What motivates me to become a blogger is the need to tell my stories, my experiences, my trials and tribulations as I walk this life from the beginning to the end. It is the need to make sense out of all the non-sense that i have encountered and subjected to asking myself why or what it is that i am expected to learn or benefit from these experiences and if they are worth it all. My stories are what defines me of who I am or who I am not, they are the record of every step I have taken and every challenges I have met, they also define my character, my strength, and my resilient, my weaknesses and my bad habits, the things I could have avoided and those that I could have fostered. It has been almost fifty since i first decided to keep an ongoing journal which was in the beginning in the form of an art-journal which I did while I was doing my 'Independent Studies' for my studies at the University of Wisconsin at Green Bay. It was in 1978 and it was the first of my trips leaving the campus to fulfill my curriculum which involves doing my Art while on the road. This too has become a repetitious old story so I will not dwell on it any further. It was out of the trip to England and keeping a record of my trip as part of the course study that I got the idea to keep an ongoing sketchbook journal which I did and perhaps still am doing except for the advent of the Blogging and the Internet the sketchbook has been phased out.
According to the latest data/stats the Blog has 813803 hits or reads thus far which really not that impressive considering the length of time that is involved and the number of posts that has been posted 2702 since the Blog was first started which was sometime in 2005. If the stats were to be accurate the Blog has a good flow of readers who seemed to follow what i write and if in the process these individuals were to learn from it a thing or two that would help them find their way, or shed some light upon their life, I am happy that I have achieved what i intended as an Artist/Blogger/a Spiritual Seeker and then some. I can safely look back and say that I have not wasted my life and it has been quite roller coaster of a life with a whole lot of ups and down. Not that it is any different from the rest of humanity as most of us will declare our lives to have the same characteristics when we relate our stories especially that of our past, like how we got to be where and who we are today. In more than one way I am blessed for at my age I am living in comfort relatively speaking, it is mostly the charitable gift of my children that i survive. As such I make it a practice not to waste my time and make hay while the sun still shines. Thus I cook, I wash, I clean, I shop, I am the uber or grab driver and make sure that things happen as they should without too much strain and at the same time make a contribution towards the betterment of Whole.
'I am the Whole, Complete and Perfect I am Strong and Powerful, Loving and Compassionate, Harmonious and Happy and I can do what I will to do, InshaAllah, so help me Lord. This has been my principle, my confirmation, my affirmation for many years ever since I discovered of it in the first book of philosophy I ever read and it was called, "The Master Key." I was introduced to the book when i was in my early twenties and took it with me to the USA when I was twenty five. I have tried to live by these principles ever since and it has helped to remind me of who I am. The Practice also is intended to reenforce my self esteem that had suffered tremendously while growing up and help to heal my anger tendencies resulting from being subjected to toxic environment and circumstances especially during my childhood years. I must say that of late i do feel the benefit of these meager practices taking positive effect upon me in my daily life. I am less to rush in and destroy or attack and i find myself often taking a step back from confrontations. I even find myself putting up a front of surrender and acceptance when in the face of adversary nullifying a potential confrontational situation with a Asalamualaikum or peace be with you, often done involuntarily and it would even surprise me pleasantly within. These are the small almost insignificant manifestations that has been happening in my life of late and I feel more lighter in mind body and spirit.
I am approaching the final phase of my journey and that is how to face death. It would be a lie to say that i am not afraid of death; I am. This is because I have allowed myself to be delusional when the subject of death arises and the Internet is full of horror stories and images persuading me what it would or might be like according to various faiths and religious practices. In the subject of death, ignorance is bliss, it is better not to know then knowing what is or might not be true and fear will always be the key. Most of us fear death as it is inevitable it takes the foremost attention whether we know it or not. Perhaps it is a morbid practice to pay too much attention to the nature of death but not having a clue as to what transpires at the end of your days is not an option if one is a truth seeker or a true believer. Personally, I take the study of what death is as a way to stay alive and keep my mind young and vigorously active in trying to solve the ultimate mystery of death and longevity; the elixir of life is within me and it is up to me to activate it and make it work if i choose to live a long and healthy life. The elixir is in the small details on how I live my life and to what purpose I wish to keep myself alive for a longer duration than is necessary; what have I got to give in return for the extra bonus time that is being blessed upon me.
So, what truly motivates me to be a Blogger, a word that had no meaning before the advent of the Internet, What make me want to keep an ongoing journal of my life? Have I wasted a whole lot of precious time when I could have been doing something else more lucrative and productive?? I have no answers as to the reason but i know deep within that this Blogging has saved me from a whole lot more confusion and chaos in my life. Perhaps I may never come to realize my true nature or if there is even such a thing as my true nature, perhaps like all lese I am merely killing time while waiting for the end game. I do not truly understand but I do have an inkling as to what if I had not made the effort to keep this ongoing journal, where i would be today with the load of crap I have been carrying with me from day one of my existence on this planet. Life and death, hey walk hand in hand like me and my shadow, what is more pressing than getting to know how i would end and why i was alive in the first place?
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