotional’ aka Steve Price hysteria label. </p>
<p>I acknowledge the male financial burden isn’t that fun when you’re losing, and they fall like mad men in Manhattan when the dollar gods turn their backs on their worship but I’d still like a bigger bit of that pie, thanks the same. </p>
<p>But let me just explore what my feeling female advantages are in my culture (acknowledging fully that there are always exceptions.) </p>
<p>1. I am allowed to have and express emotions more. <br>2. I am allowed to nurture and build relationships based on my feelings more. <br>3. I am allowed to cry and I get held when I do. </p>
<p>Imagine getting a puppy and not allowing it to bark past a certain age. It would impact heavily on its socialisation and more importantly it’s happiness. <br>That’s effectively what we do to young men. <br>I remember once very clearly telling my own son not to cry when he was about 8. Thankfully, he stood up to me and said he was allowed to express his feelings. Well done son. :) </p>
<p>However, I was shocked at myself and I’m not sure how many other times I might have disregarded his feelings but I remember being very aware of my lack of abilities to understand his emotions because I wasn’t brought up to know how to deal with 'feelings' from a male. <br>I was brought up ‘knowing’ how to deal with actions from a male. <br>So I read a few books and got learned that male emotions are pretty much identical to female ones. Der! </p>
<p>We’ve all been given a bum steer, women are now the emotions ‘experts’ who are being murdered by angry men at an alarming rate and men are emotional zombies with bigger bank balances and yet a deep crippling sadness that makes theirs and others lives seem worthless. <br>So what do we do? </p>
<p>Well, this is actually something we can all start changing by simply being aware of this inequality and the impact of it. <br>Then we need to fucking talking about feelings! <br>YES, TALK ABOUT FEELINGS or even lack of feelings. <br>Talk about the numbness, the void, the red, the black.. <br>However it comes, please just talk. <br>The RU OK campaign is a great way to get info more and also beyond blue. </p>
<p>Yet, in my sleeplessness, I had another thought. </p>
<p>My rambling midnight meanderings lead me thinking about something my mother told me when I was little. She said that all the women in our family had ‘powers’, that we had the ‘gift’. <br>She said we were all “Fae’ (an old word for fairy or intuitive) </p>
<p>The truth so happened that we did get these ‘powers of knowing’. <br>There have numerous been times when shit has gone down with my family or a loved one and I have ‘known’. <br>Yet, I bet anyone reading this has had something ‘spooky’ or inexplicable happen similar. <br>I could go on and on about how special I am... but the truth is, I, nor my family is. </p>
<p>It’s simply an extension of my ability to be emotionally connected, have awareness and the added genius of my mother planting a seed, saying the women in our family are 'magic fairy witches', so any strange anomaly would automatically be attributed to the gift. <br>That’s a pretty cool thing to get told as a kid and I did spend hours trying to use my mind to move objects and…. er… maybe I still do occasionally purely for ‘research purposes’. </p>
<p>So how does this tie in to gender inequality? <br>How many times have you ever heard the quote ‘A mothers intuition’ or ‘A woman’s intuition’? <br>How many times have you heard ‘A males intuition’? <br>None right? <br>Are men less magic? aka incapable of deeper connection? <br>I again don’t bloody think so and I think this is another terrible gender falsehood. </p>
<p>Interestingly, I have observed in my extensive pop culture ‘research’, indigenous men are waaaay more intuitive and their powers extend to talking to the land, animals and stars. I’m quoting any Disney or Hollywood film, from any era and any ancient pre-invaded white civilizations have also endowed their men with these intuitive ‘powers’. <br>How amazing are ‘native' men at this intuition caper (aka deeper observed connection at the intricate and interconnectedness of all life). Maybe that's why there is so much fucking dreadful new age bullshit around this and 'sacred' masculinity that also seems to be a lil' racist.. Mmmmmmm? Anyone? </p>
<p>Poor white guys are usually portrayed as pretty bad at the deeper feeling stuff except for Kevin Costner because he runs with wolves and builds fields for heroic dead base ballers. I badly digress. </p>
<p>So it’s no wonder many blokes are in so much pain, not only have they been told to ignore their feelings, when they dare look to the heavens for help no great whoosh happens where a king lion constellation says ‘You have forgotten who you are and so forgotten me. Look inside yourself, Simba. You are more than what you have become. You must take your place in the Circle of Life.’ </p>
<p>Let me please atone for my Hollywood references (great and small) and quote a great man who navigated and curated the world’s great myths and his own great emotions. (including his death) <br>I include religion in the term 'myths' because I reckon religion is just organised ritual gone OCD. </p>
<p>"The goal of life is to make your heartbeat match the beat of the universe, to match your nature with Nature". – Joseph Campbell </p>
<p>If our definition of being a man equates to money, power and success over connection to themselves and their place in the magic of this amazing universe, then no wonder they are hurting. </p>
<p>There are some great men of science, the arts and culture who navigate around the toxic world of enforced gender conditioning and have found their own magic and I'd like to thank them. <br>Eddie Izzard, Dr Seuss, Joseph Campbell, Oscar Wilde, Harry Hay, Robert Mapplethorpe, Carl Sagan, The crew of Briefs, etc…. so many more wonderful writers and educators. <br> </p>
<p>So maybe we can start teaching our sons that they have an inner world of magic and connection as precious and important as women's. <br>And maybe we can remind the men around us that inside them are worlds of beauty and tender connection and can we all please make a bigger effort to nurture that. </p>
<p>Midnight ramblings over, it’s nearly dawn after all and right now I want to follow my bliss to sleep .</p></div>
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  <a href="/blog/blog/3921770/what-would-tom-waits-do">What would Tom Waits do</a>&nbsp;
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  <div class="message"><p>I'm writing about my experience of feeling inferior because I have noticed how much it affects me and my passion for music.<br>While I can almost hear people say,  'Are you kidding, you're always so outgoing'.  Those with insight may have the perception that the reason I am so outgoing because a big fucking bolder of fear of failure sits atop me most of the time.<br>I'm just trying to bounce the fucker off.<br>I feel many of my fellow creatives may have experienced this too. While at home or with supportive friends I am able to blossom, it's the loneliness and overwhelming space of the stage that makes me want to crawl fetal, into my guitar case.<br>It's not just the stage though, it's in jams and when people say, Oh sing us a song' and sometimes my mind goes (_______________).<br>Especially when I am stressed.<br>Reading Sark, Patti Smith and/or Naomi Klein might pep me for a moment but it's hard to keep generating confidence from another persons experience.<br>I only have my own and I'd like to share them with you.</p>
<p>I've been asked to sing with a few old male friends, in a few weeks, who are pretty well known and I have the most terrible nagging feeling that I'm just not good enough.<br>The stupid thing is they asked me. They must think I'm up for the job, but I sit with my dark little fucker of a critic who just repeats on loud speaker every negative comment/review I have ever had.<br>Not the compliments or accolades, just the thick sludge with bits of sharded words.<br><br>So I would like to share with you what I used to do, the first few times I ever took the mic because today I'm trying to shake that nasty critic offa me.<br>I would say to myself, 'You've had a fucking baby, this is nothing compared to that' like a mantra.<br>It worked. Then after I lost the memory of that experience, I'd use another.<br>I'd say, 'You nursed your mum as she died, this is nothing compared to that'<br>It strengthened me again.<br>Then every new experience I use to help, then reminds me that there has been more to my life than just that one fearful moment before I perform.<br>I also have another mantra W.W.T.W.D - 'What would Tom Waits do'<br>This also helps me feel much more confident and sometimes I wonder if Tom has a mantra that says W.W.I.H.D-<br>'What would Ilona Harker do?'<br>Ya never know. :)</p></div>
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  <a href="/blog/blog/3779498/a-room-of-ones-own">A room of ones own</a>&nbsp;
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  <div class="message">I want to talk about women supporting women.<br><br>What kind of women do we want in the world?<br>Insecure?  Bitchy?  Competitive?<br>Or?<br>Strong, Supportive and Vibrant?<br> <br>I have a dear friend, who I love to bits; she’s a fashion model and an entertainer.<br>The amount of times I have had to defend her to others because she is pretty and successful is insulting to her.<br>It’s easy to say ‘Oh they’re just jealous’<br>However it’s a dismissal of something much bigger.<br>Internalised mysogony.<br> <br>Internalized misogyny is the “involuntary internalisation by women of the sexist messages that are present in their societies and culture.”<br><br>We are taught from a young age that we need male attention to be valuable, so we have been conditioned to do stuff to get this validation.<br>From young teens taking selfies in their underwear attempting to be alluring, to women sharing secrets on how to lose weight, to sitting in gaggles bitching about other women.<br>Look I’m not saying I have never done this, but once I recognised it as part of my own fear of rejection, I was able to start stepping away from the game.<br>Plus, I’ve also been at the other end of this and it’s not nice.<br>Women and men have shared what they have heard about me and although it’s funny, it’s also sad.<br>I now simply cut people off when they attempt to repeat what someone has said about me.<br>To quote the late great Ian Miller<br>‘What you think of me is none of my business’<br> <br>While I realise that what was said, wasn’t really true and mostly just a reflection of their own insecurities, all that understanding takes energy and I’ve got so many creative projects that need my energy that to have a distraction like this is bloody frustrating.<br><br>To quote the late great Nina Simone<br>‘I gotta lotta living to do before I die and I ain’t got no time to waste.’<br>Yet..... I’m part of a community and I need support and love to feel safe and nurtured and that I belong.<br>We ALL do.<br><br>So why do woman take part in internalised misogyny?<br><br>Basically, we hold misogynistic ideas ourselves, even though we are women. It’s involuntary because the sexism that is present in our culture is taught to us through socialization (the process of learning culture through social interaction), a process we don’t have much say in.<br> <br>So is Sinead O’Connor calling Kim Kardashian a cunt internalised misogyny?<br><br>I'd say yes and even the use of the word cunt is part of that.<br>Why use a word that puts vaginas down?<br><br>It’s just so bloody unhelpful.<br><br>Sure Kim is not a musician but how about we call Rolling Stone a sausage centric entertainment magazine that doesn’t support women musicians as much? Just google image the covers.<br>(In their defense, our whole entertainment culture is sexist)<br> <br>Is it helpful to keep shaming sex positive females?<br>Is it helpful to say to young women, 'Well all men are the same'?<br>Is it helpful to always say how pretty a little girl looks?<br>Is it helpful to tell a little boy to man up?<br><br><br>I want a world where the young girls I teach music to feel that their relationships are as valuable to each other as their relationships with men are.<br>I want a world where the young men I teach music to feel that their relationships with women are as valuable as their relationships with their male friends are.<br>Imagine that support.<br> <br>So I ask people, especially women, that we think about what we say of other women and why.</div>
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    <p class="post-info"><span data-time="2015-07-16T12:15:45+10:00" title="July 16, 2015 12:15">07/16/2015</span></p>

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<h2 class="heading-secondary heading-blog alt-font">
  <a href="/blog/blog/3678384/the-universe-doesn-t-give-a-shit-about-you">The universe doesn’t give a shit about you</a>&nbsp;
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  <div class="message"><p>Sorry, it really doesn’t.<br>How do I know? Well, I don’t for sure but to say otherwise negates all logical and rational thought.<br>Am I saying my religious friends are illogical? Yes.<br>Do I think they are deluded? Yes.<br>Do I think that faith is dangerous? Hell yes!<br><br>Hypatia was a Greek philosopher, astronomer and mathematician who had the skin ripped off her by Cecil (he was later sainted for this barbaric act) because she dared to suggest that the current ruler of Alexandria use reason over faith.<br><br>Do I think people are dangerous? Um. Yes.<br>Do I think the universe is dangerous? Der! Yes.<br>Do I think the universe is life giving? (see above)<br>Do I think I'm right? Um dunno, however I don't care if I am wrong.<br><br>The universe is a mass of swirling matter and black matter or even non matter creating and destroying life as it hurtles towards and away in to everything and nothingness.<br>We all happen to live on a pale blue dot of insignificance in this unfathomable space.<br><img src="//images.zoogletools.com/u/14415/0addec93547daa11c9d57138f88128aa41d9f6bb/large/colliding-neutron-stars-produce-gold.jpg?1430119747" class="size_l justify_center border_" /><br><br>40 million tonnes of ants, Pedophiles, Eco Warriors, Bankers, Guitarists, Mosses, Icebergs, Writers, Cancers, Sunsets, Muslims, Skyscrapers, Oceans, Guns and Farts, all on a little tiny insy dot that’s had a mostly unknown history that I am unable to know, no matter how much I want to.<br><br>It’s hard for me to accept. I really want to know, I want to be important.<br>I want my soaring magnificent heart to be as endless as an ocean in the infinite, my thoughts to erupt like Krakatoa, my songs to fall like a million billion comets in a dark and heartless sky.<br>I want 'someone' to see my every struggle, like I see the single ant in my honey jar that I rescue and I want that 'someone' to rescue and love me through my whole life.<br>How nice would it be to have a really large kind daddy who yells to guide and teach you, tucks you into bed and gives you flowers and dawns as a distraction to life’s (his own) horrors?<br><br>I honestly really do want there to be a benevolent god/deity/force/alien super being who has a grand design and plan. That would make my piddling struggles seem worth something. Wouldn’t it?<br><br>But from what I can gather, it’s just not true.<br>Look at the history of the world and of humans. From the horrific immolation of the Tibetan youth movement to the slaughter of abortion doctors in the US and that lovely guy Jesus giving his own life to save ours. These themes of ancient sacrificial gods, to gods that demand sacrifice to self-sacrificing worship; offer deities, each other and ourselves up in violent and horrendous ways to make us relevant and immortal. Who are we appeasing? Placating? Pleading with?<br><br>There are a whole bunch of snake oil merchants to soothe and ease the pains of such existential crises, from traditional religions to new age poppycock merchants who proselytise about the universe providing or manifesting or gifting. These self-proclaimed spiritual healers that make themselves the conduit of universal knowledge are often as spiritual as a Indian spittoon.<br>(It’s possible I am going to be got by a passive aggressive Byron mob with crystal singing bowls and rose quartz spritzers for saying this but by the girdle of Thor, I’m so tired of the waffle.)<br><br>The complex myths that surround religion/beliefs don’t make much sense in the face of reason.<br>Yet, we all yearn for something to make sense and these myths, we have created and organised into beliefs and religions try to do just that.<br>Therein lays the paradox.<br>They try to make sense from something that makes no sense.<br>That can't really ever make sense.<br><br>But what if we accept there is no sense?<br>What if it’s just chaos and colours?<br><br>Will we all go mad with an overwhelming nihilistic infinity complex and start killing each other?<br>Dunno, maybe?<br>If we collectively realise that we really don’t matter, then will we start killing each other more then we already do in our religious self-righteousness?<br>Dunno, maybe?<br><br>I have a strong conviction that we won’t, that the removal of the blinkers of faith will make us more compassionate, more in awe of this magnificent little blue dot of rock and more Ok with our own sacred demise back into nothingness and everything. I also think it will mean the end of ‘you’re wrong and I’m right and my daddy is bigger and stronger then your daddy and I’ll show you by killing your whole family.’ I reckon it will help us celebrate our differences and not be as offended by them.<br><br>Well, this is what not believing in anything does for me.<br>I stand on the shores of life alone with awe and love in my heart knowing the universe doesn’t give a shit about me but some people do.<br>People and small creatures that like me do, but not always. Mostly I am alone.<br>It’s not always comfortable and dealing with aloneness is tricky but I like it more than mass delusion.<br><br>So maybe the universe doesn’t give a shit about you either and knowing this might actually free you more than suffering the madness of trying to reason with a god/s of everything and nothing.<br><br>And maybe I’m wrong and will end up in hell/purgatory/the void or a djembe circle for eternity.<br><br> </p></div>
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  <a href="/blog/blog/3659030/i-take-your-hate-and-i-create">I take your hate and I create</a>&nbsp;
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  <div class="message"><span class="font_regular"><img src="//images.zoogletools.com/u/14415/c8148a854774ac0490121ab1c2e2817e05972166/original/image002.jpg?1429104958" class="size_l justify_center border_" /><br><br>I used to be so scared of men, I had reasons; a violent father, being raped in my teens, a series of violent and abusive relationships and a system so dismissive of women that we still can’t get paid equally.<br> <br>So I had good 'excuses' to fear and be angry at men.<br>But then I made a little one, pretty much all by myself. :)<br>I had a choice to either learn to deal with my fears and grow, or sit with constant fear and hate.<br>I wanted to raise a beautiful healthy man.<br><br>So I decided to try and learn 'men'.<br>I sat with men weeping in abject grief over the loss of love, I sat with men uncomfortable in their own sinewed skins, I sat with men and listened of how they had been sexually assaulted, I sat with men and listened at their hopelessness now their children had been taken from them.<br>I sat and I listened and I learned.<br>I learned how beautiful and profound and complex men were.<br>I learned not to always be scared of their grief.<br>I learned how confused they felt over their loss of so-called ‘masculine’ identity.<br>I learned that men had a great and incredible capacity of love.<br>I learned that these great hulks of flesh and bone were as scared of me as I was them. (mostly)<br><br>These men became my real heroes. They didn’t have answers or even know how to fix it. They just told me their stories.<br>And I was lucky I was open enough to hear them.<br><br>A few weeks ago, I received this email from my website traffic, from a man who is yet to be held accountable.<br><br><strong>‘Hey you little big mouthed slag I egged your car. Did you like it? I know where you live too. Wanna be raped? Fucken coming for you bitch.<br>Guess what? I'm not from Queensland. My mates aren't either.’</strong><br> <br>I am not exactly sure why I was targeted but I’m sure it’s something to do with my persistent public campaign to raise awareness of violence against women and my advocacy for feminism online or maybe it was just a really messy broken man-child angry for reasons unknown.<br> <br>I want to tell you how I shrugged it off and laughed and how I didn’t give a shit, but I didn’t.<br>My legs felt hollow and my heart was pounding as I read it.<br>It really affected me and I’m so mad that it did. I didn’t want to give this man the satisfaction of knowing I was scared.<br>However the truth is, it did.<br><br>That one email triggered all the fear I have felt from all the abuse that I have experienced from the past, that really fucked me around for years.<br>The same abuse that fucked with my relationships because in my fear and anger, I shut down.<br>You see abusive men actually hurt everyone, from the person to they abuse to their victims families, future relationships and ultimately themselves.<br> <br>Many men in my past had a hard time understanding why I’d get as upset, or why I would shake in anger or why I couldn’t trust them or why I'd hide under beds when I was distressed.<br>They had a hard time understanding why casual rape jokes weren’t funny nor why calling women sluts made me freeze inside.<br>These men had a hard time understanding the fear of being unsafe outside, of feeling sick to the stomach when drunk men started being rowdy, nor even of being scared of football players.<br> <br>In time and with help from friends, counselling services and talking to kind, understanding men about this, I grew stronger and I connected with men who tried a lot harder to understand or simply just did. I have made beautiful solid friendships with these beautiful solid men.<br> <br>Then from out of nowhere, a man was threatening to hurt me again.<br> <br>Why? Because I stood up and I made myself stand out.<br>I know my so called ‘gender’ roll is to be mild and meek but that never helped me and in fact this silence keeps women in danger.<br> <br>So I, in a loud and clear voice, am going to keep talking about this till it changes and I need your help.<br><br>I need you to talk about male violence against women openly and not be silent.<br>I need you to support women who have been assaulted by donating to organisations that protect and shelter women.<br>I need you to please, please educate you children to stand up for themselves and each other.<br>And I need you to not blame women.<br><br>This is my call to action to all the men I know, whether you call yourself a feminist or a equalist, whether you are young or old, whether a women has ever hurt you or left you.<br><br>*I call you to answer this man and tell him how you feel about what he wrote.<br>I honestly don’t want you to threaten him because the cycle of violence then just continues but please just let him know, how his words towards me, affected you.<br><br>The thing is, I am not going to give you his email address but it is likely he will read this so just leave a comment.<br>I do not want to feed his hate but I want to give all of you a chance to reply because I know that this man doesn’t get to win or get the last word.<br>I’d like you to simply address it…..<br><br><strong>‘To Shaun, who threatened my friend with rape and violence…’</strong><br><br>*or alternatively if you don't know me personally</span><br><br><strong>'To Shaun, who threatens with rape and violence</strong><span class="font_regular">...' or however you'd like to address it. :)<br> <br> <br>You see, this man doesn’t speak for you and I ask you, my friends, to speak for the real men.<br> <br>I am going to use your words as for an art work to juxtapose against the threats women like me receive daily.<br>I take your hate and I create.<br>x<br><br>*Update16.04.15<br>Of course women are welcome to respond. The reason I asked men is that I wanted to offer men the space to respond to these threats, as men are the ones getting the bad publicity.<br><br>*Update 18.04.15<br>When I wrote this I only expected that a few of my male friends would respond, I have been overwhelmed with the support from men who I don't know, I have received support from around the world. I feel such an incredible sense of strength and unity every time I read a comment below and so have many other women. Thank you for raising your voices. x<br><br> <br><a href="http://www.imow.org/community/directory/user/index?id=16942">Image by Bianca van Baast</a></span></div>
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    <p class="post-info"><span data-time="2015-04-15T23:36:55+10:00" title="April 15, 2015 23:36">04/15/2015</span></p>

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  <a href="/blog/blog/3605812/how-to-sit-comfortably-with-the-discomfort-of-others-or-don-t-be-a-silver-lining-spoiler">How to sit comfortably with the discomfort of others or don&#39;t be a silver-lining spoiler.</a>&nbsp;
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  <div class="message"><br>Having accepted the fates and succumbing to my circumstance, my first few weeks couch surfing in paradise has been pretty good.<br>It’s been a lil difficult to write or practice, being able to just drop into the ‘zone’ in other peoples spaces is as tricky as regular bowel movements whilst on holiday.<br> <img src="//images.zoogletools.com/u/14415/4ece9285f2e01b88d465086a00936ff5dea7bef9/original/bleachedprofile.jpg?1426557895" class="size_l justify_center border_" /><br>So yeah, it’s been a big time for me.<br>In the space of a few weeks, I lost my home to bad landlord greed, my son living with me to outrageous circumstances, my dog due to not finding a suitable home and a friend and mentor to cancer.<br>Big, huh.<br>It's hard to say what exactly broke between my son and I.<br>Something about the ties of mother and son, that rite of passage work acknowledges with ritual.<br>It’s like a second birth but away from me. And I, as the bow have sent him forth as a living arrow and geesh, I had to really stretch myself for this one.<br> <br>Both my son and I felt it acutely, and it’s been really painful for both of us.<br> <br>I have been lucky and so fortunate to have around me a bevy of beautiful supportive friends who have just ‘held space’ for me.<br>Yeah, that hippy sounding term that just means they have listened and offered no solutions nor advice and have allowed me to grieve, rage and weep.<br>There have also been a few beautiful friends that have tried to band-aid my brokenness and weeping heart, and as much as I knew it was because they loved me and wanted me to be ok, it was also because they were uncomfortable with my pain.<br>Oh and I get it, it’s been pretty damn uncomfortable but I realised that in their haste to fix me they actually, and I’m sure without realising it, caused me more pain.<br>These few dear friends said things like ‘Oh, that’s just a phase with him’ or ‘It’s not broken, it will be fine’ or ‘Well, now you can do the things YOU want’<br> <br>They tried to point out the silver lining in my circumstances, and that’s not a bad thing right?<br>Well….. actually trying to show someone <em>your</em> version of <em>their</em> silver lining is like colouring in your kids colouring-in books for them so they’re perfect and they didn’t have to do it.<br>They might look good to you and you might feel like you’ve done them a favour but you’ve actually taken away their ability to find the colours themselves and maybe made their silver lining, grey.<br> <br>I’ve been pretty firm with asking friends not to do this and it’s been really liberating not placating them and asking them to, please, not placate me.<br>Just allow me to process this complex and difficult time, in my own way.<br> <br>And as I write this I think about the times I’ve bloody well done this silver lining spoiler myself.<br>Because I didn’t want someone to feel distress and I can’t help but think maybe, I caused them more. I’m really sorry about that. I’m working on it.<br> <br>So things are ok in hobo paradise…not ideal, but meh..<br>As for my silver linings…. now the sun is out, I think I can see them and if I’m right, well they’re nothing what I expected nor what I was told to expect.<br>x<br> </div>
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    <p class="post-info"><span data-time="2015-03-17T13:08:01+11:00" title="March 17, 2015 13:08">03/17/2015</span></p>

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  <a href="/blog/blog/3590134/who-the-fuck-does-ilona-harker-think-she-is">Who the fuck does Ilona Harker think she is?!</a>&nbsp;
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  <div class="message">Who the fuck does Ilona Harker think she is? <br>It’s taken over a year to be able to lock Ilona down for an interview, as a singer/songwriter/cabaretartist/visualartist/microbrewerist/soapboxer/mother/poet and poetess of lowbrow haiku, she's a busy one.<br>She also attempts to manage the much-maligned Mae Wilde, Byron’s favorite cabaret vixen.<br> <br><img src="//images.zoogletools.com/u/14415/9df0fbf40d690db9fd151e79f645a1c472aa7d42/original/10.jpeg?1426039260" class="size_orig justify_center border_" /><br><br><br>I arrive to my surprise Mae Wilde herself answers, explaining that Ilona was running late and would I like a bloody Mary, It was still morning so I declined as she whipped one up and proceeded to down it one surprisingly graceful move.<br> <br>‘It’s a virgin’ she told me later with a wink ‘the only kind I know’<br> <br>As we sat in Ilona’s ramshackle tree house in the hills, Mae was telling all about her quite extraordinary life, how she was the secret love child of Mae West and Oscar Wilde and her incredible journey when I remembered that I was here to interview and photograph Ilona.<br><br><br>‘Oh who knows when she’ll return, she’s orf getting my dry-cleaning from the gold coast, how about you take some photos of me while she’s gorne?’<br> <br><br>So I set up the shoot and before had a chance to stop her, Mae had invited a few friends over and not surprisingly it turned into a circus, first there was Mae and all her dress ups and then there was Poppy Seed Loaf, a demented elf from Epping forest, England, who lived in Ilona’s garden and was trying to sell me some pyramid scheme/multilevel marketing thing. She insisted that it was a great business opportunity so I just smiled and nodded my head, before she then asked if I wanted any fresh<br>MDMA!<br><br><img src="//images.zoogletools.com/u/14415/2ebd5ca01a2907673612c7a756adcff4175497cd/original/16.jpeg?1426039275" class="size_orig justify_center border_" /><br><br><br>Thankfully another friend of Mae’s popped in as Poppy Seed was going in for the kill.<br>Mae by this stage was holding court with the gardeners out the back.<br><br>Emmy-loo Amethyst is a country/new-age singer from Texas who lourves dolphins, as she quickly pointed out when she met me.<br>She then whipped a Tibetan singing bowl out and gave me a ‘Heelin, for no charge mind you’<br>The afternoon was getting on and Ilona’s phone wasn’t answering so I stared packing up when there was a dreadful noise from the bathroom, that everyone was ignoring.<br><br><img src="//images.zoogletools.com/u/14415/5f03365cea4f0d53b7d485627393db9812e0df7d/original/25.jpeg?1426039273" class="size_orig justify_center border_" /><br><br><br>Deciding to investigate, I saw eyes rolling, what if it was Ilona and she had fallen down and couldn’t get up.<br>I opened the door and there was this lady/man/person swearing loudly in French Créole at the shower curtain.<br><br><img src="//images.zoogletools.com/u/14415/e3eb4d9d4ab4544bd2de699cbfeb134590cf2843/medium/2.jpg?1426039270" class="size_m justify_center border_" /><br><br>Emmy-loo followed me and explained that was I was witnessing was Coco Dada, an existential absurdist critic.<br>I felt like I was in a Cohen brothers film by this point and was trying to extradite myself from this weirdness, when there she was.<br><br><br>No not Ilona.<br> <br>She was 6 ft golded skinned afro wielding latex clad behemoth. She was staring at me with a look like she was going to kill.<br><img src="//images.zoogletools.com/u/14415/a43365903bdedd267384d59b83a80a616db99e52/original/28.jpeg?1426039271" class="size_orig justify_center border_" /><br><br> <br>‘Oh, don’t mind her’ drawled Emmy-loo  ‘We call her Foxy Bold, she’s a feminist alien refugee, she’s hiding here from the new Australian Government. She don’t speak any earth language but I am trying to communicate with her using my crystals’.<br> <br>My headache was now turning into a migraine as I gingerly packed my camera gear just as Ilona walked in the front door.<br> <br>She looked at me and broke down in tears.<br>After calming her down with a real bloody mary, I was able to finally understand why she was late.<br>It seems that Mae, Emmy-loo, Poppy seed, Coco and Foxy had decided to borrow her car and go to the Gold Coast for a night out.<br>She’d been with the police and her lawyer all morning trying to stop criminal charges for assault with a bucket of wet lubricated frogs, attempt to ‘heal’ a night club bouncer using crystal colonic therapy, possession of faux drugs, fraud and attempt to overthrow the Queensland government, suspected terrorism charges and harbouring a fugitive.<br> <br>Emmy-loo came over with a bottle of rescue remedy and what Ilona told her is not fit for publication.<br>So unfortunately I missed out on the story of Ilona Harker and her new album...<br>‘Stories the sea told me, Lies I told the sea’ that is due for release as soon as she can find the time, I guess.<br>I guess we can do the interview about that another time.<br><br>She’s really got a quite handful at the moment.<br> <br>All photos by Kirra Pendergast, all words by a mad woman.</div>
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  <div class="message">As bummed as I am to admit it, I think I must; I haven’t felt happy in weeks.<br>It’s a really difficult time for me and no new–age pithy inspirational poster with dolphins at sunset will make my spiritual Styrofoam cup half full.<br>It’s not; my cracked and chipped cup is just in between.<br> <br>From what I can gather in my musings, the working balance between the endless doldrums of melancholy and the giddy heights of perpetual happiness, is more important than the romantic notions of either extreme.<br>Yet how does one achieve this elusive, mystical equilibrium?<br>I dunno. But I do know it lays somewhere in the sharp rocky bed of truth and self-analysis.<br>The more we indulge the notion that smiling through pain is essential for our (and often others) happiness, the further we bury our ability to change, remove or alter that which hurt us in the first place.<br><br>Most of us are caught up in the machinations of the day-to-day grind and it’s tricky to find time to be lost in oneself and to be able to question ones needs and wants verses expectations of what one ‘should’ do.<br>‘Indulgent’ and ‘selfish’ are words we use to describe people who take time away to pull apart their layers and to seek their own truths.<br>This is a shame and while understandable in our culture of action and immediacy to not seek depth, to not do so can lead to an almost psychotic existence where we become the mask we don and lose our beautiful depth and wild selves.<br>I’m all for the occasional and essential distraction but not as a lifestyle and I believe that unless we turn off the machines and addictions of escapism, the more we will lose ourselves and our ability to be simply content, which is a far better goal than happiness because lets face it, it’s far more realistic one.<br> <br>Perpetual, seemingly happy people are, like their opposites, tiresome and there is only so much time you can indulge their character; because really that’s what it feels like, a character, a performance, a mask if you will.<br>While some of you may think I am being harsh and there are people who are, by no fault of their own, bubbly and cheery by nature. I’d agree that some people are chipper and delightful but scratch the surface and you should see cracks in the veneer and if you don’t, then I’d be very cautious indeed.<br>Everyone has their dark, as it’s essential for rest, contemplation and growth and those that conceal it are a worry.<br><br>If we are to seek the comfort of connection as humans then surely we all deserve depth and honesty.<br>Some may, for whatever reason, not want this and as Khalil Gibran so beautifully says,<br>‘But if in your fear you would seek only love's peace and love's pleasure,<br>Then it is better for you that you cover your nakedness and pass out of love's threshing-floor,<br>Into the seasonless world where you shall laugh, but not all of your laughter, and weep, but not all of your tears.’<br> <br> <br>So while I can admit I haven’t been happy in weeks, this is because, without mincing words, it’s been a shit of a time for me and as I watch the pendulum smash me in the face, I know at some point it will swing back yet again and yes, I know, this too shall pass until it eventually it will stop, but when it does, what then will I write about?<br> </div>
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    <p class="post-info"><span data-time="2015-02-17T14:14:33+11:00" title="February 17, 2015 14:14">02/17/2015</span></p>

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